December 2, 2021

Every fall our farm is a stopover for migrating birds, which includes different species of hawks. Surrounded by shedding trees, there are countless perches and plenty of places to blend in for these sharp-eyed predators to patiently wait for prey – field mice, rabbits, small song birds, and of course, our chickens.

The assault starts with the arrival of Sharp Shinned hawks that go after the opportunistic house sparrows that nest in the “hay barn”, and help themselves to the chicken’s feed in and around the coop. It is not uncommon to see 10-20 sparrows perched on the coop, a few at a time darting down to the ground for some scratch or crumbles. Caught up in their daily routine of theft and rest, they lose their awareness of what is waiting along the perimeter of their chosen space.

Sharp Shinneds are so very fast! It only takes a few seconds for one to launch from its hidden perch, accelerate, and fly a few hundred feet, coming in with the force of its own speed, grab an unwary sparrow, and be gone. Sharp Shinneds are unbelievably efficient. It uses no unnecessary movement, no wasted energy. What must be thousands of subtle movements appear as only one swift action, happening in a blink of an eye!

Luckily for our chickens, the Sharp Shinned is a bit too small to be much of a threat. I am sure though, that if hungry enough, a sharp shin might try going after one. Usually though, the chickens lose their fear of them. Sometimes a chicken will come out of hiding and defend their coop if the hawk comes bulleting in.

Even so, when we begin seeing the Sharp Shinned hawks, we stop letting the girls free range and keep them in their coop. Experience has taught us that the Sharp Shinned is just one of our farm’s visitors during the hawk migration, and that we need to be wary of any shadows and silhouettes that appear across the farm’s landscape. Soon, we will be under the watchful eyes of Red Tails, Red Shouldereds, Coopers, and possibly others. All it takes is a small mistake or an unguarded instant to lose one of the girls to one of these stealthy, talented hunters.

One of our chickens confronts a Sharp Shined hawk in the coop

 

 

A Coopers hawk surveying the field

 

A Red Shouldered hawk patiently waiting

July 21, 2021

I have been thinking about how to write a tribute to Snoopie. It’s not easy to capture any life with words, and I am not sure it’s fair, as life is more about feelings and senses than it is about how letters are lined up on a page.

 

 

Hard to believe that we lost Snoopie.

I remember bringing her home – Kath driving, kids in the back seat, and me cradling her in my arms as we drove back home from the place where we got her. That was early summer of 2007. Snoops wasn’t “hand” or “people” raised. She was born in a field, a kid in a herd of brush goats, and more wild than tame. She never really changed. That wild streak pretty much came to define her.

As she grew older, she more or less came to represent the farm – an experience with Snoops could be unforgettable.

A cute, soft eyed, pile of soft white fur with her tail wagging like a friendly puppy wanting to be petted.

And then, “BANG”! In a split second, before one could even process what had happened, she’d have knocked the unsuspecting person in their knees. We would always warn people to beware, to not get too close, and not to get lulled into her space. She was something else - as if she had a plan – a devil in sheep’s, or rather, goat’s, clothing. Oh, she could be a terror!

But she could also be affectionate when she wanted to be. I can’t count the number of times when I would take a break from cleaning stalls out in the stable, and when I sat down, she’d come lie down next to me, as quiet and as calm and as warm hearted as could be. Looking up at me with soft brown eyes. It’s a side of her most never saw.  She reserved affection for very few, but for those she did, it was hard to forget, and sometimes harder to not have.

I could go into a lot of stories here – how she broke her horns, ate a few too many flowers, how she loved to butt the wheelbarrow, how well she got along with Lou and Pat, how Zips liked to chase her, how she liked to chase the chickens, liked to chase certain people…so much more.

How she always seemed to create some kind of chaos, and then recede back into the calm.  She could be the hurricane. She could be the eye. To be her weather person was always to be wrong – no one could ever predict what was coming.

That unpredictability is what I will miss most about her.

Her leaving also closes a chapter- but not the book. Lou, Zips, and Snoops were the first to come here, and now they are all gone. At least physically. Their energies and spirits are still here. Always will be. I can feel them here, still running in the fields. They are still our teachers, still helping us to grow.

I am not sad today. I am thankful. Just so lucky to have had these three come into our lives. We’ve been bitten, kicked, and butted…we’ve been licked, nuzzled, and kissed … we’ve been loved, unconditionally. And that in turn has taught us how to love. That’s something only animals can teach us. Humans can’t. Animals are always authentic.

Thanks Snoops. Thanks for being a part of our lives.

 

May 5, 2021

I had an “unexpected memory” the other day. I was walking a trail in the Pinelands with a hiking group when I happened upon a smaller type of snake that didn’t seem too concerned about our presence - it neither scurried away nor got defensive, but just slowly kept going along its way, undeterred. I was able to take a photograph – not the best, as I only had a macro lens and I don’t go chasing down snakes for their “best side”! I am not a “snake person”. They do fascinate me, but I only like to enjoy them at a distance.

I looked up the snake when I got home to see what kind it was, and found out that it was an eastern hognose snake, which brought back a chain of memories from when I was six or seven years old, a time when we lived up on the Janesville Pike in Tyrone, surrounded by farm fields and forests.

My mom was a city girl, brought up in New Haven, who’s weekend playground was nearby New York City.  She wasn’t much for corn stalks and wildlife as she was for skyscrapers and busy sidewalks.   

So, when my older brother came in the house exclaiming there was a snake out in the back yard, we were all ushered inside the house and not allowed to venture out. Danger, danger, danger! was orbiting throughout her mind! She must have immediately called the game warden, a friendly man named Joe Grimm, because he was soon knocking on the front door.

Next, I remember Mr. Grimm leading us kids out the back door, holding a forked stick in his hand. As we stood back, he walked over to the snake and began prodding it with the stick, pushing it to the side with the fork. The snake moved away slowly, but Mr. Grimm, with a quiet grin and a concentrated look on his face, was persistent in his efforts to annoy the snake.

The snake, continually prodded by Mr. Grimm’s deft use of the forked stick, finally gave up trying to move on. It wriggled a bit and rolled over on its back, offering its white belly to the warm afternoon sun.

We kids stood there stunned, to think that Mr. Grimm killed the snake, and so easily.

He turned to us and said “See, he’s just playing dead. This isn’t a rattler or a copperhead- it’s a plain ‘ol hognose snake. Harmless!” With that, he walked back to the house to let my mom know that we were all safe and that it wasn’t much to worry about. I remember that he was laughing a bit as he calmed my mother’s fears. After he left though, it did not much matter, as it was another three days before she let any of us kids outside of the house to play!

This memory began a cascade of others. There are so many. I can still remember the skinny dogwood tree that I would shimmy up to look down on the world – I can still feel the roughness of its dry bark and its leafy smell. I remember the time our dog came home shot in the chest, and lived through it. There was the day my sister and a friend went out to the cornfield and gathered corn silk to make “mop head” wigs so that they could look Paul and Ringo. In the back yard, there were peach and apple trees, more moss than grass, and a swing. The back yard was also where, along with my brothers, I learned how to play baseball and football. At times we would see herds of deer and more than once, a black bear. Across the dirt road that ran along the side of the property, was a pasture that held a few cows that were owned by the farmer who lived at the end of that very road. Along our driveway we had wild tiger lilies that attracted all kinds of butterflies that I would sometimes catch. I could keep going and list more memories that have come back to me from that time – there are so many! Maybe someday I will write the stories of some of them.

Its interesting how a chance encounter with a snake – a kind I hadn’t seen in the last fifty-six years  since Mr. Grimm was summoned to our house – could stir up so many memories. Maybe seeing the hognose wasn’t chance. Maybe it was the universe wanting to give me back a few pages of my story, ones that had been misplaced over time. I have to admit, I feel good to have them back again.