72 Bales

I had quite a morning. Titus was telling me that Jewel was in season. Since we don't have electric fence around his paddock I let Jewel and Madiera out back into the pond pasture. Sure enough Jewel went right to the back of Valiant's paddock and started showing. Titus was so upset that those mares left he broke the chain going into the pond pasture and ran over to challenge Valiant. Silly boy Valiant is much to fierce to take on a two year old. The other mares came running out of the middle paddock to meet Jewel and Madiera and for a while it was chaos. 

Valiant was called up to the front and I was thrilled when he came. He was taken to the round pen. Titus followed the mares back into the middle paddock so I was able to catch him easily. The back gate was tied shut and he was put back in his paddock. Right away he saw Valiant in the round pen.

Above he is staring at Valiant and below he has turned around to stare at the mares.

Jewel was then taken over to the breeding stand and Evan covered her. She was put in with Rosaleigh and Irish and that paddock was given a new round bale. By the time all of that was over it was almost 7:30 am. No walk today, we met at the dumpster and went garage saleing instead. Diane drove Ruth and I, Joan went by herself and Rachel also went but with her husband  David and her grandson Brian. At one garage sale we all showed up at the same sale at the same time. David took the picture below.

I found a few church toys, a few toys for the barn and a couple of the door socks to keep the wind out of our house next winter. As Valiant was in the round pen Mark went right to work cleaning his paddock. He had almost finished by the time we got home from the garage sales.

The manure is scraped out and lime is put in.

Valiant got a new bale as did the Thoroughbred mares.

His paddock looks great now.

Bryan Sprout stopped by at 11:00 am to ask us if he could rake and bale the hay today as rain was now predicted for tomorrow. Of course we agreed. I left then for Sam's to pick up a couple items for mom's house and the rest of the Sunday meal. When I got back they had already raked one field and were starting on the field behind our barn.

It wasn't long after seeing the raking that he called to say they had started on baling as now we could get a shower tonight. At 1:00 pm Mark went out with the tractor to start moving the bales from the field by Joan's to the back of that field for transport as that field was finished. That field produced 22 bales. I went out to get in the skid steer and saw Berlica and Mike saddling up mares. They took Sally and Missy on the trails and ponied one of the Thoroughbred mares.

I was moving bales when I saw a doe running across the field. She stopped at the wooded part between the fields and then just stood there. I kept moving bales and the next trip there she was going back the way she came with a tiny fawn following. I did not take the phone in the skid steer as I didn't want to break it so no pictures but I watched them cross the entire field with that little fawn trying hard to keep up and the mom coming back over and over. They finally got to the edge of the field, the doe stopped and let the fawn nurse still out in the open. After a good drink they made their way into the woods. There were 50 bales on this field and for a while Mark was moving bales with his tractor and Mike was moving 2 at a time with his tractor while I was stacking. Soon Mark quit as his tractor got a flat tire and at 4:30 pm Mike had to quit.  I worked  until 6:15 pm and got the rest of the bales off the field and stacked. 

We started moving bales at 1:00 pm and finished at 6:15 but the hay is safe in the barn and looks and smells wonderful.

It is nice and green and still fine stemmed. It is such a good feeling to have hay put up for the coming winter.

I'm so thankful and praising God for providing again!