It’s been a while, but I managed to get a bit of progress on cleaning up the old wood pile.
This is almost how it looked when I left off last time.
I didn’t realize I’d neglected taking a picture after we shifted the doghouse aside and I took away the pallet it was on.
Today, I started digging and pulling up what I could of the rotted out pallets.
Continue readingWhile doing my rounds last night, I found Junk Pile Kitten at the stack of maple wood behind the house, playing with other kittens.
He let me play with him!
At a distance, of course.
This photo was taken yesterday morning.
I had let the kittens out early, since my husband and I were heading out to get our lab work done as early as we could, so I could put an end to my 12 hour fast. As I went to bring the van over to the house, I found kittens watching over me. Literally! LOL
These kittens bring such joy to our lives.
The Re-Farmer
These photos go back to July 3; the day Dave and Keith were briefly reunited with their mom.
It was such a lovely reunion! It was hard to separate them again.
We really didn’t have much choice, if these two were going to get healthy. Even so, it didn’t take them long to leave Mom’s hideout, and their sibling, to just sit here, looking all forlorn.
It wasn’t too much longer before we brought Dave into the house permanently.
How much is that kitty in the window?
The one with the fluffy tail?
How much is that kitty in the window?
Please make him stop using his nails!
The little bean is finally as tall as my stuffed kitty, if still quite a bit smaller!
He is now very adept at getting to the window ledge. It’s a miracle the screen is still intact, as he goes after moths on the other side.
Nothing like waking up to the sound of claws on a screen.
Yesterday, I heard some odd meowing noises out my window, so I went to check it out.
I walked right by one of the apple trees by the old kitchen garden, completely missing it was the source of the meowing!
The base of this tree is one of the cats’ favorite rolling-in-the-dirt places. When I first spotted them, though, he was mostly hidden behind the tree. It was his Aunty Beep Beep that had me laughing. It looked like a pair of eyes was watching me from the ground!
Then she rolled around some more; the epitome of grace. Not. 😀
Since I was there anyhow, I stopped to take a good look at this apple tree.
You can see one branch is hanging quite low, weighted down by apples as they get bitter.
Much if it, however, did not survive the winter. It wasn’t doing well last year, and I guess that polar vortex that kept hitting us was too much for parts of it.
As you can see from its base, it has been cut back a few times. I don’t think there’s anything left of the original graft. The two main trunks that you see in the above picture seemed to be dead. With living and dead branches so entwined together, it was really hard to tell where one branch started another began. I couldn’t tell if they were completely dead, or if they still had a live branch or two on them.
Either way, down they came.
Not a living thing on either of them.
I cut them at about 3 feet above ground, with the intention of cutting the remains, further down. Instead, I decided to make use of them.
I took the branch that was hanging down the most and braced it against one of the remaining trunks. It had a secondary branch that immediately began leaning over in the other direction, so I used rope and the remaining trunk pieces to support them. If they survive, with this support, they will continue to grow stronger, upwards.
This is not a healthy tree, however, so we shall see.
This is how it looks now.
It’s hard to tell, with the maple grove in the background, and with the dead wood gone, there’s surprisingly little left. Basically, they’re just suckers that have survived while the rest of the tree has slowly died.
After finishing with this one, I turned to another apple tree next to it.
This tree had quite a bit pruned away, but also had signs of a fungal disease.
The branches that had the most signs of disease seem to have died.
Once again, with how twisted the branches were around each other, it was hard to see how much of any particular main branch was dead.
I ended up taking out three major branches.
One of them did have a still-living off shoot, but…
The part of it closest to the main branch is blackened. It almost looked burned.
One of the dead branches I cut out was so intertwined with others, it was really hard to pull out of the tree, with several dead branches breaking off and staying stuck among the living.
After cleaning it out, one of the living branches ended up hanging down almost to the ground. It turns out to have been supported by one of the dead sections. I could have mucked about to give it support, but in the end decided it would be better for the tree to take that weight off completely.
There was a third apple tree, growing between the plums, with a dead piece I cut off as well, though I neglected to take photos of that one.
I haven’t done much beyond maintaining what I did in this area last year, trying to focus on the East yard and the spruce grove, instead. Even so, I can see how the trees that seemed the weakest last year are either struggling even more this year, or have died outright. The row of apple trees to the north of the spruce grove is no exception. I don’t think we’ll be getting many apples this year. Not just in quantity, but they bloomed so late, it’s unlikely they’ll have time to ripen before the cold sets in. One that had been pruned back the summer before we arrived had started to recover fairly well, but not enough to survive this past winter. Others in that row have lost quite a few branches. Those, I think I’ll leave pruning back until next spring or so.
Something we will have to keep in mind as we plant more food trees: either they will be varieties hardy enough for our bitter winters, or we will have to ensure they get extra protection wrapped around them in the fall.
The Re-Farmer
Today was a statutory holiday, and the pharmacy my daughter works at is closed for those, so my daughter had the day off. We still made a quick trip into town, as there was a festival going on. It was the market we wanted to check out, after I mentioned some of the vendors I saw. Unfortunately, half the market wasn’t set up today, so it was a bit of a wasted trip.
Except we got churros. Which makes up for that. These are a once a year thing, so it’s a really special treat. 😀
Another treat we had was when we got home and found the little furry bean, lying in a sun spot.
Is this little guy gorgeous, or what?
While things are starting to cool down, it still wasn’t until evening that I headed out into the yard to water a few things. I was pleasantly surprised to see Guildenstern coming into the yard with her baby.
After watching them for a bit, Junk Pile Kitten ran into the lilac bushes, so I settled myself on the steps at the door on that side and watched.
I was not disappointed.
What a beauty! Just look at those eyes!
He came pretty close to me, playing with a couple of the sun room kittens that came by. Including his brother, Keith. 🙂
I was able to get a bit of pruning done in the yard. Some of it was getting rid of low hanging branches that were starting to hang too low. Some of it was in the lilac near where I’ve planted the haskap berry bushes. Some of the branches were hanging low enough to be all stabby at me when I try to mow around the bed, but most of what I cut away was dead branches, twisted among and around the live ones. That opened the bush up quite a bit.
The kittens immediately took advantage of that.
There was 4 of them in there, at one point! 😀
As I was hauling the branches off to the wood pile, my husband went around to get some photos of the sun going down through the trees. We could see a cat off by the pump shack. After putting the wheelbarrow away, I decided to see which cat was out there, because Beep Beep has been pretty vicious about chasing Rosencrantz off in that direction.
It was, indeed, Rosencrantz, but I had another pleasant surprise, too.
She and her baby are using the pump shack again! It looks like the little guy can squeeze himself through that hole in the bottom of the door.
The hole was not that big before.
He is such a dark grey little kitty!
The other kittens came around, and he did play with one of them that came over, a little bit, but for the most part they stayed away from each other.
I’m really glad they have stayed nice and close. I hope Pump Shack Baby will make friends with the sun room kittens and start coming to the house for food.
I may not have gotten a lot of work done outside, but seeing the two other kittens is enough to make up for that. 😀
The Re-Farmer
First, the cute stuff.
My husband passed the furry little bean off to me this morning, while I was at the desktop. Dave promptly curled up in a ball and fell asleep on my chest, making the most interesting nose noises.
He then abruptly stood up, clambered up my shoulder, leapt across the chasm to my bed, and snuggled up to Fenrir.
He burrowed right into her fur and went back to sleep.
She didn’t even open her eyes.
That didn’t stop him from stretching out and luxuriating.
And twisting himself into this weird shape. That’s his bottom leg curled up in front. It’s like his head is coming out from under Fenrir, rather than attached to his body. 😀
Also on my bed was this furry black mama orb.
She typically ignores our new addition, but has been getting more accommodating; even a bit playful with him.
But cuddles?
This is a pretty huge new step in their relationship! 😀
As I was finishing up on my computer this morning, before heading into town for the afternoon, my husband came over to talk.
Our conversation was interrupted by a sudden, bizarre noise. I thought, for a moment, it was actually coming from outside.
Nope.
It was coming from my computer.
Once we established that, we could figure out that it was coming from a fan.
So I shut it down, and my wonderful, darling husband opened it up for me while I was away.
It was a mighty battle, but he was able to defeat the dust bunnies that had taken up residence in there.
Both fans were cakes on pretty solidly!
By the time I got home, my desktop was once again running on silent mode. 😀
Ah, but the technical stuff didn’t end there!
My husband gifted me with his new phone. My own phone plan is done next month, and he realized that his new tablet meets his needs quite well. So we’re transferring his new phone to me, then when my contract is done, we’re going to just switch things with the provider, and drop a phone off our bundle. This will knock a substantial chunk off our mobile phone bill (which is crazy high, considering we barely get any signal where we live).
So several hours were then spent getting those switched and set up.
I’ve been using Samsung phones for many years. The new phone is an LG. The user interface is going to take some getting used to! 😀
As I did my evening rounds, however, I had opportunity to test out the camera. It’s a dual lens camera, and supposed to be one of the better cell phone cameras out there.
Looks like Guildenstern has moved Junk Pile cat out of the yard.
Or maybe they’re just visiting another junk pile.
Well… not really a junk pile. The kitten is hiding under a hood that is over a pallet that it’s attached to. It has a handle attached to it. I think it was built to be a sort of sled, to be dragged behind a snowmobile.
Guildenstern was watching me suspiciously!
I do wish they would just stay with the other cats and kittens. The kittens would play with each other, but Butterscotch and Beep Beep have both been going after and chasing away Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, lately.
Rosencrantz seems to have taken her baby some place well outside the inner yard. No sign of that one, since the one day we saw it by the junk pile.
Ah, well. Such is life with semi-feral cats!
As for the camera… well, so far, the digital zoom does seem to be better than my old camera phone.
🙂
The Re-Farmer
The little hairy bean loves climbing to the top of the king size mattress.
Hello, little David. What lovely eyes you have!
The kittens are enjoying the cherry trees and lilac bushes on the East side of the house. 😀
This photo goes back to June 18. This was one of the first times we saw Dave and Keith’s sibling, since their mom moved him out from under the concrete steps at the East door, and we weren’t entirely sure where they had moved to.
It was quite a surprise to see this handsome kitten traipsing around the yard by the junk pile.
What a handsome kitty!
Even then, not that long after we added them to the maternity ward, he was clearly quite a bit bigger than Dave and Keith.
Those eyes are just amazing!
When I discovered they were in the junk pile, I started leaving a bowl of kibble for them at the top. Mom was happy. Kitten was disinterested. 😀
