Denise Domning's Blog, page 27

It’s Official

On Tuesday the recorded divorce decree landed in my inbox.  It was a bittersweet moment for me.  While I mourn for the man I loved for 28 years, I don’t miss the man he became in the last five years of our union.  Frankly, his trashy little hotsy-totsy girl is welcome to him.  (Now, doesn’t that just sound like something a sixty-year-old would say? //**)

So, here I am, officially single and sixty.  Which brings me full circle back to my teen years and the idea of dating.

OMG!  SRSLY?  IDTS.

I hated dating when I was a teen and I can’t believe I’m going to enjoy it anymore 44 years later. You see, I’m so not a girly-girl.  I can’t wear make up due to allergies (and I don’t really want to anyway). I don’t dye my hair and rarely manage to get it cut.  =:-0  Use a blow dryer in the morning?  NW!   I’m doing good to remember to brush my teeth.  Pedicure or manicure, waste of money.  My hands are always in something, um, interesting, from jalapenos to cheese to the interior of a just slaughtered turkey.  As for my feet, I like to wear sandals when I can and there’s a lot of dirt out here, among other things.  Dresses?  I have a few but lack the stockings one needs to wear on one’s legs in such attire.  I do save a few pairs of jeans aside–my “good” jeans–for dress up wear.  Frankly, I’m styling if what I’m wearing  isn’t also wearing a coat of fresh turkey poop.  Or eggs.  (NTS: It is better to make two trips from the nest to the house than to try and tuck eggs into your pockets.  Better still, go back to the barn for the bucket you forgot the first time. SHID.)

My Twenty-something niece is trying to coach me on this.  She and her sister are both “on the market”.  She is pushing me to sign up on the dating site FarmersOnly.com.  SMH  Then again, WTH?

I have only one caveat.  If I have to go back to all the angst and difficulty that comes with examining another human being as a potential mate, something that I think teens do so much better than I can–I mean, they have angst nailed!, I will only agree to do it if I don’t have to learn how to text the way the younger crowd does.   I don’t think I can handle learning a new language.  VBG!

Glossary:

//**: nudge, nudge, wink, wink

OMG: Oh my God

SRSLY: Seriously

IDTS: I don’t think so

=:-0 : Surprised face, or in my case hair standing straight up

NW: No Way

NTS: Note to Self

SHID: Slap Head in Disgust

SMH: Shake my head

WTH: What the Heck

VBG: Very Big Grin

 

 

 

Hatchlings

For the last month I’ve been moaning and complaining about the cats.  No, not the eight house cats I’ve got, all of which were intended to be barn cats and all of which individually decided that living in the house and sleeping in my bed with me was a far better life.  The big cats.  The mountain lion and the bobcat.  I saw the bobcat last week on the opposite side of the fence at dawn.  It was carrying something that looked mammal-like but too small to be a pretend barn cat.  Whew.

I’ve never seen the lion, but over the course of the past three years my neighbors on either side have.  I know why she originally came down from the barren, rocky hill across the road from me every summer.  She was following the deer.  The deer come down to eat the lush grass that covers Oak Creek Island.  Never heard of Oak Creek Island?  That’s because there really isn’t a bit of land with that name, but there is an island in Oak Creek.  About two houses up from me along the creek (that’s three-quarters of a mile or so) Oak Creek splits, creating a long narrow island.  I own about a half an acre on it and I hope it stays that way.  I’d much rather have the creek running through my property than have that unreachable half an acre.

But back to the deer.  Before the farm came to be, when the house was empty for most of the time, the deer would come down to cavort beneath the massive cottonwood that stands at the back of the property.  I know this because the first summer I lived in the house, I was able to sit on the porch and watch said deer doing their deer dances beneath that cottonwood.  I also knew about the mountain lion because my neighbor across the road took a photo of the big cat as she skirted the edge of their property on her way down to admire the cavorting deer…for very different reasons than me, of course.

Then the fences came to be and the deer stopped their cavorting but the lion kept coming, or so say my neighbors.  After all there were chickens to eat, and a five foot tall fence is an easy leap for a lion.  The dogs help, but there’s a lot of land between their precious porch and that cottonwood.  Plenty of time for the lion to take her chicken–or turkey as she’s been doing consistently this month.  I figure I’ve lost twenty, most of them sitting hens, because turkeys stubbornly prefer to nest in the wild, squeezing themselves beneath blackberry tangles, or under fallen logs, or under the potting table in my now-overgrown garden.  I even had one try to nest in a discarded colander on the top of an unused workbench.  Every time she got out of the colander, her eggs would spill. It took a week of removing her from the workbench before she accepted that I really wasn’t going to let her sit there.

And then a miracle.  Every evening I do the same crossfit routine:  chase the turkeys into their coop.  This routine includes sprinting, squatting, twisting, waving my arms and generally looking ridiculous.  But it’s absolutely vital.  The minute the turkeys realize they can roost in the trees all is lost.  If I can’t catch them, they don’t turn into somebody’s Thanksgiving dinner.

Tonight’s routine was going better than last night’s, when the cows broke into the turkey coop to steal the turkey food, with half of my eighty or so birds already happily contained when I heard the sound.  Just like human mamas, turkey mamas speak to their babies in baby talk. They coo and make high-pitched “pripping” sounds.  And there she was, one of my younger hens proudly shepherding eight newly hatched turkeys toward the safety of the flock.  I snatched up the babies and carried them toward my presently empty back coop, which is perfect for them.  Mama followed, crying in distress until I opened the door to the coop.  Her eyes lit up and she led the babies inside the building and settled on top of them.

Because this is my third year with turkeys, I knew she’d left behind a few eggs.  They always do.  So I scouted the huge woodpile at the back of the property.  Sure enough, she’d wedged herself beneath a bunch of branches.  Among the rotten eggs was one chick breaking out of its shell and peeping away–most likely because it had stopped hearing its mother’s voice.  I carried it to the coop and opened the door.  Mama hissed until she heard the peeping, then she lifted up and let me tuck the half-open egg, and three more potentially viable eggs, beneath her. She was happily pushing them into place when I closed the door, while the peeper’s siblings were given the newcomer the eye.

A miracle indeed, both that the lion didn’t take her and that I have half my missing birds back again!

 

Oma’s Red Cabbage

So, when he-who-shall-not-be-named (the dastard!) and I got married, one of the first things he talked about food-wise was Red Cabbage.  His paternal grandmother, fondly referred to as “Oma” mainly because they were Germans and Oma is German for Grandma, had a special red cabbage recipe that he loved and believed lost after her death.  As it turned out my dear friend and former sister-in-law (sisters forever!) Sandy told me last year she’s had the recipe since she married the dastard’s brother.

I think I’m having the leftover cabbage for breakfast

Although I wasn’t a cabbage lover and I’d never before eaten red cabbage, I went on a recipe hunt.  Over the years I’ve added this and that until I have a dish that I seriously love.  And these days I’m the Oma, since that’s what my grandkids Judah and Josiah call me.  So this recipe has come full circle and can definitely be called “Oma’s Red Cabbage”.

Last night I made it to have with Niman Ranch Pastured porch chops.  What a meal…pork doused in a peach vinegar sauce, red cabbage and mashed pumpkin from the garden. But this cabbage really shines as a side dish to Duck.  Now that is truly heaven.

 

Red Cabbage

1/4 head average-sized red cabbage
1 small tart apple
2 tbsp water
salt & pepper
1/4 cup red wine
1/4 cup white balsamic vinegar
1/2 cup orange or lemon marmalade
1 tbsp ginger root diced
1 star anise

Slice the cabbage into strips and peel, core and chop the apple.  Put them into a large skillet or pot along with the water.  Simmer gently over medium heat until softened.  Add everything else and bring back to a simmer.  Remove the anise after 10 minutes.

Makes about 4 cups of cabbage.

OMG! It’s going to be a working kitchen!

Today I spent an hour in the kitchen with Robert Mumper, a Yavapai County health/restaurant inspector.  My kitchen is provisionally certified to make jams and jellies (and as of today Peach and Raspberry vinegar along with Cranberry Chutney).  I can hardly believe it.  He came, he watched me make a batch of plain old jalapeno jelly.  He said…HE LIKED WHAT HE SAW as far as how I work.

And then he said he thought I would be as busy as I wanted to be because I not only have unusual products but GREAT products!

Look how pretty it looks even dirty!

Shortly after I got a call Sybil Smith from ADEQ (Arizona Department of Environmental Quality).  For me to rent out the kitchen, my water has to become a “public water source” and has to meet Arizona standards.  I’d sent her the water test results and we went over what filtration is in the pump house.  Her remark was “You’ll have to pay the certification fees and hire an Engineer to do the inspection, but from this report I don’t see any reason for you not to be certified.”

Four years of struggling, arguing, pleading, conniving, straining to be patient and plain hard work.  I think, just maybe, the corner if finally being turned.  It’s now officially a working kitchen and soon it’ll be a kitchen for hire, I just know it!   All I need to do now is get Yavapai County Planning and Zoning on board with it…  Fingers crossed!

Apple Cider Brined Turkey

If you’ve bought a turkey from me–or even if you haven’t–this is the recipe to use.  Trust me, you’ll never go back to roasting a bird!  A few people have mentioned they don’t care for the spicy gravy.  In that case, you’d want to omit the sage and time from the pan and rinse the bird really well to remove some of the flavor in the brine.  Or, you can make a simple gravy by boiling the neck, gizzard, liver and heart with a good amount of chicken broth, and using that broth to make your gravy.

APPLE CIDER-BRINED TURKEY

Brine:

8 cups apple cider

2/3 cup kosher salt

2/3 cup sugar

1 tablespoon black peppercorns, coarsely crushed

1 tablespoon whole allspice, coarsely crushed

8 (1/8-inch-thick) slices peeled fresh ginger

6 whole cloves

2 bay leaves

1 (12-pound) fresh or frozen turkey, thawed

2 oranges, quartered

6 cups ice

SAVORY GRAVY:

4 garlic cloves

4 sage leaves

4 thyme sprigs

4 parsley sprigs

1 onion, quartered

1 (14-ounce) can fat-free, less-sodium chicken broth

2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and divided

1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper, divided

1/2 teaspoon salt, divided

Preparation

To prepare brine, combine first 8 ingredients in a large saucepan; bring to a boil. Cook 5 minutes or until sugar and salt dissolve. Cool completely.

Remove giblets and neck from turkey; reserve for Savory Herb Gravy. Rinse turkey with cold water; pat dry. Trim excess fat. Stuff body cavity with orange quarters. Place a turkey-sized Reynolds Roasting oven bag inside a second bag to form a double thickness. Place bags in a large stockpot (a 5 gallon Igloo drink cooler works even better). Place turkey inside inner bag. Add cider mixture and ice. Secure bags with several twist ties. Refrigerate for 12 to 24 hours, turning occasionally.

Preheat oven to 500º.

Remove turkey from bags, and discard brine, orange quarters, and bags. Rinse turkey with cold water; pat dry. Lift wing tips up and over back; tuck under turkey. Tie legs together with kitchen string. Place garlic, sage, thyme, parsley, onion, and broth in the bottom of a roasting pan. Place roasting rack in pan. Arrange turkey, breast side down, on roasting rack. Brush turkey back with 1 tablespoon butter; sprinkle with 1/2 teaspoon pepper and 1/4 teaspoon salt. Bake at 500º for 30 minutes.

Reduce oven temperature to 350º.

Remove turkey from oven. Carefully turn turkey over (breast side up) using tongs. Brush turkey breast with 1 tablespoon butter; sprinkle with 1/2 teaspoon pepper and 1/4 teaspoon salt. Bake at 350º for 1 hour and 15 minutes or until a thermometer inserted into meaty part of thigh registers 170º (make sure not to touch bone). (Shield the turkey with foil if it browns too quickly.) Remove turkey from oven; let stand 20 minutes. Reserve pan drippings for Savory Herb Gravy. Discard skin before serving; serve with gravy.

Pop Goes the …???

Oh my goodness, it stinks in here today.  Moosie, my Akita/Sharpei mix dog, injured–or possibly killed–some very smelly creature last night.  Not a skunk because the smell is more musky than that but equally potent.

First, an explanation.  Moosie isn’t Moose.  His name was Moose when we all thought he was a St. Bernard/Husky mix.  But when he stopped growing at 80 pounds it was clear that the name “Moose” would never fit him.  Thus he became Moosie–a smaller version of the antlered behemoth that wades in the lakes and ponds of North America.  And for those who don’t know Akitas were bred for Bear hunting and Shar Peis were originally Boar hunters.  To say Moosie has no fear is an understatement.  Now counter that with my 115 pound Hungarian Kuvasz Bear with the heart of a…I don’t know…mouse?  The Kuvasz is a livestock guardian breed, but Bear sort of missed the memo on that.  Between the two of them they create a complete dog.  Bear identifies the threat, looses his magnificently deep and scary bark, then looks at Moosie and says “Go get ’em, little guy.  I’ve got your back!”

So it’s not unusual for Moosie to kill–and sometimes eat–the things he kills.  He’s done in 5 raccoons, way too many chickens, some very expensive turkeys as well as numerous gophers, crayfish, bullfrogs, mice, rats and squirrels.  And one trout.  He caught it in the ditch when the water was low, which tells you how fast he is.  I gutted it for him, but he looked at me and said, “Naw, I’ll kill ’em but I’m not eating those.”  The cats were thrilled.

Last night was a loud night.  Although Bear barks to hear his own voice, last night Moosie was barking too.  That’s when I know there’s a real threat.  Having seen the bobcat a few nights back and knowing that my neighbors often see the mountain lion (Moosie isn’t the only animal who’s killed my turkeys), I went out to walk the property.  This is the habit Moosie and I have formed, and how I give him permission to hunt.  The dogs came with me, scouting the fence line.  From their reactions I knew whatever it was out there was dangerous.  I figured it was the lion.

This morning when I got up, Bear was on the porch (he’s excellent at guarding the porch) but there was no Moosie.  Uh-oh. Although I have a good portion of my property fenced, the part where I keep the animals, Moosie keeps discovering escape hatches.  Worried, I went to do my morning chores.  By the time the turkeys and chickens were wandering there was still no sign of Moosie,  My worry was morphing into fear.  I wouldn’t put it beyond Moosie to chase a coyote back to the pack. Then Bear went to the irrigation ditch, which runs like a hip-deep river through my property, and looked up onto the hillside, to where several turkey hens had had nests before they were taken by the big cats.  There are still piles of rotting eggs up there.  I should clean them up but they’re deep in blackberries and I’m not going in there, I’m just not.

Bear in his natural state

When I got to the top of the hillside, I choked.  The smell was awesome in its stink.  Moosie appeared over the wall in a noxious wafting cloud, his ears down and mouth stretched into his usual goofy morning grin.  Something rustled on the hillside and like a flash, Moosie was gone over the wall again and into the prickles. A cat-like yelp was followed by a distinct “POP”.  Moosie grabbed whatever it was and shook.  The stink got worse.  Bear went over the wall into the berry bushes, stuck his nose into the fray then beat a hasty retreat.  The big dog and I left the little guy to his business, retreating to where the air was more breathable.

Good work, Moosie…I think.  But what was it he had?  I’ve seen otter, beaver and muskrats in the ditch, and I know there are a lot of skunks around here.  And I’m sure that those turkey eggs are quite the draw to such critters.  So I went to my go-to research source (whatever did we do before Google?) to see which of those creatures might have made that popping sound.

That’s when the confusion started.  From everything I read, Weasel-like animals don’t actually pop.  The sound-making weasel is a tool called the Spinner’s Weasel that attaches to the reel onto which newly spun thread is wound.  The device has a clock-like face with a pointer that “pops” every 40 yards, giving the spinner a count of how much thread they’ve spun.

But this critter, whatever it was, definitely popped.  Surely, they wouldn’t have named this popping device a “Weasel” if weasels didn’t pop.  One thing is certain.  I’m not going in there to find out.  Even if it weren’t in the blackberry patch, the stink is enough to keep me at a distance.

 

 

 

Sugared-out and Eyes Streaming

Gueros, Bells, Poblanos and Jalapenos

First, I love sugar, or I thought I did.  I mean, what’s not to like?  It’s sweet, and sweet is good, right?  As “THEY” (that’s the ubiquitous they, that mysterious group of experts and pundits who continually send out PR so we’ll know how to live our lives) tell us, sweet is the first taste that human babies recognize–and become addicted to.  And I’m surely as addicted as anyone else.

But since I started making my pepper jellies as an part-time occupation, I’m slowly losing my fondness for the stuff.  It crunches under my feet when I spill it.  It dissolves on my skin and leaves a sticky film.  It burns when I’m not careful about stirring the pot.  And I’ve tasted so much of my jelly as I develop and refine recipes that I’m getting to the point that sweet actually doesn’t taste good any more.

Oh my goodness.  Who knew that could happen? What am I going to do if ice cream begins to taste dull?  Curl up and die I’m sure.  Or lose weight.  Hey!  No…I’d rather keep the extra pounds.

It looks like I’ll just have to accept the possibility of coming to hate sugar, because the jelly-making is here to stay.  I’ve even taken (and am pretty certain I passed) my Food Safety Manager Certification, so I can manage myself when I work.  Wash your hands, Denise!  I can’t believe you spilled the sugar again!  Check the refrigerator temperature and this time WRITE IT DOWN.  What?  You forgot to buy the notebook after I sent you out to get it!? You’re fired!  (I fire myself at least twice a day.)

So I now spend half my day chopping Jalapenos, Pasilla/Poblanos (I’m told they’re called Pasillas before they’re roasted and Poblanos after), and my new favorite, a pepper my Mexican-born neighbor calls “Hot Yellow Pepper”.  I think they’re actually Gueros. Whatever they are is good!  They’re not quite as hot as the jalapenos and when I mix them with a couple of yellow Bell peppers they make the prettiest golden-yellow jelly I’ve ever seen–almost as pretty as the bright red jelly that is produced from red Bells and red Jalapenos.

Which brings me to the eyes streaming part of this.  Hoky Smokes, Bullwinkle!  Between these Guero puppies and the Jalapenos, by the end of my four hours I’m breathing fire and my eyes are watering. As I chop them they release their Capsicum into the air, and when you’re chopping pounds at a time, that’s a lot of heat.  Hopefully OSHA won’t show up or maybe I’ll develop a HACCP (Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point–see, I was paying attention in class) Procedure to help mitigate this over-release of hot oil into the air. No doubt, it’ll call for donning a surgical mask and goggles.  But I’m not ready to do that yet, not when there’s any possibility that breathing enough of this stuff might turn me into a dragon.  You see, I’ve got this huge–and I do mean huge–pile of wood at the back of the property that really just needs to go up in flames.

Garden Deprived

One of the hardest things for me to give up in my recent divorce, when I became the only farmer here, were my gardens. But the choice had to be made between animals or vegetables, and feeding my animals meant making sure I hit the computer at least half a day every day.  It was a really difficult choice.  I feel most alive when my fingers are deep in the earth.  Moreover, I’ve spent the last five years turning this compacted, lifeless red soil into something browner and richer, filled with earthworms and the fine white filaments of mycorrhizae.  The areas I’ve concentrated on are now free of most of the goathead burrs and the silver nightshade, thank you, turkeys and chickens!  Unfortunately, when one plant goes, another takes its place.  I got quack grass, European Horehound and something that everyone around here calls “sand burrs”.  The cows love the quack grass, but avoid the horehound and the burrs even when it’s nothing but grass.  I guess I could use the horehound to make cough syrup, but I really don’t think the world’s ready for tons of “Oak Creek Cough-Be-Gone”.

What the pastures look like now

So now, my ever-bearing raspberries are buried in quack grass on the upper hillside, while the same three-foot-tall grass is taking over the middle hillsidewhere I have apples, mulberries, jujubes, artichokes and elderberries along with fennel and French sorrel.  It’s hardest to watch the Bermuda grass reclaim the front acre of the flat portion of this property.  This is where I’d been doing my serious growing and from which I’ve sold produce in the past.  I’ve got everything there, from fruit trees to blackberries, chard to lettuce, melons, squash, tomatoes and all the stuff you think of when you think “farm”.

But my farm plants are fighting back!  Holding their own are the artichokes, the herbs, the tat soi (which is great in chicken soup if you’ve never tried it), the asparagus.  But the most resilient of all my additions is Arugula.  I’d never really eaten Arugula before I started growing it, and the few times I’d had it was in a salad.  To me, it tasted more bitter than peppery as usually advertised.  But I planted it because I’d read that it, along with chicory, fennel, Daikon radish and parsnips, were plants that help restore depleted soil.  The Daikon managed to survive for a year, but never went to seed because the cows loved them.  The fennel struggles but I still have those wonderful licorice tasting plants that Thomas Jefferson called “dessert” spreading slowly in the areas where they’ve managed to form seed heads.  This is the year for chicory.  Helped along by this summer’s rain I have stalks of cornflower-blue flowers showing up on the edges of the fields.  The parsnips were a complete bust.  I suspect they need a little more cold than they get here.

But by far, Arugula is my biggest success.  It grows in the summer and in the winter, even when covered by snow.  I have plants in great green swaths covering my hillsides, sprinkled into my walkways and even sprouting in thick layers in my little flower garden in front of my kitchen door.  Hardy isn’t the word for this plant.  Unstoppable might be a better description. I think it may even out-compete the Bermuda grass given a chance.  It’ll even grow in my sponge mop, should I be foolish enough not to sweep up all the seeds I spilled while transferring them from pod to seed sack before washing the floor.

Since the Arugula has become so prolific I’ve gotten a lot more creative with it, especially now that I’ve discovered it’s much better tasting cooked than raw.   It goes into all my soups, stews and hot dishes.  (If you’re not Scandinavian, “Hot Dish” is a sort of stew made with ground beef, veggies and tomatoes, usually with noodles added.  I suspect they see a lot of “hot dishes” at potluck dinners up in Lake Woebegone.)

So, while this year’s been a bust for the tomatoes and cukes I usually enjoy, I’m eating my greens.  Free is good and good for me, too.

 

Ballet-Slipper Hooves?

My new heifer Hannah Mae is two weeks old today.  It’s stunning to me how tiny she seems when compared to her big “brother”, Georgie–my orphan calf who’s five months old now.  In the three years that I’ve had Jersey cows, I’ve had five little calves born on the farm but only one heifer, Hannah.

Now, I’m the first to admit that I’m a greenhorn when it comes to cattle.  I know important things like, if the cow is mad at you she will step on your foot and stand there while you scream at her to move.  Or that scratching behind the ears isn’t as effective as scratching the lower neck.  Or that if they eat the chicken food the next two days will be really messy. And I know how to hand-milk, something that five years ago I hadn’t realized was missing from my repertoire of skills.

But until Hannah’s birth I had no idea how great a difference there is between heifers and calves.  The little boys were all born at around eighty pounds, while Hannah Mae was a spit at about forty.  Even at birth, the boys were big across the chests with hefty upper legs and good sized hooves.  Hannah dances across the pasture on long spindly legs, doing her pirouettes and leaps on her tiny little ballet-slipper hooves.  Tiny those hooves might be, but they are still plenty hard.

The storm last night came with a blast of wind that tore a widow-maker out of the massive walnut tree behind the corral.  Luckily, I was on the porch when it hit the ground.  There’s no mistaking that thundering roar as a huge branch impacts with my Mars-red soil. Praying that whatever had fallen hadn’t destroyed any of my fences, I started down to the back pasture with the dogs and my headlamp for light.  There was Hannah Mae, standing outside the corral.  Mama Elsie (yes, I have a cow named Elsie) and Georgie were still in the corral.  All I could think was that the sound had scared Hannah into crawling under the lower bar of the fence.

What ensued was something right out of Keystone Kops.  Cursing myself for not having purchased a dog collar to use as a Hannah-handle–it’s on the list, I went to put her rear-end drive into gear.  If I can get behind her, I can use my hands on her back end to steer her into the direction I want her to go. She was too frightened to let me near her.  She dodged, I darted.  She turned, I slipped. Meanwhile, the dogs were checking to see if any squirrels had fallen from their nests along with the branch.

After what seemed an eternity, I thought maybe I’d let Mama out for some maternal help with this problem.  Interesting idea, but fatally flawed.  Being a greenhorn, I didn’t realize that Hannah wasn’t the only one who’d been scared by the noise.  As the corral door opened, two wild eyed beasts, 1000 pounds and 500 pounds respectively, took off.  At that point there was nothing to do but stand back and watch.  ‘Round and ’round the back pasture all three of them went until, silly me, I opened the gate to space where I keep the hay.  That settled the two big eaters. They were back in the corral within the minute.  I closed the gate behind them, leaving me with two useless dogs and Hannah Mae.

To her credit, Mama came to the gate as George began to eat.  Elsie called.  Hannah paced in front of the opening, but each time I reached to open the gate, she shied.  At last, I lunged for her and caught her by a front leg.  She danced back, twisting and turning, and found my foot with her back hoof.  Although I didn’t lose my grip, I fell to one knee with a muttered “ouch”.  Dang it, why do I never remember to change out of my better jeans before going down to the corral?

Once I was on my feet again, I grabbed her around her middle, lifted and turned her in the right direction, yanked the chain out of the notch, then pushed her toward opening as Mama called one more time…and she was in!

Hannah Mae

I breathed in relief, incredibly grateful that I had decided to come down to check on my animals. There’s been a mountain lion hunting my property, snacking on the careless turkey hens who choose to nest where they shouldn’t.  With Hannah so small, she would have been easy pickings for the cat and that would would have been a devastating turn, a true cow-tastrophe for me.

Good bye city life!  Farming is the life for me.

 

The Rapscallion

I used to be afraid of cows.  After all, a grown Jersey cow can weigh 1000 pounds and maliciously stand on your foot because she’s angry at you.  But now that I’ve had cows for 3 years, things have changed.  When that huge head swings in my direction, I place the flat of my hand on Elsie’s forehead and push her head away.

Well, that works for Elsie, but not so much for the rapscallion, Georgie.  When I push his head to one side, he dances back and shakes his budding horns at me.  Thank goodness he’s a steer now and not a young bull!  I’ve heard that dairy bulls can be very dangerous and this one would be dangerous because he likes to play.  With me.  Never mind that I’m at least 200 pounds lighter than he is.  Worse, he’s smart.  I watch him watching me as I do things only to later discover him trying to make the same thing happen without the convenience of an opposable thumb.

Much to my surprise, he figured out the corral gates the night before last.  Now, I’m partially at fault for this because I got sloppy about tightening the chains that lock the gates.  But then, none of the cows that have lived here, nor either of the bull calves born almost 2 years ago now, have every shown any interest in the chains.  The gates, yes.  If there was any way to bull (pun intended) their way through either of the gates, they will and have.

That’s because behind those gates is where their hay and the chicken food is stored.  There’s nothing a cow likes better than the chance to eat an entire bale of hay then top it off with as much corn-laced chicken food as they can get their muzzles into.  Trust me.  It’s not pretty the day after a cow gets into the chicken food.  Let’s just say it works on them the way prunes work on humans.

So two nights ago, while I was dreaming about starting my next book (seriously), Georgie was using his nose, his tongue, his tiny little horns–heck, maybe he even got up on his hind feet and pinched the chain between his cloven hoof–whatever, to slide my haphazard chain out of its groove in the hay-side corral door.  Neither he nor Elsie bothered with hay.  Whatever for, when there was a trashcan full of chicken food just down the way?

They decimated it. Elsie was a little bloaty the next morning, her breath a little more methane-y than usual.  Not the rapscallion.  He was full of jumps and bounces, and plenty of head shaking at me.  I swear he was laughing.

Me, I caught him by the horns and gave his head a good scratching, then stroked his nose.  You can’t help but love him.  That doesn’t mean I’m not putting knots in the ends of the chains.  Fool me once, shame on you.  Fool me twice, shame on me!