Well, today marks 2 weeks ago that I started feeding pumpkin to my dogs in order for them to stop eating poop. And I must say that so far....so good.
I ran out of the pumpkin that I had put up for pumpkin pie in about a week and I found a can of 100% pumpkin puree in my pantry and fed that to them until it was gone.
I must say that both my dogs really enjoyed eating the pumpkin and looked for it eagerly at mealtimes.
So we'll keep our fingers crossed that this continues and if they start to stray again then I will whip out the pumpkin and begin to feed it again.
I just love when something works out like this.
Thursday, March 28, 2013
Monday, March 25, 2013
The agony and the ecstasy of Mother Nature
I was extremely busy last week with the part time job that has turned into a full time job. The woman that I work for had open heart surgery about 2 weeks before Christmas. Then 13 days later they had to open her up again because apparently the valve that they put in her heart was too small, and as you can imagine...one does not bounce right back after that kind of surgery at 75 years of age. So she has not been home since then. It has fallen on me to take care of her home, animals, bill paying, plant watering, swimming pool maintenance, and bill collecting for the renter that she has. On top of all of this is the fact that there are 3 Boer goats that are preggers and about to give birth. So I've been a bit distracted.
Last Wednesday morning I arrived to feed and took a real good look at all goats to see if they had any mucus coming from their vaginas and if the area around their hips has sunken in at all. These are both signs that birth will happen within hours or at least a day or two. One goat in particular had both these signs and so I figured that she would either give birth later that day or probably sometime during the night. Births with goats for some reason happen a lot at night or maybe because that's always been my experience that I feel that way. Anyway, I fed as normal and went about my day.
The next morning imagine my surprise when the youngest of the goats was there to greet me at the gate with bloody muscus coming from her vagina...that means she has in fact given birth. Her baby is no where in sight and because she is just a year old and unexperienced I think that maybe I should go looking for this baby. On top of that....another goat is missing...the one that I had expected to go into labor soon.
So off I trotted into the pasture and found the new baby who looked just fine and just beyond her was the goat that was missing and she was in fact in labor...or so I thought. As I approached I could see that she was down on her side and she had a head, ears, tongue and the front two hoofs out of the birth canal and so I just stopped right there and figured that I'd leave well enough alone and go on about my business. This particular goat gave birth last year with no problem....she seemed to be doing fine and leaving her alone was the best for everyone involved. I fed as normal, checked mail, paid some bills, took a look at the pool and went home.
I did some chores around here, told my husband what was going on and went back up to see how she was doing around 11:30 a.m.
As I looked out in the pasture I couldn't see mama goat and so I figured that I best go see what was going on.
When I saw mama goat I could see that labor hadn't progressed and called on my friend Andy who has raised a lot more goats than I have and he's raised Boer Goats. I've only had milk goats and although they are both goats, there are differences in the way they give birth and other things. Andy's advice was to wait a bit longer and if she hadn't progressed then to call him because maybe we'd have to pull the baby.
So I waited all that I could which was about an hour and called him. He arrived and we walked out into the pasture together and as he approached mama he could see that she was in trouble. What he saw with his eyes was not one head but two. And this was probably the reason that mama had not progressed anymore in her labor. He knew immediately that both these babies were dead. We have no way of knowing exactly how long she had been laboring but once the birth process begins, if the fetus does not come out within 30 minutes or so you begin to have problems. So he got a piece of mule tape (it's a flat rope) and was able to get it around one head and pull that baby out, and then he pulled the other out.
One baby was huge...it must have weighed at least 5 or 6 lbs. That is very unusual for a goat...normally they weigh between 1.5 and 3 lbs. The other dead baby was much more the normal size and we were just sad that this mother had been suffering for so long. It's quite unusual for them to deliver two at the same time...I'd be safe in saying that this is an extremely rare instance although it does happen...it is rare.
Mother goat happy to be shed of her problem is now heading straight for the barn and water and as she is lumbering toward the barn I see another sack appear and she gives birth to a third baby. We are fairly certain this one is too probably dead because he has been in the birth canal waiting to be born for lord only knows how long. But when we reach him he is struggling and so we quickly clean him off. We get the muscus out of his lungs and nose and do a quick little mouth to snout air blowing to see if he responds. Which he does. He's tiny and he's wet but he is alive.
Back to the barn we go with baby and Andy is able to catch momma and we put them in a horse stall. Drop in some hay, give momma a bucket of water and wait to see if she will accept him.
After an hour or so and she is showing no interest we decide to take matters into our own hands and milk momma so that baby can get some of that first milk with the anti-bodies that he needs to survive down him. His suckling is not very strong and so we take a syringe and fill it with milk that we have collected and make sure that he is able to take as much as his little belly will hold. Then we wait again.
Andy has errands to run and so do I but we meet up again about 3 hours later to see if momma is bonding with baby. We find that she is still not paying him any attention but Andy say's that this is kinda normal behavior with what she has been through. He says that if we can just get enough milk to feed him for a couple of days, then when he begins to pee and poop and momma can smell her scent through that, then she will take him as she should have done in the beginning. We feed him again making sure that he had a full belly and left.
When I arrived Friday morning I was pretty sure that he would not be alive but to my surprise he was alive and trying very hard to stand. Momma was paying more attention to him but I could see that he was still not nursing from her and so I fed him until he went to sleep. I fed everyone else then and did a few more chores and then left for home coming back sometime around noon to feed him again. When I arrive he was almost standing, momma was very interested and so I fed him again and thought that I would check on him one more time before I would leave him for the night.
When I arrived home I had a message from the Dr. that told me she would be home the next morning but that I was to go ahead and feed and she would call me when she arrived home. So I went back up to her house for the last check and fed him and was extremely pleased with how he was doing.
When I got home I sat down and wrote out the whole story for the Dr. and told her how to feed him unless she could see that momma and baby had bonded and that I would be in touch with her after I got back from my dad's.
So Saturday morning I fed and could see that real strides had been made in his recovery and although not nursing yet, I could see that he was going to probably make it. The hardest part had been the first 24 hours and he seemed to be beginning to thrive.
The Dr. and family arrived home around 4 p.m.....so much for arriving 1st thing in the morning...had I known that I would have checked on him immediately after I returned home but that's water under the bridge. I went back up there to give them instructions on how to milk and feed and milked momma for what I figured would be the last time as she was really paying a lot of attention and beginning to be very protective of baby. I was finally able to take a breath and figured that we'd won this battle.
I had a call from the Dr. on Sunday around noon and she just said that the baby was dead. Didn't give me any details and said that she'd already disposed of the body etc. I was saddened and shocked. He seemed to be doing so well and I really thought that even though he'd had a very rough beginning that he was going to make it through and thrive.
I don't even pretend to know why things happen like this...I want to say that maybe he had some sort of defect that I had no way of knowing and that Mother Nature did what she does best and took him before it was evident that he would have to be put down. So I'm sad but I do realize that Nature sometimes knows best.
The last goat delivered a lovely set of twins without incident on Sunday morning. So we have the agony of the death of triplets and the ecstasy of twins and a single.
First picture is of the mother with twins, except you can only see one of the babies. Second picture is of the young mother "Wendy" with her baby.
Last Wednesday morning I arrived to feed and took a real good look at all goats to see if they had any mucus coming from their vaginas and if the area around their hips has sunken in at all. These are both signs that birth will happen within hours or at least a day or two. One goat in particular had both these signs and so I figured that she would either give birth later that day or probably sometime during the night. Births with goats for some reason happen a lot at night or maybe because that's always been my experience that I feel that way. Anyway, I fed as normal and went about my day.
The next morning imagine my surprise when the youngest of the goats was there to greet me at the gate with bloody muscus coming from her vagina...that means she has in fact given birth. Her baby is no where in sight and because she is just a year old and unexperienced I think that maybe I should go looking for this baby. On top of that....another goat is missing...the one that I had expected to go into labor soon.
So off I trotted into the pasture and found the new baby who looked just fine and just beyond her was the goat that was missing and she was in fact in labor...or so I thought. As I approached I could see that she was down on her side and she had a head, ears, tongue and the front two hoofs out of the birth canal and so I just stopped right there and figured that I'd leave well enough alone and go on about my business. This particular goat gave birth last year with no problem....she seemed to be doing fine and leaving her alone was the best for everyone involved. I fed as normal, checked mail, paid some bills, took a look at the pool and went home.
I did some chores around here, told my husband what was going on and went back up to see how she was doing around 11:30 a.m.
As I looked out in the pasture I couldn't see mama goat and so I figured that I best go see what was going on.
When I saw mama goat I could see that labor hadn't progressed and called on my friend Andy who has raised a lot more goats than I have and he's raised Boer Goats. I've only had milk goats and although they are both goats, there are differences in the way they give birth and other things. Andy's advice was to wait a bit longer and if she hadn't progressed then to call him because maybe we'd have to pull the baby.
So I waited all that I could which was about an hour and called him. He arrived and we walked out into the pasture together and as he approached mama he could see that she was in trouble. What he saw with his eyes was not one head but two. And this was probably the reason that mama had not progressed anymore in her labor. He knew immediately that both these babies were dead. We have no way of knowing exactly how long she had been laboring but once the birth process begins, if the fetus does not come out within 30 minutes or so you begin to have problems. So he got a piece of mule tape (it's a flat rope) and was able to get it around one head and pull that baby out, and then he pulled the other out.
One baby was huge...it must have weighed at least 5 or 6 lbs. That is very unusual for a goat...normally they weigh between 1.5 and 3 lbs. The other dead baby was much more the normal size and we were just sad that this mother had been suffering for so long. It's quite unusual for them to deliver two at the same time...I'd be safe in saying that this is an extremely rare instance although it does happen...it is rare.
Mother goat happy to be shed of her problem is now heading straight for the barn and water and as she is lumbering toward the barn I see another sack appear and she gives birth to a third baby. We are fairly certain this one is too probably dead because he has been in the birth canal waiting to be born for lord only knows how long. But when we reach him he is struggling and so we quickly clean him off. We get the muscus out of his lungs and nose and do a quick little mouth to snout air blowing to see if he responds. Which he does. He's tiny and he's wet but he is alive.
Back to the barn we go with baby and Andy is able to catch momma and we put them in a horse stall. Drop in some hay, give momma a bucket of water and wait to see if she will accept him.
After an hour or so and she is showing no interest we decide to take matters into our own hands and milk momma so that baby can get some of that first milk with the anti-bodies that he needs to survive down him. His suckling is not very strong and so we take a syringe and fill it with milk that we have collected and make sure that he is able to take as much as his little belly will hold. Then we wait again.
Andy has errands to run and so do I but we meet up again about 3 hours later to see if momma is bonding with baby. We find that she is still not paying him any attention but Andy say's that this is kinda normal behavior with what she has been through. He says that if we can just get enough milk to feed him for a couple of days, then when he begins to pee and poop and momma can smell her scent through that, then she will take him as she should have done in the beginning. We feed him again making sure that he had a full belly and left.
When I arrived Friday morning I was pretty sure that he would not be alive but to my surprise he was alive and trying very hard to stand. Momma was paying more attention to him but I could see that he was still not nursing from her and so I fed him until he went to sleep. I fed everyone else then and did a few more chores and then left for home coming back sometime around noon to feed him again. When I arrive he was almost standing, momma was very interested and so I fed him again and thought that I would check on him one more time before I would leave him for the night.
When I arrived home I had a message from the Dr. that told me she would be home the next morning but that I was to go ahead and feed and she would call me when she arrived home. So I went back up to her house for the last check and fed him and was extremely pleased with how he was doing.
When I got home I sat down and wrote out the whole story for the Dr. and told her how to feed him unless she could see that momma and baby had bonded and that I would be in touch with her after I got back from my dad's.
So Saturday morning I fed and could see that real strides had been made in his recovery and although not nursing yet, I could see that he was going to probably make it. The hardest part had been the first 24 hours and he seemed to be beginning to thrive.
The Dr. and family arrived home around 4 p.m.....so much for arriving 1st thing in the morning...had I known that I would have checked on him immediately after I returned home but that's water under the bridge. I went back up there to give them instructions on how to milk and feed and milked momma for what I figured would be the last time as she was really paying a lot of attention and beginning to be very protective of baby. I was finally able to take a breath and figured that we'd won this battle.
I had a call from the Dr. on Sunday around noon and she just said that the baby was dead. Didn't give me any details and said that she'd already disposed of the body etc. I was saddened and shocked. He seemed to be doing so well and I really thought that even though he'd had a very rough beginning that he was going to make it through and thrive.
I don't even pretend to know why things happen like this...I want to say that maybe he had some sort of defect that I had no way of knowing and that Mother Nature did what she does best and took him before it was evident that he would have to be put down. So I'm sad but I do realize that Nature sometimes knows best.
The last goat delivered a lovely set of twins without incident on Sunday morning. So we have the agony of the death of triplets and the ecstasy of twins and a single.
Monday, March 18, 2013
60th Wedding Anniversary
So much time ahead of them with so many possibilities. Duty stations far and wide, across both oceans and a little time stateside. Long seperations during the Viet Nam era and long distance calls that involved an overseas operator and the word "over" when one was done with their side of the conversation. Reel to Reel taped letters and hand written letters when he was away.
First one child, then two, three and four. Life was indeed full.
Now there is just one and his plans for the day include a trip to the cemetary to place new flowers on her grave and to reminesc about the past and then meet up with us all for dinner.
Here's to my parents who would have celebrated 60 years of marriage today. I love you both so much and miss my mom more than words can express.
Thursday, March 14, 2013
The Great Experiment
My hubby and I have 2 dogs. Pepper who is 16 years old, a Schipperkee and "my" dog. Bonnie who is 6 years old, a Blue Lacy and "his" dog.
Bonnie from the day she came to live with us has always had a problem eating stuff that isn't good for her. As a matter of fact...we weren't sure that she was ever going to grow to adult hood with all the stuff that she ingested. One of the worst habits of hers was that she liked to eat "poop". She ate raccoon poop, she ate possum poop, she ate her own poop, she ate human poop (don't ask)...she just likes to eat it.
The proper term for this is coprophagy. There are all kinds of theories on this nasty habit but I don't think that anyone really knows the answer to this...it just is with some dogs.
We were at the Vet's for the various reasons when she was a puppy for all the perdiciments that she seemed to get into and asked the Vet what to do about it. She said that some dogs respond well to the various products on the markets and a lot of dogs just simply grow out of the habit. And that's really what seemed to happen....until I discovered that my hubby wasn't in fact picking up the poop in the yard...he thought that I was....and the ugliness of the situation reared it's ugly head. She was in fact eating it again. And this time....she had a partner in crime...her sibling Pepper!!!! Why my dog at her advanced age would pick up this nasty habit is beyond me but that's the truth of it.
There is not a lot that turns my stomach but this really does. Just the thought makes me really sick.
So I did what every good dog owner does and I went to the Internet to read about this nasty habit and what to do about it. I also ran by Petsmart and picked up some spray that has some sort of bitterness factor in it so that when you spray the poop it doesn't taste good(How could poop taste good?) and they stop eating it or so says the bottle.
I sprayed some freshly laid turds and then later that afternoon Ms. Bonnie ingested it with gusto..lord give me strength.
So back to the Internet to see if maybe there was something I had in my pantry that might help me through this. I'd already tried sprinkling it with jalapeno juice, cayenne pepper and regular pepper to no avail.
I stumbled upon an article about Pumpkin and pineapple juice. This sounded promising because I had both in the pantry and actually I had real pumpkin in the freezer.
I've decided to try the pumpkin first.
So what you do is put a couple of teaspoons of the pumpkin in the dogs bowl and mix with food when you feed them and it's supposed to make poop taste bad and it breaks the cycle and they stop doing it. It should be 100% pumpkin or pumpkin puree not pumpkin pie mix.
So I started today, they got a dose at lunch time and I'll put more in at supper time. We'll hopefully see how this goes. Keep your fingers crossed and lets hope this works.
Saturday, March 9, 2013
Spring is Springing?????
So here we are in March and I'm beginning to see the promise of spring that hopefully is just around the corner. I've seen some plants that look a lot like poppies and the odd bluebonnet or two. I've even seen a few plant that I don't recognize as native wildflowers but I'm pretty sure that they will bring forth flowers and that's because I spread a lot of seeds from packets from my best friend of 40 years. And here's that story.
About 7 years ago at a High School reunion in Myrtle Beach my BFF and I were discussing how we could get together more often now that we had more disposable income and more time. We talked about going back to England to see our old stomping grounds. We discussed also maybe taking some time during that trip and getting on a canal boat and traveling for a while like that. We talked about taking a cruise and we talked about getting together in our two states..her's being Nevada and mine of course Texas. We also agreeded to continue not to just talk about these ideas but to act on them. So we each went home to our respective states and began to search the internet for canal boat trips and places to stay while we were in England. We both came up with some interesting plans but then I began to think that this maybe wasn't such a good idea after all....the canal boat is fairly close quarters and I have a husband who snores....LOUDLY!!!! I'm used to it and most nights it doesn't bother me but to subject other people to it...not such a good idea. So I called Candy and asked her if we could change our plans to something else.
We discussed several different senarios and finally decided on a cruise to Alaska. And then we both decided to invite our parents. She invited her father (her mother passed away a while ago) and her sister who she is very close to. I invited my parents and of course we both had our husbands in tow.
We chose to sail in late May as we'd been told by many who'd gone before us that we would probably have the best weather then and they weren't wrong.
The trip was so wonderful in so many ways but mostly in hidsight it was because I got to spend time with my parents. And how was I to know that just 2 short years later my mother and Candy's father would be gone. Didn't mean to go down that road yet again but it's the god's honest truth.
On one of the last dockings before we headed back to Seattle we stopped in Victoria, British Columbia. Bob and I and Candy and her sister decided to do the off ship excurision to Burchart Gardens.
Burchart Gardens for those that don't know is 45 acres of an old abandoned quarry that have been turned into the most beautiful gardens you can imagine. And because they have the rain and the soil they are something that people like me, that live in areas like I do, dream about. Pictures cannot do it justice and if you ever get the chance to go see it....go see it. A lovely way to spend a day or part of a day.
Anyway this is just all to set you up for the gift store that we visited on site. They had the usual tourist trap sort of stuff and I'm not a big fan of wasting my money on stuff that I don't really need or will use. My husband bought a couple packets of seeds for flowers that he thought we could get to grow and Candy bought a lot of seed packets that she hoped she could get to grow in her gardens.
So now lets return to present day and a couple of days after my mother died I recieved a packet in the mail from Candy. In it was most of the seed packets that she bought that day. I kept them in the fridge until this past November when I then spread them far and wide in our gardens. November is when we plant our wildflowers. Because the seeds were old (they were bought in 2010) and I wasn't sure how they were kept, I didn't have much hope that they would germinate but I have seen a few little plants that I don't recognize that would seem to be those that Candy sent.
If they do indeed make it, it will certainly always be a reminder of a wonderful time spent with my parents and best friend.
Candy is coming to visit soon and I can't wait to show her what I hope will be what she set in motion.
We discussed several different senarios and finally decided on a cruise to Alaska. And then we both decided to invite our parents. She invited her father (her mother passed away a while ago) and her sister who she is very close to. I invited my parents and of course we both had our husbands in tow.
We chose to sail in late May as we'd been told by many who'd gone before us that we would probably have the best weather then and they weren't wrong.
The trip was so wonderful in so many ways but mostly in hidsight it was because I got to spend time with my parents. And how was I to know that just 2 short years later my mother and Candy's father would be gone. Didn't mean to go down that road yet again but it's the god's honest truth.
On one of the last dockings before we headed back to Seattle we stopped in Victoria, British Columbia. Bob and I and Candy and her sister decided to do the off ship excurision to Burchart Gardens.
Burchart Gardens for those that don't know is 45 acres of an old abandoned quarry that have been turned into the most beautiful gardens you can imagine. And because they have the rain and the soil they are something that people like me, that live in areas like I do, dream about. Pictures cannot do it justice and if you ever get the chance to go see it....go see it. A lovely way to spend a day or part of a day.
Anyway this is just all to set you up for the gift store that we visited on site. They had the usual tourist trap sort of stuff and I'm not a big fan of wasting my money on stuff that I don't really need or will use. My husband bought a couple packets of seeds for flowers that he thought we could get to grow and Candy bought a lot of seed packets that she hoped she could get to grow in her gardens.
So now lets return to present day and a couple of days after my mother died I recieved a packet in the mail from Candy. In it was most of the seed packets that she bought that day. I kept them in the fridge until this past November when I then spread them far and wide in our gardens. November is when we plant our wildflowers. Because the seeds were old (they were bought in 2010) and I wasn't sure how they were kept, I didn't have much hope that they would germinate but I have seen a few little plants that I don't recognize that would seem to be those that Candy sent.
If they do indeed make it, it will certainly always be a reminder of a wonderful time spent with my parents and best friend.
Candy is coming to visit soon and I can't wait to show her what I hope will be what she set in motion.
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