Resting on Sunday. Not. Water Troughs

09/14/2008 Sunday: Quite hot today after a foggy start to the day.

I vegged out till 11am (after doing chores, naturally) then went outside and started watering the vegetable garden. I refilled the chicken waterer, too. I also fed them some cutup windfall apples.

I got about half the garden watered when Chas called me for lunch (salad with lettuce and cucumbers from our garden among other veggies). I also had a nice cup of tea. I love tea with milk.

But, I still haven't harvested any apples for our use, just picked up windfalls for the pigs and cows and chickens.

I'd turned out the Herefords to S5 (the large pasture). Later on I noticed that some of the cows were in yesterday's pasture (I'd forgotten to close the gate). In my hurry to move them out of there I forgot to turn off the power to the fence, a fact I didn't remember till I got zapped, hard. Even so, after I moved out the cows I unwound the temporary polywire (I wind it up and attach the length of polywire and the gate handle to the polywire behind the first post) and did manage to get it connected to the t-post where it ends. I used a fiberglass rod which doesn't conduct electricity to put the polywire back on the insulator that forms the beginning of the gate into that pasture. It was a painful experience.

I still cannot get the fence back above 6.1 even though I had it up to 7.3mvh. I must have a short somewhere that I haven't discovered yet. Even 6.1 is enough to make a cow pay attention.

After lunch I had a nap. I got worn out last week. Around 2pm I went outside and assembled the waterer and trough in the Hereford's road pasture. This is the waterer on the gravel and mats. I put a scrubber and automatic waterer and a small board in a bucket. I dragged the "new" waterer to the old trough and using the bucket dumped in a few bucket loads of water so that I could scrub the trough. After the trough was scrubbed I attached the automatic waterer using the board on the back where I attached the waterer to prevent the screws from damaging the tank as I screwed them in.

Next I moved the trough back to the site where it will rest permanently, removed the hose from the old waterer and attached it to the new and watched while the trough filled up. It was quite satisfying to get this job done.

I need to add more gravel to the area in front of the waterer, out beyond 6 feet.

Still having some energy left I began work on the Dexter trough. It was crammed up against the barn wall which is a bad location for it. It needed moving. With the leaky eves that area is always full of mud. So, to fix the problem I attached a new 50 foot hose to the end of the old hose and pulled it through all the ties that are holding it up out of the way of the Dexters. When I got most of the hose outside I ran it on the middle pasture side of the electric fence as far down as I could go toward the middle of the Dexter's winter sacrifice pasture.

When I got as far as I could go and still be able to attach the hose to the automatic waterer I emptied and scrubbed the trough and dragged it to its new location tiptoeing gingerly through all the water. A hundred gallons is a lot of water to wade through.

With the automatic waterer attached I went back to the front of the stall and attached the hose and turned on the water. I went back to see if the the waterer was working the way it should. It did.

Then it was time to do my evening chores. By then it was 4pm. I was late and the goats were giving me "what for" for being late.

After feeding all the critters residing in the vicinity of the green barn (calf, pigs, sheep and goats, and ducks) I came back to the main barn and fed the Dexters. I did not give them any hay this morning since they had lots of hay left from yesterday but they sure wanted hay this evening. One of the little Dexter bulls (Cheddar's son) keeps climbing into the feeder. Good thing I put the gate on the back of the open end. At least he stays in the feeder and doesn't wander out to visit my vegetable garden.

After setting up the two troughs with their respective automatic waterers, I was plumb wore out. I sat for 15 minutes and drank a pop. Lucky and I tried to decide what Chas and I should have for dinner. I decided tortillini with a small packet of surimi and some pesto sauce would make a fine dinner. It was delicious.

The bulls still growl and bellow at each other but much less frequently. I think they're getting adjusted to there being two of them on the property. It was nice of Gary to lease me his bull. Speaking of the bull, when I was rearranging the fences this morning before turning the Herefords into S5, the bull just looked at me and waited patiently for me to open the gates. I did have a fiberglass post with me to give myself some confidence but didn't need to use it.