Cattle and walnuts

This afternoon when I returned from uptown I saw most of my cattle in my southern neighbor's field.  Once again the cattle had unlocked the gate.  After they had unlocked the gate this Summer I planned on later adding something to better lock the gate.  I hadn't found anything yet and put it off.  When I let the cattle into the hayfield I thought the cattle would prefer to stay in the hayfield as the neighbor's pasture was eaten down and dried up.  I was wrong.   The cattle just had to check the other pasture out.

I waited.  I knew the cattle would eventually come back to the better grass and alfalfa and also water.  A little later I noticed one of the calves in the south pasture.  The fence stopped him from going to the hayfield and then through the gate on the other side of the hayfield and south pasture fence.  I went out to herd him to the middle pasture and then to the middle pasture gate to the hayfield.  As I did this cow #8 came over and mooed at me.   Cow #8's calf was sold at the auction last week.  Maybe cow #8 was looking for her calf?

The rest of the cattle then came to check us out and then go to the river to drink.  I closed the gate to the neighbor's field and put a chain connecting link to hold two parts of the chain together.  That should stop my divas.  I hope.

The other news is that I finally picked all my walnuts off my tree.  They don't fall off ya know.  We have not had a hard freeze yet this Fall so most of the leaves are still on the tree.  That makes finding the walnuts hard as the walnuts are still in their green shell which blends right into the leaves.  It took me two afternoons to pick the walnuts.  And over and over I would find another walnut where I had looked earlier.

The walnuts were on the tree top to bottom.  The very top.  I first picked walnuts I could reach standing on the ground.  Then I used the orchard ladder to reach higher.  Then I had to climb the tree to reach high and then to the very top.  Fortunately the top of the tree did not break off due to my weight.

I filled two five gallon pails with walnuts.  Some green shells I could split by hand, but the rest I will have to work to get the brown walnut shells out of the green shells.

Here is the small walnut tree.  It is not old enough to have walnuts yet.  Two photos to show how the leaves are turning yellow.  October 1 and October 11.

Here is the larger tree with walnuts.  October 1 and October 11.  The large tree's leaves are not turning yellow as fast as the smaller tree.