Pocket gopher, rain, etc.

I forgot to mention when I wrote about my busy day the other day, but I also caught a pocket gopher that day.  In the NE pasture.   Weeks ago, before I started irrigating, I had noticed fresh mounds of dirt.  But when I dug to find a tunnel to set a trap in, I couldn't find a tunnel.  Multiple mounds of dirt but no tunnel.  Odd, but okay...   Maybe the gopher was digging to see if he wanted to move here.  On to irrigation.  Last week when moving pipes in this area I saw a number of fresh dirt mounds.  After I had moved the irrigation pipe on to another area I went digging to find a tunnel.  I dug and dug dirt mounds and finally found a tunnel.  I set a trap and later that day I caught the pocket gopher.   Now I need to set traps out in the hayfield.  When I have been moving pipes across the hayfield I have seen new dirt mounds.  The pocket gophers are moving back in.

Dirt mounds back when I couldn't find the tunnel.

Whenever I get the time I need to better protect the younger trees.  Here you can see where Diamond had bit off the top of this tree when she was in the NE pasture earlier.

We had rain today again.  Which is good.  I am still irrigating the hayfield so the rain makes it more challenging to move pipes.  This morning it had stopped raining when it was time to move pipes at 7 am.  Yay!  The field was wet from the rain so my lower half got wet as I moved through the tall field.  I had half of the second line to move when it started to rain again.  By the time I was done I was almost soaked.

Yesterday I had gotten only five hours of sleep as I was busy with other things that took more time that I expected.  Last night I was tired and out-of-it so I went to bed at midnight - early for me.  At 7 am it was time to move irrigation pipes.  Afterwards, since I was wet and it was raining, at 9 am I went back to bed.  I slept until 1 pm.  Seven plus four hours made it eleven hours of sleep.  Guess the extra sleep got me caught up.

Off and on rain today.  When it came time to move irrigation pipes at 7 pm it wasn't raining.  But rain clouds were off to the West.  I am done irrigating the south part of the hayfield and it was time to move that line into the south pasture.  Moving the pipes across the fence takes more effort and time.  Not what I needed with rain approaching.  But I finally got it done.  No rain yet.  Let me try moving the north line and see if I get rained on again halfway through the move.  Halfway through the move I could see the rain clouds getting closer.  Then a few lighting bolts in the far West.  Holding on to a metal pipe in a lightning storm is not what I wanted to do.

I got all the pipes moved.  As I walked back to open the valve I started to feel a few rain drops.  When I closed the valve to the third line it started to rain.  It was a run back home.  I got very wet, but not soaked.