All the Creatures

It will be soon the full blown flu season for us humans. For us pet owners that can sometimes mean struggling to take care of our pets and livestock especially if we have to venture outside several times a day to take care of them.

If you know someone who is a pet or livestock owner and they are sick, instead of taking them a get well basket of goodness, offer to help them for a few days with their pets until they feel better. It may mean a bit of time on your part but I guarantee that your actions will speak louder than a get well card any day of the week.

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This has got to be on of my biggest beefs with city folk who move into the houses for rent way out here in the country. They move in and visit the local feed store and say “how cute” to the day old chicks that are for sale. They get the idea that they can have fresh eggs when the chickens get older.

Now here is what they don’t understand: we live in the foothills where we have coyotes, mountain lions, bobcats and other assorted predators. They get the foolish idea that they can let the chickens free range (otherwise known as letting them wander all over the place including all the neighbors properties) because keeping them in a chicken coop is cruel. Then they complain to their neighbors that their chickens are missing. Us country folk just shake our heads in disbelief.

The latest nut job of a neighbor let her broody mother hen free range on my property (they have 20 acres of their own) with at least 20 chicks around her. She told me that she thinks one of my barn cats got 2 of her chicks since she can’t find them.  Sorry lady but keep your chickens off of my property and penned up so they don’t go “missing.”

Too bad common sense did not go along with the farm they rented. Welcome to the country folks, get educated.

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Living in the countyside and having a barn leads naturally to having livestock. I was never one to breed animals for food but having horses has been a passion for the last 25 years. In that time I have only bred 2 mares and each one of them only had one foal. The last foal born was over 7 years ago now and I was thankful that he was born in the afternoon.

I heard way too many horror stories of horses born during the night and either the foal died or the mother did while giving birth.  I toyed with the idea of putting a baby monitor with display in the foaling stall but wireless communications was not as good back then as it is now. I would have to run a wire to the barn for the video. Now they have wireless cams for barns made specifically for animals giving birth and/or needing medical attention.

I still get a kick out of seeing baby livestock but they are not mine. Our current barn does not have a foaling stall for a reason, we don’t breed anymore. I’ll leave that for others to do. They can handle the expenses and the worry about the dangers during birth.

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