Wednesday, October 25, 2006, 02:28
Sunshine!
Today was the first sunny day we've had in a long while. Not that it was all that sunny. It was a watery sunshine. A thin sunshine. A November kind of sunshine. But at least it was sunshine. And it made the world seem like a more cheerful place if not a substantially warmer place.
And on this first sunny day we've had in quite a while -- at almost the end of October -- what do you suppose arrived down in the barn today?
Go ahead. Guess.
Yes, that's right. Kittens.
Jeepers. Little Sister had kittens on the 24th of October.
The latest a mother cat has had kittens in the barn before this was the 10th of October.
I kind of figured she was going to have kittens, but she didn't look very big in the middle, so I was thinking she would have two, maybe.
As soon as I walked down in the barn tonight to feed the horses, I heard them. The thin, tiny cries of newborn kittens.
I crawled up in the hay to look, and sure enough, she had given birth to them in one of the 'cat holes' that Randy put into the hay when he stacked hay in the barn. I had pulled a bale away from the hay earlier, and when I saw that Little Sister's babies were in the hole, I put loose hay around the opening and also pulled another bale over the top to try to help keep it warmer in there for them.
There were four kittens in the nest. Two grays ones. Two black ones.
I am hoping that Little Sister will spend much of her time cuddled up with her babies. Otherwise they won't make it. I know for sure that when she brings them out of the nest at 4 weeks of age -- which will be toward the end of November -- I will have to bring them in the house or they definitely won't make it. Staying in the nest with momma and siblings is one thing. But being out and about on the cold ground would be the end of them.
I know the kittens were born today because when I moved that bale of hay this morning, they weren't there. But now tonight, they were. I'm fairly certain their momma will stay with them all night, except to come out for more kitty food when I give them some more later. I still can't leave cat food down in the barn because the raccoons come and eat it.
Tomorrow I am going to put some old towels in the nest to try to help the little ones stay warm. Little Sister and I have a pretty good relationship. She likes to be petted and she talks to me when I'm down in the barn. She's really a very sweet cat. Nothing at all like her hissing, growling, snarling mother! So, I'm hoping that she won't be too nervous about me putting towels in the nest for her kittens. I don't think she will be. Cats are usually quick to recognize a situation that is to their advantage. Even the old mother cat, the year she had kittens in October, did not object when I put an old sweater down in the nest for the babies to cuddle up with.
We shall see. If the kittens survive the night (and I hope they do), I will put towels in the nest. When I peeked in there this evening, they seemed strong and vigorous and mewed much louder when they heard me rustling the hay to put around the nest. When I got to the point where I needed to get more hay down for the horses, I shined the flashlight into the nest, and Little Sister looked back at me, squinting her eyes and generally looking like a happy, contented cat.
I suppose I could take the babies in the house now, but I don't want to do that. They are much better off if they can stay with their mother and nurse their mother and have their mother take care of them. Plus, I know Little Sister would be devastated to lose her babies so soon and all at once.
So for now, I will leave them in the nest and hope for the best.
LeAnn R. Ralph
Monday, October 23, 2006, 06:10
Ho-Hum. . .
Okay. Enough is enough. It has been cloudy all week. I looked back at my weather record and saw that it was cloudy Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and again on Sunday.
Along with the clouds, it's been cold and windy much of the time, too, with snow showers here and there. Oh, sure, the sun managed to peek out once in a while for a couple of minutes. But that was it. I can't say we had an afternoon of sunshine or anything like that.
This is not October weather! It is November weather!
The only problem is -- it is still October. But we've been having November weather almost all month.
One person I talked to on Saturday at the craft sale where I took my books said she wondered if this meant that winter was going to be over a month early and that we would get spring just that much sooner. Another lady who overheard her say that wondered if it means we will have an extra month of winter.
Perhaps this is why all of the birds that were still around after the drought this past summer left a month early.
Harvest Festival The Harvest Festival for the Foods Resource Bank cornfield on Saturday was a success, according to my husband. I wasn't able to be there because of the craft sale. It wasn't much of a day for a picnic, that's for sure, with a high temperature of about 42 degrees, cloudy and windy. Randy said people seemed to have a good time, though, and that they enjoyed the hay rides. Randy was in charge of the hay rides.
They got the corn picked, too, and it was running right around 100 bushels to the acre. That seems incredible, considering how dry it was during the summer. Of course, the landowner and my husband spent at least one whole weekend laying some irrigation pipe (it was probably more like two or three weekends), but it apparently was enough to help the field so it produced better. The corn has been sold for a little over $2 a bushel, so all together, it will be something like $2,400 from that field that will be donated to help people across the world far less fortunate than we are. One of the other fields was chopped for silage earlier and sold. And there's still one other 10 acre field to be picked.
Paranormal Researcher -- I am interviewing a paranormal researcher for the newspaper on Monday. You know -- a ghost buster, in other words. He has a master's degree in applied psychology. I will be interested to find out how he ended up as a paranormal researcher. He is the co-writer of a road guide to (reportedly) haunted places in Wisconsin.
To tell you the truth, it seems incredible to me that it is almost Halloween already!
LeAnn R. Ralph