Do you remember the polar vortex of 2014? I think it was ‘14. We hit -20 and stayed there for way too long. That was a bad winter. Though there were two of us farming then. We lost The Duke of Kupa that winter.
That was the first time I had ever heard the term Polar Vortex.
Well this weekend we went down to minus 12 with terrible winds. This morning was minus 8 with no wind. Another Polar Vortex shifting down onto us.
This break down into frigidity will only be for a few days. By next Monday we will be hurled up above freezing and beyond and it will be raining again.
The temperature changes are doing my head in. I am calling it the YoYo effect.
You see that layer of snow/ice on the cows back, that means their coat is doing its job and keeping the cold out. That white layer is a good thing to see.
Both of them were stood at their water this morning waiting for me to break the ice. Even with the new heater a layer of ice will form at high tide.
Here is a short of Jude and FreeBee sleeping under the straw. They did not want to get up for breakfast.
Mr Flowers went missing for 24 hours and was found sleeping under the truck in the garage. So I fed him there. He gave me a fright. He must have first in the blowing snow.
I have not seen LuLu since the bad cold hit. I can usually entice her inside when it is cold but I have not been able to find her.
She does this though. Hides out. I am willing to bet she is deep in the hay stacks above the cows.
In the cold the chickens prefer to huddle together on the ground in the deep bedding.
And look who is huddling with them.
I am late posting this again today. It takes me longer to do chores in the deep cold because I have to take breaks inside to thaw my feet and hands when they start to really hurt. The pain from cold is very intense.
Here is a funny little short story that I wrote while waiting in waiting places last week. It is my Sustainable Sunday post.
There will be more waiting places this week too! Which gives me lots of time to write more. At least it will be warm in the hospitals. It was 46f in my room when I woke up this morning!
Have a gorgeous day!
Celi
The Kitchen's Garden 
23 responses to “Hell is not hot. It is Deep Cold.”
I hope Lulu is right where you think she is. This polar vortex reminds me of my years in Chicago & Milwaukee when I kept saying I had to get out of there & finally managed to flee one way S to Florida one 5 below day. It will be bad enough here in NC this week, down to 8 or 9 – above!
8 or 9 is still really cold. Snuggle up!
One of our 3 cats, Moe Moe is on the wild side and refuses to come inside. We, too, tried enticing her inside…, well, just brought her in two days ago when this polar vortex began rolling in, and she cried and screamed and tried to get out so forcefully that we let her back out. She is in an insulated box on the porch and I go out several times a day with water (which freezes almost immediately!) and food. But I still think of how cold she must be! 😦
Luckily she is wearing a fur coat!
Thank goodness! And she is round, like a little beach ball, so has fat storage going for her too! 🙂
It looks hard, seeing cows drink from frozen water in the winter, but we should remind ourselves, that we are not cows. To them it’s normal.
I bet those pigs would stick out a trotter if you offered to hand fed them in their beds 😉
Actually i am making some pig bread so I can hand feed FreeBee. He is such a slow eater and Jude is such a bully about food and that is hard to manage in the barn when they don’t want to go outside.
It will be better when the weather warms up.
Ohhh – bless!
I am late to reading this but…I so admire your, and the animals fortitude. Temps in the teens here have about done us in so I can’t imagine negative numbers. My brain won’t allow it. Thinking of you, stay strong C, and please take care. Frostbite will not help anyone.
My hands got so cold yesterday that they started to itch – the body sends out histamine when the skin gets too cold. I have never had frostbite but sometimes I lose feeling below my knuckles. Which is a very weird feeling.
I don’t suppose you can use hand warmers inside your gloves?
Not unless they are compostable or reusable!! 😂
I get that! I have a brand that I will use for hiking on occasion called Hot Hands. They are easily activated with a shake. The ingredients are iron, water, Vermiculite, charcoal, polymer and salt. The polymer might be an issue I suppose but the other grainy mix…are those acceptable things to mix back into soil?? . The disposal notation says: Ingredients will not harm the environment, dispose in garbage. Anyway it was a thought… 🙂
I am fine without these things.I wear 2 pairs of gloves- and take warm breaks. I don’t have a lot of stock this year
Be careful with those hands. We need you to keep the stories coming. Look out for chilblains and nasty cracks that won’t heal. My Ma used to make a winter hand ointment with goose grease and comfrey and arnica, among other things. You’d put it on your hands thickly, then cotton gloves, then woollen gloves before you went out to feed the chooks, and the ducks, and the horses. It wasn’t lovely and luxurious, but it worked.
It sounds like the Vaseline that long distance swimmers put on their bodies if the water is cold. I bet yours was better for the skin!
Well, natural fat rather than petroleum jelly, but it did need to be scented with rosemary or your hands smelled like Sunday roast!
Duke of Kupa, that’s a blast from the past. Glad you found Mr Flowers, l’m sure LuLu will be keeping warm somewhere and how great that the chickens let Quakers huddle with them. Stay safe Celi and as warm as you can.
I was so grateful when o finally found Mr Flowers- I know he is getting on in years but thought of losing him made me so sad.
Brrrrzeeee is right! At least the sun is shining through the cold here today. Our geese, ducks and chickens are all inside today too. I am able to use heated buckets. Even so the rims of the goose buckets are coated with thick ice. They do love to splash! Looks like we are in the cold for a week. Hold on!
Holding on as we speak!!
I remember that polar vortex, it was awful. I have put a board over half the water tank, it seems to help the heater keep it open longer. I have a pair of gloves with rechargeable batteries in a little pocket to power the heat. They help some but eventually my fingers start to throb with the cold. All the chores do take more than twice as long in this weather, the older I get the less I like winter. The only good thing I can think of is a lot of the bugs die.
greetings ! great post .
stay awesome and keep blogging
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