Thursday, January 8, 2009

BAD BAD Flooding

We just got back in the house. We spent most of the night moving sheep, chickens, dogs, ducks, a trailer and other stuff. The water is at a all time high and it is not crested yet. It is the worse since recorded history. It is about 13 feet from my barn and rising rapidly. I took all the sheep from the lower and upper pasture and put them in the backlawn. I moved the lambs and LGD in the barn. The neighbor brought his calves and they are in the barn. The horse is on an island and won't move, no matter how hard I tried.


The water has been rising but in the last few hours, it has risen FAST......we timed over 6 inches in a hr. You can hear the roar of the river from the house. The town is closed off all directions since the roads are flooded.

Tess had to move the chickens out of the coop. It was under 2 feet of water and the chickens were perched on their sticks but would be drowned. Tess had to swim in the coop to bump the chickens off and make them swim out to land. It was very, very difficult as chickens don't swim. She got most of them and we went into the coop to get the ones that refused to move and were drowning (2 of them). She got them all moved into a stall except for three that flew off somewhere near the house. She was gentle to the chickens and got them to move. She knew the urgency in my voice.

The sheep in the upper pasture were in a island and the island was disappearing. She swam out to them as it was 3 ft deep and got the 7 sheep off the island and had to make them swim in 3-5 ft of water to me. I only gave her a couple of flanks and told her to bring them. She did it all by herself and made the sheep swim to safety. I about cried seeing this. All I could see of the sheep was their heads in the water as they swam. I knew Tess was bringing them as they would turn right and then left as she swam behind them and flanked (swam) them from behind.

How many dogs do you know that will swim out to an island and move sheep off the island and make them swim in 3-5 ft of water over 50 yds against the current to a gate? It take a hell of a dog to do that and by God, she did it. Without me telling her every step, she did it knowing what needed to be done.
She then gathered the upper and lower pasture sheep and put them in the back lawn. Thens she went and moved the ducks out of the duck coop to a safe fence pasture.

Getty had to move the new trailer we just bought. It was hard trying to back the truck up to get it hitched up in gale force winds but he did it.

Moved the barn dogs to the laundry room. The water is about 13 feet from the barn. We hope it doesn't flood the barn as the lambs, calves and chickens are in it. If it goes up 2 ft high the barn will be flooded. The critter pad is saving the barn

Will write more later......Tess is dried off and I need to give her some treats. She is wiped out.

3 comments:

Loretta Mueller said...

What an amazing dog Tess is :)

I hope the water is gone soon!

BCxFour said...

Wow...Diane...WOW! First, if you need ANY help with clean up - I have the next three weeks off from work. My strapping 17 y/o son and I can come help - just say the word. Second - Tess is absolutely amazing!!!

dreameyce said...

"How many dogs do you know that will swim out to an island and move sheep off the island and make them swim in 3-5 ft of water over 50 yds against the current to a gate?"

WOW! Amazing girl!

I kept up on the flooding on the news, but am amazed by your 1st hand experiences. WOW!

I was in Mt Vernon during the '96 floods, and remember them well. This is worse!