Good Morning

[lolotsung]

fire can be caused by thermal runaway in a sealed lead acid battery due to overcharging, high ambient temperature, old battery, and float charging voltage

@Happy does your hubby install Generac solar? If so, would he like to provide us with a quote?

[Happy]

fire can be caused by thermal runaway in a sealed lead acid battery due to overcharging, high ambient temperature, old battery, and float charging voltage

@Happy does your hubby install Generac solar? If so, would he like to provide us with a quote?

They really just deal with the back-up systems. And I'm afraid they have more local work than they can currently handle. Thanks for the offer though.

[Killerbunny]

More f*****g white stuff down. Enough already. Try explaining to the poor chickens, turkeys play in it like dogs. I have 3 broody turkeys now, they started this nonsense 6 weeks earler than usual and are trying to get the young (<1yr) girls to play along! I have orders for fertile eggs and now production drops. Weird spring.

[Bayvistafarm]

Good day!!

Its blowing here, WAS supposed to drive to Paisley this morning, but one look at the forecast with white-outs and squalls... and dangerous driving conditions etc, made me think tomorrow would be a better day. Ugh.. I can't believe 2 weeks comes around so fast. At least its March Break... and if I have to keep putting it off... I can go any day this week. Not with my sister tho, she milks every afternoon. This is her weekend off.

We have a generac kind of hooked outside to the meter somewhere. I know not much about it... but we bring the generator up, hook it into a plug there, and it runs absolutely everything..... except... Gary ran the bath water... and when the hot water heater kicked in... it quit the generator, LOl, so he went downstairs and shut if off. I think it will run 3 hours on a tank of gas... but it IS using more oil than necessary, and it shut off once for that reason.

So..... we all went bowling last night for Gary's birthday. We had 3 lanes side by side. The kids and Gary played 5 pin... we (all other kids, and spouses) played 10 pin. Then, Whiskey Friday in the drive shed.... I came home from bowling... did barn, and came home to sleep for todays trip. Sawyer awoke in the night, with a hoarse/no voice. Tested positive this morning. Ugh. I think I was far enough from Sawyer, to hopefully not catch. We all wore masks... well, not for eating or drinking... but I was alone at a table while doing that. Kids wore masks as well.. well... not in the shed. Be interesting to see who comes down with it. Jeremy/Heather/Jacob of the group just got over covid second to last week ago.

My niece texted me to see if I wanted hatching eggs from her hens. She has LOTS of eggs.... shes thinking of water glassing some to try. Shes got Coronation Sussex... (I miss those, used to have them... so pretty.... Black Copper Marans.... and lavender Orphingtons. So... with her eggs, I will save mine (EE's).... and hatch soon. I'd like about 20 pullets, so will fill my genesis and one (or both) brinsea's... hold 24 eggs each. Not for a couple weeks anyhow... too cold, too windy... too everything, lol. Feed is SO expensive... but the eggs are a perfect food, when the price of all else is so high. Just glad I don't have to buy beef....whipping cream is cheap enough at Costco.. thinking I may try and make butter! I have one of those old fashioned butter churn things... need to 'rub' off the rust, but it still turns, lol.

I guess when kids go back, they will have the option of going maskless. I however, will still wear one while driving, until the weather is hot enough, to have ALL the windows fully down. As it is... I have many of them open a crack, and my drivers window is always fully open. Kinda freezes one hand... but I have a heater vent on it as best as I can get it to directly hit my hand, lol.

Got a call from mom's long term care home yesterday, but didn't get the message, because they didn't leave one, lol. I called Dad.. and apparently, shes been in contact with another resident... arguing and such, and the one lady hit mom. It was broke up before mom could sock her back, however, I got a call this morning, and my mom apparently hit the woman back today, and they broke it up again. I guess they are going to monitor the pair of them a little more closely. She also fell, and has a bump on her head, but are doing her vitals all day, to make sure shes fine. Seems fine. Then, just an hour ago, I saw the home phoning AGAIN... and I thought, "Oh God.. shes not fine", but it was for a FIT test for the masks. Its next Saturday, which is NOT my day.... Roxanne my other other sister does that day... and I also told them, its too far for me to make it on any day just for that. As it is right now, essential or NOT, you have to book a visit... and make sure you cancel (I did todays visit), and rebooked for tomorrow. IF you do not... you get the gears, and they told me I could be denied the visit, if I just showed up. Regardless of how far I have to drive. (takes 2.5 hrs.... pedal to the floor). My sister was 20 minutes late last weekend.... blowing snow on roads, had to drive slower, and they gave her crap about being late!! She told them its hard to gauge getting there on time, if there are other things going on, like weather/road conditions/traffic.
I hate people. There are NO considerations for having to travel a long distance.

I have geraniums and salvia seeded and up. Most of the petunia's.. which is pelleted seed... I water with a big 60ml syringe, and try to do it carefully, because they need light to germinate... but I may have buried a little sprout here or there. My eyes aren't quite like they should be, ha ha. I'm going to see a couple dopes.... and I picked up some perennial sweet pea seed when I was out picking up T-12 grow lights... which have been discontinued I have read... lucky to find 4... should have bought all 5..... for my growlight assembly I moved up to my living room.

Here are some pictures. My daughter had to put her calico cat Chub's down, she noticed her lower jaw looking funny, and opened it up to reveal this. She suspected oral cancer, and thats what it was. She took her in for a diagnoses, and it was determined she only had a couple weeks left... and would decline the whole while. It was unexpected to take her cat in, and then say goodbye immediately, but she prepared the kids for that, they gave her pets and lots of treats and took pictures. She was one sweet cat... would DIE for attention... begged for it... tolerated the kids (maren's 2) laying on her, etc.... I miss her too. Sigh. Why do they have to die? They don't live as long as we like... although my oldest barn cat is 17... and doing great. The one we put the plate in his leg 3 years ago? Maybe 4? Time marches on.

This is the salvia I started... supposed to be a pollinator magnet... and loves hot and dry conditions. I have lots of perennial salvia I purchased from Northland.

Well, have a great weekend all!

[Killerbunny]

Oh must try that salvia. I lost poor little Muppet to parotid cancer a few years back.

[lolotsung]

I find that when I'm tired of winter and SNOW...Spring arrives...so I spent a bit of time trying to find out why chickens do not like snow and why turkeys like snow...I found webpages that said chickens slip on snow, it was too cold, they are snow blind...so I wondered "What do chickens see?" and found this article from Mike the Chicken Vet https://mikethechickenvet.wordpress.com/2012/03/

the biggest surprise was this photo of what humans look like

humans-seen-by-birds.jpg (5.61 KiB) Viewed 4156 times

[ross]

How do they know? Do they put a little camera in a chicken’s head ? Hmmmm

[Killerbunny]

How do they know? Do they put a little camera in a chicken’s head ? Hmmmm

SOrt of like the spy cam Nat Geo uses?

[lolotsung]

@Bayvistafarm hope you and your family feel better soon...Chubs was a a rare colour and wonderful personality...nice indoor setup you have!

[WLLady]

good afternoon all! for a rainy blustery saturday-at least it's not snow this weekend (so far!). sorry i've been MIA for a bit. things have been totally crazy. My clyde's farrier got covid and ended up in the hospital, and as far as i know she still is. she texted to let me know the day she was scheduled to come trim. So then it was pick up the phone....i called 17 farriers. not a single one would come and trim a draft horse because (get this) "they're too dangerous". Well, molly, the big suck, took it all personally and needed a few apples to settle down. I finally called her old farrier who is now retired. She came out last week-5 weeks of trying to find a farrier that would trim a 28yo clydesdale. Got her all trimmed up and we've decided we'll just keep her filed down every weekend now and try to push it out as long as we can. She's got MAYBE a year left in her health wise i think. it just smacks of specieism. sigh. She's the nicest horse....a little ouchy with arthritis, and stiff, but never done anything to anyone and certainly has NEVER thrown anyone or dragged them or kicked them or bit or anything. sigh. who knew this would be such an issue.

had a friend drop by for eggs, and she brought her new puppy, he's a blue heeler. wasn't so sure about our sally for about 10 nanoseconds and then the play and chase was on. They had a great time. He tired sally out so badly-she's done nothing but sleep for the last 2 hours!

Well, time to figure out a heater for the greenhouse so i can get a few things started somewhere where the cats won't get into them. i'm out of room in the front room in the house, with about 400 tree seedlings....hm. i guess i could set some grow lights up in the bedroom upstairs. there's a smidge of room in there LOL. anyways, want to tape the seams in the greenhouse too, and see what the BTU rating is on the heater. just waiting for a break in the rain to go out. Also want to set up a couple of honeybee swarm lure boxes, since we lost 4/5 hives this winter. Just couldn't get in front of the mites last year i guess with the swarming and everything. oh well. live and learn. we have the one hive doing well so far, and will split it next month. Bees are finding pollen from somewhere....likely someone has crocuses or snowdrops or pussywillows. i see the maples are starting to try to bud out here as well.

chickens ducks and turkeys all being allowed out -although they're liking the rain about as much as i am.....so they're all inside. Just waiting on the end of mud season to do a good clean out on the barn. Then the ducks will move outside for the summer and get their pool back they're laying up a storm too! mom's aren't sitting yet, but they've been allowed to keep their eggs now for a few days, so i'm sure the brooding will start soon!