I am currently in Fargo, ND at a nice hotel. My home is 300 miles to the west. Since Tuesday, the residents of my town have been having a rip roaring blizzard, and I am missing it! For the first time since we moved to our town in 1988, my office has been closed for three days in a row due to the weather.
I love snow storms. I should preface that with the disclaimer that I love being in a snow storm while in my warm home with a full refrigerator. Friends are sending videos of their yards, their stock pens, their barns full of goats and leghorn chickens, and I am so jealous. We have been in a drought, and this moisture is welcome, but it is hard on the cows and their new calves. The header photo is of a friend’s cow on Wednesday during the storm. As she says, “the price we pay for moisture”. I should add my friend and her husband provide good protection for all their cows in various ways. I don’t know why this one was out in the open and looking so pathetic. Another friend just reported that her snow day was ruined by the discovery of a mouse in her house
My next task is to drive home on not such good roads. If I were at home, I would spend time staring out at the snow blowing by, gauge the depth of snow in the driveway, perhaps bake, and maybe take a nap. As it is, I will just bless the snowplow operators and keep both hands on the wheel.
What don’t you want to miss? What do you like to do during a snow storm? Any good storm stories?
Man, this weather. It’s probably normal for early April to be undecided about what it wants to do… it just doesn’t feel like it after last year’s early spring. And I think I say that every year.
But the turkey vultures have returned! And the Killdeer! And I’ve put the pot of chives out on the step. And just this morning, we heard Sandhill Cranes! (Aw, Steve…sure miss you. )
The other day, the day before it started raining, I got out in the fields with the tractor and loader and started pushing trees off the edges. Most of these down trees were from the December storms and since that was a South wind, these were on the North side of the fences. Meaning It was muddy there and the frost maybe wasn’t out, and it was kind of a mess. Only once did I scare myself thinking I probably shouldn’t have really gotten down in this muddy corner hillside, but I got out and it was all fine. Had three of the tractors running, which always feels good, pulled the seed wagon out, and hooked onto the soil finisher with the big tractor. Made me feel better that I was at least getting a start on things. Doesn’t take too long to get things greased up before getting into the fields.
Also, finally found the lid from the big garbage can that we keep salt and sand mix in. It blew off during that December storm and I figured it was gone for good. Nope, found it thirty feet away in some trees.
When I left for work one day this week there was a car parked on the township road, just off the highway. I took a photo of it and told Kelly about it. Figured maybe it was someone walking, maybe it broke down, maybe it was a couple high school kids hooking up and left one car here. Didn’t think much of it. But 6 hours later when I came home, and it was STILL there I called the deputies. Turns out it had been stolen. No other details.
Not the first stolen car we’ve found. Thirty years ago there was the car on a field road, but the tires were gone and ignition was ripped out and the dealers lockbox was in the back seat. We found it before the dealership reported it stolen.
On the duck and chicken front, all is holding steady. One Phoenix chicken is broody so she’s in a nest box all day. Since I collect the eggs every day, she’s moving daily to sit on someone else’s eggs. And I haven’t had to give them any water the last few weeks (because there’s water everywhere!) But otherwise all is well for the moment. I’ll need to start cleaning up the pen I use for the baby chicks. They’ll be here before I know it.
What was your biggest accomplishment or disappointment last week?
At this time of year when you wake up to ice and snow, you have to work hard to find the fun in it. I’ve been very crabby the last week (due to work) and boy, did the crummy weather not help. All morning I was kind of fuming about it.
YA goes into the office on Wednesdays (although starting next week, we both have to go in on Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday). When she drives, she turns her car around near the garage so that she goes headfirst down the driveway. When I went out over lunch to do a couple of errands, the tracks that her car made in the ice were kind of pretty, like the work of a modern artist working in an unusual lmedium. It was just the lift that my spirits needed.
Have you seen anything that struck you as “artsy” recently?
Cold again this week. The farmers’ spring excitement has tempered a bit this week. Next week it will be back.
Tuesday was such a nice day, Kelly and I went out and took down the snow fence we so carefully put up last November. The mid- December storms shredded up 80% of it and the weather turned too cold to fix. We had more snow in the road this year because of it, and it made me realize how useful the snow fence is and why we put it up every year. I was tired of looking at the remains of it and we got it picked up. The dogs helped.
The ducks have split into their summer groups; Mostly the fliers and the non-fliers, but there might be some other sort of grouping that I haven’t figure out yet. It makes it hard to get a good count on them. But I did see 6 mallards take off and then 7 more took off. And still got 2 poufs, 3 cream, 4 black… and some others.
The chickens are enjoying the grass again. And leftovers. And they like when I fill the bird feeders.
Kelly and I saw ‘Hadestown’ last week at the Orpheum. Boy, was that good. And my friend Jerry and I saw Colin Hay at the Pantages. Colin Hay was the lead singer for ‘Men at Work’ way back when. I saw them in concert way back when.
I should have found this picture of the barn for Wednesday’s article about selling the cows.
Dinner at Olive Garden Wednesday night was yummy
I know some of you read ‘Independently Speaking’ by Brent Olson. His latest article is in the same vein as I’ve written about lately. Getting machinery ready and being in town before the stores are open. We’re both still farmers at heart. www.brentolson.online He’s also on FB as ‘Independently Speaking’. He’s got great stories. Colin Hay told some stories too.
Pies, donuts, chairs, cows, dogs. We’ve had it all this week.
What’s in your fridge and what are you making for supper? What do you WANT for supper?
It’s warming up. Last week I talked about the slope of our land and how bad it is when icy. Mud isn’t much better. After my shoulder surgery I’m being extra careful not to slip and fall. I was extra careful walking on the snow or ice, and now it’s mud and I’m trying to decide, should I put that hand in my pocket just to keep my arm down? Any suggestions? In a slip, it’s the sudden lunge with the arm—as well as the stop at the end, that I’m worried about. So far so good fingers crossed. As the weather has warmed up this week, first I unplugged the well house heater and put it up on the shelf. I’m really done with it for this year. Then I unplugged the heat lamp over the dogs’ water dish. Next day I unplugged the chickens water bucket. I haven’t had the tractor plugged in for a few weeks now. The only winter thing left is the heat tape on a water pipe down in the barn. I’ll wait on that yet for a while. I’m pleased the electric bill is going down.
Missing another poufy duck. Dang, I don’t know if it’s because they’re white they stand out in the early morning light and it makes them easy to pick off? Or are they just that slow moving so the weak get picked off first? You may notice I don’t comment on missing chickens. The ducks stick together for the most part, and there’s fewer, and they’re more identifiable and easier to count. Of the 40 or 50 chickens, some are in the nest boxes, some are in back eating, some are in the rafters, a few are in the bushes, a few are at the bird feeders, and a bunch are scattered around the yard. I try counting them, but they move too… so I don’t know how many chickens we have. Forty or fifty. I try to count them at night, but still, a few on the perch, a few in the rafters, a few in the pen, some over there, some over here… it’s a mystery! So, I don’t know if one disappears. Except the ones with the funky hair. The rule of thumb is the fancier the bird, the sooner it’s gone.
These didn’t last long.
Daylight Savings Time. Do the chickens care? Egg production is up so maybe they do. The other day there was 9 eggs in one box! They had a second level going in there. Never seen that before and I don’t know why they like that box so much. Usually, they spread out more. (see header photo)
All the animals are sure enjoying the lack of snow and they’re free-ranging all over the yard.
During the winter as we move snow, it’s not unusual to scrape up some gravel as well. And then come spring, as the snow melts, we end up with piles of gravel in the grass. It’s a bummer. The other day just before it got really warm, I had a thought: I used the loader and pulled the snow piles back into the road, so when the snow melted, the gravel would be back in the ROAD, and not in the grass. Seemed like a revolutionary idea to us.
We have one really nice day this time of year and all the farmers get excited. We know it’s a false spring and the ground is frozen and we haven’t gotten though basketball tournaments yet (there’s always a snow storm during tournaments they say) but suddenly we all think “SPRING! I GOTTA GET MACHINERY OUT!” and everyone gets excited. The parts guys are busy. I’m thinking about what needs fixing before spring planting. (I need to put new fertilizer openers on the corn planter this year. Got the parts last year and they’re sitting there. Thankfully, we got the drill fixed last summer) I’ve also started looking at Camera systems and options. Cameras have really become popular on machinery as a way to see behind things or be sure critical components are working. I’m thinking about putting some inside the drill grain box so I can monitor the seed level without having to stop and go look. Time is money! Plus, I could put them on the baler to know the strings are tying, which would save bales and time. This year I’m also thinking what I can actually, physically, pick up with my left arm. It will be helpful that I’m having the co-op do all the fertilizing as that will save a lot of wear and tear on my arm. (not to mention time. Notice I didn’t say “money” there…) I’m a little concerned about the reality of scheduling them. I’ll need to have all the fields worked up at once (all the corn, or all the oats or beans) and then hope for good weather until they get too it. Plus, at the college, as covid settles down, all the extra spring concerts are coming back, so I have extra shows to deal with.
I feel my stomach knotting up already.
Talk about your hair stylist or barber. Got a favorite hair style?
I’ve been writing a lot of notes these days and it’s been hard. I don’t find I have much to say about my life. It’s kinda boring. I work, I sleep, I read – the triumvirate. Then there’s all the day-to-day stuff that makes life run (cooking, eating, laundry, errands).
There is crafting of course. It goes into the “Other Stuff” category because it’s not a daily activity; I tend to do most of my crafting on the weekend, when the big a** work monitor is moved off my desk in my studio. It probably accounts for 6-7 hours a week.
But even with the crafting, my life right now feels boring to me. I lost my winter attitude way too soon this year and I’ve been feeling trapped in the house by the cold weather. This is not something I usually experience during Minnesota winter. The only difference between this winter and other winters has to be the lack of seeing other folks. Calls, text, even online meetings for work aren’t quite the same as being with people (although I will admit the irony that I wish I could keep working from home starting the first week of April).
I am really looking forward go warmer weather so I can add a socializing slice to my pie. And then there will soon be a gardening/yardwork slice to my pie as well as a dog-walking slice. Can’t WAIT for a more interesting pie!
What does your pie include these days? Any new slices coming up for you?
Our farm is in the “gently rolling hills” of SE MN. I have one field that is mostly flat and that’s on the low ground by Silver Creek and is in the Conservation Reserve program. The rest of the farm, the valleys, and the shape of our farm, is primarily the result of hundreds and thousands of years of water erosion. Its beginning was hundreds of millions of years ago and the seas that covered the area and created the limestone layers that eventually I played on as a kid. (Thank you Dr. John Tacinelli and the class MN Rocks and Waters for teaching me that). The topographical map in the header photo is part of our farm; the closer the lines, the steeper the slope. All those lines also mean our ground is considered highly erodible, which is why we use conservation tillage practices and crop rotation.
Also, when we get freezing rain, every step is treacherous. Everything seems to be downhill from wherever I am. Course then it’s all uphill back.
Those thousands of years of erosion are still happening… heavy rains or spring melt and there’s quite the stream coming down through our place. It’s impressive to think about the total area it might be draining; roughly 70 acres doing a quick Google Map distance check.
Last Saturday morning it was warm and the snow was melting and we’d had a little rain and I could hear the water rushing through the culvert under the field road down in the swamp.
Later in the day, the snow melt had grown in volume and was over the road.
The culvert is mostly frozen yet, so it didn’t take too much more to overload it. But since the ground was frozen it didn’t hurt anything. Later in the day the runoff slowed and it was back in place. When I was a kid there wasn’t a road here, we had to go off through the pastures to get to those fields. And my siblings talk about skating on the pond down there. I think I even caught a crawdad down there once. Then dad put in some old culverts and made the road, and when that washed out, I had a better culvert put in.
Sometime last week we lost two more poufy ducks. Then the next day one was back! Pretty beat up, moving slow, and all bloody, but back. We started calling him Lazarus. He’d be gone one day and back the next. We couldn’t get too close, but we could see he had something wrong with his bill. One day I went to get corn for the ducks and when I came out of the feed room, he was right there. I gave him some corn and got him some water. He seemed like he wanted our help. To leave the other ducks, go off by himself, and come that close to us… the ducks don’t normally do that. He drank some water; I used the hose and ran some water near him and sprayed a little on him. He seemed to appreciate that. Then he let me pick him up and I could see he had a chunk tore off his bottom beak. I didn’t want to try cutting it off yet. I put him in the feedroom with food and water so he could just rest. Kelly went down at noon and checked on him and talked with him, and I went down after work and he’d died. Shucks. I wonder if he came to us for help, or as animals do, was he looking to go off on his own because he knew he was dying? We hate to lose one, but it’s worse when we’ve been helping and we get attached to them.
Township elections and the Annual Meeting was last Tuesday. The second Tuesday in March is ‘Township Day’ and all 1780 townships in MN have elections and annual meetings that day. A township is the rural equivalent of the city council. Townships provide or coordinate road maintenance, fire protection, law enforcement, and whatever other issues may arise. It might be property boundary issues or animals at large. Usually, it’s a pretty low turn out and a pretty quiet meeting, which means we’re doing alright. When there’s a crowd, there’s usually a problem.
You’re up for election. What position did you win?
In October of 1915, Ernest Shackleton’s ship, The Endurance (oh, the irony), was crushed by pack ice in the Antarctic and then sank. It had been trapped in the ice for 9 months. In August of the following year, a rescue ship arrived; all of Shackleton’s crew had survived.
The news from Antarctica this week is that after 100 years, the wreck of The Endurance has been found – nearly 10,000 feet under those frigid waters. It didn’t move too far in 100 years, it was found just four miles south of the location recorded by the crew when she sank. According to the search team, it is “in a brilliant state of preservation” and is even sitting upright.
I’ve read a handful of books about various exploration voyages, some about Shackleton, some about others. I also see several stories in National Geographic every year about someone heading off into the unknown to do something that no one has ever done before. None of these stories makes me want to do this kind of thing. Even today, 100+ years later, I can’t imagine how awful it must have been to be trapped on the ice of Antarctica, listening to the timbers of your ship creaking then finally breaking. You’d have to be fairly certain at that point that you would never see home/family/friends again. I don’t even like to set up the tent out of sightline from the car!
I used to think of myself as adventurous, based on all my travels, but after reading these stories about wandering out into the unknown, I’ve decided my level of adventure tolerance is much lower. I can live with that.
Have you ever ventured into the unknown? The partly unknown?
Sunday night and yesterday we were in a winter weather advisory and got 4 inches of snow that blew around and actually drifted. People assume that because we live in ND, we must have scads of snow all winter. In our part of the state we are semi-arid the best of times, and since we are currently in a drought, our snow fall has been negligible. Our snow is typically light and dry.
There are times when snow removal is necessary, though, and this recent snowfall was one of them. Husband went manfully out into the bitter cold yesterday afternoon and attacked the drifts in the driveway and between the garage and the front steps using three of the five snow shovels he has in our garage. They differ in the volume and weight of snow that can be thrown from the particular shovel. You can see them lined up in order from least to greatest volume in the header photo. He insists his numerous shovels and judicious selection of shovel to weight and volume of snow is ergonomically sound and the reason he has not had a serious injury or heart attack clearing the snow. He has not succumbed to the lure of the Dakota Roller, a shovel with wheels.
When I clear snow, I grab whatever shovel I can find and push the snow around to where I want it. Tossing the snow seems like too much work. I sort of share the philosophy of our municipal street department. If it isn’t too deep to drive through, why bother with it? It is going to melt by the middle of May.
How many snow shovels do you own? What is your philosophy of snow removal? Do you drive through through drifts and puddles just for the fun of it?
I got an email a couple of weeks ago from the State Fair folks. They wanted to give everybody a heads’ up that ticket prices are going up this year. And that wasn’t all – they also wanted to give folks a chance to pre-purchase tickets before prices go up. The difference in ticket price is one dollar. This doesn’t seem that big of a deal to me – after all, the tickets have been $13 for years. The cost of setting up the website to pre-sell tickets plus the cost to send out the communication probably wasn’t inconsiderable, so my cynical side kicked in; I’m thinking they just need some cash before the fair. I didn’t delete the email, but I also didn’t give it much more thought.
Then yesterday morning, our ring doorbell chimed as someone was delivering a package. It was for YA and it was about the size of a shoebox but didn’t seem heavy enough for a pair of shoes. When I asked her about later, she said it was a pair of sandals. Seeing as it was -2° F when we were having this conversation, I commented that this was a great show of hope and faith on her part. She laughed.
So I decided that I could have some hope and faith as well. Most days I don’t feel particularly hopeful about the end of pandemic but I went online and ordered all our State Fair tickets for August. Hope, faith and I saved $8!
Trail Baboon 