Feeling Guilty

I swear, I try to be good.  It just seems not to work out the way I plan sometimes.  I worked hard to evict the little opossum from the Love Shack.  I know some people will tell you that opossums won’t hurt chickens and it’s okay to leave them in the coop, and that is true right up to the moment it’s not.  But I have nothing against opossums, so I decided to just evict him.  If he had “played opossum”, I’d have put it in the middle of the barn.  That’s a perfectly acceptable place for it to live.  I felt horrible when I came home Monday afternoon and saw it lying inert on my front sidewalk.  My dog is a dog.  I put the dog in and ran to do a few chores.  Just as I was coming to scoop him up and set him someplace safe to see if he was playing or really dead when I saw him very unsteady walking out of the yard.

a very distinctive looking little one

Poor baby.  He was walking.

pausing for a rest

He was moving. Slowly.  I’m not sure if he’ll be okay or not.  I did watch him go into a little den under the corner of the garage.

almost to the den–it’s right behind the tubs

I felt so bad after evicting him that I would have fed him if I had known at that time where he was staying.  Since I saw where it went, I did set out some cat food.

I’ll keep giving him some if he eats it.

He’ll get it as long as the geese don’t sniff it out.  They like cat food too.

Buffy and Miss Goose

I actually set it there on my way to put more cat food in the barn.  When it was so cold and I was checking chickens one morning, I saw a streak–obviously a cat–go into the barn.  I had no idea who it was, but nobody should be out in the cold without food.  When I went in the barn to finish haying the goats, I saw who it was.

Silver Boy!

Silver Boy!  He does come and go, but this is the first I’ve seen him over here in a while.

Staying a safe distance from me and going up to the shelter of the hay

I am happy to make sure he has something to eat this winter if he needs it; although, with the warm weather he seems to have left again.  At least that one seemed to work out.  He’s looking great!  Tuesday, when I came home, I also noticed that the cat food by the opossum’s hiding spot was gone.  I took that as a good sign.  Then I found it in the Morton building.

poor baby

I am not going to lie.  He’s not looking good.  Poor baby seems to have a head injury from my dog.  It’s in a much more comfortable spot, and I think the girls in the Morton building will be okay with it.  I think.  After all, they are goats.

It’s by the door behind the green tub. Dee, Ava, and Wanda

I gave it some more cat food. Hopefully, it will just rest and heal.  And the weather is warm enough that I can leave the door open and let him have access as needed.

The next morning, the food was gone and so was he.  So we’ll see how this one turns out.

Odds and Ends

My dog has been naughty lately.  Well, he’s being a German shepherd.

Yes, he does look sweet.

He’s been trying to kill the baby opossum(s).  I’m not sure if it’s the same one or different ones, but the poor baby needs to quit coming into my yard.

poor baby opossum

I am also thrilled to say that after about six months I finally saw my Silver Boy again!

Silver Boy in the north paddock

He looks so good.  Getting him fixed was the best thing I could do for him.

I kept my distance, but he didn’t even run!

There’s no way you’ll ever convince me that he and Tiger are not full brothers.

Tiger

They both seem pretty happy with their lives here.  I do wish I could do more to help Silver Boy, but I’m not sure what it would be.

A Change in Weather

This morning, our brutal cold was still in full force.  I admit I stayed in bed with cats and tried to put off actually getting up.

After I downed some coffee, I put on my layers and headed out to check on everyone and do my morning chores.  By the way, my morning chores usually only consists of feeding the chickens.   Of course, the dog has to go out with me.  I don’t know why.

Waiting at the door while I put on my boots.

Right now, it’s checking everyone.

It’s humid in the Morton building–if I turn the fan on, it sucks any little warmth out of there.

Perdita eating leftover hay for breakfast.

Tansy chewing cud and snuggled into hay.

Everyone enjoying the sun. Ms. Goose cracks me up hanging with the herd.

At one point I had to move Maisie and Casey into the Morton building because they were just too cold.  Maisie is back out now.

Maisie and others basking on the south side of the barn.

Casey is still in there.  He’s my sweet old boy, and he really has started showing his age these past few months.

Casey and Joy in the Morton building.

I also have to beat the ice off the cattle tank; I feed Zora and BJ some sweet feed; I turn on the lights in the buck room and garage so they have a bit more light.  Recently, I’ve been putting cat food out in the barn.  I am so glad I saw that Silver Boy was out there so I knew to feed him.  I wasn’t sure if he made it through the cold or not, but I think he was just hunkered down.

Cat food in the plastic bucket would be busted open if it were a raccoon eating.

My cat food has started disappearing again.  I was going to put out the trail cam to see who/what was eating it, but my batteries were dead.  It’s on my list to get more.  But this morning, I found solid evidence that makes me think it is the cat.  Yay!

Cat’s paw print in the snow

There’s a lot of snow out here.  It’s just exhausting to do chores in this type of weather.

Those drifts make it nearly impossible to do chores. The pile my nephew made clearing a place for me to feed them.

I keep telling the animals that the cold won’t last much longer.

The dog has a little bit of space where the snow didn’t drift by the house.

Nobody can get into the Quonset hut

The field looks empty–that’s what drifts to fill the ditches and road.

In the last eight days, we’ve only had one warm day (the second one was an early warm and dropping temps all day). And by warm I simply mean not stupid cold.  But you can see that it’s going to change, so I’m not lying when I tell them it’s going to get warmer.

I’m not sure it’s a really good change, though, because we’re also going to be wet with rain or heavy wet snow.  The sudden temperature changes to damp and dank is a perfect recipe for respiratory infections.  Hopefully, we’ll all stay healthy.