Nature's visitors
I wanted to take some new photos of the lambs today but we are having stupid weather so the ewes and lambs are hanging out in the barn and lamb pen munching on hay today. The windows under the lean-to side are all open so there is a nice breeze going through.
We are having some wild storm systems blowing through. One minute it is sunny, warm (82 F / ~28 C) and beautiful (though a little humid) and the next minute we are having a complete downpour with scary high winds. The older AI lambs are practically miniature sheep now so I think they would be OK. But the younger lambs are only a month old, so I don't want them to get drenched to the skin when it can be avoided.
These storms are moving up from the south-west which is weird and not usually a good sign. (They usually bring heat, humidity and bad storm systems.) Our weather systems normally come from the west. In the wintertime we get Alberta Clippers from the northwest. With this weird weather pattern we have had some interesting animal visitors.
Last night my Border Collie, Joe, was sitting out on the screened porch in the back of the house and he started barking. (He is a pretty quiet dog and doesn't bark at nothing.) When I went outside, I saw a dark lump in the grass on the edge of the house. I got out the big flashlight and saw it was a huge snapping turtle!
My husband took this photo in the dark with the flash, but you can still see him pretty well. He was about 16" long and had weird dinosaur like spikes on his tail. A couple of years ago, I saw another fairly large snapping turtle in in our back pasture near the woods, but it wasn't as big as this one. (The sheep avoided that pasture turtle. The turtles have an entourage of flies surrounding them and I suspect they don't smell too good.) I was surprised this one would come so close to the house. It must have wandered up from the creek or scrape pond. I am wondering if it was looking for a place to lay eggs?
By the time I took the dogs outside to go potty before bedtime, I went out and checked the area with the flashlight, but fortunately the turtle had moved on.
Then this morning I saw this angry juvenile robin. He was not happy with being rained on every half hour. And if a bird wasn't already pretty good at flying, a day with gusty high winds like we are having today, was not the day to practice. He was right outside my back door.
We are having some wild storm systems blowing through. One minute it is sunny, warm (82 F / ~28 C) and beautiful (though a little humid) and the next minute we are having a complete downpour with scary high winds. The older AI lambs are practically miniature sheep now so I think they would be OK. But the younger lambs are only a month old, so I don't want them to get drenched to the skin when it can be avoided.
These storms are moving up from the south-west which is weird and not usually a good sign. (They usually bring heat, humidity and bad storm systems.) Our weather systems normally come from the west. In the wintertime we get Alberta Clippers from the northwest. With this weird weather pattern we have had some interesting animal visitors.
Last night my Border Collie, Joe, was sitting out on the screened porch in the back of the house and he started barking. (He is a pretty quiet dog and doesn't bark at nothing.) When I went outside, I saw a dark lump in the grass on the edge of the house. I got out the big flashlight and saw it was a huge snapping turtle!
My husband took this photo in the dark with the flash, but you can still see him pretty well. He was about 16" long and had weird dinosaur like spikes on his tail. A couple of years ago, I saw another fairly large snapping turtle in in our back pasture near the woods, but it wasn't as big as this one. (The sheep avoided that pasture turtle. The turtles have an entourage of flies surrounding them and I suspect they don't smell too good.) I was surprised this one would come so close to the house. It must have wandered up from the creek or scrape pond. I am wondering if it was looking for a place to lay eggs?
By the time I took the dogs outside to go potty before bedtime, I went out and checked the area with the flashlight, but fortunately the turtle had moved on.
Then this morning I saw this angry juvenile robin. He was not happy with being rained on every half hour. And if a bird wasn't already pretty good at flying, a day with gusty high winds like we are having today, was not the day to practice. He was right outside my back door.
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