Derby and Chores

I think my days are getting better now. I actually got a few things done yesterday. Course there is always something to be done around here. I don't know what people mean when they sit and say they are bored, that is unknown to me. I have to keep a steady pace and not start to feel overwhelmed by all that needs to be done. I can only do so much in one day. I could take a lesson from Fern. He runs a real farm, and there is so much to do, way more than I have to do...but he manages to pace himself and not feel overwhelmed, at least that is what it seems like. Only so many hours in a day.

So what DID I get done. I will tell you what I got done. I raked out all the old hay in Derbys barn and put down fresh wheat straw. He was pulling it out of the bale while I was raking out the old, thinking I had brought him a treat. I think at first he was afraid I was going to tell him not to eat it. He would snatch a mouthful and back off, waiting for me to scold him. I told him it was alright that he could eat it if he wanted. Once I had it down as bedding he lost interest in it though.

The farrier came on Monday to trim. Says Derbys back feet look great, but he will always have that seedy toe on the front feet. As a result he is bearing some weight on the back of his front hooves...so he said he would see about shaping them up next time he came. When they put all the weight on the back half of the hoof it cant take that forever and begins to sort of spread out. I showed him the supplements I had been giving him and he said it couldnt hurt for him to have them but that usually hoof supplements were for horses that didnt have a good hard solid outer structure and that was something that Derby does have is solid hard hooves. But still he said it wouldnt hurt. Overall he said it is just going to be a matter of maintenance of his feet, taking special care to make them last as long as they can.

While I was talking to him we got to talking about the horses I saw at the fair. I asked him why some draft horse owners have their horses feet shaped square and some are traditional. He said when they are squared like that they tend to make a more dramatic "clop" and its showy to have that loud clop. He was right about that, you sure knew when they were coming. He said he shoed for the Budweiser horse team for a while before the team moved to Florida. He said draft horses feet are a lot of work but Budweiser sure did pay well. After the team left and moved to Florida they began giving people his name and telling them to use him that he did a great job. Pretty soon he was overwhelmed with business for doing draft horses feet. He didnt mind except he said for instance working on those eight Budweiser horses took a total of three days to do alone. So he had to back off from doing draft horses, it was just more than he could handle. So that was pretty interesting, and made me feel confident to have him as my farrier.

Well I sure did get sidetracked didnt I? ;) So after I got Derbys barn tended to I put fresh hay in all the nesting boxes for the chickens to lay their eggs in. Oh I found some eggs some of my old girls had been hiding on me...one bunch in the flower bed and when I went to pick up some siding laying against a fence I found another bunch. They were all old, you could tell when they clacked together they sounded hollow. I carefully picked them all up. I didnt want to break a one and have a stink bomb let loose!

The chicken house roosts inside needed replacing badly. Two boards had broken under the weight of all those chicken bodies...so I rounded up some heavy duty wood to replace the flimsy ones. I found the battery to the hand held circular saw dead, and the spare dead also, so I had to saw the ends off the boards by hand, what a job. After measuring and cutting I got all the boards in there and nailed in. Everyone seemed pleased with my work as many chicken rears were sitting on the roosts at dark.

So you see I am getting some things done. Oh and I finished mowing the back..yeah, that too. All this after cleaning up the house, doing laundry, dishes, and homeschooling. Thank goodness we had leftovers. I love leftovers, gives me more time to do the things I want or need to be doing.

Here are a couple of pictures of Derby enjoying his new bedding. He has actually been using it to lay in for now instead of his own personal toilet. ;)