All About Spring, Mud, and Such!
Winter is passing quickly, and the days are getting longer! Hi, Jake the Farm Dog, here, and I can hardly wait for spring to arrive in Alaska. You know what Wayne and Patti call Springtime? "Break-up!" I'm not sure why they call it that, though I have my suspicions. The warmer temperatures cause the snow to turn to ice, and the ice to a slick surface. Anyway, you should see Wayne trying to walk on it. When he falls, he lies there for a moment, checking to see if he "broke" anything. I think that is where the term "break-up" comes from.
Anyway, back to spring. New things are coming along. We will have new chicks by the end of March, and I have told the pair of geese and the three ducks to get busy and start laying some eggs. The Icelandic sheep are about to lamb, and Wayne is going to be shearing the sheep this week. I can't seem to talk him into giving me one of the fleeces. I could really decorate the place up by shredding it, and scattering the clumps of wool here and there to give the place a more festive air. He's funny like that.
One thing I don't like about spring is the mud. I mean, don't get me wrong, I love mud for what it is designed for. You, know something to splash around in, and make marks on the porch with. But when I try to go in after a romp in the stuff, Patti yells, "Put that DOG in the entry way! He needs to stay there until he dries off!" I have tried to show her that I dry off better on the living room carpet, because it will soak the water out of the mud, and then the mud falls off, but she won't have it! And another thing that mud causes her to do is to start swearing that four letter word "bath"!
One thing about the mud is that it may not be good for our peonies. The repeated cylces of freezing and thawing that has dominated the last two winters, has caused problems. The water that thaws in the ice saturated soil gets trapped by the frozen soil beneath it. Instead of continuing to thaw, and then soaking into the ground the water remains around the peony roots. This can cause the peony plants to get what Wayne calls "wet feet". I didn't know that peony roots have feet to get wet, but I guess if they are exposed to too much saturated ground for too long of a period, first the feeder roots, and then the large roots may die from the lack of oxygen. Wayne and Patti mulched with straw last fall, so it remains to be seen if they have solved this problem.
I overheard Patti tell Wayne that the next thing on the docket for her is taxes. Whatever that is. She said something about "blood from a turnip". I didn't know turnips had blood! Dog! Am I learning things about peony feet and turnip blood! And all of this typing is getting me hungry. Well, that's all for now. I need to go find a snack. I wonder if Patti left any of that roast on the counter, I had some chicken taco caserole last night and was it delicious!