We need rain

It’s very hot and miserable here today.  Overnight we got a tiny amount of rain, not enough to even register in the rain gauge, just enough to make it horribly humid.  Trying to do anything outside is rough.  We bought hay for the horses, the pasture is gone.  When I brought it home Friday I left it on the trailer in back of the car to unload later and that’s when we had one brief, heavy downpour- 2/10’s of an inch of rain. I had to run outside and cover the hay with a tarp.  Not anywhere enough rain though. 

 I have made the decision to sell my horses if I can find a good home for them, preferably together.  I lost my part time job and while some writers must be rich we usually aren’t.  The old cliché of struggling writer is more appropriate.  But its not just money it’s the physical work and the stress of caring for big pets. I worry about big vet bills, no grass, training the foal, about deep snow in the winter and so many things.  As my husband says I worry too much.  Not having the horses will be one less thing to worry about.

 I am also whittling down my chicken flock, going to sell off all the old hens and just do with the 10 young hens I’m raising.  I want to keep the turkeys and ducks but they may go too.  I have 2 new pairs of bantams, a Porcelain pair and a pair of Belgian Quail Antwerps.  They eat next to nothing so I will probably keep them but sell off a few more of my frizzle bantams.  Right now we spend about $120 a month on poultry feed which is way too much.  They aren’t getting much pasture to eat because there isn’t anything growing.

 I have a red turkey sitting out by the pond under a thorny bush and I am hoping she gets to hatch her eggs.   The 3 babies the brown turkey hen hatched are doing well.  I still have the family locked up in a pen and the hen hates that.  I am going to move the pen into the chicken pasture and in a few more days let her out.  There are 3 baby chicks out there who have managed to survive with a hen just fine.

 I have chickens sitting everywhere, hens who shouldn’t want to sit, but even 2 Isa hens are sitting.  Two new duck nests are started inside by the hens laying boxes, I have one duck sitting in the back stall of the barn but I don’t know exactly what she is sitting on, chicken eggs, duck eggs or guinea eggs.  There is another nest out there that seems to be being shared by the remaining red turkey hen, and several chickens.

 My sweet corn is starting to tassel and I am out there every night watering it, trying to get a crop.  The farmer’s corn is rolling up in the fields and if we don’t get rain soon, there will be a poor corn crop and that’s going to really drive feed prices up.  The soybeans aren’t growing well either and it isn’t just in Lower Michigan where it’s dry.  There are a lot of states dry.  Even vegetable crops coming into the farmers market are getting scarce and pricy.

 I am seeing deer and turkeys out in the daytime searching for food and water.  Deer damage to watered ornamental plants has jumped.   Flocks of Canada geese are searching for food and new water holes. The wild birds pile up at the bird bath and they are missing many fruit crops they normally feed on. Everyone should pray for rain.  And maybe I should go buy some more hay and leave it out.