What a beautiful day today! Bright and sunny, with only a light wind, with an expected high of -4C/25F. A perfect day to finally get outside and do a burn! We’ve needed to do it for a while, as the cat litter sawdust was filling the burn ring to the top, but it’s just been either too chilly, too windy, or both.

I had company while I was getting set up to start.

Rolando Moon was enjoying the sun on a nice, snow free spot!

When we do a burn, along with the burnable household garbage, I have been slowly burning the old rotten pallets from the junk pile. This leaves a good body of coals that allows me to cover the burn ring, leaving the coals and litter sawdust to slowly smolder away for several days.

A lot of the old pallet pieces are so rotten, I can break them up with my hands, but there are still some longer pieces to fuss with. It takes a while to burn them through in the middle enough to break them pus the ends into the ring, so I made sure to bring a camp chair to use in between tending the fire.

Any time I sat down, Gooby came over and was all over me! He’s always had a thing for noses, but lately, he’s not just trying to lick my nose, but trying to bite it!

Then Pointy Baby came over. He’s still full of burrs. I tried to at least break them up, so he could groom some of them out himself, but he just would not stop spinning around. I think they were hurting him. After awhile, though, I think he figured out that what I was trying to do actually make him feel better. He still spun around a lot, and would lick/bite at my fingers, but he did stay mostly still enough that I got some progress. Some of the biggest bunches have been broken apart, and I even got a few out completely. There are some small, hard ones, completely encases in fur, that I haven’t been able to do much about. Still, he’s a much happier boy now!

When the fire was burned down enough to cover the ring, I was going to grab the camp chair and found this!

These two know a good thing then they see it! I didn’t have the heart to kick them off into the snow, so I picked the chair up by the arms and carried them. Pointy Baby did eventually jump off, but Gooby got a ride all the way to the sun room. So I just set the chair up where the frame to the mini greenhouse used to be, and the last I saw, he was still enjoying his comfy spot!

Tomorrow, we’re supposed to start getting a cold spell again. Nothing another bitter polar vortex like last time. As long as it’s not windy, it should still be fine.

Just out of curiosity, I just the app that has historical weather data. The 30 year average high for today is -8C/18F, and the average low is -19C/-2F. The 30 year record high for today is 7C/45F, set in 2017, while the record low was -30C/-22F, set in 2015!

I think I’m good with what we’re getting now. 😄😄😄

The Re-Farmer