The calendar has the scurs thinking the Weather Eye will manufacture another forecast at least making it look like spring. Will the ground stay bare or does Old Man Winter have one last gasp, or several? Starting Wednesday, partly cloudy with a slight chance of an afternoon shower. Highs in the upper 40’s with lows in the low 30’s. Thursday, mostly cloudy with a slight chance of rain and/or snow. Highs in the mid-40’s and lows in the low to mid-30’s. Mostly sunny on Friday with highs in the upper 50’s and lows in the mid-40’s. Saturday, mostly cloudy with highs in the low 60’s and lows in the upper 40’s. Mostly cloudy on Sunday with a slight chance of showers. Highs in the low 60’s with lows in the mid-40’s. Monday, partly sunny with highs in the upper 50’s and lows in the mid-40’s. Mostly cloudy for Tuesday with a continued chance of showers. Highs in the low 50’s with lows in the upper 30’s. On April 6th we’ll see 13 hours of daylight, about the same as we saw on September 5th. The normal high for April 6th is 52 and the normal low is 31. The scurs will be getting the patio furniture dusted off for placement around the cement pond. The still frozen cement pond that is.
Little in the way of progress in the fields just yet as temperatures this past week with the exception of last Wednesday remained on the cooler side. Precipitation fortunately has been on the lighter side, so at least we’re making some headway with tile running. Frost has gone out of many areas, although as of Saturday, there was still bale wrap frozen to the ground where I’d moved a bale back in February. Wanted to get it picked up as visions of cutting a wad of bale wrap out of a mower deck danced in my head. There was also evidence of earthworms being consumed by robins and other birds around the yard last week. Over the weekend however the robins were glad to still have access to crabapples. It was cold and the ground was frozen both Saturday and Sunday morning. It lent itself to the Dubyas spreading pack manure and some primary tillage in other areas. The frost was officially out where it’s measured at the SROC back on March 25th. Fingers crossed.
The recent light precipitation and being frozen on top are a boon to keeping Ruby clean in the morning. As she’s aged, she tends to shy away from the water and mud anyway. If there’s a reason to run through it of course it doesn’t stop her either. Ruby turns 9 on the 4th. She’s been a great companion and, for a Border Collie, is one of the friendliest around adults of any I’ve ever seen. I imagine she’ll want to stay up late on her birthday to watch dog shows, Clint Eastwood flicks, and eat popcorn. Even though she’s caught up to me in dog years, she’ll be doing it by herself as I’ll likely be fast asleep.
We’re still waiting for a couple straggler ewes to come in yet. It’s likely going to be their last rodeo as stretching out this lambing season stuff is overrated. The cold weather has stymied any potential for moving animals into more spacious accommodations. The electric fence remains buried in the snow around the building site, in some places still 2-3’ deep yet. It’s frustrating, yet there really isn’t much a person can do other than be patient and hope the small square hay supply holds up. In the meantime the remaining ewes and culls have discovered the pasture. Counting eight head from the house on the hill below the house saves time looking for phantom lambs.
There were more swans in one place than I remember seeing last week. I received a call inquiring about them, particularly whether they might be snow geese or pelicans. Since I needed to make a run home to check for lambs I grabbed my spotting scope to ID the large white waterfowl. Sure enough when the scope was trained on them they turned out to be swans. From a half mile away it was difficult to tell if they were tundra or trumpeter swans.
Grilling last Thursday night was one of those evenings that one savors in retrospect. The air was very still so one could hear everything. There were killdeers calling in the pasture and sandhill cranes flying by, emitting their bizarre calls not more than 100 yards from the patio. Even more interesting when one really listened was the faint sound of chorus frogs emanating from the wetland. By Saturday the wetland had frozen over again. They must be full of antifreeze.
Pruning fruit trees has been a catch-as-catch-can affair. After chores I’ve tried to get as many of them done as possible. I finished the eating apples up Thursday night and I got the award winning pear trees done Friday night. That was a relief. Their growth habit is a little different than our apple trees, focusing on growing vertically. I really didn’t want to prune trees on Saturday but given some of the things on my plate I really didn’t see a way around it. I hammered out the largest crabapple tree which turned out to be a larger task than I’d thought. Not only that, with the northwest wind howling it was as cold as I’d been all winter. Hot cocoa was in order to warm up again.
When the snow was largely gone I noticed the local track team out in force running the streets of Bugtussle. As a lad I remember doing the same thing, although sometimes it was hard to approach it real seriously. Track was one of those sports the school didn’t spend a lot of money on. Good running shoes really weren’t readily available while the sweats and shoes were faded hand-me-downs from the ‘60s or before. Few of them fit so we’d improvise. Carrot Top had a pair of sweatpants he’d pull up to his armpits. He fashioned a set of suspenders from a pair of shoestrings to keep them up. A ragtag bunch, we were sent out the door to run for an hour so off we’d go. Fortunately the bakery was about a half mile away. My buddy Bersample and I put money in our socks and then made a detour. The track coach couldn’t figure out why we never improved. Maybe if they’d moved the bakery farther away…
See you next week…real good then.