The Adventures of TLC Cai-Cai on Friday—-Farm Life Series Chapter 6, The Second Season, Spring, Wednesday, February 2, 2020

Posted on February 2, 2022 by Dayphoto

By the end of February Dad is getting pretty excited to start farming. Why even some of the other farmers…the BIG GUYS… have started. It all depends on the frost in the ground, or not in the ground.

Dad and Mom have been busy ‘doing stuff’ most of January and most of February. This stuff usually consists of whatever it takes to make the FARMING SEASON go smooth.

Sometime in late March or April, the Apricot trees will start to bloom.

Mom says LATE APRIL, please. If you must bloom make it LATE APRIL!

You see there are still many, many cold nights and days that kill things that burst forth into robustious blooms.

A cold snap (or a terrible freeze) doesn’t seem to hurt the trees or the leaves (or lack thereof) on the trees, but it does take a huge whack out of the blossoms!

First, there are lovely sweet-smelling flowers and BAM! They are brown and dead and fall off the trees.

Of course, that also means there is no fruit to can later on.

Anyway, by the time March comes roaring in (we hope it roars in not out)

Mom and Dad are farming—

Which isn’t weather, but still…it is SPRING!

TLC Cai-Cai

The Adventures of TLC Cai-Cai on Friday—-Farm Life Series Chapter 5, The First Season, WINTER!!! SNOW, or How Wet Can You Get, Friday, January 28, 2022

Posted on January 28, 2022 by Dayphoto

Mom says snow is one of those weather things that is—well, a person had mixed feelings about. (Cats don’t have mixed feelings about snow…just so you know.)

Snow is beautiful to look at.

Snow is necessary to have water…. water to drink,

water to irrigate with, and for the land —it nourishes the roots of all the plants…weeds, and good plants.

Sometimes we get blizzards. I’ve really never seen a blizzard, but I have been in the WIND full of SNOW!!! Mom says THAT is a blizzard!

When a cat (or a person) is in a blizzard there is so much snow and wind you can’t see ANYTHING!!

Nothing! It’s scary.

AND YOUR FUR GETS VERY, VERY WET!!!!

That’s when I meow to come inside and stay inside.

I let Mom and Dad go outside and do all those ‘outside’ things they like to do.

After the snow ends…then we start one of a couple of different types of Winter—SO COLD YOUR PAWS STICK TO THE GROUND or Mud Season.

I don’t know which is worse. Mom calls horrible cold an inversion. She says it is pretty. And it does kill all the nasty bugs, but oh, my is it ever cold!

Then there is everyone’s dreaded season—melt. Snowmelt. When that happens, you get MUD!

On your paws, where you have to take your teeth and pull it out, on your lovely fur, where Mom gets a wet rag and washes you all over–

and MUD ON MY TAIL! Horrors!

Then there is mud on shoes, boots, in the house from the back porch to the stool where the shoes and boots are removed.

Mud season is pretty messy.

That is for sure!

TLC Cai-Cai

The Adventures of TLC Cai-Cai on Wednesday—-Farm Life Series Chapter 4, The First Season, WINTER!!! Then there is the WIND, Wednesday, January 26, 2022

Posted on January 26, 2022 by Dayphoto

Wind is the worst!

Mom says Wind in the Winter is the worst, she rather likes wind any other time.

Wind in the Winter is COLD!

I agree with her! Wind in the Winter is horrible, terrible, and bad!

It snaps the trees, throws tree branches every which way,

picks up all the weeds, and flings them in your face, not to mention…what it does to a CAT!

There are warm fuzzy covers for dogs, and humans have hats, gloves, and hooded jackets to put under big thick heavy coats and socks and boots and…. well, you get the picture.

Cats, now…they don’t get any of that stuff. Just think what a cold nasty wind can do to trees and weeds, now think of what wind does to cats!!!

TLC Cai-Cai

The Adventures of TLC Cai-Cai on Friday—-Farm Life Series Chapter 3, The First Season, WINTER Storms, Friday, January 21, 2022

Posted on January 21, 2022 by Dayphoto

Mom always checks the weather on the weather apps. She says it gives her an ‘idea’ of what the weather is going to be.

Then Mom goes and looks at the Uncompahgre Plateau—if there is a line of huge big black clouds over the Plateau in the west…

Then Mom knows a BIG STORM is HEADING OUR WAY!

If Mom sees a mass of clouds already in the canyons, dumping moisture then she knows in a few minutes we are going to get ‘it’.

And Mom is always right! The only thing Mom can’t predict is how COLD it’s going to get, by looking at the canyons or the Uncompahgre Plateau, but she can tell by the feel in the air, the crispness,

the look of the sun, as it shimmers through the sky, and sometimes by seeing Sun Dogs.

Then Mom starts warming up the hen house by putting in a red heat lamp. Red—because if you don’t use red the hens will start picking on each other. Something about seeing everything better, I suppose.

She makes the heat lamp turn on when the temperatures drop way down to 10* and stays on until around 9 in the morning when the birds can start taking care of themselves.

As for keeping me warm, she says I’m smart enough I can go outside if I want, or I can stay inside, or I can come and go. She says I decide since I’m not living in the hen house.