Signs of Spring

Last week we could see wee leaves appearing on the trees. This week, they are really starting to pop as you can somewhat see through the fog (it was a great foggy Saturday). The oaks on the upper yard lose their leaves in autumn. After studying several leaves and referencing a couple of books, we believe these oaks to be Post Oaks. At the very least, we think they are in the White Oak family. We hope so any way. White Oaks are not as suspectible to oak wilt as the Red Oaks. These trees are just awesome and we would hate to lose them to the hideous oak wilt.

Last weekend, we converted a deer feeder left on the property to a bird feeder and the birds have discovered it. Essentially, this meant removing the corn feed and loading bird seed. I am not much of a fan of feeding deer, then stating that they are over-populated as an excuse to shoot them. Truthfully, we don't need corn to attract deer--they show up on their own accord. By the way, the fan is on very low speed so we don't hurt the birds. We miss the orioles, but look forward to their return on the next migration.


I continued my donkey and llama poo-scooping duties which is on the agenda every weekend. We are really starting to develop a small mound in the future garden area. Yes, I am including a picture of the dung hill. Some may consider it gross. I consider it part of nature.

This week, we finally caught Jasper braying on video. Actually, Sean caught him twice on video. The first video was of Jasper dashing out of the barn as Sean was approaching him. Jasper equates people in the barn with him as an anticipated "capture." I have included below a link to the video of Jasper braying. You can't really see him, but if you turn up the sound, hopefully you can hear him.


We also captured pics of what I am referring to as "llama wrestling." Joker is the white llama on the left, Titan is on the right. Jasper and the llamas seem to be getting along fairly well. I believe Jasper takes his guard duties seriously.