Cold Winter Touches The North Country

Of course I knew it was coming, yet still I was surprised to see the frost all over the Rugosa roses when I went out to do the morning chores:

 The leaves were frosted and the magenta buds were covered with icy crystals:

 Some of the flowers had wilted to the point of being unrecognizable:

 Fergus and Seamus watched me from their frosty yard as I began the morning chores:

There were only two open Daylilies left, and they were wilted and covered in ice:

 And the grass crunched underfoot as I walked to the barn:

 Sadly, the sunflowers, which had put on such a late season show, were done for the year:

 I walked the little horses out to their corral and discovered that their stock tank was covered in ice. Remy and Blue were not amused, but I figured it would melt once the sun was fully up:

The cattle were hungry and collected at the barn, demanding grain:

 I let them have some, then shooed them back outside as I carried hay to the horse corral. Most of the cattle followed me to the corral, hoping to steal that armload of hay. I guess they did not want to eat frozen grass:

 I tossed the hay in for the horses without giving the cattle any of it. Ruby knew what to do, and immediately went for a breakfast of warm milk:

Getting Cattle Inside The Barn

I need to get Scarlett, Rosella and their calves to start coming into the barn so I can have the two moms artificially inseminated again and so I can tattoo and sell the calves. I began by tempting them close to the barn with bowls of grain:

I don't care if the other cows eat any grain, but I decided to give them some if they come close enough:

Rosella and Scarlett are both producing large amounts of milk, so they are always hungry and ravenously eat any grain or hay they find:

Rosella was the bravest and the first to begin coming into the barn, returning to her former regular stall:

Then Jasmine, Rosella and Amy began coming into the barn. That giant on the right is Amy. She was smaller than the others when she arrived six years ago, seemed a bit oddly shaped and was sometimes bullied by the bigger cows. Now she's a giant, albeit with a docile personality:

Because Rosella couldn't reach the bowl on the floor as easily as the other cows, I made a little stand for her bowl of grain:

 Ruby and Scarlett in the rosy light of dawn, as they came in for a drink of water:

 Scarlett and Ruby by the salt lick and trace mineral feeders:

The girls became so accustomed to early morning grain that they often now come as a herd to the barn when they see me enter it:

 Jasmine, Amy and Rosella:

 Winston, Scarlett, Ruby, Violet:

 Winston has resisted coming into the barn, but he's getting closer:

The End Of Summer

The Red Poll cattle are looking happy and healthy:

 Little Ruby has not yet had her ear tattoos but she seems to know I'm a suspicious character so she hides behind her mother, Scarlett:

 And Scarlett usually hustles her away when I get too close:

 Blue and Remy are doing fine, but their Box Elder tree will drop its poisonous seeds any day now, and I will have to lock the horses in the barn until I get the seeds all cleaned up:

I walked into the barn one morning and found the two boys together in the hay, head to head and looking cute. It's apparent how attached they are to each other in spite of their quibbling and mischief:

 The sunflowers are almost finished. I've cut the tops out of many of them and others are going to seed already:

 Another photo of a Monarch butterfly in the Frans Hals Daylilies. It's ironic that the only place I can get a photo of a Monarch is on flowers of the same color:

 The littlest sunflowers, barely 6" tall:

I put the fantail pigeons on Craigslist, offering to sell 20 out of 43 of them. Alas, I've had no response, even after cutting the price in half:

 I took three vases of flowers to church, possibly the last of the season. This vase contained three colors of fragrant roses (orange, dark red and magenta), smallish sunflowers and red Mountain Maple leaves from the side of the road:

Blue and white wild Asters plus Birch leaves, all from the side of the road:

 Various colors of sunflowers plus red Mountain Maple leaves and Cattails from the side of the road:

The Red Poll Cattle

It's easy living for the red haired gals of Windswept Farm these days. The temperature has cooled and while there are still a lot of house flies, the biting flies seem to be disappearing:

 Rosella no longer keeps her calf by her side and he is free to roam anywhere he wants. She is ready to be artificially inseminated again and her calf, Winston, is ready to be sold - but first I need to get them into the barn when called. I'm working on luring them with grain:

 Jasmine and Winston were hanging out together near the gravel road:

 Gracie, Ruby and Scarlett were out near the neighbors' house:

Scarlett and Jasmine were by the stock tank. I also need to get Scarlett into the barn for grain so I can close the door on her and tattoo her calf's ears. Alas, her calf (Ruby) is getting big enough that I may need to get her locked in the barn instead. She's getting too big and too fast to catch when loose in the field:

 Jasmine and Rosella:

 Gracie, Violet, Winston. Winston is of course the smallest, but for this photo he was the closest:

 Scarlett and Ruby at mealtime - Jasmine in the background

Winston and Ruby were running and playing:

 Winston and Ruby again. They are playmates:

 Amy and Scarlett, with Ruby and Blue in the background:

A Peaceful Time Of Year

Our temperatures have been gradually getting cooler and we've had more rain. The Cliff Swallows and Redwing Blackbirds have disappeared, the Starlings are flocking and the Goldfinches suddenly seem to be everywhere. Blue and Remy continue to spend their days in the corral. I dare not let them out until almost all the green grass is gone lest they get laminitis (founder) again:

But they seem content, and all the extra handling they've gotten has them behaving beautifully:

The cattle are fat and contented, though the flies are a persistent problem:

Little Ruby is growing rapidly but Scarlett, her mom, is still swollen with more milk than the little one can drink. That won't last, though, as Ruby grows and wants more milk:

I planted Armenian Basket Flower seeds this spring but none came up. I waited a long time for them, then bought some half price Red Hot Poker roots to replace them. The four Red Hot Pokers came up, although I worried that they weren't hardy enough to endure our winters. Then one day I said, "Wait a minute - those aren't Red Hot Poker leaves." I looked online and discovered they were Armenian Basket Flower (AKA Giant Yellow Knapweed) leaves after all. Four of them were growing and one now seems to be sending up a flower stalk:

Some neighbors came to collect all my windfall apples (that 55 gallon drum was almost full, as were a number of pails and coolers). They will feed them to their pigs:

Flowers are almost done for the year, but I managed to put together three vases full to bring to church on Sunday. This one included mini-sunflowers, pink Rose Mallows and Tree Hydrangeas:

All sunflowers, but various colors. Someone from church had a death in the family the previous night, so these flowers went to him after the service:

Peony leaves (turning autumn red), various colors of Yarrow, blue Delphinium and Rugosa roses:

These baby fantail pigeons were not siblings, but they had found each other, established a friendship and slept together in a nest. I found it heart warming:

The flock is now so large that I will have to sell some as soon as the babies are all on their own: