Mama and the twins have braved the presence of Scary Eunice, the snowman.
Barbecue and Hungry Girl came by this morning, too.
The Re-Farmer
Wildlife out our window
For the Birds
Alas, no deer photos today. None dared go past the snowman to get to the feed.
The birds, on the other hand, had no such issues.
I played around with the preset settings on the camera today and found that the landscape setting seems to address a problem I’ve had with some photos I’ve attempted.
Getting images of the birds when they are sitting in the lilac bush.
This redpoll is on a branch that broke from the weight of our recent snowfall. It is at the far side of the bush from our window, so there are twigs and tall grass in the way. It’s pretty rare for the birds to perch somewhere that doesn’t have twigs or branches in the way of a clear shot. The camera will keep trying to focus on the things in front, and in the time it takes me to get it to focus past them, the birds are usually gone. But on this setting, it seemed to ignore the things in the foreground and focus on the larger objects behind them.
I’m still at a loss about the purple that is in the photo. It’s there in the original, unadjusted image. When I lighten the images for these posts, it brings the purple out just like any other colour in the image.
It’s not in all of them, though.
This is actually the first photo I took today. The bluejay is perched lower down on the broken branch. You can see the shadows of twigs in between the camera and the blue jay.
No purple in sight!
Any camera people who can explain it to me?
I also got a nice shot of a blue jay in the sun.
Oh, those colours!
I think I could happily paint the entire house in that blue on its head, neck and shoulders.
Hopefully, tomorrow, the deer will be brave enough to emerge from the trees and I’ll be able to get some photos of them, too.
The Re-Farmer
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The deer showed up, too!
One last post for today!
This morning, I was quite surprised to see Hungry Girl show up on her own. This was early enough that the feed wasn’t quite covered by the snow, yet.
She was very skittish coming in. I wouldn’t be surprised that all that snow would have made everything sound very different to a deer.
Gosh, she still looks pretty rough, doesn’t she?
Though the feed was still visible, she nuzzled pretty deep into the snow as she was feeding.
I just couldn’t resist posting this goofy photo of her!
Later on, well after the snow had covered the feed, Barbecue came by, too.
He had to dig his nose down pretty far to get at the feed by then, but he had no problem finding exactly where the food was!
He gets a more dignified profile picture. :-D
I saw Hungry Girl come along shortly after, but they were both very nervous and ran off before she got to the food again. They did come back, but not for long.
They at least got some food, though. I’m hoping that Mama and the twins come by at some point, too, for a bit of a snack.
The snow has stopped falling now. My brother who lives nearby was kind enough to come and clear our driveway out. He’d fired up the tractor to do his own driveway and just popped over to do ours as well. I’d seen the snow plows going by the main road earlier, so I’m hoping they’d already gone through the road past our place before he came over. The last time the snowplows went by, they left a windrow across our driveway. Not enough of one to be more than a bump, but having another one on top of that now would be much more than just a bump!
After doing the driveway, he came in for a bit of a chat. During the conversation, he mentioned last winter being one of the coldest in many decades! He feeds deer with hay at his place, and he said he was feeding 39 of them! I just can’t imagine that many deer crowded around by his place. He trained his dog to leave them alone. He said that they were pretty mean to each other, too, attacking each other with their hooves. One young orphan deer was small enough to jump up into the round hay bale and get some food while avoiding attacks from the other deer. After a while, he broke up the bale to spread it out, so they could feed farther apart and not be attacking each other so much. Sadly, one night, a pack of coyotes killed a young deer, right there next to his house! They had heard their dog barking like crazy, but by the time they saw why, it was too late.
Coyotes can be a real problem. Especially when the population is high enough for them to start forming packs. That’s one of the reasons I want us to get our firearms acquisition certificate as quickly as we can, and get at least a .22 rifle. Being on the farm without a gun feels very wrong. It’s a vital tool. Especially if we do start getting farm animals over the next few years.
This has been a pretty mild winter, though, so there is less chance of a hungry coyote showing up and attacking anything in our yard.
It’s supposed to be just below freezing over the next few days, then creep above freezing again.
Time to keep a close eye out on the roof, and for any more leaks that might show up! Hopefully, once the roof is shoveled off, that won’t be an issue. We shall see.
The Re-Farmer
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Blue Jay Antics
I had a blast getting pictures of the blue jays today! They were dashing in and out of the trees and to the seeds so fast, it was a real challenge. Many of the photos didn’t work out at all because of that. More than a few times, by the time I took the shot, the bird was already gone, and I was left with a picture of a pile of seeds! :-D
These photos were taken before the snow completely covered the seeds, and I fiddled around with the settings on the camera part way through, to try and better capture flight images. Unfortunately, one of the down sides of using the zoom lens is that it makes for darker photos. Between the two, I had to do a fair bit of lightening of the images. Hardly the best photography, but they were fun to take!
I just love that little head tilt!
Out of focus, but gosh, I love this one!
It wasn’t until I cropped and lightened the photo that I could finally see what was really going on here – that blue jay in front plowed right into the soft snow at landing!
It then immediately turned and hopped the other way, again, sinking into the snow on landing!
The other bird seems to have a “this guy is nuts” expression going. :-D
Another poor photo, as far as image quality goes, but I think it’s my favourite of the bunch. Just look at those wing feathers!
The Re-Farmer
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In the snow
The predicted snow finally arrived last night. While other parts of the province is storming, we have had a gentle snowfall.
The feed I left out this morning has been buried, but that is not stopping the critters from finding it. Like this squirrel.
Also, our satellite internet is having troubles due to the weather. My husband has been able to get enough signal for a wifi hotspot. Let’s see how long before I can upload and post this video! It’s already failed to upload twice as I’ve tapped this out on my phone.
The Re-Farmer
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Catching Up With Old Friends
Today was one of those weird days.
I woke up this morning, feeling like I was coming down with something – sore throat, stuffy nose, and my entire body aching. Even all the knuckles in my fingers hurt. So I took some pain killers and went back to bed.
I didn’t wake up again until 11!!
I was feeling better after that second sleep, but now I’m feeling exhausted, while having done nothing to warrant such fatigue.
My old daughter was a sweetheart and took care of the feeding of critters this morning. She posted photos of a couple of cats on her tumblr, which are just too funny. She even got photos on the big camera for me.
Rolando Moon was on her favorite spot on the old barrel.
Beep Beep settled herself in one of her favorite spots.
And yes, that is most definitely grass growing through the snow!
I’m guessing this is Nasty Crime Boy, up at the top of the dead spruce tree.
All those cats make the deer nervous! :-D
I was out for much of the day, heading into town to visit with an old friend from high school. We’ve been trying to connect for a couple of months, now, and finally have!
It was so good to see her again, and there was so much to catch up on! Too much for just one visit.
We’ll just have to get together again. :-D
When it comes to playing catch up with old friends after so long, I have been finding it difficult to maintain any sense of order or time. We start talking about one thing, which leads us to jumping ahead a few years, or back even more years. Or saying one thing would remind us of something else, only tangentially related. One big change in playing catch up these days is something I appreciate about or technology. We were both digging out our phones, able to share photos and video about so many things! When we left this province, the first smart phones were still just coming out, and texting hadn’t even become that big of a thing, yet. Very few phones had cameras, and none could take video, yet. It’s much easier to share things with each other, now! It’s pretty awesome!
One thing I definitely noticed, as we went through photos, a photo album and even an old high school year book (I could barely recognize our own faces!), is how many people we are now talking about in the past tense. We’ve both lost siblings and parents, and an amazing number of people we went to school with are no longer with us.
I always knew we’d be reaching that point in our lives, but somehow I didn’t think we’d reach it quite so quickly.
After a wonderful visit, I took advantage of being in town and played a bit of Pokemon Go. One of the new things about the game is that it reflects the local weather.
Or at least what the forecasters say should be the current weather.
We’ve had all sorts of storm warnings for the Southern half of the province. We are just on the Northern edge of the forecasted storm area. I figured we’d at least gets some snow, but we didn’t even get that. Yet, according to the game, we should have been in the middle of the storm, and the game opened with an extreme conditions warning, where you have to tap a button that confirms, “yes, I’m safe” to continue to play the game! It was rather funny.
While I was gone, the girls decided to bake some sourdough bread, and make some sourdough “piggies in blankets” – sourdough bread wrapped around wieners and baked. They even kneaded some shredded cheese into the dough for the piggies. Hmm. They were made with all beef wieners. Maybe they should be called beefies in a blanket? LOL One of these days, I’ll get some good pictures of them to share. They’re a nice supper treat. :-)
I have a wonderful family.
The Re-Farmer
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Do I See What I Think I See?
I just finished going through my photos of the feeding station today.
Mama and the twins came by nice and early, and even stood together in a lovely grouping that allowed me to get photos of all three of them, at once.
How considerate of them. :-D
“Hey! Hey, Mom! Look at me! My nose is all tickley.”
I got a couple of good ones with a blue jay. I really liked this one.
Something about that tilt of the head makes me smile.
Then the sun started shining on the feeding station, and Wow! did those feathers start to shine!
The camera just does not do justice to how must those brighter blues gleamed and glittered. It was amazing to see!
Then a squirrel posed nicely for me.
It wasn’t until I was cropping the photo that I spotted something…
Is that green grass growing in there?!?! There are so many little spruce tips on the ground, that’s what I thought it was at first, but no…
I think that really is new grass!
It’s only March. We’re nowhere near done winter yet. There’s a storm predicted for tomorrow evening, though we’re at the very northern edge of the expected path. We should get a few centimeters of snow, at least. While the long term forecasts are for warmer weather, there’s almost always at least one last blizzard in April that hits, before spring finally arrives.
Seeing that green right now is very interesting. What it likely shows is how much warmer the darker areas are, even with snow under the dust and debris. Little patches of micro-climates.
Cool!
The Re-Farmer
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Two Steps Forward, One Step Back?
Before I get into the bureaucratic battle of the day, I will start with the pleasant things.
Critters.
Mama and the twins came out first, today, but at one point, we had all 5 deer hanging around.
Then Mama and the twins chased off Hungry Girl and Barbecue, who hung out in the spruces for a while. Barbecue tried to come back, but one of the twins chased him off. Then Mama and the twins left, and Hungry Girl and Barbecue had a chance to eat.
I had to include this one. It looks like he’s shouting!
Mama and the twins hadn’t gone far, though, and hung out in the garden area for a while. When the twins started to come back, it was Hungry Girl’s turn to chase them off. Back and forth it went, until they were done eating. Then the birds got their turn!
The grosbeaks really like the black oil seeds. There aren’t as many in the deer feed, and we didn’t get one of the big sacks of just that type of birdseed this time around, so we’re seeing less of them, already.
Quite the drama! :-D
That redpoll looks like it’s trying to figure out just what those crazy deer are doing!
In the middle of all this, I finally got a call back from Vital Statistics. We’ve been playing telephone tag for a while. The main question she had for me involved our address, of all things. I included both our postal address and our physical address. She went with just the PO Box. Then there was all the confirming of names and spellings; my husband’s name became the issue, because she wanted to put in his first name, as it is on his birth certificate, but that’s not the name he uses, nor is it what he would have put on the form when we got married, nor anywhere else. Then there is the whole “birth name” and “name before marriage” part. I told her about the problems I was having because of the names, so she ended up deciding to drop my husband’s first name completely. That done, she said she would finish processing it today, and it’d be done! Yay!
Then I got a phone call on my cell phone. Yeah. It was my old doctor’s office, once again calling the wrong number. At least it rang, this time, though she couldn’t hear me and I had to call back on the land line.
Turns out that they can’t do debit Visa, after all.
They also don’t take electronic transfers.
So I’m going to have to find a check. *sigh*
My younger daughter and I went into town again, to pick up some things we forgot yesterday. We took the opportunity to play Pokemon Go, and it was actually warm enough that we walked over to a couple of gyms. One of them is right along the lakeside that, in the summer, you can walk to rather easily, but in the winter, there is no path. When we walked over, though, we would see a trampled path in the snow from the other players that have made their way to it, too. With things half melted, it was a little rough and hard on the ankles, but we managed not to slip and twist anything. :-D
Among our errands, she picked up some birthday beer for her sister; a splurge on some Innis and Gunn. Not sure how I ended up with daughters who like beer. I could never acquire a taste for it, myself. Same with wine. Maybe it’s because I got traumatized by the cheap swill I drank back when I was a teen pretending to be cool at bush parties. LOL
When I got home, there was a message waiting for me. From Vital Statistics. She wanted me to call back.
Telephone tag it is, once again!
So the two things I thought were finally done…
Aren’t.
*sigh*
The Re-Farmer
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Hello, March!
Ah, what a lovely spring day we are having today! As I write this, our temperature is at +2C. That’s right, I’ve had to add a + to the temperature! We are above freezing temperatures right now, and it’s already evening.
Awesome.
Of course, we’re also getting storm warnings for Sunday – when we’re also supposed to be above freezing for temperatures, so it’s a heavy snowfall that would happen, if it does happen. From talking to my dad over the years, these snowfalls tend to miss the farm, and hit farther south. So we’ll see.
The melting snow has left the deer feeding area looking much bigger! All the detritus of past feedings is being revealed, so the spots where I’ve been leaving little piles of seeds are now looking much bigger. And blacker.
This morning, Hungry Girl and Barbecue came over before I’d gone out to freshen up the feed. I tried to take photos, but the camera wouldn’t work. Checking the display, I saw what looked like CHR. Or maybe CHA. Anyhow, I figured the battery needed to be charged. So I took the one from the camera to charge and popped on the extra.
Which was also almost dead, even though I had fully charged it not long ago. I still thought there was enough charge to take some photos, but not; I still got the same display.
So I missed getting photos of them while the batteries charged.
It turned out not to be the batteries.
Somehow, the memory card got locked. The photos I took yesterday are still there. I copied them, but I can’t remove them, nor can I take more photos on the card.
I have no idea how this happened, or even where. It could have happened on the camera itself, or on the desktop.
I will have to investigate further.
I did, however, get a nice photo of a blue jay, at least.
I got a call from my husband’s doctor this morning about a change in his medication. (I appreciate that they will talk directly to me about it, so I don’t have to interrupt his lie-downs.) The new medication is covered by insurance, so he gave me information and instructions about it, then sent the prescription to the pharmacy so I could pick it up today. Rather nice having a prescription that we don’t have to physically pick up at the clinic and take to the pharmacy within a limited time period!
So my younger daughter and I headed into town to pick it up (and get some Pokemon Go in).
While there, I checked to see if my own file was successfully transferred from our previous pharmacy (it was) and if it had been filled (it was). So I got both at the same time.
One of the pharmacists and a trainee spent some time with me, making sure I had the needed information about the updated medication, the dose, when to take it, etc. They even opened the package to look at the paperwork to make sure the dose measurements on the injector pen matched the previous version of the medication. It did, but the dose my husband is supposed to be on is quite high, so the box will only last a few days. It was decided to leave it as is, for starters, then in the future we can get multiples of boxes, so I’ll have fewer trips into town.
Meanwhile I glanced at my own prescriptions and choked at the price tag.
The insurance coverage wasn’t used.
So I let them know and gave them my insurance card. Once done with my husband’s prescription, they started fixing my file.
It’s a good thing I brought an insulated bag and asked for ice packs.
I think I spent at least half an hour waiting, as they first tried to get my insurance set up on my file in their system, which failed, and the pharmacist then called the insurance company directly.
Long story short.
They couldn’t get it to work.
At the insurance company’s end, the person was going to talk to someone else, but that someone else was on lunch, so she would call the pharmacy back later.
The pharmacist, meanwhile, felt that the problem was at their end, not the insurance company. I could pay the full price and get reimbursed (nope; we may have just got paid, but reimbursement wouldn’t happen until it got fixed, and who knows how long that would take), or she was willing to transfer the prescription to the competing pharmacy across the street to be filled.
Yeah! Really!
I decided to not get them for now (it’s a good thing they’re not a vital prescription!!). She said she would call me if she got a call back from the insurance company. I mentioned coming back tomorrow, but she suggested I call, first.
So what should have been a quick trip into town, with some leisurely Pokemon-ing ended up being much longer. At least there is a Pokestop right next to the pharmacy, so my daughter was able to throw on a lure and played on both our phones while she waited for me.
Meanwhile, my phone let me know I had a voice mail. Which was weird, because I got no phone call. Turns out I did, but it just never rang. It was my previous doctor’s office, wanting to talk to me about my file transfer.
So, once I got home, I had lots of phone calls to make.
I called the insurance company and explained what happened. He could see nothing wrong with my file on the system, so he put me on hold to talk to someone else.
When he came back, I could hear the perplexity in his voice. It turns out that in one area, my account was active, but in another, I was no longer active. They don’t know why. So he was going to contact the carrier my husband’s work is hooked up with to figure things out and get my file fully active again.
Hopefully, it will not take as long as it did to fix up the mess with my husband’s file.
Then I talked to my old clinic. Turns out there is a $35 fee to transfer a file, and how did I want to pay that? I don’t have a credit card, but I do have debit Visa, which they take, so we did that.
I also updated my address and phone number, so she wouldn’t call my cell phone, though my cell phone number is still there as a back up.
Then I worked on something else when I got a notification from my phone.
Another voice mail.
Yeah. She called my cell phone. And since I had zero signal at the time, it went straight to voice mail.
I called back and found out my card was declined. Which made no sense.
So I called the bank’s 866 number on my card.
Which got answered with a cheerful recording saying I could help them out by taking a short survey. As a reward, select customers could win a Caribbean cruise.
Uh huh.
So I went through the three question survey (there was no option not to take it), and at the end, the cheerful recording congratulated me, because I just won the cruise; it would only cost a $65 processing fee. Did I want to accept the prize?
Uh huh.
So I selected yes. A live person answered the phone, greeting me with an “are you excited about winning this cruise?” To which I responded, “Actually, I’m trying to figure out how I got you guys, because I was trying to phone … ”
*click*beepbeepbeep*
She hung up on me.
I called the bank’s number again and got through to where I was supposed to. After being on hold a while, I made sure to first tell the person who answered what happened. She took notes to pass on to the back office to see if there was a security breach on their system.
Then I talked to her about my debit Visa being declined. She checked, but there was nothing wrong with my card. After getting more details, she put me on hold and went to talk to someone in the back office about it. When she got back, she informed me that no transaction on my card was attempted, according to their system.
Which means that, somewhere between the clinic and the bank, something went wrong.
So, back on the phone with the clinic I went. I told her what the bank told me, and she was surprised, because she had tried twice. I told her the bank confirmed there is nothing wrong with my card, so she said she would try again later, then call me back if it was still a problem.
So far, no call back, but then if she tries to call my cell phone again, it might be a while before I find out. I forgot to mention that she’d called the wrong number.
Ah, well.
So, more move related hassles to sort out.
Later on, I went and got the memory card from the camera, as well as the one that got locked. I uploaded the photos I took…
And found pictures of Mama and the Twins.
I didn’t remember taking those.
I uploaded them all, then started trying to figure out what happened with the locked card, and if there was something I could find to unlock it on the desktop.
While I was doing that, my older daughter came by to let me know she’d taken some pictures of deer while we were gone.
I suddenly felt sane again. LOL
Here is one of the photos she took for me.
With the melt, it looks like there is so much more feed out there than there really is! I’d emptied the bag this morning, and picked up 3 more on the way home, so we should be good for the Month.
Now, I am looking forward to a quiet evening. I’m not used to talking so much. My throat is sore. I have a friend I’m hoping to talk to soon, and I don’t want to have to cut conversation short because I’ve spent so much time talking on the phone!
The Re-Farmer
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A long day – and yes, I got critter pictures!
It’s the last business day of the month – payday – so it was off to the city to stock up for the next month. I rather prefer to be able to do that in an afternoon in the middle of the week. As someone who hates crowds and shopping, it was a LOT less stressful.
But I am getting ahead of myself.
I was actually able to get some photos this morning. Much to my delight, we had 5 deer visitors this morning.
First to arrive were Mama and the twins.
Her babies are getting so big!
And confident, too. I caught on that Hungry Girl and Barbecue had shown up, too, only because I saw the twins chase them into the spruces!
At one point, while Mama and the twins were eating, I saw that something else was making Mama nervous. Something close to the house…
Yes, our very own cryptid, the Mothman, showed up this morning! I saw her a few days ago, going by in the same area between the feed and the house, but other than that, we haven’t been seeing her at all lately. It never fails; each time I see her, I am again struck by how big she is.
This was before I’d gone out to feed the critters, and so I popped out right away, hoping to see the Mothman. Alas, she had disappeared, once again. Not a sign of her, anywhere!
The other cats where happy to see me, though.
Nasty Crime Boy, Beep Beep and Butterscotch dove right in. Lately, the food bowls have been completely empty by morning – picked clean. I’m not sure if it’s the cats that are finishing the food off. I see enough tracks in the snow to know that some birds are eating the kibble, too. Skunks come by, but they tend to be rather dormant this time of year. I recall we briefly saw one before the snow, but not since.
Squishum and Rolando Moon got a bowl to themselves. Rolando Moon is why I tend to be surprised by Mothman’s size. Rolanda Moon is so much bigger than the other cats, with a big round belly – we thought she was pregnant at first, but she is the one my brother had fixed shortly after my husband and younger daughter arrived. She’s just big. I see her and begin to think that she and Mothman are close in size. But then I see Mothman again and… yeah. Mothman is quite a lot bigger than Rolanda Moon.
Once back inside, I found Mama and the twins had gone, but soon after, Hungry Girl and Barbecue came out of the trees.
Whatever was making them so skittish in the past week or so, seems to no longer be bothering them. They seem a bit more relaxed, and tolerant of our movements inside.
I just really like this picture of Hungry Girl. Such a pretty lady. :-)
After this, my older daughter and I worked on our shopping list. Last month, we got 3 big bags of dry cat food at Costco, as well as a bag of mixed bird seed to supplement the bag of bird seed we got locally. I opened the third bag of dry cat food just this morning. We decided to stay with 3 bags of cat food, but not to get more bird seed for now. The mixed bird seed bag is cheap at Costco, but we decided to wait until we get the bird feeder cleaned out and possibly moved by the living room window (we might just get another feeder), and start getting bird seed in the spring. For now, the birds we have this time of year are happy eating the deer feed, which has the same seeds as in the big bag of bird seed we got locally. Last month, we got 2 bags of deer feed and there is still a bit left of the second one, so we’ll likely get 3 or 4 bags of deer feed, instead of both deer feed and bird seed. At least for the next month or two.
We also decided not to get things like flour, as we can get a really good price locally, and I’d just got a big bag not long ago. And we still have lots of canned cat food left, too, so we decided to skip that. We also still haven’t even opened the laundry detergent we got last time, nor the container of cat litter, so a couple more things didn’t need to be added to the list. We are well stocked up on quite a few things, still, so our list got to be focused a lot more on actual food! :-D
That gave us room to get things we pick up more rarely; a case of Coke Zero and a case of V8 – we don’t have bottle depots in this province to get our enviro fees back, but we’re keeping the pop tabs (pure aluminum) and the cans themselves separate from the rest of the recycling. When we have enough, we’ll take them in to someplace that will pay us for the metal by weight. It might take us a long time to have enough to make it worth hauling in, but we appear to have a lot of space to store such things now. ;-)
Because I wanted to check out an aquarium store in the area, we decided to go to the Costco closest to us – the one with the pharmacy that didn’t know wtf they were doing, and the horribly designed parking lot. It’s a smaller one, too. I just didn’t feel like driving to one of the two locations farther away, then come back to a store that’s on the same street as the closer one.
Thankfully, because of the time of day, it was not very busy. A relative statement for a Costco, I know. :-D We filled a flat cart with our shopping, this time using our hard sided grocery bags to help keep the smaller stuff from falling. That worked out well.
One the the main things we are sure to pick up the most of at Costco is meats, because it’s so much cheaper than the local grocery stores – and mostly pork, because that’s even cheaper. This time, we picked up a big bag of oranges, too. Normally, we get fresh fruits and vegetables in smaller quantities at the local grocery stores, but my husband has been getting some dangerously low blood sugar readings, so he asked for some oranges. (Yes, we also have the glucose tablets.) We got twice as much eggs as usual. I typically get the double trays with 60 eggs. We go through a lot of eggs, yet never seem to have enough to boil up a whole bunch for quick snacks or to make egg salad. :-D We also got an extra gallon of milk, to make more yogurt.
My daughter has a birthday coming up, so we picked up a big fillet of salmon for her birthday dinner, as well as a big bag of mixed baby potatoes (we will have lots of regular potatoes, thanks to my sister dropping off another bag). I look forward to making a special dinner for her. :-)
All in all, I think we’re well stocked for the month again. We didn’t even have much we needed to get elsewhere, though we did stop at a Save On Foods in the area. That was my usual place to shop before our move. I even used to work there, many years ago, and found it a great company to work for, so I’m glad to support it when I have the chance.
On the way out, we found the aquarium and fish supplies shop I was looking for – it was kind of tucked away from the road, so I almost missed it. *L*
I talked to someone there about finding a replacement for a part I broke on our filter system, when trying to dismantle it for packing. I was hoping to replace all the hoses, as they are getting old and stiff. Unfortunately, no one in the city carries this brand, and the other brands use very different hoses, and none of that particular part. And I’m not about to replace the whole thing, just for a missing part. For the 90 gallon tank, the size we need cost about $380-$450, depending on the brand! After talking to him for a bit, he had a suggestion for me to try and use it anyhow – it’s stuck in the hose, anyhow, so since the part broke while I was trying to remove it from the hose, it’s not like it will pop off. I’ll have to take another look at it and see if it can be salvaged. I would REALLY like to get our 90 gallon tank going again. That 20 gallon tank was supposed to be much more temporary!
Which lead me to my next request from the guy I was talking to; to show me to their algae eaters! I had got 10 neon tetras to provide the oxygen/CO2 balance for the tank I needed. Unfortunately, after a week or so, I woke up to a mass die off! I found 6 dead tetras, and there were two live ones left. I never found the missing 2. Unfortunately, 2 tetras really aren’t enough for the amount of plants I have in there, though there is certainly enough plants that I don’t need an aerator. I’m also having a harder time with algae. Partly because the tank is next to a window, which it shouldn’t be, but I have no place else that will hold it – another reason I want to get that big tank going.
The guy first lead me to some golden plecos. Now, I love plecos, but they get BIG. When we got our first pair of little plecos, one of them killed and ate the other. Then it eventually grew to over a 18 inches long. Regular plecos can get much, much bigger than that. I want to focus more on plants when I set up the new tank, with just enough animals to have the right balance. Long term, I want it so that I don’t even need a filter, and have a self-contained, ecosystem. Plecos would be too big and active for this.
When I mentioned that I’d had two Siamese Algae eaters before, but that they didn’t survive the move, the guy lead me to the ones they had, and I got two of them.
Here is one of them.
Okay. I wasn’t going to say anything at the shop, but I’m pretty sure these are Chinese algae eaters, not Siamese. They are a lot smaller than the ones we had before, but the mouths are different, for starters. Siamese Algae eaters do not have the suckerfish mouths to attach to the side of the tank like that. We shall see as they get bigger to properly identify them.
The main thing is that they are algae eaters, and that’s what I need. They will be good with my aquatic plants.
I must admit, even with the algae, it’s much easier to maintain a tank with well water than with treated city water. I almost never need to use additives.
By the time we got home, it was almost evening, and I sure was happy to be back in our home in the middle of nowhere.
I didn’t realize just how much I’d come to dislike the noise and activity of the city until we moved away from it. I don’t mind visiting it. I just don’t want to live there.
I got a call from my mother this evening. She was in the habit of asking me how the cats are outside. Now she has started to ask me how the deer are, too! They were never around when my parents were here; at least not regularly. No one was feeding them, so they had no reason to. She is really enjoying hearing about the antics of our regular visitors – and got a chuckle out of the names I’ve given them. :-D
I also mentioned to her my thought of adding a ramp to the outside of the house. I’ve learned that my brother who lives next door was going to build one for my dad, after he’d had so many falls, but then my dad went into the nursing home. My sister does freelance house designing, so she’s got the code book for that sort of thing and was able to give me the details. My mom was okay with the idea, which is good, since it’s her house, after all. It would make things easier for her, too, when she visits. She has an awful time with those two steps right outside the main door, too.
All in good time.
I remembered to ask her about the stuff we found in the horror tunnel. It took me a while to get her to remember where I was talking about. She’d forgotten about it completely. She said she was storing stuff. I’m not sure she completely understood what I was describing to her, because “storing stuff” doesn’t describe what we found tossed in there! Then she went on to talking about how she never threw away anything that might get used.
Yup. And then some! LOL Plus lots of things that would never get used again. Plus things stored in places that don’t protect the things in them very well. Plus storing things in places where it’s virtually impossible to get at them again!
I’m all for saving useful things, but my goodness. A line has to be drawn somewhere!
Which, I admit, is much harder to do when you live somewhere that has lots of places to leave things and forget about them.
:-D
The Re-Farmer
The Re-Farmer 