Furry things, pretty things and growing things

June 12, 2021 / Re-Farmer / 1 Comment

I tried to do another post last night, but simply could not load the WordPress editor, our internet was so crappy. My husband tells me it was working fine when he got up at 2am, which suggested that their system was overloaded, on top of the weather wreaking havoc on our signal. Satellite can only handle so much traffic at once.

It seems to be working well now so, to start, here are the photos I meant to post last night. :-)

I just had to share this little cluster of family adorableness!

This is part of a strange thing that’s been happening lately. Nicco (the grey and white) is the cat all the other cats seem to bully all the time, poor thing. Including bullying by Beep Beep (at the top), her adopted mother, but Beep Beep is still very much a yard cat in attitude, so she bullies pretty much all the cats. ;-) Lately, however, Beep Beep has been hunting Nicco down for aggressive cuddles and grooming. In fact, as I write this, they are mashed together, asleep on my bed, with Beep Beep using Nicco as a pillow.

The sudden love and attention is wonderful to see, but then there’s Turmeric.

If Turmeric sees Beep Beep and Nicco snuggling, she will go over and squeeze herself in between them. Sometimes, it’s to join in the grooming and cuddling session, but usually, it’s to try and nurse on Beep Beep.

Who is letting her!

The kittens are a year old now, and Beep Beep was never shy about weaning them. For the spice girls, they found solace in “grandma”, who would let them nurse on her.

Very noisily.

Irritating, but when we introduced new yard kittens as part of our ‘population control program’, and she let the new babies try and nurse on her, how could we stop it? She played a big part in getting the new babies settled into the colony. ;-)

Any that attempted to nurse on Beep Beep, however, would get smacked away. Eventually, they stopped trying, even on “grandma”.

Until now.

That Turmeric is trying to nurse again, after all this time, is maybe not that surprising, but Beep Beep allowing it certainly is! So is her sudden affection behaviour towards Nicco.

I wonder if it is some sort of reaction to her not having kittens this year, for probably the first time in her adult life? Normally, she’d be nursing a new litter right now.

Curious.

Meanwhile…

We had furry visitors last night, of the smelly kind.

After taking some pictures, I used the hose to drive them off. The big one went running to and under the storage house, but the little one disappeared around the cat house. I went around and fired the hose off at it again, and it ran off towards the storage house… then turned around and ran back! I got some video of it, but was never able to upload it (maybe I’ll succeed today). I kept trying to spray towards it, but it was willing to get wet, to get food. I don’t normally try to spray them directly, if I can avoid it, and this little guy was clearly very, very hungry, and I just couldn’t do it. I left it alone and let it eat.

Some hours later, I heard cats fighting, so I went outside to check. I never found what cats were fighting, but I did find this.

Two skunks in the kibble house!

Neither of which was the little one. That one was over here.

I have a container with water next to the steps that the cats like to use, and I think Little Stinky was drinking from it.

So, we’re now up to three skunks.

I did use the hose to chase them away. The two big ones in the kibble house did not get along, and as they ran under the lilac bushes over where they get under the storage house, I could hear one of them grunting and growling at the other. The little one by the stairs didn’t want to leave and tried hiding under the lilacs, but I think that has as much to do with the grumpy skunk as the water.

Hopefully, we won’t be getting more stinky visitors!

Meanwhile…

We had more rain during the night, but by this morning, we were bright and sunny again, though still quite windy. Of course, while doing my rounds, I checked all the garden beds and kept an eye out for more fallen branches.

The tomatoes are doing fantastic. I don’t think we could have picked a better spot for them! They get the sunlight they need from their southern location, while still getting protection from the driving rain from the trees above. They got plenty of rain, and are showing lovely new growth, with no signs of damage at all.

These roses were a surprise to see this morning. This rose bush is in front of the sun room, at the stand-alone rail between the door and the laundry platform. My mother had planted it there to help shade the sun room, but it keeps blocking our paths. When we were hauling loads of soil to the old kitchen garden, I tied the bush back, so we could get through without fighting it all the time. It worked out so well, I left it like that. It’s a mass of greenery right now, and these flowers are tucked away under the bulk of the branches, having burst into bloom overnight. The other flower buds I see are still quite small. There are more roses of this time in the old kitchen garden, and they not blooming yet, either, so these hidden roses were a pleasant surprise.

I had another surprise I didn’t get any pictures of. While checking on the Montana Morado corn (some of the smaller stalks look a little beaten down by the rain, but all still look very good), I passed the little kiddie pool we’ve been using to mix soil. There was still a bit of soil on the bottom I wasn’t able to get out when I was transplanting the Crespo squash. Just a smattering, sitting at one side. I’d added water into the pool, just to keep it from blowing away, but of course there’s more water in it now.

This morning, I found a frog floating in it.

We’ve found drowned frogs in the bird bath before, because once they get into containers like this, they can’t get out again, and that was my initial thought. Dead frog. I grabbed a garden tool to fish it out, only to have it dive down and try to burrow into the bit of soil on the bottom. I knew the frog wouldn’t be able to get out of the pool on its own, so I tried leaning a stick across for it to climb. That seemed too light, so I tried a brick. That would have worked, but the poor little frog looked like it was having a hard time, so I managed to get it out. I don’t now now long it was stuck in there, but it was looking really tired as it tried to get away from my hands, eventually letting me lift it out. I think it was quite happy to be on solid ground again!

I left the brick in the pool, leaning against the side, just in case something else falls in. We’ll bail the pool out until it’s drained enough to tip over without breaking it, later.

I like frogs. We’ve been seeing them in the garden, quite a bit. :-)

One of the last things I checked this morning was the potatoes, and found another garden friend.

A pretty little ladybug, on a potato leaf.

I’m happy that most of what we’ve been finding among our plants have been beneficial critters, like frogs and ladybugs, and not the problem critters! Even the skunks are good for eating grubs that would otherwise be causing damage, and so far, other than a tulip, they’ve been digging in the lawn, which does just fine when the divots are put back later.

Now that the weather is turning again, we’ll have lots of work to catch up on in the garden. Especially weeding, but we also have one last bed to build for the cucamelons and the late sprouting gourds, along the chain link fence. We also have pink celery sprouts, but they were started so late, and are so tiny, I don’t know that they’ll ever be transplanted outdoors. We might be able to grow them in containers, though. Then they can be moved into the sun room in the fall, to give them a longer growing season. We shall see! I definitely want to get more seeds for next year, though, and start them indoors much earlier.

Here we are, so early in our gardening season, and I’m already thinking of next year’s garden! :-D

The Re-Farmer

Our 2021 garden: more firsts!

June 4, 2021 / Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

Okay, this is getting ridiculous!

I don’t think the needle on that thermometer can go any further. What do you think that’s at? 65C/149F? Closer to 70C/158F? I don’t think I’ve ever seen that thermometer get that high.

Of course, the weather apps didn’t show temperatures that high. One of them allows me to look at historical weather. Our average temperature for June is 22C/72F, and our record high for the month was 37C/99F, set in 1995. I’m pretty sure we did beat that, today. The average low for June is 12C/54F, with a record low of 0C/32F, set in 2009.

This is the thermometer in the sun room.

This is with the inner door open, the screen window in the outer door open as wide as it can, and the ceiling fan going at its highest setting, and it still got to about 37-38C/99-100F. There are still a few trays of seedlings (and cups of dirt I’m pretending to expect things to germinate, still) in the sun room while I take the rest out to harden off. The trays outside got misted several times during the day, but a bunch of the squash and melons were really droopy by the end of the day. For all the misting they got, they still dried out quite a bit, so everything got a thorough watering before they came in for the night. Except the corn. They get put back into their bin, without the outer cups, so I put water in the bin for them to absorb from below.

When the girls went out as things started to cool down, they checked on the netting over the lettuces and beets. They ended up flipping one side up over the other, because there were so many insects caught inside. Including several of these guys.

This snowberry clearwing moth decided to just sit there and chill instead of flying away!

We also had a visitor, as things cooled down.

Madam Stinky came over for a snack! Later on, we saw a second one in the kibble house with this first one. I am loath to chase any critter away from food when it’s not doing any harm, but it’s really not good for them, and there is potential for harm. I think they are both hungry mamas. It’s certainly the time of year for them to have babies. When I used the hose to spray them away, the second one, which is quite a bit bigger than this one, did NOT want to leave! It kept grunting at me and trying to go back to the kibble house, until the water finally drove it away.

They’ll be back tonight, I’m sure! :-D

Before it had cooled down enough to start the evening watering, I checked on the garden beds to see how they were handling the heat. Especially the new transplants. I’m happy to say that the tomatoes and sunflowers were doing just fine. Only the bunching onions were starting to get a little bit wimpy.

While checking other beds around the transplanted sunflowers, I spotted little bits of green and pink.

We have beans!!!

These were not there when I checked them this morning, but both the yellow and green bean beds had sprouts, some still carrying their brightly coloured inoculated seed covering. The Royal Burgundy didn’t have any sprouts, but when I came back later to water them, even that bed had sprouts just starting to break through the soil. I’m so excited!!!

While watering the sunflower transplants, though, I got an even bigger, more exciting surprise.

This is a Hopi Black Dye sunflower seedling! I had to check and double check to be sure. I marked the spacing to plant them with flags, which are still there, so I could use them to confirm that yes, these are in the right places and everything. Considering how long it took for just one Hopi Black Dye seedling to sprout in the tray, I am totally stunned that they are already sprouting after being direct sown, just 5 days ago! All I can think is that the seeds we tried to start indoors were just too cold to sprout, even in the warmth of the sun room. Now that I’ve started to take the tray outside, to harden off the cucamelons sharing the tray, we might get even more of them.

The heat may be hard on humans and animals, but some of our plants are just loving it!

Hopefully, the extra watering they all got will help the ones that maybe don’t like the heat quite as much. :-D

After the watering was done, and things had cooled down a bit more, I did decide to do one transplanting job done today, but that will get its own post. :-)

The Re-Farmer

Evening visitors, and growth progress

July 27, 2020 / Re-Farmer / 2 Comments

Yesterday evening, I happened to glance out my window facing the garden and saw a deer making its way into the yard. Something startled it and it ran off, but I figured that would be a good time to do my evening rounds – and check the sunflowers!

I headed out through the sun room and found another visitor.

The cheeky little bugger completely ignored me and the noise I was making as I came out the sun room doors.

He seems to have some odd matting in his fur. Or maybe something it caught in it?

It wasn’t until I started moving further from the doorway that he started paying attention to me.

(Yes, I was zooming in to take photos, and then I cropped the photos. I was staying well away from Stinky!)

He was not a happy Stinky! I just kept moving away, and he eventually ran off through the old kitchen garden.

So I made sure to go around the other side of the house, to check the garden! :-D

After checking the sunflowers and making my way back to the house, I saw Stinky again – with a friend! – running through the back yard towards the old garden shed. Of course, that was the direction I needed to go! I was able to skirt around them, then use the garden hose to discourage them from coming closer.

Alas, we did lose one of the smaller sunflowers.

I took this picture this morning. This is one of the third variety of giant sunflowers that we planted much later, to replace the ones we lost in the original planting.

The survivors of our first planting are doing pretty good, I think!

Most of them are approaching 5 feet in height, now. Once they got higher than a couple of feet, the deer seemed to ignore them. One of the last ones that got its top chomped off is surviving quite well, and is growing a new “head” from the side of the main stalk. I have high hopes that the most recently decapitated sunflower will do fine and grow a new head, though being one of the variety planted the latest, chances are it won’t have long enough of a growing season to fully mature. We shall see.

I’m just really impressed with how big the pattypan squash plants are getting! They are also filled with buds and blossoms, and little baby squashes. None of the others are even close. There’s a good possibility these will be the only squash that actually produce this year. Which is okay. This year is our experimental year. Anything we get is bonus, and we’re learning a lot.

I keep forgetting to take pictures of the potatoes. They actually look rather sparse, as far as foliage goes, but some have started to bloom, so we can definitely look forward to having our own potatoes this year. Whether or not we use the same method to grow them will be decided when we harvest them.

I also found a rather dramatic surprise this morning, when checking on the carrot and beet beds.

This is a chokecherry tree growing among the sour cherries that are doing so poorly. When I went past it last night, the berries were all still green!

This one is mostly by the cherry trees and a lot of other stuff that we will be taking out (the cherry tree by the house has ripening berries on it, but none of the ones in this other location). I want to make sure to keep the chokecherry tree, since it seems to be doing so well, now. Our first two summers here, this tree didn’t even bloom, so we didn’t realize what it was!

There is another chokecherry tree, in behind where the sad little Saskatoon bushes are, that also decided to bloom and produce this year. It is in an area still filled with spirea that we need to clear out.

Another surprise this year is that we have more, stronger and healthier Saskatoon bushes, hiding behind the stack of boards and junk that have Junk Pile kitten her name. (No kittens in there, this year!) They are still producing big, juicy berries. There is another chokecherry tree growing with them. It’s berries are still very green. In this location, this tree is in shade most of the time, whereas the other two get a lot of sun.

Which had me curious about the other trees we’d gathered chokecherries from, over the past two summers.

It was pretty windy when I tried to take this photo, so it’s not very clear, but you can see there are no red berries on here, yet. A few of the berries are starting to show just a bit of a blush on them. This tree has more shade, being planted so close to the maple grove and rows of spruce trees my parents added on the North side over the years. The berries on this tree ripened later than the other two I checked next, but the berries it produced were larger and juicier.

This chokecherry tree is being choked – by lilacs! It is tipped way over and hanging down. My daughters and I have been talking about what to do with this one. I’ve been thinking of cutting away the lilacs surrounding it, then adding some sort of support I can use to train the tree to start growing upright.

My daughter suggested we leave the lilacs, and get rid of this chokecherry! The lilac hedge serves as both a privacy and dust screen from the main road that goes by on this side of the property. It has quite a lot of traffic, for a gravel road. The reason my mother spent so many years planting and extending this hedge was partly because of just how much dust drifts in, every time a vehicle drove by. Plus, every now and then, vehicles going by would slow down to peer into our yard and garden. And not just the year we grew “konopie” from seeds my mother got from Poland, after regaling us with stories from her childhood. It turned out that konopie is Polish for hemp, but someone thought it was marijuana and stole a row and a half of it.

Anyone who tried to smoke that would probably have gotten rather ill rather than high!

Anyhow. The lilacs serve a purpose, and in that location, privacy and dust screening is more important than having chokecherries. Especially since it turns out we have so many more, elsewhere.

This chokecherry tree is also among the lilacs.

Unlike the other one, this one is growing from the inside of the hedge, instead of out from the middle of it somewhere. So it is growing straight and tall, rather than falling over. In the last couple of summers, I found that of the two among the lilacs, this one also produced better berries, and ripened sooner, than the one that’s falling over.

There is also a small chokecherry tree growing in the middle of the area I move, near where the falling over chokecherry is. It likely sowed itself, but over the years, it has been allowed to grow, rather than getting mowed over. We will likely leave that one be. In the open as it it, it will have lots of light and space to grow straight and tall, and eventually produce lots of berries.

It’s a good thing we like chokecherries. I like to eat them straight off the tree, even though they are very … astringent, I believe the word used is. Given how many trees we’ll have producing berries this year, we can expect to have lots to make things with!

The Re-Farmer

Furry friends, and making do

July 10, 2020 / Re-Farmer / 4 Comments

Last night, while heading out to do my evening rounds, I had a little surprise – a stinky friend coming out of the sun room!

I wanted to use water from the rain barrel, but Stinky had other ideas! :-D

He is not, however, the furry friend I was alluding to in the title.

While mowing the outer yard today, I saw a little dark shape, running across from the deep grass to the pile of junk that needs to be hauled to the dump.

Then a mostly while shape followed.

Two little kittens! About the same size as the inside kittens.

I am guessing they are Junk Pile cat’s babies, but they might be Rosencrantz’s, too. I saw no mom around.

This means we might start seeing kittens show up at the food bowls soon!

Which reminds me. I noticed, a couple of days ago, that Butterscotch is no longer pregnant. After what happened with her last litter, it’s hard to guess how many will survive. :-(

Also, this evening, I won lawn mower chicken! I was doing the very last patches of grass for the night, when the mower started to stutter. I just managed to back it up over the last bit of grass when it coughed and died, completely out of fuel! :-D

While I was finishing up with the lawn (though I still have the area in front of the storage shed to do – tomorrow!), the girls tended to the gardens, including thinning out the carrots. We now have lots of little, bitty carrots to snack on. They are all new varieties for us and, so far, they all are quite tasty! :-)

This morning, before I headed into town, I had a conversation with one of my daughters. Later, when I was at the hardware store, that conversation had me looking extra hard at the display of 20 x 20 inch box fans. We need at least a couple, including one for the old basement to replace the one that disappeared.

I finally broke down and bought one.

Plus a package of 20 x 20 furnace filters.

We now have a poor-man’s air filter! :-D A furnace filter is attached to the back of the fan with a few little strips of duct tape. For now, it’s sitting on my husband’s leather working desk as we test out how it works, before deciding on a final spot to put it. This one will stay in the living room, though. Depending on how things go, I hope to pick up another when we’re in the city, for the basement window. For now, I want to see how well it does in keeping the levels of cat hair down! :-D

I also had to pick up a round file while in town. I still haven’t been able to put on the second latch on the screen window. I did find a round file in one of the miscellaneous drawers in the basement, but it’s the wrong type, and was doing absolutely nothing as I tried to enlarge the opening for the new latch post. Hopefully, this new one will do the trick.

The cats and kittens have, of course, been exploring the counters and shelves in the basement, and I’ve been finding a few things knocked to the floor. Yesterday, I found a piece of wood with a rose design carved in relief into it, lying on the floor. Today, I found another piece of wood on the floor; this one had floral designs on one side, and my late brother’s name carved on the other. I don’t recall seeing those when we cleaned up the basement before bringing Beep Beep and Butterscotch indoors. I’d forgotten my brother had tried his hand at wood carving, too, and you can see quite a skill improvement between the two pieces.

While looking for a round file, I also found a small carving tool. I recognize it as part of a set we had, when I was quite young. There were at least a dozen different types of blades in the set. In fact, I’m pretty sure the wood box it came in is what’s now under my computer monitor, raising it up to a more comfortable viewing height. That box now holds my late father’s hair cutting supplies. I don’t know what happened to the rest of the wood carving tools. Considering how long ago we had them, I’m surprised to have found the one that I did!

I set it aside for sharpening. It has a flat tip, like a very fine chisel, that I think I will find useful.

Funny how, after being here for more than 2 years, we’re still finding things like this! :-D

The Re-Farmer

A good morning!

July 5, 2020 / Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

As I write this, I’m having a hard time wrapping my mind around how not-late in the day it is. :-D It feels like it should be early evening. Granted, part of that might be the lighting out my window North facing window right now. It’s looking a bit dark out there, even though it’s not that cloudy. We’ve got another storm heading our way. The storm itself looks like it will pass us on the North, but we’ll likely get some rain. There’s another storm that might hit us, during the night, but I suspect that one will pass by us as well.

Anyhow.

After tending to the kitties this morning, I brought both of the windows for the old basement outside. I’m happy to say the Weldbond seems to have a marvelous job of not only adhering the window screen in place, but the metal mesh as well. I was hoping it would hold the metal. That means that all the staples I used to attach the screens, as well as the metal plates, are all now bonded to the frame!

First things first, though: tending to the outside cats.

They were oddly nervous this morning. When I headed into the sunroom, I saw why!

Look who was visiting!

In the sunroom, we have two identical bins; one for the cat kibble, and one for the bird seed. The skunks had been managing to get the cat kibble bin’s lid off, and eating the kibble. The lid had a crack near a handle, so I switched it with the other bin. The skunks have not been able to open it, since.

I guess this guy was getting pretty hungry!

Gosh, he’s so cute!

After feeding the critters, I had an extra job to include during my rounds.

While in town yesterday, I was able to pick up 10 new little flags to put on our fence posts, replacing the old ones that were torn to shreds. There wasn’t enough of a wind to be able to see all of them in this photo, but when they’re all flapping in the breeze, it looks really awesome!

With my rounds done, I headed inside for a bit, to give the cats (and guests) a chance to eat, before testing out the window.

This is the eyesore we’ve had for the last while.

You can see a nail in the wall above the wooden frame, which would have been used to hold the metal mesh frame in place. We just shoved things in to prop it a bit, and the foam insulation made sure nothing got into the basement.

What a mess.

After moving the stuff out of the window well, and pushing the insulation into the basement (there is a platform under the window for it to fall onto), I swept up the dirt a bit.

I need to prioritize getting some puck board to make a new “roof” over this. It served a definite purpose!!

Then it was time to finally check out the new window.

It fit perfectly!

The top kept tipping forward, though, so I had to hold it to take the photo.

Not only did it fit the opening as well as the plastic window, but it is even just as flush!

That is the hole for one of the latches on the plastic frame. We can just get another pair of latches, and use the same holes.

That weather stripping must have been what made the difference, because this frame is easily twice as thick as the plastic frame.

I should probably get some of that self adhesive foam weather stripping for this frame, too. Not to keep the weather out, obviously, but to keep insects from crawling around the frame.

For now, I just propped up some bricks to hold it in place. I will see about getting new latches tomorrow.

I am so happy!

Then it was time to go into the basement and take care of that foam insulation.

Here is how it looks on the inside. The platform the insulation is now lying on was built to hold a box fan, which is among those things that disappeared while the house was empty. It still comes in handy.

The breeze though that window, though! Wow!!!

Now that the screen is in, I unplugged the blower fan, to give the motor a chance to cool down. We’ll get it going again later, though, because it’s really damp down there.

Which had me checking something else out.

When we moved here, there was a dehumidifier in the corner, next to the well pump. When the girls painted the second level, they had to lug it upstairs, because it was so humid, the paint actually sloughed off the walls. So we know it works.

Sometime between when it was returned to the basement, and this spring, the water reservoir for it disappeared.

I don’t know what happened. It was there when the dehumidifier was brought downstairs. The only people besides us who have been down there has been my oldest brother, and the plumber. So what happened to the reservoir? I have no idea.

Today, I took a look at where the water would drain from and realized it was a standard male coupling, like for a hose.

We have spare drain hoses for the hot water tank; these are short hoses with a female coupling at each end.

It fit!

This is what we have now.

I’ve got the hose draining directly into the sump pump reservoir. This area is getting the most water right now, due to the condensation on the well pump and all the cold water pipes.

Since there is no reservoir in the dehumidifier, there is nothing to trigger the float to shut it off automatically. Theoretically, it will just keep on running, non-stop. We will have to check it to make sure it’s working properly, later.

Between the window screen and the dehumidifier, even with the blower off for a while, it should make a big difference in the state of the basements.

Even the new part basement.

Where I had an audience, trying to check me out!

The new part basement has its own fan, but the cement is clearly saturated. This concerns me, since it means the weeping tile is not doing the job as well as it should. After what we discovered when the septic pipes got plugged, I was afraid it would be an issue. *sigh*

Oh! The rain seems to have reaches us now. Time to shut down the computers, just in case!

Another reason we need to get that “roof” over the basement window. The breeze is really nice, but there is nothing to stop rain from getting in.

Dang. I took to long to finish this post. Looks like we lost internet! Here’s hoping we don’t lose power – and this post!

If you’re reading this, that means I managed to save it… :-D

The Re-Farmer

Evening visitor, and escape attempts

May 18, 2020 / Re-Farmer / 3 Comments

While doing my rounds yesterday evening, I spotted a stinky visitor crossing the barn yard. He caught up with me some time later.

He moves pretty fast! :-D

I often see signs of where they have been digging up grubs during the night. Last night, I could hear their odd screeching noises out in the old garden – soon followed by some distinctive whiffs! – so I made a point of checking the area out when doing my rounds this morning. As long as they aren’t digging up our potatoes, I’m happy.

The potatoes beds are looking untouched. :-)

The kittens, meanwhile, are getting so much more active! And Beep Beep has been leaving them alone more often, even if it’s just to lounge nearby.

The kittens are also getting increasingly curious about that big world out there!

Leyendecker (the tuxedo) came very close to scrabbling his way out!

They may want to climb out, but if we actually take them out, they can’t wait to get back into their nest! :-D

Hard to believe they’re almost a month old, now.

With their increased activity, we’re going to have to find some way to set them up in the basement again. It is much safer for them down there.

Today, I’m hoping to get some more planting done, but at the moment, it’s amazingly windy out there! I was happy to find that our new garden bed, where we planted carrots and parsley so far, is quite sheltered from winds. Meanwhile, I’ve set up the trays of transplants in the open mini-greenhouse, next to the open door. I want to expose them to some wind as they harden off, but not too much! It’s a bit difficult to harden off the larger seedlings, when there are still new seedlings emerging in other ares of the trays.

Still no gourds, though.

Oh, my goodness! Looking out my window as I write this, I can see that the winds have increased again. Those maple branches are really swinging!

Hopefully, it will settle down a bit and I’ll be able to get some more planting done. Until then, I’ll use the time to head down to the basement workshop and help my daughter make some more plant markers. :-)

The Re-Farmer

Well, that’s a mess

April 13, 2020 / Re-Farmer / 6 Comments

Before I show you the messy stuff, let me share with you some adorableness!

This morning, while doing my morning ablutions, I noticed Dave on the bath chair, eyeballing the towels. We have a small shelf with folded towels under some hanging towels. The hanging towels cover the top, and the cats like to go behind them to create a little cat cave as they nap on the towels. They do it so often, I now keep an old towel the top, just for them to use as a bed. I figured Dave wanted to get in there, so I moved a hanging towel to let him behind it.

It was already occupied!

I had no idea she was there, the entire time I was in the bathroom! :-D

Such a cutie. :-)

Now, on to the icky stuff.

During the evening cat routine, my daughter headed to the sun room to top up the food and water for the outside cats.

The sun room was a mess, with stuff scattered all over, part of the cat condo was collapsed and the bin holding the cat kibble was open.

Two skunks where in it, eating.

*sigh*

I had hoped it wasn’t them getting into the bin. They are likely why we are not seeing the cats using the sun room as often. When I do my morning rounds lately, the cats almost always come over from elsewhere.

My daughter splashed them with water to get them out. One left, but the other might have still been in there when she brought the bin into the old kitchen.

Since it was so late, the mess was left to be dealt with this morning.

When emptying the big bags into the kibble bin, I use one as a garbage bag for the others. It had been sitting beside the bin. I would also sometimes put a bit of kibble in the cat condo, to encourage the cats to use it. My guess is, the skunks has finished off all the food in the bowls, then dug through everything they could get at, to find stray bits of kibble, including pulling the crunched up bags out of the bag that was being used to hold them.

Spotting this as I picked things up was concerning.

Yeah. That’s frozen blood spatter.

While cleaning up, I heard a plaintive meow, but there was no sign of any cats. I eventually was able to lean far enough to look under the swing bench, where I saw a big orange lump loafed on an old blanket we’ve got under there.

It was Jim Boy.

When he came out, the poor thing seemed desperate for cuddles – and for food! I haven’t seen him in quite a while. He still looks like he’s in pretty rough shape, but better than the last time I saw him.

The more important thing was, no sign of injury. The blood did not come from him.

As I continued my rounds, I saw Creamsicle and Potato Beetle – both also looked fine. Butterscotch came from somewhere behind the house, looking uninjured and still very pregnant. I even saw Rosencrantz who, thankfully, does not look at all pregnant. Even Junk Pile cat showed up. I never saw Beep Beep, though. I also didn’t see Pump Shack cat, though I did see him later in the live feed for the security camera. None looked like they had any injuries, from what I could see.

Butterscotch even started to sort of follow me when I was doing the rest of my rounds. I heard her meowing in the spruce grove, but she never came close. On my way back to the house, I cut through the trees to see if I could convince her to let me at least pet her, but she wouldn’t let me come anywhere near her.

I did, however, find this.

Another old and rotting bench!

I may have seen the board before and thought it was an old, fallen tree, but once the leaves come in, it’s completely hidden and the area impassible. This is the first time I’ve been able to come close enough to see that it was a bench!

You can tell, by the trees growing around it, that it’s been there and fallen over for quite a long time.

As we clear things up, I do want to eventually put benches and seats among the trees. Seeing the remains of so many makeshift benches all over gives me an idea of what NOT to do. I might just go ahead and buy the heavy duty plastic benches or picnic tables that Costco carries every spring. If we do go with wood, we’ll need to take steps to protect it from the elements and the moisture of the ground.

All in good time.

As for the skunks, we’re going to have to stop topping up the food bowls in the sun room overnight. Once the weather finally turns to spring, all the food and water will be kept outside, so we can close the sun room doors again – especially after we’re able to empty it out and give it a thorough cleaning. I’m not actually too bothered about the skunks coming around, but they are greedy guts – cat kibble is bad for them to begin with – and seem to be driving the yard cats out of the very room we’ve taken great care to turn into a safe and warm sanctuary for them.

Yet another reason to finish cleaning up the basement and turning it into a maternity ward for Beep Beep and Butterscotch. I’d hoped to have had it finished by now, but my goodness, it is such a huge job!

Which I need to get back to, today.

Time to get to work!

The Re-Farmer