Dog stories

I've been inspired by Sara, over at My Favorite Sheep, to try the short movie option on my camera. I didn't plan on it when it happened, but I saw this interaction between Buster and Holly and just thought it so typical of them, I wanted to capture it. Please pardon the poor quality and the jiggly nature of the movie. I was standing in the middle of the adult ewes that we had penned and were de-worming and they weren't so interested in standing still so I could play around with my camera (if your sound is turned on, the bells you hear are those the adult ewes wear).

Holly is still continuing to amaze me with her instinctual behavior. And now there is another twist to the story of her showing up here just when she did. A few months ago we had four Great Pyrenees........and now we only have two. The elderly male we had adopted last fall was already ill when he came to us, so our goal with him was to make him as comfortable as we could for the the time he had left and I think we succeeded. He seemed very happy to be with the other dogs and the sheep, and although he slept a lot, he still wanted to patrol and work when he felt up to it. When the weather got hot back in early summer, it was obvious that the time had come to let him go. Every breath became a struggle for him and we made the difficult decision to put him down. Luckily for all of us, he didn't have to be traumatized by loading him into the car to go to a veterinarian's office for his final moments. My husband, who is a small animal veterinarian who makes house calls, performs this service for someone nearly every week, but we've been fortunate to not have to make the decision very often ourselves. Buddy went very peacefully and we know we did the right thing, even though it was very sad.

Our original guard dog, Abby, has been with us for eleven years and was quite old by Pyrenees standards. She's been a wonderful, dedicated guardian for our sheep. About a month ago, she just disappeared. Here one day and gone the next. She would occasionally be out of sight for a day or two, but never longer than that, so the first few days, we weren't alarmed. Then, it turned into a week, then two and now about a month. These dogs are not terribly social, especially with strangers, so we don't think someone took her. She just wouldn't let anyone get close enough for that to happen. I've heard about dogs going off to die, but have never experienced it before.....and that is what we think may have happened. We have searched for her, but with 160 acres, there are many places she could go and not be found. I still expect to see her sleeping under the trees with the sheep or hear her familiar bark during the night. If that never happens (and at this point, I don't think it will), I want to think she went out and chose her spot and then peacefully went to sleep. It's just too hard to think about otherwise.

So, that leaves us with two Pyrenees. Hannah is a little more than five years old and does not have very strong guarding instincts. She will patrol and bark at night, but she would much rather be sleeping under the screened porch or in the hydrangea bushes beside the garage. She's very sweet and quite goofy at times, so she will live out her life here with us even though she does a less than stellar job.

And then came Holly into our lives. If not for Holly being here and working so well already, we would be beginning the process all over again with a 6 week old puppy and be a long way from giving our sheep the protection they need to survive here on this farm overlooking the Kentucky river. We hear the coyotes every night. We know when they are feeding their pups and when they are training them to hunt on their own. We share this land with them and are willing to co-exist as peacefully as possible. Having the guard dogs with the sheep keeps the coyotes away. Our dogs don't kill the coyotes. They just warn them and chase them away from the flock. At less than a year old, Holly has some big paw prints to fill and she is doing an admirable job already. This is not a time-table of events I would have planned for, but you know that old saying about how "life happens when you are busy making other plans". I'm prone to spending a lot of mental and physical energy trying to make things turn out "right" (not that they always do). I know there is a lesson somewhere in all this, probably meant just for me.

Making hay while the sun shines....

Not us...not this year. It's in the barn and we are prepared for winter (which seems a long way off), but someone else raised the hay this year and someone else put it in the barn loft. And all I can say is Hallelujah! My husband loves to bale hay (go figure!). I think it brings back fond memories of his childhood growing up on his grandparent's farm. Me? Not so much. I like it in the barn loft, smelling sweet and green, but I don't like being part of the team that gets it up there. I'm way over proving that I am a strong woman, and actually, I'm not so strong anymore---at least my back isn't. It's enough lifting for me to throw those bales down from the loft when I'm feeding the sheep during the winter. The main problem with us raising our own hay is that it is seldom ready to be baled on the weekend and that is the only time my husband is available. Every year there is this great rush to get it cut, dried to just the right stage and then baled and in the barn. It almost never works out the way it should. So, it is cause for celebration to see all those lovely, sweet-smelling bales stacked up there just waiting for cold weather.

Togetherness

I had to laugh when I walked into the chicken pen this morning. These two banty hens are some of the oldest and the only ones laying eggs right now. I guess the bigger hens have used up their allotment of eggs and now their main job seems to be just eating as much as they can! What you can't see in the picture is that these girls are surrounded by empty nest boxes. I'm not sure why, but this is the one box that seems to be favored by all the old hens. They all laid their eggs in this particular box, and if one of them happened to be broody and wanting to sit on the nest full time, why the rest would just climb in on top of her and lay their eggs anyway. It will be interesting to see what the new chickens do, once they start laying.

We've gotten so spoiled with having fresh eggs, I can't seem to make myself buy the ones in the grocery. In order to use the banty eggs in cooking, I measured them by weight and volume and discovered that two banty eggs equals one large regular egg. So we are just hanging on here, waiting for the new chickens to get with the program.

Living in the land of giants

Giant zucchini and cucumbers, that is. Honestly, I was just out in the garden picking two days before and look what I found yesterday. How is it possible for things to grow this big, so fast? I suppose I must have overlooked these, and we have had two days of rain (finally), so they just exploded. You're looking at chicken treats here. The next few mornings, when I feed the chickens, I'll cut these into big chunks and they will literally jump all over it (and I won't feel wasteful).

The green beans are in the picture for scale. There are many more beans to pick and they will need my attention soon. These were for dinner last night, along with some potatoes, sliced tomatoes and cucumbers (all veggies from the garden) and a roasted chicken (not from our flock). I've been using this roast chicken recipe for many, many years. It originally came from "At Home in the Country", a book written by Mary Emmerling (remember her from American Country fame?). It makes the best chicken and is so easy to prepare. Once you put the chicken in the oven, you have an hour and a half to get the rest of your meal together. I love it when everything doesn't have to be done at the last minute and at the same time.

ROAST CHICKEN-

Ingredients-1 4-5 lb whole chicken - 2 cloves of garlic - kosher salt - pepper - juice of 2 lemons

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Line baking pan with foil (or you'll be sorry!). Rinse chicken and pat dry. Salt and pepper the inside. Rub the halved garlic cloves over the skin, then place them inside the cavity. Pour lemon juice over the chicken and sprinkle kosher salt liberally over the skin. I usually tie the legs together with cotton twine. Roast uncovered for 1 hour and 15 minutes (or use a meat thermometer if you are unsure). Remove from oven, cover with foil and allow to rest for 15 minutes. The skin will be crispy and the inside juicy and tender. Hope you like it!