A spring day in February

What a beautiful day! Blue skies, sunshine and 43 *F.

Of course I had to sieze the break in winter weather and head outside. As soon as I set foot out the front door I could hear them. Little pleading voices, they are everywere. They all ask for the same: Take care of me, no me, I really need it more... It is impossible to ignore them, they surround me, remind me, force me to pick up rake, shovel and wheelbarrow. Since I am in the yard, I start right here and there. Every spring this is the hub of pineneedles, bones of all kinds of nature (for details please refer to the the dogs), shredded balls and much more.

After a few loads I needed a break from raking, so why not bring the chickens their daily leftovers. The chicken coop does not whisper, no it screams in my ear: Look at me and do something about it!

See, we have two Indian runner ducks, which decided to overwinter with the chickens. BIG no-no! Ducks love water and they will be spreading it very liberaly. These two runners did just that and now the coop is not just sawdust, straw and mostly dry chicken manure, now it is a watering hole filled with sawdust, straw and everything but dry chicken and duck manure.

Of course I picked up the shovel right away and started filling up the wheelbarrow. It was not until after I had packed it all the way to the top, that I paused for a moment and recalled how heavy this mud hole material was. To make matters worse, the manure pile is about 80 feet of steady uphill from the coop. So up I pushed, slowley, very slowley. The worst thing that can happen with a wheelbarrow overflowing with nastyness is having is tip over. So remember: slow and steady wins the race. I did manage to clean out two good loads. Now taking care of a few loads from one of the sheep paddocks was a cinch.

All that was left to do for today was filling up the water troughs. No big deal, since there are no frozen hoses at 43*F.

All in all a very productive day for me, since I did all this with the assistence of my two, four and two year old, little girls.