Farm News 10-30-05
Farm News
Sunday morning, after chores, 54°
Drat! Another Duck Disappears
The brown hen duck that was rooming with Bump disappeared. I didn't see her for a week and had to assume that something had picked her off. Coyotes generally leave a pile of feathers behind when they kill poultry, but raccoons will often steal a bird without leaving a trace, so I figured a coon had probably got her. I came in and wrote an obituary for her and decided to go coon hunting. The next morning when I went out to do chores she was waiting for her breakfast. “'Rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated',” said the duck.
I'm not going to throw away a good duck obituary just because the duck didn't die. Writing a weekly newsletter about happenings in the barnyard is difficult enough without uncooperative ducks. She's probably the best looking duck of the bunch, the other two being almost as ugly as Muscovies (the ducks that have red warts on their faces), but she still isn't any prize-winner. You could put lipstick on that duck, but you couldn't make her pretty.
Tessie and Trusty keep most of the predators at bay but the predators do safely prowl just outside Trusty's patrol boundary. Trusty's patrol boundary corresponds to my cardiovascular patrol course,. All summer I have been taking a shortcut and ignoring the north end of the patrol course. After a month or so Trusty also began ignoring the north end, so I need to refresh his memory.
I'm going to have to spend more time on the cardiovascular patrol course. Statins, the drugs that reduce cholesterol, give me a pain in the complete pelvic girdle, especially when I exercise. So, if I take statins, I end up sitting on my butt because it and the whole general area aches like hell. The only other way to reduce cholesterol is to do without cheeseburgers while exercising like an olympic contestant. If I don't go to town I don't have to worry about cheeseburgers. As for exercise, Trusty has been getting fat so this should be a good time to take some of it off him.
When we walk the route together Trusty usually covers about four times the distance I do. He bounds back and forth over the first three or four laps. The next five laps he tends to stay a little closer to me, and after the ninth or tenth lap I generally have to encourage him a bit to keep up.
Did you know that a human in good shape can generally run down a horse? True. Last week I mentioned that Audubon could walk 65 miles a day. Not very many horses can do that. In Medieval times, footmen would follow their horse-borne nobles all day, trotting along to keep up. At the end of the day the horse rested and the footmen ran errands inside.
Dogs, like horses, are best in short chases, not marathons. Do dogs run with their nobles in the Boston, or any other, marathon? I know some readers are Wellesley women and know the answer to that question. The only animal that I can think of that runs long distances is the Gnu, which runs up and down Africa. Take a look at Wildebeest. Gnu's, by the way, do not eat ducks.
Dr. M on Bird Flu
An Avian Influenza Primer for regular folks:
Avian influenza (or High Pathogenic Avian Influenza as vets know it) is a variant of the type of flu that most species (man, dogs, horses, pigs) are susceptible to. Flu viruses are what's known as orthomyxoviruses. They are the only type of virus in the orthomyxovirus family. The orthomyxovirus has a special type of genome that can recombine, hence the H and N designation. H5N1 flu (avian flu) has the unfortunate characteristic of being transmissible to humans.
The average person is not at risk right now for avian influenza. The regular flu that comes into our lives in the winter is going to make us miserable enough. But common precautions are advised like washing your hands frequently and covering your mouth when you cough (all those things that your mom told you). And for heavens sake, if your are sick stay home and don't give it to everyone else in the office, you aren't that valuable.
How might a pandemic get started is a common question. Well, public health officials are worried about poultry husbandry practices and bird smuggling. Asia is such a high risk place for avian flu because of the high population density in the cities, and the high density bird population in those same cities. For example Hong Kong has about 7 million people and 1.5 million birds 1042 sq kilometers for 6700 people per square kilometer and 1500 birds per square kilometer. Birds and people live together and are in close contact. Combine this with world wide trafficking in birds and travel, and there is some cause for worry and alarm.
Fortunately, the husbandry practices of American bird farmers are very strict (one good thing about mega-corporate chicken farming) and backyard poultry farmers are well versed in good husbandry. These husbandry practices have saved us before, and will help stave off any pandemic most likely. We've got vaccine coming, and antivirals that work like a charm here. Plus, what kills people in influenza is dehydration mostly, not the virus itself. By and large we have the infrastructure to deal with keeping people hydrated.
Hope this helps
Dr. M
Pony for Sale
Calvin has a nice pregnant pony mare for sale. Ginger is tiny, sweet of disposition, gentle for children to ride, and only four years old. She'll never win a beauty contest, but she is tough and smart enough to survive. She is bred to a palomino pony stud.
That's what Calvin says, and he's a horse trader, so you know what his statements are worth. It might be that the sire of the predicted pony foal was a stud that sort of looked like the famous pony sire of West McLouth that he thought was named 'Pal'. I've never known Calvin to totally lie, but he would consider that sort of stretch perfectly honest. As I said, he's a horse trader.
Back to Ginger, she really is sweet. I hung around on her for a bit and she was perfectly docile, a trait that is not necessarily always there in small ponies. I think I would be willing to share a stall with her through a cold night. What does that mean? Ginger is pregnant, and if a child or two wanted to be there for the birth of her foal, they would be completely safe sleeping in her stall with her while they all waited.
Ponies are rugged and not nearly as stupid as horses. Ponies aren't as smart as donkeys, but neither are most humans. A pony needs a drink of water once a day, although twice is much nicer. A cup of oats twice a day is close to spoiling them. A big round bale of prairie hay, about $50 delivered, will provide roughage for the winter. They can do fine without shelter but I would give her a little shed where she could get out of the rain.
If you are interested in having the option of telling your children to go out and sleep with the pony then you need to talk to Calvin. Send an email to Farm News with any message for Calvin and I'll find him and deliver it. This is the real, not the semi-fictional, Calvin we're talking about, by the way, and he wants $500 for Ginger, which is about $50 too high, probably. He can also help you find a stall for Ginger, even one suitable for sharing with children on cold nights.
E-mail Subscribers: To subscribe, unsubscribe, contribute stories, complain or send a gift subscription, send an email to FarmNews@GeezerNet.com . The editor reserves the right to steal ideas submitted, rewrite submissions, and sign false names to them whenever it strikes his fancy to do so.
Sunday morning, after chores, 54°
Drat! Another Duck Disappears
The brown hen duck that was rooming with Bump disappeared. I didn't see her for a week and had to assume that something had picked her off. Coyotes generally leave a pile of feathers behind when they kill poultry, but raccoons will often steal a bird without leaving a trace, so I figured a coon had probably got her. I came in and wrote an obituary for her and decided to go coon hunting. The next morning when I went out to do chores she was waiting for her breakfast. “'Rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated',” said the duck.
I'm not going to throw away a good duck obituary just because the duck didn't die. Writing a weekly newsletter about happenings in the barnyard is difficult enough without uncooperative ducks. She's probably the best looking duck of the bunch, the other two being almost as ugly as Muscovies (the ducks that have red warts on their faces), but she still isn't any prize-winner. You could put lipstick on that duck, but you couldn't make her pretty.
Tessie and Trusty keep most of the predators at bay but the predators do safely prowl just outside Trusty's patrol boundary. Trusty's patrol boundary corresponds to my cardiovascular patrol course,. All summer I have been taking a shortcut and ignoring the north end of the patrol course. After a month or so Trusty also began ignoring the north end, so I need to refresh his memory.
I'm going to have to spend more time on the cardiovascular patrol course. Statins, the drugs that reduce cholesterol, give me a pain in the complete pelvic girdle, especially when I exercise. So, if I take statins, I end up sitting on my butt because it and the whole general area aches like hell. The only other way to reduce cholesterol is to do without cheeseburgers while exercising like an olympic contestant. If I don't go to town I don't have to worry about cheeseburgers. As for exercise, Trusty has been getting fat so this should be a good time to take some of it off him.
When we walk the route together Trusty usually covers about four times the distance I do. He bounds back and forth over the first three or four laps. The next five laps he tends to stay a little closer to me, and after the ninth or tenth lap I generally have to encourage him a bit to keep up.
Did you know that a human in good shape can generally run down a horse? True. Last week I mentioned that Audubon could walk 65 miles a day. Not very many horses can do that. In Medieval times, footmen would follow their horse-borne nobles all day, trotting along to keep up. At the end of the day the horse rested and the footmen ran errands inside.
Dogs, like horses, are best in short chases, not marathons. Do dogs run with their nobles in the Boston, or any other, marathon? I know some readers are Wellesley women and know the answer to that question. The only animal that I can think of that runs long distances is the Gnu, which runs up and down Africa. Take a look at Wildebeest. Gnu's, by the way, do not eat ducks.
Dr. M on Bird Flu
An Avian Influenza Primer for regular folks:
Avian influenza (or High Pathogenic Avian Influenza as vets know it) is a variant of the type of flu that most species (man, dogs, horses, pigs) are susceptible to. Flu viruses are what's known as orthomyxoviruses. They are the only type of virus in the orthomyxovirus family. The orthomyxovirus has a special type of genome that can recombine, hence the H and N designation. H5N1 flu (avian flu) has the unfortunate characteristic of being transmissible to humans.
The average person is not at risk right now for avian influenza. The regular flu that comes into our lives in the winter is going to make us miserable enough. But common precautions are advised like washing your hands frequently and covering your mouth when you cough (all those things that your mom told you). And for heavens sake, if your are sick stay home and don't give it to everyone else in the office, you aren't that valuable.
How might a pandemic get started is a common question. Well, public health officials are worried about poultry husbandry practices and bird smuggling. Asia is such a high risk place for avian flu because of the high population density in the cities, and the high density bird population in those same cities. For example Hong Kong has about 7 million people and 1.5 million birds 1042 sq kilometers for 6700 people per square kilometer and 1500 birds per square kilometer. Birds and people live together and are in close contact. Combine this with world wide trafficking in birds and travel, and there is some cause for worry and alarm.
Fortunately, the husbandry practices of American bird farmers are very strict (one good thing about mega-corporate chicken farming) and backyard poultry farmers are well versed in good husbandry. These husbandry practices have saved us before, and will help stave off any pandemic most likely. We've got vaccine coming, and antivirals that work like a charm here. Plus, what kills people in influenza is dehydration mostly, not the virus itself. By and large we have the infrastructure to deal with keeping people hydrated.
Hope this helps
Dr. M
Pony for Sale
Calvin has a nice pregnant pony mare for sale. Ginger is tiny, sweet of disposition, gentle for children to ride, and only four years old. She'll never win a beauty contest, but she is tough and smart enough to survive. She is bred to a palomino pony stud.
That's what Calvin says, and he's a horse trader, so you know what his statements are worth. It might be that the sire of the predicted pony foal was a stud that sort of looked like the famous pony sire of West McLouth that he thought was named 'Pal'. I've never known Calvin to totally lie, but he would consider that sort of stretch perfectly honest. As I said, he's a horse trader.
Back to Ginger, she really is sweet. I hung around on her for a bit and she was perfectly docile, a trait that is not necessarily always there in small ponies. I think I would be willing to share a stall with her through a cold night. What does that mean? Ginger is pregnant, and if a child or two wanted to be there for the birth of her foal, they would be completely safe sleeping in her stall with her while they all waited.
Ponies are rugged and not nearly as stupid as horses. Ponies aren't as smart as donkeys, but neither are most humans. A pony needs a drink of water once a day, although twice is much nicer. A cup of oats twice a day is close to spoiling them. A big round bale of prairie hay, about $50 delivered, will provide roughage for the winter. They can do fine without shelter but I would give her a little shed where she could get out of the rain.
If you are interested in having the option of telling your children to go out and sleep with the pony then you need to talk to Calvin. Send an email to Farm News with any message for Calvin and I'll find him and deliver it. This is the real, not the semi-fictional, Calvin we're talking about, by the way, and he wants $500 for Ginger, which is about $50 too high, probably. He can also help you find a stall for Ginger, even one suitable for sharing with children on cold nights.
E-mail Subscribers: To subscribe, unsubscribe, contribute stories, complain or send a gift subscription, send an email to FarmNews@GeezerNet.com . The editor reserves the right to steal ideas submitted, rewrite submissions, and sign false names to them whenever it strikes his fancy to do so.
posted by The Geezer at 7:56 AM
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