Renee's First Radio Program

Very exciting news here at Crossed Sabers!  I have been invited to be a guest on a radio talk show called Defensive Logic. I'll be talking about the importance of becoming more self-reliant/self-sufficient as well as some of my experiences turning Crossed Sabers Ranch into a working homestead.

The show will air on Saturday, July 19th from 9:00 AM until 11:00 AM Mountain time. 

If you are local to Colorado Springs, CO, you can find the show on FM 98.5 and AM 1040.

Otherwise, you can find the program streaming live online at:

I25talk

My segment will start at approximately 9:30 AM Mountain time and run for about the next hour.

I would love it if you tuned in to the show!  I'd especially love it if you tuned in and then called the show to add your ideas, thoughts, and opinions.  

Wish me luck on my first ever radio talk show appearance!

Does a Bear Crap in the Woods?

Not always!

While I was feeding the horses in the morning, I noticed a bunch of crows (the collective noun for crows is a "murder". A murder of crows.) in our east pasture. They were fighting over something on the ground. 

I walked over to see what it was. It was this:

What's left of the leg of a deer. 

Then I saw this:

That's bear scat.

It's possible the two things are unrelated. Or maybe the bear found a road kill deer or one that died of natural causes. 

No matter how it happened, this is very close to my barn and corral. I took this picture below while standing at the corner of my barn. The red arrow points to where the bones and bear scat are located. 

You can't get a real sense of scale from the photo, but I'd say it was less than 50 yards from where I was standing to where the bones are. 

Makes me nervous for my horses, who live by the barn and spend a lot of time in that pasture! Where is this bear getting through my pasture fence, anyway? Or is it going over? Does electric fence deter bear? If it does, I should run some hot rope around my pastures...  

Digging Up Bones

Life is full of surprises. Life at Crossed Sabers Ranch is full to overflowing with surprises. I love it!

We sat on this bit of information for a while until we knew what we might have on our hands. What we have are some old bones.

Last month, while renovating the chicken coop, I was inside of it using a shovel to clean up the floor. Suddenly, the shovel hit something solid. Wood. Interesting. Did the coop have a wooden floor? Was it just a hunk of old plank? This was back when Richard was here helping us with the coop. I called him in, since G.W. was away on a supply run. 

After a bit of scraping, a curved edge appeared. A circle!

What on earth? A well or cistern cover? It's right in the middle of the chicken coop. 

I've got to tell you, I read far too much. And I read Stephen King and Dean Koontz so you know where my mind was going with this wooden circle. I was already imagining psychotic clowns coming out of the hole that this was covering up. Or giant alien insects who will invade our minds and gradually turn our physical bodies into them! Or this is an old graveyard and the zombies are coming, or the ghost of an Indian Medicine Man....Ahhhhhh!!!!! I'll never sleep again!

Some more scraping revealed a hole in the middle of this wooden what-ever-the-heck-it-is.

Richard popped the thing up. It's just a big, heavy wooden circle thing. I suddenly realized what it was. The end of a spool from wire or cable. Nothing odd or scary at all. Just something ordinary. Disappointing! 

What was under it? Dirt. Dirt that was different from the dirt around it because it was damp.  Oh jeepers creepers! I just know there's a clown under that dirt! 

Richard used the hori hori to dig around a little and a bone popped free. The hair on the back of my neck stood up. You wanna talk about being creeped out!  It wasn't the clown! It was the victim of the clown! Any second now and a bony hand will shoot up from the earth, grab me by the throat and drag me to my underground doom!

He dug a little more and another bone came up. Then another. We decided to stop digging at that point because we really didn't know what we had.

They were large and looked like vertebrae. The size led us to believe they were not human bones, but we didn't rule it completely out.

That's why we stopped digging. In the unlikely event they were human remains, we didn't want to dig anymore. It could be Jimmy Hoffa!  

Seriously though, in case they were human we didn't want to disturb the area. In my mind, instead of the freaky clown, I now was picturing CSI Colorado crawling all over the ranch. I imagined the big white tent with a crew sifting through the dirt from the chicken coop looking for more bones. Where would the chickens live while they were doing all of this?  Who would pay for alternate chicken housing? How would my horses react to news helicopters hovering low over the field? My mind works in very odd ways!

Through Richard, we sent the bones to the New Mexico Museum of Natural History. The initial exam showed them to be the bones of a large hoofed animal, possibly even a bison. The animal was definitely butchered. No word yet on how old they are, but they might be fairly old.  An expert associated with the museum is going to have a look and let us know what exactly we've got. 

But we know it's not human. And not an evil clown, or an alien insect. 

For now, we wait to hear back from the museum. It's probably some steer that was butchered 75 years ago. What ever it is, the rest of it is probably under my chicken coop. Weird.

Hay! It's Egg-strordinary! We've gone to the dogs!

I don't even know where to begin! In the last two weeks the kittens have doubled in size! They all have homes to go to when they are old enough. We got some of our hay delivered, the chickens started laying eggs and we got a dog. Whew!

The kittens are next to impossible to photograph with my point and shoot camera because they are NEVER still! They're maniacs I tell ya!  At seven weeks old, they run, jump and climb with no fear. They'll climb to the top of the draperies, then cry pitifully for help because they can't get down on their own. 

Fuzzy picture of kittens swinging from the curtains.

There are four girl kittens and one boy. 

The boy is going to be a house cat. His new people have named him Buckaroo. We used a white thread as a sort of collar to identify him.

We are keeping two of the girls for our barn and the other two girls are going to live in my farrier's barn. All of the kittens go to the barn with me every day. They play in the stalls while I work.

When I'm out working on projects around the place, I pack the kittens up and take them out with me. It's a lot like taking a human baby someplace. The carrier with the baby, the bag of supplies for the baby, the playpen for the baby....

Here's my cart loaded with tools, materials, kittens in their carrier and all of the kitten supplies. We're going to work in the chicken coop.

I set up their playpen beside the coop. My project was installing a couple of nest boxes.

Three days ago, I discovered two eggs on the floor of the chicken coop! Surprise! I didn't think the girls would be old enough to lay until September! I didn't have the nest boxes up yet.

I'm trying a couple of types of nest boxes. The two I quickly installed are repurposed cat litter containers. 

The shelf-type nest boxes are what was already in the coop. I'm using them as the base for the nest boxes I want to use.

 Here are the two kitty litter containers. I used one screw through the back of them to secure them to the wall.

 To keep the chickens from sitting on top of the nest boxes and pooping all over them, I've leaned some scraps of plywood on them. The slope is too steep to allow them up there. 

 I'm using pine shavings in the boxes. 

I'm going to use a couple of plastic milk crates for nest boxes and also maybe some 5-gal buckets or storage totes, too. It's kind of an experiment to see what the girls prefer. I'll see which box type has the eggs in it most often. Then I can convert and use that type for all of the nests.

Then we got three tons of hay delivered. Our supplier is Hay Now Colorado. Kirk and Karina are also our farriers. We love them!  They have a skidsteer which makes unloading a breeze!

This is the first of several hay deliveries for us. We ordered twelve tons which will be enough for the next year or so. 

But the really big, exciting, wonderful news is that we got a dog! 

I'd like to introduce you to Makarov

Mak is a Great Pyrenees/St. Bernard mix. At 94 pounds, he's not quite big enough to saddle and ride, but I'll bet he could pull a cart.  He comes up to my hip!  He's a Livestock Guardian Dog and believe me, he knows his business!  He's not aggressive, but he is territorial. I've seen him in action when he spotted two red tail fox heading toward the chicken coop. All it took for Mak to deter the fox was a deep, rumbling growl. Those fox beat feet in a big, big hurry. Yay, Mak!

Some friends of ours gave Mak to us. We are so happy to have him! I'd been praying for a good guardian dog to protect my chickens.

On Sunday, we are having a contractor install underground, radio fence around seven of our acres for Mak. He'll have the freedom to run around both pastures, the barns, plus the house and yard.  

Every day seems to bring a new adventure for us!  No such thing as a boring day at Crossed Sabers Ranch!

Kittens!

I think that one corner of our garage is destined to have a box with baby animals. No sooner did I get the brooder box out of there when I had to set up the storage tub that used to be the Little Deuce Coop to house four orphan kittens.

Yup....cutest little things you'll ever see!

Four days ago, G.W. and I, on different occasions, found one or more of these very small babies out alone, wandering around a neighbor's house and barn. They were crying loudly, which is what alerted us to them. No mama cat in sight. They're too little to be out unsupervised and were so vulnerable to a fox or crow. 

Three days ago, when I heard them crying again, I called a different neighbor (Maria) about them. She told us that a feral/barn cat had had a litter in the first neighbor's barn. She hadn't seen the mama cat in several days and was worried something had killed it.

Yesterday afternoon, when the tiny kittens were still alone, still crying frantically, and now in dire danger of either starvation or being killed by a predator, Maria and I took action. 

We spent hours crawling around some guy's junk-filled barn trying to round up the kittens. I don't want to think about what I must have been laying in while trying to reach into small spaces to get the babies. They were afraid of us and would dart around and hide in every inaccessible spot. 

We moved slowly when we could and with as much patience as we could muster considering the hot, dirty, icky conditions. 

They look to be maybe four weeks old. They're so thin you can feel all of their little bones. 

Last year, Maria had taken in seven kittens from a different feral cat. She said her husband would kill her if she brought in more, so I brought these little guys home. I knew G.W. would be OK with this, since he was as worried about the little ones as I was!

Over a period of a few hours, I gave them small servings of milk replacer. They were so hungry they practically attacked the bottle, but since they may have gone without food for three or four days, I kept each meal very small. They're so little they fit in the palm of my hand!

It didn't take them long to catch on to drinking their milk from a teaspoon, and then from a saucer. 

I used the brooder lamp from the chicks to help keep these darlings warm. They don't have much weight to them and I didn't want them to get chilled. They've been through so much already.

Yesterday evening, G.W. and I went to the Pike's Peak or Bust rodeo. I left early to feed the babies again. When I got home and looked into the tub, there was only one kitten in there! Crap! Who'd have thought they could jump that high! 

An hour later and after tearing apart the garage, I found the three missing babies. You can't imagine the places they found to hide in! Everybody was fine, thankfully!

This morning, they are doing well. They're eating canned kitten food from a saucer in addition to their milk replacer.

 All four are active although one is much more shy than the others. 

This is not the shy one!

I may have found a home for one, possibly two of these adorable little faces!  

For now, the babies will stay in the garage. Our house cat Piper wanted nothing to do with them. Our barn cat Elizabeth hissed and spit at them, too. 

They're going to outgrow their storage tub home very quickly. Does anyone near Denver or Colorado Springs have a really big box, like from a washer or dryer that I could have? They'll climb out of one of those doggie play pens, so what ever they're in needs to have high, smooth sides and/or a secure cover. 

I know I promised a post to introduce you to my flock of chickens. I haven't forgotten! I'll do my best to get that posted by Sunday. And I'll post lots more adorable kitten photos, too! 

Bye for now!

It's a wild life out here!

Between wildlife and wild weather, every day out here is an adventure! 

Hail storms are common. This one lasted more than 20 minutes and left the ground looking like we had accumulating snow.

 The pea-size hail didn't damage any of the plants in the garden, luckily.  So far, all of the hail I've seen has been small like this. Anything larger and the garden would have been a total loss!

I'd been seeing this guy and his wife hunting in the yard and garden for a few days. I finally got a fuzzy photo. (I should learn to have the camera with me AT ALL TIMES) He's a Spotted Towhee.

I've looked for a nest, which is supposed to be largish and low to the ground, but haven't found it yet.

About a week ago, I had an amazing wildlife encounter. While working in the garden, I turned around to find a beautiful silver fox just 30 feet away. It was sniffing around in the grass right next to our deck. About the time I realized I didn't have the camera with me (of course!) a red fox came out of the trees. The two fox stared at each other for several seconds, then the silver one chased the red one away. 

Since then, I've seen the silver fox at a distance. Then a few days ago I saw it again and this time, I had the camera. Can you spot him in this photo?

It was hunting the squirrels that live in the old cabin. 

I love seeing the fox around. However, I am pretty sure my attitude towards it is going to change in a month or so. Why? Because I have fourteen baby Golden Laced Cochin chickens in a brooder box in the garage. Once they feather out, they'll be living in the chicken coop. That fox is going to do everything it can to make a meal out of them. 

The chickens? Oh yes, I forgot to tell you about the chickens.  I'll leave that for the next post. Come back tomorrow and I'll introduce you to them.

Don't fence me in!

Another HUGE project was replacing some fence in the east pasture. The existing fence was leaning badly.

It was leaning so much that we were afraid the horses would try to step over or through it and get hurt. We ran some temporary hot rope fencing and T-posts to make it safe to turn the boys out into the pasture.

With the help of our dear friend Richard, we set about replacing this whole 300 foot section of fence. Eventually, we'll replace all of our perimeter fencing. We'll do it one section at a time, because of the time and expense of installing a wood fence like we're doing. 

Here they are pulling up the old posts. The Bobcat sure makes the task easy! That's G.W. in the driver's seat and Richard on the ground. 

Wrap the chain around the post and pull!

Easy peasy...if you have a Bobcat and a couple of guys who know what they're doing.

Here is some video of the process.  

Richard setting the new posts...

We're using 6" x 6" eight foot long treated lumber posts. They're sunk three feet into the ground. Solid!

For the horizontals, we're using a unique material...lumber reclaimed from wooden snow fence. The good folks at Repurposed Materials in Denver carry it. By using this reclaimed material, we're keeping it out of a landfill and saving ourselves quite a bit of money over the cost of new lumber. It's a win-win situation!

I've mentioned Repurposed Materials here before. It's where I got the billboards I'm using to cover my hay bales. 

The wood pieces are eight feet long and probably an inch and a half to two inches thick. It's heavy, solid and perfect for our fence.

You can see the holes from the bolts from the snow fence as well as the sun bleaching on the wood. Neither of those things bother us. The wood has a nice gray weathered color which fits in perfectly with our old homestead outbuildings.

In this up-close photo, you can see both the holes and the bleaching. 

Here's a series of photos showing the progress G.W. and Richard made over two and a half days.

 Yes, I had a small part in this, too. My job was to check the reclaimed wood for any stray nails and then measure and sort the boards by length. I had several categories..."8 feet", "between 8' and 8' 1/4"", "between 8' 1/4" and 8' 1/2"" and "unusable for the fence". 

The wood we couldn't use for the fence because it might have had a split or been too short will be saved for other uses, like repairing the chicken coop. 

 And, four days after they started, here's the finished fence! 

They've even built in a section for a gate. (We'll do the gate at some point in the future). This fence line is on the border of our property and the public open space. It'll be nice to have a gate for easy access to ride the horses out into the open space, but we need to have a strong and lockable gate to keep people out.

The section on the left is for the gate.

We're very happy with the finished fence. The weathered boards make it look like it's been there for a long time. At five feet tall, it's safe for the horses and is very solid!  

It was extremely hard, dirty work! G.W. and Richard did an outstanding job.  And just think, guys, there's only about 2,000 feet more to replace!