Once the scurs dialed the Weather Eye in last week and wound up with the rain as forecast. Are our fortunes about to change to snow? Will we see more liquid instead or some of both? Starting Wednesday, cloudy with a good chance of forenoon snow. Highs in the low 30’s with lows in the mid-teens. Thanksgiving Day mostly cloudy with a good chance of snow by evening. Temperatures remaining steady throughout the day at 28. Cloudy on Friday with a good chance of snow. Highs in the mid-30’s with lows around 30. Saturday, cloudy with a good chance of morning rain changing to all snow. Highs in the upper 30’s and lows in the mid-20’s. Mostly cloudy Sunday with a good chance of snow before noon. Highs in the upper 20’s with lows in the low teens.. Monday, mostly sunny with highs in the low 20’s and lows around 10. Partly cloudy for Tuesday with highs in the low 20’s and lows around 10. On the 3rd the sun will rise at 7:30 a.m. and on the 5th it sets at 4:46 p.m. and continues to do so up through the 13th. On the 9th we are down to 9 hours of daylight. The normal high for December 1st is 32 and the normal low is 16. Having put Thanksgiving under their loosened belts the scurs can focus on Christmas shopping procrastination.
2019 is likely going to go down as the year of ornery weather and rightfully so. As it has at the ranch, it seems like just about the time we’re getting a leg up, Mother Nature and now Old Man Winter backhands us into reality. One has needed to be opportunistic. With the freezing conditions late last week and into the early part of the weekend, much fall tillage was accomplished in a short period of time. Some attempts at anhydrous ammonia applications were made with largely disappointing results. As one astute observer put it, it was like knifing it into peanut butter. There were also some who desperately wanted to bale cornstalks for bedding yet. Last week’s rain put a damper on that and while a few days of nice weather teased us, the end result was no baling done. Moldy or wet cornstalks that wind up smoldering aren’t an option, not a good one anyway.
At the ranch it continues to frustrate us as well. 3rd cutting hay never materialized and we’ve been trying to stretch our hay supply as far as we can. Another round bale feeder designed for sheep is due for early December so the goofy yearling ewes will be forced to eat the round bales rather than use them for gymnastics. Watching the brood ewes completely devour their first round bale while working hard on a second one convinced me there’s no margin for error. Those feeders aren’t cheap but neither is hay. It doesn’t take long at these prices for them to pay for themselves. Best of all, these are steel and built heavy enough so they’ve passed the durability test. Even the rams haven’t figured out how to wreck them.
As with many rural residents we were taking the snowy forecast to heart. Being prepared is half the battle. The yard and feedlots were cleared of anything that might go through the snow blower. As many things as possible were put away and stored inside. Sure, it would have been nice to have the barns cleaned too but after the rain last week and greasy soil surface conditions I wouldn’t have been on a lot of Christmas card lists. If it snows as much as advertised, it will likely mean putting the chains on just to get in and out of the field. Running up and down the blacktop with chains on really isn’t an option. Even if it gets stockpiled, it will still get cleaned one way or the other.
Earlier this fall/winter Mrs. Cheviot spied some small cones in the spruce tree outside the living room window. They were just the right size for some of the decorations being made for the holidays so I grabbed a small container worth. I could only reach so high so on Sunday I backed the Gator up to the tree and was able to harvest a paper grocery bag full. Once inside and warmed up the pitch on the cones stuck to my hands. Sticking my head in the bag, the aroma was that of the north woods in Canada. Had wanted to make one more journey that direction but things are looking grim. The bag of spruce cones was a nice reminder though.
On Sunday Mrs. Cheviot requested another batch of red osier dogwood for holiday decorating. With the ground conditions not conducive to barn cleaning, I grabbed the pruners and set off to see what I could find. I’d been on foot last year but this time I wanted to explore into the CREP acreage so I took the Gator. I’d learned that decorators primarily want the single stemmed twigs, the longer and redder the better. Something I noticed this year after seeing where I’d taken twigs last year was there were frequently two nice long straight stems replacing the one I’d taken. It’s nearly impossible to kill dogwood by cutting it so I did some pruning on the main bushes to see if that would stimulate more desirable regrowth for next year.
My foray into the CREP acreage uncovered a goldmine. There was dogwood scattered all over the acreage. Some had been established a while as the bark on the bushes had turned from striking red to gray. While perch trees aren’t welcome, something shrubby with wildlife potential like is a positive. There were some nests in the dogwood bushes themselves and the white berries are bird favorites. That’s likely how they came to be in the CREP acreage in the first place. Along with the pussy willows, American cranberry and the spruce cones from the yard, decorating material originating from our humble little acreage may wind up in your house sooner or later. Better than in my garage!
And finally we planned ahead. Over the weekend we got the Thanksgiving turkey and trimmings locally as we almost always have. It’s great to have a plentiful supply of food and access to it locally. More than we know, we are blessed.
See you next week…real good then.