Ice Storms, Loose Heifers, & Recovering
February 13, 2021 (Saturday) - A large ice storm bore down on the western side of Oregon on Friday the 12th of February. As I headed to bed, I made sure that we were prepared for power outages, downed limbs and, God Forbid, downed trees. Thankfully, the fiancé had gone out the week before to trim up many of the limbs and so I hoped our vehicles and buildings would weather the storm okay.
At 1:00 am we officially lost power but I was pleasantly surprised upon waking at 5:00 am that the power was back on. Quickly surveying our own property, we were thankful to only have debris and limbs down. We reached out to our community and family to see how everyone else had fared. As I was doing so, my phone dinged with a message.
The cows are out. There’s a tree down.
That was all the message said from my landlord of the property I lease for my heifers down the road. Kicking myself for not heading their sooner, I stopped dragging my feet and enjoying my morning coffee and joined the fiancé as he loaded up his large pickup with everything we’d need for storm clean up from chainsaws to axes, boots to gloves.
The tree fell down and around the fence, we were fortunate that the damage wasn’t worse.
It turned out that the tree falling on the fence wasn’t the reason that the heifers got out but the fact that when my landlords arrived to check on their horses, also at the property, they had driven down to see the damage and the heifers, excited over the activity, and frolicked and bounded along with them … promptly jumping the fence at the end!
They are silly girls but at least they are well-behaved, for the most part, and came back to their pasture with a simple whistle and some grain as a reward in the barn. But because of their inquisitive nature, I made sure to lock them into the barn so that they didn’t get used to getting out while we fixed the fence!
I could see the steam rising from my fiancé’s back and shoulders as he wielded the large chainsaw, cutting the tree in a way to ensure that we could get the fence repaired enough that we could come back in the spring, when the ground is (hopefully) dryer with bigger equipment. In no time at all, we got the fence fixed and were on our way to my parent’s property to help them with another old, large tree that had fallen. Unfortunately for them, it was on their small shop!
A bulletin-board of photos from the 80’s of my dad’s first airplane build, handmade wooden toddler toys, an eclectic mix of wine barrels and kegs, and the road bikes were under the large tree that had fallen. No damage seems to have been done but the torrential showers the fiancé had worked through just a few hours earlier as we worked at the lease property had resulted in a waterfall flowing through the back part.
Team work makes the dreamwork and we got everything out and, as the guys used heavy equipment to remove the offending tree and it’s debris from the roof, I headed to Home Depot to grab what would ultimately be the last tarp on the shelf. As my dad finished hammering the tarp into place, another “wait-for-spring” fix, I saw an older cousin turned neighbor farmer walking up the hill on the road that leads to the back woods.
“Hey Uncle! Are you going to keep going down the fence?” He asked with a big grin. My dad looked confused, “What?”
With a Vanna-White motion towards the remaining road, he gestured to the debris along the fence row. By the drop of my dad’s jaw, it’s obvious that his tunnel vision on his shop had limited his thoughts past this task and he hadn’t realized that there wasn’t one, nor two or even three trees down along the property line, but SIX including one on the driver of his wheel line! Thank heavens we bring the motors in during the winter in preparation for flooding - there is very little chance of the driver being salvageable.
It was hard work but there’s no time like the present to get work done, especially when you have help! My fiancé is a workhorse and I don’t know what we would do without him! Not only did the leased property get cleaned up and fences repaired, but so did my parent’s shop, the property line of my parent’s and we even headed to my older sister’s home nestled in the coastal mountain range to cut the tree up that was blocking her driveway.
The least I could do was buy him a store bought (BIG deal!) coffee and allow him to ride shotgun as we headed home after a long day.
Looming Projects:
New Laying Hens
I got my first laying hens in 2020, staring with a set of ready-to-go yearlings and adding in my own addition of farm store chicks. A total of 14, we have decided to get 24 additions with the intentions of selling some, keeping others, and continuing to sell eggs to the community.Propagating Succulents
When I was living in my apartment, in what feels like forever ago, I purchased a few adorable succulents. As they have continued to grow, I decided to tap into my fiancé’s robust knowledge of crops and plant sciences to have him teach me propagation to hopefully create some spring gifts!Ag Book Club; Hungry
I am a bit behind, but my goal is to finish the January 2021 Ag Book Club title this month.