misty donkey herder on Nostr: The expanded version of why I got a barn cat but don’t need one anymore: I needed a ...

The expanded version of why I got a barn cat but don’t need one anymore:
I needed a barn cat to keep the inevitable rats from nesting in and peeing on and ruining my horse’s stored hay. Nightlight was pretty good at that! But my mare poisoned herself on a toxic weed last November (on the day Henry Kissinger died, which kind of ruins that upcoming holiday) and almost died. Part of the discharge instructions was to feed her the special low-starch diet for insulin resistance. No more bales of hay piled in a stack! Now she and the donkey eat “diet hay,” a low-starch vitamin fortified chopped hay sold in expensive little plastic-wrapped bales. Everybody’s various bags of feed are stored in rat-proof steel garbage cans. There are still barn rats, too many barn rats even, but they aren’t ruining any feed so I don’t need a barn predator anymore. The owl that lives in the woods behind the barn is theoretically helping, at least.