Ginger does love to roll around! He doesn’t seem to mind a bit of spilled water in the way, either. :-D He was quite happy to let me pet him, as I went in and out to feed his brothers.
Nutmeg actually let me touch him this morning, and even skritch his head a bit – but not until there was food in the bowl!
Gosh, Creamsicle Jr. looks ornery! :-D
Even their calico cousin came by for eats.
Would you call that a calico? I don’t know. I am fascinated by the fact that the patches of both grey and orange fur have tabby stripes in them.
With the high winds we had in previous days, I actually shifted the kibble house to have the back facing south, instead of being at an angle to the cat’s house. We had so much wind from the south east, it was actually blowing around the smaller kibble bowls. I had it an an angle because I wanted the space in front of the entry to the cat’s house more open, but the whole point of it is for the cats to be sheltered while they ate, and that wasn’t happening!
Ginger actually let me pick him up and cuddle with him after I fed his brothers and cousin. I even tucked him into my coat, though it wasn’t anywhere near chilly enough for it. He was a bit restless in my arms shifting about until he was curled up on my chest, with his head hanging down. It made it easier to give him head skritches, which he really, really liked.
Then he started licking my hands! He went into full grooming mode. Apparently, my fingers and wrists in particular, are very tasty. :-D
What a sweetie!
I think I spent about half an hour, cuddling with him before I had to head out again, and he was quite happy with the attention. He was also up to jumping down himself when I stood up, rather than waiting for me to put him down.
Day after tomorrow, and he’s at the vet to get the sutures removed. :-)
He’s still doing very well. Last night, my husband spent some time in the sun room to keep him company. I think it’s the first time he’s seen my husband! He did allow for some scritches, but did not otherwise come close. Plus, he really likes his spot under the heater bulb.
This morning, he was quite active, and my daughters had to keep him away from the door when I had to head out to feed the outside critters. He wanted outside again!
We also turned the new warming mat on, with an hour on the timer. It’s been positioned so he can sit on it while eating, so even after it turns itself off, he has a nice, soft butt warmer. ;-)
Through much of the winter, there was a lot of kibble left in the bowls outside when I came out to refill them in the morning. So much so that, some days, I didn’t add any more at all.
No longer! For the past few days, I’ve been finding the containers completely empty. Not a crumb left! When I come out the door in the morning, the cats come running from all over, eager for food. Even the heated water bowl was completely dry this morning!
Judging from the smell I’ve noticed some mornings, I suspect we have some stripy “kitties” showing up at night, having a snack. Since adding that board across the front of the kibble house to keep the containers from being knocked out, they have a harder time getting at the kibble, but they still manage. I’ve stopped adding kibble to the bowl just inside the entry into the cat house, until we have a chance to open it up and tidy things. The container in there is upside down, with cat mats bunched up on top. This morning, I found one of those mats outside the entry. I think it got pulled out while critters were digging around in the entry, trying to find every last bit of kibble that was spilled onto the floor!
The outside cats are seeming more skittish than usual. Not even Butterscotch would come near me, and when I get too close to the kibble house, they’d all bolt. Only Rolando Moon would let me touch her this morning, and that was only because she thought I was bringing out food! Creamsicle Jr. (in the above photo) has become more skittish for some time. Which I’m sad about, because we had been able to at least touch and pet him, once in a rare while, over the summer.
The mostly white cat in the above photo has always been skittish, though. Nothing has changed, there!
Rosencrantz looked like she was stalking her baby! :-D
It was good to see as many of the outside cats as I did, but there are some missing faces still, and I am starting to think they won’t be coming around anymore. :-(
That’s just how it goes on the farm, and we’ve had many cats simply stop coming round in the years we’ve been here – Beep Beep, Butterscotch and Rolando Moon are the only ones left among those that were here when we moved in, and they were all among the cats my late father took care of. The males, in particular, disappear faster as they range further out. I can hope that they’ve settled in on another farm somewhere, but … well. That’s not very likely. At least the females tend to stay where they know there are safe places to have kittens and there’s a reliable source of food. They let the boys all come to the yard to see them, rather than going further afield themselves. ;-)
Another reason to turn Ginger snap into an indoor cat!
This morning, I went ahead of my daughter to visit with Ginger, so I could first give the outside cats some warm water.
There was a slight delay on that.
Since we took the extension cord that was providing power to the cat house, so it wouldn’t be in Ginger’s way, the heated water bowl is no longer heated. And it got chilly last night!
So I decided to quickly pop into the sun room to give Ginger some warm water first, and the little bugger actually managed to get outside!! Thankfully, he didn’t get too far, and I was able to get him back into the sun room. His food bowl was empty, so I topped that up to tempt him away from the door.
We can give him normal amounts of food and water now, too.
My daughter joined me with his medications and we took care of that, then she stayed with him to make sure he didn’t run outside while I fed the critters, returned the containers, and got her to pass me one of the 100ft extension cords, before she could finally close up the outside doors to the sun room and safely leave.
I then plugged the 100ft extension cord to the outlet on the side of the house, ran it across the entry, making sure it was tucked under the door, and plugged in the cat house.
We shouldn’t need to keep power into here for much longer!
That done, I quickly finished my rounds, then headed into town. We decided to go ahead and buy a surgical shirt for Ginger, rather than make one.
Which is when things got weird.
When I opened the door, I was immediately greeted by a dog in the doorway. His two humans were just finishing up and on their way out, so I held the door for them to come out.
The dog insisted on more pets, so that took a little while.
Which is when one of the staff came over. She had recognized me and was all “this is the person I was telling you about! The one with the poster…” They still have posters with the kittens we have for adoption on there. The woman held up a paper where I could see a hand drawn map, saying “we were just on our way over there!”
Now, the first thing that came to mind is, who at the clinic knew where we lived enough to draw a map?
The next thing to come to mind was, having people suddenly show up at our gate might not work out too well. So I quickly suggested they wait until I was done, then they could follow me, which they agreed to do. As soon as I was done getting the surgical shirt, I sent a quick message to the family, letting me know someone would be following me to look at cats to adopt. I didn’t have time to tell them any more than that!
So off we went, with them following me, until we reached the gravel road. It’s incredibly dusty, as well as lots of rocks showing through the gravel, so I drove slower than usual. Even so, I noticed after a while, that they didn’t seem to be following me anymore.
I stopped on the side of the road and waited for the dust to settle and, sure enough, they were well behind, and looked like they were in the process of turning around.
??
They seemed to see that I had stopped and starting heading my way. They caught up to me and we stopped alongside each other to talk.
Her first comment was, “I think I’m following the wrong person!” They thought they were going to somewhere in town, to the humane society. That’s where their hand drawn map was for.
What we eventually worked out is that, while at the clinic, the person at the counter had told them about us having cats to adopt, as well as the humane society. I mentioned we’d never been able to get through to the humane society, and she said they’d told her that at the clinic! So it looks like they thought the staff member was telling them I was with the humane society. After confirming that yes, we do have fixed female cats up for adoption, they continued to follow along.
The gentleman was older and not up to getting out of the vehicle, so I quickly went in to talk to whatever daughter was around. Susan was near the door, so I took her out while my daughter went looking for Two Face.
Susan hasn’t been outside since she’s been fixed, other than one very brief escape attempt in the winter.
She really wanted to be outside! I ended up having to put her down, hoping she would be too nervous to go far, but nope. She was ready to explore! I managed to catch her again, but had to bring her inside at that point.
My daughter had Two Face, so I grabbed her and headed for the door.
The woman saw us through the window and her immediately response was, “oh, I like her!!” One look at that beautiful face, and she was in love.
Two Face was also a lot calmer, and we were able to bring her to the car for the gentleman to see her.
The main problem was, they had their dog in the back. I have no doubt the dog would have been fine, but Two Face would probably be too nervous.
We spoke for a while, and figured things out. Two Face is due for her annual shots, and their dog has to go back to the clinic in three weeks. They’ll make an appointment for both of them, then call us to let us know when that will be. They have a cage they can put Two Face in, so they’ll come here first, with the cage, then take her to the vet for her shots. Since the clinic has Two Face on file, they can transfer her file to them at the same time, and they will take her home from there.
Unless something happens in the between now and then, Two Face will finally be adopted out!
It was really weird, but it worked out in the end!
As I write this, Ginger has been dropped off at the vet, and should be in the middle of surgery to amputate his busted up arm.
He was in very good spirits this morning, though I don’t think he was too happy about being on a fast!
A spice girl, checking out the spice boy! Saffron, meet Ginger! :-)
He wasn’t too happy with all the other cats circling around him in the cage, though!
After his surgery (if all goes well, he will also be neutered), he’ll be isolated in the sun room for however long the vet says he should be kept there. We’ll take the opportunity to introduce him to some of the inside cats, since they are going to be his new family.
Right now, we are waiting for a call from the vet to let us know how things went, and to come and get him. I will update as soon as I can!
Thank you, again, to everyone who was able to help out!
Well. Maybe Big Rig, in this case. I am sure David and Keith are not responsible for the latest damage.
I had issues with the small tank being used as a greenhouse for the bunching onions. With cats trying to get at the seed trays through the back, we’ve been diligent about catching them coming even close to that tank and chasing them off.
Unfortunately, with this tank having its hard lid with just a couple of openings I’ve had to block off, it’s been too moist in there. Yesterday, I spotted mold starting to grow on the egg carton trays and onto the peat; one patch on each tray, closest to the front, where there is the least air circulation.
So I took the mini fan out of the big tank and set it over the opening in the back of the small tank. The seedlings are getting big enough to need a fan on them, anyhow.
Several hours later, I came back to find the fan on the floor, the lid askew, and one of the trays half on top of the other.
*sigh*
This is what I’ve done.
I took out the box that raised the trays closer to the light. They’re now just a few inches from the bottom, on top of 18 count egg cartons. That puts them lower from the light than I would want them to be, but they are now also out of reach. I also turned the trays, so the areas with the mold were to the back instead of the front.
I had already replanted some of the plugs with more bunching onions, from the last time a cat messed them up. I still have some seeds left, so I could replant more, but some of the cells in the trays are so badly damaged, they’ll no longer hold the peat. I’ll see how it looks over the next few days, then decide if it’s worth replanting more. These poor seedlings have taken quite a beating!
Apparently, we only managed to train the cats to stay off the tank while we are not around to see them. :-/ I’m pretty sure it’s just one cat. I’m just not sure which one!
After doing as much damage control as I could, I was happy to find everything still intact by morning. One of my daughters accompanied me to the city to do the second half of our monthly shopping (though we only went to one place, so I’ll still need to get more cat litter and kibble, but I will go to the smaller city for that). When we got back, everything was still intact. Also, putting the fan on seems to be solving the mold problem. It’s barely visible now.
Oh, you might notice a single tall blade of green growing out of one of the trays. We have one growing in one of the trays in the big tank, too. They are oats! The peat bale was stored near the deer feed in the sun room, so a few seeds managed to fill into the packaging. When I used the peat, I did take out the ones I could find, but clearly missed a couple!
As an aside, the van’s check engine light is still on, but it’s behaving beautifully. While I thought the mileage was getting worse, based on watching the fuel gauge wile I was driving. Yesterday, it seemed to be dropping way faster, but during today’s drive, we burned about as much gas as I would have expected. When I checked the onboard computer, the average mileage has actually improved since before the EGR valve was replaced. Which I would expect, but it was still a bit of a surprise. If the valve were stuck, fuel efficiency would be expected to drop. So far, so good. I’ll have to talk to the garage about giving it a quick check, and manually resetting the codes.
But that will wait. We got back from the city early enough that I’ll have time to hit the post office while picking up more deer feed and bird seed.
Oh, that reminds me. Potato Beetle came over while I was doing the cat stuff this morning. When I first saw him, I was rather alarmed by how dirty the wound area was; just plastered with plant matter and …
… then I realized it wasn’t the wound area. Just near it. Potato got himself into a patch of burrs! He wouldn’t let me pull them out, but I did get to check the wound, which is looking noticeably better. And so is he!
When I did my rounds this morning, I did let him out of the sun room. I figured it would be good for him to stretch his legs and … do things. (The litter we had for him looked unused, but that plant pot was knocked over again…) He followed along as I did my rounds, but wasn’t looking to happy about things, so I carried him back and closed him up in the sun room again. The fur around his wound was looking damp, but I couldn’t tell if that was from him licking it, or if the wound was seeping.
Shortly before we headed out, I got him into the carrier and brought him into the house.
Which had the other cats VERY interested! He didn’t make a sound, though, and just sat there.
Cabbages and Beep Beep would have been familiar smelling cats. He might not remember Susan, Two-Face, Cheddar, David or Keith, though. Or Fenrir; when she showed up here, he was one of the kittens among the two litters that absorbed her into the family.
He wasn’t too happy with the car ride to the vet. The vibrations from gravel road in particular seems to spook him. My daughter took him in while I waited in the car (I have no idea if the vet honours mask exemptions, and I really didn’t want to deal with it if they didn’t). He was given a thorough examination, the wound was shaved and cleaned, he got a rabies shot, just in case Nicky the Nose (the only cat that we’ve seen that would do this to him) is infected, plus the slow release anti-biotic. Overall, he checked out well. Since he is willing to stay in the sun room, we will be keeping him indoors for a little while. If possible, we are to keep the wound clean with a damp cloth, but that’s it.
He is now back in the sun room and seems content.
Even with the wound shaved, it’s hard to see in the photo! When the light hits it, though, you can see that it is bright, bright red.
We’re expected to get some colder overnight temperatures coming up, and while he’s got a cozy set up in the sun room, we decided to dig out the light attached to a board that my brother used under the kitchen sink, to help keep the pipes from freezing when the house was empty over the winter (the kitchen has no heat running to it, so it was the one vulnerable spot). We later used it to keep the water bowl from freezing when we had the sun room set up as winter shelter for the cats. I switched out the light bulb for the spare ceramic terrarium heat bulb. It’s now set up facing the food and water bowls, and the nearby box nest we made for him. It’ll be just enough to keep the edge off in a small area, but that’s all he’ll need. We could probably do nothing at all; while we are at -8C/18F outside, the sun room is above 10C/50F. His little box nest would be even warmer. But we have the means to safely give him some warmth, so why not?
I’m glad that he checked out okay. Plus, it cost much less than we expected, which is bonus. We’re so used to the high cost of getting a cat fixed, it seems weird that other services they provide cost so much less! The main thing is that he’s healing up nicely, and is doing well. That’s a relief! :-)
In other things, I updated yesterday’s post about the pressure canner my sister in law found for us. Click on the link for more details, but the short version is, even though it was in the canning section and being sold as a canner, when she checked the instructions, there was nothing about how to use it for canning! We’re going to keep it, anyhow. It will be used! Meanwhile, we’ll still keep our eyes out for a pressure canner that is affordable. It’s not a big deal if we don’t get it this year, but we will eventually need one.
Getting a chainsaw is higher on the priority list right now. ;-)
Don’t they look so sweet and innocent, snuggled together?
Don’t believe them. They lie!
They are devious, destructive beasts! :-D
Okay, okay. I don’t think Cabbages and her “grandma” are the guilty parties responsible for this.
The tank’s lid has an opening at the back for the filter, cords, etc. I’d blocked it off, but some cats – and I think at least two are guilty! – still managed to get a leg through a gap to reach the trays below. Juuuuust enough to scratch up the cardboard edge and dig up some of the peat. I finally put a piece of the rigid insulation under the lid, cut wide enough to cover the opening in the back, but narrow enough to not reach the light fixture attached to the underside of the lid.
Can you guess what the clever little monsters did next?
They figured out how to open the little flip-top door in the front of the lid, that was used to drop fish food in!
I’m pretty sure we’ve lost some sprouting onions from this.
If you look closely in the photo, you can see white specks in the peat. Those are little curled sprouts, pushing their way through the peat!
I ended up putting a weight on top of the little door, but with the back blocked off, and the little door once again closed, there’s no air circulation in the tank. The glass started to fog up! So I’ve created a small gap in the back slot that I hope the cats will not try to get through.
It takes a lot of determination for a cat to be able to reach these trays! They really, really want to dig in that “dirt”.
It’s easy to get excited about things today. As I write this, we are at a balmy -18C !!
Okay, the wind chill is at -27C, but that’s okay. We’re at -18C! And our predicted high is -15C! It’s feeling like spring out there!
For my friends in the US, -18C is 0.4F, -27C is -16.6F, and -15C is 5F.
Last night, we did hit temperatures of -33C/-24F with a wind chill of -37C/-35F, so this is a huge increase in the space of about 14 hours. Not only that, but by the 22nd, just 5 days from now, we’re supposed to reach 2C/36F
I don’t know how we’re going to handle all that heat. LOL
Even the deer are happy. I took these shots, after I’d done the morning rounds.
I had seen two deer at the feeding station, but by the time I came back with my phone to take pictures, there were three!
Cabbages was watching them – and didn’t run away when I came close to take pictures!
When I headed out this morning, there wasn’t a yard cat in sight, which concerned me a bit. With the increased temperatures, I expected to see them all over. Then I saw the fluffy white flag in the outer yard! :-D My brother’s dog had come to visit the kitties, and they were all in hiding. They did eventually come to the kibble house, and indulge in some warm water, though.
I’m starting to think that the terrarium heat bulb inside the cat’s house has stopped working. I can see by the red light on the timer that it is still getting power when the light sensor is triggered. However, that spot on the roof where the snow would melt is not clear, even after I shoveled off most of the snow and things have warmed up in general. We have no thermometer inside (something we intend to add, later in the year), so the only way to tell would be by lifting the roof and manually checking the ceramic bulb.
Which is not going to happen, any time soon! Unless the heated water bowl gets unplugged again, we are not lifting that roof. :-D
I ran our van while I was switching out the memory cards on the trail cams. The coolant levels are where they are supposed to be, which is good. It’s still making a whining noise, but I no longer think it’s the cold serpentine belt. I think it’s the power steering, right next to it. Something else to get checked. *sigh*
Trading the locations of the trail cams seems to have worked. When I switched the memory card in the new camera, the display screen inside activated without my having to warm it up with my hands, first! We had a busy day at our gate, yesterday. The older camera, which is set to take only short videos, had 44 files for me to check. The new camera, which is set to take 3 stills, then a short video, had 233 files waiting for me! It did have a hard time with night shots, but it was taking stills with an internal temperature of -25C/-13F before stopping completely. The other camera was still recording, and I finally saw what has been close enough to trigger the motion sensors, but too far for the infrared flash to light up. I could just barely see the shadow of a deer walking though the far end of the driveway, by the road.
So the camera set up is working better now, which is the important thing.
And now for the thing that I’m really excited about!
As the girls and I were pouring over the diagram of the property, our need to buy soil – and a lot of it – is something we just can’t get away from. It’s not even that we don’t have the years it would take to build up the soil, as we originally planned, but that we don’t have the organic material to do it. We just don’t produce enough compost, don’t have enough yard waste, and don’t have access to the amounts of manure and other amendments we need, in the quantities we’ll need.
I’ve tried to find out how much it would cost to get a dump truck load of garden soil through various sites, but I don’t know how much a dump truck would hold in the first place. We don’t plan to have a load spread onto the garden area. We just want a pile that we will spread ourselves, where we need it, as we need it. Most of where we are planting this year is going to be temporary, anyhow, so we will be very selective on where we put purchased soil.
Then there are all the different mixes you can get. Some sites I found offered a basic 3 part mix of soil, compost and manure, while others offered up 4 and 5 part mixes, with additional amendments. Of course, the more in the mix, the higher the cost, but without knowing how many square yards I’m even after, there was no way to figure out how much it would cost. The only thing I really had to go by was how much my older brother paid for loads of soil, but he wasn’t buying garden soil. He was buying things like fill and gravel. Still, it gave me the closest thing to a ball park figure I was able to find.
Today, I decided to call a local company. They have a yard just a couple of miles away from us, and we pass it every time we go to town. I knew they did gravel, but in passing the yard, I could see they had soil, too. Was it fill? Topsoil? Garden soil? I had no idea.
So I called them up and asked if they had garden soil, and was told, yes, they did. Then he began rattling off four of the five part mix they have! He couldn’t remember the last one, but it includes both cow and sheep manure, as well as a type of sand, to make it lighter. I’m guessing the one he couldn’t remember was compost. With the companies I found online, this would be their high end premium mix, but for this company, it’s the only mix they have!
I asked about load sizes, and their truck holds 10 – 12 square yards of garden soil, and we would be charged only $25 a yard.
And because we are so close, that would include the cost of delivery!
A load of 12 square yards would cost about $300. I’m assuming there would be taxes on top of that.
That is about half of what I was expecting it to be.
My older brother happened to call not long after, and when I told him about it, he was astonished at the price. He also wondered if a single load would be enough, but at this price, we’ll be able to get two!
I’ll be calling the company back to arrange delivery around April. That gives us time to figure out where we want to have the soil dumped. If we’re getting two loads, I’m thinking maybe get one for the inner yard, and one for the outer yard, but I really can’t think of where we can place a truck load in the inner yard.
We’re already looking forward to what we’ll be able to plant this year. That we’ll be able to afford the soil is just icing on the cake! We were talking about waiting until we get our tax returns to do this, but the cost is so much lower than expected, we could even be able to do it from our normal budget, even if we’d have to split it between two months – so long as we don’t have anything break down! :-D
I just realized something.
We can get a dump truck full of premium garden soil for less than the cost of getting a cat spayed.
Yesterday, I made a point of running our van and my mother’s car for a while, to warm up the engines.
The doors to where my mother’s car is parked are sagging, so they open on their own unless they are blocked with something heavy. I’ve been using one of the many tires scattered about to do that. The cats have been loving it. Even in the cold we’ve been having, the black rubber gets quite warm in the sun!
Potato Beetle really wanted attention! :-D
The van keeps making a noise, even after it’s been running a while, so I popped the hood to take a look.
The noise is coming from the serpentine belt, which is what I expected, but then I noticed something else.
I was basically out of coolant/anti-freeze. ?!?
I had some in the garage and topped it up a bit, but decided to check under the van to see if there was some sort of leak. The most efficient way to do that, for someone who can’t get down on the ground, is to use my phone to take pictures.
I didn’t find a leak, but when I uploaded the photos to my desktop so I could see better, I did find a mystery.
What the heck is that? This is under the driver’s seat. I don’t know enough about what’s under vehicles to know what that is. I’ll have to look it up.
Meanwhile, I hooked up the OBD II reader and it actually worked this time, so I did a scan.
One thing came up as an issue, code P0404. I looked it up, but what I found really didn’t tell me much. The EGR valve is what got recently replaced, so this could related to what the mechanic told me about how carbon in the lines he couldn’t reach to clean might come loose and cause some stuttering, etc. I’ll have to give him a call.
On the plus side, my mother’s car was running better, so when I headed out to do my rounds this morning, I made sure to grab the keys and get it warming up.
This morning was the first time in a long time where the temperature and the wind chill were both warmer than -30C for a change!
The cats were quite enjoying the comparatively warm conditions! Poor Nosy is still looking miserable, and he really wanted attention. When holding him, he’s actually taken to grabbing my hand and pulling it to his face, for me to scritch his neck.
It’s warmed up enough that I will be switching out the memory cards on trail cams regularly again, though I had to take the new camera inside and switch to warm batteries again. I took the opportunity to reverse it’s location with the older camera. It is now in full sun, which should help with the frozen battery problems.
Once that was done, I used my mother’s car to go to the post office/general store. It’s just a few miles away, so I felt confident it would be fine.
My mother’s car is a hatch back, and always makes rattling noises in the back. It makes a lot more rattling noises when it’s cold! :-D
While getting the mail, I picked up some more coolant/anti-freeze for the van. Once at home, I topped up the reservoir a bit more. Later today, I’ll run it again for a while.
Meanwhile…
It’s been over a week since we were able to get the mail, so we had lots waiting for us. Including…
This was from the order I placed as birthday presents for the girls. :-D The purple asparagus crowns and the black iris will be shipped later, just before it’s time to plant them, for our zone. As of now, the only seeds outstanding are from my last minute order from Baker Creek. They have been shipped, so it’s now in the hands of the US and Cdn postal systems. We’re not expecting them for quite a while. I just hope we’ll get them early enough to start the spoon tomatoes indoors!
Last night, I used a satellite image of the property to create a line diagram of the inner yard, marking off where the house, storage house, fence lines and trees areas are. After printing it out, I drew in where we have existing beds and a few other details. The girls and I have been going over it, trying to figure out what to plant, where, and sketching it in. There is going to be a fair amount of inter-planting – especially with the Daikon radishes, which will be used to help break up the soil. I was amused to discover this type of radish is known as “pile driver” radishes. :-D Among the things we need to consider are the permanent locations. The asparagus, for example, can be expected to produce for 20 years, and the strawberry spinach is self sowing. Once we have a better idea of what we’ll be doing, we’ll make a bigger version of the line diagram to consult as time goes buy. We fully expect to change things up when it comes time to actually plant/transplant, but at least we’ll have a general overview.
Another thing we got today was the catalog I ordered from T&T Seeds. This is the seed catalog from my childhood. :-D I’m glad I got the physical catalog, because I find it much easier on the eyes than their website. :-/ There are quite a few things they carry that few others carry. One of them that caught our attention is the Forage Radish. From their website:
Help loosen your soil! Forage Radish or Bio Drilling. White radishes are quickly becoming a popular cover crop, as growers planting them are seeing benefits beyond commonly used cover crops, such as rye and clover. Forage radishes can improve the soil and environment. With taproots that can grow several feet deep, forage radishes bore holes into the ground, loosening the soil, hence giving them the nickname “tillage radishes.” The deep roots penetrate many layers of compacted soil, with the thin lower part of the taproot reaching 6 feet or more during the fall. After the cover crop dies in the winter and roots decompose, open root channels can be used by subsequent crop roots to grow through compacted soil layers.
Which is exactly what we need. They also carry sugar beets, which can also be used to break up soil like ours, though that’s not a selling feature. Plus, if we wanted to, we could actually try making our own sugar. Or just use them to feed the deer. At some point, we will be getting animals, so it could be one of the feed crops we can grow. Just one of the possibilities we will keep in mind, over the years.
In going over our map and figuring out where to plant, it really is hitting home how much we’ll need to actually buy a whole lot of soil. We will also have to find a way to efficiently water plots that will be well away from the house. Our current 300 ft of hose will not be enough! Things like drip irrigation, soaker hoses, or even lengths of PVC pipes with holed drilled into them that we can attach a hose to, are things we’re considering. For some things, just burying plastic containers of varying sizes, with judiciously placed holes drilled into them, next to plants that need deep watering are an option. They just need to be filled with water, which will slowly drain into the soil near the plants. We have already been keeping all kinds of containers that can be used that way, ranging in size from small water bottles to 5 gallon water jugs so, for us, that will probably be the easiest option.
At one point, I was amused by the realization that, while we are planning our garden for this year, we are also already planning our garden for next year… and the years after! We’re having a blast with it, too. :-)
I have one last photo to share with you before I finish this post. It’s completely off topic, but I can’t resist! One of my constant battles with the cats is that, as soon as I get up from the computer (which is frequent), my (very worn out) chair gets instantly occupied by a cat. Usually Cheddar.
Last night, I had this group waiting for me. Beep Beep and her babies, Saffron and Turmeric. :-D
Those faces! They’re like owls. :-D
It’s a lot more challenging to remove three cats, since any one I’ removed jumps back the instant I’ve turned my back while removing the next one!
I couldn’t resist one last post for today! I must be crazy, considering how hard it has been to upload anything, with our internet constantly flicking out, but I’m waiting for bread to rise, anyhow, so I’ve got time. :-D
I just had to get some photos of Fenrir, sitting on the light fixture over the seed starts! Thankfully, only the featherweight cats have been sitting on it, to warm their butts and cold little toe beans. :-D
I was able to head out and start up the vehicles and let them run for a while. That gave me time to get a meter reading on the power pole, as well as spend time with the yard cats. Potato Beetle showed up! I haven’t seen him in almost a week, so I was very glad to see him. He seems to have a runny nose, but no leaking eyes, like Nostrildamus and Junk Pile.
Butterscotch came over for pets, too. I was able to see her back leg a little bit. The wound has healed enough that I can’t see it at all. The shaved patch on her leg is just as nekkid as ever, unfortunately.
When I went back to check on the vehicles, the van was certainly sounding better. It didn’t want to start at all, but at least it didn’t stall. When I leaned over the steering wheel to check the gauges, however, it complained rather loudly! It sounds like the power steering fluid has frozen again. We’ve had that problem with this van before.
My mother’s car was sounding better, overall. When the time comes for us to head out, we’ll be using her car for now!
Tomorrow, we’re supposed to get as warm as -20C, so they should be fine, but I plan to run the engines again. Even just having the doors open to let the sun in helps warm them up a bit, since the winds are coming from the North. Hopefully, they will be running fine by the time we need to actually use them again.
Insulating the garage is rising higher on our to-do list! :-D
What a face! Those eyes!
Fenrir looks ready to bite my head off for disturbing her. :-D
For those who are new to following this blog, Fenrir is the first cat we brought in from outside. She showed up as a kitten, about the same age as the kittens our own yard cats had at the time. We suspect she was dumped. There is no way she came from any of the local cat populations. Even the little yard cats, like Beep Beep, are far hardier than she is. We called her The Outsider (a game reference) for the longest time.
Our own yard cats and their kittens absorbed her into the creche. We were never able to socialize all of the kittens from those two litters, and were barely able to get Fenrir to let us come near her. That winter, we turned the sun room into a cat shelter. It turned out to be a brutally cold winter and, unlike the local yard cats, she did not develop a thick undercoat. Nor did she put on any winter weight. We finally brought her inside, because we knew she would not survive the winter, otherwise. Eventually, she settled in, learned to get along with our two cats that had moved here with us, and is now quite settled. She can still be an ornery cat at times, but she’s a real sweetheart.
She is still incredibly thin under all that fur, so I can’t fault her for using the light fixture on the aquarium to stay warm!
