Bad blogger. Bad, bad blogger.
But I’m pretty good with the children, and I understand my cows better even than my vet, and feeding random stuff I find in the kitchen to the chickens is one of the highlights of my day. Also, my dog thinks I’m awesome and my prodigal cat came back, and she’s pretty fond of me, too, even going so far as to meet the van in driveway when we come home so she can twist and curl around my feet. The laundry is always clean and the dinners are pretty good and the floor is usually swept and other people know they’re welcome for a cup of coffee any old time at all.
So I guess being a bad blogger isn’t really the end of the world now, is it?
~*~
One of the things I have been working on this week is producing a hard cheese with no added cultures beyond what is naturally present in the milk. The best cheeses belong to a particular place and by trying to make for myself the cheeses that belong to other climates, other forages, other bacteria, I am fighting a losing battle. So I am trying to make a palatable cheese based on our own place. It should, if this works, be a perfect synthesis of our own animals, the weather, the grasses, the native germs, turning ordinary milk into a delicious food that goes well with crackers, and possibly tacos and pizza. 
~*~
There are R.O.U.Ses living in my chicken coop. I saw one yesterday when I went out – earlier than usual – to gather the last eggs of the day. They’ve been stealing eggs, too, not just chicken feed. I don’t know how to kill them without running the risk of killing the cats, too. Poison is out, for if the cats try to eat poisoned rats, we poison the cats, too. Rats, I’ve read, are suspicious, but whatever we try to trap them with has to be undercover because of the amount of dust and straw and mess they will encounter in the chicken coop. Rats are disgusting. Evil. Mice are bad, but nothing like rats.
~*~
I’ve been married to my soldier for seventeen years now, and at no point has time dragged on so slowly as these last few weeks in the Army. Five weeks left! But it might as well be an eternity. (Why, yes, I am a little dramatic.)
~*~
People keep asking me how terrible the change from military life to home-all-the-time civilian life is going to be. I didn’t know, honestly, until New Year’s Day. That was our anniversary, and we’d ditched the kids after Mass and gone out to lunch. While we waited for our food to arrive, Davey daydreamed aloud about working out in the back field, seeing me coming carrying a picnic basket, the two of us sharing a meal together on a sunny hillside with the tractor parked nearby. I knew right then that everything was going to be fine, because just a couple of mornings before, I’d had the same daydream. Yes, I really do believe that it’s all going to turn out just fine.
~*~
Hope you all have a lovely weekend. I’m going to email my sisters now about their upcoming visit. Only six months to go! 
Two songs: Big Green Tractor and She Thinks My Tractor’s Sexy. Every time they come on the radio, I will think of you and your soldier-turned-farmer.
I have an interesting book called Club the Bugs and Scare the Critters. It is all about dealing with various pests. Trapping is the best way to deal with mice/rats, it says. Gum drops, dried fruit and hot dogs work as bait for rats.
It lists 2 “poisons” that are not harmful to humans…but I’m not sure how it would work with pets. One contains barium carbonate, the other has you mix cormeal and dry cement…and a source of water. Will turn the rats stomach to cement.
Also suggests barn owls as great rat eaters (a family of 6 could eat 16 in one night) and suggests making nesting boxes.
Once you deal with the current problem, the book lists many plants that repel rodents: ground covers like Indian rock strawberry and creeping speedwell as well as flowers like daffodils and hyacinths. Not sure if either will work in the winter, but if it repels a burrow in the spring-fall, it might minimize the attraction when the plants are dormant.
If you think a lethal trap would be a risk to the chickens or the cats, you could get a non-lethal trap (we rented one for a groundhog problem from a local misc equipment rental company – caught possums instead of groundhogs).
I love this book, BTW. You might like it too.
To clarify, you don’t mix the water with the cornmeal mixture. It’s good if there is water nearby to quench their thirst, but it’s not as necessary. Eventually, they will drink something and the cement will set.
Rats are very smart. We had them in the house when you were little. They came for Uncle John’s dog pen area. We managed to trap one rat and nothing else. Rats unlike mice learn. They are strong also. They bent back the sheet metal on the stove to nest in the insulation there.
One morning there was a dusting of snow and daddy followed the rat tracks to see where they we getting in. He plugged the hole and followed the tracks back to the dog pens.
We have not had any rats since but the conjer up scary images. Ugh – I hate rats.
Our biggest problem here are shrew. They look like mice (face a little longer and ears bigger) and the are meat eaters. If we don’t catch the critter with peanut butter, we use a meat in the trap and usually catch the critters.
I love the cornmeal and cement remedy. Ingenuity is an amazing thing. If you know a path they are traveling and it is too small for other critters I would place the mixture in the “run” area. Rats only need 1/2 inch to get into an area and that is too small for the other critters on the farm.
TARGET PRACTICE also works. If you have a pellet gun, you can practice and hone your skills.
Love you,
Mommy
So when I read this…. I saw R.O.U.Ses and assumed that it was some sort of army designation for rats, which would be silly since it really doesn’t save letters. But maybe the army doesn’t care about that… Then I spoke to our mommy and she let me know it was a movie reference. Ahhh!!! lol I love that movie, too!
Love you!
No, it’s not the end of the world. I am also a bad blogger, and yet my laundry is still backed up and the floor needs to be swept badly. You are still welcome for coffee, but keep your shoes on because the legos will hurt.