A Tornado at the Fair

Miniature farms in the 4-H building

Bison at the museum display

Just one of the model railroads

Adirondack Wildlife Museum

The part I avoid religiously

See, a tornado. 
And it works too! 

See the cow?

More Cattle Rustlers

This has me worried

It's in the Blood

The love of the outdoors that is. It is cold here this morning, at least for summer, but I keep the door open just the same. Got to catch all the sunlight, fresh air, bird song and tame turkey chatter that I can.

Tiny Peggy is the same way. She has been at the fair all week with her folks, and thus outdoors most of the time. Yesterday they lingered home a bit, as there was a big horse show going on over at the fair and they didn't want to try to do their stall chores in the middle of the uproar.

She had a fussy tummy and was a little bit cranky from being over tired. However, every time her mommy took her outside for even a minute the tears stopped and she was happy as a clam....it was kind of funny. Going through the kitchen door in either direction was like tripping a crying switch...inside holler, outside giggle.

 

In just the three or four days that she has not been here all the time she has gone from much enjoying her hands as chew toys and blanket holders to reaching out for people and things and purposefully reaching up to touch her own face and such. What a fascinating journey it is, watching a baby learn and grow.

I wonder how long it will be before she is running through clouds of puddling butterflies like these that were all over the walk way to the barn the other day.

Blue Ribbon Bird

Jade's rooster Mr. Blue, a blue Cochin, won his class.

Fine Swine

Is this Sponge Bob Spampants?
Thousands are waiting to know

Speedy too!

Jack and Diamond at the Fair

Sheep at the Show and a Small Rant about Things which really Ticked Me off this Week

A goat for good measure

You can't have an ag fair without sheep, and there is a fine showing at this year's Fonda Fair. Here are a few I noticed on the way to the oxen.

Not impressed by all the excitement

Don't they look comfy?

Border Leicesters

I think it is telling that a well-known animal rights group, whose name I won't share so I don't attract trolls, would find the treatment of every single one of the pampered and beloved animals I have shared with this week to be cruel in the extreme. (You know who I mean.) They pitched a fit about an emergency C-section that took place at the Birthing Center at the State Fair.

I guess the calf was structurally compromised in some way and did not survive. However, thanks to the intervention of a team of highly-trained and knowledgeable veterinarians the cow was saved.

With living creatures, no matter how diligently you undertake their care....stuff happens. Heck the ones that are out running wild die in horrible ways....pretty much every single one of them sooner or later. Survival of the fittest rules and eventually all become unfit.

Perhaps this incident did not showcase the simple majesty of a straightforward birth, but I would think that rational beings would see that things go wrong even in the finest human hospitals. I could name you far too many good people who have come home from one with all sorts of infections and ills they didn't have when they went in.

The outcome of this sad bovine birth to me showed the level of concern, caring, and up-to-the-minute technology used by modern farmers in their care for their animals.

However, when your goal is total extirpation of domestic livestock, including pets, nothing is enough. Those sheep? Shoulder deep in fresh bedding, clean, well-fed, and as happy as sheep get....yeah, those sheep.

 They should be running free on the hillsides, cavorting with unicorns.

Of course to anyone who actually knows what a contented sheep looks like, these are downright happy, chewing cud, and resting comfortably. If they were nervous, in pain, frightened, or in any way distressed, they would be standing up at the very least and blatting like bugles, and at worst caroming off the walls of their pens like pin balls. 

I have had sheep. I know this. Most people haven't and don't and thus are ripe for the real exploitation that takes place in the animals rights movement...the exploitation of innocent people who don't understand and so believe whatever they are told.

Those ponies? They should be out running with the wolves and bears, under rainbows, among pots of gold. They must hate the hurly-burly of the show scene right?

Wrong. In so many ways. Little Jack is around thirteen and has never been to a show before. It took him about thirty seconds in the ring to figure out what it is all about.

When he got his big laugh leaping the cavaletti, he tucked his chin and played his audience. Little stinker. Little show off. He was so proud of himself...and.....

He loved it!

When I worked at Saratoga Race Track the stable that employed me claimed a big, chestnut gelding. He showed me how much race horses love the thrill of the chase too. 

He wasn't a big winner, and no one would recognize his name today, but when I was walking him back at the stable he could hear the faint sound of the bugle calling the horses to the post parade. He would always stand on tiptoe, ears pricked, eyes bright and eager, and fairly quiver with the desire to get down there and run.

Animals are so much more than untutored sycophants of animal rights groups, who troll the newspapers and blogs demeaning the people who care for them, give them credit for being.

If they took the time to actually know anything about them, they might begin to understand just the faintest glimmer of the joy of life with livestock...and the bond we share with them when we take the time to learn their ways. 

Cows at the Fair

The wash rack opening day.
When their young owners finish their cosmetic efforts
 these girls will shine

Like this

Because of course there are cows, and Fonda Fair has a serious dairy show, with contenders that would not embarrass their owners at any show.

Fonda Fair Pony Classes

Photos by Becky, shamelessly stolen from Facebook

Jack and Jade were so cute! Jack has never been to a show before, but they managed to come in fifth. Couldn't see too great on cell phone video, but it appeared that they had to cross a little bridge, back some poles, weave some cones, jump some cross poles, trot some cavaletti, and then run through a sort of tunnel of pool noodles or some other brightly colored tube thingies.

Jack was kind of slow on the backing up, but did great until he got to the cavaletti. He jumped the cross poles brilliantly and then did a perfect capriole over the cavaletti and onto Jade.

I don't think that is exactly what the course designers had in mind, but it was good for some laughs. Jade said if he hadn't woven the cones backwards they would have placed higher. They certainly jumped higher.


Diamond and Liz did well too, with a third in halter, and second in the trail class. Diamond too was a bit slow to back up, but really showed her stuff on the other obstacles. Good job!

Beck is trying to send me videos she took but we may have to wait until tonight to use a cable instead of quirky cell phones and questionable emails.

Ox Training Demonstration

There were three or four yokes of little milking shorthorns. They and their handlers were so cute and fun to watch.

Fonda Fair..for Grey

Fonda Fair

City ducks

Country ducks

Pretty ducks

A horse named Mud Slide

 Something for everyone....rural or urban

And Hooter, whom we have known since he was dark grey

Good Folks helping other Good Folks

Amish people are rebuilding the garage of the couple who brought the kidnapped children home.

Deadly Doilies

Drape the drooping grass, durable diligence waiting on destiny. 

Dew displays the dastardly details; by noon they are invisible. 

Did our grandmothers learn lace from spiders?

Dragonflies tremble and shiver off the wet, darkened by the dampness of the day. 

All is softened by twisting fog. It swirls knee-deep over old red grass, knotting and loosening in the eddying air.

 Birds are visible only by voice. A blur of racing yellow darts into the big oak tree. No sound, no name, no way, no how

Absence makes the walk grow harder. When there were cows out here, more cows than two, plus a heifer and a calf, the grass was short, the hummocks and divots visible.

Now they are sand traps and water hazards, or mud traps and tangle hazards if you will, covered in a pelt of clinging green.

You cannot walk and look up at the same time, atall, atall.

The light is mysterious this time of year. Colors glow within. Shadows burn three-dimensional, tangible; shadow suddenly a color of its own.

Thank you cows, for lingering in the woods this morning. My knees and bad foot will ache later from walking up to get you, but memories of morning will surely light the day.

Something's Up

Out on the sitting porch. The Carolina Wren has been going nuts out there since I got up. I crept out and peeked out the door, and he was over between the chairs up to something.

He saw me and flew out under the railing, but now he is back. Guess I will leave him alone. I disturbed a sleeping hummingbird when I opened the door...can't have that.

Meanwhile, in other news, today is truck-in for the fair. The ponies, old Black Jack, bought on a whim, around twelve years ago or so, and Diamond, the princess pony.

Me:
"I want to get a black pony that looks like Magnum, so I will see him in the pasture and not miss the old guy so much."

Ten minutes later
Becky: "Well, here's one in the want ads."

Phone call. 

Frantic race to be the first ones there. Little pony that is too much for his current owners. All bluff and fake out.

Fast forward all those years, still a little pony, still full of bluff, but we have his number, so off to the fair he goes.

And another spur of the moment purchase, Diamond, AKA McCall's KL Crimson.

Who else but Liz could be looking for lawnmowers and find a pinto Shetland from way out west?

Diamond has been to the fair before, but this is the first time for Jack. Should be interesting, as he is small but feisty. 

Sunday Stills...Flower Gardens

For more Sunday Stills....

Albany Implosion

Along with many others we waited all week to watch the implosion of the Hotel Wellington in Albany NY today.

We did chores a little early to make sure we were done in time.

Then we sat through what seemed like interminable political back-scratching and chest puffing....all that free advertising right there on TV for all to see.

Just as impatience nearly sent me back to the kitchen it began.

It was pretty cool. Lots of fireworks, a little dynamite, lots of dust and booming and all that stuff...nearly made up for the politics.

But all I could think was that there will be a lot of confused pigeons tonight...homeless even....I wonder where they will roost. 

Again with the Flooding

The calm before the storm

Ridiculous. I have no idea how Jade got home last night, as he was hauling up in the western part of the state when the really heavy rains hit.

It began raining night before last. It is raining now. It rained most of the time in between. There were horrible thunderstorms, wind, and lashings of rain, some of the hardest we have seen all summer.

All the roads were closed in front of the farm when we went to bed last night. Mud slide across the river. State of emergency for the whole county. Don't know if the report is true, but I saw on FB that someone was struck by the lightning.

I know I took the cows up the lane a lot faster than I normally do. Metal gates. Metal umbrella. Metal fence wires. Tall trees all around. Normally I meander a bit listening for good birds and staring up at the branches. Not last night.

It was nasty. It has been nasty all year. Our hay supplier from when we had the cows called to chat last night and said he was down 500 bales this year....500 big round bales that is. If we still had the cows, he would not have been able to supply us!

California, and anyone else who has come up short, come get your rain. It has outstayed its welcome.

See What I Mean?

BouncyTwirlyLightsNMusicNoisyFunThing

Took about ten minutes for her to figure out that she could bounce and dance and have a ball. Thank you Aunt Jen and Uncle Scott