Critters

Racoons, kitties, and new phone goofs

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Who’s that judgey boy?

Judement is that judgey boy!

Yeah, I’m going to like the camera on this phone.

We’ve been allowing the kittens to stay in the sun room overnight, propping the doors so that they’re just barely open, since cleaning up the glass in the broken windows. The down side of that is, other critters get in, too. It used to always be skunks, but we hardly see the skunks anymore.

I think the racoons have chased them off.

After deciding to let the kittens use the sun room for the night, I put the extra kibble bags in the old kitchen, the used my husband’s walker, with the brakes on this time, to block the kibble bin into its shelf. This morning, my husband chased a racoon out of the sun room from the old kitchen, but he never actually went into the sun room. The walker looked like it was where it belonged and he didn’t think anything of it.

Well, they did get into things.

When I tried to open the door, I had to push away some things that had been knocked in front of it. The walker almost worked, but was half pushed aside.

The racoons had got at the bin from the side of the shelf, and did this to the lid, managing to get the bin partly off the shelf in the process.

*sigh*

At least the bin was already mostly empty. I’m glad I didn’t refill it instead of putting the bags away.

As for the kitties, they were more than happy to see me with the kibble container! We top up their kibble in the late afternoon, but not too late, because we want to feed the cats, not the racoons and skunks. This time of year, the other critters will clean out every crumb by morning.

I tried to do a heat count and I got to 28! I might have counted some twice. It took a while, but I did see the bitty baby. It was under the kibble house again. I’m concerned the racoons might have scared it – and all the other cats! – out of the cat shelter. I could just see it, but couldn’t catch it. It just exploded with spitting noises at me, and went further under the cat shelter.

While doing the rest of my rounds, I took the time to pump the tire on my mother’s car. After 4 or 5 days, it was completely flat again, but it should handle the trip into town this afternoon, though I plan to leave quite early, just in case I end up on the side of the road or something.

The good thing is, we finally got my new phone set up and activated. Last night, I’d been able to get pretty much everything I needed going, but the one thing I couldn’t get working on the phone was… the phone. The instructions were simple enough. Go online, find the mobility options and activate the new phone. Simple enough.

Except the option wasn’t there.

Now, we are on a family plan, and it’s under my husband’s name. I can log in, but it’s his account, so I don’t like to mess around with it. That’s why, after I’d settled on a couple of possible replacement phone choices, I left it to him to actually go through the final details, then order the phone.

On top of that, my phone number is technically his. When he replaced his old phone, he took that opportunity to get a new, local number and was able to find one that was almost identical to my childhood phone number. So when his new phone came in, we traded sim cards. I got the new phone number, he got the new phone. That was a couple of years ago. Then we ended up trading phones – and sim cards – more recently because of the Bluetooth problem my older phone was having that was not an issue for him.

Odd that it would be the newest phone in the household that would develop a swelling battery and need to be replaced!

Unable to activate the replacement phone, I finally turned it over to my husband so I could work on other things. It took a while, but he finally found the activation option.

Under our daughter’s phone number.

Somehow, when he went through the upgrade process to purchase the new phone, he ended up doing it under her number in the group plan, instead of what the account sees as his number.

Once he got the new device activated, I got the sim card from the phone that was being replaced, my daughter got the new sim card, and her old sim card is now in the phone that’s been replaced. So we all have the same phone numbers, but I have a new phone with an old sim card, while my daughter has a new sim card with an old phone.

The main thing, though, is that we now all have working phones!

Because the new phone can’t support an external memory card, I wasn’t able to transfer everything over from the old phone. So last night, I started transferring everything on the micro-SD card onto my external hard drive. I expected it to take a long time, but it stalled at 16% and stayed there for hours. It ended up locking up my desktop, and I had to do a hard shut down. Even after restarting it, there were issues. After much fighting, I got everything unlocked, then started going through individual folders on the card and transferring them. I knew where the problem was – my photos! I simply have too many of them on there. When I’d set it to transfer everything, it got to the photos folder, and just froze. I have them organized into folders by year, then in sub folders by month, and I’m now having to transfer each month over, individually. Even then, it still takes a while, but at least it’s not freezing my computer!

So that’s something I’m going to have to slowly work on tonight, when I can be around to monitor it. Then, once that’s backed up, I’ll do the same thing with files that did get transferred to the new phone, and see how much storage space I can free up. It’s not an issue right now, but with how many photos I take, it’ll fill up fast. Especially if I’m also taking video.

For now, however, I have a few things to get done before I have to head into town and get my mother’s car in the garage. Thankfully, we’ll be having a nice warm day today, so I will be able to walk around town and do some errands while it’s being worked on.

I’ll be so glad to have that tire fixed, and not have to rely entirely on one vehicle again!

The Re-Farmer

Some good news

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Well, according to the Canada Post tracker, my replacement phone will arrive today. So I am delaying my trip into the city a few hours. It’ll take a while for the postmaster to sort through the packages that should have arrived by now, and scan it into the system as arrived, so I’ll be checking the tracker until I see it listed as arrived. Once I’ve got the phone activated and set up to bare bones functionality, I’ll head into the city. Once I have the time later today, I’ll finish setting it up and transferring my data from the other phone’s backup. Then I can wipe the old phone, and I should be able to send it back as part of their buyback program.

I’ll be able to take pictures again!

I mean, it’s not like I use my phone as a phone, after all. 😉 That’s what the landline is for! 😄

Meanwhile, I’ve done my morning rounds and checked on the bitty kitty. I’m happy to say that I could see him in the soft cat bed I put in there last night, right next to one of the windows. (I even put the sun room litter box in there, tucked into the corner we’ve found they usually crap in, in the winter, when it’s too cold to go outside.)

He also had a fair bit of company. I’d put some other donated cat blankets, and the box with a pillow in it that was in the sun room, inside and it looks like they were well used. I could see several smaller kittens in there with the bitty, though the smallest ones (still bigger than the bitty!) still seem to prefer being under the cat shelter, rather than in it. Among the things I did yesterday was push some larger sheets of leftover rigid insulation under there, so they can sit on those rather than bare ground.

I tried to do a head count, several times. The first count, I got 21, including the bitty. The second time, I got 23. The third time, I got 24, not including the bitty, since I didn’t want to poke around the entry too much, but he would make it 25.

Among the adults, I saw Broccoli running around from food to food, going from the roof of the cat shelter, to under the water bowl shelter, to into the kibble house, and even nibbling on the kibble I’ve been putting on the ground for the kittens under the cat shelter. I also saw Junk Pile, coming out of the cat shelter. We still don’t know which of the mamas the bitty belongs to. If it’s Junk Pile, that would make it her third litter of the year, and considering how young her second litter is (they were the pump shack babies), I just don’t see that as likely. If Broccoli is the mama, that would make it her second litter of the year. That makes a bit more sense, since her two are among the oldest kittens. It seems unlikely, though, because when Broccoli comes over for kibble, it’s always from somewhere outside the yard.

Oh, gosh. I hope that doesn’t mean there’s an even younger litter out there, somewhere!

I know it’s not Rosencrantz. She had two litters, but lost the first one. They were born so early, everything was still frozen and covered in snow. Her second litter is the older white and greys, plus a tortie. That litter is slightly older than the pump shack kittens, and I’m pretty sure they would not have been weaned yet, when the bitties would have been born. It would have been the same situation with Junk Pile’s second litter. I’m pretty sure Caramel is the mother of the youngest kittens (until the bitties showed up), and they look barely weaned.

If it’s not Broccoli, that means it’s one of the ‘iccuses – and they’ve all disappeared. The females since weaning their own litters, and the males even earlier.

Well, whoever the mama is, the little spitfire seems to be taken care of, for all it doesn’t seem to be growing. I’m hoping that, with the kibble I’m putting just inside the entry, it will beef up a bit. I moved one of the baking trays I was using as a kibble tray into the entry, and it just barely fits. Which is good, because it means it won’t get knocked about, like other containers we’ve tried to put in there. I’ve added a smaller container for water to sit on top of it, that I can reach to pull out and refill.

Here’s hoping it works out! So far, so good.

The Re-Farmer

Oh, you’re not going to believe this!

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I headed out this morning to do my rounds, starting with feeding the outside cats, as usual. I managed to do a head count and got 26! That included several adults, including Rolando Moon, Rosencrantz, Caramel, Broccoli and Junk Pile (I think!). I also spotted one of the younger kittens that I think are Caramel’s, that has the distinctive Beep Beep orange splotch on the forehead. 😄

When I was finished my founds, I stayed to pet as many kittens as I could. One of the little white and grey ones now allows me to pet it, though it has the most startled expression when I do!

While moving around the cat house to reach different kittens on the roof, I suddenly realized I was being watched.

From inside the cat house.

By tiny blue eyes.

You could have knocked me over with a feather. Yes! The last bitty baby is back in the cat house!

I suddenly couldn’t remember if I’d put kibble inside the entry. I usually do, but I was drawing a blank, so I went and got a scoop, just in case, and carefully poured it in. I could hear the very familiar spitting and hissing in response.

I hung around to watch and after a while, I could see a single paw grabbing one of the strips of carpet that serves as a door to the entry. After a while, I decided to try and pick it up – and found it had climbed the carpet strips almost to the top of the entry! It exploded with hisses and spitting as I picked it up and held it. Several kittens on the roof came running and started sniffing it, which seemed to calm it down.

As far as I can tell, it is in good shape. The eyes are clear and look like they are starting to change colour, but still very blue. It doesn’t seem to be hungry or dehydrated. It does not seem to be any bigger, though.

When I couldn’t find it the night I found its two surviving siblings in the middle of nowhere (and a dead one in the cat house that same morning), I was convinced I would never see it again. To find it back in the cat house just blows me away!

We still don’t know who the mama is, but she’s been dragging those kittens all over the place. I’m hoping, now that there is just one for her to take care of, it will have a better chance of surviving. I don’t want to take it from its mother, and inside the cat house is the safest place for it to be.

Now, if the mama will just stop taking it away, we can help her take care of it!

The Re-Farmer

Wet, wet morning

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While the Western parts of the prairies got walloped with snow yesterday, by the time the system reached us last night, it was rain. Some places even got thunderstorms, apparently.

When I headed out this morning, it was still raining pretty heavily, so not a lot of kitties were coming out for kibble! Quite a few of them were inside the cat house, though, so that was good to see. As I went to switch the memory card for the driveway trail cam, I had to walk on the grass to the side of the driveway because it was covered in water.

We seriously need more gravel on that driveway.

While we have not finished winterizing the sun room, we did get the broken glass cleaned up, so I’ve been allowing the kittens to go in. When I topped up their kibble last night, some of them were still in the sun room, so I rigged the doors so that they were mostly shut, but the kittens could still get in and out. Then, because racoons remain a problem, even if we don’t see them, I used my husband’s walker to brace the kibble bin in its shelf, then took the two big bags of kibble my BIL and his family so generously gave us, and tucked them into the old kitchen.

Well, I forgot to put the breaks on, on the walker! This morning, I found the walker had been pushed aside, and the kibble bin open and almost knocked onto the floor. Thankfully, the bin was only half full, so while it was on its side, hung up on some buckets (with a kitten sitting in the kibble!), the kibble wasn’t spilled onto the floor.

Before moving things around, I’d had a shallow bin, designed to fit under beds, on the top of the shelf we used to hold the kibble bins to catch water from the leaking roof. Well, that shelf isn’t there anymore. I wasn’t expecting it to rain this heavily, so there was just stuff set aside against the wall until we could finish cleaning and winterizing the sun room. I had to move those out – and my husband’s walker that had been pushed that far back – so I could set up a bucket to catch the drips.

I will be so happy when that roof finally gets done, though my brother and I are both on pins and needles, afraid our mother will suddenly decide not to pay for it after all. She tends to do that at the last minute, though, so I expect that once the roofers are actually here and the final bill is being tabulated (the total will likely be higher than the estimate, as I expect them to find rot from leaks that needs to be repaired), she’ll try to refuse to pay it. Much like she tried to do after promising to pay for the movers so we would move out here to take care of the place for her.

There was water on the sun room floor, of course, but it’s a concrete floor and not going to be a problem. Seeing how it all flowed across the room to the opposite corner, though, really shows how much the room has shifted since the concrete was poured, and how much that one corner has been undermined.

Speaking of which…

Something knocked the diverter off the downspout above the rain barrel. It had not been full before, but it sure is now, and was starting to overflow. I got the diverter back in place, so it’s not an issue anymore. Getting that barrel empty and set aside for the winter is going to have to be done soon. The girls are going to have to clean the eavestroughs (aka: rain gutters) out again, too. I did pick up rolls of mesh to cover them, but those won’t be put on until after the roof is done. I also picked up a spray sealant to be used after they’ve been cleaned. There are a couple of places where they are leaking. The roof is supposed to be replaced, but I don’t think that includes the eavestroughs.

Looking at the short range forecast, we’re supposed to get a couple of chilly days, with highs barely above freezing, then it’s supposed to warm right up again for about a week, with several sunny and dry days. That will be a great time to get more progress on things, and to finally be able to finish cleaning out and winterizing the sun room. Cleaning the other half of the sun room will require removing the swing bench, the table saw, and a couple of shelves, along with all the stuff in them, outside. Because overnight temperatures have already been going below freezing in there, all the remaining squash have already been moved to the living room. Some of them are still ripening, so they won’t be going to the root cellar, yet.

In putting the stuff back, we need to keep in mind that we’ll be using the sun room as a greenhouse again in the spring. I want to come up with a way to be able to hang those lights we used last spring, more efficiently. If we do it right, the same set up can then later be used in the fall to hang things like strings of onions and garlic to cure.

Wow. I just realized that, if we’re going to be doing things like starting onions from seed again (which we likely will be), we’ll be needing to get those going in just a couple of months. Onions should really be started indoors in January in our area.

The girls and I will go over how the garden went this year and, taking into account the failures due to flooding and other issues out of our control, what worked, what didn’t, what we want to keep doing, what we will stop doing (if only temporarily), and what we don’t want to ever do again! 😄

We have lots of work to get done before the snow flies, and then lots of planning for next year to get working on.

It’s going to be fun!

The Re-Farmer

An awesome day!

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I didn’t get to do much posting yesterday, because most of it was spent outdoors. We had our company come over, and we spent many happy hours around the fire. This will probably be the last really pleasant weekend of the year to do that, so we were really happy to be able to drag things out as long as possible!

My day, of course, started with feeding the outside cats.

I think I counted 21, or maybe 23, cats at feeding time. Quite a crowd!

The girls decided to take advantage of our plans to use the fire pit and went out several hours early. There was quite a build up of ashes, so that got cleared out to make room (getting dumped near the main garden area, so it can be used to amend soil in the beds). I’d found another fire brick and it was added to the others that were set in there previously, so there is now a sturdier base to put the Dutch Oven on, the next time we used it.

Once that was done, the girls started working on clearing away the branch pile that was against the collapsing log building nearby. It took about four hours, but it got done!

There were a few logs that are too big for the fire pit and need a saw to break down. Once the pile was gone and the ground raked up, I found a half buried metal pipe, with another piece of metal under it, both of which are now leaning against the wall. I also uncovered a surprisingly loose large rock. It came out of the ground quite easily, but I put it back so no one would twist an ankle in the hole it left behind. Since my daughter has plans to use rocks to create a wall to frame her daffodils and irises, along the edge of the old kitchen garden, I was quite happy to find it. We will be able to make use of several more that I could see, once we are able to start clearing the far side of the building. There are dead trees that need to be cut down, so it won’t be a small job!

While the girls were working on cleaning up the branch pile, they had a major breakthrough with Plushy.

This is Plushy.

We have been trying to socialize this one for ages, with little success, but yesterday my younger daughter managed to reach her ears for some scritches.

Ah, the magic ear scritches.

Before long, she was accepting pets and cuddles, and stayed with the girls as they tended the fire, even to the point of accepting belly pets! Even I was able to pet her, when I joined them!

Which hasn’t continued into today, unfortunately. I’ve been able to touch her, but she moves away before I can pet her.

Also, she is confirmed female.

Unfortunately, it looks like it’s too late for the possibility of adoption, as the potential adoptees have arranged to adopt a pair of kittens. But who knows. It might still happen, of we can continue the socializing!

When my BIL and his family arrived, they had quite a surprise for us – two big bags of kibble! My SIL said it was one bag for the cats, and the other for the skunks! 😄 We actually have not bee seeing skunks much at all for quite some time! We know they’re still coming around. I’ll even see one running by the garage security camera at times, but we’re not getting the sort of visits to the kibble house that we used to. They didn’t know it, but they’ve saved us from likely having to get more kibble before our usual monthly shop.

The socialized kittens, by the way, were in heaven. The entire family are cat people.

I’ve taken to calling this one Baby. He basically took my nephew over and claimed him as a bed. All the most socialized kittens got more human attention in one evening then ever before! 😄 They had a blast! Unfortunately, while she certainly hung around, Plushy was not one of them. She skulked about and watched, but once more people showed up, she was done with human attention. I don’t think it will take too much effort to get her more comfortable with people, though.

All in all, it was a fantastic evening, and we really enjoyed it. Even my husband was able to join us for far longer than he’s been able to previously, though when my daughter checked on him later, he was seriously medicated for it. It was worth it to him, to be able to spend time with his brother and family, though.

We’re already talking about doing it again in the spring – before the bugs are out in full force! The last time they were here for a cookout, the mosquitoes were so bad, even though we were all using bug spray, we ended things far earlier than we had wanted to. I’m quite looking forward to it!

The Re-Farmer

Strange Furry Fruits!

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I tried to do a headcount while feeding the outside cats this morning. I got either 21 or 22. Hard to say for sure, given how much they move around!

Once bellies are full, they tend to get playful.

I found some strange fruits in the ornamental apple tree! 😄

The little grey tabby in the back had been, until the bitties showed up, the smallest of the kittens. Even younger than the second litter of white and grey kittens that were in the pump shack. I don’t see any of the kittens with mamas anymore. They are all weaned, whether they wanted to be or not, because almost all the mamas have taken off!

When the cat lady was here, she noticed the stuffy noses and leaky eyes. She recommended adding lecithin powder to their food as a preventative. She said it can be purchased from a vet, but it’s very expensive that way. It’s a human supplement, too, and very cheap. She uses it regularly. Looking it out, it sounds like something I might want to add to my own supplements, too! 😄

I definitely want to pick some up soon. This is the time of year when the outside cats get hit with the leaky eyes, stuffy noses and sneezing the most. I want to give those babies everything I can to help them make it through the winter!

The Re-Farmer

The bitties are gone away, and vehicle updates

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Well, the transfer is done! The bitty kitties were picked up late this morning… but not before they had a good nap.

On me.

After filling their bellies, and cover themselves in kitty formula!

The grey and white tabby is male. He is a show off, so that was pretty easy to determine. It took more effort to check the black and white, but I’m pretty sure it was female.

The cat lady, meanwhile, came baring gifts! A big bag of dry kibble, a cat bed, some small cat blankets, a baggie of cat treats and…

… a toy for the outside cats!

We talked a bit about all the cats running around, with several of them coming right up to her. She noted quite a lot of them look old enough to be fixed, so after she gets the three we have in mind right now done (they will stay with her for a week after surgery, then come back, unless she finds adoptees for them), she will start looking into booking visits for more outdoor cats, and hopefully adopt some of them out, too.

We didn’t stay long after she left with the bitties, heading out to pick up my mother soon after. It was supposed to be a warm day today, but there was a chill wind, and my mother wasn’t too happy about that. We picked up some fried chicken and wedges for a picnic lunch, though, and she was very happy about that! After we ate, the girls took the short hiking path around the marsh, while my mother and I made our way into the interpretive centre. She wanted to visit the gift shop. I ended up buying a cookbook of recipes submitted by volunteers. We left soon after the girls caught up with us again. My mother is noticeably having a harder time walking. It’s a shame we couldn’t load her little power chair into the van for her. The ramps we have are fine for loading snow blowers and riding mowers. Not so great for something more delicate! Mind you, just getting in and out of our van was really pushing it for her, too. My mother was more than happy to go home and get some rest.

The girls and I took advantage of the outing and went to a different town. They wanted to hit the grocery store. Our mechanic’s garage is across the street, so while they did that, I went in to talk to him.

After booking an appointment for my mother’s car, to get the leaking tire looked at (I expect it will only need to be patched), I talked to him about our van. He sells vehicles, too, now, and I was suggesting maybe using it as a trade in – he’s done enough work on it to know it very well – and talked about what we might get. It would have to be another older vehicle, because we can’t afford much, but once the quarter beef and the branch chipping are paid off, we can use that money towards a slightly newer vehicle.

He actually recommended we try selling our van privately. At best, he’d be able to give us $300 for the van, and it would be sent for scrap. On a private sale, we might be able to get about $500. (Or, he suggested, we can just keep it as a back up vehicle.) For someone who has the tools and knowledge to do most of their own repairs, it could still do well by them. The problem is all those little things that go wrong on an older vehicle – it’s a 2005 – that is the issue. There are just too many little things that should be fixed, before they become big things, but taking it in to get them all fixed at a garage is still more than we can afford.

We talked about what sort of vehicle we are looking for; the Grand Caravan we had before did well by us, and this Uplander is doing remarkably well, considering how abused it turned out to have been before we bought it. The Uplander hasn’t been made and sold in Canada since 2010, though. He still finds some decent Caravans, though. The other possibilities we are looking at are an older F150 or Ram1500 – both vehicles that are highly rated for winter driving, and that my husband would be able to get in and out of all right. He happened to have an F150 in one of his bays that was for sale that he could use as an example. It was a 2010 and well out of our budget, but my goodness, it was in fine shape!

Because he’d mentioned scrap dealers, I brought up that – now that our vandal can no longer try to claim the junk here on the farm – we can actually have it sold as scrap. He said to wait. This past spring, the prices where the highest he’s seen, but right now, the prices are down again. They go up again in the spring.

So we will wait.

I think we’ll be waiting with replacing the van until spring, too. Whatever we get, I’d want to be able to have it paid off within a year, and that might not be easy.

Ah, well. We do what we can!

The funny thing is, after the girls and I were back at the van and were about to leave, someone came knocking at my daughter’s window, wondering if he could ask us about how we liked our Uplander. I recognized him as an employee from one of the local hardware stores, so I just got out and went to talk to him. It turns out he needs to replace his wife’s car, and was thinking of getting an Uplander, but had been hearing conflicting reports on how good they are. So we had plenty that we could share with him! I think he found it helpful.

We did get a laugh about his asking about the van, just as we were talking to someone about trading it in for something else!

We shall see how things work out. I’m glad I finally had the chance to talk to our mechanic about it.

Oh, and guess what?

He also hauls scrap. Which makes sense. With all the cars he works with, he’d have plenty to send to the scrap dealer. One of these days, I’ll have him come out to our place and look at what we’ve got and see what he says about it.

All in all, it’s been a very productive day, even though we were away from home for most of it!

The Re-Farmer

Grooming!

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The girls had set up a next in a laundry basket for the bitty kitties, which they promptly climbed out of. Last night, we kept them in the cat carrier for the night, to be safe (and I got some sleep!).

Butterscotch does NOT like the kittens. She hisses and runs away from them, clearly very unhappy. Nosencrantz growls and them, but won’t go near them. Cheddar sees them and runs away.

Then… there’s Leyendecker.

He has claimed the laundry basket as a bed.

He will chase after them and insists on grooming them. When he lay in the basket, I put the bitties in with him, and he immediately starting licking them both!

The kittens are quite active as I write this. And loud! They are wandering all over my office/bedroom as I write this. I got the heat pad for under seedling trays out. It’s water proof, so I put it under their bowl of formula. The little black and white one, which is more content to turn into a loaf and just sit for a while, discovered it. 😁

The grey and white tabby is definitely the more active one, and rarely settles for more than a few moments. It’s very talkative, too!

It’s coming up on 9:30am as I write this. The cat lady was hoping to get here by about 10am. Not much longer before we’ll be saying goodbye to the bitties, and turning them over to her tender loving care. She’ll be able to get them checked by a vet, too.

Oh, a bitty is crying by my feet now. Gotta watch out when I roll back my office chair, that’s for sure!

The Re-Farmer