Ugh, still at it

[altivo]

It's 0°F/-18°C and headed down. Predicted low for tonight is -10°F

Our heating system is malfunctioning, the service guy will be here at 9 am tomorrow. Fortunately, it works, just not very well. Unfortunately, it's probably eating electricity like nobody's business. So I've pushed the thermostat down and am relying on the woodstove. That works, and there is sufficient wood. Unfortunately, it really warms one end of the house, while just keeping the other end from literally freezing. I think I'm taking my quilt and my plush pony to sleep on the sofa tonight.

It's the kind of weather where water in the animals' buckets freezes solid in a few hours. We have heated buckets where possible in order to prevent this, but some are not near a safe source of electricity. Those have rubber buckets or bowls. In order to refill them, you take the frozen bucket out to the side of our creek, which is also frozen now, and drop it from shoulder level. Hopefully that breaks up the ice a bit. Then you stomp on it and jump up and down on it until most of the ice is broken up and can be dumped out on the ground. Refill with water from the (now restored) freezeless hydrant in the nearest barn. The sheep don't seem to mind the cold, but they have wool coats three inches thick now. The horses have grown fuzzy, but not that fuzzy. The boys never seem to care much, but Tess is good at the reproachful looks. It's hard to explain to her that I don't control the temperature.

By Monday we are supposed to be back up to +40 degrees with rain. Neither extreme is appropriate for late January here. We should be about halfway between those. Time to be thinking about what I'm planting in the vegetable garden this spring, but it's too cold to even think about it right now.

Comments

[alaskawolf.livejournal.com]

damn i really hope you get your heat working fully again

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Fortunately we have the woodstove. It kept the average temperature in the house above 65F all last night, though I had to get up several times to add wood.

[linnaeus.livejournal.com]

Good luck, I hope that's working soon without much further hassle or expense.

I always wonder how horses cope with cold weather. I've never seen them *really* fuzzy, and I've seen them standing around outside on really cold days in the upper midwest in no apparent distress. Sure, they're large and should have an easier time holding on to body temperature than smaller critters, but (prehistoric New World origins notwithstanding), I thought modern horses were from the vicinity of Arabia, and I always marvel at how they can deal with cold temperatures.

I applaud your ability to read Tess, by the way. I don't have much experience with equines, but they all always look at least kind of reproachful to me. I'm not sure if it's the cast of the eyes, or just something I bring out in them.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Horse facial expressions, body language, and vocalizations are apparently quite readable by humans. I'm only a novice at it. Like any language, you learn by exposure more than anything else.

The thing about that long face is that most of it is bony and immobile. The expression is based on the mouth, which is very flexible and capable of fine movement, the eyes and eyebrows (the eyebrows are difficult to see except up close) and the ears, which can say quite a bit on their own. Tail position and posture, movements of the head and feet, and other such things add more detail. Tess is also extremely vocal and doesn't hesitate to tell me off when she is displeased. Females, you know. ;p

[kildoo-lonewolf.livejournal.com]

Maybe you should put a fan in your warmest room so to blow the heat to the other room of your house.

Also, you could put a piece of wood in your water buckets. It will help your animals to break the ice to drink. It should buy them a couple of hours more water for the same bucket.

If you give Tess a hot porridge, I am sure she will forgive you for the cold weather :D

I too hope that the weather will stop playing yo-yo like that.

Godspeed.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

We do use fans, and you're right, they make a difference.

The easiest thing for the water buckets is to dump and refill them two or more times during the daylight hours. Tess has an insulated bucket in her stall at night, and it holds the water from freezing usually all night, though in this weather what's left usually freezes by morning. Normally she has drunk most of it, though, so she's OK. She doesn't rush to the water when I turn her out.

The sheep are the ones who end up with frozen water most often, and it doesn't seem to bother them. I think they eat snow if they are thirsty. For less well insulated animals, that uses up body heat that they need. But a sheep has so much wool on it that cold doesn't matter at all it seems.

[saythename.livejournal.com]

*hugs Tess and whispers in her ear she nickers and then looks at you
with amusement*

"Hey, she liked the joke"

^_^

[altivo.livejournal.com]

I don't know if Tess has a sense of humor. The two boys do, though, for sure.

[saythename.livejournal.com]

*he whispers*

"two horses walk into a bar..."

^_^