Papaya - spayed

Not Papaya's greatest day: she got spayed today.

We were not looking forward to this. It's an operation, anesthesia, a wound, stitches, pain. We'd prefer her to stay as she is, integral, but we're strongly advised differently. Dogs get a lot older than wolves in nature, and that means their wombs and mammary glands have a high chance to react badly to their own oestrogen hormone at later age. They'll have nasty inflammations or cancer. When spayed the risk is greatly reduced.

If we'd had done this before her first period the chance wold have been negligible, but we were too late.

Well, she spent 10:00-17:00 at the vet's, in a cage. Now she has to take things easy for a few days. No running and/or jumping. Hm.
But she eats well again, pills and all, and she looks happy, and wags her tail again. We think she's well.

Delonix Regia - Poinciana - Flame tree

 You all know the Jacaranda, so I won't bother you with that. They look a bit like Paulownia, but are better suited for the climate here. They also grow very fast, and can stand heat and draught well.
And they flower with those nice blue bells that I so like.

And what do I see in the garden center? (40€ for a tree of ca. 3-4 meter)

I know this one from Australia, and I even took seeds from one in Brisbane, that I still have. (Hi, Anne!)

Oe!

Antas cocktail 2 - Grenadine

The Antas cocktail is great, with fresh pomegranate juice, but what to do when the season is over..?

Bag full of pomegranates. (We have two.)

Avoid these nasty black ones!

1 liter juice, 150 g sugar, juice of one lemon, boil 5 minutes in a skillet for evaporation = grenadine.

No, it's grenadine.

Antas cocktail

If you've got it flaunt it! We have pomegranate trees. And thus pomegranates. For the curious of mind: military grenades are called after the fruit, not the other way around. But here I thought of this combination: 1 small pomegranate, squeezed like an orange to get the juice, and one smallish glass of white tequila. Add ice. And yes, it's pink, and yes, it's lovely. It's called the "Antas Cocktail" from now on.

Coco and the clean teeth

It was an interesting week, especially for Coco, who needed to come to Veravet for a teeth-cleaning procedure.
She's a lovely dog, and very cuddly too, but that is no fun with her mouth odor. This was no surprise, as she had big crusts of tartar. Black.
I managed to scrape of some with a blunt knife, but I could not reach most of her teeth.

I feared for the condition of her teeth, but it turned out quite well, actually! She has lovely white teeth and molars under the crusts. Tooth cleaning with dogs is done anesthetized, else they wriggle, as I already experienced.

But: all fresh now!

Balsa leak

We have a leak in the balsa. Lost 200m³ water. Now wait till the water level drop stops, so we know where the leak is located. My guess is at the bottom, as we can see a dark spot next to the drain pipe.

Matacarcoma - Permethrin 2

As you have probably read in this piece about matacarcoma-permethrin, you need to treat structural wood against termites and woodworm in this region. The ceilings and beams of the roof were done a few weeks ago, but the ceiling of the kitchen = first floor floor still needed to be one. 40m² wood, but with beams of 21x7cm you need to add 30m², so about 70m² total. You need to apply 250cc per m², so that's 17.5 liter. And that is about right, I have sprayed about 3 cans of 5 liters. Nasty work.

At the end of the day: below 90 kg! All water I'm afraid.