These are some photos of the flood at our place during December of 2007. We had some pretty exciteable animals- and one anxious Momma! My husband was at work when I noticed that our goats were about to get wet feet! Needless to say, he came home early that day, fired up the tractor and whisked our chicken house to safety. We also "borrowed" the kennel from the dog to house our goats for the night, and then tied the dog up on top of a wood pile to keep him from having to swim. An interesting few days, to say the least!!
This is the pasture area where my chickens and goats live. Notice the beat up goat shed? It was tumbled in a windstorm just the week before. The hen run (to the left of the shed) got left behind in the field because it was already water logged by the time we got the chicken house out. The irrigation pipe is nearly buried - we didn't see it for two days and thought for sure that it had all drifted off downstream.
A little bit of water out there!
My poor goats weren't really sure what to think. This piece of grass is the highest elevation we have (other than upstairs in the house!) So we put the goats here for the night. You can see the chicken house just behind the green shop. The floor ended up covered in water before this was all over. The chickens, thankfully had three "stories" to climb before they got wet!
This is what confused Pygoras look like! The water continued to rise and we had to place this upside down worm bin inside the kennel. They stood on it all through the night. Thankfully the water began to recede just before daybreak - whew! I was one worried Momma! I checked on them every half hour with my spotlight from the bedroom window of my house.
FOUR days later we were finally able to move the hen house back to the field - only to a different location in case the water tried to come back up again.
Hard to believe this was a furiously rushing river just a few days before... but hey, our irrigation pipe was still in place (tied down by nature's twine -- morning glory). The chickens were insanely happy at the sheer number of worms!
And now we see the reason some people swear by chicken tractors!! EVERYTHING on our property must be somewhat portable unless we don't mind if it floats away. It's a good thing we enjoy adventures.
*And YES - we do have flood insurance, and it paid us nicely for the damage to our home*
*And YES - we do have flood insurance, and it paid us nicely for the damage to our home*
