Yesterday's Activities

Well, yesterday I did get the rabbit house finally cleaned out and de-wasped. Yes those pesky little buggers are searching for anywhere and everywhere to make their new summer homes. I have already knocked down several small starter nests and squashed dozens of those buggers with my hand dandy barn broom. If anybody has any suggestion for getting rid of paper wasps, pleeeeaaasssseee let me know. They take over our farm every year and really are a deadly menace!I swiped down 4 new nests in the feed room yesterday and 3 in the rabbit house. Anyway back to the rabbit house, it is all cleaned out. Now we just need to repair the hole in the roof and hang the cages on the walls. The bunnies will be set to go then and it will be really nice to get our doe out of the house as she is making a huge mess everywhere. She is a large rabbit and very playful. It seems her favorite activity is to get close to the edge of her cage and shove all of the shavings out of the cage and onto the carpet, then she takes off running around her cage. The next trick is to take her food dish, which is actually a quite heavy crock and pick it up and throw it. Yes, she really does do this. So needless to say I spend quite a bit of time cleaning up after this bunny. Yesterday, the new chickens came out of the coop for the first time. This was a little nerve wracing at first because of the dogs. I wasn't too worried about our rhodi as he is known to be the mother hen to small animals and quite gentle, however, I was not sure about our pit bull mix. She has not been around chickens since she was a small puppy and she really likes to chase small animals a few of which she may have even caught. So, as my daughter opened the door to the chicken coop and led them outside with some feed I held her collar and anticipated the look of lunch crossing into her eyes. She sat calmly beside me and watched as they peeked outside the door of the coop. Once outside our rhodi (short for rhodesian ridgeback)walked over to sniff the chickens and say hello. Our rooster promptly bowed up, flapped his wings and screeched, and the dog tucked tail and ran for the house. He is more of a chicken than the chickens. So I am still holding the other dog's collar and she lays down and decides it is nap time. So I decided to let go of the collar and she did not move. In fact she slept so hard with the chickens scratching around her that she was snoring for about an hour. I stayed close and since the rabbit house is right next to the chicken house and the chicken yard this was not a hard thing to do. For the rest of the afternoon there were no problems between dogs and chickens and the one I was worried about showed no interest in them. So I guess we are good for now. The rhodi is terribly upset that the chickens won't be nice and be friends with him though. He sat at a very healthy distance and whined. His last hen was his best friend and the two of them were inseperable. I guess he really does miss her. I also got the future goat pasture overseeded for the year to boost the grass production and now it is raining like cats and dogs. I did expect rain because that is why I put the seed out, however this is a deluge and so I envision most of my seed washing to the bottom of the hill in that pasture and off the bare spots where I wanted it. We have always had problems in that pasture and really don't know why. The other two pastures have good stands of grass and this one is just poor. I have more seed to put in the other side of that pasture where the old orchard used to be, but I think I will wait until the rain is almost done otherwise I will have a great stand at the bottom of the hill and nothing on the top. We have to plant in the rain because otherwise our spring birds think that we have just provided them with a great feast. The best way that I have found to keep the cardinals from stealing all of my grass seed is to run around in the rain scattering it. I always overseed by hand because in this manner I can assure that the areas that are thin get the most seed and no seed is wasted. I am a deliberate planter and have no intention of wasting very expensive good grass seed. I did a pH test this past week on all the pastures and we are in good shape so it doesn't look like we will be liming this year. It has only taken us 6 years to get these pastures back into good condition and it is about time.My husband bush-hogged the front pasture and we will be closing that off this weekend so it has a chance to rest. The boys will be upset because that is where they like to spend the most of their time, but they will deal with it. Next week we will be bush-hogging and burning the big pasture which will make them even more upset. They will be confined to hay bales for a month or so, but will be happy when they have nice fresh grass for the summer. Well, I guess I have rambled enough and need to get busy. Ya'll have a great day!