Haynes with another gate

Yesterday after I had washed the stock trailer I noticed the gate between the hayfield and the south pasture was open.  No big deal as right now the cattle go between the two if they want.  Still, I don't like gates open when they don't have to be open.  So I went out to close the gate.

I thought I had forgot to wrap the chain around the gate handle and the cattle may have slid the gate handle to open the gate.  No, that didn't happen as the chain was wrapped around the handle.  The other thing is that the railroad tie post the handle is slid into to close the gate has over the years started to lean away from the gate.  The fence wire pulls on the post.  A year or so ago I added a 2 by 4 to the post so the gate handle would have enough to slide into.   The post continued to lean away and it appears - Haynes most likely - pushed on the post and popped out the gate handle.  I was able to close the gate.

But... its time to fix the leaning post.  I got the tractor to push against the two posts to straighten them.  The fence wire wanted to hold the posts back.  So I unhooked the wires for now.

Meanwhile, the cattle who were at the opposite side of the hayfield saw what I was doing.  As they were done eating for now and bored came over to check out what was going on.  So I had to walked around them to do my work.  Then Haynes came.  He decided to rub his neck and back against the tractor's load arm.  Haynes is good to me. But he is a bull.  So I had to keep my eye on him as I moved around.  He may want to only play, but he is strong.

I got the posts straight.  I decided to come back today to re-hook up the fence wire.  I also left the gate open as some cattle were in the hayfield side; some cattle were in the pasture side; and some standing in the way of the gate.  They all wanted to check everything out.

Here is a 24 second video of Haynes rubbing against my tractor.   https://youtu.be/OOwX6bi3o10

Today I came out to re-hook the fence wires.  I re-hooked them.  I also discovered the gate was down.   Haynes?!!! 

The top lag bolt hinge pin was turned.

I went home to get a wrench to loosen the hinge on the gate.  To keep the gate from being popped off, I have one lag bolt hinge pin facing up on the bottom and the other lag bolt hinge pin on top facing down.  To get the gate to fit I move the top hinge down then up against the lag bolt hinge pin as the lag bolt hinge pins are not movable.

Then I noticed this type of hinge.   Two pieces, not one.  Why the hinge popped off the lag bolt hinge pin is that the end of the hinge was bent more open.  Haynes?!  I had to walk home to get a sledgehammer so I could beat and bend the hinge end pieces back to be close to one another.  Below is the result.

This old railroad rail - that formerly was a fence post in a fence I had rebuilt years ago - was no longer leaning against this railroad tie to keep it from leaning.  Most likely Haynes or a cow rubbed against the rail and knocked it over.  I put it back in place.

Once again another unexpected fence / gate project to fix.  My friend Mark wrote me that I need to write down a "to-do" list.  No, I don't have a written "to-do" list.  I have a "to-do" list in my head as every day or so the cattle alter the "to-do" list.  It saves me from having to re-write my "to-do" list.