FAQ Friday, episode 2

Welcome to the second episode of FAQ Friday, where I'll answer the questions you've posed this week and tie up a few loose ends.

Early in the week, I was fretting about whether all the new plants sprouting across the ranch might be locoweed. Erring on the side of caution, I elected to build a new fence to isolate the boys from the prodigious patches of possible poison in the pasture. A few of you picked up on my fractured Scarlett O'Hara quote and guessed correctly that I was listening to "Gone With the Wind" while I was fencing.


Oh fiddle dee dee, indeed, because my worst fears have been confirmed. I'll spare you all the sordid details of my angst, but here is quick summary of the current situation:
1. All the questionable sprouts are locoweed.
2. Sprouts I hadn't questioned are poisonous as well. Nothing is ever as bad as it seems...sometimes it's worse.
3. The heretofore unquestioned sprouts were growing in the boys' newly fenced pasture. Meet our latest enemy:

Appropriate name, don't you think? This stuff is known to cause cyanide poisoning in cattle and sheep. Absent definitive information about its effect on horses and burros, I pulled every stinkin' sprout from the five acres where the boys are temporarily living.
4. My new best friend is a PhD and rangeland weed specialist in Artesia, New Mexico (I call him Dr. Weed).
5. My other new best friend is licensed to apply the controlled substance which will eradicate all this lovely greenery from the 7MSN (I call him Bubba).
6. Said spraying will commence as soon as the multi-gallons of herbicide are FedExed to Bubba.
7. Hank, George and Alan will have to get used to their temporary mini-pasture - it may be July before I am able to turn them out again.

So...
From C in Wi:
Q. Would Roundup kill the devil plants, or are there just too many of them?
A. No. Yes.

On to happier topics. So how about those chickens?

From Lynette:
Q. As soon as I saw "girls" in the title, I said YAY - the chickens! Happy foraging to them. You can tell them apart?
A. No.


Clara, Lorena and Peach look eggsactly alike. I'm determined to devise a method to identify them until such time that I can pick them out in a crowd by their personalities – perhaps differently colored nail polish, perhaps ID badges hung around their necks. Time will tell.

From Morning Bray Farm:
Q. Looks like the three of them tended to stick together. Did they?
A. You know how Fergus and Nigel or George and Alan or Bernard and Ellsworth are never more than an inch apart? It's like that.

From Sandra and Fantastyk Voyager and This DVM's Wife's Life:
Q. What about Deets and snakes and birds?
Q. How does Deets like them?
Q. But what about Deets? What will he think of them?
A. For now, Deets has absolutely no interest in the chickens, which baffles me. He doesn't step paw into the chicken yard. Experienced chicken-raisers have led me to believe that full-grown chickens and barn cats can peacefully co-exist. Until then, close supervision is our mantra. The chicken yard (formerly known as my garden) is adjacent to the house, so I'm hopeful that predatory birds and other varmints won't want to get too close to civilization and my girls.

Regarding the Prank in the Pasture...

From JaneK:
Q. Were you just completely cracking up as this whole thing unfolded....or were you a little nervous hoping that it didn't end with needing a call to the vet?
A. I could barely take those pictures because I was laughing so hard and smiling so big. As rambunctious as George and Alan can get, I never worry about them hurting each other. That's just not something they do. Amen.

And a final question to close out the week...

From Gazelle:
Q. Just wondering was there a post I missed that explained how the 7MSN was named ? I'm sure there's a story behind that name too.
A. Wayyyy back in the olden days of this blog, I wrote about the fairy tale that is my life. The answer to your question is at the end of Part 4.

That was fun. Thanks for your questions and all your comments this week. We'll be back next Friday with more answers, more explanations, and continuing updates to the locoweed saga. But I can't think about that right now. I'll go crazy. I'll think about that tomorrow.