Counting down the Caturdays too….
Here’s Porcini waiting for food in the feeder:
Porcini and Bella:
Porcini closeup:
Waiting for breakfast in the comfort of the cat house:
Another Porcini closeup:
Our dog Rory sitting on the driveway, oblivious of a cat laying on the path:
Two cats at breakfast time:
I flew my drone today; the first time since the end of August. Previous flights this year included June, April, and March. This time, some nice fall foliage.
A view of the shop, veggie garden, chicken runs, back lawn, pond, flowerbeds, etc:
Closer to the pond:
One reason for this flight was to get an aerial shot of the path to the duck house; I have a hose used to fill the duck’s waterer, which is also arranged as a possible edge of the path. Hard to see in this picture, though:
Over to the flowerbeds; you can see a fallen tree from the big storm that contributed to the wildfires earlier (we’ll cut it up and remove it soon):
Closer:
Part of the field and flowerbeds. The long grass in the field looks like nice soft velvet:
From higher up:
I landed the drone to change the battery, then took off again; Rory wasn’t thrilled about that:
Finally, a few shots of trees, to capture the fall foliage:
The latest news from our evacuation from the wildfires (or more accurately climate fires): last night the power was restored to our homestead, having been off since Tuesday afternoon. Since it was without electricity for over three days, it’s safe to assume the contents of our three freezers and two fridges will have to be thrown out. But having power means that the well is working again, and the waterers in the chicken runs will refill, which will help them survive. The stream to the small pond will also be running again, providing water for the outdoor cats and wild birds.
We remain safe at Mom’s place, though the smoke from the fires is affecting the air quality up and down the west coast, as can be seen in this map (or check the current conditions):
The fire boundary and evacuation map hasn’t really changed since yesterday (website):
The Clackamas county map (website):
I talked about the chickens and ducks yesterday; today is Caturday, so I’ll talk about the cats.
We care for nine cats: two indoor-only pet cats (Pippin and Paladin), two indoor-only feral shop cats (Pepper and Pansy), and five outdoor-only feral cats (Poppy and her offspring Porcini, Portabella aka Bella, Pomegranate aka Pommie, and Potato aka Spud).
Pippin and Paladin are safe with us. Pepper and Pansy are still in the workshop, and should have enough food and water to last them about a week. Poppy and the others can feed themselves on rodents etc, but now that the power is back, they will get some meals from the cat house. That food should last about a week too. And they can drink from the stream and small pond, plus a waterer near the cat house.
So I’m not as concerned about the cats as I am about the chickens, though the shop cats would be my next concern after the chickens. I do worry that the outdoor ferals might have abandoned us when they weren’t getting food while the power was off. The feeder has a battery backup, but according to the feeder log, apparently it didn’t work while there was no power, so the batteries must be flat. D’oh! They’ll probably stick around, though.
Unfortunately although the power and internet are back on, my Camect camera server is connected to a UPS that is off, so I can’t view the cameras remotely. I won’t know what’s happening until we go home.
Enough text, let’s have some photos. Here are Paladin and Rory snuggling in our room at Mom’s place:
Some pictures of the feral cats from before we evacuated. Here’s Poppy:
Porcini having a bath on the kitchen lawn:
And relaxing in the kitchen garden:
Poppy emerging from the feeder:
Porcini:
Porcini again:
Poppy again:
Poppy and Porcini:
A tail:
Finally, Pansy in the back of the shop:
I hope the cats will be okay!
For this week’s Caturday, a number of pictures of spotting cats in person, plus the usual cat cabin and house pictures.
While doing afternoon rounds, Rory spotted Paladout in the distance:
Spud emerging from the breezeway cabin:
Two cats in the cabins:
Having a drink:
Feet:
I spotted Porcini on the path near the stream:
Cabin twins:
Two cats on their deck:
Three cats at the cabins:
Porcini:
Three cats inside:
I spotted a cat on the edge of the field:
Make that two cats; looks like they’re watching something:
Then they both headed towards the front yard (Porcini and Poppy):
Poppy and Porcini again:
And again; those two like hanging out together:
Three cats:
On this week’s Caturday, camera replacement, Poppa, Rory cameo, and sunshine.
The camera inside the cat house stopped recording, so I slid open the rarely-opened maintenance door to investigate it:
I couldn’t get it to work, so I swapped the cat house camera for the spare one that was previously in the old chicken coop. Here’s a closer look at the camera enclosure:
The cat house cam is mounted upside down on the ceiling, so here’s the view just after replacing it:
I then told the camera to rotate the view 180°. Here’s a cat looking at the cam:
It’s hard to tell, since the inside is symmetrical, but that picture is actually horizontally mirrored; I forgot that I also needed to un-mirror it to get the correct orientation.
Here’s Porcini and Pommie in the cabins, visited by Poppa:
After a while, Pommie left to go eat or something, and Poppa went into her cabin. Here’s Pommie returning to find it occupied:
A few minutes later, Poppa emerged; he’s such a big boy:
On evening rounds, Rory spotted Paladout on the path to the duck house:
Hard to see in that picture; here’s a closer look at Paladout:
Two cats under our car:
The sun shining down the breezeway, with a cat silhouette:
Pepper on her nest in the shop:
An animated GIF of Poppy, Bella, and Porcini playing:
Poppy, Bella, Porcini:
Pommie oozing out of a cabin on a hot day:
Poppy inside:
Porcini relaxing in the shade under the bird feeders on a sunny day:
Closer:
Poppy and Porcini:
Too hot to be inside last night; Spud and Poppy in front of the cat house:
This week, Rory with the ducks, broody chickens, and a new camera view.
I posted a similar (but different) picture to this one, of the ducks and Rory, on my personal blog:
The ducks on the back lawn, with their heads in the grass, looking for tasty bugs:
By the chicken run:
Two broody chickens in a nesting box:
Gert on the “island” pot in the pond at night:
You probably saw these two pictures of the ducks and Rory on my personal blog:
I moved the mobile cam from by the cat house to the (currently off) waterfall area of the pond:
A view of the pond and ducks from that camera:
Gert with her head in the ground:
Gert was curious about the camera:
And knocked it over:
So I moved the camera to a better location, closer to the pond deck:
A view from there; you can see the ducks hanging out below the pond deck, where they’ve been spending a fair bit of time:
I suspect Gert may be considering that location for laying eggs, though haven’t found any more yet.
Swimming past the camera:
Ducks eating treats:
Gert:
Bert:
Gert below the pond deck again, and Bert walking past the camera:
Both ducks below the pond deck, and Paladout walking by:
The chickens in the old coop:
Broody chickens again (still):
A wider view of the broody chickens and others:
The ducks walking by:
Chickens roosting on potato planters:
The ducks below the pond deck again:
Ducks and a bird:
As was foretold, some more photos of and from my new drone, as I practice flying it. Gotta put in that flight time to become proficient!
Firstly, a shot of the drone on the (rather mossy) driveway, with a bee on the nose (I didn’t take off until she left):
(I probably shouldn’t attempt beekeeper humor by saying it’s not that kind of drone.)
A shot from higher up of the pond and landscaping; beehives in the upper-left, greenhouse, hoop house, veggie garden, chicken runs, etc:
From another angle:
Looking straight down:
The pond, from lower down (with a duck in the middle):
The main deck, with Rory sprawled out:
The chicken runs, veggie garden, and greenhouse:
Miles of trees:
Trees and a glimpse of Mount Hood in the distance:
I then flew around at a lower level, practicing my flying precision. Here’s the drone flying through the breezeway, as seen by the cat cam there (I did check that there weren’t any cats present before flying though):
And inside the brown gazebo:
Those pictures were from yesterday. I did a little practice today, but it was too windy to go very high, so I just did more low-level flying. Here’s a shot of the flag from flagpole height, showing the breeze:
This week, chickens in the veggie garden and coops, and ducks in the pond. You know, the usual. Except a bonus Rory sighting.
A couple of the oldest girls perched on the potato planters in the veggie garden:
The ducks during some rain showers:
Mealworm treats:
Water trailing off the bill:
Bert:
Gert:
Rory out for her walk on afternoon rounds, watched by the chickens in the veggie garden:
Chickens in the new coop:
And in the old coop:
A couple freshly laid eggs in a nesting box:
Firstly, while the Caturday posts are typically about our feral cats, I wanted to start by wishing a happy 12th birthday to one of our pet cats, Pippin:
Not-a-cat: a dog checks out the cat house during our summer party:
Three cats waiting for breakfast:
Four cats at breakfast:
Pansy reaching for food:
Scratching a tree:
A GIF variation:
Three cats:
Four cats:
Contentedly waiting:
Sleepy cat:
Four cats:
A couple of cats playing by the tree, while a couple more wait for food:
We got a few more inches of snow overnight. This morning we lost power… still off a couple of hours later as I write this, though predicted to be back on soon. Hopefully. We have UPSes powering our internet, but no water, since we’re on a well. One day we want to get a whole-house generator, or Tesla Powerwall, but those are expensive. We do have a portable generator, but that doesn’t help with the water, and isn’t needed unless the power stays off for a long time.
Anyway, this morning Jenn and Rory joined me on the rounds, and I took a few more snowy pics.
This is the tree by the chicken run. The branches are usually high enough to walk under, not touching the ground:
The pond is frozen today; unsurprising with the temperature below freezing:
The brown gazebo and chicken coop:
Jenn taking a picture of the snow by the pond arbor:
Rory:
A view of the frozen pond from the pond deck:
Rory enjoyed some off-leash scampering in the field; she loves to run in the snow:
The apple orchard in the field, with the white gazebo in the background:
Rory sniffing deer tracks by the bird feeders:
