A little birdie

Tipped us off that there is most likely to be a federal rating inspector checking on all the farms in the cooperative to which we belong sometime during this week. Federal ratings are a challenge. (That is a nice way of saying horrible, nightmarish, hard as heck.) Everything must be perfect. Hah! This is a farm. Fifty cows and forty heifers and two men who never pick up after themselves conspire with muddy Mother Nature to make immaculate walls and floors and cows and properly organized shelves and suchlike things to dream about. And baling twine. What is it with that stuff anyhow? It has a life of its own. Then when we do get everything spic and span keeping it that way for a week...Arggghhh!!

So we thanked God that Liz had Saturday off and we all pitched in and cleaned and cleaned and cleaned. Because I am Queen of the Pressure Washer (having worked on a dairy where I washed the whole parlor down with one every day) I did the milkhouse. Everyone else moved things and swept them and put them in the truck for the landfill. Although it was hard work, most of the job was done by Saturday night, so we were free to share the celebration of Easter yesterday with the dear folks who are giving Lizzie her internship position.

Last night it came down to getting calves out of the manger. We had a couple of them tied in front of loving new mamas who were not exactly happy to see them moved. However, calves in the manger is a major no-no, so they had to go to new locations. Holsteins are usually led on a halter.. Jerseys don't need to be. There are other ways of moving Jersey calves.

Put me down! I want to run up and down the alley

Then last night we came in to enjoy leftovers from Easter that we brought home from dinner with us. I looked up at nine to realize that Alan had not come in from the barn yet. He is often last one in as he feeds out the last hay and fills the stove nights. Still nine was too late so I booted up...my feet that is...and went out to see what was going on.

He was just turning off the lights when I got there. He had scraped and re-swept every bit of the barn walkways and spread a coating of lime on every inch...on his own...without being asked.
It looks terrific and I am grateful. And it is time to head over and milk and clean up whatever messes the cows and cats managed to make last night......

Everyone's an art critic.



I love you, mama

Happy Easter to All

Thanks...for reading and keeping me company. Hope you have a great day with family and friends.
Love to everyone.

Guess who went out barefoot with the doggies this morning

To shoot pictures of the moon? (The rest of them were taken through the windows...I am only half way crazy).







Happy, happy morning...no school, no milk truck, Liz has the day off so I can let everyone else sleep in an extra hour while I play.

Flower garden

Here is a silly little thingie one of my delightful aunts sent me. Just hold your mouse button down or click creatively to grow some springy flowers...since the wind is howling a gale, it is about twenty degrees and snow is in the forecast, I probably got more bang out of this than someone who lives in a more reasonable climate might but....but I gotta tell you, this really feels good

MOS

Photo by Alan
This is the road we take every day over to the college....I stand corrected. Becky took this one.

Big (ish) sky

Another view of the beaver dam taken by Alan while mom was driving about 55

Road trip...detour

Beaver dam on Goldman Road

One of my favorite swamps

"Get offa my cloud"...these Canada geese are already pairing up and staking out territories

Westland/Hallmark and some happier cows

The animal abuse incidents at this plant have had and will continue to have, far-reaching and ugly effects on the animal livestock industry. When one business allows such transgressions everybody gets a black eye, whether deserved or not.

Thus I was simply tickled pink to find this story central in all the news feeds over the past few days. It puts a better face on agriculture and it is much more the true face than what the HSUS has been putting about about cattlemen and women. Cow water beds have actually been around for years, as have dozens of other kinds of mattresses for cows. A comfortable cow is a functional, productive cow. Thus it is not only kind to make them comfy, but profitable too. There is actually constant intense research done on which beds cows prefer and will use most, as they make more milk lying down than standing up.

We bed with straw (or right now, hay, since our straw guy is out)., but we do have thick rubber mats under some particular cows, which could be described as klutzy and need them. The cows love to be bedded and fluff their own straw up before lying down on it. Our oldest ever cow, Frieland RORAE Ann, who passed away on the farm at just shy of 21 years old, used to stare at me nights....I could feel her eyes just boring into me while I milked, until I ran over and bedded her stall. Then she would lie down with a contented sigh to chew her cud. We always get a big kick out of the way cows communicate with their peons (us). They have the stare of demand down to a science...and you know, after a couple or three decades of living so close to them, I usually can figure out just what they want from me.

Some of them also delight in eating their bedding, which is both hilarious and frustrating. For example old Beausoleil picks her bedding up on her hind leg so she can reach it easily and eats it that way. It is not that she is hungry, as I can toss a chunk of the same old hay up in her manger and she will push it away. It is just a habit she has and there is nothing I can do about it but laugh at her and stay out of the way of that waving leg when I am shaking out her bed.

No more excuses

For lame photography.....



Thank you...you know who you are but I don't know if you want to be unmasked here.


First attempt....it's raining so we are a little limited outdoors, but as soon as the sun shines... I have already been immortalized on television as this hooks up to it....much fun being had here.

Maple season explained

I have been wanting to photograph a wonderful sugar bush we drive through every day, but the road is dangerous and there is no place to pull off. then the boss called me in to see this on TV. This is Steve Savage, "our" maple guy who taps our woods (and lots of others too) and keeps us in sweet, golden syrup. If you have the speed, watch the video. It is pretty cool. If not, the text is pretty explanatory.

What is it with roads and birds anyhow?

Coming home from taking Beck to college, late (in more ways than one) this morning. There is a red truck on the other side of the road, partly off the road and partly in traffic. (We are talking busy state highway here, narrow as heck and cars are flying along at least fifty-five mph.)

The man, bearded like a singer in the Soggy Bottom Boys, (only his is real), and dressed perfectly for the part, gets out of the truck and begins to step out into the road. I slow down and wheel over the object of his interest, which is dead center (quite literally) in my lane.


The thing is what we up here in the Northeast call a partridge, which is more correctly known as a ruffed grouse. As I pass, the man steps into my lane and bends to pick the critter up. Winding out of sight, several curves ahead, I can still see him in my rearview mirror, trying to pry that bird off the pavement.


What's up with that I ask you? Nobody is that hungry.


Maybe he ties flies.....

****Update, Becky had the likely answer to this dilemma. The college has a taxidermy class and they often use reasonably intact road kill for practice subjects. This bird was pretty fresh so.....maybe....

Be careful what you wish for

Driving down to Cobleskill, nearly nine last night. Had to pick Becky up after a late class (when will that girl learn to drive?) Alan was riding along to keep me company and we were enjoying each other thoroughly. He is a nice boy and very aware that his eighteenth birthday is Friday...and that the world will change for him and us real soon. As we passed the spot where Beck and I saw the screech owl the other day, I calmly mentioned, "Gee, we haven't seen any owls tonight. Usually we see a couple."

Not three hundred yards down the road we saw one alright. boy did we see it! It swooped right across the grill of the car, almost over the hood. It was close enough that we instinctively cringed backward and stomped on the floor...me on the brake, him on empty floor mat and an imaginary clutch (he is used to his five speed truck). Despite the fraction of a second that we saw it and the gasp factor, I did get to see what it was. A barred owl, all fluff and stripes. It looked big as a turkey from where I was sitting. If it had extended one feather even an inch it would have touched the car. I like owls, but I will not ask so carelessly again.

Which do you prefer?

Fresh fish on ice?

Or really, really fresh fish under ice?

Yesterday hundreds of geese

Today thousands. This flock took long enough to fly past for Alan and me to stand discussing whether he had time to run inside for the camera. Enough to decide, well maybe. For him to run inside and get it. For me to take dozens of pictures. At least five or six minutes. At least a thousand geese. Probably many more than that.

The Season is in Full Swing

Sweet!

Reaching joy

Winter is prison. I don't care how beautiful it is, it makes me miserable. I get though it by feeding the birds, growing as many plants as I can fit in my windows, on my benches, anywhere I can put them, and by waiting.....

***do click***

For a day like this one. There is still snow, but it is perfect snow...loose granular is the skiers' term I think. It has a satisfyingly sloppy crunch underfoot. Fun to walk in. It is on its way out too, leaving us apace..... Every step you take will be a bare place tomorrow. Every dark thing has its own Easter basket nest too, melted by absorbing rays from a still hidden sun.





Birds are everywhere...avian surround sound.

There be robins. Maelstroms of geese, hundreds and hundreds and hundreds ringing everywhere. Red winged black birds and grackles, blue jays with cheeks so crammed with sunflower seeds that they look deformed when they fly. Thunderous clapping mourning doves...birds everywhere. One flock of Canadas went by this morning, sailing east down the river. I counted...slowly....very slowly...to thirty seconds worth and they were still coming, punctuated by silver gulls that were caught up in their beating flight path.




Because I was on a hill and they were not so very high over the water I was looking straight across at them and could see their wings throbbing, brown, then grey, then brown again, in flickering unison.


There is water everywhere too, rushing toward the river like it might miss it if it didn't hurry. The horse pasture pond is overflowing. As I sit on the old barrel I set here years ago, I can hear the excess softly burbling across the grass despite the racket from the Intersate. It is so clear that if it weren't for reflected light, you couldn't see it.




Can you see the water below?...



Even though it is still winter you can sense the springing up of outdoor things. It is easy to remember why lambs buck and caper and horses gallop and kick just for the fun of it. I feel downright frisky too.

Beginnings

We had a second baby yesterday..... out of Dreamroad Extreme Heather. Sadly he is the first bull calf she has ever had and isn't much bigger than a breadbox. We don't know what the heck to do with him. Anybody need a well-bred Jersey bull? Out of a former reserve champion Jersey, bred by a nationally known herd. By the bull Moment?

It's a girl

Meet Frieland E Cookie Crispy

That is not her mama checking her out but rather Consequence who is also due for a baby pretty soon. She stands next to Crunch, the new mother. Sire is Four-of-a-Kind Eland

And so it is done

Elliot Spitzer has resigned. I spent the morning listening to the news with one ear (no choice, the boss had it on) while writing the Farm Side. Deadline day and as usual I was right up against it. This week it is about the effect this scandal could have on agriculture in the state. The Farm Side BTW is a weekly column about farming (amazing huh?) in our great state. Farming is about as regulated as an industry can get so what happens in government greatly affects everything we do. A late state budget affects everyone who pays taxes. Budget deadline is April 1st. What are the odds that it will be done by then? How many heads of departments will roll under new leadership?

Time will tell how this all plays out, but I am glad at least one aspect is finished.

Just passing through

Snow is softly falling, but like a decade of beads on a rosary a javelin of Canada geese wings over,seeking true north and talking to the tundra.

Mackey Leading out of Safety

I thought that the Iditarod would probably be over when I got up this morning. It is not, but it won't be long now. Mackey is still in the lead going away from the Safety checkpoint, but Jeff King is hot on his heels. King has kept his team intact at 16 dogs through most of the race up until now, which is quite a handling feat, but now that they are on the ice he dropped two. Probably by the time we are done milking it will be history....a very exciting race this year and we much enjoyed it.


A few complaints about the new website though. Someone was looking to make money off race followers and if you were a non-paying customer the site was frustratingly hard to navigate. Lots of fascinating anecdotes to be read on the blogs, but when you wanted standings you had to click all over the place. In the end I missed the old stand-alone Cabela's site. The official site when it was stand alone was a pain in the neck and the new one seems to fit that description as well. I expect by next year they will work the bugs out, but if they don't I will use the newspapers for info.