The sun has finally made its way through the clouds and it looks like i have the day off today. I take the opportunity to explore the farm. But first, breakfast out in the sun. During my basking in the sun, i get my first peak at a real live gopher. (I had found a dead one.) It is pushing soil up in a mound around its hole. It pops its head up and down out of the hole. I can't figure out what it is really doing, other than digging a hole.... but, why? A hawk flies over and the gopher does not reappear. Finishing my granola, i head to see what the sheep are up too. On the way i see my first blue bird in the vine yard, mustards and calendula blooming a long a wall, and last falls coyote mellons dotting an irrigation ditch. Spring is well under way here.
I am almost to the sheep pen, when the snake, i was about to step on, warns me off. It looks like a rattle snake but i am not so good at identifing snakes. I watch as it slides away under the rocks and see that it does not have a rattle attached to the "none business" end. Looking it up, when i get back to my computer, i find out that it is a gopher snake. Every thing around here seems to center around the gophers.
I watch the sheep for a few hours, they really are beautiful creatures. They do poop and pee a lot...... theirs is supposed to be one of the better manures for gardens and farms. The sheep were going to be pastured in the olive orchard but when they decided the olive trees were just as tasty as the grass, that was the end of that. Maybe, when the trees get a little older, they can try again.
I watch the sheep for a few hours, they really are beautiful creatures. They do poop and pee a lot...... theirs is supposed to be one of the better manures for gardens and farms. The sheep were going to be pastured in the olive orchard but when they decided the olive trees were just as tasty as the grass, that was the end of that. Maybe, when the trees get a little older, they can try again.
