There was still snow on the ground for my last blog entry, so I guess it's time for some updates. Summer has arrived to the North Country, and this year, it doesn't want to leave. Along with warm temperatures, we've had more rain than I've ever experienced anywhere, I think. It rained so much, I didn't water my garden for most of July and August. The mosquitoes are absolutely thriving, which makes being outside almost intolerable—unless you're covered head to toe. Not ideal for hot and muggy days.
Back in May, the dog van's transmission started giving me trouble on a visit to New Jersey. I brought it to a local specialist (shout out to Robbin's Transmission) and while it took a few months, I have it back now and it's driving great. I didn't get to take as many trips down to New Jersey, like I had hoped, but I did manage to spend Labor Day weekend with friends and family there.
My garden was a big success this year. I somehow ended up with about a dozen squash and zucchini plants (I swear I planted cucumbers, too, but none materialized) which spawned my "free veggie cart" idea. Growing my own food and sharing it has brought me a sense of community that was sorely needed, especially in these "Trying Times". I'm still getting tomatoes, peppers, and kale almost every day, but the bulk of the garden has run its course.
Last Christmas, I received a better canning system from my sister and her fiance, along with a vacuum sealer and a food dehydrator from my parents. Even with giving away a bunch of vegetables, I still have a surplus, so preservation is in full swing. My freezer is stocked with vacuum sealed zucchini, squash, carrots, string beans, snap peas, and sweet corn. I've got canned beets, peppers, and pickles in the pantry. I've dehydrated some peppers and tomatoes with varying degrees of success.
I only got a handful of potatoes from my grow bag experiment; I think next year I'll try another method. I grew six lovely pumpkins and a bunch of bird house gourds. It always seems when I plant a variety pack, I ultimately end up with mostly one thing, but I did get a single speckled swan neck gourd and some other weird green thing. Next year, I need to stagger my planting so I have the pumpkins and gourds later. I'm hoping they'll last until October, though. The wild blackberries didn't do well this year, it seems they preferred last year's drought to this summer's monsoon weather. When my parents visited, we picked about a jar full that I'll use for pancakes and smoothies.
We lost the other ISA Brown chicken (Cheese, of the Macaroni and Cheese duo) this summer. I noticed she stopped laying and had a few symptoms of various possible issues. I attempted to treat her and she was still eating and evading me up until her last day. I suspect she may have had cancer, which is common in high egg producing breeds. Since her sister died of heart failure (best guess) before reaching maturity, I suspect that whole brood was genetically compromised.
Oh, that reminds me, I don't think I mentioned the two new chickens that joined the flock this spring. I picked up Bread and Butter, a pair of Easter Eggers, from a farm about an hour away. After losing Macaroni, I knew I wanted another big-sized egg layer to join the flock (PJ and Jean lay tiny eggs and not very often). It's recommended to introduce at least two birds, as a singleton may get harassed, so I got two cream colored ladies who lay beautiful green and blue eggs. They integrated with the flock without much fuss, and have been happy and healthy ever since. Morticia and Frosty have been reliable layers, PJ is as cute as ever, and Jean has been "broody"; she needs to be moved from the nesting boxes pretty regularly. Poor thing just wants to be a mom!
As for the dogs, it’s been a long off season. Atlas, fitting his namesake, has grown to be my biggest Siberian—and he’s only 9-months-old. So far he’s been a delightful pup, able to keep up with my more dominant dogs but doesn’t start trouble and knows when to surrender. He had his first few runs in harness last month, and as expected, he’s a total natural.
Willow has had an interesting summer. I noticed she was losing chunks of hair (more than the usual summer coat blow), mainly around her neck and shoulders. Upon further investigation, I found skin irritation right where I had applied Advantix a day prior. I took her to the vet, and the best we could figure was that she developed a new allergy to the topical preventative and from there, developed a little infection. I’m sure her thick fur and the humid weather made a perfect breeding ground for whatever was going on, though it never seemed to bother her.
I spent the next two weeks or so giving her topical and oral antibiotics, along with a few medicated baths which she tolerated but very much loathed. Her skin cleared up, but then a new weird thing started happening. She would have these little episodes, usually at bed time, where she’d pant heavily and wouldn’t settle. They freaked me out, which seemed to only make her worse. One night I almost brought her to the emergency vet all the way in Ithaca, I was so worried. Except the moment I got the leash out, she became her usual happy-go-lucky, perky self. After a midnight walk around our trail, she did finally relax.
My vet ran lots of tests on her, but everything came back perfectly healthy and normal. Diagnosis was another guess, but we think it was a combination of anxiety (she had these episodes when we went upstairs, where the bath is) along with some gastric distress. She’s a notoriously fussy eater, and while on the antibiotic, she was even less enthusiastic about meals. I now have her on one or two Famotidine (Pepcid) pills a day, which seems to be helping with her acid belly issues.
I’ve also dealt with a couple fights between the dogs this off season. Everyone is luckily OK, but I’ve learned that adding more dogs means scaling and changing our existing procedures (this is a very project manager-y way to explain it). For example, I won’t release all ten dogs into the large play yard anymore. There are too many personality dynamics and opportunities for problems to pop up. I’m also enforcing strict crate rules whenever there’s food around (human or dog), to avoid resource related aggression. The learning continues.
Looking forward, our 2021-2022 season is just now beginning, and there are still a lot of unknowns. We’re still in a pandemic, but with vaccines available, races and events are being scheduled. There are some other challenges we’ll be working around as well, but I’ll write more on that later.
For now, happy end of summer, and cheers to the best time of year.
