New camera

The camera I ordered came today. A Panasonic Lumix. Gramma has one, but hers has a few more features than mine. She can afford them, I can't. So I took a bunch of pics to try it out. Here's the world's cutest dog.

Ain't she cute? Anyway it works really great and the pics are really good, very clear with good color. Now I have a small camera to carry around so I can get more spontaneous pics of horses, cats, chickens and grandkids. It has more megapixels than the bigger camera so I think it will take clearer pics. We're happy.

Snow

This is for those of you who haven't seen snow for awhile and those of you who have never seen it except in pictures. Wish I could send you some.

It was snowing when I got up a little after 4 yesterday. This is a little later.

It snowed all day and blew hard. They said on the news that over 500 cars went off the road. It never ceases to amaze me how people can forget how to drive in the winter. We missed the Grandkids birthday party and stayed home.

It's still snowing now, but lightly.

I suppose we might have gotten 6 inches or so, but it's hard to tell because a lot melted and a lot of it blew around.

It's very sticky and wet. I tried to get Gramma to build a snowman so that I could take pictures of it, but she just laughed at me and said no. Go figure. It will at least make it easier to see deer. Haven't got one yet, but there's still hope. Anyway winter is finally here and I think it's going to stay for awhile. Ice fishing soon. Yay!

Opening weekend

Deer opener 2010. On Saturday deer were seen, but none harvested. I had three deer walk under my stand that morning. The first two came by before legal shooting time and the next one was a young doe, probably last year's fawn so I let her go. The Boy saw one deer, but too early to shoot. I went back out to my stand to fix something in the middle of the day and halfway up the steps here comes a nice doe running down the entire length of the hayfield. Rifle? What rifle? DOH! So Saturday we went deerless.

Sunday morning, nada. Sunday evening The Boy harvested two big does that came out together. Way to go son! Neither one had fawns and they should have. I believe the coyotes are taking the fawns around here. We are hearing coyotes almost every day and this is the first year we haven't seen fawns on our property. I did some research and found that coyotes are very good at fawn predation. Oh well, all I can do is try to decrease the 'yote population when I see them. It's warm here, (50's) so I can't let these deer hang, so I'll put off my hunting for a couple of days and process them. Now I have to figure out what I'm going to charge The Boy for all my work. I think I'll make him come back and get a couple deer for me.

Eggs and Deer season

Ok, ok. Enough about eggs already. This will be the last egg picture, ever, really. Probably. Maybe.

Anyway I wish you all could see these eggs up close. They are so cool. And so good. Our new darkest egg is the one on the right. Ok, done. This weekend is deer opener. I just realized today that I got my first deer 49 years ago. Man I'm old. I missed two years in the Navy and the year I got out, there wasn't a season. Then I missed two years when my Dad died, cause I couldn't imagine hunting without him. Then I realized that wasn't what he would want me to do. Now my son comes up here to hunt and even though he doesn't know it, this is what makes my season now. And if he want's it, I'll give him my secret jerky recipe.That way I don't have to give him my jerky. Hopefully some day I can hunt with some of my Grandkids. And maybe one of my daughters.

Sparkle in the coop

Our chicken coop is built with hardware cloth instead of chicken wire.

This is because critters like weasels, who like to eat chickens and eggs can get through chickenwire. Hardware cloth has 1/2" holes.

As you can see even mice can't get through hardware cloth. They get stuck. But they like to run behind the wire on the 2x4s and hide behind the 6x6 posts.

Sparkle likes to lay in the coop and watch the corner and pretend that she can catch these mice. She always lays in about the same spot.

Usually the chickens just ignore her. Well yesterday morning I was filling the chicken feeder and Alice was in there and Sparkle was doing her thing staring in the corner. Alice walked up to her and looked at her and then looked at the corner and back at Sparkle and back at the corner and then back at Sparkle again and then at me and then walked away clucking as if to say "This cat is crazy". It was the funniest thing I think I ever saw. If nothing else, these animals keep us entertained.

Maran eggs

Our newest Maran hens have started to lay eggs. We're not sure if all of them are laying, but we're pretty sure at least two of them are.

This is a Welsummer egg on the left, two of the new Maran eggs in the middle and a Simone egg on the right.

This is our darkest egg so far. Almost like chocolate. Store bought, Maran and Lucy. Cool huh?

Pizza and weather and other stuff

Last night Gramma made pizza.

She used Mrs. Smith's sauce recipe (yummy sauce) and she tweaked it a bit for us. Wow! I think it's better than the pizza we go into town for. I don't think she realizes that she's going to have to make this on a regular basis. (So don't tell her.) Yum!

It has been raining and very windy the last couple of days. It blew the deck chairs off the deck.

It blew the the beer bottle out of Fred's hands. It sounded like a freight train all night. Then this morning it snowed. They said that we had the lowest atmospheric pressure ever recorded in Minnesota yesterday.  The weather service said that if the pressure were that low over the ocean there would be a hurricane. As it was we had sustained winds from 30 to 50 miles an hour. I'm going to have to check all the trails and shooting lanes for downed trees tomorrow. I just got done cleaning them all up about a week ago. There are trees down all over and the rivers are over their banks and running fast like after snow melt in the spring. I saw a large metal shed on it's roof in the middle of a plowed field. It's still blowing now but not quite as hard.      
On another note, we got the results back from our hay test. The U of M and other research facilities say that a sensitive horse requires hay with a sugar content of 10% or less and ours tests out at 8.2%. Yay. It also tested out at below the max for moisture content which is 15% and ours was 11%, so we're doing something right. We no longer have to soak it. We do have to weigh it though and feed them a certain amount. So it's better than soaking, but still not as easy as putting out a bale in the feeder. This spring after we butcher the pigs I'm going to remodel inside the barn and make two stalls so we can be sure who's eating what.

And on still another note, Gramma and I went to the VA medical center to find out the results of my latest hearing test. If you don't know or don't remember, I broke my hearing aid this summer. I don't remember when exactly but it's been over three months. I sent it in and waited. Finally came back with a note that it was too damaged to fix and I would need a new mold of my ear so they could make a new one. Make an appointment. A month later we go to the med center and the guy we see says I need a new evaluation cause my hearing has probably changed and the aid I have is old technology and obsolete. So I had the test and Monday got the results. I will now require two hearing aids. The cool thing is they come with a "Remote Control." What? Yes. It's like "The Bionic Man" or something. I'll be able to change the volume in each ear and change where I want the most volume to come from, behind me, to the side or in front. Maybe I can go to the movies again. Maybe Gramma won't divorce me. It's been tough on her. Maybe I can even hear what my soft talking Grandkids say. That would be nice. Still, it's going to take about a month or so to get them. Hang in there Gramma. There's hope on the horizon.