Weed was my best friend ever. She shared every aspect of my life with full gusto and keen intensity.  

Gopher trapping was exuberant adventuring. Weed knew where all 30 traps were located and dashed ahead to check each and every one of them and signal excitedly at each catch. She would have warned me about the rattlesnake surprise on today's route. Instead, I shrieked and leaped from a high writhing strike. The remainder of my path, from trap to trap, hole to hole, was a plod without Weed's joyous companionship.

Corralling ewes and lambs each evening used to be a favorite. I opened the gate, Weed swept wide, and the sheep headed in--no questions, no panic, no disobedience. Oh sure, occasionally half a dozen naughty lambs opted for freedom, squirting off in opposition to the flow. Those were moments Weed cherished, opportunities to test her savvy and show off her skills. Now I go forth armed with a rattle paddle. The ewes take note of me, listen, make preliminary moves toward the corral and then casually ignore me. I cut back and forth, shake my noisemaker, threaten them with whoops, and dread this late-day routine without Weed's eager and efficient command of the job.

Even private moments--sitting on the throne, for God's sake--Weed shared with me. She insisted on an open door policy, guests be dammed, and locked her Border Collie "strong eyes" on me. Of course, that look is intended for controlling livestock. Ha! She used hers to impose her will on me and make sure that I did not read while perched atop the best reading chair in the house. She knew that The Economist news magazine was flaming liberal fake news or a commie pinko rag, and she distracted me from it, protected me from it. Now, I am free to read it cover to cover, but it's hard to read while weeping.

My joyous, purposeful, little dumpster dog was fearless around kicking cows, charging rams, and fierce ewes, but she was afraid of thunder and gun shots. Saturday morning, while helping Jim feed cows, she heard a neighbor shooting gophers and sought safety under the tractor.    

Without her accompaniment, every step I take feels flat; without her assistance, every task I undertake is arduous; without her joy, my life seems dull. Her appalling death, crushed under the tractor, haunts me. Without her, I am desolate and so lonely. 

Early season snakes on Prairie Island are less precocious than our pestiferous gophers. In contrast to those cheeky rodents that pop forth with unwelcome predictability on sunny days in February, sometimes even January, our snakes maintain a thankfully low profile early on. We rarely see any before mid-April. Both rodents and reptiles are now in full bloom. 

Today, while checking my gopher trap-line, I discovered a bull snake doubly caught in one of my traps. It (Note my politically-correct, gender-neutral subject.) must have had second thoughts about descending into the gopher hole, turned around before its tail cleared the gopher-sized hole in the guillotine trap, and sprang the guillotine when its head exited the hole. In short, it got caught about a foot behind its head and 18 inches from the end of its tail. I could see no sign of life, but . . . I don't do snakes at close quarters, dead or alive. I manned the camera while Jim approached the site cautiously. We both spotted a bull snake approaching from the west, six or eight inches from the hole entrance. Sounding relieved, Jim exclaimed, "You caught a slow learner. He escaped but now wants to return to that same hole." 

Wrong.

My trapped snake, tail now flicking with obvious signs of life, was still caught, but a second bull snake was now intending to occupy the hole. What we had was a Montana style traffic jam. Jim pulled the trap out of the hole, opened the guillotine,  and the formerly-incarcerated snake glided out, unfazed and undamaged, to join its comrade in subterranean comfort. May there be two gophers within--enough to provide a royal, reptilian repast for two. 

I wanted to capture a closer-up photo, but I caught what I caught. It should be noted that Weed is looking on at about the same distance as I. She and I have similar aversions.            

Recent weeks have felt jumpy. Scatter shot, but productive.

Calves are booster vaccinated and branded.

With the exception of one lamb that seems chronically puffy, all are castrated, docked, ear-tagged, and vaccinated. Nearly all have received a 2nd dose of vaccine, a boost against Clostridial diseases and tetanus. That job sounds benignly passive until you understand that we function without any sheep facilities. Working Prairie Island lambs is, indeed, western. We snatch individual lambs from among groups of ewes and lambs, carry or pedal them into close proximity to the barn door escape hatch, and scoot them out the door after the doctoring routine. Thankfully, most of our ewes are docile; they form placid barriers to greased-lightning lambs bent on evading our snatching forays. As for the puffy lamb, he has received several doses of ginger solution, a dose of bicarbonate of soda, and a dose of Clostridial anti-toxin. I remain at a loss about what ails him, but I think a regular burp of cud would be a step toward cure, and he is feeling and looking better.

Then there are the tomato and pepper seedlings mentioned in my previous blog. Nurtured through single-digit temperatures and blizzards, over half of them succumbed to what I suspect was a greens-hungry pack rat. All seedlings were thriving at my evening watering hour in late April; at dawn, 100% of the Early Girl tomatoes, 75% of our favorite Sweet Baby Girl cherry tomatoes, 50+% of the hybrid sweet peppers, and most of the hot pepper seedlings were gone, demolished, obliterated, with no remnant trace of leaves or stems. Our rat-bastard, dark-of-night raider left unscathed only a few, never-before-tried, full-sized tomatoes. So much for visions of summertime bushels of flavor-rich beauties to use liberally and share generously. We hastily moved our sparse inventory of survivors into a garden cart and the little red wagon from Katrina's youth. Depending on wind and temperature, we wheel them out of the garage during the day and regularly adjust their position to maintain all seedlings at an angle to capture sunlight.

As for Jury duty, if the clerk of court (whose name I shall not mention) is vindictive, I may be saddled with duty until death removes me from the potential juror pool. As per instructions on my April summons, I called the prescribed phone number to receive a voice message with further instructions, As per those further instructions, I showed up at the courthouse bright and early Monday morning (after busting ass to get AM chores done before heading to Great Falls). At the appropriate office, I was pointedly ignored by employees. Finally, one of them, hands on hips for added emphasis, informed me that I should have read Step 2 in the instructions and called on Saturday. If I had, I would know that jury selection and the trial had been postponed. I whipped out my summons and read from it, aloud and emphatically, those Step 2 instructions telling me to call after 6 PM on Friday. "Well," she countered, "the message was changed on Saturday." How grateful I am to be retired and have no outside job demands, Because of that, I had time--time to document the dismissive insolence of said office employee and share my experience with the clerk of court. It was cathartic! Like I stated earlier, I may be a potential juror until eternity, but I will neither tolerate insolence in taxpayer-funded employees nor let it go without response. Though that trip to Great Falls was an inconvenient waste of time, it had one benefit: I picked up a case of Ménage à Trois Midnight wine previously ordered. Cheers to retirement and a judicial system that is the best ever devised, despite a bad apple employee or two.

Having channeled my inner rage into a temperate and carefully-crafted letter to the clerk of court, I was energized to take a preliminary shot at a half-sheet painting of a sheep, one of my long-term subject matter nemeses. Fly-away Killer Curls is the result. As of now, I'm too close to it for analysis and critique, but it challenged me and brought back vivid memories: bringing Curls home from Canby, Oregon as a yearling comfortably ensconced in the back of my old Subaru Forester, his Overall  Grand or Reserve Champion Fleece awards year after year at the State Fair. (Was it four or five years? I don't remember.), his gentlemanly manners when being handled, and, finally, his penchant for efficiently killing other rams, a skill that ultimately led us to cull him. He was quite a guy; I'm glad I have photos and a desire to capture his essence in watercolors.            

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