Equus Asinus

The new drinking fountain is in place, replacing the two big plastic buckets that have been the water supply for the donkeys on the field for the past five years.  The problem with the buckets was the amount of wastage.  The water is delivered to my house by lorry – usually once every two months – and until now the donkeys have used most of it, particularly during the past summer which has been very hot.

The wastage is due to fastidious donkeys rejecting the water as soon as it has a few bits of straw in it! They are very particular and as soon as one of them pauses from eating, goes to take a drink, and leaves a few bits of straw in the bucket, none of the others want to drink the water! Hopefully the new arrangement will be better because the drinking fountain can be wiped clean frequently without wasting too much water.  It is a self-filling unit operated by a ballcock and connected to a covered tank of fresh water on the next level up from the field, so fed by gravity.

Of course, anything new on the field is immediately suspicious and the donkeys all ran away when the drinking fountain made a gurgling noise as it filled up for the first time. Rubí was the first to bravely come forward to see what it was for.  She quickly got the hang of it.

 Water tank supplying the new drinking fountain. For my GCSE Geography students, this is a handy way to visualize one cubic metre of water. River discharge is measured in cubic metres per second (cumecs).

World Animal Day

Today is World Animal Day #WorldAnimalDay

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This blog salutes the work of the Donkey Sanctuary in caring for donkeys and improving animal welfare throughout the world.  http://www.thedonkeysanctuary.org.uk/