Sable Houdini and Other Tricks

8:27 PM, Monday, 29 March 2010
Temperature: 40 F, raining

The rains came upon us today, and are with us still. The geese do not seem to mind; they've been drinking from puddles rather animatedly, and display their usual talkativeness and combative stances on all creatures great and small. That they are substantially smaller than us matters little, and we occasionally have to remind them that they are suspiciously football-shaped to be getting too uppity.

The sable doe got out again, having chewed through the string holding the back door shut this time. It took a bit of doing to round her up; the door's now secured with a ziptie, and we know who will be getting the next cage as soon as it's been assembled. The water containers in the two already assembled are working out fairly well, but we may want to keep already filled and ready to go bottles nearby for ease of use. Similarly, we need to work out a better feeder, something which keeps their food dry when inclement weather comes.

In addition to rain, last night saw heavy winds, along with the discovery that a farmer had left a flour sifter on the roof when applying baking soda to kill moss. No harm was done either to or by the flour sifter, but it was a startling sight. A plastic pet carrier that had been on the grass near the porch was carried away to about a third of the way across the pond; a long-handled rake and a certain amount of caution combined managed to do the trick of fishing it out again.

The sheep are out of sorts with the consistent wetness, and some of the ewes complain about it by demanding food whenever a farmer is in sight. There's no sign of illness or injury; they just complain until they have something to put in their mouths, regardless of when or how much they were last fed, and then they're quiet again - perhaps not happy, but grumbling into their cud instead of bellowing their complaints.