Inside, outside, we are surrounded by adorableness.
Like this majestic beast.
Of all the cats, he likes this plant stand the most. He’s so fluffy, he fills it out the most, too!
What a handsome boy!
As for the new additions inside, we have some progress with Butterscotch!
Not only is she starting to come out more often for some cuddles, she actually stayed on the bed after her human of the moment left – while other cats were on the bed, too! No hissing or snarling to be heard, either.
Speaking of cuddles…
Here was have Beep Beep, dwarfed by Cheddar, her son of 3 years ago, snuggled by her daughter of 2 years ago, Turmeric, who is still slightly smaller than her mother, if heftier, and finally, Beep Beep’s grandson, David. Who is the same age as Cheddar.
I think Beep Beep and Butterscotch will both be very happy to be done with kittens. :-D
Before heading outside this morning, I popped into the bathroom, glanced out the window into the sun room…
…did a double take…
I couldn’t tell which cat it was while looking through the window but, from the photo, I’m thinking this is Caramel.
Before leaving the bathroom, I glanced through the window to see if he (she?) was still there.
Suddenly, there was more!
Also, that’s a different cat in the bowl. I recognize Agnoos and Potato Beetle. I half-think the one in the box might be Junk Pile, but she is really shy and doesn’t tend to go into the sun room, ever, so I’m likely wrong about that.
There were seven in the sun room, in total. Along with the 5 in the photo, where was one in the box nest in the shelf above, and one more was on the top of another shelf, in the corner by the old kitchen window.
Once outside, I think I counted 14 cats this morning, but I’m not quite sure.
While putting some kibble out under the shrine, I got a giggle out of this.
Deer tracks… of a sort! A deer went galumphing through the snow, instead of using the cat paths, leaving big holes.
You know what else is amusing?
The fact that my spell check accepts the word “galumphing.” !! :-D
In other things, I’m looking to finally go our Costco trip into the city today. We’re at -21C/-6F right now, with a wind chill of -31C/-24F. We are supposed to warm up to -12C/10F with a wind chill of -21C/6F this afternoon, so I’m going to wait a bit before I head out. Looking at the long range forecast, this is supposed to be our coldest day for the rest of the month. In fact, after the middle of the month, we’re supposed to have several days above freezing!
Wouldn’t that be nice.
I’ll believe it when I see it.
Hhmm… the more I look at the weather, the more I’m thinking, maybe I should just wait until tomorrow to go to Costco.
Can you tell I really don’t want to go at all? :-D
Hard to get a head count, when they move around so much.
But I think I saw 13 cats in total this morning, out of the 18 yard cats we have outside right now.
I’ve been in touch with the Cat Lady recently. Yesterday was Cabbages’ day to be spayed, at the special vet that works with cats that have had neurological problems.
If you would like to contribute to our fundraiser to reimburse the cat lady for Cabbages’ vet bills, click on the button below, or click here. If you would like to read more about it, click here.
Cabbages seems to have recovered completely, however, so that’s amazing news. The original plan had been for her to stay with them for another 2 weeks, then go to someone she’d found to adopt her, that works in animal welfare. It’s looking like that won’t happen, though. Cabbages has adopted her daughter, instead, and it looks like she will be staying where she is!
Saffron and Nicco should be on their way to fosters, and the adoption process will begin. It seems that the three of them remembered each other, as the Cat Lady found them all sleeping together in a big pile. :-)
With her help, we’ve had 6 cats spayed, vaccinated, etc. at a steeply discounted price. The amount we pay for can be done as we are able. Two had already been paid for, and I let her know that I’d made a payment for 2 more, and would be able to send a payment for the last two at the end of this month. She let me know that we do not have to make the next payment.
It was already paid for by donation!
I asked for our thanks to be passed on, if possible, and it will be. It turns out that someone had bequeathed a donation to the organization for spays and neuters! That was so thoughtful of them, and much appreciated.
There are some issues going on, partly in regards to the vet bills with the clinic we use, partly due to finding fosters, so we do not have any more appointments set up, yet. The Cat Lady is trying to find us an alternate clinic we can take cats to. Worst case scenario, she would pick up cats from us to stay with her for a few days, they would have their appointments with a vet, and then they might have to stay with us for a while until fosters can be found and the adoption process started. Which works for us. We’re already taking care of them all, so there wouldn’t be much change. We still have several females to do that are indoors, but we should also be able to start catching some of the outdoor males, as well. Of all the outdoor cats that we can actually catch, Rolando Moon is the only female left, and she’s already fixed. Oh, and sometimes Rosencrantz, depending on her mood. It would be better if we could have started with the females, but that would require trapping, and we’re not going to do that until the temperatures are safer.
The Cat Lady will contact us as soon as she has information, and then we’ll decide on which cats are next in line for a vet visit.
We’re okay with any delays. At least the process is happening, and we will slowly be able to find forever homes for most of the cats.
I just had to laugh when I came into the sun room this morning, and found Potato Beetle, curled up in the window.
My attempt to take a photo disturbed him.
Gosh, he looks like such a grizzled old man!
He’s only three.
Since we’ve been keeping the sun room doors propped slightly open to allow access to the working heated water bowl, he seems to be spending most of his time in there – if he can claim their favourite bed before one of the other cats gets into it!
In total, I spotted 15 cats this morning. Even Ghost Baby flashed momentarily into view before disappearing again.
I had a bit of a surprise this morning. After finishing with food and water for the cats, I popped into the sun room to get seeds for the feeding station. When I stepped outside again, I was startled by a loud HUFFFFFF!!
The piebald deer had just wanted into the people gate in the chain link fence. I think we startled each other, and she was warning me off! :-D
This is the first time I’ve actually heard a deer make a noise.
It was funny to watch her as she ran down the shovelled paths to towards the back of the garage, then across to the compost pile, huffing away at me every now and then, before running into the spruce grove. There, she and another deer that was already there, stopped to watch while I put the feed out.
I later saw three of them at the feeding station, watching me as I moved around in the outer yard.
I got the burn barrel going again and, as usual, had company.
I don’t know why, but Agnoos just LOVES it when we are at the burn barrel. He rolls around in the snow, usually at our feet, asking for attention. Of all the outside cats, Agnoos seems to be the one that wants human attention the most, but never so much as while we’re tending the burn barrel!
I wasn’t able to stay out too long, though, as it started to snow. We were already at -5C/23F this morning, and are holding there for most of the day, but we are now under a “blowing snow advisory”.
Unfortunately, for all the shoveling on the roof my daughters did, the warmer weather has resulted in leaking at one of the windows upstairs. *sigh* We need a new roof so badly! We have the leak upstairs, and right now the ceiling in the sun room has icicles hanging from it. :-(
We’re supposed to cool down to between -10C/14F and -15C/5F over the next few days, so that should stop the leaking for a while, at least.
I guess I was just too disruptive this morning, because I wasn’t able to get any pictures of the outside cats! We’re expecting another warm day, so I wanted to make sure the sidewalk was scraped and cleared, so the concrete can warm up in the sun and melt away any remaining ice and snow.
The deer didn’t seem to mind! I saw a group of three, before I headed out, then my husband saw the usual pair, before the piebald finally came around. We are definitely seeing a lot more deer lately, all over. Sadly, that also means we’re seeing more on the side of the highways, that had been hit by cars. I’ve lost count of how many bald eagles I’ve seen, scavenging the carcasses. I’ve never seen as many bald eagles as I have this year – and it’s only the beginning of March!
While checking and tending our seedlings, I was happy to see the 4 new Canteen gourd seedlings are growing very quickly. I had been wondering about the on luffa that started to sprout, but hasn’t gotten any bigger, so when I had the chance, I checked it out.
Oh. This would be why it’s not growing.
That little bit of seedling had been right against the side of the pot, but when I touched the leaves, it fell right out.
So far, there’s just the one luffa seedling we have, which seems to be surviving the cat damage all right. I’m not as sure about the one Canteen gourd in that tray, but with that one, we at least have 4 new sprouts. Aside from the one seedling that did not succeed, there is no sign of more luffa germinating. We still have luffa seeds, so I’m thinking of adding more to the pots to try again.
The seedlings in the mini-greenhouse seem to be struggling, and not just the ones with cat damage. I suspect part of the problem is that we have to keep the plastic cover on it, to keep the cats out. I’ve put the little fan we’ve got, inside the mini-greenhouse, so there is at least going to be air circulation. They may be getting over watered, too. We’ll have to watch out for that.
In other things, I got word from the garage about my mother’s car. It’s ready to be picked up. He checked it over, reset the codes and found nothing wrong with it. Most likely, the check engine light and codes were triggered by changing out the battery. Which is a relief to hear, but I still don’t know what made that “pop” noise when the car died! We’ll head in this afternoon to pick it up and hopefully, I’ll have a chance to talk to him about it.
It’ll be good to have the car issues over and done with for a while!
Beep Beep and her “baby”, Turmeric, were all shmushed together adorably, looking so sweet and innocent.
They lie.
;-)
I counted a total of 14 outside cats this morning. They were very happy to see me. The water bowl in the sun room was completely dry, and all the kibble was gone. From the state of things, it looks like something other than cats has been into it. We’d given them a big, meaty turkey carcass to pick at, but something made off with most of the bones last night.
I stayed out longer this morning, hauling more snow away from the pile at the well cap, and getting the burn barrel going again, to burn away more of the sawdust from the cat litter. It keeps going out. :-/ Not enough air getting into the barrel to keep it smoldering.
Before going back inside, I found Agnoos had claimed prime real estate in the sun room. :-) One of my daughters headed out later, to continue working on the snow pile, and Agnoos was still there!
Feeling the need for some cat therapy right now. I just got a call from my brother, who had made the drive out to visit our mother. I can’t go into detail here, but it turns out my mother has, yet again, stabbed him in the back and kicked him in the teeth. She actually did it over a year ago, but he just found out about it today, and the betrayal is just heartbreaking.
One thing is for sure. I am so very thankful that my brother owns the property we are on, not my mother. If my mother still owned the farm, we’d probably have moved out by now. Knowing all this is part of my mother’s slowly failing mental faculties does not make it any better. She’s just well enough to function independently, but also just far gone enough to really mess things up, with no understanding of the consequences of her actions.
With all the vehicle troubles we’ve been having, we still haven’t done our monthly Costco trip and, frankly, I didn’t even want to think about it. Aside from that fact that I dislike shopping in general, the unexpected work on the van and my mother’s car has me just plain not wanting to drive, if I can avoid it. I keep expecting something else to break down!
In the end, I decided to make the shorter trip to a nearer Walmart, since some of the stuff we need isn’t available at Costco, anyhow. I’ll save the Costco trip for after my tax return comes in, which should be in less than a week.
After I got back and the girls took care of hauling things in and putting it all away, I took advantage of the -4C/25F temperatures and chipped away at the snow over the well cap.
We can at least access it now, though as you can see by the height of the snow the shovel is leaning against, we have a lot more to haul away to prevent spring flooding in this corner.
Most of the outside cats were very unhappy with the commotion I was making and ran off, but Tuxedo Mask stayed to watch me from the warmth and comfort of their shelter. :-)
Oh, my goodness! As I am writing this, a deer has just shown up on the live feed for the driveway cam. Usually, it goes down the driveway and to the road, but this time he went up the cat path to the old shed we shovelled out. It isn’t shovelled all the way, because of the things buried in the snow at the far end, but it looks like she went the rest of the way through, and disappeared into the shed!
Too funny!
Now I’m trying to remember if there’s anything in there a deer might damage. ;-)
Where was I?
Oh, right…
Tuxedo Mask had front row seating in their shelter, but I found that Potato Beetle had claimed prime real estate inside the sun room.
He was more than happy to get some attention, too! What a sweetie!
While at the store today, I did pick up something extra. We’ve still got those beef bones in the freezer, and I want to make and can bone broth. That would require using the pressure canner, which we still haven’t even tested out. It turns out we can’t use a pressure canner on our new glass top stove. I kept finding contradictory information about that, but eventually concluded it’s not something we can do.
The stove we have is the type cycles the heat on and off, rather than reaching a temperature and then maintaining it. Which means the pressure doesn’t remain constant, either. I have used the smaller pressure cooker on it, as a sort of a test, and it did have some issues. I noticed that when we did water bath canning, it was difficult to keep the water to temperature as well, because of the cycling.
We can make it work with the little pressure cooker and with water bath canning, but the potential problems with a pressure canner ranges from not being able to maintain the correct pressure, to shattering the glass cooktop. !!
So, when I spotted this, I decided it was worth the splurge. It was only about $25, anyhow.
We actually do have a two burner countertop cooker we found while cleaning the new part basement, but I have not yet dared to test it out. It looks like sometime from the 70’s. It might be useable, but not for something as large and heavy as a canner.
This new one should be safer to use, and with a more controllable temperature. We’ll test it out the next time I use the little pressure cooker, first. I might even find something to use our big stock pot as a water bath canner again. If it can handle the size and weight of that stock pot, it won’t have any problem with the size and weight of the pressure canner!
When my daughter bought the new stove, none of us expected to have any sorts of problems like this! We thought the glass top would make things easier, not more complicated! :-D
For all our efforts, a cat still managed to get into the mini-greenhouse. My daughter found Susan … SUSAN! … sitting on the second lowest shelf. I would have expected Tissue, or even Turmeric, but not Susan! My daughter got her out but Susan didn’t seem to be into anything, so she thought things were okay.
I went over to see where she got in and how to block it better, when I saw this terrible sight.
She ate the Sophie’s Choice tomato leaves! Two of them, right down to the stems! A couple others even looked like the soil was dug into.
I took the trays off the two bottom shelves, rearranged the box we put to block the back and used packing tape under the corners, taping the plastic cover to the bottom shelf. Hopefully, there are no more gaps a cat can squeeze into.
The tray with the eaten tomato seedlings then went onto the bottom, where the light is, and the tray with the gourd pots went up a level.
There is a Canteen gourd breaking soil, so there’s at least that to be happy about.
We still have some Sophie’s Choice seeds left, so we can start some again, but the instructions for these said to start them much earlier than other varieties. Hopefully, we still have time.
Hopefully, some of what we already have will survive, too.
Once that was all done, it was time to do some research and…
Yes. Tomato leaves ARE toxic to cats. However, it takes quite a bit to make them sick, and quite a bit more to endanger their lives. For the amount she ate, she might throw up or something, but nothing major.
This is just so, so frustrating! And potentially alarming.
We’ve had issues with cats going after our plants before. Usually to dig in the dirt, not to eat them, though there was that one succulent we had that they just couldn’t resist.
Notice I said “had”. :-(
We’ve got all sorts of barriers around our remaining house plants to keep them out. As much as the damage done to them bothered me, right now we’re trying to grow food, not decorations, so this is bothering me more.
Why are the cats so determined to destroy our seedlings? There are the barriers, the space around the trays is tight, the pots and trays are wet – we just refilled the bottoms of most of the trays to water from below – and you’d think something in the nightshade family would taste pretty gross.
I am not at all happy right now. :-(
I will, however, share a photo of some well behaved kitties I took earlier.
When I headed outside to get a meter reading, I spotted these two, cuddling together in the sun room. Agnoos is fine with us, but the ‘iccus he was cuddling with is one of the more feral cats. I had to move fast to get a picture before he (she?) ran away. I’m not sure which one this is, but from the facial markings, I’m guessing this is the one the girls named Sadiccus. He looks like he’s been crying!
Which is kinda what I feel like doing right now. Crying in frustration!!
The heated water bowl had a layer of ice across the top, but wasn’t frozen solid. The second one in the sun room was bone dry this morning, so it does show that the cats have figured out where they can get water.
We’ve had a busy day outside our living room window!
We’ve had quite a few deer visiting the feeding station, and just plain hanging out. The piebald has been standing around the old junk pile (maybe we should start calling it something else, since we cleared out the junk and there’s just old stacked boards now), chillin’ for at least a couple of hours. Others have just been wandering around the area, sometimes at the feeding station, sometimes nibbling lilac twigs, sometimes among the spruces, nibbling whatever underbrush they happen to be next to.
Keith had front row seating to watch them all, with his ever tragic expression!
Now that Saffron is gone, other cats have been sitting on the warm light fixture over the seedlings. Especially Fenrir and, pictured above, Beep Beep.
It must feel nice on their still nekkid bellies!
Today, I finally got around to sterilizing bottles and equipment, and bottling the second carboy of hard crab apple sider.
The one I meant to bottle months ago!
The other other we had fermenting was bottled back in August. If you follow that link, the post has links to the whole process of making it, starting from when we picked the apples back in September, of 2020. We had no apples in 2021, so no new crab apple brews of any kind, sadly.
So… yeah. This carboy has been fermenting since September of 2020.
When the other carboy was bottled, we didn’t do a hydrometer reading, so I did that from the last bottle we’ve got of it, while preparing to bottle the second batch.
I really hate doing hydrometer readings. I can’t read the tiny numbers and have to take pictures to be able to see them – but the camera does NOT want to focus on the hydrometer.
Anyhow.
After – hopefully – reading the hydrometer right, the ABV calculator I’ve got came to 10.5% Alcohol By Volume.
For the second carboy, I did a reading before starting to bottle, and the calculation came to 11.8% Alcohol By Volume.
Not too shabby!
The jug we’re using as the carboy after racking the initial brew was repurposed from a 3L wine bottle. I was able to fill three 750L bottles, plus a 250ml bottle, before it was down to the dregs.
Of course, we had to do a taste test to compare the two.
The first thing you’ll notice in the pictures, is that the cider I was about to bottle is a darker colour compared to the one already bottled.
The previously bottled cider had a strong, almost bitter, taste to it. It tasted stronger of alcohol, too, though it had a lower percentage.
The newly bottled cider had a fruitier, smoother taste.
Both tasted good, but I prefer the one that stayed in the carboy for 1 1/2 years. That extra 7 months seems to have made a positive difference.
I do hope we have crab apples this year. I look forward to making this again!
We are supposed to be warming up, and predicted highs and overnight lows were all forecasted to be above -20C/-4F at night, and around the -15C/5F range during the day. Pleasant stuff, really.
At the same time, the app on my phone had a warnings that the cold spell would through to today. I’d read that, look at the forecasted temperatures, and wonder what “cold spell” they were talking about.
This morning, the actual temperature was -28C/-18F before wind chill.
We’ve already warmed up to -16C/3F as I write this, but it’s frustrating to see such wildly different predictions, at the same time, within the same app.
For the outside cats, this is spring, already.
And by “spring”, I mean “mating season.” This morning, I looked out the kitchen window and saw Tuxedo Mask, whom you can see by the water bowls in the above photo, getting lucky with Broccoli.
We don’t know how many female cats we have out there right now; most of the newest cats that are reaching their first birthday in the next couple of months, are cats we haven’t been able to get close enough to see. Of the ones that we could, only Nosencrantz, who is now fixed and indoors, and Broccoli, whom we can’t touch, were identifiable as female. Of course, with the older cats, we know that Ghost Baby, Junk Pile and Rosencrantz are female. Tuxedo Mask is Junk Pile’s baby, while Broccoli is Butterscotch’s, and with both tuxedos and calicos showing up in litters only since we’ve moved out here, we’ve at least got some new bloodlines being introduced. When we first moved here, it was mostly orange tabbies.
By the time the Cat Lady is ready to start taking in outdoor cats for adopting, we’re probably already going to have more kittens. Which I don’t mind, really. If they got taken earlier, they’d probably still get spayed, and I’m not okay with kitty abortions any more than I am human ones. They can be spayed later.
While setting food out under the shrine, I found myself being watched! I’m not sure which if the ‘iccuses this is, other than it’s not Chadiccus, who was busily trying to trip me over by the kibble house, or Bradiccus, who it the only one with a white tail tip.
Speaking of trying to trip me…
Agnoos really wanted attention!
When I came into the sun room, he had the prime spot in the window, on the pillow lined box. :-D
We’re leaving the sun room doors propped open regularly now, with the heated water bowl in there kept on. The outside heated water bowl had ice across the top, but was not frozen solid, which suggests it is still working, at least a bit. Very odd. I look forward to being able to being able to pick it up and give it a thorough examination. Since we know the extension cords are fine and the water bowl is still plugged in, that leaves the cord to the bowl itself, and most of it is under packed snow. Maybe the deer stepped in it or something and damaged it somehow. There is nothing obvious that can be seen, without being able to actually pick up the bowl and looking under it. At least we’ve got the second one’s cord taped up and it’s working fine, inside the sun room. It just means we can’t close the outside doors completely! With things warming up (if we can trust the forecast), that should be okay now.
In other things:
We have our van back. The tensioner got replaced and, so far, that seems to be making a difference – though I get the sense that there is something draining our battery while the engine is off. No idea what it could be. The mechanic wasn’t seeing anything obvious.
Our wipers are working again. Something got misaligned somehow – possibly accidentally knocked about while the alternator was being replaced. With the wipers mounted so low and under the hood, that’s entirely possible. It took next to nothing for him to fix it, and there was no charge for it. The cost to replace the tensioner was on the low end of the estimate, so we are still under budget on that, which is nice.
As for my mother’s car…
We’re still hopeful it’s something minor setting off the check engine light. After I’d sent him the codes my scanner showed, he’d done his own research. If it is related to the transmission, he couldn’t do the work himself. With one code’s possibility, it would have to go into the city to get the work done. With the other, it might have to go to a Dodge dealership for recalibration after the part was installed – a part which he might be able to find second hand, for $1200.
That would be the less expensive of the potential problems.
Not going to happen.
Those are the worst case possibilities, and our mechanic knows we wouldn’t be able to afford that kind of work. It’s my mother’s car, but I already know she wouldn’t pay for it, even if I asked her to, which I won’t. I’m sure he remembers how difficult it was to get her to pay for the major work that needed to be done, the first time we brought her car in to him. He’d owned the garage for less than a year, at the time, and her car was stuck on a lift, with parts and pieces removed, for about a month before my mother finally agreed to pay for it. My mother firmly believes that all garages lie and cheat little old ladies like her, so even if work clearly does need to be done, she doesn’t believe it. My poor brother put up with a lot of abuse from her, when he was the one getting her car taken care of for her. He’s much kinder and gentler than I am, and her behaviour was very hurtful to him. I’ve become an old crone with very thick skin and, as frustrating as her behaviour can be, at least she can’t hurt me anymore. My brother is a much better person than I am! :-D
All that over a car. :-/
We shall see what the garage finds. I don’t have any expectations for when he can give it a thorough check, since he’ll be working it around the appointments he already has.
All in good time.
Meanwhile…
When we discovered the belt broke on our new vacuum cleaner (probably my fault… LOL), I ordered replacement belts from Hoover in early February. They sent me a USPS tracking number, but it always read, ‘information unavailable’. Once we got a running vehicle and I could check the mail, confirming it was not in, I contacted Hoover about it not being in.
I got a response saying that, according to their information, it was delivered. It turns out that, once the package got to Canada, it was shipped by Purolator. I got a new tracking number and…
According to Purolator, it was delivered to us on Feb. 28.
We did not get any deliveries.
I wrote back saying we don’t have it; wherever they delivered it to, it wasn’t us. I also mentioned we might not even be in their delivery zone.
This morning, I got a new email. They’re sending it to us again – with a different delivery company! I also got an order confirmation for the re-order. I made sure to write back to explain our physical address won’t show up on GPS because our road is not labelled on maps, asking that our land line phone number be available for the driver if they need to call for directions. I also made sure to mention we are in a cell phone dead zone, so a driver might not be able to get a signal in our area.
I recognise the delivery company name, though, only because companies my daughter has ordered from have used them. They are not common here. If I remember correctly, they were one of the delivery drivers that left her package tied to the gate.
We’ll see how that works.
I think it’s time for me to send another edit to Google Maps to get our road properly labelled.
The Re-Farmer 