Day 360

Every time you go out and experience nature, you walk away with something. Maybe it’s less stress. Maybe it’s peace of mind. Maybe it’s mental clarity.

Or maybe it’s a deer leg.

Over our few years at the farm, we’ve had plenty of time to explore what our twenty-acre slice of heaven (almost) has to offer.

As we’ve seen the transformation of our restoration take place right before our eyes, we know that the explorations and discoveries will only continue. On each and every step of our journey, we have a close relationship with the land. We enjoy each and every trek. Although many of these treks end with new additions to our golf ball collection. We’ve added to another collection along the way.

While I can’t remember how we acquired every item, I can remember some of them.

We found the antler rack while scouting out potential routes for our trail. We’ve looked for others but have come up empty so far.

The snake skins are found under our makeshift snakeboard. We used an old warped barn door and placed it on a patch of the tall grass to serve as a place where garter snakes might protect themselves from rain or colder temperatures. We do  snake checks occasionally. We have found plenty of slithering snakes and even more snakeskin sheds.

When our restoration partner thought he may have hit a turkey with his tractor. We went out and inspected. He most certainly did. After allowing scavengers to have their fair share, we grabbed plenty of feathers and a few bones.

A very well-preserved deer leg was found in our culvert. I was mowing the lean and noticed a hoof sticking halfway out of the culvert. Seeing it in pristine condition, we were excited to add it to the collection.

Many other bones have been discovered when cleaning up the barn and excavating dirt to build the coops. 

We have found remnants of other things that have either gotten lost or broken along the way. Tufts of animal fur, cracked eggs, and enough bone fragments to put together a mismatched skeleton.

The collection is sure to grow. We can’t wait to see what's next.