We Poison Our Pets

We purchase poison and pour it over our pets.  And we do it on a regular basis.  We are also CHEAP pet poisoners, so we search the internet for the cheapest poison and use that.  We are bad people.

Because I am lazy, I don't like trying to carefully remove ticks from our pets.  ( What an indictment, lazy and cheap.)  You have to hold them still and comb all the hair away from the attached insect.  Then you have to use tweezers to grasp the tick at the attachment site, grab it and pull it out.  If it has been there for a while it may be stuck in there tightly, so keep pulling until it comes out. You also have to be careful not to squeeze the body of the tick.  You don't want the contents of the tick squeezed back into the pet.   Then go buy poison so you don't have to do that again!

   

I use the Frontline Plus for dogs and also for cats.  Do not mix these up.  Cats and dogs are not interchangeable and neither are their meds. 

Flea and tick preventers are not cheap.  I also give the dog heartworm preventative.  These add up, but it is cheaper than dealing with diseases carried by these insects.  Or getting fleas in the house.

The strange thing is that we get ticks, but I haven't seen a single flea since we moved here.

   

I also use Equi-Spot for horses.  Have you ever seen a horse in the field with a face full of flies?  If the owner just knew to put on some Equi-Spot, they will fly-free for at least two weeks.

A lot of people just buy the Frontline and Heartguard from the veterinarian when they bring their pets in for "service".  It's easy and convenient...and pricey!  There are a lot of sites online where you can buy these meds, but I use Joe's Pet Meds.  They are about half the cost that I would spend at the vet and they are mailed to my house.  No vet visit required.  The strange thing is that they seem to come from New Zealand.  I don't see how that makes for a less expensive product, but it does.

   

I wish they could make a similar product for humans.  I would love to put goop on the back of my neck once a month ( so I don't lick it off) and then not have to spray myself with OFF! every time I venture outside.  I don't like finding the odd tick crawling on me or imbedded in my own personal flesh.

I presume it is because humans live a lot longer than dogs and they do not know what would happen with long term use.  And because you buy the product based on weight, and women would buy a much smaller size than they really need, and then it wouldn't work!

A Full Day's Work By Noon

I had a long list of things I needed to accomplish today.  Even though it is hot and humid first thing in the morning, and only gets worse as the day goes along, I dressed in jeans and a long sleeve work shirt.  I haven't bought a wedding dress, yet and I don't want a farmer's tan or some other zebra striped tan to look strange.  Can you get a spray tan to cover up tanning errors?  Well, I don't know, so I covered up.  I also used sunscreen on any exposed areas and wore a sun protective hat.  Oh, yeah, and gloves.  I must look like a lunatic in this heat.

                                 

Our apple trees and our pear have a disease.  I took a cutting to the county extension agent and she told me it was called "fire blight".  I Googled it (she reminded me to only look at sites with "edu" in the address) and discovered it is a bacterial disease that can kill the trees.  Oh, great.  The leaves wilt and look burned.  The cure involves spraying when there are blossoms...too late...and cutting off the diseased portion during the summer.  That I can do.

In order to prevent the spread of the bacteria it is recommended to dip the pruners in a 10% bleach solution between each cut.  I filled an old measuring cup from the laundry detergent with bleach and then dumped 10 more of the same amount of water.  Sure glad I took math and science!  It said to dip the shears for 5 seconds between each cut and I sure hope I did.  There were a lot of cuts.

                                   

 I had to take off some good wood as I wanted to make sure I cut about 6 inches below where there was an obvious infection.


                                         
It made the newer, smaller trees look rather sad.  I hope this will make them stronger next year.  Now I have to remember to spray them in spring and then I guess I just hope for the best.  I hope I can get rid of this and maybe get some fruit NEXT year. 
                                   
                                      

I made sure to pick up all the cuttings.  Then I dumped them in the burn pile.  Lee started them burning while I continued with my list.

                                    

We got new hay!  We had already put our share away in the barn and out of the weather.  There were three bales left over from last year, so we rolled them out to the large rolls so Mr. Crouch can get them when he gets his share for doing the cutting and baling.  We took the last roll which we were currently using up to the blueberries.  No point in feeding old hay when there is new hay available.
 
                                    

I keep adding hay to the blueberries.  I put a lot down and say, "That ought to do it."  Then the rain comes and it gets compacted and then the grass starts coming back up through it.  We are using the hay to keep the grass away from the blueberries and to hold moisture in.  They like a lot more water than they can get naturally here, so we have to water them by hand and preserve the water they do get.  When they get established we may leave the hay off and mow around them, but the are small and young and I want to give them the best start I can.  At some point I want to buy a drip line to water them.  Then all I need to do it hook up the hose and turn it on.  I am hand watering for now to see how they are doing and if they need something.  At the same time I water the young fruit trees.  When everybody gets established I hope to be able to cut back on all the hand watering!

                                    

By this time I was sweating underneath my glasses.  It was 10:00 and I was ready to quit working outside for the day, but I had one more job to do.  The horses.

                             

I haven't lunged them in two days and I want them to be well behaved if I get a potential buyer.  It has been rainy and wet and I don't want them to slip and fall.  I don't have an arena and I work them on grass.  Fortunately , they haven't forgotten everything with their "holiday".  It is probably a good idea to give them a break now and then, anyway.

It has been so hot, I hosed them off after the workout and covered them with fly spray.  It is almost time to re-dose them with Equi-Spot.  This is a topical liquid similar to putting Frontline on your dog or cat to keep away the fleas.  This helps to keep the flies away from the horses.  It works amazingly well and is worth the money I spend every summer.  Libby is allergic to flies and her eyes can swell shut from the little monsters.  When I first got her I used a fly mask.  They began to cause sores from the rubbing against her chin, so I tried the Equi-Spot and never went back.  I still use fly Wipe on them when I work them.  I spray it on them and wipe it on their faces and it adds an extra layer of protection.

On the way up the hill I could see that the burning was almost finished.  Now there is room for the brush the power company dumped on our property!  Great.  More outside, sweaty work.

After all that, it was noon and I quit for the day.  Well, I quit outside work.  I still want to make some new cards and I have an idea for a fruit cobbler I want to make for dessert.  I want to try low fat/ low sugar and see how it tastes.  That's Next!

Too Hot

I went to bed last night with great plans for today. I was going to go down to the bridge and start weed-eating the brush. I have to do this about two times a year. Once in spring and again in the fall. Notice spring has come and gone and I haven't done it. So the weeds are getting pretty tall. It took us weeks to clear it when we first moved in. We had to cut small trees and clear blackberries. A labor intensive job. I don't want i to get like that again, so I have to keep it up. Working full time at the library makes it difficult to find the time. We have had a lot of visitors and now it is so incredibly hot, so I haven't been able to get to it.

We bought a brush mower to help the first year. It was big and powerful and could cut through anything under two inches in diameter. Unfortunately it was also way too heavy, even for Lee. It wanted to run downhill when you were on a slope....and most EVERYTHING is on a slope around here! You had to wrestle with it on anything other than a flat surface and those we could get with the Bush Hog attachment to the tractor. I managed to get a lot of the brush cut, but it came at the expense of very sore muscles. I started to wake up with tingling hands, as though they had gone to sleep and it took some time to get them to feeling normal again. So we have gone back to the weed eater and clippers and loppers. I may get a weed eater on wheels, but after the disaster of the brush mower, I am afraid to put out the money. Roughly $400 to get a good one.

It was in the 80's when it was 8:00 this morning. Not a good start for a day of outside labor. So I chickened out and I am writing this instead. Sure, I can pretend this is work, but I still have to get to the driveway and I am not looking forward to it. We have worked in some terrible heat, but this is the worst ever. It is not just my opinion. This year has been the coldest winter and the hottest summer for years.

So, instead I am going to tell you about an experiment I am running. Libby has a terrible time with flies. If she is out without a fly mask, her eyes swell up something terrible. I always keep her in a fly mask during the day in hot weather. I used to do the same for Claire, but lately I can't find one that doesn't rub her raw. The one from last year that worked fine, gave her a raw spot this year. I thought maybe the accumulation of her hair on the fabric around the edges was causing the problem, so I washed it as well as can be done with soap and brushes in the barn. It still rubbed. I bought her a different mask and more sores. So I have just been putting a lot of Repel-X on a cloth and rubbing it around her face. It was OK, but not a perfect solution.

I needed to order some more Repel-X, so I went to Horse.com , the site I usually use to order horse related items. They carry an item that I have often wondered about. It is called Equi-Spot. It is a small vial of liquid fly repellent. It works like flea and tick repellent for dogs and cats. You squeeze out some under their forelock, along their neck and back and the backs of all four legs. It is supposed to keep the flies off them for two weeks.




I put the Equi-Spot on as directed on June 19th. So far, I would say it is a success. I can see a few flies around them, but they are not covered as they have been. I am concerned as I have heard some reports from people that have used it successfully for awhile and then they developed a reaction of some sort and lost hair where it was supplied. So I will keep a close eye on them and see if it works as advertised.




Another thing we did to control insects, including flies, is we mowed the fields down a bit. There are spots where they won't eat and weeds they won't touch. When grass gets high and woody, horses prefer the short tender new growth. The dense, high grass contributes to the humidity in their pasture. It is also a lovely spot for ticks to wait for the unwary. Horses will not eat where they have defecated, so those spots are left to grow unchecked. So we try to mow down the high uneaten growth to make new spots for grazing. It also spreads the manure around and breaks it up. We switch fields when we do this and wait for quite a bit of rain to replenish the now fertilized grass. It seems to work for us. They have good grass clear until the snows come, when we have to start feeding in the morning.