Cold heater

Bored cattle get into trouble.  Since the last few nights have had temperatures down into the teens, the water trough water freezes over.  So I dropped a stock tank heater in the tank, and before going to bed at night I plug it in.

This morning I discovered the water trough frozen over.  The cattle had lifted the heater out of the trough.  Why...?!! 

The heater element was cold.  I hope it didn't burn out.  I broke the ice and put the heater into the water.  It started to heat and melt the ice.  *Whew*

By the way, the cow with the limp still moves slowly and is still recovering.

Labor Day Washington trip

Over Labor Day Tammy and I drove out to Washington State to spend a long weekend with several of my uncles and aunts at their river properties.

It was a nine hour drive there and a nine and a half hour drive back.  Funny how a desirable goal makes the time shorter.

Tammy and I were surprised at how many large motor homes pulling a good sized SUV behind them were on the interstate.

Columbia River in Washington State

Wind farm near Columbia River

The following photos were taken on Highway 12 west of Yakima, Washington.

The next photos were taken near White Pass on highway 12.

Between White Pass and Packwood, Washington this large guy was calmly standing near the road.

Our destination.

Tammy and I had good weather until we entered the Cascade Mountains.  Then we started to get off and on rain.  By the time we reached the river properties it was raining really hard.  Fortunately the rain left by the next morning and we had sunny and warm weather the rest of the weekend.

The mossy trees indicate how much rain this area gets. 

Now I offered to bring some of my fencing material to help my uncles with their fencing but I was told they would have the fencing all done by the time I got there.  Guess not.  No matter... it looks like they wanted to go fancier than having a simple fence like I use to hold livestock.

While in Washington State Tammy and I took an afternoon and she attended a Tastefully Simple meeting with her team members.  During our drive back to my uncles' properties my car quit running just as we were exiting the interstate to get on Highway 12. I had to leave my car overnight at a gas station at the exit.

The next morning a buddy of my uncle Curt looked at my car and discovered the distributor's rotor was loose.  We tightened the rotor screw but it was stripped.  The screw held just long enough to get the car back to the river property. The distributor had been replaced a few months earlier in Kalispell but this was the first time I had really driven my car other than a few short trips around Kalispell.

I needed a new rotor.  This was Labor Day weekend and a Sunday. Amazingly a O'Reilly's auto-parts store was open in a nearby city and I was able to fix my car.

The weather was gorgeous on Labor Day Monday when we returned to Montana.  With the clear skies we could see Mt Rainer, something hidden in the rain clouds on our drive to the river properties.

Back near Yakima again.  I love these mountains.  The other side of the mountains was so near and so green.  And here? Dry, dry, dry.

The Yakima area apparently is a large fruit producing area.  We saw lots of fruit stands and trucks hauling fruit.

Fruit: Pears, Peaches, Apples... Wine?

Coming down the mountains that are between Yakima and Interstate 90. Interstate 90 is in the far distance.

We had a great time visiting my relatives and took our time when it came to leave. We didn't leave until noon Pacific time. We didn't get home until 10:30 pm Montana time.  Nine and a half hours after we left.  It was plenty dark by the time we got home.  Very little traffic was on the roads. Fortunately we didn't see - or hit - any deer.

Stormy weather

A strong cold front came through this afternoon.  Very strong winds.  Midwest style winds.  40 mph or so winds

Late afternoon after I got done with chatting with my uncle Curt on Skype I looked outside to see part of the asphalt roofing on the tool shed bent back in the wind.  The wind had torn the bottom roll from the nails.

I got the roll back down flat without tearing it too badly.   Tammy held on while I got blocks to hold it down until I can nail it later after the winds die down.

Late afternoon/early evening I was outside a number of times calling for Daisy as she had been outside since late morning. No Daisy. After 8 pm I went outside again, and with a flashlight, checked the rounds of the property (house area/corral/NE pasture) and no Daisy. I wasn't about to wander around the neighbors' properties with a flashlight after dark.  When I got back to the house Daisy was on the step. And she was warm when it was cold outside. Hmmmm..  Where were you Daisy?!

More hay

I got some good news.  Wyatt hadn't sold all of his hay.  He had held some hay back for a relative who then didn't need it after all.  I think the amount of hay Wyatt had left is the amount I need to ensure I have enough hay for the cattle this Winter.   *whew*   My friend Dan had told me that it would be no problem to get more hay but then he came up empty from all his contacts.

Now the work began.  I had to load the hay bales on the pickup, move them over to the hay shed and stack them.  With the barn full of hay I had to move the stock trailer out of the hay shed in order to stack the hay in the hayshed.  When it comes time to feed the hay to the cattle, I will either have to bring the hay to the feeder in the corral, else set up another feeder near the hay shed.

I counted Wyatt's bales.  218.  In the hayshed I had room for 12 stacks.  That meant 18.1 bales per stack.  Or 9 rows high.  High.

Because I didn't want to start retrieving bales this Winter from a stack 9 bales high, I stacked the back stacks 11 bales high.  That would allow me to stack the front stacks 5 or 6 rows high.

This week I started moving bales.  In the pickup I could move about 40 or so bales at a time.  Two loads the first day and I had 82 bales moved.  The next day I moved another 40 bales.  I concentrated on making the back 3 rows of stacks 11 rows high with the next row of stacks high enough I could step on them from the back of the pickup and climb on them to reach the back stacks.  I had the back three rows done and 8 bales left in the pickup when I stepped off the stacks.  Suddenly the stacks started to lean sideways and then fall over.  One.. two.. three stacks.  A jumbled pile of the top half of the stacks.  Due to the stuff on the sides of the hayshed I had to stack the bales in the middle and could not use a side wall for support on one side.  I had placed long boards against the sides of the stacks to hold them, upright but apparently not enough of them.

I was starting to move bales from the fallen stacks in order to reach the level of bales to start rebuilding from.  Then the fourth stack fell over.



By the end of the day I had much of the stacks rebuilt.  The pickup was mostly full of bales as I used it as a staging area to hold the bales while I rebuilt the stacks.  I was done for the day as it is tiring lifting so many 60 pound bales.

The third day I finished unloading the pickup and stacking the bales.  While I doing that Wyatt stopped by to tell me that he had forgotten that he had promised hay to a lady.  So he would appreciate it if I left 32 bales for her.

That left me 186 bales.  And I didn't need to make the back stacks 11 rows high.  Too bad.  I already stacked them that high.

That left the back stacks high and the front stacks dropping quite quickly.

I stacked the bales on wooden pallets instead of the ground.

The back stacks - 7 rows high

Moving bales by pickup

Two times I lost a bale of hay from my pickup load.  Once when I turned into my driveway and once when I left Wyatt's driveway.   The time I left Wyatt's driveway I lost eight bales off the back.  So I had to go back with Tammy's minivan to get four of the bales off the road.  I moved the four bales that fell into the ditch over to Wyatt's property until I could get them in my next load.

The final result on Friday.  See how the front goes down quickly. 32 additional bales would have been another story.

I have gates on the hayshed to keep the cattle and deers away from the hay.

The weather forecast for Sunday night and Monday has a winter storm blowing in.  To further protect my hay I placed several large tarps over the top and front of the stack.  This should protect my hay until it is eaten.

With my other hay I estimate I have 17.6 tons of hay.  Dan thought I would only need 14 or so tons of hay but I wanted extra hay in case it is needed.

Injured leg

Tuesday I noticed one of my cows sitting alone in the south pasture with no other cattle nearby.  By the time I walked over the herd came and all the cattle milled around and I lost track of the single cow.

Wednesday I saw her alone again in the south pasture.  She got up and started to walk by the time I entered the south pasture.  I walked over to see if she was ok as she was moving slowly.  I saw she had a limp and was favoring her right back leg.  I couldn't get close as she tried walking faster the closer I got.  So I let her be.

I wanted to get her into the corral for a better look and to restrict her walking.  But the cattle stayed closer to the river all day.

Thursday morning I got up relatively early.  One cow was alone at the salt feeder so I went out in the chilly frosty morning.  Once out there I discovered this was not the cow with the limp.  The herd was in the middle to river side of the south pasture.  I found the limping cow to one side.  She still limped.  Since she was near the herd she let me get closer.  Her leg did not look swollen but she certainly favored her leg and if she tried to move too fast sometimes her leg wanted to give way.  I couldn't see if anything was in her hoof.

As I got nearer the house the herd came to the east side of the south pasture.  I went back out and opened the gate to the hayfield.  All the cattle except the limping cow came through the gate and followed me to the fence by the barn.  I waited.  The herd drifted off.  The limping cow didn't connect the dots to go through the gate and instead came right to the south pasture fence.

I went out and encouraged her to follow me through the gate.  By the time she got near the gate the herd came to check out me and my pail of salt blocks. So she stood and watched.

*sigh*

So I had to herd her through the gate.

She joined the herd and off they went.  Then they noticed the neighbor's cattle across the road and most of them ran along the fence and mooed at them.

After a long tour along the fence of the hayfield's parameters they came back to the fence by the barn with the limping cow trailing.

Time to let them into the corral.  The entire herd except for the limping cow slowly made their way into the corral.  I waited.  And waited.  The limping cow saw the herd in the corral but she had no interest in joining them.   She preferred to hang closer to the horses across the fence in the middle pasture.

I had to herd her into the corral.  But slowly as she was limping.

After I had all the cattle in the corral Dan stopped by to look the cow over.  She was laying on the ground and her calf was trying to suck from her udder which was partially exposed.   It was good her calf was there as I didn't know which calf was her.  Usually the calves stick together except when they drink from mom.

Her leg looked good and her hoof was clear with nothing stuck in it.  It appears she may have stepped in something and twisted it, or less likely Beulah or another cow rammed her badly bruising her leg.

I am keeping her in the corral for the time being so she doesn't have to walk much to give her a chance to heal.  I separated the limping cow and her calf from the herd, and after the herd had their early afternoon siesta in the warm sun, they returned to the south pasture.

For now the horses will have to be content with the north and middle pastures, where they spend the majority of their time anyway.

Jan's ER visit

Sunday morning at 7 am Jan called me and asked me to take her to the ER at the hospital.  She hasn't eaten much in three days, had flu-like symptoms and had a horrible migraine headache.  It felt like someone hitting her in the head with an ax.

In the ER we had to wait.  A young couple in their pajamas with their baby was talking with the one person in charge.  After a long wait Jan talked to him.  Then came back to sit next to me.  After another long wait she was called in to a back room.

I passed the time talking with a guy waiting on his wife.  She had miscarried earlier and they were waiting for her to pass the fetus when she started to bleed heavily.  He waited in the lobby except for a few times when he was called back to her.  He couldn't handle being there during her exam and procedure.

I was called back around 10:30 am.  Then a young ER doc came in and talked fast with lots of jargon. He thought her headache may be due to temporal arteritis.   He wanted a few more tests to double check stuff.  From the chest x-ray he was surprised to see signs of pneumonia.

So it was decided to admit her into the hospital.

Nurses with meds came by: antibiotics, steroids, pain meds.

More waiting.

The admitting doc came by and did another exam on Jan.

Then we had to wait for a room.  In between times while waiting I asked the staff for a drink of water for Jan.  I also had the staff get Jan a warm blanket as she was getting chilled.

After 2:30 pm Jan was admitted and taken to her room.  I left at 3 pm once she was settled.  Her headache was only slightly dulled due to the pain meds but she had taken short cat naps while waiting.

I was hungry when I got home and had breakfast, lunch and dinner in one meal.

Jan was released from the hospital today.

October Treasure Market

Tammy held another one of her Treasure Market expos.  The expo where sellers have antique, vintage, crafts, clothes, rummage sale and miscellaneous stuff.  Kind of like a flea market.

I never got around to holding a garage sale this year so I brought a number of boxes of garage sale items.

For this expo Tammy decided to have it only be one day.  In the past she had two day expos, and once a three day expo.   For two days expos she tried Saturday and Sunday and once a Friday and Saturday expo.  Saturday was usually the best day and the other days were slow.

Tammy's last Treasure Market was early September and it was slow.  She wasn't going to have any more Treasure Markets until next Spring but a number of her vendors convinced her to do an October expo and to have it the same weekend as the final Farmer's Market.  The last Farmer Market of the year is held this Saturday and is in the Expo building at the fairgrounds.

Tammy booked another building on the fairgrounds for this Saturday.  Everything was fine until Wednesday afternoon when the fair called and asked if Tammy would swap buildings.  The gun show suddenly outgrew the grandstand building, and the building Tammy was booked into (the Trade Center) was larger than she needed as she would have used less than half of it.  So Tammy swapped buildings to help the gun show and the fairground people.

Some of Tammy's vendors were very unhappy as they preferred the Trade Center building and they chewed Tammy out for being too nice and swapping buildings.  The old Grandstand building has steps and is not handicap accessible.  Since it has steps the vendors have to carry their wares into the building and can't wheel them inside.  We had a bit of a scare in the morning when an older lady customer fell down the steps.  She was ok but a little shaken up.  I think everyone who saw her fall was more shaken up than the old lady herself.

But the nice thing is that the Grandstand building is right across from the Expo building where the Farmer's Market was located.  People came out of one building and would walk over to the other building.

Both markets had lots of people.  In the afternoon I walked through the Farmers Market.   "Farmers" is a bit of a misnomer as I saw only a half dozen vendors selling food: squash, pumpkins, onions, potatoes, carrots and apples.   The rest of the vendors, around 40(?), were selling mainly arts and craft stuff.  I talked with one lady selling handcrafted oven hot pads and she said selling was slow.

I think most of the vendors at Tammy's market did well.  Some vendors had a slow day as people looked but did not buy their stuff.  Still, there were enough customers that most vendors weren't standing around talking to other vendors and watching the door for customers.

Most vendors set up their tables Friday between 4 pm and 8 pm so they would be ready by 9 am Saturday morning when the market started.  Tammy included free use of one table as part of their spot.  We got to the grandstand building a little before 3 pm and some vendors were already there.  Tammy and I had to measure and mark the vendor locations and I had to set up a table and chair for each vendor.

We had an old map for the grandstand from when Tammy first rented the building another year and in that map she had a two foot space between each 10 foot vendor space.  Tammy forgot this and after measuring the 10 foot vendor space on Friday we came up with more spaces than on the map.  It doesn't look good to have empty spaces and Tammy had a full building with the 10/2 set up. So I had to remeasure the spaces.

I had a lot of tables to set up and take down when the market was over.  Some vendors rented more tables.  I think 60 tables ended up being used.

Tammy wanted balloons outside and on her signs.  She bought a small helium tank and 30 balloons at Walmart.  A vendor friend of hers said the balloons didn't last long and recommended we wait until Saturday morning to fill the balloons.  So Saturday morning after I set out the signs she and I filled balloons.  Meanwhile customers started to come.  Lots of customers. We filled about 20 balloons and hung some outside near the building and then I placed two each on the signs to help draw attention to them.

As I said, I had brought garage sale items and set up three tables next to Tammy's Tastefully Simple table.  I still had to price half the items on Saturday morning.   A number of those items were Tammy's which made pricing harder.  Tammy was running around managing the market so I had to keep an eye on her booth in addition to mine until things slowed down.

Crazy, crazy time.

A busy day overall and I maybe sat for a total of 15 minutes all day.  Good thing the floor was a wooden floor and not concrete as my legs were tired enough from standing on wood.  Concrete would have been worse.

I sold lots of stuff.  I was surprised at the number of books I sold.  Quite a number of 1970s science-fiction books.  I didn't have enough room to put all of my books out on a table but when someone came along with a great interest in the books I would get the extra two boxes of books out from under the table for them to look over.  Once time a woman laughingly told me I was the devil for tempting her with more books.

"Who?  Me?"   

The empty grandstand building.

In the afternoon when it slowed down and I had time to take a photo.

In Tammy's ads she asked people bring warm outer wear or blankets for donation to the local Evergreen clothes exchange at the church down the road.  Look at all we got as donations.  In the Spring Tammy collects donations for the local Food Bank; in the Fall, warm outer wear and blankets.

Some of the balloons near the building.

Here I collected the balloons after the market was over.

The ballloons at home.  I plan to wait and see how long they float with the helium.  They are already starting to sink and I think they will be on the ground by morning, 24 hours after we filled them.

Headlight fixed

I fixed Tammy's headlight and signal light that the deer broke.  A local auto salvage business sells new headlights at a much cheaper price ($50) than NAPA, O'Reilly's and the other parts places who had prices of $90 and up for the headlight.  The same with the turn signal light - the salvage business was cheaper at $25.

The headlight came with a bulb.  The turn signal light did not.  On the "to-do" list is to get a turn signal light bulb.

As you can see, the passenger light is fogged. The old driver's light was like than too.  The lights are sealed units so I can't open the light and clean the inside of the lens.  Tammy probably will replace the passenger light as she has said in the past that her vehicle's lights weren't as bright as she'd like them to be.