animal shuffle

We are two bolts away from a new goat pen. Tim built a beautiful gate, but in our numerous trips to Home DESPOT we forgot to get the megabolts to hang it. The fence didn't pull very tight and it's not much to look at, but it should keep them IN (read:
OUT of Frank's hedge).

Menagerie Update: The kitten moved next door to live with Chase's Granny and is named Lily. Cash the rat and Appalachia the rabbit lovingly cohabitate in the hutch. The turtles are heading for the Blueridge Mountains and freedom this weekend. And since Nicali and Hannah left to go back to their silly old family in VA, no one comes over to play. Guess I'm just not as much fun.


I received the Seed Savers Exchange newsletter today and there was an alert to help save Pavlovsk Station, a century old seed bank in Russia. Apparently a court ruled that a luxury housing development is more valuable than some crumby old biodiversity in the form of seeds, fruit trees, berry bushes and other plants, ninety percent of which are found NOWHERE else. Am I getting my Russian seedbank stories confused or is this the same one that a bunch of scientist locked themselves inside and STARVED TO DEATH in order to protect it during WWII? This truly is the age of stupid.

(so i just wiki'd it and only one person starved TO DEATH surrounded by edible seeds, but the rest came close. there are over 5000 impossibly rare seeds and the plants in the ground are ones that don't "breed true" from seed. it's like torching the ark.)

Please sign:
http://www.change.org/croptrust/petitions/view/tell_the_president_of_russia_to_stop_the_destruction_of_the_future_of_food

menagerie

What a week! Somehow having Nic and Hannah Ban here has opened the house as a haven for neglected neighborhood pets (and children). At role call this morning, present were: Nicali, Hannah, Chase, Ramon, 4 cats + new kitten (from Ramon), rat we named Cash (from Ramon), 2 box turtles (from Ramon), a beagle (with Chase) along with the usual 4 goats, 12 ducks, 2 geese, bunny and beehive.



Chase and Ramon stayed late last night and we all watched The Last Mimzy (love that show!). Both the girls and Tim crashed out before the end so I was left to walk the boys home. It's a good thing, because upon returning I heard weird sounds coming from the duck pen. I already had the flashlight so went immediately to check it out. Raccoon!! A scrawny, wicked, mean looking thing that was making these nashing and hissing sounds, freaky! Raccoons are known to behead fowl for fun so I chased it up a tree and shut the birds in the barn. The poor goats were on their own, but everyone survived the night. Frank lent us a trap and we'll hopefully be taking another trip to Falls Lake soon.


The girls looked up "pet rat toys" online and decided to make Cash a hammock out of old socks. For a rat who's been kept as boa food his whole life, I think he's doing pretty well. He is really very sweet, doesn't nip and loves jiffypop. Nic wants to take him home with her, but knowing my brother... I think he's staying here.

summer visitors

My Brother and Family finally came down to see the new homestead. It was a great day playing games, chasing goats, holding bunny, making dinner... then ordering pizza. Really fun, so fun that when Philip and Ashli forgot to take the girls home with them we didn't mind too much.




They might come back for them on toward the end of the week. We try to remember to feed and hose them down once in a while. Hannah has been very handy as the morning egg finder (six this morning) while Nicali runs wild with the neighborhood kids.






We all loaded up the turtle and took it out to Falls Lake. He didn't hang around long. We sent him off with well wishes like "live long, but lay off the geese!" and " Watch out for alligators!"