working dogs

Squirrel!!

Steve HardinLeave a comment

I was supposed to be fencing all day today to keep the bull away from the heifers he is not to breed. He has a different plan and it starting to become highly annoying. I spent two hours yesterday with the dogs moving him away from the heifers. It was an exercise in patience. I finally started tossing dried cow poop patties at him. He didn’t like that and it seemed to move him better than anything else I had tried.

I started out fine, went and got my drill so I could install the gate hinges. I found all my fencing tools in the pickup and needed the tractor to move rocks. So I chased the sheep into the front yard to finish mowing the lawn and then alternated driving the pickup and tractor to get them both through the gates into the barn lot. I did get Zeke to load up in the pickup, he always wants to ride and then on a fluke I told Mouse to load up. Damned if he didn’t do it on the first try! So I had both dogs ride in the back of the pickup through the barn lot. We then unloaded and took the tractor up to the far upper bottom pasture to get the smooth wire dispensing bucket and some wire. Well there is a lot of water running on the wheat field side of the bottoms. Usually, there is not very much water on this side. I ended up digging out the ditch in a section in the upper prime pasture. When I got into the next pasture it was even worse. I had to clean up two sections of the ditch I dug earlier and then tried to dig four channels in a swampy area. All the dirt I take from the swampy area I put on the edges of the swamp. I will try and build up some of the low spots in an attempt to keep them from getting so swampy. I am going to have to dig a couple of small ponds. They will only be about 18 inches deep and 6×10 feet across. I just need the water to settle someplace and then evaporate. I may have to see if I can find some used grape poles to build a visual ring around the water so we don’t accidentally drive the tractor or equipment into the water or swamp.

I then drove up unto the middle pasture that has not been burned yet. WOW! There is at least 2 acres of swamp. There is running water through the middle of the field. It looks like a ditch may end up separating the field in the middle. This isn’t such a bad thing we just need to be able to get by the ditch on the upper and lower side. I think I am going to have to install one of my new culverts up here to ensure cross field access. There is no question that we will not be doing anything in these fields in the spring after we plant them with alfalfa. Not even spraying the first year until we can see how the field and alfalfa does. I am hoping it takes up some of the water. I managed to get stuck again in the upper pasture and could not get out. I have only ever pushed myself with the tractor bucket backwards in an attempt to get unstuck. I had about a 30 foot liquid mud trail in front of me and i was pushing myself further into the swamp. So I figured out how to pull myself with the bucket! Its not as easy as pushing but it is possible. I then went to load up the wire and realized I needed to drill some post holes for the gates up here. I had the auger on the tractor and ended up digging 7 holes. Which made me aware that I need to dig holes in the barn lot ASAP. This was nice all dirt bottoms and each hole took me 5-7 minutes to dig. I cannot let the barn lot dirt get any harder or I will never get a hole dug. No hole means more rock cribs!I managed to get started on the fencing at noon. The dogs got to terrorize the hillside, the CRP, the creek and occasionally the chickens. Mouse had a thing for chasing the chickens today, I had to call him off three times. Zeke ratted him out every time by perking up his ears and slinking toward the sound of distressed chickens. Zeke either runs away or stays close, he never does anything halfway.

Mouse loaded up into the pickup a second time on the first jump. I had to talk him into it and make Zeke jump out and show him how it was done. He was a little light on the jump but managed to scramble in without assistance. I got the upper gate installed. I had to create a chain that is attached to hold it open so you can drive through. Otherwise the gate is angled such that it automatically closes. I managed to get the tractor to finally hold a roll of wire such that I can just walk away and it unrolls without any problems. I have been trying to figure out how to do this for four years. The trick is the bar has to touch both sides of the tractor bucket and the chains hold it level. The horseshoe is one of my gate latches. I am running out of them again. I usually have them welded ten at a time and I keep using them up. I didn’t get all the fencing done. I still have the lower gates to install. I had some gate posts hooks but they are too big for the ones already installed on the gate. So I will just buy smaller ones it is easier. I need to fill one rock crib, so three hours of hard labor with the mistress doing all the heavy lifting. I have one spot just to the right of the rock crib on the right side of the picture that needs a rigid panel installed to keep the animals from crawling through the gap. I am pretty sure I can use a piece of scrap from the horse enclosure that is still propped up in the front yard. I keep using those scraps in an attempt to get rid of them.

The sheep finished mowing the front yard! I will now have to get out a hose and wash down the sidewalk, bridge and our front porch in the morning before our Easter guests come for brunch. This takes care of mowing and fertilizing all at once. The only problem is we have to watch the dogs go potty for a week or two as they love to rub sheep poop all over themselves. I thought about this today as Annmarie kept hollering from the back porch to get my opinion on Iher attire for tonight. I enjoy doing this stuff, its hard to explain to people why I have a full time job that pays so I can have a full time job taking care of the farm. The farm is always there and forces you to constantly change and adapt. When you think you have it figured out, someone or something changes to prove that you do not. It keeps you moving, there is no time to sit around and be lazy. I get to work with animals and fix stuff. I love doing the 90% on projects and most farm projects are complete at 85%! Not the ones inside the house, I know dear. I love to reuse and cobble things together. The farm keeps me healthy and whole.

Some days life chooses your direction

Steve HardinLeave a comment

I came home on time today after picking up groceries for Easter brunch. The sheep are “mowing” the front lawn so you have to be very careful as you make your way down the steps, across the bridge and onto the stepping stones to the front porch, there are a lot of sheep bombs. I had two loads of stuff to bring in and on the first load I failed to latch the gate securely. This caused a mass exodus from the front yard out into the car area in front of both houses. I managed to spot it and stop about half the herd from leaving. So now we only need to get 40 sheep back in instead of 80. I told Annmarie I would be right back and took the dogs to get them back. We wandered out through the ram pasture. I have been popping thistles all week with my pocket knife and spotted a few I missed so I got those. As I walked by the bridge over the ditch I noticed that it was clogged with tumbleweeds so I waded in and pulled all those out and an old piece of tin I found. I slowly started heading to the barn. I let the horses out and closed the front barn lot off and left the main gate open so we could push the sheep into a secure area. This is when my phone rang, Annmarie wanted to know where I was as she was heading out to help and the sheep were now down at her mother’s house and she was trying to push them toward our house because the alpaca were herding the sheep.

We had to push them around her house and back up to ours. Just as we got all the gates shut and were headed back to the house Annmarie spotted a ewe that was stuck in the orchard and her baby was in our front yard. She went to go deal with that while I snuck off to take care of chickens. After grabbing my second egg the cell phone went off, it was Annmarie there were two separate babies separated and where was I? I left the eggs and went and helped corral the last two sheep. All the sheep were behind the barn and we were getting ready to go inside when Annmarie looked up on the hillside and spotted the Bull outside his area. He was on the open hillside which means he had to have pushed through the creek crossing after I tried booby trapping it. This contraption had lasted for almost three weeks without him thwarting it. I was able to go up to the hillside and have him follow me up and through the gate. I even managed to find a coffee cup out near the fence that I had forgotten when I was building my contraption. The bull ambled down toward the other cows and all was good with the world. We headed back to the house and just as we got to the hillside gate we spotted the bull going through the ram pasture. He had gone down and pushed through the creek crossing behind the house and then went straight to the creek crossing behind the barn he tore up last year and up to the fence next to the heifers. It looked like he had spent a large portion of the day alongside the fence. It was pushed over in areas and there was a beaten path alongside it. Annmarie tried to push the bull back out with the dogs but this went no where as the dogs kept circling around and pushing the bull the wrong way. Annmarie had to be in to town so I took over. It took me another hour of pushing him around to get him to go back down to the other cows.

It was painful for me, the bull and the dogs. I then had to go up to the incomplete fence line and wire up the upper gate and wire up the two bottom gates. I then went and redid the creek crossing behind the house. Then I went and got a heavy metal gate and wired and tied it in place over the ram pasture ditch crossing. I used a lot of bailing twine to get it to hold. There is no flex in that sucker now so he cannot shimmy under it. I also cleaned out the ditch for about 30 feet while I was here. I wear rubber boots all the time now when working outside. It works for me and I can easily clean them off. I need to get in here and rework this fence crossing. I have just about decided that I need to string cable across the bottoms of the ditch so I can clip in the panels during the summer so that the bull cannot lift them. I need to do five separate crossings this way to keep him in. I really need to build the bull enclosure inside the barn lot so we can keep him separate from the heifers when we want.

Tomorrow I will be completing the fence running up the back hill and installing all the gates in that fence permanently regardless of what the weather is doing. I need two fences between him and the heifers.

Gizmo and Bo, the cat were keeping Annmarie company while she worked until eh home office today. They were sucking up a little extra heat from each other and the freestanding heater.

Gotta get out of the house

Steve HardinLeave a comment

The little tractor that could! I have a culvert on the bucket and pulling a small set of discs for the upper field. The dogs are giving the cows the stink eye after moving them away from the gate. This way I don’t have to worry about them making a break for it to get back to the bull. It’s a two way street, both parties would go to the other if they could figure out how to get out of their respective enclosures.

The culvert is for the upper spring, this way we can drive over to the back half without having to go all the way around. I have three more culverts left and need to install two more in the lower bottoms so I can easily get the tractor in and out of those fields even when it is fairly wet. Driving through the irrigation ditch when all the surrounding dirt is muddy is a good way to get the tractor stuck in the ditch.

The moving water in the upper prime pasture is half way through the trees now and starting to cut a ditch in amongst the trees. Its pretty slow going and I don’t know that it will make it to the fence. I can really tell in the front creek that there is a lot more water coming out of the spring than we have had in the past.

This is the upper prime squared field before I did anything to it. I had burned it off and it had a disc drug through parts of it once by someone else. My real goal is to just knock everything down into the dirt so that it can start composting and breaking down. We will then keep it down and sprayed with roundup so that it has some forced idleness this year and plant it in the fall. I had only taken my outer coat shell and it was just not enough to keep the wind at bay. I had to zip it all the way up and put the hood on to stop the wind on Saturday. I am getting stir crazy in the house and I cannot paint because of the baby chicks.

One of the things I noticed dragging the disc set around was that the back part of the disc was not digging in enough. It needed some weight. I backed the discs up and changed the angle on them so that helped but the soil is still very wet and I had a hard time getting any traction with the tractor. I had to make the discs easier to pull a couple of times until I got the right amount of earth movement and tractor traction. I was glad when my alarm went off to go feed the animals as I was cold and ready to be done.

Today I went out early in the morning after a freeze last night. The real problem with this is I added some weight to the discs today. I knew I had some old tractor weights kicking around the farm. Every time I have found one on the farm I have tossed it into the machine shed or in a pile over by the grain bins. I found eight 50# solid metal weights and tossed them into the bucket. Once I got to the discs I ran a chain through the weights and chained them to the disk over the second set. There was a welded piece of steel there already as it looked like someone had been piling up rocks for weight before. This added weight caused me to have to adjust the disc angle a couple of more times as they were now digging into the ground better. I failed to take into account that when the ground thaws it becomes super slick on top! I had a couple of times where I thought I was going to have to unchain the disc set just to get the tractor unstuck but I managed to get it out every time. I got almost the entire field done and only found one 30×40 yard patch that still has standing water. I need to mark this area and the couple of spring heads that are visible. I think I can dig trenches and connect this waterway up to the spring ditch that is already running. If nothing else, I may have to create a small pond to corral all the water. I will try some ditches first.

It was a beautiful day today and it only hailed on me once. I remembered an extra layer and a neck warmer and had to take the neck warmer off it was so pleasant.

The tractor is the perfect time to just contemplate life as you go around in circles. The ground is so rough that I over tighten the seat belt so it holds me in place and I don’t get thrown from the tractor. I also eat the pickle flavor sunflower seeds. They are the best, except the seeds are too small unless you get the Biggies!

I had plans on getting a overall picture and hiked up to the top of the bluff, looked out over my work and went to take a picture and my phone died.

The written word of my awesome job will have to suffice as testament to my hard work!

It’s been a long week

Steve HardinLeave a comment

It was a long week, as Annmarie was out of town and I was alone. I had big plans of painting the entire house during that time. Those plans did not come to fruition. I had to do the morning chores and then come home and do the evening chores, go to work and get cows back into their respective “fenced areas”. Fenced should mean they cannot get out but it doesn’t really work that way. The bull needs another fence to keep him away from the creek crossing. I think I am going to run a fence up from the corner of our yard. We have a fence already up the hill slightly for the ram pasture enclosure. I just need to run it directly up to the top of the hill. The only real problem is the hill is solid rock! I will have to put in rock cribs the entire length of the fence. I may get 6-8 T posts in the ground if I am lucky. I really need a teenager to come over and help me when I do that fence. If you have two people on the fence driver sometimes you can drive them in when I cannot do it alone. It will have to be very wet ground also. Luckily, filling up the rock cribs will not be hard as they are readily available and close at hand.

The big score this week was the stock racks for the pickup. They actually work as is but we are going to look into having them painted. I got an amazing price and I will call the powder coat shop in Hermiston and see what they would charge to paint them. If it’s over $300 then I will be doing it myself with a grinder and a multitude of cans of spray paint. I am hoping its under the budget! We will be able to move any of the sheep we need in the pickup and not have to pull a trailer. I need the racks to look nice so that I can get them mounted to the pickup.

Winter decided to make a strong comeback. So now we are dealing with snow and mud. This makes moving the large bales very hard with my small tractor. I am looking forward to no more large bales. I am going to get the tire fixed on my beat up pickup bed trailer. This will let me store 20 bales of hay on the trailer and just hook onto it with the tractor and feed the cows out of the trailer. I can keep the trailer under cover in the machine shop and still feed 2k pounds of feed at a time. Zeke is making us crazy again. He has decided that he doesn’t appreciate the constraints of being fenced into the yard. Since we have taught him to go around, under or through fences as part of his herding jobs we have created a monster. He now knows that the front creek bank is a weak spot in our fence. He keeps digging into the bank and under the fence. I have added three separate panels to plug various holes. Nothing is working to keep him in. So now he is back on the overhead run. I am going to have to lay horizontal fencing down along the banks and wire it to the vertical pieces so that he cannot dig down within two feet of the creek bank. I suspect this may work. I cannot guarantee my hypothesis until I do the actual experiment.

Hormones are the male species greatest weakness

Steve HardinLeave a comment

Today was the day to crank out the hallway and another wall in the living room with new paint. The downfall to this is I need to put blue tape everywhere first. I was almost done with the taping when I got a call from my nephew stating that the bull was no longer in his area and was standing outside the separated heifers enclosure. This means he got out again! I know where the hole is, he has to be going under the fence at the creek crossing. The problem with this is I cannot lower the fence down into the water because the spring runoff has not happened yet. If I lower the fence then Mother Nature will rip it all down with a sudden deluge of runoff in the back creek. I grabbed the dogs and walked up the back hillside to the upper gate and opened it up. I was thinking we could drive the Bull back up the hill and inside his area. This did not work as he did drive to the corner but then crawled under the fence again. Ugh! I just remembered at 8:00pm that I forgot to close the stupid upper gate!! Now I gotta go trudge up there in the dark and check for the bull then close the gate! There are days that the farm life is more work and less play than others.

Stupid dogs chased the bull out quickly then when I used them to try and push him away from the creek opening they pushed him back through the opening! We had to start all over again. The second time through I decided I needed to make something that would allow the water to run past but would keep the Bull from getting back through. I thought about making a T-post fence by driving a T-post every 6 inches in an arc in front of the opening. This sounded a lot like work and no guarantee that it would keep him in. I was looking around thinking when I spotted three old wooden posts so I wired these onto the fence leaning in toward the Bull. I wanted something else so I walked over to the old chicken coop and started digging around. I found a piece of corrugated roofing. I used an old nail I found on the ground and a rock to punch two holes in it and I found a piece of rusted 1/8 inch wire to tie it in place over the boards. I am hoping all of this combined will keep the bull from crawling under the fence again and let the water flow by.

As I was sitting down to have a third cup of coffee I saw the bull going by the window. He was unable to get past my obstacle course. I had taken the time to use the Bull as a training tool for the dogs. I took some video but cannot upload it on the blog, our internet connection is too slow. I will post it to twitter in the morning. I got one clip of the bull calling for his women and one of the two border collies pushing him away from his women.

I did finish putting up all the blue tape in the hallway. No paint went onto the walls today. I had plans to finish the blog earlier but I spotted a deal on Facebook classifieds for some fencing material but I had to go pick it up asap. I hooked the trailer up in the snow and drove over and bought some T-posts, gates, smooth wire rolls, wooden posts and two sections of culvert. I brought a lot of cash but needed more. I wrote down all the information to mail a check and as soon as I got home I wrote the check and have it in a stamped envelope ready to go in the morning. There was even more snow down when I got home and unloaded the trailer.

As an added bonus I managed to purchase a stock rack for the pickup! I am going to pick it up tomorrow which is why I needed the trailer unloaded tonight. It only cost $200 but it does need a paint job! I just need to get some of that paint that you brush on and it converts the rust to a primer then I can just use spray cans to finish it off.

I did manage to draw up some plans for the back wall of our in ground greenhouse. I am loving the idea and can stack 3-4 high 50 gallon drums. I think it needs to be 20 feet x 10 feet minimum after doing some research. If you make them small the temperature tends to fluctuate too much. I would love to grow a lemon, orange and kiwi tree inside the greenhouse! Plus have tomatoes year round along with spinach and carrots and lettuce. The barrels will be filled with water and act as storage and heat sink. They will do double duty.