100 Year Flood

As soon as Phil woke up, he suited up and drove the truck out of its mud trap. Amazing how easy it is when the ground is frozen solid (and, thus, solid!). Then he did the chores.

After breakfast, he changed the tire. He couldn’t find his hydraulic lift (the result of living a life with little storage space), so had to resort to the one included with the truck, which took a long time spinning. But he got the tire changed before lunch, and that was a huge load off his mind.



We walked down near the creek and saw that the creek had jumped the bank into the 100-Year Flood Plain. (In the photo above, you can see the line in the woods where the water came.)

So the rain on Sunday night WAS unusual. It was a 100-Year Flood. (On checked the Weather Underground website, I was shocked to see that we had just about two inches of rain, actually. This makes no sense to me, since our 5-gallon buckets in the middle of the yard were filled to four or six inches depth, but I suppose 5-gallon buckets are not official gauges, so we’ll go with the official reading.)



The waters have receded, leaving behind a scrubbed earth, with some leaves piled against obstacles like small downed trees. Moss and grasses poke greenly through the springy earth.



The shape of the river is new, with the banks denuded of vegetation and new gravel spits and sand deposits instead.

Phil loves it. “I love this land more every time I walk on it,” he said. That was a relief to me; with the land next door currently selling for less per acre than ours, I have second guessed our purchase at times, wondering if we were too hasty. (But what price can I put on neighbors like the Bessettes and Butch … and all the Bush clan?) So to hear Phil remain so pleased with our purchase is a great relief.

Thankfulness is becoming on anyone, I think.

Phil put up four more cattle panels this afternoon, after repositioning the last few he had put up. Then he hacked out the path for the next few panels; adjusted the new feeder he made for the sheep, cut Isaiah’s hair, and held B.B. the ram while I castrated him.

Real farmers use a knife to open the scrotum and pull the cords. I am not there yet. I had a hard enough time opening the elastrator and putting two rubber bands at the top of the scrotum. Supposedly, these bands will, over the next two weeks, cut off the blood supply until the scrotum falls off.