I Wonder What's on TV

Well, the fence repair and rebuilding continues, but I got the sheep and goats back out on my East Pasture last week. I am on my porch, and though I am supposed to be reporting to you folks how the food and farm are coming along, truthfully I am really watching "Sheep TV."

I have not had television in close to twenty years, and I was really only a sporadic watcher most of my life, with plenty of years without even a set to watch it on. I say this not as a claim to be some kind of an ascetic, with a holier than thou attitude, but merely as an explanation as to why I am so often blissfully unaware of "current events." (You know, like the fall of a civilization.) I do believe the word programming was chosen for a reason, and that so much of what we perceive as our culture for the past century or so has been dictated to us by whatever media we digest.

Like most everybody, I am guilty too. What starts out as looking up a new wire stretching method on youtube can lead to an hour of binge watching people with better gardens than I will ever get around to making.

But this evening, as I sway in my porch swing, my sheep are almost hidden in orchard grass and fescue up to their shoulders. Several orioles have been around singing all day, and the buzz of two tiny hummingbirds competes with both the buzz of a somewhat annoying fly hatch in the cat's bowl, and the "chanters and drones" of bumble bees playing a pibroch on the rhododendron blooms behind me.

The goats are easier to spot than the sheep as they reach up to clean the leaves off the lower branches of a large maple shade tree, seemingly oblivious to the robins singing their evening song and the flicker that has just left with his white "cottontail" flipping indignantly as he heads for the big oak below the old railroad tracks..

Suddenly an impromptu game of "Marco Polo" breaks out as lambs and ewes realize they are separated in the grass. Both sides are willing to call, but each is reluctant to head in the direction of the sound they no doubt hear, preferring to instead call out and wait for the other to come to them. My neighbors probably love this time of year.

There must be a wind above, as the maples in the grove are swaying pretty hard, but as of yet it is calm down here in the shelter of the river valley. I can hear a snap from one of the new electric fence wires I have strung, meaning I still have a short there, but with this now reduced, though hopefully improving, herd I have been lulled into a sense of security. They have been rather tame this spring, patiently waiting for me to repair the damage done by their predecessors, and quietly nibbling at my fingers as I try to splice wires.

I cannot say the same for the laying hens. They have been outside the fence several times a day, every day, while I get their new digs finished. This despite sightings of various chicken predators. This always leads to a great deal of hubbub as the alarm is sounded. Even after the all clear, there is a great deal of noisy gossip and complaining. Though the blame never seems to extend to themselves for extending their temporary boundaries.

All but one of the new meatbird coops are finished, and the layer coops are lacking only their tops and should be back on the pasture any day now... I guess... Then the gossip will certainly take another topic to bear.

But for now, an early crops of crickets are conspiring to make my eyes a bit heavy. Maybe I'll head in to bed and write the newsletter tomorrow.

Unless there's another special on Sheep TV.

P.S.: I must have drifted off before I sent this out... I didn't find out until this morning. That's why it's late. Don't you just hate it when you fall asleep in front of the TV instead of going to bed?