Tag Archives: animals

Halloween in the Middle of Nowhere

Posted on October 31, 2011 by | 2 comments

I heard a helicopter out there somewhere and was slipping into my orange jump suit while I headed out the door.  The helicopter faded, but I encountered a gathering of cats and chickens as I hopped off the porch.

Hydrox:  “Is that how you’re going to dress for Halloween?”

Me:  “I haven’t given any thought to Halloween.  What are you guys going to do?  Is Halloween something you’re thinking about?  You used to hate it when we were in Placitas.”

Hydrox:  “I don’t know.  Coons driving us off the porch every night, you shooting them through the window screen.  Hauling their carcasses out to the meadow on a grain-shovel.  Something BIG carrying them off.  Life’s sort of scary around here.”

Great Speckled Bird:  “That ain’t the half of it.  Coons and skunks trying to dig into the chicken-house every night gives me and the hens a case of the willies.”

Guinea #1:  “You think that’s bad?  What about the possums climbing around up in the trees looking for US?  It’s gotten so we’re flying around blind all night long finding branches in other trees.”

Shiva:  “It’s whatever it is carrying those coon carcasses off that worries me.  If we run out of coons it’s liable to come up here looking for the only thing outside worth eating.  Cats.”

Guinea #2:  “I resent that.”

Me:  “Whoooooah!  What is it you guys want?  I’m doing everything I can think of to keep you safe.”

Long pause.

The Great Speckled Bird:  “How about we have a celebration of Life?  Of surviving this long?  That might be fun.”

Niaid:  “Yeahhh.  That sounds good.  We could pretend we’re coyotes and you could open some of those special treats for us.”

Guinea #1:  “No need for anything special.  You could just open a can of what you give THEM,” gesturing with her beak toward the cats, “We’d love to get some of that.”

Tabby, muttering:  “You guys STEAL enough of that already.  Running us cats off it when he’s not looking!”

Great Speckled Bird:  “Nevermind!  Nevermind.  No point fighting among ourselves.  Let’s keep on track here.  How about you give the cats the special treats, and open some canned cat food for the rest of us?”

Americauna Hen:  “Yeah! Cool.  And we’ll have a big celebration of LIFE before you lock us into the fortress tonight!  Then if a coon or skunk gets in we’ll die happy.”

Guinea #2:  “Or if a possum grabs one of us before we know it’s up there.”

Hydrox:  “Or if whatever-the-hell’s carrying off those coon carcasses comes up here and catches one of us cats.”

The Great Speckled Bird:  “We’ll come knocking before sunset.”

I started pulling off the orange jump suit and opened the door to go inside.  Behind me I heard Niaid, “If he doesn’t do it we’ll dress up as a SWAT team and go after him.”

Tabby:  “What would we get him for?”

Hydrox:  “For being HIM!”

Old Jules

 

 

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Posted in 2011, Adventure, Chickens, Country Life, Current Issues, Free-ranging-chickens, Homesteading, Music, Solitude, Texas, Wildlife

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Mocking Bird Trap

Posted on October 27, 2011 by | 11 comments

A mocking bird’s been terrorizing the cats and chickens for some while now.  It even swoops down on me and takes me by surprise sometimes.  I noticed Niaid lying upside down out there and thought she was dead.  Headed over there just as the mocking bird dived at her. 

When the mocker was pulling out of the dive she came alive and grabbed at it, got a paw full of feathers, but it got away.  Niaid resumed position and I ran for the camera.

Old Jules

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Posted in 2011

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Fiddle-Footed Naggings and Songs of the Highway

Posted on October 22, 2011 by | 19 comments

The human mind is a strange place to find ourselves living if we ever get enough distance from the background noise to notice.  I tend to notice it a lot.

This morning seemed destined to be just another day.  Gale and Kay were doing the Austin Gem and Mineral Show, so I’d figured to walk up to his house to get the truck mid-day so’s to take care of putting their chickens to bed tonight.  Startled me a bit when I looked up and there he sat in Little Red a few feet away, having brought it down to me.  My hearing must be further gone than I’d realized.

Seemed they’d no sooner gone than I got an email from Jeanne saying my old friend from childhood and later lost-gold-mine chasing days was in Fredericksburg trying to get hold of me hoping I could get over there for lunch.  Heck, it must be 15 years or more since I’ve seen Keith, though recently he’s been reading this blog.  Naturally him being 40 miles away and me with a truck sitting there available, I headed over there.

Really nice visit, but in the course of bringing one another up-to-date he asked me a number of questions about my situation here that forced me to take a hard look and organize my thoughts about it all.  That kicked off a series of trails of thinking to organize clearer, more concrete priorities for myself within a realistic examination of my options.

There aren’t a lot of them, but they’re all stacked atop a single one:  having the means of leaving this place in a relatively short time if the need arises.  It’s time I decided on a single course of action and begin leading events in a direction that allows it to congeal in a way that accomodates the needs of the cats. 

But the process of thinking about it in an organized way had a parallel thinking-path over whispering somewhere else in my brain wiggling out a sort of excitement, anticipation about it.  Here’s something that will be pure trauma and agony for the cats I do everything possible to spare such things, and my ticker’s beating a little faster in a pleasurable way just considering it.

That, combined with the certainty the process of getting things together to execute the plan I come with is going to involve some unpleasantness, excruciating work and fingernail chewing as it goes along.

Seems I’ve somehow contrived to be two different places at the same time inside my mind.  One being pushed by probabilities to do what makes sense rather than what I’d prefer, the cats would prefer.  And one reaching somewhere into fond memories of pinon trees, high mountains and an entirely different sort of solitude than I have here.

Keith confided to me today, “Everyone thinks you’re crazy.”  I can’t find any good argument that everyone’s wrong.  It’s nice being crazy and still being as happy as I manage to be all the time, though.

Anyway, to satisfy that fiddle-footed nagging, here are some songs of the highway and the road.

Old Jules

The Cheers – “Black Denim Trousers”

 

Roger Miller “Me And Bobby McGee”

Merle Haggard – White Line Fever

NAT KING COLE ROUTE 66

John Denver – Live in Japan 81 – Take Me Home, Country Roads

Roger Miller – I’ve Been A Long Time Leavin’ (But I’ll Be A Long Time Gone)

Hank Snow – I’ve Been Everywhere

Charley Pride-Is Anybody Goin’ To San antone

Playmates – Beep Beep (The Little Nash Rambler)

 

Robert Mitchum sings The Ballad of Thunder Road

Roy Orbison – Ride Away

C. W. McCall “Wolf Creek Pass”

Hot Rod Lincoln – Charlie Ryan and the Timberline Riders 1960

 

MAC DAVIS Texas in My Rear View Mirror

 

Guy Clark LA Freeway

 

Willie Nelson On the Road Again

 

Easy Rider – Born To Be Wild (HQ)

 

LOST HIGHWAY by Hank Williams

 

Leonard Cohen – I Can’t Forget (live 1988)

 

Beach Boys – (It’s The) Little Old Lady From Pasadena

 

Beach Boys live ’64 Little Deuce Coupe

 

Neil Young – Hitchhiker

 

VANITY FARE HITCHIN A RIDE

 

‘YOU KNOW I LOVE YOU’ BY KENNY ROGERS & THE 1ST EDITION

 

Fats Domino – Walking to New Orleans

 

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Posted in 1950's, 1960's, 1970's, 1980's, 2011, hitch hiking, Human Behavior, Music, Senior Citizens, Survival

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Friday limerick and flock update

Posted on October 21, 2011 by | 2 comments

The head-count of chickens and truants
Considering sub-plot and nuance
Suggests there’s a vixen
Requiring a fixing
Or else a coyote’s influence.

Old Jules

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Posted in Chickens, Creative Writing, Current Issues, Free-ranging-chickens, Homesteading, Poetry, Solitude, Writing

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House Coon and Cat Houses Update

Posted on October 19, 2011 by | 15 comments

Brother Coon and I couldn’t come to an agreement about the availability of indoors as acceptable behavior for a coon with a long life expectancy.  Whatever I did to keep him out, half an hour later he’d be poking around trying to find a way in, eventually leading to success.

Last night I’d had a bellyfull of it.  I brought the live trap in and put it down next to the sack of cat food, then went to bed.  Around 3:00 am I heard the trap slam shut and a lot of ruckus.  Transported trap, coon and angry all outdoors to await arraignment, trial, conviction and final disposition.

Original story here:  Wake-up Call – Coon in the Living Room

Cathouse Success

For once I predicted something and it came to pass.  That ice chest I salvaged out of the grader ditch actually has proved itself the popular cat-hotel I hoped it would.

Cathouse urgencies – 6:30 pm Grader Ditch Hauls

Another exciting day forming up in the Middle of Nowhere

Old Jules

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Posted in 2011, Adventure, Country Life, Homesteading, Human Behavior, Redneck Repairs, RedneckRepairs, Senior Citizens, Solitude, Uncategorized, White Trash Repairs, Wildlife

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Building A Salvage Chicken-Hilton – One Man Band

Posted on October 18, 2011 by | 10 comments

Follow-up construction details:

I’ve mentioned and shown pics of the chicken-house built from discarded shower doors, etc., several times here.

“A chicken-house fabricated entirely from salvage, discarded shower doors, camper shell roof, refrigerator shelves, whatever came to hand free”

White Trash Repairs: Throwing Down the Gauntlet

From the ground:

I said when I made the post I’d be talking more about it, but way led onto way and I never got around to doing it. 

This was a one-man-band project.  The footprint of that structure has about an inch-or-less of topsoil over hardpan caliche or limestone.  Digging holes for the uprights wasn’t something I wanted to contemplate.

I knew I wanted the pickup camper as a roof, the shower-doors as part of the walls, wanted uprights with lateral stability without digging into limestone.  But otherwise it was plan-as-you go, driven partly by material availability.

Those lower walls are two sides of a huge packing crate I picked up for $5 from a guy in Kerrville.  Bought 30# of large lag-screws [$1.00 per pound] from Habitat for Humanity Recycling Store for the project because I anticipated difficulties in the lateral stability department.  The shower doors were free.  The 4x4s were from the same guy who sold me the packing crate.

I used the crate-sides to get three of the uprights generally in place by bolting them together.  Trust me when I tell you this ought to be a 2-man job.  I fudged on a lot of things by not paying a lot of attention to right-angles because I couldn’t be two places at once and knew I wasn’t going to live forever.

I took about a week building it, but probably it could have been done in a day with two people working.

As you can see I trenched below the lower walls and dug to bedrock, only an inch or two, to level the lower walls and provide a base for the corner posts.

Before putting the camper shell on top I built an interior frame and stabilized it with a steel bed frame salvaged from a junk pile:

Once that was in place I ran the front bumper of the truck up against it from whatever angles I could get to it, hooked a chain to the uprights from other angles pushing and pulling it with the truck to test the lateral strength.  We get some high winds and I didn’t want it coming down, even if the additional strength the camper shell structure would add became fractured.

I constructed a lean-to ramp using 4 2x12s and positioned the camper shell diagonally on it, skidded it up with a come-along until I had it in place, then bolted it to the top frame.  As I was finishing, Gale dropped down to see how I was doing and helped a lot during the final positioning of the shell.

The camper shell was missing the door, so for ventilation I used salvaged refrigerator shelving.  It keeps the predators out but allows a good breeze.  But to keep out the water I added the additional planks at an angle sloping away from the roof runoff.

Other than that there wasn’t much to it.

Old Jules

Three Dog Night– One Man Band

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Posted in 2011, Adventure, Chickens, Country Life, Free-ranging-chickens, Homesteading, Human Behavior, Kerrville, Poultry, Redneck Repairs, RedneckRepairs, Texas, Thrift Stores, Uncategorized, White Trash Repairs

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Wake-up Call – Coon in the Living Room

Posted on October 17, 2011 by | 7 comments

Sheeze.  I was lying in there meditating, preparing my spirit for the coming day when I heard a rustling in the other room.  I ignored it at first, figuring it was just one of the cats took advantage of the window screen that doesn’t latch convincingly.  But gradually I focused because somebody was having a party in there.

As I considered the awakening possibilities an opinion formed that it was probably Tabby as the most likely candidate, her being the youngest and most imaginative.  Now, completely focused I listened for more hints until the sound of something falling nudged my curiosity enough to pull me out from under the blanket.

When I came through the door I couldn’t see any cat, but the window screen was pulled open far enough to admit a large cat.  No sign of the offender still, though as I walked over for a closer look.

Then out from under the layers of books and other belongings a large coon face glared at me, hissed and threatened.  I didn’t like this a bit.  There was an escape route through the window, but I was near enough the way out Brother Coon mightn’t consider it the best option.  I didn’t want him coming further into this maze of hiding places.  This cabin isn’t big enough for me and a coon.

I stepped slightly away from the route through the window, eyes locked to his, baring my teeth, growling and snarling, him baring his, then stood stock still.  Clint Eastwood and Lee Van Cleef in the final scene of the Good Bad Ugly.  It seemed to last forever.

But while the tension never eased, like Tuco, I saw his eyes working toward that route outdoors.   My arms were spread to increase my threatening appearance and my hand was near an open bag of pinto beans.  I allowed my hand to creep toward it, then drew and fired a handful of pintos at the coon.

He didn’t have the strength of his convictions.  No Lee Van Cleef, old Brother Coon.  He was out that window faster than I can type it.  I probably should add, I’m having a bit of difficulty typing.  My hands are still shaking a bit.  Clint Eastwood, I ain’t. 

————————————–

Ms Cholla, I feel obliged to update you, wasn’t there for headcount again last night.  This time I was more canny, looked right away over at the rooster compound and there she was, searching and poking around for a way in.  No problem for me.  If she wants to live with the damned roosters it suits me just fine.

————————————————

Spent most of the day yesterday trying to get the Documents and Settings saved from this going-kerplunk comp into some sort of form to allow it all to be transferred to the Thrift Store comp, but no joy.   Kept getting error messages after a few hours at a time of the old machine considering the matter.

Just saying.

Old Jules

5:30 am – That coon’s been back on the porch three times since the post.  He’s standing on his hind legs trying to look in the window or playing with the edge of the door trying to get back in.  But thus far, he’s just a smidgen too canny to give me a shot at him through the window screen. 

He needs to figure out something else to do with his time if he wants to live until daybreak.

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Posted in 2011, Adventure, Chickens, Country Life, Free-ranging-chickens, Homesteading, Human Behavior, Poultry, Solitude, Survival, Uncategorized

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Unrequited Requiem for a Chicken

Posted on October 16, 2011 by | 20 comments

She was always crosswise to the world, even when she was just a pullet, just beginning to free range.  That’s her going back into the night fortress.  It wasn’t more than a week after this picture was taken the guineas decided to sleep in the trees and she decided to join them.

Every night I’d have to turn a water  hose on her and drive her around up there until she gave up and reluctantly came down to join the others out of harm’s way.  As she matured she always reminded me of a woman I used to spend some time with in Socorro, New Mexico, called herself a Cholla.  A consistent pain, pleasing to the eye but always in the wrong place, always ready with a dagger.

Yeah, this chicken sorely tried my patience in every way a chicken could from adolescence to full maturity.

So last night when she wasn’t there for the headcount I assumed she was pulling her favorite evening trick, waiting until all the others were locked down for the night, then coming in panic-stricken, pacing and fussing in mock terror until I re-opened the fortress to let her in.  But she never showed up and I was secretly glad.  I searched around with a flashlight after dark for a while, thinking she might have gone broody outside, or decided to roost on a treelimb. 

Ha!  Nowhere to be found!  Ha!  Coyotes have been calling in close nights lately, so I figured between coyotes and coons that lady was going to pay the price of freedom.

This morning before daybreak I put together a post entitled, Requiem for a Chicken.  Said some nice things about her, partial, selective truths.  Then, in the false dawn I went out and released the main flock, did another headcount as they emerged, just to make sure.

Next I went to the old fortress and cage where I keep the other two roosters separately penned.  Out they came, and there she was.  I don’t have a clue how she got in there.

Always in the wrong place.

Old Jules

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Posted in 2011, Chickens, Country Life, Free-ranging-chickens, Homesteading, Human Behavior, Poultry, Uncategorized

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Bat in the bug light and other big news and events

Posted on October 15, 2011 by | 15 comments

Evidently a bat got confused and got snagged in the buglight instead of coming into the cabin to fly around as they usually do.

Every m0rning the chickens feast under that light as soon as I turn them loose.  But I think I’d best unplug it before I poke around with a stick trying to get that bat out of there.

Ah well.  Maybe the chickens will eat it.

This cool morning had me putting on clothing instead of running around with nothing but shoes on to turn out the chickens and feed the cats.  But it reminded me I’ve been almost a year without any gas for the cookstove and no way except the woodstove to knock the morning chill out of the cabin.  I’m going to have to do something about that.

Then there’s this:

It’s coming nigh onto time to haul water again.  Probably also ought to try to figure out what’s wrong with that well pump.  It’s been since last December it quit, but I didn’t want to rush anything.  If I need to pull that pump I didn’t want to do it in cold weather when it happened, but didn’t want to do it in hot weather the rest of the time.

Saw this in the parking lot of the Humane Society Thrift Store the other dayInside the guy was easy to identify, looked about like you'd figure

 

He was poking around in a box of old LP records.  I tried to start a conversation with him about old music but he wasn’t having any of it.

This old XP’s going kerplunk.  I picked up a replacement at the Thrift Store and if I can figure out where all these wires go I’ll have it in here in a jiffy as soon as I get around to it.

Great day to you.

Old Jules

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Posted in 2011, Adventure, Country Life, Free-ranging-chickens, Homesteading, Human Behavior, Music, Senior Citizens, Solitude, Survival, Texas, Thrift Stores, Uncategorized, Wildlife

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Pack Goats for the Elderly and a Youngish Hermit

Posted on October 12, 2011 by | 6 comments

I didn’t know I was joking when I composed this post a couple of days ago.  But even though Jeanne’s visited me here and knows me better than anyone else, when she read it she thought it was so outrageous I must be joking.  After I explained I was serious and consider it a viable alternative she thought about it a day and just told me again she likes the blog entry as a joke.  But she’s really uncomfortable about the concept as a serious possibility I might try living this way.

So I suppose I must be joking unless I decide it’s the right way to go.  But I’m concerned about the bearings on bicycle wheels.  I’m thinking maybe light motorcycle wheels might hold up better:

The financial constraints involved in trying to get the old F350 capable of pulling a travel trailer and the unknowns involved in why it was left on this place when Gale and Kay bought the property are seeming a bit overwhelming at the moment.  That, combined with the uncertainties of whether I can find an old travel trailer I can fix adequately got me thinking about this.

A couple of years ago when I thought my life might proceed differently than it has, there was a middling possibility I might have an extended trip into the high mountains left in me.  My thought at the time was to spend a month or two in the Gila Wilderness in the immediate vicinity of the Continental Divide.

But at that altitude and the years creeping up on me, combined with the length of the stay that would be required, caused me to think I didn’t want to do it carrying a backpack the way I’ve always done in the past.  My initial thought was a burro, but the fact is hauling a burro’s a bit of a problem.

A few times in the mountains, decades ago, I encountered packers with llamas and talked with them about it, but those animals are as difficult in the size department as donkeys.

However, I ran into someone once in the Gila with a string of goats doing the packing.  Goats, to my way of thinking, have a lot of advantages over the larger animals insofar as transport.  Considering it led me to join some Yahoo Goat Packing groups:

packgoat · All Things Packgoat
 
I began doing some shopping around looking for a couple of young goats I might train, but intervening events led me to see that another long trip into the mountains isn’t in the cards for me in the immediate future.  And further consideration about that particular use for them in that area also mightn’t be the best.  They’d be a magnet for large predators, risky to leave unattended, and they’d need a lot of attention.
 
But thinking about pack goats during the years since has caused me to think there might be a role for them to play in a more urban setting.  Namely, for older folks who could hike to the store for groceries, but have difficulties carrying them home without a vehicle.  Maybe a goat cart, for that matter.
Feeding them would be no problem because goats will eat just about anything and thrive on it.
 
But a pack goat would provide a lot more mobility than a shopping cart for people living on the streets and under bridges, as well.  A goat can go almost anywhere a person can, climb into places where a person would have a lof of problems climbing into.   The ability to easily move residency out of the clusters of street people living under bridges would keep the owner out of police sweeps, out of reach predatory humans preying on the people living under those conditions.
 
In fact, I’ve been acquainted over the years with several people living in small house-wagons traveling around pulled by burro-power as a lifestyle and talked with them about it at some length.  It strikes me a person with a willingness to walk alongside the contraption instead of riding in it might actually be able to construct a small, light house on an aluminum frame with bicycle wheels sturdy enough to carry everything it took to live, move without buying gasoline, big enough for four cats.
Maybe something along these lines only larger
 Something large enough to haul some luxuries such as a camp stove, some groceries, a place out of the weather, but small enough to get out-of-sight come nightfall.
 Nothing as big, or elaborate at this, but something a lot lighter a couple, or four goats, maximum, could pull.
 Maybe about that size, but constructed with bicycle wheels, ball bearing axles, built on an aluminum frame from salvage aluminum rails and door frames.  Actually aluminum mightn’t be durable enough as the frame.  Maybe steel bed frame angle iron frame as a base for everything above aluminum.
 
Equipped with photovoltaic charged LED lawn lights to allow night reading, cooking, etc, a chuck box and a small gas fridge.  Maybe a guy would have to move up to a pair of donkeys to pull it.  But maybe not.
 
I’m thinking maybe two bicycles welded outside a steel bed frame with a tie-rod between the handle-bars behind a yoke might serve, and a swiveling tail-wheel [bicycle wheel] to stabilize the weight and balance on the overhang behind the two rear bicycle wheels might be a good starting place visualizing the possibility.
 
I’m going to have to puzzle about this more as a potential way to keep living without going under a bridge if circumstances demand I have an escape route.
But here are a few other concept pics from the Practical Action website, Cabelas, and elsewhere, just to remind myself of the directions my mind’s going on all this:
 
 
Old Jules
Frankie Laine, Mule Train

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Posted in 2011, Adventure, America, Senior Citizens, Solitude, Survival, Texas, Uncategorized, White Trash Repairs, Wildlife

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