Day 11:
Today, I became a rancher.
So there’s wheat down here. It’s probably not really wheat, but it’s some kind of grass that comes to seed. I planted some of it a few days ago because I was really coddamned hungry and, just like everything else on this lunatic planet, it came to maturity in just a couple of days.
(“Lunatic” seems fitting. The moon is huge and scary and rolls across the sky every night, leering at me.)
My primary goal was to make some kind of pathetic bread with it. Wheat flour ground between two of the tons of stones I’ve removed, water, bake in forge.
But now, maybe I can make good bread, with milk and eggs in it!
OK, let me move back a step. So I cut down the wheat in my tiny garden, and gathered both seeds and wheat stalks from it. I planted some of the seed, but I had too much to replant… so I started wandering around, looking for another good site to turn into a garden… and I suddenly felt like I was being followed.
Of course I assumed that it was the camo-giraffe-hell-bomb creatures, and dove to the ground. But just like the other day, I was greeted not with a bombastic BOOM but with a puzzled MOOO.
The cows were quite interested in my wheat stalks. In fact, they were following me.
Slowly, casually even, I wandered across the field back toward the cow hole/back porch/covered cave entrance I’d dug out. The cows followed. I stepped into the hole. They followed. I fed them the wheat. THEY BEGAN TO FRATERNIZE. And while they were fraternizing, I quickly piled some stone up into the area they’d just left, trapping them on my porch.
I HAVE A COW PORCH.
And also I now have a baby cow, because apparently these animals gestate for about 10 minutes. The baby cow isn’t exactly small. I’m pretty sure it outweighs me.The amount of energy the mama cows must use has to be pushing the laws of physics.
Do you remember the ancient film Gremlins, where the creatures got wet and suddenly multiplied by the dozens? Apparently that’s how wheat affects the cows here. I’ll have to keep that in mind when deciding when and how to feed them.
But the effect isn’t limited to cows. I noticed not long after luring the cows to safety that two chicken-ducks were following me when they noticed I was carrying some of the wheat seeds. (This must be some kind of superfood. Can’t say it makes an overly tasty bread though.)
The chicken-ducks were just as easy to lure as the cows, and just as easy to breed. They just prefer seed over stalk. So now I have three birds and three cows, and in theory, I can gather eggs, milk, and flour.
If I go get those pigs again, I could probably have some bacon too.
I think I’ll need more fencing before that.
Also some fencing to keep the skeletons out of my cow hole would be good planning.
Tomorrow’s going to be a busy day.
