Hospitality, Friendship, Encouragement

Wednesday, November 19, 2014

Animal Husbandry: Winterizing the Animals

We returned home Tuesday evening from a quick trip to Monogahela for our beloved Aunt Mary Lou's funeral.  It was so good to be there with family, and to celebrate her life and express how blessed we all were to know and love her.  She would have been quietly pleased with it all.

We returned home after dark, in the deep cold.  We quickly unloaded the car, and Tim and Rachel put blankets on the horses and gave them their evening feed.



 Sandy


Both of these photos were taken several Novembers' ago.  They weren't blanketed yet, but this year they now are!
Cheyenne

We usually ease into winter but it has hit us with a fierceness (thank you Polar Vortex).  So the suddenness of the cold and that fact of being away means we will have to finish quickly work that we thought we had time to do.

Here is a brief list -

1. Put the light in the chicken coop.  We use a timer and it comes on during the coldest portion of the night.

2.  Put the heater in the horse trough.  This keeps the water from freezing and refreezing.




3. Restock the horse grain and chicken feed.  Even though they all range around eating in the pasture and for the chickens, all around the property, they need extra feed at this time of year.

All of the regular care for these animals as well as our dog and cat continue as usual.  We just need to do a few extras during the winter.

Do you have animals that live outside of your house?  What kinds of care do they get for winter where you live?

6 comments:

  1. We have a cat who lives outside. We'd love to have him inside, but he is a psychological wreck and, even though he has been on our property for SIX years, he will only come inside for brief times before he panics! Poor boy.

    Anyway, he does have a little house on our porch that we fill with soft, warm bedding when the weather gets cold.

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  2. The dog is spoiled and does his business on the deck in winter when there's lots of snow.
    Other than that, we take care of our feathered friends with 3 different feeders, suet and a heated bird bath.
    It must be hard to get away for any length of time on a farm without having to enlist the help of friends or neighbours.

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  3. We don't have any animals but I have family with horses! They make sure they are good and warm:) Have a blessed day dear friend! HUGS!

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  4. We have an indoor cat and no outside domestic animals. I do feed the squirrels from time to time. =D I am sure that there is a lot of work to keeping all the critters healthy and comfortable.

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  5. And didn't this cold weather come upon us way too quickly!

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  6. No animals around here in our suburban home. I can imagine they would take quite a lot of work, especially in the winter.

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