The Camera Came Today

From the contest.

I am so excited. Can't wait to get it charged up and take some video.

****A big thank you to NutriDense

MORE of this darned weather again tonight. The guys just got the last load of hay unloaded as it hit.

Sometimes You are Glad You Took the Time

Got up really early yesterday to get the most bang for my morning off buck. The sun was just edging a little light across some chilly clouds and puffing up the fog and the Thruway was almost quiet.

Out in the yard a something was singing. Cardinal-like, very flutey and lovely. I figured either a creative cardinal or the mockingbird, but I listened whenever he sang....his call was so sweet and pretty.

Then he came to do the thing so many birds do...sing on the front porch, beak at the door, taking advantage of the two story foyer for a concert hall.

Sweet indeed.

I climbed out of my creaky old desk chair and crept to the door.

Right on the step was the Carolina wren that was hopping around my feet on the other porch last week. Supposedly he is singing tea kettle, tea kettle, tea kettle.... if he is that is the prettiest tea kettle song I have ever heard. I would link to some of the places that have bird call recordings but I haven't heard a one that does him justice. Most of them are much flatter and less fulsome than the real thing, up close and personal.

I am so glad I left my games to go see!

Sunday Stills...Clouds

For more Sunday Stills.....

Oil Change or Perhaps Not

What do you think of a dealership that takes in a tractor to replace a rear wheel bearing and fails to replace the used transmission oil, filter or strainer?

Or even to call to see if we wanted it done?

Said oil was full of metal filings from the scored housing from the failed bearing so bad that the filter clogged...

TWO, count 'em TWO service calls yesterday to deal with that situation and I am not a happy camper. This kind of thing is why jackknife mechanics flourish around here.

August 6 2005

The day the first post appeared here. It's been a great five years. Thanks for riding along and sharing via the comments!

Incredible Photos from the 30s and 40s

Do take a few minutes to look at these in the Denver Post. They are phenomenal and include homesteaders inside their prairie homes, juke joints, dam building and so much more. Amazing!

HT Luv Hahn on FB

Armed Robbers Hitting California Dairy Farms

This is a chilling story of armed robbers attacking Fresno County farmers as they go about their work. The attacks have been brutal with injuries for the victims


It seems horrifying that even out in the country people can no longer feel safe in their own homes, barns and fields.

Grinning in the Garden

Do click for comparative largeness

My garden is small and crowded, but I have a lot of fun with it. These giant sunflowers are volunteers that I let go among the beans and sweet corn. As you can see my model was more than a trifle reluctant to participate in this particular comparison (Coulda been the nettles).


BTW the model is six feet tall under normal circumstances and six one with those big boots.

Tornado

Alan was up chopping Tuesday when a hellacious storm hit. Trees were bending right over, rain was slashing and drumming and he could barely see to drive the tractor. When he came down he told us about a thing dangling down from the clouds that was circulating and undulating up and down. Over the past few years we have seen that two or three times so we didn't think too much of it until today....when we heard that an E-F1 tornado touched down just a little bit from here.
Wow! He must have been watching it forming. It went right over him.

Defining a Family Farm

Read about it here

Local Meat Harvesting Facility on NPR

HT to Chuck Jolley on Facebook for this story about the meat lab at SUNY Cobleskill. Alan took some classes there, which made our venison processing efforts much smoother. He learned a lot about cutting meat from Director Eric Shelley and worked in the room pictured in the article.

Could We Have

Male bobolink in fall plumage

Indigo bunting singing in the sweet corn

An almost wordless Tuesday? Much to do and never enough time, so I will leave you with a couple of bird pics I took the other day when I was working on Sunday Stills.

This Explains a Lot

From John Bunting's Blog. I frequently feel sad and guilty because our place doesn't look as nice as it should. These numbers can tell you where the fix it up money goes.

"In June, 2010 New York dairy farmers were paid a total of $177,505,300. According to USDA "Costs and Returns" the total costs were $261,960,900. There will be those who argue the "costs" numbers are not accurate because milk can be made cheaper - think slavery."

Monday

Remember Scottie?

We don't usually work Sundays except for chores but yesterday the boss worked his fanny off, all by himself, finishing up a hay field because it was going to rain.

And then it didn't .

But he got some things cleaned up so they can start fresh today. The Sudan grass/sorghum is so wet they are mixing it half and half with dried out first cutting so they can get it in the bag. They are feeding a similar mix green chopped to the cows and they seem to like it pretty well. The kids worked for my bro then went to the fair to the tractor pull. Mark finished up seventh I guess.

Today the sun is coming up in a blaze of red and it is humid enough to wring a glass of water out of a handful of air. Off to the barn then the usual round of garden, kitchen and bookkeeping. Have a good one.

I was walking over to take my Sunday graffiti pics and heard a loud rustling in the creek bed between the farms. ANOTHER woodchuck carting plastic. I have no idea where he found it...but must be a new style in marmot housing.

Sunday Stills...Graffiti

Hickory Tree Field

Instead of concrete and railroad cars...

This could have been quite a challenge in our neighborhood. We do live near a city with a bit of a problem with it, but right here...well, not so much.




However, the boss gets creative with the markers when he is keeping track of which field is put up in the ag bags and this year was no exception.


He is quite the artist isn't he?

Bird Graffiti

And so was this little bird (thanks to Alan for tipping me off to all this good stuff)



For more Sunday Stills....

Blue

Indigo blue
Indigo bunting
In a cottonwood tree

We Don't Need No Stinkin'

Yellow jackets. This has got to be the worst year ever. The tractors are full of them. I swear we are going to buy Hand's right out of wasp spray. The men have been finding nests the size of dinner platters everywhere.

Yesterday I found my share. It was only one, but it came boiling out of the barnyard gate and dug into the upper curl of my poor ear, buzzing ferociously.

And stinging too. It hurt so bad I could barely stand up. The kids sent me to the house with ice cubes and pain reliever and milked without me. I couldn't believe how pale it made me...white as the proverbial ghost. Nasty darned things!

We have been opening and closing that gate a dozen times a day all summer....even earlier in the day....without a sight or sound of the vicious things. Suddenly in one day there are three nests in it, with hundreds of the buzzing abominations.

Alan got them gone, but somebody is going to have to get some cans of Great Stuff and seal up all the holes on tractors and gates. I don't care to have that experience again any time soon.

How Much

Wood plastic could a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck.....?

I was sitting here at my trusty computer yesterday when I heard a weird rattling sound from the front porch. There was a lusty breeze bending the sumacs so I thought it was just the plastic that was on the door in the winter rattling in it.

However it went on and on so I got up to go look. Elvis was staring out the door in his grab-the-robin pose, only different. Kind of hesitant and nervous-ish.

Well no wonder! In place of the robin was a fat young woodchuck gathering plastic in its mouth like a gerbil collecting tissue for a nest. It was perhaps six inches from his face. It was so darned bold that it let me take its picture. Then when I clapped and shouted to make it leave the region it ignored me.

The cat ran away but not the road rat. Dag nabbitted thing anyhow. It just looked over its shoulder in an irritable fashion and sauntered away.

A much better encounter of the wild thing kind came later on the other porch. I was watering the plants when I heard an unfamiliar bird call. I looked up and the speaker came right to my knees...right there a foot away from me a lovely little Carolina wren. It hopped all over the porch looking right at me, completely unconcerned, then flew down below the driveway. How cool is that?

Sold on Milking Shorthorns

If you've been reading here a while you know about Checkerboard Magnum's Promise, a milking shorthorn bull we bought to breed heifers for calving ease a few years back. We had used Angus, Hereford, Jersey etc. and had complaints about all. Mostly temperament but calving ease on the Herefords was no better than Holstein bulls. We don't have access to the kind of genetics you find on ranches....

I had hoped to sell some matched steers for oxen, an option which has not materialized. However, we were astonished at how typey the shorty calves are. I think that is partly that we were very lucky in the bull we got, but they are just so correct and sharp that you can't stop looking at them. Dense, strong bone, lots of dairy character and tough as nails. A little bit of attitude in every one of them, but it is not meanness, but a strong will to prosper.

We raised one shorty steer and the processor we took him to ruined the meat so we didn't get to find out how we liked it. Then this week we finally got a shorthorn beef back from a reputable place. When the boss picked it up our man said it was the best we ever brought in. I took that with a grain of salt, as he is quite the salesman....but....

It is! The ground beef is very lean like we like it, but tender and succulent....so good. And last night Becky broiled us some steaks. Flashback to Missouri where we ate at a really nice steak house. They have a lot better beef out there where they grow it and this was like that. Fork tender, juicy, very flavorful. I am delighted, partly that we have a freezer full and partly that we have a heifer all raised up that we can process at any time, plus two more steers of various ages. After a long winter of venison, goose, chicken and vegetables I am such a happy little camper.

Music

Stumbled upon some wonderful music on Facebook yesterday...real traditional country sound.
We are fans of the Texas singer, Todd Fritsch, and have him as a friend on FB. He "liked" RW Hampton, so I checked out his music on his page.
I liked it.

Even bought one song with part of the Amazon gift certificate brother and sis-in-law gave me for my birthday. (Thanks guys, my iPod is a much happier place because of you)




Here is RW"s Facebook page....give the song, "Donny Catch a Horse" a listen...wish I could buy that one, but alas, it doesn't seem to be available on Amazon.

Nation's Oldest Farm for Sale

Read about it here.

Wordless Wednesday

What's Up with The Milk Numbers

According to all those dairy situation reports you read in all the farm publications, production is up from last year despite the loss of so many farms. According to a source close to the industry (who shall remain unnamed) plants are scrambling for milk and taking loads they turned away a few months ago.....hmmmm......

While We Were Gone

Nothing daunts a border collie.

If there are no cows to herd, a lake will do nicely, thank you

The bull calf tide continued....very few heifer calves this summer. Alas Spruce had a really nice boy, tall and dairy, Balsam had a Silky Cousteau son of fine proportions, and Bonneville (Balsam's daughter) had a Keeneland Astre Pat son too (same sire as Spruce's).

No more calves expected for a few weeks...However, fair preparations are in full swing. The health work is finished on Lemonade, a Holstein veteran of the show ring of Becky's, Rose Magnolia, the milking shorthorn daughter of the Select Sire Power bull, Poker(pdf) and my Broadway cow, and Gypsy, the Roylane Jordan daughter of Lizzie's retired show cow, Mandy.

Lots of clipping and washing going to be going on, which may be a challenge as Liz has started her new milk inspector job and is at least half past busy. We also have to hustle up and get Rose Magnolia and her mother, Broadway, registered, not a small feat as we have never registered a milking shorthorn before. Liz will be taking the three of them to Altamont Fair this year while the rest of us hold down the fort here at home. Maybe you will see them there.


In the meanwhile, the garden is beginning to produce, I have more lawn cows to paint, we are getting a steer back from the processor and haying is continuing apace. Although I miss camp, as I always do, we came home to glorious weather, which makes it all seem fine.

Noticed

These stories might be of interest to North-viewers....I was thrilled to learn the results of Web Moo.O, an agricultural social media contest, (which I had incidentally forgotten that I entered) (although no one has contacted me yet). I discovered it through the stats on Site Meter and did some happy dancing etc.

Northview Diary is a lot of fun for me...I love getting to know all of you....and it is so nice that the folks at Nutridense liked it too.

That's Just Ducky

I am going to be putting more camp pics up here

Sunday Stills....Rule of Thirds

For more Sunday Stills

Best Photos of Camp Week

This week was the first time I ever saw a loon chick....and this young eagle was very obliging.

Our Dangerous Southern Border

Affects unexpected people in places we might not normally imagine......

I Want It

Side A

and Side B
of the same screen door

Gimme, gimme, gimme.....rowrrrrrrrr

A fat flock of fledgling robins can be frustrating


If you are a house cat and they are inches away on the other side of the screen

Rain on Sumac

A sudden thunderstorm one hay day afternoon.

Catches the men unready and unawares, way back up in the fields.


Almost catches the laundry out, but I outsmart it by ten minutes.

The drops plink on the sumac fronds, depressing the leaflets one by one, like hot green piano keys played by ghostly hands.

A sumac player piano. I like that.

Blessing

Standing on the sitting porch in the mid day sun. Suddenly, a breeze on my arm, an eager buzz and I am being investigated.

Closely, bzzz, bzzz, bzzz, tiny jet bead eyes staring into my eyes as if wondering what I am. Pausing finally for a quick nip of sugar juice, back feathers glowing fire coal green, then back to buzz bombing me again.

Soon there are three of them, whirring around my head like airplanes on a baby's mobile. Sometimes it is a very fine thing to be the center of attention.

I think the hummingbirds have children.

Curious, glorious, bright green children.

I like them

Sunday Stills....Summer

The epitome of summer for me.....

For more Sunday Stills.....

Camp

Some among us are off to camp for a week. Fishing, swimming, canoeing and hopefully, lots and lots of sleeping. See you next Saturday, although I scheduled a few posts for the week.
Have a good one!

Strange Things in the Stats

Don't you just love

I am sure most of us who use traffic meters see some pretty strange search terms now and then. I get a kick out of watching what lands folks here and sometimes wind up scratching (or shaking) my head (although I rarely get any that are as funny as the ones Jeffro gets.)

Anyhoo, now and then Googlebot shows up in the results ...maybe five or six times a week...and it is always interesting to see what sent it here....usually calf names and growing lettuce indoors and such. However, last night it stopped by and stayed....and stayed...and stayed.....for over an hour and a half. To the tune of thirty pages.

Photos that have

Anyone more knowledgeable than I who knows what's up with that?

And what are the funniest searches that bring folks to your neighborhood?

Nothing whatsoever to do with the actual post?
(Or maybe I found the Googlebot out on my porch
and grabbed pictures of its head, paws and fur....)

Second Nesting

(Not unlike second breakfast, only with birds). In all my years here I have never seen anything like this one for birds. We keep remarking about it. Phoebes have chosen the house yard for their second nesting and they are right in front of the windows all day long. And I do mean right in front. You can see every detail of feather color, even the shading between charcoal neck and dingy grey breast feathers (they should really do their laundry.)

Now that I know the call of the indigo bunting I am awakened by them several times a week. The baby robins on the porch have shown phenomenal growth this week. From the bare ugly skull heads of last week to cheeky fat robin faces complete with the little white markings in less than three days. They still sound exactly like the bearings on the washing machine when it is spinning off balance and thus still drive me crazy thinking I have to fix it.
Earl will probably remember the killdeer baby we saw in the opening to the thirty-acre lot when we walked up there. All week long the guys regaled me with stores of how it would jump in front of the tractor when they passed and run before them all the way down to the ag bags. It slowed them down a lot but they got a kick out of it just the same. Anyhow yesterday it finally figured out how to get out of the road.

Saw the sparrow hawk streaking for the heifer barn like his tail was on fire. In hot pursuit behind him, the house mockingbird. You wouldn't think a fast little falcon would be intimidated by a clown like the mocker, but he was really moving.

Saw what I thought was a new warbler right at the window yesterday too. Warblers are not usually so obliging and are hard to identify. This one was just feet from my eyes, picking insects off the cow parsley. I looked her up in Peterson's first after getting out my lovely stack of field guides and there she was...a female yellow. We have had yellows all along the driveway all spring,,,,but just were seeing the males.

And then there is the gold finch picking larvae out of the wasp nests at the big windows (excuse the lack of clarity...I will wash them later) and grabbing spider silk, evidently for its nest. It is a bold little critter and let Alan get these pictures.

High Tech for Everybody

But us. Ag columnist Chuck Jolley shared a link to this well-written piece on Facebook. Mike Barnett man tells it like it is and I wish I could walk up to him, shake his hand and thank him for it."

Wordless Wednesday