Happy 61st Israel Independence Day!

                      Please pray for the peace of Israel on this 61st Israel Independence Day!

Shearing & Late Pruning just before Spring sprung

Our smallest apricot and pear trees burst into bloom only a couple days after we pruned our fruit trees. Hopefully we didn't harm the trees by pruning so late. The pinkish flowers are apricot. The white ones are pear.

The pruned branches are awaiting our getting our chipper functional. We plan to reduce the cherry & apple branches in this picture to chips we will use in barbecuing this summer.

Praise God, our interventions were a success so far with our septic ewe & her ram lamb. Mama can now walk on her own, has now been sheared & the lamb's tail is banded. The tail will eventually fall off from lack of blood supply. Behind the ewe & lamb is our arthritic "Grandma" ewe. We thought she wouldn't make it through the winter two years ago, but she's still hobbling along in her ancient & thinner state.

Three Spring Hikes during woodtick season

April hikes can be accompanied by woodticks if the weather is just turning warm. I've hiked the Bass & Larry Creek area twice & OBrien Canyon once already in April. Only OBrien Canyon was loaded with these tiny critters that the Hallelujah Hikers had to pick off each other all during the eight mile hike. If you turn the tick over & see a white spot, you count yourself fortunate for finding the tick before it embeds in your skin & causes Rocky MT Spotted Fever.

I hike the Bass & Larry Creek area with my friend, Janie & her standard Schnauzer, Hansi. Since we had almost a week of 70+ degree weather in mid-April, all the Spring wildflowers were blooming. Hansi would stand or partially submerge herself in the creeks that we came to along the hike.

Bass & Larry Creeks are known for their wonderful Trillium that bloom in profusion along the creek banks in April.

We even saw some Oregon Grapes beginning to bloom on the second hike in the Larry Creek area. The day before had topped at 80 degrees, which triggered much of the blossuming.

A couple of meadows were blanketed with the tiny Blue-eyed Mary plants in full bloom.

Shooting Stars mixed with Buttercups in some areas. In many other locations, we saw bunches of Pasqueflowers amidst the Yellowbells & Buttercups. Native Indians in the Bitterroot used to eat the bulbs of the Yellowcups, cooking them like rice.

The 4-5 mile hiking loop Janie & I take in the Bass & Larry Creek area is one of many horse trails, so we sometimes meet folks out horse-back riding. We also sited white-tailed deer & wild turkeys. I wasn't fast enough with my camera to catch them in a photo for you.

The "Tick Hike" up OBrien Canyon was around 8 miles of mostly old logging roads. Dry grass rubbed against our ankles most of the hike & must have contained the ticks.

The Blue MT & OBrien areas were engulfed in a forest fire four years ago. We saw evidence of this everywhere on our hike. Two days after our hike, the Forest Service had a "controlled burn" in this location, but it got away from them. They had to drop fire retardants from planes to get it back under control.

We saw interesting tree shapes, like this split trunk. Actually, with poor signage, we had taken a dead-end trail just before I shot this photo. We did that a couple of times on this hike, making it around 8 miles instead of 5.

We saw wildflowers in this area only near the Trailhead. They were the same flowers I had seen in the Bass & Larry Creek areas, with the addition of a few Glacier Lilies like the ones below. The thick underground stems of Glacier Lilies are also edible & were staples of the American Indians in this area.

Louis's skills at work ...

Prior to every Passover seder, Louis meticulously trims the meat off of legs of lamb before starting the koshering process. The lean lamb is soaked in cold water, which is changed several times a day to get out all the blood. This also takes out the strong lamb taste before we roast it. Thankfully, we didn't know this lamb that we will be eating this week. There have been past Passover seders where we have prepared & eaten a lamb that we have raised. It is difficult to swallow such meat & the personal relationship also reinforces the cost of our sin in our own minds.Ironically, at the same time as Louis is trimming lamb for the seder, we had been intensively caring for one of our ewes & her newborn lamb. We almost lost our ewe who birthed that healthy ram lamb several days ago. She actually had twins, but was unable to birth the second lamb, even with our trying to help to turn it. On the second day, I was walking her a lot & gave her a dose of Penicillin IM & Benamine IM ( a pain med.). By the beginning of the third day, she couldn't stand & wouldn't eat or drink, so the vet came & helped me deliver the dead twin. Whew, what a stench!! We gave the ewe a whopping dose of steroids & a strong antibiotic IM. She drank some water that day & began to eat a little hay the next day. We are giving her antibiotics for four days to counteract the sepsis caused by the dead lamb.

Louis creatively devised this homemade hoist to help the ewe stand today. He used such parts as an old ladder, a sling we use to carry firewood to our fireplace, a bunch of rope & a pulley system. By just turning in a circle, the ewe can lick her salt block, drink water or eat fresh hay. All the while, the lamb can suckle. His little tail has been wiggling all afternoon as he gets frequent drinks from Mom.

No Fooling!

Louis woke me this 1st of April with Jim Elliott's quote. "He is no fool, who gives up what he can not keep, to gain what he can not lose." A great quote to remember for the days ahead.