Canesister's 2025 journal - Bushel & Peck Farm

[canesisters]

Pine Knot Farms Hellebores

Our Fall Open House is just one week away! October 3 and 4 from 9am to 4pm we'll be open for shopping. We'll have our full array of Hellebore Cultivars and Seed Strains available along with a...

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Pine Knot Farms annual open house Oct 3 & 4!

Took a day off from mowing & farm chores and went to the open house with @Iron Cauldron Gardens .

They are only open to the public 2x a year - Feb & Oct. The last time I went was the spring sale & the greenhouses were open... dozens & dozens of varieties plus so many other shade loving plants, shrubs & trees. This time it was just the one building . I picked up a blue variety! Plus another 6-pack assortment & a tiny little trillium looking cutie.
I've just fallen in love with these little plants. Anything that can produce such bright cheery blooms in the dead of winter will always be welcome here
After we grabbed some lunch she gave me her best guess on the sexes of the mutt chicks. We agree that the one who is a carbon copy of Christopher Owen is a boy & probably the dark one that looks to have some gold lacing. Hopefully the other 4 are pullets.
Then loaded up Birdie's old dog house to be a goat house.
... now that i think about it, considering who I got it from, it was probably a goat house before.

 

[drstratton]

Took a day off from mowing & farm chores and went to the open house with @Iron Cauldron Gardens .

They are only open to the public 2x a year - Feb & Oct. The last time I went was the spring sale & the greenhouses were open... dozens & dozens of varieties plus so many other shade loving plants, shrubs & trees. This time it was just the one building . I picked up a blue variety! Plus another 6-pack assortment & a tiny little trillium looking cutie.
I've just fallen in love with these little plants. Anything that can produce such bright cheery blooms in the dead of winter will always be welcome here
After we grabbed some lunch she gave me her best guess on the sexes of the mutt chicks. We agree that the one who is a carbon copy of Christopher Owen is a boy & probably the dark one that looks to have some gold lacing. Hopefully the other 4 are pullets.
Then loaded up Birdie's old dog house to be a goat house.
... now that i think about it, considering who I got it from, it was probably a goat house before.

I wish I could find something that would bloom here in the winter. That would be lovely!

 

[fuzzi]

I wish I could find something that would bloom here in the winter. That would be lovely!

Camellias?

 

[drstratton]

Camellias?

I wish, those are so beautiful. Our winters are too cold for them and our summers are too hot.

 

[Baymule]

Crocus? I see pictures of them blooming in snow.

 

[drstratton]

Crocus? I see pictures of them blooming in snow.

Those come up in early Spring or I guess maybe late winter. I kind of forgot about those. I think we need to plant more.

 

[fuzzi]

Those come up in early Spring or I guess maybe late winter. I kind of forgot about those. I think we need to plant more.

Grape hyacinth

 

[drstratton]

Grape hyacinth

We have those too, they come up just after the Crocus, then the daffodils. I've never seen any of them bloom here when there is snow on the ground. But they are the earliest.

 

[canesisters]

Comments I've received on my most recent "questionable" decision:

Oh my god.... you are something else
Are you serious???? Why???
What's wrong with you?
Wait.... like a real, actual vulture?? Why?

Yesterday, around 5:30pm I was taking a load of trash to the dumpsters & passed something on the road. Honestly I couldn't tell if it was a trash bag, a re-tread come loose, or some kind of animal.
20mins later, on my way back home... it was still there. A buzzard of some kind, standing in the middle of my lane... soaked, drooping, not getting out of the way. I swerved & missed it. So did the car right behind me. I circled around - hit the emerg. flashers - got out and approached it. It made no attempt to leave... just hunkered there looking as miserable as a naked-headed soaking wet bird can.
I dropped my raincoat over it & scooped it up. It didn't struggle even a tiny bit. And it felt soooo thin.
I put it in the passenger side floor, cranked up the heat & pulled into a wide shoulder.
I googled 'wildlife rehabilitation near me' & spent the next hour leaving voicemails at every one of them plus a few animal control offices, and a couple of vets. Getting nowhere, I took it home and put it in a dog crate in the barn with large cardboard pieces to block the wind. It had started to look comfy in the car with the heat blowing on it & I felt bad that I didn't have a way to warm it in the barn.
Anyway, I continued to make calls and finally started getting responses around 9pm. By 11 I had Finally made contact with someone willing to attempt taking it. Message alerts kept coming in until well after 1am - people not able to help, but wanting to tell me that they hoped someone would.
This morning it was still alive & even hissed at me... weakly. I gave it a bowl of canned chicken in juice & an egg.
Around 10 the rehab lady finally responded to my message about it still being alive. She was heading my way.
I contacted Dad & explained that there was a sick vulture in my barn & a lady on her way to come get it. Could he please be up there around noon to meet her? No, he wouldn't have to do anything, just be there so she wouldn't feel weird going in my barn. Yes... a vulture.
Unfortunately, by the time she arrived it had died. Best guess is that it was a juvenile who was - for whatever reason - starving.

Almost everyone I told the story to couldn't belive I stopped to help a vulture. Some insisted I should've just left it in the road & let 'nature take it's course'. One said I should've sped up & 'put it out of its misery.... ha ha'.

But I can't help it. When faced with a helpless being who is suffering, I have to try and help.

 

[drstratton]

Comments I've received on my most recent "questionable" decision:

Oh my god.... you are something else
Are you serious???? Why???
What's wrong with you?
Wait.... like a real, actual vulture?? Why?

Yesterday, around 5:30pm I was taking a load of trash to the dumpsters & passed something on the road. Honestly I couldn't tell if it was a trash bag, a re-tread come loose, or some kind of animal.
20mins later, on my way back home... it was still there. A buzzard of some kind, standing in the middle of my lane... soaked, drooping, not getting out of the way. I swerved & missed it. So did the car right behind me. I circled around - hit the emerg. flashers - got out and approached it. It made no attempt to leave... just hunkered there looking as miserable as a naked-headed soaking wet bird can.
I dropped my raincoat over it & scooped it up. It didn't struggle even a tiny bit. And it felt soooo thin.
I put it in the passenger side floor, cranked up the heat & pulled into a wide shoulder.
I googled 'wildlife rehabilitation near me' & spent the next hour leaving voicemails at every one of them plus a few animal control offices, and a couple of vets. Getting nowhere, I took it home and put it in a dog crate in the barn with large cardboard pieces to block the wind. It had started to look comfy in the car with the heat blowing on it & I felt bad that I didn't have a way to warm it in the barn.
Anyway, I continued to make calls and finally started getting responses around 9pm. By 11 I had Finally made contact with someone willing to attempt taking it. Message alerts kept coming in until well after 1am - people not able to help, but wanting to tell me that they hoped someone would.
This morning it was still alive & even hissed at me... weakly. I gave it a bowl of canned chicken in juice & an egg.
Around 10 the rehab lady finally responded to my message about it still being alive. She was heading my way.
I contacted Dad & explained that there was a sick vulture in my barn & a lady on her way to come get it. Could he please be up there around noon to meet her? No, he wouldn't have to do anything, just be there so she wouldn't feel weird going in my barn. Yes... a vulture.
Unfortunately, by the time she arrived it had died. Best guess is that it was a juvenile who was - for whatever reason - starving.


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Almost everyone I told the story to couldn't belive I stopped to help a vulture. Some insisted I should've just left it in the road & let 'nature take it's course'. One said I should've sped up & 'put it out of its misery.... ha ha'.

But I can't help it. When faced with a helpless being who is suffering, I have to try and help.

I can't stand to see something suffer either. I have a feeling it was probably hit by a car and had internal injuries. You did the best you could for it.