vandalism

Chill

/ Re-Farmer / Leave a comment
20190126.ice

Brrr.

As I write this, we are at -29C, with a wind chill of -39C. Nasty!

Last night, we made sure to top of the outside cats’ water bowls with warm water before heading to bed. This picture is how I found the sun room water bowl, this morning. The cats were able to keep that opening in the ice licked open, to get at the liquid water below. I could even see some layers of ice, as the water level dropped and froze, dropped and froze. By the time I got this photo, though, there was no liquid water left. The bottom of the pan was dry, and there was no ice touching any part of the metal that would have been warm enough to melt it.

They were very happy for more warm water this morning!

While doing my rounds this morning, I had an extra task on my list.

Measuring.

Continue reading →

What greeted me this morning

/ Re-Farmer / 15 Comments

Look what I found, when doing my rounds this morning.

Our front gate was popped off its hinges, then set aside, upside down.

We know who did it, we have proof, and we intend to press charges. I’ve already called the RCMP.

This is ridiculous.

The Re-Farmer

A difficult post

/ Re-Farmer / 6 Comments

I admit to substantial hesitation before writing this post.  But since I’ve already posted about the vandalism to our locks, I suppose it doesn’t make much difference.  Plus, this blog was intended to be about all of the things we are discovering and dealing with as we take care of the farm for my mother, and… well, this is part of it.

This is the latest vandalism we have found.

Continue reading →

I wish I could say this was a surprise

/ Re-Farmer / 6 Comments

Just over a week ago, we discovered that someone had put glue into the lock on our main gate.

The last time this happened, my daughter and I went through our back gate, which isn’t normally used, to get out.  Then we had to get bolt cutters and a new lock for the main gate.  This was before we rebuilt the back gate, so at the time, the lock and chain where the only things holding the remains of a barbed wire gate up.  It was basically enough to keep the cows from getting onto the road, the first time they broke through by the barn and into our outer yard. Continue reading →

There’s a reason we lock our gate

/ Re-Farmer / 5 Comments

You would think, living in the middle of nowhere, we wouldn’t have to worry about things like vandalism and security as much as when we lived in the downtown area of a major city.  In many ways, that is true.  However, we are certainly not immune, and in some ways, folks in the country have more to worry about.

I won’t get into the reasons here, but having to put locks on our gates has been quite disheartening.  It is what it is, however, and we just deal.

Like today.

My younger daughter and I loaded up the van to go to the dump, then she walked ahead to unlock the gate while I drove over.

She couldn’t unlock it.  The key wouldn’t even go into the lock.

This would be why.

20181013.vandalized.lock

What you’re seeing is after my daughter used a knife to try and clear it, to no avail.  Not that it would have made a difference.  Even if she had been able to get the key in, the glue would have prevented it from turning.

(The black, by the way, is from a graphite lubricant I used when the weather was making the lock a bit stiff, about a month ago.)

While we were at the gate, a candidate for some local elections came by to drop something off, so she saw what we were dealing with, too – and later saw my daughter getting into the van with the bolt cutters, after we got through.

So our trip to the dump was followed by a trip into town to get a new lock.

This is the second lock we’ve had to replace.  I don’t expect it to be the last, unfortunately.

Frustrating.

The Re-Farmer