Farm News 04-30-06
Sunday morning, after chores
More Bunnies!
Fifi, the solid black doe, produced a litter of bunnies Thursday morning. It doesn't feel like there are a lot of bunnies in the nest, but I have not yet tried to count them.
Suzette's three bunnies have opened their eyes. On Saturday the gray bunny spent part of the morning at the Public Library helping the volunteer librarian.
Marriage and Chicken Bones
Dr. M., the veterinarian who has agreed to do any future heart surgery I might need, became a Mrs. last Sunday. I'm sure all the readers of this publication join me in wishing the new couple happiness.
Dr. M., now that you have all that wedding stuff out of the way and have had a week to adjust to being married, (isn't a week long enough to adjust to being married?) would you please try to find time to answer a serious question from the editor? “Is it really dangerous,” he asks, “to feed chicken bones to dogs?” Are chicken bones more dangerous than the wonderful items of road kill that the dogs like to bring home? One time Trusty had a chicken bone stuck cross-wise in his mouth; it didn't appear to be dangerous to him although he was certainly uncomfortable with it jammed in there.
Paula insists that chicken bones go into the landfill so that the dogs can't get to them. The other garbage goes into the chicken yard and, when we turn the chickens out to chase bugs and eat greens, the dogs go into the chicken yard to find old bones and other treasures. Most web sources say that chicken bones are dangerous, also. Are they correct, Dr. M.?
Incubation
Ting has decided to try motherhood, finally. She is four years old, middle-aged by chicken standards, and she has started setting on her nest. She was missing from evening chores on Wednesday so I started looking for her and found her on her nest. Her eggs were stretched out in a line with three eggs exposed on one side of her and four on the other.
I rescued seven exposed eggs, brought them to the house, and put them in the incubator alongside the turkey eggs that were already there. The remaining eight eggs I tucked under her a little better, a procedure which elicited growls and snarls one would expect to hear from from a Tyrannosaur.
Thursday morning Ting was off her nest, stomping around in the barn, snarling and attacking anything that moved. I gave her some grain, which she ate, but she wouldn't go back to her nest. Her eggs were again arranged in a line longer than she could possibly cover. Friday morning, though, she was on her nest again and had all her eggs covered.
Sunday morning, as this is written, she was still keeping them covered, generally, and not taking any long excursions from her nest. Will Ting make it to motherhood? Which will be first, Ting or the incubator? Life is exciting out here in the country.
Blanche and Blue, the hen turkeys, spent Thursday night on their nests. Blue has a nest behind the fire wood stack south of the barn and Blanche is nesting under a spruce tree. This is the first attempt at motherhood for both of them and I hope they will be successful. Unlike Guy, the hens are calm and docile.
There are three hen ducks, one of whom, the brown hen duck, has a nest under a pine tree near the barn. The other two are hiding their nests or not laying very often.
Precipitation, Finally
It was best described as precipitation and not rain because most of it was in the form of hail. Sunday night we received 0.7” of water, after it melted. The hail was mostly pea to marble size and did little damage; the Flowering Dogwood still has its flowers. Friday morning dawned with a small shower and rain predicted for the entire weekend. Saturday morning the gauge held 1.3” and Sunday morning 1.2”, all in the form of gentle drizzle.
More Fragrance
I thought it was the Russian Olives starting. Then I looked up and there, reaching for the sky, were clouds of Black Locust blossoms. The Honey Locusts have not yet bloomed.
Petroleum
Petroleum, like most commodities, is sold primarily in two different ways. There is the spot market, where crude is currently selling for $70 or more per barrel. On the spot market you buy it and then take it home with you. The other market is the contract or futures market. A futures contract is an agreement where the seller agrees to deliver a certain amount of oil at a future date at a specified price.
The strategic petroleum reserve, an enormous salt cavern down in Texas that is used as a storage tank for crude, is an example of a use of the futures market. The government doesn't buy crude for the strategic reserve on the spot market, it contracts with the oil companies for them to deliver so many barrels of oil to the reserve within the next year. The average price of the oil in the reserve is currently a little less than $28 per barrel.
When the President canceled deliveries to the strategic reserve, he allowed the oil companies to keep oil that they were contractually committed to deliver at the contract price and instead sell it on the spot market at over $70 per barrel. I couldn't find the average contract price for deliveries to the strategic reserve for this year, but I'll bet it was less than $40 per barrel. If so, that would mean that the oil companies are being given an opportunity to make an extra $30 or more per barrel.
If the President had decided to take oil out of the reserve and sell it, instead of canceling deliveries, the U.S. Treasury would then reap the difference between the contract price and the spot market price.
Aren't you glad the President is looking out for our interests?
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.
More Bunnies!
Fifi, the solid black doe, produced a litter of bunnies Thursday morning. It doesn't feel like there are a lot of bunnies in the nest, but I have not yet tried to count them.
Suzette's three bunnies have opened their eyes. On Saturday the gray bunny spent part of the morning at the Public Library helping the volunteer librarian.
Marriage and Chicken Bones
Dr. M., the veterinarian who has agreed to do any future heart surgery I might need, became a Mrs. last Sunday. I'm sure all the readers of this publication join me in wishing the new couple happiness.
Dr. M., now that you have all that wedding stuff out of the way and have had a week to adjust to being married, (isn't a week long enough to adjust to being married?) would you please try to find time to answer a serious question from the editor? “Is it really dangerous,” he asks, “to feed chicken bones to dogs?” Are chicken bones more dangerous than the wonderful items of road kill that the dogs like to bring home? One time Trusty had a chicken bone stuck cross-wise in his mouth; it didn't appear to be dangerous to him although he was certainly uncomfortable with it jammed in there.
Paula insists that chicken bones go into the landfill so that the dogs can't get to them. The other garbage goes into the chicken yard and, when we turn the chickens out to chase bugs and eat greens, the dogs go into the chicken yard to find old bones and other treasures. Most web sources say that chicken bones are dangerous, also. Are they correct, Dr. M.?
Incubation
Ting has decided to try motherhood, finally. She is four years old, middle-aged by chicken standards, and she has started setting on her nest. She was missing from evening chores on Wednesday so I started looking for her and found her on her nest. Her eggs were stretched out in a line with three eggs exposed on one side of her and four on the other.
I rescued seven exposed eggs, brought them to the house, and put them in the incubator alongside the turkey eggs that were already there. The remaining eight eggs I tucked under her a little better, a procedure which elicited growls and snarls one would expect to hear from from a Tyrannosaur.
Thursday morning Ting was off her nest, stomping around in the barn, snarling and attacking anything that moved. I gave her some grain, which she ate, but she wouldn't go back to her nest. Her eggs were again arranged in a line longer than she could possibly cover. Friday morning, though, she was on her nest again and had all her eggs covered.
Sunday morning, as this is written, she was still keeping them covered, generally, and not taking any long excursions from her nest. Will Ting make it to motherhood? Which will be first, Ting or the incubator? Life is exciting out here in the country.
Blanche and Blue, the hen turkeys, spent Thursday night on their nests. Blue has a nest behind the fire wood stack south of the barn and Blanche is nesting under a spruce tree. This is the first attempt at motherhood for both of them and I hope they will be successful. Unlike Guy, the hens are calm and docile.
There are three hen ducks, one of whom, the brown hen duck, has a nest under a pine tree near the barn. The other two are hiding their nests or not laying very often.
Precipitation, Finally
It was best described as precipitation and not rain because most of it was in the form of hail. Sunday night we received 0.7” of water, after it melted. The hail was mostly pea to marble size and did little damage; the Flowering Dogwood still has its flowers. Friday morning dawned with a small shower and rain predicted for the entire weekend. Saturday morning the gauge held 1.3” and Sunday morning 1.2”, all in the form of gentle drizzle.
More Fragrance
I thought it was the Russian Olives starting. Then I looked up and there, reaching for the sky, were clouds of Black Locust blossoms. The Honey Locusts have not yet bloomed.
Petroleum
Petroleum, like most commodities, is sold primarily in two different ways. There is the spot market, where crude is currently selling for $70 or more per barrel. On the spot market you buy it and then take it home with you. The other market is the contract or futures market. A futures contract is an agreement where the seller agrees to deliver a certain amount of oil at a future date at a specified price.
The strategic petroleum reserve, an enormous salt cavern down in Texas that is used as a storage tank for crude, is an example of a use of the futures market. The government doesn't buy crude for the strategic reserve on the spot market, it contracts with the oil companies for them to deliver so many barrels of oil to the reserve within the next year. The average price of the oil in the reserve is currently a little less than $28 per barrel.
When the President canceled deliveries to the strategic reserve, he allowed the oil companies to keep oil that they were contractually committed to deliver at the contract price and instead sell it on the spot market at over $70 per barrel. I couldn't find the average contract price for deliveries to the strategic reserve for this year, but I'll bet it was less than $40 per barrel. If so, that would mean that the oil companies are being given an opportunity to make an extra $30 or more per barrel.
If the President had decided to take oil out of the reserve and sell it, instead of canceling deliveries, the U.S. Treasury would then reap the difference between the contract price and the spot market price.
Aren't you glad the President is looking out for our interests?
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 9:01 AM
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