Zandstra's Farm

Monthly Archives: June 2017

Lawn Mower Disaster and Dead Dog

Posted on by Posted in Calamities, farm animals .

It never fails that eventually something will go wrong.

No, scratch that. Horribly, terribly, gut-wrenchingly wrong.

This week I had TWO such events!

 

Since I’ve been busy shooting footage for new video blogs,  I carry the video camera around where ever I go. Erik insisted I use his favorite, (once expensive) video camera, eventhough the thing is large and heavy.

Sure the thing is over 10 years old, but it still shot excellent quality video.

I was getting ready to mow my garden (yes, mow it — the grass had taken over the area I had planned to put potatoes and needed to be tamed down again) but because the grass was so tall and thick I decided to shoot a video in it, pretending it was the hay field.

After I shot the video, I set the camera down by my feet on the mower’s platform (thinking my lap wouldn’t last long, and anywhere else I put it would leave it forgotten and possibly rained on).

After some thought I decided to mow along the cow fence since I was already there. On one particular bump, the camera jolted off the mower and landed right under the mower’s deck . . .

. . .  and was promptly annihilated.

I stood there in shock, knowing very well I’d be in a heap of trouble.

And like I figured, I sure was.

 

If that didn’t ruin my week, then what happened yesterday sure did.

Our male boxers like to fight each other, and, knowing this I go to great lengths to keep them apart.

Lately, our largest male, Finley, has been climbing out of the fenced yard when the dogs are out running around their new backyard area. While he hadn’t caused any trouble, I usually had Gator (our older male boxer) tied up outside to keep him away from Finley. I knew it was a matter of time before Finley found Gator and got into a fight.

This time, I decided to let Gator out into the fenced yard with the female dogs, and try to keep Finley penned-up. I thought about tying him outside, but last time he got all tangled up. I went for option 2: putting him in Gator’s pen.

Gator’s pen is on the end, and I had erected 2 security fences to keep Finley from trying to attack Gator while Finley was in the yard (their outdoor runs all sit in the main fenced yard).

I was quite pleased with my new set-up, and thought “finally all the dogs can be happy”.

I was DEAD wrong.

 

Because Finley had discovered he could climb out of the fenced yard, he decided to climb out of his kennel pen (or rather, Gator’s). The dogs all have a small, 4.5 ft walled area inside our 12×12 building. Finley climbed over his door and landed in the main area.

They had only been out two hours. Long enough for me to feed my 4 year old and put him down for a nap.

When I walked out to do some weed wacking, I decided to check the dogs.

What I saw will leave permanent scars in my memory.

 

I will save you the gory description.

I stood in complete shock and quickly closed the door again, shaking violently. What do I do? He was severely wedged into the door and I needed help getting him out! And I needed some moral support!

My feelings were a mixture of sick shock, and utter grief at our much loved Finley. And fear. What would Erik say?! He had been irate about the video camera. Finley was worth well more than that!

I looked around. I needed help. I needed it NOW! I don’t ever ask anyone for help, and certainly most people are not inclined to offer it. But if there was EVER a time I needed it, it was NOW!

My vet tech neighbor was not home. She would have been perfect. I didn’t know our new next door neighbor well enough nor did I know if he was home, and none of my other female neighbors had a strong enough stomach to help.

Then I spied one of my guy neighbors driving by. He was a hunter. I knew him enough to feel comfortable asking for help.

I tried waving him down, but that didn’t work. I thought I had his number somewhere on my phone, so I sent him a text begging him to help me if he wasn’t too busy.

But the person on the other end insisted they had no idea who I was and was not the guy I was looking for.

This left me thoroughly perplexed and in further shock. Did the neighbor just not want to help and was making stuff up or did I really have the wrong number?!

Since I didn’t know, I sat down and let the tears stream down my face.

Sometimes it’s hard being alone, an island looking off into the distance at the main land with all the hustle and bustle.

And while I knew I could find a way to lift poor Finley out of the door (I always find a way to do stuff by myself), I would have to face the horror of it all alone.

I’d have to stuff the overwhelming feeling of grief, shock and terror aside, shut my brain down and look at it as “just another job” to get done.

I’d have to ignore the blood splattered across the walls, the bits of flesh stuck to the door, and the horrific smell of death that had now permeated into the wood.

The thoughts of how he died and what he must have gone through threatened to break my fierce determination, and several times I had to walk outside and catch my breath to re-focus my mind on getting him out.

I had to stand on a chair to get enough leverage to pry him out, and it took a good 20 minutes. I brought the tractor over with the bucket, and loaded Finley in to go bury him at the back of the property.

I suck at digging holes with the tractor bucket.

After 30 minutes of digging, I managed to carve out a shallow grave, gently slid Finley in and covered him over.

Then I went for a short walk through the woods to clear my head and check the chanterelles.

 

So this is what MUST have happened:

Finley figured out how to climb out of his inside pen, over his door (using his dog water dish as a step stool). Once out into the main house, he saw the other dogs running loose in the fenced yard through the doggy door and tried to climb over the door to his normal pen to get to them (or maybe he just saw Gator in there, I don’t know). He didn’t make it over and got stuck. Gator found him struggling and took the opportunity to attack.

 

I was sick all day trying to figure out how to tell Erik.

I finally broke the news later that night. Erik simply shrugged and said it was too bad, but Finley did it to himself.

I still feel like crap, and am really shook up.

The images of what happened will haunt me forever though.

Adventures in Farming “On The Road” – Mom Fail.

Posted on by Posted in Calamities .

To supplement our newly-planted hay fields and ensure both a sellable farm product and food for our own animals, we decided to pick up another 10-acre hay field.

Well, the honest truth is, a buddy of Erik had a 10 acre field that had been leased-out by a farmer. Last year the farmer had planted hay and promptly retied this year, leaving the field uncut.

After quickly looking the field over, we decided it would be an excellent idea to lease the field.

Leasing a field means driving all your hay equipment down . . . and back again.

Luckily, the field was a 10 minute drive by car from the house . . . or a 30 minute drive by tractor! Easily do-able.

 

Now, it’s not at all uncommon for tractors to be driving equipment down the roads around here. In fact, I passed several others going the opposite direction.

Its IS, however, not common to see a GIRL driving a tractor with equipment down the road, and I certainly received some startled looks, and a few paused to pull-out their camera phones.

On one such unfortunate trip, I was running late getting to the field and Erik offered to get Earen from preschool and meet me at the field. He’d brought along lunch, so after he left I sat Earen down in the shade of a bush with his lunch and told him I’d stop at every lap to see if he was done and ready to sit with me.

We don’t have a cab tractor, so Earen has to sit behind me in the seat, which makes it impossible to eat.

It took me maybe 15 minutes to complete the first lap, but as I circled closer I could see something was amiss. Earen appeared to be crying, and he was standing up . . . with his pants down.

I quickly parked the tractor and ran over thinking he must have to pee and didn’t know if he was allowed to pee in the field.

And then with horror, I realized how wrong I was.

(I’m going to do my best to NOT make this too graphic)

He had to go #2, and had already attempted to do so. Unfortunately, he had no idea how to do it correctly and some of it landed down his pants and a good portion sat still attached to his back end.

I stood there crying, feeling bad for the poor little guy and feeling quite helpless since I had no toilet paper or tissues, and Wendy’s had not put any napkins in the bag. I knew very well I’d be laughing about it all later that day, but at the moment, I was stuck.  Even the leaves on the trees were too high to reach. I calmed myself back down and forced myself to calmly evaluate the situation. There had to be SOMETHING.

A grapevine on the back of the bush had a few promising leaves, and looking at the bag I figured tearing off sections might work for toilet paper.

With the help of both, I managed to clean both the little guy up AND his pants, which actually came out pretty darn good.

We then had a discussion on how to properly poop in the weeds.

And, since this IS the start of summer, I think I need to make sure to keep a pack of wet wipes on the tractor.

Just in case.

WTF Girl?

Posted on by Posted in Uncategorized .

Yes.

While many things no doubt run through your head about what WTF means, and it does mean all of those things, the real name is “What The Farm Girl”. Or, better transitioned to “WTFarm Girl”.

Simply put, because the name “Farm Girl” was already taken by ex-playboy model “Banshee Moon”. While not really a “farm girl”, she does live on a farm, and at the age of 50 looks damn good (don’t most Playboy Models?).

“WTFarm Girl” is my new video blog YouTube channel, or rather, “vlog” as they are called. And, unlike Banshee Moon, I actually do work! Everything, as you already know.

Based on comments and stalkers on Facebook, I realized a lot of people (especially other women) really admire what I do and look forward to hearing about my many adventures (and super fails).

90% of everything I do out here is a learned trait that I had to acquire “on the spot”. I see many women moaning about not having someone to “help” them with something, instead of trying to do it themself, and it got me thinking that they just need some inspiration.

Hence the channel.

To inspire other women/people to “try something new”, to get dirty, and to learn something. Oh, and lets not forget the entertainment factor!

So far I’ve only got 2 videos up. On average it takes me about a week to complete a video. Many, many hours with plenty of interruptions!

So, spread the word, subscribe to my channel and lets get this thing rocking!

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQuEO01jp9V9fqIRHilwc9A

Run Away . . . FAST!

Posted on by Posted in Uncategorized .

With all of the work to be done around here, and way too much serious business to attend to, I’ve found one of the best stress relievers is scaring people.

I don’t know, there’s something calming about hiding silently in a dark closet, breathing slowly, waiting, listening, picking the right tactic and making a slight rustling sound. Then another. Then a bit louder as you peek through the crack of the door and watch them cautiously glance over at the closet, that look of trepidation on their face hoping the sound goes away so they don’t have to check it out. You wait a few more minutes, then rustle again, quieter. Their head shoots rights up out of their phone, eyes wide, and they slowly crawl across the floor as you poise yourself for your next move.

The closet door s flung open, and you manage to fall out on top of them, uttering the most horrific of sounds. They release a flood of sounds just as horrible, and then screams of anger when they finally come to their senses and realize the trick you had played.

It just gets the endorphins going!

And so, I’ve been banned from hiding and scaring people.

My argument is that it’s educational. You don’t want someone worse sneaking-up and grabbing you, or beating you over the head. You need to constantly be aware of your surroundings and plan accordingly.

When we first moved onto the property, there was a lot of discussion about bears, and wolves, and coyotes and cougars. And Big Foot.

One day I had a thought. We had game cams all over the property and the kids always get excited to see what’s on them. Why not dress up in a Big Foot costume, and slowly creep across the camera area? Maybe dragging a deer carcass or some other unfortunate object.

As the kids watch the video, and get freaked out, you then place “Big Foot tracks” all around the house the next day. . .

Another idea was the garden patrol creature. This nifty invention is a motion-activated fan-dancer waving guy. Used in gardens to scare away animals, it inflates instantly when the laser line of sight is crossed. We had thought about putting it out by the bus stop in the early morning hours. As soon as the kids hit the line of sight and go running to get on the bus, the waving guy inflates instantly to tower 20 feet above them.

More realistically, I’ll probably just settle for the coyote call. I got a pretty nifty remote controlled coyote call for Christmas and the sounds are amazing. I could easily set it up by the road, place a few questionable foot prints around there, and sit behind a tree and control the sounds. Single coyote nearby? Check. Sounds of animal being tortured? check! Sounds of unknown origin? You bet!

The only reason I haven’t is I want to video it. It will be worth the wait.

You just Got CHORED.

Posted on by Posted in Uncategorized .

Nothing fails to infuriate me more than people who assume I do nothing all day. Now this might stand to reason considering my house is trashed and much of the time so is my yard. However, 9 times out of 10 I am covered in either poop, dirt, grease, maple syrup (that was a few days ago), water or diesel fuel.

I am doing SOMETHING 18 hours of the day. The remaining 6 I am sleeping.

There is no “end of the workday”, there are no weekends. Heck, I don’t even get Mother’s Day, Christmas OR my birthday off!

So when my daughter made a snarky comment about how I don’t do anything all day, I lit it up.

No, I didn’t yell. I simply explained that there are so many chores to get done that it would take 3 or 4 people to keep up on all them, so pretty much nothing is ever fully done (except for cleaning the animals out).

As the conversation progressed, it became quite clear to me that my child had fallen into the tight grip of social media and TV and lost track of reality. Being a city-kid and all, life on the farm has been a bit hard for her to enjoy.

Now, you may be wondering why on earth we’d have so many kids, and NONE of them with any chores?

Well, the answer to that one is long and arduous so I’ll save that for another time.

But I’d had enough, and if my own child is questioning WHY one thing or another that “should be so simple” isn’t done, then guess what? She just earned herself an apprenticeship!

As parents it’s our job to raise our kids the best we can, and I’ve certainly been guilty of being so overly busy with “work” that I haven’t paused to ensure my own child understands the importance of work.

 

I fully expect her to hate me by the first week of summer vacation, and probably not speak to me the remainder of it. But if she can at least grasp a small amount of what it takes to keep things running around here, well, then it just might be worth it.