Run-ning as fast as we can

Some of you may recall my current chicken run situation. It is made up of portable dog run panels with a deer netting roof. Neither secure nor solid, I feel like I've been gambling with time (and my chickens) until predators figure out how flimsy this structure is.

We've been lucky so far. The only uninvited visitor to the run to date has been Sarah the donkey:

and the only unwelcome critter found outside (on top of) the run has been Coral the chicken when she somehow managed to escape:

But with fall and winter not far off, I knew that we needed to get our permanent run in place and soon. Thanks to my friend Angie and her husband, Eric, at Children of the Corn, we were at last able to finalize plans for our permanent chicken run. Angie and Eric posted wonderful instructions for me, on the turkey run they recently built. Jim and I then adapted these to be on a smaller scale for my twelve chickens.

Since Jim had this week off work and his two, grown sons were coming for a visit, NOW was my moment to POUNCE. With just a bit of effort, I was able to pull this small team together to get the chicken run started.

Both Brian and Peter, Jim's sons, were happy to help(that's Avalon, Brian's fiance, standing with them):

The chickens were fascinated with all the activity. This kept them from noticing that their temporary outside run is now only about 1/5 of its original size:

The hardest part was digging the holes for the posts. The site for the run, we've come to find, has at least a foot of densely packed gravel followed by a foot of the hardest clay soil imaginable. We had hoped to dig 3 feet down, but decided 2 feet was just gonna hafta (technical term) be good enough! (Please note the flip-flop farm footwear and the fact that Peter is inadvertently burying his dad's foot with gravel):

Slowly but surely, all the posts were placed:

And the horizontal support beams screwed in:

The structure is now ready for wire and a door. The 3 feet below the middle horizontal support beams will be secured in 1/2 inch hardware cloth. The 4 feet above that and the roof will be done in chicken wire:

The final run will be 7 wide by 16 feet deep. I can't wait!:

Augtober

They've created a new month for us here in Oregon. It's called Augtober. This is what the weather people are calling it on the NW Oregon news. Practically overnight, we've gone from record highs surpassing 100 degrees to temperatures in the 40's and 50's at night and only low 60's during the day. After not having had rain for over a month, we've been hit hard with a series of storms that have us shaking our heads.

First we had crazy thunder and lightning:

I say it was crazy because our part of the state rarely has thunderstorm activity, so this was big news for us:

After I read the online news about staying in my house or car, I went outside and dug potatoes, snipped basil, picked a few beans:

gathered a couple handfuls of blueberries:

and (literally) a bucketful of shelling peas:

Ha, ha! I laugh in the face of storm danger! (Probably not very smart of me.)

The exciting thunder and lightening activity has since ceased, however the rain has picked up. We're getting lots of it. This is what I woke up to this morning:

The donkeys are not happy:

They tend to get these cute little hair spikes up top when it has rained on their heads:

This seems to just make them grumpier.

The forecast says it's supposed to clear up and be in the 90's again by the weekend. As dusk fell, the sun peeked through the clouds just before it went behind the mountain range:

What to do when it's 102

If you're Holly the donkey, you take a nap in the sun:

You move over just a bit to accommodate the friend who decides to join you:

and politely ignore the dust he generates from his rolling around:

And then you immediately doze off in the sun again:

If only it were just a *bit* warmer...

The other critters of Critter Farm

I see some of the coolest things when I'm outside doing chores.
Some people are clever enough to know the names to all the creatures, insects, amphibians, butterflies, etc. that they encounter. Sadly, I'm not one of those people. But, I am in awe of each of these small creatures...and thrilled every time I see a new one.

For example, I have no idea what this thing is, but he looks like he's got something he wants to say:

Sorry, but I had NO idea that moths did it this way:

This very cool dragon fly impressed me by balancing on the top strand of my electric fence. He smiled for this shot:

Li'l frog here was climbing the outside of my glass porch door. I didn't notice him until I turned on the outside porch light:

He was a beautiful green:

...and he did a good job accommodating me opening and closing the door:

This is the sister of the snake that got caught in the blueberry netting the other day. Her name's Gigi (or so she said) and she's all about sunbathing:

I'm always learning new things. Like, Tansy Ragwort is bad bad bad to have around browsing, grazing animals. And that we have a lot of it in our fields. Prior to pulling it, though, we found it covered with these interesting caterpillars:

Someone told me they are actually beneficial, as they eat the flowers of the tansy preventing it from going to seed. They also said these caterpillars were brought in to rid the planet of this scourge, but I haven't verified this yet:

I wasn't willing to risk this info being wrong, so I spent a few hours pulling it all out by hand:

I uncovered this spiny guy when I went out to dig potatoes:

He hung out for a second to see what I was up to and then bolted into the foliage:

I've been seeing these two around the property lately:

I love this shot. Do you see three animals surveying the situation?:

I woke up to this the other morning, climbing up the kitchen door:

Blech. I don't really like these guys. I think this one had to weigh about 8 pounds. And, why my glass door?:

Once a week I have to go and wash the slime off the outside of the door and walls:

I found this caterpillar on one of my bean bushes. Probably not a good thing, right?:

But, of course, no critter post would be complete without a shot of this Critter Farm cutie:

She's the critter I enjoy seeing most on our farm!

Ever worm a donkey?

How about five of them?

It's not as bad as it sounds. Really!

Since I am a Satellite Adoption Center for Peaceful Valley Donkey Rescue, the Rescue sends me all of the meds I need for the donkeys in my care. I love this. I received this cute box in the mail that had these little, single-serving, plastic cups with worming medicine in it:

And these helpful directions:

Despite the picture showing various injection sites, I was ever so grateful that one doesn't do injections for worming. I was equally relieved that I didn't have to do the paste wormer. That's the stuff that comes in a long, plastic syringe thingy that you have to stick in the backs of their mouths and squirt down their throats:

Now, maybe some people's donkeys will stand still for this squirting-in-the-mouth sort of thing, but my donkeys run at the mere sight of the fly spray bottle. There is no way they're going to let me put some big plastic thing with foul tasting medicine in their mouths.

So, still feeling extremely fortunate, I followed the instructions. Based upon their weight, I choose the appropriate number of plastic containers and pour the worming medicine on top of a bit of sweet feed (they LOVE this):

The sweet feed is a very special treat, as they normally only get grass hay and occasional treat carrots, watermelon, etc. Donkeys are very prone to weight issues, so I monitor their intake pretty closely. After adding the medicine, I mixed it up a bit, just so it wasn't sitting right on top, looking all medicinal and such:

I thought for a minute Brownie was on to me:

But then he and Ian settled right in and practically moaned with delight over getting a bit of grain:

My son, Aidan, monitored the other donkeys who were getting their grain (tee hee - worming medicine) in the stalls. We separated everybody so we could ensure they each got the appropriate amount:

Aidan's friend, Chris, assisted Ian in getting the last little bit (sheesh - look at the dust covering my camera lens - ugh):

Ta daaaa...absolutely painless. It was over and done in virtually no time and I was amazed:

Donkeys need to be wormed every three months, so this will become a regular part of the routine here on Critter Farm.