Where does it end?

CNN reports that a canary fighting ring was busted in Connecticut:

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/us/2009/07/27/konopka.bird.ring.wfsb

Really? People are breeding canaries to fight to the death now... I guess I'm at a loss at this point. If people need to gamble on the outcome of a fight, can't we all just agree to limit it to boxing or mixed martial arts or something else where the participants actually give their consent to being pummeled? If you need some direct involvement, play a video game or learn how to build one of those battlebots.

When the reptiles come back to Bully Hill

Wow, I normally do not post twice in a day, but this has been a pretty interesting one. As I noted earlier, we found a decent sized black rat snake in the horses' schluffing barn. I heaved my mass off the couch in the afternoon and went out for a bit of exercise. Just after I got down to the end of the driveway, I saw a grey rock-like object moving accross the road. I quickly realized that it was a turtle. We live on a country road, but cars do come by the farm pretty frequently. This turtle was going to end up turtle-mash if I did not get him out of the road. I went over to pick him up and I realized it was a baby snapping turtle. He was small, but fiesty. I touched his shell and he actually jumped... yes, jumped up to bite my finger. Turtle got hops, son. Now, when you've been a farmer as long as I have, you know how to pick up a snapping turtle. I grabbed him by his tail and I took him up to the house so I could snap a few pictures of him. Here he is:



He was just so incredibly interesting... like a little dinosaur. The shell was all spikey and he had some pretty serious claws. Still, the mouth was the most impressive part. This guy was not big, but I was not about to let him bite me... and he wanted to bite me too:

Obviously, the little guy didn't know that I was trying to save his life so I can't blame him for feeling a need to defend himself. Even though he wanted to do me bodily harm, there was something about him that I found endearing and familiar. I'm not sure what it could be...

Well, after I got a few pictures, I released the turtle back into a stream so he could go about his turtle doings. I know that snapping turtles are generally found in ponds, but there was no accessible pond so the stream was the best I could do for him. It was a better place than the road anyway.

One of those weeks

It indeed has been one of those weeks. I woke up in the middle of the night to the horses carrying on. There was the telltale thumping of hooves on the ground so I assumed that Snow had broken one of Ellie's unwritten and heretofore undisclosed rules. Ellie has no problem with giving Snow a good whooping. I've started calling her Muhammed El' Lie. We've had a serious talk about her behavior... she was abused by her original owner and now she is carrying on the "cycle of abuse." I'm not sure that I have been getting through to her. She normally just gives me a look like this:

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(obvious look of defiance)

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In the morning, when I went out to groom the horses, I gave Snow a good exam. To my surprise, she was free of cuts, hoof prints, or anything suggesting she had been kicked. When I was grooming Ellie, however, I found that she had a pretty nasty gash on her leg... right on the joint. There were a few vet visits, lots of antibiotics (shots... both to the joint and to the neck), and even an ultra-sound. Now she is on stall-lockdown and I need to keep her wound clean and bandaged. She's not enjoying it, but all things considered, she is being a pretty good patient.

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(note: blue bandage)

To keep the horses stimulated, I have been doing a lot more target training with them. Snow in particular has been bored without her friend. She has been getting into everything. I went to dump the manure and shavings from Ellie's stall this morning and lo-and-behold Snow comes running in with me. She decided to trample through the manure and thus, I had to give her a bath. She loved the attention and seemed rather pleased with herself. Unfortunately, the pictures did not really come out.

Just as I was done squeegeeing her off, Cowboy and Sarah showed up. I guess they heard I was bathing animals because they needed it:

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As I noted, Snow is bored and wants to be in everyone's business, thus, I got a few shots like this:

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It was all quite a scene and we even drew the attention of a new resident:

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I'm pleased to have Mr. (or is this a Ms.?) black rat snake in the barns. I think he/she is quite handsome and/or pretty. Sarah, Cowboy and Snow, however, were a bit too interested in their new guest, so I figured it was time to put the camera away and lead the curious onlookers to safer activities. Snake bites are terrible and I did not want to spend the rest of the week rubbing antibiotics into noses of various shapes and sizes.

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Thankfully, things will get back to normal shortly.

Huzzah!

CNN reported that a large dogfighting ring in the midwest has been busted:

http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/07/08/dogfighting.charges/index.html

Down to the chicken farm

I spend a good bit of time with my chickens. I find them to be a very calming influence. In the morning, I exercise the dogs, then enjoy a cup of coffee with the chickens before I groom the horses. During my visits with the chickens, I sing to Brett (he sort of sings along) and Eunice generally comes and sleeps in my lap while the others scurry about searching for food. Sadly, I don't really know many songs about chickens so I end up singing "Chicken Farm" by the Dead Kennedys over and over. Just to add a little variety, I've been trying to think of more chicken songs. I'm at a loss. There was an old Fear song that had an intro about chickens, but I think the lyrics ended with "chicken oh chicken, chicken on my plate." I don't want to traumatize them. There is a great Jaco Pastorius song, "the Chicken," but it is instrumental.

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So twice a day, I sing "I'm going down to the chicken farm," as I stroll out to spend time at the coop d'etat (it is really intended for foster dogs, but the chickens have taken it over for now). The chickens don't seem to mind the song, but it is really not about chickens at all. The song is about the struggles experienced by Vietnamese boat people after the war. I'm a bit concerned that I'm giving little Brett Buckwalter an identity crisis. He's been off a bit lately. I found him trying to beat up the bag of pine shavings the other day and I think he's been wanting to start trouble with the Bumpases (which would be a very bad idea). I may need to get him a life coach or something.

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In the meantime, I thought I would just take some pictures of the chickens to show how much they have grown.

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Here is a shot of little Brett... I was trying to catch his inner torment:

Here is Camilla taking a bit of a rest:

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While I was trying to get another shot of Camilla, Brett kept walking in front of the camera:

Since Brett was being a bit of a ham, I moved and took pictures of Beatrix and Matilda:

... and Eunice:

I got a couple of pictures, but Brett chased everyone off and started posing again:

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By this point, I had finished my coffee and I was starting to make up my own songs so I thought it best to move on to my other chores.

If anyone has any chicken song ideas, let me know.

The Bumpases

I found a few old photos that I took after the fiery demise of my old computer. Some told a pretty good story.

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I recall getting up and walking outside with a cup of coffee. It was a beautiful day and the sun was rising over the ridge on the other side of the road. Flowers were blooming, trees were budding, and the world was good. I thought to myself that life was perfect here on Bully Hill. Then I suddenly heard the telltale jingle of dog tags coming from the side yard. Sarah and Garfield stumbled into view like two smelly, yellow rain clouds hovering over my parade. (Note: this was probably a week after the skunk hunting incident and they still were rather pungent.) Reconsidering my declaration of perfection, I looked over at them and said, "Oh yea, you guys." Then I realized that it may have been the first time I saw Sarah and Garfield without their giant, bounding progeny, Cowboy. I asked them, "Where is Baby Huey?" No sooner had the words come out of my mouth, Cowboy came into view with a blanket hanging from his mouth.

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My wife had purchased several blankets for the Bumpases so they could have a proper and comfortable bed in the corner of our garage. Cowboy enjoyed taking these blankets and moving them to the middle of our driveway which has better views than the garage. Thus, it was not too surprising to see Cowboy rearragning things. But suddenly a thought popped into my head, "That's funny, neither of the blankets we gave them had a spine...." Yes, of course, it was not a blanket, but rather a full deer pelt with a complete spinal cord and even a jawbone attached... lovely.

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As I sat contemplating whether I could reformulate my concept of perfection to fit this situation, I realized that, having just applied to refinance our mortgage, an appraiser would be arriving shortly. What will a pack of free-ranging, skunky dogs do to the price of a home? Has anyone ever had to pose that question before?

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Needless to say, this is the scene to which the appraiser arrived:

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There were dogs chewing on fur;
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There were dogs chewing on bone;
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There were dogs rolling on both;

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There were contemplative moments when dogs considered what to do next;

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But of course, there was no remorse.

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The appraiser was a little put off, but thankfully, everything worked out. A pefect ending at least?

Happy Birthday America!

I decided to get in the 4th of July spirit a bit early this year. Since I had the day off from work, I jumped in the pickup truck and drove to the local Amish market. After gazing longingly at the various chicken coops they offer for sale, I got down to business and sought out the object of my desires. Of course, when you are a large man like me, you tend to get distracted easily by baked goods. Amish markets are filled with baked goods. Thus, I purchased some fresh baked peach bread and a peanut butter whoopie pie... the traditional devils food cake discs but with a peanut butter creme (as opposed to cream) filling.

Note, there will be no picture of the whoopie pie because it did not make it back to the house. In fact, I'm not even sure that I got the car started before cramming it down my gullet. I must say, I was a little disappointed with myself... I completely forgot to get a bottle of homemade rootbeer. I probably would have purchased some additional items, say a pecan pie, sticky buns, a pumpkin roll, etc..., but this Amish bakery limited their business dealings to cash transactions, and I had a specific purchase I needed to make.

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Well, I was finally able to tear myself away from the food stuffs and made my way down to the furniture area. There I found my intended purchase, a large Amish barn star in an American flag paint scheme. The moment I became the proud owner of a barn, I secretly wanted a giant Amish barn star to adorn the front entrance. I purchased it and quickly headed for home... well, as noted above, I did take thirty seconds or so to suck down my Amish-made, sugary confection... but then I drove right home.

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Once I was back to Bully Hill, I popped up to the barn with a drill and some stainless steel screws, pulled out a ladder, and set to work anchoring it above my barn doors. Here are some photos of the end product:

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So, happy birthday America and happy 4th of July to both of my readers.