Pre-school Farm Tour and more...

Every year for many years, we have hosted school groups touring the farm. We started back in 1970, I think, when we lived the other side of Salem on 9 acres... with goats and horses and a donkey. We moved here in 1977 and have had mostly pre-school groups visiting every year since. This year the children were able to pet baby goats, horses, a llama and throw feathers in the air for swallows to catch and take to their gourd nests. I only managed to take a few photos, all of the children in the group I was leading. (We divided the kids into three groups.) I enlisted friends to help.

Here friend Mary supervises the baby goat petting area.

While waiting their turn to pet the baby goats, children fed the big goats willow branches that another friend, Matt, had cut for them. He was also responsible for taking them to pet big Mister McCoy, the livestock guardian dog. Matt's mom, Bev, was the goat area organizer, directing people to the goat petting area or the dog petting area.

I did not manage to take any photos of children petting horses, where yet another friend, Susan, was in charge of teaching them safe ways of approaching horses and supervising the petting and brushing. Many thanks to all of them plus friend and neighbor Claudia, who was the leader of one of the three groups of children.

The feather-throwing activity was a big hit, as always. The swallows enjoy it, too.

 Johnny was responsible for another group, plus the feather area, and helping the kids feed bamboo to the llama, although here it looks like my group is feeding bamboo to Johnny!

It was exhausting getting the farm ready for our young visitors but all went well and they had fun.

Although we have had light rain off and on, it did not rain much at all for the pre-school farm tour, or the next day, when I took some time to recover and take photos while it wasn't raining.

Mr. Smith is just visible at far left

Jessie Anne and Nightingale

Rhododendron in full bloom

Inside is colorful, too, with orchid cactus blooming in the jungle room...

And a mini orchid opening mini blooms in the kitchen...

And now it's back to weeding and bird surveys on the coast, once the rain stops again.

One of the other school related things we do here is donate Barn Owl pellets to two different teachers. One of them sent photos of the results recently. How cool are these??

Thank you, Mrs. Bachmeier's Newberg class!

Black Oystercatcher Survey Season

Portland Audubon is again sponsoring a 3 week population survey on the Oregon coast for Black Oystercatchers (BLOY), a  "species of concern". The survey started May 7, Tuesday. Johnny and I went to Road's End that day, as one or both of us have been doing since these surveys began in 2005, under USGS back then.

Two of the three pairs of BLOY that usually nest in that area were nesting. One was even in sight of our Observation Point atop "The Thumb". It was a hot day and the nesting bird spent quite a bit of time shading the egg instead of warming it up.

You can't beat the views on the Oregon Coast. This is from our Observation Point looking south with Lincoln City in the distance along the shore line.

 A pair of Bald Eagles hung around for the entire time we were there.

 Johnny was worried his knees would not handle the climb but he did just fine. It is great to have him back helping with BLOY surveys.

 From Road's End, we went to another of my survey areas near Neskowin. Unfortunately, the unsold lot from which I had access to an offshore nest has been sold and the owner doesn't like company.

So I tried to find another viewpoint of, at least, the eagle nest I also monitor there. No luck but I did find an interesting horizontal tree covered with ferns.

Next trip, I will try yet another access direction. Hope springs eternal...

Farm duties kept us busy the next day, but on the 9th, I trekked to Cascade Head for the very long hike into a former BLOY nest site there. I do have access permission from the Hebo Ranger District onto a road behind a locked gate. The trek at the end of the road is arduous but the view lovely. Unfortunately, there were no BLOY at the usual nest site on the big rock in the photo, or anywhere else.

 But there were lots of Sea Lions on the rocks below...

These four seemed to be doing some sort of water ballet...

The hike back up out of that area is very steep and exhausting. I always look forward to the Sitting Log, as I call it, part way up, where I rest and drink water and work up enthusiasm for the rest of the climb.

Meanwhile, Johnny was having his own adventure. That morning he had loaded a big trailer load of lumber to take up to Kevin and Jessica's chicken coop project at Traumhof, their dressage facility near Seattle. He left home about 10:30 a.m..

Johnny got as far as the middle of the bridge between Oregon and Washington when the van broke down. Many hours and phone calls to repair shops and efforts to figure out what was wrong later, he limped off the bridge and found a repair shop that fixed (replaced?) his water pump. He finally arrived at Traumhof after midnight.

I had left home at 10 a.m. and was home by 4:40, having rested while surveying for BLOY and enjoying sea lion antics... and on the Sitting Log on the way back out. Certainly a great improvement over sitting on a bridge with four lanes of traffic whizzing by trying to figure out how to fix the van and get out of there.

Now it's back to farm chores for me and chicken coop building for Johnny. Monday the BLOY adventures begin again.

Busy Days and Baby Goats

The two does due to kid in April did. Here are Bonnie Belle's surviving twins: Bella Donna and her golden brown wether brother... (a third kid was born dead)

And here are Cindy Lou's twin doelings, Lou Anne and Lou Ella

 They did not stay still for long so I asked Johnny to come hold them for a photo where I could see both of them. That was a challenge. Their mom stood watch over the squirming twins.

Most of my time in dry weather has been spent pruning the dead limbs off the lower trunks of the pine trees in the arboretum. Below is a "before" photo.

And then after limbs are off but still lying on the ground... hence still a fire hazard...

Johnny did much of the picking the limbs off the ground and loading them onto the tractor wagon...

And here is what the pine forest looks like now...

Johnny burned the huge pile of dead limbs in the middle of a field. As dry as the weather has turned now, burning season may end sooner than usual. For that reason, he also worked at getting the trees that came down this winter out of the woods along Agency Creek. In the process, he turned my primitive trails into major thoroughfares.

... with a seat carved out of a stump too big to move...

He transported them out of the woods into the horse field to be split for firewood and stacked in our wood shed. That can be done even after chainsaw use is shut down for fire season.

Today I started opening up old trails that grandkids and I made some years back. These trails have a long way to go to look like Johnny's super highways, but they're walkable. Sort of.

They start at the bridge Johnny made several years ago over the little creek. Yes, there really is a trail on the far side of this bridge. It turns right and disappears behind the bushes, but it's there!

Once a month, I still do my beached (dead) bird survey for COASST. For the last two months, Johnny has driven me there and then gone to survey eagle nests for a friend who has surveyed them for years but is now in Ohio caring for his 93 year old mother. We send him reports and photos. This month, no eagles were attending any nest so we don't know if the nests are not in use (one was attended by two eagles last month), failed, or just what. Johnny will check again next month during my beached bird survey. We did, however, see an eagle on its usual fishing perch across the Little Nestucca River.

It is on top of the flat-topped fir in the center of the photo below...

A little closer look...

... and closer...

...and closer still... (I love my Nikon Coolpix P90 camera)

... so long as I have it braced against the car window. It is a little too heavy for me to hold steady... or to carry a distance. All the other photos above were taken with my Panasonic Lumix which is light and okay for close-ups.

When not doing surveys on the coast or pruning pines or birthing goats or cutting trails, I'm weeding the garden... which may take all summer. I dumped horse manure everywhere for fertilizer and now I have grass everywhere. Johnny took a photo of me trying to liberate the blueberry bushes.

When I can talk a birding friend into it, I get some time off hiking them around the property and throwing feathers to the swallows for their nests. Here is friend Loree doing the feather tossing honors... (photo by Johnny with his camera)

Friends Dawn and Mary have also been here recently, enjoying the birds and our trails that Johnny cleared. One of these days I'd like to get them all here at the same time. They are all good birders and very much help at spotting and identifying our birds and wildflowers and wildlife.

Although we may pay for this warm, dry April weather later on, we are sure enjoying it now.