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One of the things I love so much about the farm is that every day is a new adventure. No matter how often we plan our tasks, inevitably something will come up and our plans change. This isn’t always so easy for me to accept – I love having a plan, and following it through to the end. But, the animals don’t care so much about my checklist.

For example, I really intended to write about our intensive pasture management practices tonight. As I was moving from the lot where the mamas are staying over to the alpaca lot, something caught my eye. It was this:

Do you see it? Here’s a closer view, under the timber:

We have all kinds of critters roaming in and around the pasture – I shouldn’t have been so surprised to see him this evening, but I was. And he reminded me of two very happy memories.

When I was a little girl, my brother and I used to find box turtles on my grandfather’s land. Each summer, we would paint markings on their shell with fingernail polish (to be sure we could recognize them!). It was always so exciting for us to see one of our marked turtles returning the next year.

More recently, one beautiful spring Sunday after church, Brian & I along with his mom & dad went digging for wildflowers on the side of the road. Trying to make out what the yellow spots hidden under some leaves might be, I giggled and mentioned that I saw a turtle hiding. Brian’s dad looked at me in disbelief and said, “that’s not a turtle! That’s a terrapin!”

Turtle / terrapin – I’m not sure. But this guy hiding under the landscape timbers startled Sharna. She barked a few times, sniffed close to him, and then walked away. As I was leaving, I gave the dogs their evening treats, and even left one for this guy. I don’t know what he wants to eat, but in the lot he chose his only options are grass, hay, or apples!

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