It's gettin' hot up in here.

It's been about a month since we've had any measurable rainfall here, and daytime temps have been stuck in the upper 90's for some time, yesterday was 100 degrees. Today we are supposed to hit 101 with a heat index of 120+ and unbearable humidity. It has been a  huge challenge to keep the animals cool. I have several fans in the sheep barn, and we added two more high velocity fans a couple of days ago. The fans help, but they can only do so much when they are just moving hot, soupy air around. The sheep keep their noses plastered to the fans all day and then go out to graze at night after the sun goes down.

I also have sprinklers running all day over the barns to cool them down.

The chickens are having a very difficult time as well. I lost my big Blue Cochin rooster and one of my Easter Egger hens in spite of my efforts to keep everyone comfortable : (. 

The chickens are all walking around with their wings up, trying to cool themselves.

I have a sprinkler going into the chicken run, and over their barn to cool it too. The chickens find some escape from the oppressive heat by picking around in the puddles.

Even my little Barn Swallow baby is lifting himself up out of the nest to stay cool. He is an only child so he is doing pretty well....no siblings to heat the place up.

Rooster Cogburn and Swagger seek shade under the apple trees....and beneath the weeds in my overgrown garden during the heat of the day. That's why I left all those weeds in there....yeah...that's it.

The horses are a little tougher to keep cool. I have fans in their barn as well, but the fans don't offer much relief in this weather. I hose the horses down with cool water a couple of times a day. Jasmine feels the need to taste the water as it comes out of the hose, making it kind of difficult to spray the rest of her body down.

Then, of course, after she is all clean and fresh, the obvious thing to do next is to roll around in the dirt and replace all the gunk that just got washed off.

  Dead horse.

Aaaannnd shake it all off.

.

Ande has his own way of keeping cool. He has his sprinkler...

...and his swimming pool, albeit a little small for him.

Sometimes he likes to combine the two for that true 'water park' experience.

He is, however, not too excited about the prospect of sharing his water park with Emma and Jolly Ball.

We have chances of rain in the next couple of days and temperatures are supposed to be more bearable....like 95.....it had better cool off because I promised my critters that if we can just get through today, we will be OK.

I hope it's cooler wherever you are!

Now I have to make jam for Farmers' Market. YAY! Boiling water and hot, molten fruit!

Fun with Japanese Beetles! Caution, this doesn't end well for the beetles

Well, I have no excuse for my long absence from my blog. The summer is flying by and there have been a number  of things that I could have blogged about, but time just seems to slip away so quickly. I vow to be a better blogger....or, that is to say, I will blog more often...it won't be any better 'cause I am still the one that is writing it, there will just be more of.....well, whatever this is.

Recently our farm has been invaded by Popillia Japonica-no, this is not some hip, new rock band-we are talking Japanese Beetles here.

At first, there were just a few of them munching on some of my flowers, which was not much more than an annoyance.

Then they brought their friends- along with their voracious appetites..

Then they started dining on some of my fruit trees. 

 Oh, heck no! I am not havin' any of this!!!

Something had to be done, and since I really try not to use any insecticides on the property, I had to get creative.

In past years, I have gathered up some of  shiny little insect-offenders and thrown the mercilessly into the chicken run, to be gobbled up by my hungry flock. It was pretty much a win-win situation.....unless you were a beetle. 

Hard-shelled beetles provide extra phosphorous and calcium - not to mention lots of protein for the chickens- which means happy chickens, less feed for me to buy, and, as an added bonus, by keeping the number of beetles down , my plants looked less like Grandma's lace doilies. But, collecting the evil little creepy-crawlies was a bit time consuming- as well as a bit disgusting when they decided to fly into my hair, so I needed a new, improved method of revenge.

I considered placing one of those Japanese Beetle traps in the chicken's run, but I didn't really want all the beetles to land inside a trap where the chickens couldn't get to them, so I improvised -as I sometimes do.

I bought the bait that is intended to go into the trap - apparently it is scented with beetle pheromone and the beetles are lured into thinking that they are on their way to some sort of  insect swinger's party, when, in reality, the only date that they will be having is with their maker.

 I tried to think of a way to expose the bait, while ensuring that the chickens couldn't get to it. The bait is supposedly non-toxic -  the beetles are only lured by the scent and then are captured in the trap, but I still didn't want to take any chances. I had a few ideas to keep the chickens safe from the bait, but some of them were not very practical. At times like these I go to our junk- garage and take inventory of all the useless stuff that we have been hanging onto "just in case we need it".

I found a couple of old vent covers...hmmmmm...one of these could work.

The back had wire mesh, so there was no way for the chickens to get through it.

I found a board to attach my new-fangled trap to.

Opened the bait and secured it to the board.

Covered the bait with the vent cover.

And then nailed it into place...OK, so I am no Bob Vila, but I got the job done.

I almost forgot to mention that you will need a good supervisor for this project.

I then selected a spot in the chicken run to place my new chicken feeder, and waited for the fun to begin.

Are you wondering why you only see a few chickens in the video when you know that, in actuality, I have....well....a lot of chickens? It has been obscenely hot here and most of the girls were seeking shade at this time of day. One of the older Barred Rock girls, however, was particularly persistent!

Is this going to solve the problem? No, but it will give me a little satisfaction knowing that there are a few less beetles eating my yard!

Useful piece of advice for the day..

If you are going to leave your 'barn shoes' out on the porch overnight........

Just make sure you take a quick peek inside before you put them on.

Just sayin'.

A few ewes and a flea market.

First of all, I am not dead, thanks for the inquiries ; ). I just haven't been very bloggy as of late.

I  have added some of my ram lambs to my 'Shetland Sheep for Sale' page on this blog.  Some of the ram lambs are still being evaluated; it takes a while to figure out what those darn horns are going to do! I have been trying to take pictures of the ewe lambs in between the rain storms, but haven't been very successful thus far. All of my ewe lambs are spoken for...so I almost hate to post more pictures of them...it's kind of like saying, "Hey, look at these sheep you can't have!"  Hopefully next year I will have more ewes lambs than ram lambs to offer.

Here are a few of the girls that I did get pictures of.

What? I said, 'I ALMOST ' hate to post pictures of them.

This pretty spotted ewe is going to an unregistered flock in Indiana. 

These two black ewes, Juno and Forseti, will be living with a nice family in Iowa.

The new owners picked the name, Juno, for this solid black ewe.

 And Forseti is this pretty girl's name.

Freya will be moving to Decorah, Iowa.

This little moorit ewe will be going with Freya to Decorah...I always like it when they have a buddy to go with them.

I will try to get pictures of the rest soon.

About the flea market.

Those of you that have been following my blog are familiar with the Flea Market routine. We (my sister Marie and I) get up before the crack of dawn and meet so that we can make the hour and a half road trip to West Burlington, Iowa, for the monthly flea market. You are probably thinking, "Wow, there must be some great stuff there to make it worth getting up that early!" Ummm, not necessarily, it's just the possibility of some really great stuff that keeps us going back.

So, this time, my husband Gary was brave enough to join us for the trip. Sunday morning we were on our way before 4:30.....yes, AM.

Note the age of my truck by the fact that I have a cassette tape player in the dash board.....more about my aging truck later.

We arrived right around 6 AM, and Marie started finding bargains right away. Large Coleus plants for $2.

 Annnnd a few accessories that we opted to not purchase...

 We found these purses that would go with...well....umm, nothing that I own, but here are some purses.

 And some fancy beads....it was like Mardi Gras- without the nudity.

 ?????

I've been looking all over for this stuff!

And this, apparently, is a Bunny vacuum cleaner cover...to hide your vacuum...'cause this is more attractive than a vacuum?

Nothing says flea market like a heart-shaped hot tub!

We met some interesting people. This guy was nice enough to model his hats for us.

I thought it was adorable how this man and his dog kinda had the same expression.

This kitty picture is for my son-in-law, Andrew, because the only thing he loves more than a squishy-faced cat, is a squishy-faced cat wearing clothes. Not joking. He loves this stuff.

I found an old table and a bench that needed a little TLC, but with some sprucing up they might be kind of neat. Hey, they were a dollar each, so what the heck.

At this point we had wandered around for about three hours and were starting to accumulate a few things. Gary was holding up pretty well, his job was to keep an eye on Marie so she didn't wander off too far; there were shiny things there, so it is sometimes difficult to keep track of her. 

Pay no attention to the pink Barbie Christmas tree.....it has a special purpose bwahahaha!

By the time we had wandered around for almost 4 hours, Gary started looking at knives...I am not sure what that was about....hmmm. I think he had reached his 'fun' limit.

When we were just about to leave, we made an astonishing discovery. I thought I was pretty good at geography, especially when it comes to the great state of Iowa, but something we found told me otherwise.

Apparently, Iowa is farther West than I originally thought...like, West, as in, the desert, West.

And Iowa is much larger than I thought-stretching all the way to the ocean. I must live a sheltered life because I have never seen dolphins in Iowa. Good to know.

And who knew that Iowa reached all the way to the South Eastern part of the U.S.? I had no idea that Iowa was in the land of Dixie! 

OK, now I am really confused.....

 I better study my geography.

After we had just about all the fun that Gary could stand, we headed home. After leaving the flea market we made a brief stop to gas up and hit the road. We only got a short distance from the market and my truck (Larry) started making strange noises. The RPM needle was going up and down and the engine seemed to be "missing". We wondered if we should try to baby the old boy home, or try to find an open service station in one of the tiny towns ( most of them with populations of less than 300) along the way...on a Sunday morning... we opted to try to get him home....which we did...still waiting for a damage report on that one....I think the mechanic is afraid to call me.