Farm Fresh Blog

The Blue Heeler is the quintessential Texas Farm Dog.  No ranch in the Lone Star State is complete without one.  Our Blue Heeler is an excellent ranch dog.  Not only does he work cows, he is a good guard dog.

  Unless this is your dog, you don't really want to see this running at you.

But he has so many other uses:

   Holding down the ottoman.

  Border Collie Aerobics Partner

  Supervisor of coffee and do-nut breaks

His most unusual job has been instructor of the English as a Second Language Class for New Police Dog.  You will recall that she came to us speaking only Czech.  She needed some tutorials in English.  Blue Heeler proved to be the perfect ESL instructor.

  "Welcome to English as a Second Language Class!"

   The teacher tells the class to "stay" and walks off.

  "Hey!  Whut did she say????"

  "Shsshh!  Just do what I do!"

 "Yeah!  Yeah!  I can DO that!"

"See, English is easy.  Now we've gotta work on getting you a Texas accent!"

People ask me all the time how I get good shots of my critters.  The answer is easy, "Take a LOT of them!"  I have a Canon EOS Digital Rebel XT.  It's the same kind of camera that I use for work.  It takes great pictures but I also use to take great shots with my Kodak Easyshare too.  The camera is only half the equation.  The person BEHIND the camera is even more important.  Get a camera you are COMFORTABLE with and take it EVERYWHERE!  Trust me, mine goes everywhere with me.  I take lots and lots and lots of pictures.  Then I download them into my computer, edit them, and toss out a bunch.  Ultimately I'm left with a few good shots.  Digital photography is easy, fun, cheap, and keeps you off the streets.

Here are some shots I got when Blue Heeler and I were coming back from feeding the cows.  I had to edit his ears out of the pictures.

This hawk was just sitting there, minding his own business.  And then we came along.

  This is my one good shot. 

Then he noticed us and flew off.  I missed that shot because someone stuck his big blue head in the way!

   I wish this was in better focus, but it was a long way off.  The look on his face is priceless though.  He is just so offended!

"Freakin' paparazzi! Go away and get a life of your own!"

  This is Ice.  She is The Enforcer's sister.  Ice is concerned.  While The Enforcer seems to be doing better, he does still have bouts where he throws up.  Last night The Enforcer started throwing up again.  Over and over again.  Because he hates to be coddled, I lay in bed and waited for him to get finished before I got up.  (stone tile floors)  His sister became concerned and came to get me.  She put her front feet on the bed and said, "MOM!!!!  Kona is sick!  He needs some help!"

It was touching. 

There is an order to how things work on the farm.  It goes like this:

Feed livestock. Feed dogs. Feed me.  Because Briar spends all night with the sheep, I let her run and play with the dogs after breakfast because she wants to play rough games and the sheep do not.  She gets so enthralled with the lambs' games of chasing and mounting each other that she wants to play too.  This results in lots of running sheep.  Although she doesn't seem intent on harm, I don't want her running sheep.  Thus, I let the Border Collie and Blue Heeler get the zoom-zooms out of Briar before I deposit her tired little hiney back into the pasture. 

This morning there was a hitch in the plan.  Briar has learned to use the doggy door.  She went into the Laundry Room and stole a good long-sleeved white t-shirt.  Then she ran around the yard with my good shirt while her buddies chased her.  I happened to see a bright white shirt bouncing through the mud and became curious.  I called her.  She ran behind a rose bush with her prize.

Because it was muddy and I was sock-footed, I sent The Enforcer out in the mud to take the shirt away from her.  She growled at him.  Time just stopped.  The Earth stopped spinning.  The entire farm gasped.  Briar had growled at The Enforcer!  Was she crazy?  Cattle tremble at the mere sight of Blue Heeler, yet The Enforcer can glare at Blue Heeler and he pees on himself.  Who WAS this crazy woman who would GROWL at The Enforcer.  He stood over the puppy with the shirt in his mouth.  She wiggled her butt.  His eyebrows shot to the top of his head.  Rather than put her in the position where he would eat her, I called him back.  Then I put on my boots and tromped out in the mud myself.

"That's MY shirt!  Give it back!"

"Unhhh  uhhhhhhh!  Finders Keepers!!!"

I won.  She pouted.

It's about time to toss her back in the pasture with a bone. She is a delightful pup who is quite full of herself.  She is beginning to guard the pasture and it's quite comical to see her barking at something she believes is a threat. The sheep have totally accepted her now.  As soon as she grows up enough that she cannot fit through the squares in the cattle panels she will be able to be with them all the time.

This is what greeted me today when I went to take care of the cows.

No. We are not raising "low-rider" cattle.  She is standing in a mud-hole up to her knees to lick that syrup tub.

It's not all muddy though.  Fortunately this calf's mama found one of the dry spots to sun her calf.

The new calf is doing well.  I named her today.

   "Hi! My name is Mud!"

  "I am getting good at slopping through the mud. It's hard work."

  "But WELL worth the effort!"

  Look at our Sweet Tater Gator!  Girl Power!

This is what Other Half and New Police Dog are doing this month.  Our little Sweet Potato is having so much fun! She makes a convincing argument that a police dog doesn't have to be massive.  Since "Force = Mass x Acceleration" it stands to reason that a little dog running faster than a speeding bullet can hit just as hard as a slower moving, but larger dog.

  I LOVE this little dog! 

But it is very cold up there and I keep telling Other Half that we need to buy her a little sweater to keep her warm.  Perhaps something in pink?

Update on The Enforcer - the vet is coming to our house to give him IV fluid treatments to flush his kidneys.  He hates the treatments, but likes the boiled chicken he gets as payment for his trouble. His appetite is good. His eyes are bright.

Update on the New Calf - So far, so good.  I'll post pictures later.

    Things are looking better today!  After lounging around like a lazy-bones in a drug haze yesterday, I feel a lot better.  We are giving The Enforcer penicillin injections daily now.  Vet's Wife/Dear Old Friend is helping me.  I hold him and she pokes him. Then we pay him with boiled chicken.  The chicken is staying down now! Vet is coming over tonight to start him on fluids to flush his kidneys.  This should be interesting since I won't be there. (can't miss work two days in a row!) Vet and Wife are on their own.  (the sign of a good friend is someone who will come over even when you're not home to poke your snarly dog) 

Keep your fingers crossed that they love him as much tomorrow as they do before they try to give him fluids tonight!

Today is a "cocoon" day.  Woke up this morning and realized that I was officially "sick."  Felt it coming on yesterday.  Head felt like a football.  Eyes itched and burned.  Woke up this morning to find eyes almost swollen shut  (that was a pretty picture!  Exactly WHO was that troll in the mirror this morning?) and head was indeed, a football.  Border Collie let me sleep until 10 AM!  I don't think she had a choice.  I was awakened every 2 hours last night by animals and another storm roaring through.  Had to get up at 2:30 AM to settle sheep with more hay and make sure their area wasn't flooding.  I'm not sure what I planned to do with them if it WAS flooding because they won't fit it in the living room! 

The Enforcer is having a hard time keeping his food down.  He threw up his chicken and rice.  Retired Police Dog ate it.  At that hour of the morning I didn't even care.  It was one more thing I DIDN'T have to clean up.   Storm roared through at 4:30 AM.  Checked on stock again, shut top windows in barn, and fell back into bed.  Said a prayer that baby calf made it through the night.

Since Other Half's Son is doing Cow Duty today for me, I planned to sleep late.  Other Half called at 10 AM.  I informed him that Princess IS SICK.  He informed me that Princess needs to go on antibiotics just in case she has whatever The Enforcer has.  Hmmmmmm . . . Princess thinks that it's just the flu, BUT . . . it would be nice to know EXACTLY what The Enforcer has that is making him so sick. 

Decided then and there that today should be spent laying in bed under electric blanket with Border Collie and Enforcer.  Stumble out into mud to care for sheep, goats, and horses.  Feed dogs and coax Enforcer into eating more chicken.  Want to go to bed but cannot trust myself not to burn the house down while boiling chicken, so I figured it'd be a good time to update you guys on the latest happenings.  Thank you so much for all the emails of support and cyberhugs regarding Kona.  He is my Attila The Hun, but I love him and don't want to lose him.

Someone told me once that we are all on our own journey and must walk along our own path.  I think that's probably true. I am most thankful that at least for a little while, Kona's path walks beside mine.  

The sheep finished lambing, now it's time for the cows. This is the first calf of the year.  She's a pretty little heifer.  I'm really concerned because it's cold, windy, and wet.  Look at all this water!

Check out this wind!                                             

(That's Reggie the Hateful Rooster.  If I'm lucky, the wind will blow him into Oklahoma.) Look at the freakin' mud!!!! 

I'm so worried about this little girl.  They are predicting 2 more inches of rain this afternoon.  She is shivering.  I know. I know.  Cows are born out in this every day,  (I've already heard it from Other Half.) but I wonder about the mortality rates in those calves.  Other Half is out of town for 3 whole weeks.  It's cold, it's wet, the house is full of mud, the cows are calving, and the dog is dying . . . and all I want to do is sit at the kitchen table and cry. I know that if I just keep plugging along, things will get brighter. In the back of my mind I keep hearing that fish's voice in "Finding Nemo" - "just keep swimming.  Just keep swimming. Just keep swimming . . ."

  The Enforcer is in renal failure. The vet just told me that if he was a human they would put him on dialysis (sp)  {pardon me for not checking that in the dictionary right now} and give him a kidney transplant.  Obviously we cannot do that.  All we can do is bring him home and make him comfortable.  At the moment, he is still happy.  He is in some pain, but he works through it.  We suspected somthing was wrong because he was losing a lot of weight, his breath has a "urine" smell, and something just wasn't quite "right." His blood work was VERY Bad.  Because the vet is a friend, and married to my oldest friend, he is pretty straight with me.  Even with herioc efforts that we cannot afford, and wouldn't force him to endure anyway, we cannot save him. 

Sooooo . . . I cried.  And I called Other Half who is out of town at K9 training, and cried some more. And I called the vet's wife . . . and cried some more. And I called my former sister-in-law who is still "my sista" . . . and cried some more.   And considered calling my mom, but figured that both of us would be hysterical, so I put off that call.  Then I called his breeder . . . and cried harder.   His breeder is more optomistic than I am.  She says she's gonna "ride the Hope Train." 

I didn't pin the vet down to a number of how long he had, because I didn't want a number in my head.  We will take it one day at a time.  We will have fun.  We will work on a Bucket List.  For those of you who didn't see the movie, Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman were terminally ill patients who embarked on a grand adventure to finish all the things they wanted to do before they "kicked the bucket." 

So Kona The Enforcer, also known as Attila The Hun, will begin his Bucket List.  We will try to do everything except allow him to kill the Blue Heeler.