How strong does a chook shed need to be?

[droog]

About 13 from memory.

That's not even the goodest jaw dropping story. The dead sheep/ram is a absolutely hilarious, jaw dropping, mind blowing, doozie.

Ok, Ok, now we are all waiting ⏱️

[Neil]

Our daughter was given an orphaned lamb "Toby" he grew and grew into a pretty big ram. Was kinda like a big wooly dog. Followed her around and us depending on what was going on. Very gentle and always around had fun playing with our bull terrier "Sheeba". He must have been 4+ because he was shorn 3 times.

We were away for a couple of weeks and when we came hone there was no sign of Toby so figured he was out in the paddock somewhere. We found him the next morning after the daughter had gone to a friends house.

He was in the house paddock, a few feet inside the gate and dead as a doorknob. I brought the van around with the trailer on and backed it up to as foot or so way from Toby so we could get him in the trailer with not too much effort. My 2 boys around 16 and 18 yrs old said they would lift him into the trailer. Unbeknown to us he must have been dead for more than a few days and it had been raining whilst we were away.

Anyway the boys grabbed a 2 legs each and on 1 2, 3.... They lifted in perfect unison but Toby didn't move even though his 4 legs did the boy had pulled his rotting legs off. Dropped them and were rolling around on the ground screaming out unintelligible noises and words like yarrrrk, gurrrrk, gaaaah, etc.

I know it wasn't funny but Pauline and i had tears rolling down our faces and our sides ached from laughing... So glad the daughter wasn't there.

Still had to get Toby into the trailer so once the boys had finished dry-retching, shuddering, laughing and regaining their composure they had a go at try #2. They reached down grabbing handfuls of his thick woolen coat 1 2, 3... and this time they came up with 4 handfuls of fleece. More of the same antics on the ground, more laughing and aching sider.

We grabbed a piece of old carpet from the off the floor in the tack shed, rolled him over onto that and got his front half up onto the trailer just as the carpet split and his back half began to separate from his front half. My extra pair of hands helped to keep what was left of him in almost one piece and finish off the loading onto the trailer.

Quick trip into the gold fields and to the dead animal mine and poor old Toby was unceremoniously dumped down the longdrop where cows, sheep and other largish animals called their resting place. Daughter was never privileged to the full story. Rest In Pieces toby.

If you don't think this is funny... YOU JUST HAD TO BE THERE!!!

As for rats. One warm summers night there was a cacophony going on outside the house which sounded like it was coming from the corrugated iron roof. We went outside to see what was going on, the roof was absolutely covered in rats and they were streaming across the electricity wires leading from the homestead to the cottage and to the tack shed and root cellar, then down the yard to the big barn, out sheds, cattle shed and smithy.

They were everywhere.

What did we do? Not a thing went back inside and ignored the blighters. We had problems with them in the roof before and discovered that they hated mothballs and camphor flakes so there was always s few boxes of it thrown around the inside of the roof from time to time. To our knowledge not one rat came into the roof that night and within a few hours all but a few stragglers had moved on. Strangely they didn't come down onto the ground or try to get into the house or half cellar at the back of the house which had open vents at ground level.

Pauline said "If just one of those rats gets inside, I'M LEAVING!!!"

Not sure what was worse the noise of the rats on the roof or the sound of buckshot raining down on the roof opening weekend of duck season.

We did have the odd snake venture into the half cellar from time to time. I drew the line at the 10ft king brown I saw disappear into one of the vents and covered them all with tin after he/she had moved on.

Also had a pet goose (Howard the duck) Not pet... possums, echidnas, owls, bats and a dozen or so swallows who kept on coming back to their same nests each year, a squadron of pelicans about 60 strong, a number of platypuses (not platypi), a ship load of sheep, a wombat or 2, thousands of rabbits and half as many feral/wild cats, the odd wallaby or few and some thoroughbred horses mostly Trotters and pacers amongst them the trotter known as That horse Mouries Idol Never beaten in his long career. Almost forgot a couple of really scary Cape Barron Geese that stopped off for a few days, from time to time.

Oh yeah, we rented the house and out buildings. Thee property (380 acres) was at Welshmans Reef Central Victoria and the Loddon River ran through the property into Cairn Curran Reservoir the head of which flooded the bottom 60 acres of the property. Hence the pelicans and platypuses and duck season shrapnel.

This was also the home of Maine Woodworkers Woodies Swap Meet for a number of years, boasting as many as 5000+ plus through the gates for a 1 day event in the middle of nowhere.

Do we miss not still being there. Yep sure do. Would we want to go back. No, not any more.

OK that's enough of that stuff.

Cheers - Neil

[ErrolFlynn]

Regarding poor Toby, I think you have to be tough to live on a farm.

[Neil]

Huh. Yeah tough and slightly nuts. When it's good it's great and when it's not it's really not. Helps to have a good sense of humor. a thick hide and a knack for getting into or out of trouble without getting committed, shot, kicked in the face by a horse or falling down and jumping up with a joyful cry of "I'm alright" before collapsing in a heap and starting it all over again.

It's all fun and games until it gets serious. Then it's not.

-----------------------

Back to the chooks:

A really great trick for the chooks... throw a piece of corrugated iron on the ground in the chook yard and leave it for a week or so. When the chooks are out in the the yard flip the iron over and watch the fun. There should be dozens if not hundreds of earwigs under it and on it. The chooks will go absolutely berserk... it's a smorgasbord of their favorite food on the run. They absolutely love earwigs.

Works best if the ground has been well picked over of vegetation and is slightly damp before putting the iron down.

Cheers