Wet

A drizzly, joyous day last week! We have been having drought for months...so finally, this rain is a serious blessing, especially for the wildfires raging out of control in the region. Also, most of Gatlinburg burnt to the ground (except for the main street, which is ironic because that was the ugliest part). A sad night for thousands.

People may have been happy about the rain, but the donkeys weren't:

They do have a barn to go in, and in fact today (more rain) I fed them the ration balancer left over from Angel's stint with her poor baby before she died and then I tossed a bale of hay down into the stall where they can freely come and go. They munched for a while and enjoyed dry hay, as opposed to the now wet round hay bale in the field. I guess I need to build something to keep the round bales out of the elements in the future. Right now they are just covered with a tarp, to the left on this picture: 

So glad to see everything drinking up the water. I hope we don't lose the berry bushes, strawberry plants, garlic, rubarb, and any trees....I'm pretty sure the Jerusalem Artichokes didn't make it, but I'm leaving the tubers (whatever might be left) in the ground, hoping they will grow next year. Same with the berry bushes. You never know!

School stuff, but fascinating...

This is mostly a test ;) I want to see if this actually DOES embed the powerpoint into the post, since there isn't an "embed" button on my blogger dashboard that I can see...

A presentation about prions, the structure (not actually a microbe, oddly) responsible for mad cow disease and other diseases:   Prions, A Presentation

Here is the readings for the slides:

I'm going to talk about prions today. First off, there isn't really a consensus in the pronunciation - some say prions and some say "pree-ons" so sorry if I confuse you!

Prions are a misfolded protein found on many cell membranes, particularly nervous system tissue. we aren't sure exactly what is usually does. The normal configuration is referred to as PrPc (cellular). The misfolded configuration PrPsc (scrapie) where the structure alters from alpha helices into beta sheets that pack tightly together into amyeloid aggregates that disrupt the cell function and interfere with tissue function. The ends of the aggregates are fibrils, which contact adjoining prion proteins and trigger this post-translational rearrangement and add them to the aggregate.

Prion-based diseases are not curable and are fatal. Because of the affinity of the prion protein for neural tissue, the diseases are all neurodegenerative. Scrapie has been the bane of livestock farmers since at least the 1700’s, all they really knew was that it was incredibly infectious. Transmissible spongiform encephalopathy, or TSE, also known as mad cow disease, emerged in the 1980’s in Great Britain, where some infected sheep parts were rendered into cattle meal which infected the cows, and when the beef was eaten, it then infected people and eventually was strongly linked to sudden increased emergence of the variant Cruetzfeldt-Jakob disease. Chronic wasting disease, CWD, is the disease affecting

the cervid family – deer, moose, and elk. This was my research focus. There are also other prion based diseases.

CWD was first identified in Colorado in 1967 but now is found in 23 states and Canada, in

wild populations and deer farms. Like other prion-based diseases, CWD has an incubation

 time after infection from 18 months to over 20 years. During this phase, the deer may display muscle wasting, excessive salivation, and weight loss. Near the end, the acute clinical phase develops, asts around 2-6 months and includes hyper-excitibility, abnormal behavior, loss of bodily functions, and eventually death.

Transmission - Only cells that can express the PrP protein can become infected. Researchers have studied transmission routes. Plant leaves can become infected from direct contact with prions or plant root uptake from infected soil. After infection, even before the onset of the acute clinical phase, the deer shed infectious prion particles into the environment. Once death occurs, the body contains a large volume of infectious prions that can be carried to water sources via runoff, or contaminate the soil when the body decomposes. Contaminated water can also come from slaughtering facilities. Ecto-parasites such as certain fly larvae and mites can transmit prions from one species to another.

Holcomb et al, 2016, used computer modeling to determine the volume of shedding from infection until death from saliva, urine, and feces. it predicted that one lethal dose around 9 months post-infection increased drastically by 15 months, to over 10 lethal doses.

Prions are notoriously difficult to eradicate from surfaces or to disinfect tissue. The prion in tissue has found to still be viable at 600 degrees Celsius. And of course, removing plants, soil, water, and ecto-parasites from infected pasture, fields, or forests is almost impossible. The World Health Organization recommendations from 1997 only include “Variable or partially effective” methods. I assume if they had better suggestions, they would have updated this information.

But, there are researchers investigating prion treatments. Ding and his associates have done many ozone treatment studies. Because prions will bind to solid organic particles in water, gravity separation to remove these from wastewater, followed by ozone treatment, can neutralize the water to a safe level.  Marciniuk is investigating the possibility of developing vaccines for protein aggregate diseases and others that may be similar, including Alzheimer’s, Huntington’s, and Parkinson’s diseases. There are some challenges involved but they are hoping to use the misfolded protein as an antigen. Hou’s research that our immune system uses infectious aggregates very similar to prion-caused aggregates suggest that this kind of infectious protein may be more common in the natural world than we realize.

I would like to raise deer on my farm, that is why I wanted to research this disease, and there are some risks. Unknowingly buying infected breeding stock has the potential to transmit prions via ectoparasites to other animals on my farm or to nearby farms. If contaminated, the pastures would be unusable for any animals raised for consumption (by humans or other animals) for an unknown length of time. Another would be the possible contamination of slaughterhouse facilities and its wastewater, and inability to safely decontaminate them. And, disposal of bodies after death and loss of investment money.

hawk deterrant

I must protect the chickens! I've lost 2 to a brass balled hawk already! Although one he didn't get to eat, as I frightened him off.

Surprisingly he looked a tad bit smaller than my chickens. He's only eaten the smaller ones, so hopefully my big ones are safe. So I made a scarecrow of myself LOL!

And my boyfriend bought an owl statue, which freaks out my dogs! One in particular barks incessantly at it, good thing the owl will be living in the pasture, not the dog yard :)

and this morning was just beautiful, although my camera doesn't do it justice: 

Egg hunt

Finally! A huge pile of eggs from under the kiddie swimming pool propped up against the wall of the barn....

With daily checking, the piles are much smaller. And more edible. 

Some are even being deposited IN the coop:  

No, not the top left...that's a fake egg. You mean you can't see the ones I talking about? let's get closer, then: 

Still don't see them? Let me lie down on the straw and streeeeeeetch: 

Sometimes there are 3 or 4 in this hard to reach nest! Stinkers! ;)

Donkeys and a few chicken stories

Just because I love to look at them! Although it's surprisingly tough to get good donkey photos - almost as hard as getting good dog photos!

And Nina, my very favorite hen. She runs right up to me, talking to me in soft little clucks. She is also an odd one - for days now she sat on a nest in the barn, even at night a few times. I finally carried her down to the small coop, with her fake egg and the other egg (somebody else's egg!) and put them all in a nesting box. She chirped and squawked and ran off into the woods. Next day, she was sitting on the (now empty) nest again. CRAZY BIRD!!

And then there was Georgy Porgy, who began to tend towards some rather violent domestic abuse, cornering and then viciously pecking at hens who were not interested in sex. He tore the entire scalp off one; I had to put her down. I didn't see a chance of that healing up without infection in a barnyard, even assuming I could sew it up. The bones of her lower jaw were exposed and everything. It was gruesome. I wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt, wondered if it was an accident. Apparently, chickens have skin that easily tears. But I was out there a few days later when he was going after another one who had gotten herself stuck in a thicket. I hate to interfere in interactions of other species, and she was hard to get to in the brush. he finally pecked her unnecessarily quite a few times on the head and stalked off. I hauled her out, praying she wasn't dead. Or massively injured. Her comb was torn in two, she had lost a LOT of feathers on the back of her head, and she had some lesions through the skin right there, too, but the skin was primarily intact, so I let her go. And pondered what to do with George. 

I manged to sneak up on him later (all that nonconfrontational nearness paid off!) and snatched him up and threw him (literally) into the small coop, to protect the others, while I decided long term plans. His gorgeous coloring made him a lovely candidate for making babies - and some of the hens didn't mind him mounting. So after a week, I put a few hens in with him who I've seen he breed with in the past without difficulty. Unfortunately, it seems he liked being violent and mean, as he went after one of those hens, too. In the ensuing ruckus, the first hen escaped, terrified. I hauled him off the second hen before she was injured, and flopped him around by the feet for a while until she left the coop. So, the end of the story is that now I have just one rooster, Goldy Roo, who so far is quite a darling although wow he is huge! Photo coming soon, with a comparison hen near by. 

A Writer Who Is Channeling Me; or Why I Call Phyllis Schlafly the Spawn Of Satan

The article that restored my belief in the perception and courage of others:  http://ordinary-gentlemen.com/2016/09/07/hannity-before-there-was-hannity/

As for my own view of Schlafly....a few years ago, a brief 2-hour education in college about Phyllis Schlafly's activism and after watching an interview with her, shortly after she squashed the Equal Rights Amendment, told me everything I needed to know about her actual motivation and desires, and evoked in me a heartfelt scorn and condemnation. Pursuing fame and power without regard for one's actions, solely for acquiring fame and power and influence is despicable. Of course Schlafly didn't really think women had no place in the world as educated, political, influential citizens. She craved those things far greater than most women of her time, running for congress twice, killing the ERA, and in the interview I referenced above she stated, so proudly: "I showed them we [conservatives] could actually win." THAT is what she was proud to have done - won a battle. Made her mark. Become a part of history. Yet she herself was a poster child for the potential possessed by the hitherto "weaker sex" when educated and provided a voice - a powerful force (albeit in this case, sorely misguided and fame-seeking) who could, just as a man could, achieve results and effect change.

It's the hypocrisy that I despise. She used her privileged status and hard-won education (one assumes she surely didn't cheat her way all the way to her doctorate law degree) to try to keep the rest of the women of the United States, and by example, the rest of the world, as appropriate only as homebound, reproductive slaves, mentally unchallenged and financially dependent, legally enforced submissives, and not worthy of contributions to and equal status in society. She used the status quo and public opinion and rather dated ideas of the differences in gender to further her own agenda - the goal of being a worthwhile contribution herself, of being powerful, of becoming a well known name. What hubris infects a soul so badly that they are unable to admit the value of other people but feel themselves to be worthy of fame and not required to assume the lower places in society that they proclaim others should and must adhere to? My previous psychology studies evoke in my brain a murmur of sociopath but that may be too strong a word...yet she shared some rather uncomfortable behaviors that align with historical figures such as Adolf Hitler, Pol Pot, and Kim Jong-un.

In her latter years Schlafly spent her time crafting Conservapedia in response to Wikipedia. An example of her work is demonstrated here:

Liberal
A liberal is someone who craves an increase in government spending, power, and control, such asObamaCare. All liberals also support the censorship and denial of Christianity.^[1] Liberals who are a part of the secular left prefer the atheist religion over the Christian faith, as atheism has no objective morality to hinder their big government plans. ^[2] Increasingly, liberals side with the homosexual agenda, including homosexual "marriage". Liberals favor a welfare state where people receive endless entitlements without working.^[3] The liberal ideology has degenerated into economically unsound views and intolerant ideology. All liberals support, in knee-jerk fashion, the opposite of conservative principles, while lacking an actual ideology or values of their own^[4].

Anyone who uses the format "All ....(insert your most disliked group here)" demonstrates a lack of critical thinking and a refusal to admit any respect for the truth. 'Nuff said.

Cool lentil salad

Lentils are cheap and healthy, but I don't always want to eat them. Then after I found a recipe for toasted lentils, I threw this together in the kitchen. YUM!

Cook 1 cup of lentils with 3 cups of water (about 10-20 minutes, depending on the type and your preference for firmness). Let the cooked lentils sit in the fridge overnight if they are too mushy even after draining out any remaining liquid. The fridge will help dry them out a little bit so that this process works better. Or you can used canned, drained lentils. Which I didn't because I'm not sure I've ever even SEEN plain canned lentils in the store, But apparently somebody sells them, because the toasted lentil recipe used that!

Once you have somewhat dry, cooked lentils, put some olive oil in a pan (I used a nonstick pan for this, although I don't for much else other than scrambled eggs) on medium to medium to low heat, and add a small portion of the lentils. 

Let them toast slowly, breaking up the clumps until you have somewhat dry, toasted, small clumps of lentils. I am wondering if making a large, thin patty and frying that up would be easier or more effective? I might try that next time....

Don't forget to add a little seasoning! I put salt, garlic powder, and white pepper into mine ;)

Once parts of the lentils have browned, put them in a bowl. Add diced cucumber, halved cherry tomatoes (although mine are more pea-sized since the cherry tomato plant in the front yard is on its last legs), chopped rocket, and feta cheese. 

I also added a splash of olive oil and balsamic vinegar, and then a couple turns of the salt grinder with sea salt in it. I love it! *But (required disclaimer) for someone unaccustomed to more healthful eating, it might be a drastic taste difference from burgers and potato salad! 

and the donkey farm begins...

Loki! 

The newest member of the pasture!

He's not sure if he's comfortable here yet. 

He needs a good brushing

but he won't stand still enough for the whole thing yet. 

Angel just paces. 

She isn't happy with Loki right now. 

She wants a boyfriend! ;)

a day of sadness

Cookie passed away in the night. She looked like she just fell asleep for good. Poor momma Angel is running all over, knowing she has lost something.

:(

The vet hospital

On June 12 the two donkeys I bought arrived on the farm - a jenny and her 1 1/2 week old baby girl! I named the baby Cookie, because she is so sweet, and the mama Angel. My neighbor has two full size donkey females and just got a mini (really mini!) 7 month old full male donkey. He's not even full grown but he wants us to know he is a stallion and ready to mate 'cause he brays all the time! Also, he is enthralled with my new donkey girl. He follows her along the fence line and cries piteously when she walks away from the fence. His name is Charlie - thus her name Charlie's Angel ;)

They were here less than a week when I started to suspect Cookie was not doing well. It was a killer hot week, usually into the 90's all day, without a drop of rain. Long story short after a frustrating day trying to find a horse doctor that would call me back, I ended up driving her to UT Veterinary Hospital on Sunday night. My son rode in the back of the pickup with her head in his lap and my neighbor stuck around my place for a little to make sure Angel didn't bust through the fence after us. That was June 19. The on call vet that night said she probably wouldn't have lasted the night. They put her on IV fluids and tested her blood with just a very basic panel - super high liver enzymes, really low pH, and electrolytes all out of whack. The next morning she was still alive so they asked if I could bring Angel in. She really needed to be nursed! Poor girl, her baby taken away and her udder tight with milk! I tried to milk her some but holy cow her milk comes out in tiny amounts! No way could I milk her dry.

By today, June 22, her electrolytes are about normal, pH is normal, liver enzymes are almost back down to normal. She still looks ghastly, not moving much but she will dart over to mom for nursing when she is unhooked from the IV and put in Angel's adjoining stall. Once she is back in her own area, though, she mostly just stands, staring at nothing, or lies down to nap, I guess.

I'm still deciding how much money (credit card)  I will spend on this almost -free (HA!) donkey, but I do feel she deserves a chance. I couldn't just let her lie there and die....

awesomeness of photos

Just WOW

http://flickrhivemind.net/flickr_hvmnd.cgi?method=GET&sorting=Interestingness&photo_type=250&page=2&noform=1&search_domain=Interestingness&photo_number=50&sort=Interestingness&tag_mode=all&textinput=2016-06-04&search_type=Interestingness

enjoy!

Chick growth by the week

I figured the chicks were probably born some time April 4, spent April 5 in transit, then arrived at my post office branch at 3:30 a.m. April 6. The first week I kept them in two Rubbermaid-type totes with wood shavings topped by some newspaper. The larger babies were quickly kind of squished in that so an emergency project was called for.

Week one:

I fabricated a 33-inch by 4-foot (sort of) cardboard box with duct tape that didn't actually stick to the cardboard very well. The box will probably fall apart quickly but at least for the time being, they were contained safely as we worked on the new chicken baby enclosure in one of the haylofts out in the barn. 

Week two and the homemade box:  

End of Week four:

Goldie has yellow feathers on her legs - I don't know what breed she is. This must be the "free, exotic chick" included in my hatchery order LOL!

this one with the pompadour is Elvis!

Weeks 5 or 6, something like that:

The move out to the new coop shed! 

Finally, pix from today, May 24 - almost 2 months old: