a man and his hoe

every day is a good day

  • Baby Potatoes and Peonies on Mother’s Day

    PotatoBabies

    It’s the beginning of May and there are baby potatoes in the garden. Dust them off, pop them in your mouth, and they are like little crunchy sugar bombs going off in your mouth.

    DogsInTheForest

    Takuma and Ena aren’t interested in baby potatoes. Rabbits are more their thing. They already ate three today. Maybe not the thing to say on Mother’s Day, but the vegetables are happy the dogs are here. If they could talk, the peas and carrots would scream to the dogs where the rabbits are hiding.

    PeonyWhite

    Peonies scream Mother’s Day like no other flower.

  • Dig, Dig, Dig

    DiggerA

    They are diggers. We found that out yesterday and today. Moles and gophers be forewarned, Takuma and Ena are here.

    DiggerB
    DiggerC

    In the woods and in the garden, Takuma and Ena dug deep, trying to find whatever it is that they are smelling. All that digging is so tiring.

    DiggerD

  • A Cat and Its Cow

    ACatAndItsCow

    This is what you don’t see in your large box store. This is one of the cats at Belfast Feed Store, a local feed store a few miles from us where we get many farm supplies, milk, cream, and honey. He is often on the counter, eager to greet you and let you pet him. This is one reason I avoid the box stores. I’d rather chat with the person who owns the store and say hello to their pets. You can’t do that in stores with tens of thousands of employees.

    [wpvideo dGO1on9u]

  • 枝那-Ena and 拓真-Takuma

    Dogwood

    The dogwood buds look like they are ready to take flight, or burst out in a chorus. May should be called Dogwood. It should be forbidden to build a house or apartment where the residents can’t see a dogwood. If everyone had a dogwood they saw every day, the world would be a much happier place.

    MotherHenAndChicks

    The chicks are ready to explore. Tomorrow I’ll open the door and let their mother take them on their way. She is dying to show them their first worm. Little chicks can eat worms longer than they are tall. It would be like us trying to swallow a six foot long hot dog.

    EnaAndTakuma1

    Their names are 枝那-Ena and 拓真-Takuma. Ena is the white female and Takuma the black male. They are exploring the greener areas of their expanded kennel. They have a fifty foot section which wraps around the west end of the house.

    EnaAndTakuma2
    Takuma

    Takuma is taking in his new surroundings. He can hear the chickens rustling in the brush. Hopefully it won’t be too long before he and Ena can go chase rabbits through the woods. We’ll see if these two can outsmart the rabbits. A trick I saw many rabbits do with our previous dogs, is to run around in a tight circle in the thick brush and get our dogs spinning around the circle, following the scent. And when the dogs were sure they had it, the rabbits would make a bee line in another direction. The rabbit would be long gone by the time the dogs realized they weren’t on its tail.

  • New Protectors of the Chickens

    NewDogsC

    The new protectors of the chickens have arrived. They are settling in well into their new home. They were part of a pack of seven dogs found in Okanogan, hanging out near an airport. The pack ended up in the Humane Society in Kitsap county. They could not handle the whole pack, so three siblings ended up in The Noah Center in Standwood. We wanted to take all three siblings, but were limited to two. The Noah Center was concerned that taking three might be overwhelming for us.

    NewDogsB

    We need to train them that chickens are not for hunting but protecting. They sure love eggs. They are very calm and well behaved. Hard to believe they are feral dogs. They are believed to be eight months old and border collie mixes.

    NewDogsA