A Big Project, A Crisis At Dusk

I've needed to trim the apple trees for a long time, but it began to look urgent as they increasingly rested on the electric wire which feeds my property. I began cutting big limbs which were dead, shading smaller trees or hanging on the electric wire. I had a lot of chainsaw trouble and had to sharpen it a few times.

  I also climbed up on a ladder on my porch and trimmed a number of big cedar limbs which had grown so heavy and low that I could no longer see out over the south field from my porch. This photo was taken when only  a part of the limbs were on the ground - there were many more:


 I was filling the tractor bucket with limbs and driving them across the gravel road and the north field, then dumping them on the brush pile in the woods. It involved more chainsaw trouble, but I got the yard cleaned up, the electric wire looking safer and the porch again receiving sunshine:

 I hauled eight bucket loads of limbs to the brush pile beyond the north field. Then I made sure the gates were closed in case I get to bring the cows into that field again this year:

 Once the limbs were off the lawn, I saw a few apples and pears, which I collected and then took out into the south field to give to the cattle and horses:

 It was almost dusk, so the following photos are not as clear as I'd wish, but the first thing I saw was that Rosella had a snout full of porcupine quills. These are big, easily frightened animals and I didn't know how I'd ever be able to remove the quills. I called the vet, who said he'd come out after dark if I could get someone to put her down with a tranquilizer gun:

 I knew a neighbor had a tranquilizer gun, so I gave him a call. He was trucking cattle at the time but was nearby and came right over. He shot her in the right shoulder and then left to finish his cattle delivery, promising to be back as soon as possible:

 Rosella took it calmly, but it took ten minutes for her to start to nod:

 At about 15 minutes, she went down. I put the pesky horses in the barn and brought out a bucket of tools to see how difficult the quills were going to be:

 The other cows were worried about Rosella and kept coming over to check on her. I was careful, lest they think I was hurting her and come after me - especially since it was rapidly getting dark. I managed to get all the quills out with pliers. When the neighbor returned, he checked and found one I'd missed. It took Rosella all night to fully recover, and even then it seemed to be painful for her to eat (but she continued to do so anyway). As of this writing, she appears to be someone painful but otherwise OK: