Cattle into NE pasture

This morning when I woke up I saw that the irrigation sprinklers were not at full blast.  One of the sprinkler risers in the NE pasture had unscrewed itself and created a geyser.  I fixed it then ran the sprinkler lines in the south hayfield today.  I re-ran the NE pasture sprinkler line this evening and overnight.

The north pasture grass is down so I let the cattle into the NE pasture this morning.  That lasted almost a day before the cattle started to complain.  So this evening I let them in the corral to eat the grass there.  That will last a day.

In the north pasture waiting to be let into the NE pasture.

And they're off!

The calves have seen the irrigation pipes in the hayfield, but this is the first time they saw a line laid out.  Of course they had to immediately check the pipes out.

I have a few tires in the north pasture under the tree.  I guess the cattle had to play with a few tires and move them around.

Hawthorn branch pile

Here are some photos of the branches I cut and saved when trimming branches in the area where most of the hawthorn trees are located.  A lot of the narrower branches were tossed as they weren't good enough to save for the woodstove. Those branches are not in the photos.  Many of the branches in the photos were from the hawthorn trees.  A little over a dozen branches were from the downed evergreen trees.    

Some other branches were from trees I don't know which variety they are.  Here is a photo of one of those.

The start... and the end for the saved branch pile.

I chain sawed up the branch pile and it made a pickup load of branches.  How I got all the branches into just one pickup load... I don't remember.   More wood for my woodstove this Winter.  This, and the other branches I cut up earlier this year, may be all the wood I need this Winter.

Hayshed roof fix. Petunias. Cattle.

This morning I fixed my hayshed roof.   A few days ago it was fairly windy and I heard metal banging when I was out in my pasture.  The hayshed roof has metal roofing and a metal panel on one corner was loose and flapping in the strong wind.  The roofing is nailed on and the nails on part of one panel had come loose and were now gone.  I had to wait until I had a day with little to no wind, and also wait until the sprinkler line wasn't nearby.

The hayshed is very tall.   Many years ago after I first moved here I was on the roof to fix loose metal panels.  I had to put an extension ladder in the pickup bed to just reach high enough that I could get on the roof.   I haven't been on the roof since then.  This loose metal panel was on the corner next to Curtis's place and also next to the old OMC haybine.   Due to the haybine I couldn't get my pickup close enough.  On Curtis's side he had a pile of metal things which we slightly moved so I could try using my extension ladder.  Nope.  The top of the ladder went against some fiberglass panels just below the roof line.   Due to the metal things location, I couldn't get my pickup close enough.   I put the ladder on the side with the haybine.  The top of the ladder went against metal panels I had on the side under the roof line.

Curtis watched as I slowly climbed up to the top of the ladder.  Instead of using nails to fasten the lower corner of the roof panel, I used screws and a drill.  About a dozen screws.  When reaching to the very left to screw in that screw, the ladder started to slide to the right.  I stopped the slide then tried to drill the screw in.  This time: success.

Here are some of my petunias.  These have flowers.  The rest of the petunias were getting lots of water from the irrigation line today.  Those petunias didn't have open flowers.

Now that the irrigation line has moved out of part of the north pasture I let the cattle into that pasture this afternoon to eat the fresh green grass.  It was easy as they had read my mind and were standing near the gate and waiting for me.

Here you can see what was irrigated and what was not.

The cattle were happy.

Calves.   The little red steer on the left was born June 22.   The larger red steer on the right side was born March 20.

Hawthorn thorns

The hawthorn thorns are nasty, as you can see.  This is mostly new growth from this Spring.  Look at how long the thorns already are.

The hawthorn trees are very pretty in the Spring when they bloom.   They produce berries for the wildlife.  Here are berries on a branch I had cut.

The cattle aren't interested in the berries, but they are interested in the leaves. With all the green grass back then, some cattle insisted on eating some of the hawthorn branch leaves.  How the cattle didn't get stabbed by the thorns is a mystery.

After I had finished cutting and removing the hawthorn branches and removing the tree stumps, the next up was to get rid of (cutting) some odd-and-ends of branches on a few trees, then the small pieces of branches on the ground that were left.  I didn't want to step on the thorns or have the cattle avoid the ground and grass due to the thorns.

While the hawthorn wood is strong and doesn't like to be cut or broken off, I then found on the ground all over quite a few small branch pieces that had broken off the larger branches.  Really?!  Just to be annoying to me?!

I got a rake and raked to gather the pieces.  The less I had to touch the branches the better.  That was because I keep getting stabbed when touching the branches, even when I wore leather gloves.  I raked up over a half dozen wheelbarrow loads of pieces. 

The hawthorns were hard on my rake and I had to fix my rake when the branches and grass took the rake head off the handle.  I wasn't thinking clearly.  I just wanted to be done with the hawthorn work.  Using a wheelbarrow?  Not the best thing.  The wheelbarrow's wheel is filled with air.  And... the wheelbarrow tire went flat after the first day of work.  Most of my wheelbarrow loads was on a flat tire. Not the easiest way to move a fully loaded wheelbarrow.  I didn't bother fixing or replacing the tire as it would get flat again.

After I had finished the hawthorn work, in between other work items I found some time to work on my wheelbarrow tire.  My neighbor Curtis thought I could fix the tire like I do with my bicycle tires.  I gave it a try.  After I got the tire off the rim I looked for thorns.  I found 10 or so that I had to pull out of the tire.  Days later I worked on patching the tire.  Where were all those punctures again?

Once I thought I had patched all the punctures I inflated the tire.  After a while the tire started to feel softer.  I put the tire in a water trough and found four air leaks.  This time I marked the spots.   Now too find the time to re-fix the tire.

Hawthorn tree stump news

Back when I was working on my hawthorn tree trimming and stump removal, I didn't get all the news posted before I got distracted with haying and other news.   The last I posted back in June I thought I only had a few more workdays left on the hawthorns.  As usual with the hawthorns, what I thought would take a few days took much longer.  I did finish in June just before I started my hay cutting.

This update is about removing the stumps of the hawthorn trees I completely cut.  I cut more hawthorn trees, but not all hawthorn trees were completely cut due to the time I was spending on the cutting and removal.

It's almost been a month since I worked on the hawthorn trees.   I forgot how many tree stumps I dug and chopped to remove.  Six?  More?  I removed the tree stumps for the trees I had completely cut.  That is because the tree stumps were sprouting new leaves a week later.  I want the hawthorn trees completely gone.  So that meant removing as much of the stumps as I could.

New leaves already.

One day several cows decided to help me with the stump removal.  Haynes the bull watched/managed from a distance.

Haynes the bull.

The last stump removed.  The dirt areas in the photo were where I removed some of the stumps.

I'll try to get the last of the hawthorn tree photos posted soon.

English Walnut tree and hazelnut bushes

My large English walnut tree is slowly leafing out and coming back to life.

Photos taken July 5.

Taken July 20.  When I ran an irrigation line near the tree one day it helped.

Here is the smaller English walnut tree.  It is doing well.

The hazelnut bushes are doing fine.  Deer haven't found the bushes yet this year.  No nuts from them yet.

End of haying for now

I am done with haying for now.   This morning after moving my irrigation pipes, now that I can get in-and-out of the ranch via a vehicle, I drove to Donna's to get my portion of the hay bales.  The first trip had a bale in my baler, a bale of the tractor's bale spear, and a bale in the back of my pickup.  After leaving my baler in the corral, the second trip was a bale on the bale spear and a bale in the pickup.

The buyer of Donna's bales said he would be there at noon. I had then planned on moving all the bales in Donna's field to one location to make loading quicker.  When I got back to Donna's place after 10:30 am the guy was already there.  His plans had changed.  No problem.  Let's me get done quicker.

He had bought Donna's small bales in the past.  This was his first time buying large round bales.  He wasn't sure how many bales would fit on his trailer and how to put them on the trailer.  I suggested we could place them two across even though a foot or so of bale would hang over each side.  That is, if he had a strap to hold the bales onto the trailer.  He did.  So I loaded two bales side by side so he could see how they would fit.  He guided the placement of the bales as I would load the bales from one side of the trailer.  After the first two bales were loaded I suggested a little movement of the two bales so the bales were equally loaded and equally went beyond the trailer edge.  That done, and he was satisfied on how the bales would sit, I loaded 14 bales onto his trailer.  Five rows of two across.  Then I placed four bales on the five rows, placing the top bales in the middle of the two bales.  That way the top bale would help protect the bottom two bales from moving/leaning off the trailer.   That was all his trailer could handle.  And he had a diesel pickup that was able to tow the bale loaded trailer.

When I was loading the bales he offered to pull the trailer closer to the remaining bales.  I told him no.  Donna's field is uneven due to pocket gopher dirt mounds and I didn't want the bales falling off his trailer as they were not strapped onto the trailer yet.  It was easier for me to slowly drive across the field as the bouncing didn't cause the bale to come off the bale spear.  He had six straps to hold the bales in place.  I'm sure he made it home without any bales falling off the trailer as long as he drove responsibly.

I didn't have my camera with me otherwise I would have taken a photo of how his loaded trailer looked.  He took a photo of his loaded trailer just before he left.

Then I took the last bale home with me.  Then I spent a few hours cleaning the hay pieces and chaff out of the baler.  Once that was done I had one more fix to the baler.  Monday when I was re-lacing my formerly twisted baler belt and re-threading it around the rollers, Donna noticed the formerly twisted belt, at the opposite end of the baler, that Curtis and I fixed last year, didn't go correctly around one of the baler's rollers.  Whoa.  I had no problems baling my field's hay this year with that belt.  So instead of fixing that other belt on Monday due to how long it took me to fix the latest belt, I left it be.  After cleaning the baler I decided to fix the other belt.

How long did it take me to fix last year's belt?  A couple minutes.  It took me less than a minute to remove the pin, less than a minute to move the belt correctly around the roller, and less than a minute to reinstall the pin.  Not seven hours like it did for my belt this year.

How last year's belt looked: before and after my fix.

Then it was on to mowing the rest of the yard with my lawnmower.   I wanted to mow the yard after the cows had eaten the grass to even it out and break up the manure, but other events took my time.  I had half the yard already mowed as I took a little time before dark each day to mow an area before I would move an irrigation pipe to that location the next day.  Then haying Donna's field wrecked my schedule.  Now that I am starting to move the irrigation lines back across the field and yard, I had a window now where I could mow the rest of the yard.

The mowing now done I then moved the north line.  That done I picked up the small apples the irrigation had knocked off the apple trees yesterday.  I'll give them to the cattle tomorrow.

Also while in the fruit tree area I saw that the two small black current bushes had berries on them.  I rarely get berries as the birds get them before I do. But last year I re-wired the bushes to protect them from the cattle.  I guess it also stopped the birds from getting to them.  I had to temporarily take some of the wire off them.  Even so I had to lay in the ditch and go under and through the barb wire to get all the berries.  None of the vehicles driving by stopped to ask if I was ok laying in the ditch like that.

Here is a handful of the berries.

Then it was off to moving the south irrigation line.  After that I checked the pocket gopher traps.  I caught two more.

Now it was 8 pm.  I had been up since 6:30 am.  Before that I had 5 hours of sleep.  I hadn't eaten since breakfast (other than the berries).  I was tired.  I went to sleep.  I slept for two and a half hours.  I slept so hard I didn't hear Rascal asking to come back in the house.

Donna's hay is baled

This morning I got Donna's hay baled.   Everything worked fine today.  The bales were netwrapped appropriately.  No belts twisted.  I had only one potential problem.  When a bale reaches full size (60), the controller will beep and seconds later the netwrapping will start.    At times when the amount of hay coming in is small, the controller will temporarily go between .5 and the new number until enough hay comes in to move the number to the higher value.  This time it fluctuated over and over between 59.5 and 60 as I initially hit 60 when the hay quit, and I had to turn a corner to get to the next windrow.  When hay started coming back into the baler the controller listed 60 and would keep going instead of stopping and switching to the netwrap mode.    So I hit the manual netwrap button and started the netwrap.  Then everything worked fine and the bale was netwrapped.

I made 15 bales today, for a total of 20 bales from Donna's field.  It took me only 2 hours and 15 minutes to bale those 15 bales.  Sunday and Monday when I worked on the baler problem it took me three to four hours each day.

But I am done haying until my second hay cut in August. So happy to be done haying.  Since my irrigation line today is blocking all my gates to the ranch I can't drive in or out of the ranch.  Tomorrow after I move the line to the next spot I can drive in and out of the ranch and can bring the tractor and baler and the few bales I am keeping home.  Donna sold the rest of the bales and I will load them tomorrow afternoon for her.

Still working on baling Donna's field. Plus turkey news

I don't have Donna's field baled yet.  But I made progress today.  Slowly.

I found my extra baler belt lacing pins this morning.  I didn't look yesterday considering how bad the day was going.  I wouldn't have found the pins.  This morning I found the pins the first place I looked.  Now, sliding the pin into the belt's lacing should take 5 to 10 minutes.  I spent almost 4 hours this afternoon getting the pin through the lacing's needle-like eyes.  The middle part of the lacing, where yesterday I had major trouble getting the last broken part of the pin out of the needle-like eyes, today didn't want to let the pin through the eyes.  Lots of work with little effort.  At one point, finally, I used a drill to make a few eyes larger.  Then I got the pin through four eyes.  Then I was stopped again.  Donna and I came up with sharpening the one end of the pin.  Donna has a grindstone machine.  That helped a lot.  In about 15 minutes I got the pin through the rest of the eyes and the belt was now completely laced.

I didn't do any baling today as it was now around 4:30 pm.  This afternoon got really windy.  A dry weather front came through.  No rain.  Lots of wind.  Yesterday, while not near as windy, because Donna's hay is short and light, when the baler picked up the hay, before it could be fed inside the baler, some hay would blow off to the side.  Today's hay is longer, but I figured a lot of hay would still blow off to the side.  So tomorrow I'll see how the baling goes as the wind is supposed to be less tomorrow.

Pin for lacing a baler's belt.

This branch was from my front yard.  The strong wind broke it off a spruce tree.

When moving irrigation pipes this evening I took time to check on the turkey.  This is what I found.  Her 15 chicks hatched yesterday or today and they have left.   The photo was taken the same way I took the photos of her laying there.