Ugly Bookends

Today has been an incredibly long and difficult day on the farm.

Reminds me of a roller coaster a bit.

We started the day off thinking about the plan for our work day with several of our helpers on site today. The weather looked nice, many things had been going fairly well and some fairly major projects looked like they could get finished.

Then Tammy went to feed the turkeys. Go to bed with 57 turkeys. Wake up with 34 (or so). The devastation had many of the hallmarks of a mink that had gone on a killing spree. Tammy spent a good deal of time trying to plug every small hole in that room she could find. We stopped by the room multiple times during the day. And, of course, we had to build a funeral pyre (so to speak) for the (too small to eat) turkeys. It makes no sense to bury or otherwise dispose of them in ways that attracts more predators to that taste.

Lost a few small trees we just put in to some rabbits - so things are looking just a little dicey. But, we're pretty resilient and we had wonderful help....so the day got better.

K finished cleaning up the shingles from the truck barn roof. 400+ peppers went into the ground (thanks to L and T). We got the irrigation system going for the season (just a few more repairs and it is again fully functional). Five rows of tomatoes got hay mulch and several more were cultivated (thank you D). And, we actually got all of this done with our helpers so that they could all leave right on time. Tammy and I then were able to get some young plants watered *and* get to a movie in Waverly before it started (that was strange - on many levels).

Upon returning home, we dutifully went out (after 9pm) to check on the turkeys. More carnage. We're down to 29 turkeys at this point.

We're also down a masked bandit. We still do not know how it got in (one of tomorrow AM's tasks). But, we've only seen this kind of thing happen before (where a raccoon appears to get a taste for just killing). Usually they take one or two - but normally not more than the family will eat in a day. The normal result is continuous depletion - but more chances to respond to the problem.