Hi everyone!
Happy New Year!
I really wanted to share this photo of a visiting coyote that I took... while sitting at the very desk I'm at now. This furry friend has come to visit a couple of times, specifically to eat out of that hole it's standing over.
I had a look in the hole myself, and I honestly can't tell what is/was in there, but I've see the coyote eat from it a couple of times now, I'm guessing maybe a mole or ground squirrel was in there.
Each time I chased the coyote away (after I took photos of course) just because I was worried about the sheep.... but I'm not sure how worried I should be... each one of our sheep seems to be at least 4 times the weight of the coyote. As you can see, I feed them well... (this photo was also taken from my desk):
In the 8 years in the US, I've only seen coyotes twice before... and both times they were running near a road while I was driving, so I never got a good look.
I've heard coyotes tons of times though, usually at night doing a weird yipping noise along with their howls, and sometimes dogs barking and I'm sure that's all a vocal territory battle. I put the sheep to bed every night in a horse stable so they are totally safe from coyotes and the weather.
Speaking of.... this time last year I was without power and water for almost a month.
The pipes that come out of the ground from our well had all frozen, which is no big deal, but then all burst when they thawed - I had something like 20 different gushing leaks, so I turned the water off and got it repaired, and then a day later, storms came through and pushed one of my trees onto the powerlines - taking out my power and a few of my neighbours as well.
The power had already been out, so even though I work remotely, I had gone into the office, which was super lucky because the tree had come down across my driveway so I would have been stuck a while (nothing is walkable near me). The power company eventually sent another company to clear my driveway, but then they didn't repair the power lines for another couple of weeks because only 3 houses were affected, and they had to literally replace two whole powerlines.
This winter has been way more mild, no freezes, no crazy winds and no snow so far... thanks El Nino.
Anyway, I hope everyone is well, happy New Year!
