Turkey soup and tummy aches

I had good intentions when I made turkey soup for our dogs and cats.  We were cooking the white tom turkey that came from our Bourbon red turkeys for Christmas.  I took the neck, giblets, tail and some turkey wings frozen from a previous turkey meal and put them in the crockpot where they cooked as our turkey roasted.  I added a box of stuffing mix to the pot to soak up the broth in the evening and everyone got some.  We gave each dog their own little paper bowl so there wouldn’t be any fighting.  They loved it of course but we regretted it later in the night when Sadie got a tummy ache. 

Sadie is an old, small Jack Russel that sleeps with us.  She has had tummy problems before - she gets gas I think.  She shakes and her ears are up on alert and she can’t stay still.  The only thing that helps is for me to pat her back like you do a colicky baby. I don’t know why that soothes colic but it does. If I start drifting off to sleep and the patting slows down she scratches at me.  I tried just putting her off the bed but then she paces around the floor and I can hear her nails tip tapping, click, click, click and she goes under the bed and scratches at the floor.  

It took hours last night before she settled down to sleep. I patted and patted and patted. No more soup for her.  We are actually making some more today from the carcass of the turkey but she will get something else.  All of the other dogs and cats were happy though and the other dogs were quite content last night.

We have a light dusting of snow on the ground and more on the way.  I have kept the birds locked in the last few days so the coop stays warmer but they aren’t too happy about that.  One of the ducks is starting to lay again but I have news for her, the eggs will be cooked and fed to the cats if the egg eater doesn’t get them first.  I am picking up the frizzle eggs too and cooking them for the cats.  No chicks or ducklings are wanted until its warmer.

I had to separate the big male ducks.  They were doing a lot of fighting and chasing and keeping everyone stirred up.  I moved the younger one into the chicken side of the coop.  He spends all his time in front of a ventilation opening between the coops that has netting over it.  The old drake parks himself on the other side of the net and they fight through the fence.   But at least they aren’t chasing each other wildly and fighting beak to beak. 

The two little frizzle roosters that were running free separated themselves.  One of them moved into the side with the ducks.  Two Ameraucana hens live there and he went to live with them.  The other little rooster is a real meanie and he has stayed in the front of the barn.  One or two big hens are always out there with him. They run by me when I open the coop door to feed and I let them hang around in the front of the barn.  They like to lay in the tub of hay I put out for the cats to sleep in.

I have cooked and baked so much in the last few days we are only going to eat leftovers for a few days.  Went and got feed this morning and Pepsi for me and we are ready for the snowstorm.

Let's talk and eat chocolate

What can you say about last week?  I have been eating chocolate and listening to quiet country Christmas music to try and keep from crying all weekend.  Sometimes the news is just too much.  Those innocent little kids, killed by another kid who our system failed.  So sad.

Our country does need to talk and gun control has to be a part of it.  As a country person I know guns are a valuable tool.  We own a gun.  But our country just doesn't have a sensible attitude about guns.   No one other than the military needs semi-automatic or automatic weapons.  Things need to be done, its obvious what we have doesn't work. 

But there are other things we need to talk about too.  Our mental health system is failing people.  We are holding the rights of individuals over the rights of society as a whole.  People cannot get the help they need for those they love unless they do try something horrendous.  Our prisons serve as mental hospitals.  It’s a system that desperately needs an overhaul and we need to discuss it. 

The video games and movies we let children watch or play do have something to do with the disconnect from reality, the tolerance of violence, the normalizing of abnormal behavior.  You can trace the upswing in violence to the rise of more and more violent and realistic video games and movies.  There’s no doubt in my mind they play a part in this mess we are in.  We need to talk about that.

And the media - and ultimately our fascination with violence, the competition to outdo the last guy who did something violent, the media shrilling everyday about this or that “record” in violence, all of that feeds violence and we have to talk about it.  Here in mid Michigan the media can’t stop reminding people that the Newtown shootings are not the worst school murders, citing an 80 year old incident in Bath where a bomb killed many elementary school children.  It’s not the same and we aren’t in a competition. 

We don’t need the honor of having “the worst” record.  Children don’t need to worry about bombs as well as shooters when they go to school.  As adults we know of all the horrors that are in this world.  But our children shouldn’t.   We shouldn’t even be bringing up the Bath bombing.  It’s not relevant and I repeat we don’t want the distinction of holding the record for most dead school children.

Every night the media reminds us that the last shooting or other violent death brings us closer to the “record”  or has exceeded the record.  We count the senseless acts of violence up and it takes more and worse violent acts to get our attention.   Let’s stop announcing the shootings and other violent acts.  It hasn’t seemed to help. No publicity for the stupid and evil.  Let’s make it news when there hasn’t been any violent deaths and announce how many days we have accumulated to a violence free days record. 

Candle light vigils and piles of memorial junk don’t help anything so let’s stop showing them.  Let’s focus on kids doing good things, adults helping others, and stop focusing on the terrible and sad things in the world.  If we portray a sad and hopeless world filled with violence that’s what we will have.

Oh yes this country needs to talk, about a lot of things.  There can’t be sacred cows and political correctness needs to take a vacation.  We need to get it out, work it through and just make the changes we need.  A New Year is beginning and we don’t need to accept violence any more.  Let’s talk - and eat a lot of chocolate.

Egg thief is still around

It’s a clear crisp morning here in Michigan.  The sun makes the 30 degree temperature bearable.  I went out to the barn early this morning, in attempt to foil the egg thief but I may have been too early for some of the hens to lay.  I set the light timer back an hour a few days ago so there would be less time between when they got up and started laying and when I got to the barn.  However I only collected 4 eggs from the 15 hens in there.  I also collected 4 eggs from the silky chickens and there are only 5 hens in that pen.

Last week I put a dozen large plastic Easter eggs, the kind you open and fill with candy, in the nests as an attempt to confuse the egg thief.  It crunched some of them in its teeth cracking them apart.  Some were under the nest boxes, where I often find eggshells.  It’s obvious from the teeth marks that it isn’t the hens eating their own eggs.  I don’t think a cat could open its mouth that wide to take the whole plastic egg in it and bite down.  I am leaning toward an opossum even more.  Now I just have to catch it and kill it.

I opened the outside hen run up so they could go wander this morning.  There is a little dusting of snow here and there and they ran over and were picking at it.  I think they confused it with bread crumbs.  The grass is still green and I wanted them to be able to harvest a little of it.   They will be all over the yard I know and in the front of the barn eating cat food but it keeps them from being bored.  Some of the hen ducks are also flying over the fence and wandering around.

I finally got the white turkey butchered.  He dressed out at around 15 pounds with a decent breast, good for a young heritage bird.  He had grown a few dark feathers in his wings.  The older toms were starting to pick on him and he was starting to gobble and strut so it was time.  I may cook him tonight or tomorrow or freeze him for Christmas, haven’t decided. 

Another stray cat has shown up at the house.  She’s a big black and white fluffy cat, very friendly but it looks like she was well groomed and although she’s thin now she was probably well cared for at one time.  She rubs around my feet and meows in the barn.  I gave her some dry food off by herself because she seemed reluctant to get in the feed bowls with the other cats.  She eats a little but it seems like she’s looking for something else.  Maybe her family. 

I don’t know if the fluffy cat was dropped off or wandered here.  But Steve told me I needed to stop sitting out in front of the yard with cats on my lap and draped over my neck where people could see me and think about how much I love cats and how I might like theirs.  I like cats but I don’t really want another female one.  I am hoping she’s spayed because her head is large like a males and she is big, sometimes cats spayed early take on male traits.   But the underside is definitely female.  I haven’t been able to pick up the black stray that has been here a couple weeks now although he’s no longer afraid of me.   I think it’s male but who knows.

The bad thing about strays is you don’t know if they are carrying fleas or diseases.  But when you have a barn and feed cats there you always end up with more cats.  And the new research that shows cats carry a parasite, Toxoplasma gondii, that can cause depression and mental illness in humans doesn’t make me feel better about having a lot of them around.  Read more about that here;  

http://www.examiner.com/article/common-cat-parasite-is-linked-to-mental-illness-and-suicide-humans  It gives new meaning to the crazy old woman hoarding cats stereotype.

I am off to taste test 3 types of chocolate peanut butter cups I am experimenting with for a cooking article.  They are cooling and hardening and Steve is waiting impatiently to tell me which one tastes the best.  I’m going to run out and check for more eggs too.

Bugsy is gone

We lost another one of our old dogs.  It wasn’t unexpected in some ways; Bugsy was the dog whose soul mate Hazel died last month.  He had never been happy since she was gone.  He was bladder incontinent but still was able to go out to poop.  Before his friend Hazel died he waited for her to finish what she wanted of her special chicken soup then he got to finish the bowl.  I wanted to quit making the chicken soup but Steve kept making it for Bugsy and Sarah, our old dog in the barn.  We spoiled him in other ways, trying to make him happy again, but he still searched for Hazel and seemed sad. 

Bugsy had been eating pretty well and he had taken to following me around in place of Hazel.  He loved to lay at my feet while I was in here in my office typing.   He has never walked well- even when younger.  He was dropped off at our place 15 years ago with rickets so bad he was bowlegged.  His brother Mugsy was dropped off at the same time and my sister took him.  He died 2 years ago.  They had been terribly mistreated, with cigarette burns and other scars and Mugsy’s jaw had been broken and healed.  They were only about 6 weeks old then.  But both had pretty good lives with us and with my sister.

We had noticed early last week that Bugsy wasn’t eating well.  Then Thursday I had to be gone most of the day at doctor’s appointments and Steve went with me.  When we got home we saw that Bugsy was in the same spot he was in when we left- a bed in the living room.  (We have dog beds throughout the house.)   A little later I tried to get him up and he seemed too weak to stand.  I changed his bed because it was wet and told Steve we would take him to the vet Friday to be put down.

On Friday however Bugsy was up and though he wouldn’t eat he drank well and followed me to the office.  I decided to wait and see what would happen and didn’t make the vet appt.  By late Friday evening I regretted that as he began whimpering and shaking, a sign he was in pain.  I fixed him a nice soft bed and sat by him all night; the only thing that soothed him was me stroking him. 

The closest emergency vet open at night is 50 miles away.  Every time I moved him to change his bed he cried in pain.  Since he was still a heavy dog for me to carry, I wouldn’t have been able to get him in a car easily and I knew he would be hurt even more.  He never liked cars either.  So all night I was up with him, stroking and talking to him, and giving him water from a syringe until he passed at 7 am.  It was a horrible night.  Steve buried him next to Hazel.  I warned the other dogs that if they quit eating they will go right to the vet. ( There's a picture of Bugsy in the Nov 20 blog entry.)

If there is a God that accepts dogs in heaven Bugsy is happy again, following his love Hazel around.  We will all be together again soon.

Who's eating my eggs?

It’s snowing here today, with about an inch of mushy stuff on the ground.  It’s damp and gray and cold, the kind of day to spend inside.  Looking through the window is pretty enough with the trees draped in white fluff.  I thought about going out to take pictures but I have a hard time motivating myself this time of year.  My body says stay in, eat and hibernate.  Last night I made a banana sour cream cake- delicious- but not what Steve and I need.

I went to the little store in town this morning to buy my newspapers, the roads were slick and I thought about skipping the whole thing but we need the newspapers for slopping up after Bugsy, our incontinent dog.  I also wanted to buy a lottery ticket for the powerball game which is up to some fantastic amount.  But it was a struggle to get my mind and body in gear to make the trip.

The hose at the barn was froze this morning and all day yesterday.  Friday I filled two buckets and left them in the barn and that was used up this morning so tonight I will be carrying water unless some really bright sun comes out and warms us up, which I doubt.  I thought the chickens would all stay inside but they and the cats came running to meet me when I came out.  I saw chicken tracks all around the front yard in the snow so I guess their little bare feet were tolerating the snow. 

Usually I shut up all the birds before the first sticking snow but last year I regretted not letting them out more when it was nice.  I kept thinking if I let them out someone would get left out over night and freeze.  This year I haven’t closed up everyone yet- I have yet to find all the turkeys and ducks roosting inside.  All the chickens come in each night but the others are more stubborn.  Tonight though, I may go back out after it gets good and dark and see if I can shut them in.  That will guarantee we get a warm spell.

Something is eating eggs.  I don’t think its chickens, doesn’t look like their work and it started in the frizzle pen.  The eggs look like they are being bitten open.  I hate to think it’s the cats because I can’t keep them out of the pens.  I found the shell from an eaten one in the big hens nest box this am and that bothers me because I don’t want to paying this much for laying feed and not get eggs.    We do feed the cats cooked eggs several times a week (and they always have dry cat food).  I confess I have on occasion given them raw eggs, usually after I find a cracked one.  It may be my fault if its cats doing it. 

There has been a big black cat hiding in the barn lately.  He sneaks out to eat with the other cats when he thinks I’m not looking.  You can tell he was once a pet, I think someone dropped him off so I don’t think he would be any more likely to eat eggs than mine.   I’m thinking maybe an opossum is eating them.  I do wish I had a night vision trail camera out there- maybe one day.

Speaking of eggs, my crazy canary laid one this morning on the cage floor.  I took her nest out last week because she has been sitting on it for weeks.  There were eggs once but they never hatched.  She got busy and tried to make a nest in a seed cup, pushing all the seeds out and scavenging little pieces of paper and feathers.  Today when I found the egg, which I broke trying to pick up, I took out the seed cup and replaced her nest and gave her some moss and yarn to re-build which she has been happily doing.  The male is still with her but I haven’t noticed them mating. 

I was getting ready to put the cage separators back in both cages and let them be separated for a while.  I know male and female canaries should be separated but mine don’t fight and seem happy and it does give them a lot more room with the cage dividers out.  I think I will put the one divider back in the cage with the older male and switch the hen that he is next to, since I got nothing out of that pair this year.  I have one poor little hen that has been in the bottom cage all year and in the winter it doesn’t get a lot of light.  Its time for her to have a chance to attract the male, although he took a big fancy to the hen he is with last spring.  Maybe he will get to like her because she will be “new”.

That’s news at the bird house.  Here's a picture of the hen  trying to nest in the seed cup.

Dogs who read calenders

It’s been a quiet week.  It started rainy and mild, ended up cooler and sunny. This morning there was heavy fog.  The hose has been running at least every afternoon, although there have been some mornings when the water on the animals dishes was frozen pretty deep.  Still the ducks have been out on the pond and the turkeys and chickens are ranging far and wide.  Its nice they don’t have to be shut up yet.

I wish I could keep the hens and young roosters from being out roaming in the front yard and garden.  It always gets bad in the late fall when they have to go farther to find yummies.  They think if they meet me at the back door they might get something extra.  That doesn’t work well when I am coming out of the door with a dog or two on a leash like this morning.  Lucky it was the cockers and not the Jacks I was taking to town with me.

I don’t know how they know the date but Honey, Barack and Ginger at least always know its Sunday.  On Sunday I go up to the little town nearby to buy newspapers and I usually take dogs with me.  The named dogs above, who love to ride in the car, like to go anyway.

Honey begins watching me the moment breakfast is done on Sunday.  I don’t know what I do different from any other morning.  Maybe it’s what’s on TV as Steve can’t be without TV in the background.  I think Barack and Ginger pick up on it from her - or maybe Ginger also knows as she’s pretty smart.  Anyway they won’t leave me alone until I pick one or two to go and leave.  I can handle Honey and Barack together but Ginger, although she’s smaller I take alone. 

Honey and Barack are the cockers.  They walk fairly well on a leash and jump in the car when told to.  Inside they sit on the console and passenger seat and behave pretty well.  Ginger is a Jack Russell mix and she is just itching to get away and chase something when she goes out the door.  I have to carry her to the car and I don’t let go until the door is closed.  Once inside she insists on sitting crammed between me and the driver’s door with her nose pressed against the window.  It makes it hard to get out but she does love it so.

It’s only about 2 miles there and 2 back but that little drive each week means a lot to some dogs.  Sometimes when the weathers nice I take Ginger for a drive after I get back with the cockers.  The things we do for dogs.  I am glad most of the dogs don’t care about going in the car.

Bugsy, our old farm terrier has started following me in the office to sit at my feet while I work.  I put a rug there for him.  It’s between the heating vent and the little heater I sometimes use in there.  Cricket, our little yorkie-jack mix lives in the office.  She is old and getting very blind as well as deaf.  She doesn’t mind old Bugsy in there but she barks when the other dogs come in.  She used to fight with them and that was why she was separated all the time as she was very aggressive with the other girls.  Now she is very docile, in fact I sometimes chase the others out if they threaten her.

Honey loves to come in the office and sit and eat Crickets food, which is the same exact food she has out in the kitchen.  Unless I pick it up she eats every crumb.  And she sure doesn’t need the extra food.  They all like to drink out of Crickets water bowl and they take turns checking out her kennel run, the ones who can fit through her doggie door anyway. 

When they sense I am going to my office all the dogs follow now. Honey beats me to the door.  It’s great to go to work with Mom I guess.

Bird talk

I brought in some of the inner leaves of ornamental kale, curly purple and white leaves, for the canaries in place of the usual chickweed.  As a bonus there was a tiny cabbage worm on one piece.  It went in the cage with the younger male, whose hen is still sitting on a nest, although she hasn’t hatched anything all year.  He appeared interested but a little frightened of the worm.  The hen finally came off the nest and picked at the kale but I guess canaries as seed eating birds don’t appreciate worms. 

It took the hen canaries only a minute to realize the odd colored plants were edible but the males didn’t seem interested.  Females are smarter after all.  Kale is a little tougher than chickweed and they had to hold it down with a foot to tear at it but they knew what to do.

 Last night I sold off all of the young ducks that were left, 19 of them.  Over the last week we sold all 30 young ones.  The feed bill was getting huge-80 pounds of pellets a week between the turkeys and ducks.  We are now down to a more manageable number 6 adult ducks and 5 breeder turkeys and 1 meat turkey.  Last year we butchered the leftover babies and I got a good price for the meat but this year they were not going to mature enough before the processors quit for the season. 

I have learned a lesson, cut off the hatching of ducks by mid-summer.  We had a late start because something was eating eggs in the spring but the late summer and fall duck bounty was not a money maker, that’s for sure.  Turkeys could hatch anytime and be sold for a good price, at least the heritage ones but not ducks.

 Speaking of turkeys I may not get my white tom butchered before Thanksgiving.  I called my usual meat processor at the end of September and she was already booked for Thanksgiving week.  So far no luck with a processor.  Steve said we could do it ourselves but I said no.  I can’t eat the ones we butcher until they have been frozen for a while and I have forgotten the whole smelly process.  I guess I am not as good a live off the land person as I would like to be.  We can get him butchered after Thanksgiving and have him for Christmas.   I do hate the thought that I raised these heritage turkeys all summer and I am not having one for Thanksgiving.  I hope we are able to raise more of them next season so we can sell breeding stock and have some left to eat.

We are hoping for some dry, warmer weather this weekend so that we can get some more winterizing projects done.  We need to repair part of the tarp roof over the chicken run after the high winds last week and cover the small coop run with plastic.   The mower needs to be run over to the old horse shelter for the winter and I need to put away some cages and other things so they are out of the way for the winter.  And I still have daffodil bulbs to plant.

 Winter is almost here and I dread it.  I hope we have a mild one like last year but not quite as warm, as that didn’t work well with the fruit crops.  Just above freezing in the day so the hose will run is fine and sunny would be really great.  We have had a long stretch of cloudy or overcast days and it gets very depressing. 

This morning it is foggy but I am hoping the SW wind will clear it off.   The pond is up a little, less evaporation, trees have quit drawing up water and we have had a little rain.   But I know that snow would be beneficial for the pond and the environment so I will try not to be too unhappy when it falls next week as they are predicting.  I am going to try and leave the birds free ranging longer this year, instead of closing up the barn with them inside.  Unless the snow is deep and it’s really cold they might benefit from being outside more.

 

I could see the neighbor’s house through the woods this morning.  That really tells me winter is here.

Good Bye to Hazel

Today in Eastern Michigan we are watching the weather closely.  The edges of hurricane Sandy are going to impact us with high winds.  Its 40 degrees with drizzle and the winds are already strong.  I went out a bit ago to fill a big 20 gallon tub with water in the barn in case the power goes out.  I shut the chickens inside but most of the ducks were still out at the pond.  The turkeys are smart enough to stand inside out of the wind.  I worry that our new tarp roof  over the chicken run is going to come off but there is nothing I can do about it. 

 Last Thursday we finally had our 17 year old dog Hazel put down.  It was a very hard decision for us.  She was still eating well but had wasted to skin and bones.  She could not get up on her own and could only walk a little when we got her up.  She was always wetting her bed and although we knew she tried to get up and out to poop she seldom made it.  We would get up with her several times a night as she cried until we did.  Often she just wanted to be lifted up so she could wander aimlessly around for a few minutes. 

On Thursday it was warm and sunny and while I cleaned up the mess she made inside she managed to get outside through the dog door.  I found her sleeping in the sun so I left her there until just before we got ready to take her to the vet.  I wanted them to come here but one vet didn’t do that and the other local vet wanted more than $100 to do it, which we couldn’t afford.  I had made the appointment on Wednesday after Steve and I discussed it for hours. 

We both felt bad but it wasn’t like if we waited that she would get better.  I felt that it wouldn’t be too long before she passed anyway but I also thought she might linger for many days more.  Maybe it was selfish but Steve and I hadn’t had a good nights sleep in weeks because of getting up with her and it was depressing us too. 

I don’t know what dogs think but I had the feeling she was always feeling guilty or sad after she wet the bed or messed on the floor.  She had always been meticulously housebroken until a couple months ago.  She was always so clean, and now she often was dirty, even though I bathed her every few days. I tried to reassure her and never scolded her but it can’t have been comfortable for her.  I had to cut off the “feathers” on her beautiful tail and clip her hindquarters.  Her hair came out in clumps.

I don’t know if she was in pain but she was often confused about where she was and unhappy and crying when she couldn’t do what she wanted.  Hazel was a dog who lived for strict rules and a set routine and tried to get us to live by them too.  She had no control anymore, even of her own body. She would wander aimlessly until she collapsed from weakness but we couldn’t get her to stop or even go where we wanted her to without upsetting her.  She still knew her name most of the time but didn’t seem interested or appreciative of being petted or sweet talked anymore. 

 Steve cooked her the special homemade chicken soup she loved and we fed her bread which she also loved whenever she seemed restless or hungry.  Yet she constantly lost weight and Thursday she weighed 17 pounds, down from an average weight of 35 pounds.

 Bugsy her true love and constant companion also worried over her.  When we made her clean beds on the floor he would come over and try to lie down beside her although we discouraged it because he often ended up lying partly on top of her, squashing her.  When she cried he barked to make sure we knew she needed help.  His devotion did not include passing up her food, which he always tried to finish up for her.

 I was pretty prepared for Thursday.  I wanted her to go out after a pretty good day, which I think she had outside in the sun.  She didn’t like car rides but she was very passive and only cried a bit.  The worse part of the whole thing was that the vet couldn’t find a good vein because her circulation was so bad and they had to try in both legs several times.  I know it hurt her as she squirmed and wimpered a bit but there was no going back then.  He kept trying to make small talk like Hazel would have been over 90 had she been human.  I have always thought comparing dog years and human years is senseless.

 We buried her under a tree in the yard.  Bugsy spent a lot of time looking for her around the house for a few days but he is adjusting now.  He seems a little depressed and his health isn’t so great either but I think he will be ok for a while.

 She is at peace and comfortable now I hope, chasing after sheep and enjoying strength and beauty.

 

 

rain and shine

It’s a cold dreary light rain falling this morning.  I know we need the rain for the trees and perennials and to fill my pond but that doesn’t make it less miserable.  My old knees can’t take the slipping and sliding out in the mud behind the barn.  Most of the birds were inside this morning because of the rain but the turkey and duck dishes are still outside.  They all ran out to the dishes when they saw me.  I did put some feed down inside and I moved the 2 gallon water container inside.  Eventually it will all have to be moved inside but there are just so many ducks right now and ducks make such a mess with the water.

 More baby ducks hatched Wednesday, 13 of them.  It’s a cloud of fuzz balls with the 8 ducklings from last week and now these.  And of course there are 9 older ducklings which are starting to feather out.  The 2 younger groups keep getting mixed together which their mommas don’t like but the babies just follow whatever group they are close to. 

 On Thursday the newest mom had brought her bunch outside and the slightly older bunch started to follow their mom to the pond and some of the tinier ones were following.  I tried to head them off because I didn’t think they were ready for the long walk down the slope and would get lost or picked off.  I ended up catching all the tiny ones and putting them in a pen but their mom threw a fit and refused to go inside so after the bigger ducks were out of sight I let the little ones out.  They have managed to make it through the last few days of rain and mud and big birds stepping on them just fine.  I sure do hope we sell some soon.

 Tomorrow it’s supposed to be sunny and we are going to finish putting a tarp over the outside chicken run and enclose it for winter.  It won’t be clear plastic this year because that didn’t hold up over the summer for some reason.  I hope the blue tarp holds up to snow.  November is almost here and we need to get a lot of winterizing done yet.  Storm windows need to be put on the house and some weather stripping done.  I just have to get Steve pried away from baseball and football games.

 Sunday- we did get the tarp up over the chicken run.   That was fun.  You know how fun it is to work on a project with your spouse?  That kind of fun.  All that’s left now is to cover the south wall with clear plastic for winter.

 Interesting find was that one of the new young hens has been getting onto the rather deep barn window ledge about 5 feet off the ground and laying her eggs.  When I was on the ladder I spotted the pullet size brown eggs and removed them.   Until we cover the south side of the run she can probably get back up there so I will have to remember to check there.

 

Saturday night it was raining and a good night to catch all the birds roosting in the barn.  Well I didn't want to catch all of them, just some for two people coming on Sunday to get them.  A neighbor wanted my two hen guineas and I was glad to sell them.  Those buggers proved very hard to catch even though they were shut in the hen coop and it was pretty dark.  He also wanted a pretty young Ameraucana rooster I had and that bird had to perch on the highest spot in the back of the barn.  I had to push him off the roost with a broom because I couldn't reach him.

I also caught up some older hens for someone.  Those weren't too hard to catch.  I had both sets of birds in cages overnight in the front part of the barn.  Of course both people were later than they told me they'd come on Sunday.  The woman for the hens was 3 hours late.  They laid eggs in the cage so she could see they were still laying..

That leaves me with 14 hens, some older ones along with the new pullets and we should still have plenty of eggs.  I am picking up 8-9 every day but I think the 2 Jersey Giants haven't started laying yet.  We eat eggs every morning and the cats and dogs get them often too.

The little porclein bantams have started laying- or at least some hen in that group is laying.  There are two tiny hens, breed unknown with the porclein pair.  They don't seem interested in sitting on the eggs, at least not yet.

The mama duck with the youngest babies has been taking then to the pond everyday and keeping them there most of the day.  All 8 are still alive even though one gets left behind at the barn every so often and goes around peeping for awhile.  They always seem to get re-unitied.  But this morning all the baby ducks were at the eddge of the barnyard when I went out to feed with no mama in sight.  They were just sitting in the sun.  I hope she turns up.  I didn't go out to look at the pond but it seemed odd that the babies were all the way up by the barnyard without her.

We still have 9 of the older baby ducks left.  The three I thought might be lilac colored are getting very odd looking.  The underdown seems gray or lilac but the wing feathers look like they are coming in black barred. ( see picture)  I don't know whether I want to try and sell this bunch or save them for eating.  Either way they need to be gone by true winter.  And I still have one duck sitting on eggs.

The mud around the water pan out there is very slippery and I have been trying not to walk in it as I am afraid of falling out there where no one can see me.  The worst part of ducks is the mess they make with water.  I don't want to over winter more than 5-6.

I have an idea.  I will vote for the presidential candidate that has ducks.  Hmmm - which will it be?

a cold bath

It froze here last night, the water containers all had a light layer of ice on them and the hose ran very slowly in back of the barn.  The sun was just coming over the trees and all the turkeys and ducks were trying to find a spot in it up against the fence.  The poor chickens didn’t have any sun yet and were kind of huddled up under the tarp covered section of their outside run waiting for it. 

Another duck hatched her eggs Friday and 8 new little babies are waddling around in the cold.  Yesterday morning she brought them right over to the mud holes that get made when I pour out the big tub of water to change it.  All the young ducks like to play in the mud, they make holes with their beaks rooting in it and when I dump the water tub it runs downhill and into these holes. 

New momma duck protected the first couple holes yesterday from the other older babies and let her babies play in them.  It sure looked cold to me.   But this morning she had them all in the barn and when they all started outside in their little troop one duckling broke off and ran toward the mud holes.  Momma stopped him with a sharp quack and he ran back.  She took them to the fountain waterer, where they can’t get in the water.   Then they all sat in the sun near it.  Now that is an example that animals have some reasoning ability.  She knew it was just too cold this morning for bathing.

 The oldest bunch of baby ducks are starting to get feathers and I am waiting to see if I have some lavender colored ones in there.  Three of them look very gray in the down color and their beaks are gray.  But it looks like the wing and tail tips are coming in black.  We’ll see what happens.

I had to put a dish of starter feed under a milk crate in the frizzle pen so the baby chicks could get something to eat the bigger chicks didn’t hog down.  The little chicks can go through the handle holes easily.  There is still another hen sitting in that pen that should hatch later this week-or early next week.  But there will be no more frizzles this season after that.

 Inside the house my canary hen threw out the eggs she laid and set on that didn’t hatch and built a new nest.  She is now sitting again at a time when most canaries are molting and done with nests for the year.  I haven’t checked to see if she has eggs again.  It would be nice to actually get a few baby canaries but I won’t hold my breath.

 Took a walk at lunch time around my property.  I scared up a nice buck hiding from hunters up by the pond fence; under an autumn olive where it was obvious deer had been browsing the plants for the berries.  In some ways it’s nice to be a safe haven but other times I think about inviting someone to hunt on the property.  There are just too many deer.

 The grass has improved so nicely throughout the pasture and I know it’s a funny way of looking at things but I just keep thinking what a waste it is that nothing is eating it, like horses or steers.  That thinking must come from my farming ancestors.  I try to funnel my thinking into planting more trees out there, turning pasture into woodland.  Nature is trying to do that, I found a red and a white pine growing that I hadn’t seen before.   I was looking at pictures yesterday from 20 years ago when we bought the property and so many of the big trees we have now weren’t there.  We planted hundreds of trees at first.  I wish we had planted a more diverse range of species.   It was mostly red and white pines, some spruce and a few maples at first.  I did add some other things later but wish I had added more odd things earlier.

 

 

Bye Bye Birdies

I sold some turkeys and ducklings today, enough to buy feed for a couple weeks, which is good because keeping all these birds is an expensive hobby.  Our feed bill runs about $100 a month, which is too much.  Selling birds also means fewer mouths to eat feed.  I sold 2 of the older young turkeys and the little one and 6 ducklings.  Last night I tricked the two older turkeys into the barn with bread and shut them in.  I didn’t think I could catch the little one because it wouldn’t go inside but this morning I was able to corner it outside when I fed.  It had never been caught before and wasn’t too experienced in ducking me. 

 The ladies that came to buy the turkeys wanted to look at the ducks and decided to buy some.  Their little boy wanted a black and white one but they picked out the rest of them that were lighter colored- because they don’t like dark pinfeathers in their meat.  The momma ducks were not very happy and neither were the momma turkeys.   It’s kind of sad but you sure can’t keep them all. 

 We kept the white turkey for our Thanksgiving meal.  The women were getting the turkeys for eating this winter and I admire the fact that they choose to pay for free range heritage turkeys instead of broad breasted turkeys.  I hope we can raise more turkeys next year.  People are recognizing the value of them.

 The hen turkeys are just coming out of molt and I hope they don’t nest again this year.  I am ready to be done with babies for a while.  We still have two duck clutches to hatch and one more clutch of frizzle chicks.  The tiny frizzle chicks we have are getting out of the pen and yesterday I was lucky to save one from the cats.  They were a little unsure about catching it - I think they recognized it as a chicken but that tiny thing whizzing around was too much to resist. 

 Baby chicks shrill peeping when they are unhappy bothers me as much as it does the hens.  The little chicks can’t get in and out the coop door well yet and that makes them unhappy when mom goes outside.  Some get out; some are left behind and start peeping.  Mom comes back because they are peeping and the outside chicks have trouble getting back in and they start peeping.  And I go nuts from the peeping.  Good thing I don’t have to be around all the time.

 The cats have been catching frogs lately.  I think they are getting them down around the pond.  It’s so dried up I hate to look at it.  At least we have a little water left in it.  But if we have a cold winter it may freeze solid which means any fish that are there will be gone.   I don’t like snow but I guess we need it this winter- or at least rain.  Our wettest month is supposed to be September but we sure didn’t get much rain. 

 

clipping wings

When we left to go to the grocery yesterday morning we noticed our turkeys and guineas a 1/4 mile up the road, walking in the road.  We stopped and were going to shoo them home but they took off like wild turkeys into the weeds.  We couldn’t even see them and one of them is white!  That made me realize it was time to try and pen them up again or we wouldn’t be having turkey for Thanksgiving.

 That evening they were waiting by the door for their bread treat and I made them follow me to the barn.  I put a little down and went and closed the back barn door, then tossed more bread into the barn and when they went in, shut them in.  I managed to get momma separated into a back stall, then caught her and clipped both wings. I took a chance that the young ones would stay with her and not jump the fence if their wings weren’t trimmed.  I then shooed all of them out the back barn door directly into the pen where the other turkeys and ducks are. 

 Momma turkey was quite upset.  She kept looking at and preening her wings.  Since she has had that done in the past I think she actually knew that she was now ( hopefully) trapped.  The youngsters were pretty much tired and ready for bed after they ate and jumped up on a fence rail to sleep.  She was wandering around making calling noises when I left for the evening.

 I expected to come out this am and find them all out in the front yard again but they were still there in the turkey-duck run.   After I fed them they wandered out to the back side of the pond to eat autumn olive berries.  Our other turkeys don’t seem to wander too much although there is about an acre fenced around the pond they could roam in.  They stay up close to the barn in the 20 x 40 smaller fenced area.  We leave the gate to the pond pasture open most of the time, which gives them the much larger area if they want to wander. 

 A great deal of the pond pasture area is fenced with 5 foot fence.  It doesn’t have a top rail, which makes it harder for turkeys to get over.  The smaller run area is 4 foot fence with a top rail on the west and north side, where the hen turkeys generally roost when the weather is nice.  The toms are too heavy to roost.  There is only a 3 foot tall fence separating the turkeys from the chickens.  If the momma or young ones jump that then the outer fence of the chicken run has a rail all around it that makes it easier for them to jump up and over and get into the yard.  So far the young turkeys have sat on the rail but since mom was grounded they didn’t go over, they got back down on the pen side.

 I believe the young turkeys are two toms and a hen.  We want to eat the white tom for Thanksgiving, he is getting big fast.  The other tom is bourbon red and what I think is a hen is bronze.  The other younger baby turkey is a bourbon red, but too young to sex.  It was not too happy with new turkeys arriving in its territory and challenged them a bit, which they just ignored.  I would sell any of the young ones, even the white one, if the price was right.

My toms were happy to see the bronze hen returned to the flock.  They put on a big display for her.  The two bourbon red hens are both molting and have no tail feathers right now.  The bronze hen looks so much nicer than them.  I don’t know if it was because she had a very varied diet and lots of cat food from the barn or if she molted early.  I hope she molted because that will mean the wing trimming job will last longer.

The guineas are a little lost without their turkey friends to run around with.  Maybe they will stay home now too and quit bothering the neighbors.  They were in the chicken run this am but I saw them back out in the front yard later.  I don’t know how to even trap those two.  And I am not worried if they disappear.

Comings and goings

I sent Steve off to the market this morning with chickens and ducklings; I need to reduce the number of mouths we are feeding.  We have 21 ducklings and more on the way.  And I had way more chickens than I needed.  Since the young hens are starting to lay I sent 5 older ones off to market along with the oldest big rooster and 2 banty roosters, and 4 half grown frizzle chicks.  I managed to catch 6 ducklings to send also. 

Steve likes to do the market part, sitting outside the stockyard with the tailgate down talking to all the old guys.  I am not so hot on that.  I spent an hour this morning just catching birds.  I went out last night after dark and shut the coop door on the chickens but it was still a lot of work chasing them from one end of the coop to the other just to get the ones I sent.  Even the ducklings were hard to catch.  I thought I would just throw some bread down and be able to catch them but they must have heard me catching the chickens and were real wary.

A few days ago someone stopped when Steve was outside and asked him if he could buy the guineas and a turkey or 2.  He is supposed to come back today but I don’t know if I am going to be able to catch those guineas easily, although I am willing to sell them.  I am also willing to sell all the young turkeys except the white tom, which I think will be our Thanksgiving meal.  The problem is the turkeys and guineas roost outside and no- you can’t catch them in the dark with a flashlight- at least after you catch the first one.  Darkness doesn’t make them as frozen as it does chickens; they fly off in the dark and are gone.  They do go in the barn to eat from their dish and my best bet would be to trap them in there, but it will be when there is an opportunity not necessarily when someone wants them.

 We had more silkie/frizzle chicks hatch yesterday, I don’t know how many and two more little hens are sitting.  I have two ducks sitting still.  No matter what we sell the population keeps on rising.  I do know that I will be collecting all the silky/frizzle eggs after this last bunch hatches until about next March.  And no more duck nests either.  The only thing I would possible allow to reproduce would be the porcelain banties.

 The granddaughters were up here yesterday.  They got to hold baby ducks and see a newly hatched silky chick.  They helped me feed last night.  And we had a good supper.  I hope I gave them some good memories for the day since they were going home to some unpleasant happenings.  Their other grandmother, who lives with them, had passed away just before they left and they didn’t know it yet.  Their mom found her in bed- it was unexpected- just before they were to leave and she told my son to go on ahead with the girls who were eager to get up here to see us.  All the police and medical examiner stuff were done and the body removed to a funeral home by the time the girls left here.  Sad, for my poor daughter in law but probably the best way for the girls.

I guess that’s what life is about, the comings and the goings.

As the kittens play

It’s a beautiful cool and windy day in Michigan today, only 68 degrees.  Last night we received much needed rain, almost 2 inches of it.  Of course it was on a night when we had a yard sale set up outside.  We moved the clothing into the car last night and covered everything else but it was a soggy mess this morning.  Still my plants are very happy this morning and I’m happy for them.

 We had 9 baby ducklings hatch last week.  I moved them into a pen outside for a couple weeks with their mamma.  She hatched them in the chicken coop but the kittens were way too interested in them and they had access to the coop. The pen is in the outside area reserved for ducks and turkeys and eventually mama duck will be able to take her brood to the pond.

 The pen has a blue tarp over it for a top.  The kittens follow me around everywhere even though most of them don’t want me to touch them.  After I feed all of the birds I usually sit down outside the barn to observe things for a few minutes.  The kittens have begun to use the top of the pen as a big stage for them to perform huge elaborate skits for me.  They run across the tarp, they wrestle, they skitter through the dry leaves collecting on top, they chase their tails and pounce on flies.  They climb the fence next to the pen and leap down onto the tarp top.

Poor mama duck underneath all this activity keeps cocking her head warily at the tarp above her head, probably wondering just what the heck is happening.  The baby ducks no longer seem bothered by it, its normal for them.  But I soon feel sorry for her and go somewhere else so the little cat brats will follow me.

 There are seven kittens left from 2 mama cats, neither of which I have seen in several days.  That’s ok because the kittens are about 3 months old.   One of our other old barn cat females died this week and I am beginning to wonder if the older cats aren’t roaming somewhere and someone is poisoning or harming them.   This old white cat that died had distemper some time ago, the only survivor 2 years ago when distemper swept through here and killed all the other cats.  For a while there was only her around then a momma cat moved in last fall and had 5 kittens in a groundhog hole under our propane tank.  She has since disappeared and now all the original 5 kittens are gone too, if the two females who had this batch of kittens are truly gone.

 It’s strange since all of the kittens here appear healthy so I don’t think a disease is the cause.  The momma cat that came here last fall was a terrific hunter and really cleaned up on the population of mice and rats.  The two daughters that had this current crop of kittens were also great hunters.  I hope they had enough time to teach these babies well.   I didn’t like it when they hide under the ramp in the front to catch birds at the feeder but we did like it that the mouse/rat/ mole/ rabbit population had dropped.

 As my husband says seven cats are enough to feed so I shouldn’t worry about it.  I think 4 are males and 3 are females in this batch so we have plenty of cats to carry on for a while.  One gray male and a little golden striped female are pretty friendly and allow me to pick them up but the rest only want me to feed them and watch them play.   They meet me at the door at feeding time.  Barn cats are a whole different breed from house cats in many ways.  Our dogs don’t play well with cats so we have barn cats.

They say that turkey vultures rarely eat any live prey and the prey they eat is mostly things like grasshoppers and washed up shrimp or snails.  But I am getting a bit suspicious of the large flock that uses our land for its home roost.  They have been around here every summer for the last few years.

 I noticed them flying very low, just above my head, over the chicken pasture and pond areas, a few days ago, something I never noticed in previous years.  And then the next day 2 of the turkey chicks from the hen that nested out by the pond disappeared.  What makes that more suspicious is that she took the remaining chick up by the barn and is now hanging out there, close to the tom turkeys and where she can rest under the lilac bushes and apple trees with the chick.  The other hen and her solitary chick are there too.

We have had baby ducks and baby chicken chicks up in the area around the barn without problems but that turkey hen was ranging way out in the pasture looking for autumn olive berries and other things.  I think they were also going to the pond to drink, which meant crossing a wide bare area because of how far the pond has dried up.

 My sister in Missouri says she has seen them snatch and eat small birds.  But there is a chance that she is seeing black vultures instead of turkey vultures and black vultures do take live prey much more often.  And since the government says that black vultures are spreading north I wonder if some of the birds I’m seeing are not turkey vultures. Maybe there are black vultures mixed in. I will have to pay closer attention.

 I do know that they keep flying low over the chicken and turkey areas and I also noticed that my birds are spending more time in the taller weeds and under trees and bushes.  It worries me a bit because I do want these turkeys to grow up.  And I hope to have a bunch of ducks hatching soon.  We have had rotten luck in the reproductive category this year with the birds.  First something eating the eggs, now when we do get some chicks those are going.

 I have actually enjoyed watching the vultures soaring around, although it does make me feel funny when I am on the ground weeding and they are circling overhead.  They roost in our tall trees in the woods.  I can watch them landing on the trees and squabbling for spots.  Sometimes they break off dead limbs and I can see and hear them crashing down from across the pond.  I just recently found out that turkey vultures nest on the ground, sometimes in old barns.   I think they may be nesting in our tangle of a woods and I also see some frequently perched on some old silos down the road.

 

Turkey vultures are protected by law and can’t be harmed and I don’t want to harm them they do valuable work cleaning up dead deer and rabbits.  But I do wish they would leave my babies alone.  I could be blaming the wrong species, there are hawks around but I haven’t seen any big hawks lately.  And we do have owls too, but the turkeys seem to huddle down under things at night when the babies are young.  The suspicious part is why the vultures are suddenly flying so low over the barnyard.  There’s nothing dead here.

 We have been doing our summer cleaning of chicken coops, boy is that a smelly job.  Most of it is dusty but some areas around the water containers are wet.   We do it a bit at a time so we aren’t breathing that dust for long periods.   Steve does most of it, working from his wheelchair.

 We are reworking our housing arrangements so that ducks and turkeys will be separated from chickens inside this winter and moving the lights on timers, little things like that.  Now that we don’t have to have an area free for the horses and hay storage there will be more room for the birds.  We have had to repair our “greenhouse” roof over the chicken run outside their area several times.  Something ripped the clear plastic.  We replaced that with a blue tarp over one half and will probably have to tarp over the other side too.  You still get some light through a tarp but not like clear plastic.  Since I intend to carry over fewer hens this winter that area won’t be quite as needed anyway.

 
Right now the chickens can range over a large pasture area but they don’t really go that far.  I say they stay within 100 feet of the barn most of the time.  They have separate groups that go to different areas.  I do think our poultry have a pretty nice life here.

Be careful what you wish for.  There’s an old saying I have used a lot this month.  Right now I am using it in the context of rain- we needed it but boy are we getting it today.( August 10)  We had  2-1/4 inches in the gauge this am and it has rained steadily, sometimes torrentially all day.   I had to unload groceries in pouring rain.  I sat in the car waiting for it to quit but it never did and I didn’t want the frozen food to thaw so I slogged the short distance from car to back door unloading groceries and getting drenched.

I worry most about the turkey hen with her three chicks out by the pond.  She had her nest under a flowering quince which helped keep animals and other birds away but doesn’t shield rain too well.  She could go to dozens of places where the cover is better or for that matter into the barn but she stays huddled under that bush when it rains, with the chicks under her.   I tried putting a tent like cover over her with an old plastic seed variety sign but I couldn’t get it all the way over her because of the bush.  And she is too stubborn to move under it more.  That’s why turkeys get the reputation of being stupid.

 My other older red turkey hen finally got to hatch a baby.  At least she is in the barn with it, not in the rain.  The poor thing has had such bad luck with her nests and she almost had more.  I was going to throw out the nest yesterday because I thought the eggs were way past hatching date.   I didn’t feel good yesterday so it got put off to today and lo and behold - a chick. 

 The other mama turkey that has her 3 chicks in the front yard was smart enough to bring them into the front of the barn today.  They sit in there right next to the cats.  They have been coming in the front of the barn to eat cat food anyway- those little ones have it made.  Thats her in the photo, we call her the front yard turkey. ( By the way I pulled the weeds in front of the flower bed after I saw the picture.)

 I had to separate one of the young frizzle roosters, the one that is the spitting image of his grandfather, my pet frizzle rooster, from the rest of the chickens.  He wouldn’t leave the young hens alone; he kept chasing them into the coop, constantly herding them somewhere.  The old, bigger roosters even left him alone. I put him on the turkey side of the barn.  There are 3 half grown chicks out there; so far he’s left them alone.  The other 3 roosters his age just hang on the edges and don’t make trouble.

 We have started culling some of the older hens.  Steve took 6 of them up to the market and they sold within 15 minutes.  I sent the oldest rooster with them but no one wanted him and he got to come back home.  There are still about 10 older hens left but at least one is sitting on eggs and I am only picking up 4-5 eggs each day now.  But the young hens should be laying in about a month.

 My little frizzle- sizzle hens are good layers.  Their eggs are small but they lay regularly.  The trouble is they start sitting on them soon as they get a big pile.  I have been picking them up lately and feeding them to the cats.   One hen is sitting on a huge pile now.  I am hoping the 2 pairs of tiny bantams I kept will also lay and sit well because they might be good sellers.  One pair are Porcelains, the other Belgian Antwerps.

 Our county fair is this week and I took a turn watching the Master Gardener display barn this Wednesday.  We have a butterfly tent where kids can go inside and feed monarchs Gatorade off their finger.  We also made an earth tunnel, that kids can walk through and see roots and bulbs hanging down as well as a rat with her nest.  We have a display of pollinator plants and a “plants of the bible” display.  The first two days of the fair had great weather; I don’t know about the next few days, we sure need the rain though.  I bet there are plenty of places that would trade their fairs for a few inches of rain this year.

The grass is starting to grow again but my horses are gone.  It was a difficult decision to sell them but as I lost my part time job and hay is looking like it will be quite expensive this winter I decided that it was time to sell them.  It wasn’t just money- they may have cost less than the chickens, turkeys and ducks to feed but also the work and worry that goes along with larger animals.

 I was surprised that they sold so fast. I expected that horses would be slow to sell, even though I wasn’t asking a lot.  They all went to the same place and I hope it was a good home.   It was to an older couple who told me they had 2 mini mares at home.  They also had a teen age granddaughter they thought would love to train Lucky the foal.  Or so they said, my husband thinks I’m crazy but I’m always a bit skeptical of what people say when they come to buy something.

I still think I see or hear them from time to time.   I really miss Lily, I feel like I broke a promise or something to her.   I won’t get to see how the foal matures, whether his long legs mean he will be bigger than Lily.  But I won’t have to worry that I can’t train him and that he will soon be fighting with his dad.  He loved his dad so far, they were best buds, so I hope they are together still.  The guy was actually looking for a stud for his mares, or so he said.

 

I love watching horses, I love to smell them and hear them.  But I can watch the neighbors horses  and see and smell them without trudging through snow to feed and water them or worrying about them getting loose or how I was going to pay for shots, gelding etc.  If they get sick or hurt horses cost a lot to treat.   And I was worried that Lily would foal again in March and that next March the weather wouldn’t be as nice as the past one.   So I have to stop thinking about them.

 

I did have 4 more baby turkeys’ hatch and some frizzle chicks.  Naturally the days the turkeys were set to hatch were the days that it poured all day.  I think more may have hatched except for the weather although the heat when the eggs were sitting out there waiting for her to start sitting may have killed some of them.

 The momma turkey with the first 3 chicks is now out of her pen and sure enough she led her babies out in the yard.  The babies are just like the last ones, they come running to meet me as soon as I come out the door, looking for bread.   They scare me by going right up to the cats, walking and running right in front of them, but so far the cats have paid them no attention.  What’s odd about them is that one is bronze, one is a bourbon red and one looks like it will be white, or nearly so.  The mom is bronze and the dad is either bronze or bourbon red. 

 It’s early to tell but it looks like the 4 new chicks will be all bourbon reds.  Their mom is keeping them out by the pond area.  That’s another good reason the horses are gone, they used to chase the turkeys for fun.  We are going to divide our barn and pasture areas with turkeys and ducks on one side and chickens on the other.  Two ducks are however, sitting in the barn on the chicken side.  One turkey is still sitting, the one who lost her eggs the first time, but I don’t think there are any turkey eggs under her and I don’t think anything else is going to hatch either, I think the duck and chicken eggs were old when she began sitting on them.

 One little baby duck is still following his mom around.  They are so cute to watch, the little ducks.  I expected to have tons of baby ducks this year with 4 hens but so far we have only managed to hatch 2 ducklings.  Maybe these next two sitting ducks will raise the total.

In the hot weather we have been having I go out everyday around lunch time to check on the animals.  The heat has been very stressful on the birds and egg laying has been down.   The horses seem to be doing ok, but aren’t real thrilled about having to eat hay this time of year.  This morning we had a tiny bit of rain and I’ll take it, in a brief dawn thunderstorm.  We are waiting to see if we get more tonight. 

 I watched 4 baby starlings at the feeder this am sitting on the crook of the shepherd’s crook holding the feeder.  When their mom or dad approached they went nuts and totally knocked the parent off the pole.  Bugs are probably sparse in this dry year and they are concentrating on the suet to feed their young.  I actually like starlings, they are cheerful birds and eat a lot of harmful bugs.  They get their bad rep from their habit on congregating in large flocks and sometimes stealing grain, although they prefer bugs.

I had another single duckling hatch and his mom is having a heck of a time trying to get out with him and get food and water.  She chose to sit under the top half of a dog house in the back of the barn.  But a hen chose to start sitting right outside the entrance to the duck’s nest and she doesn’t want the duck to emerge.  I put the duck with her duckling in a pen outside but she managed to get out of the pen and come right back inside under the doghouse top.

I was able to successfully move the hen and her nest over to the other side of the stall where they are but the duck still doesn’t want to come out and let her baby eat and drink.  I don’t have any other birds in a brooder and I am not going to set up a brooder for one duckling.  I put a baby water dish and feed right next to the ducks spot but the chickens just eat it up and turn it over.  I’m going to try something else tonight. 

 My momma turkey who hatched 3 chicks is going nuts being penned up and I want to release her.  Her chicks are feathered out and getting big.  But I am afraid she will jump the chicken yard fence and get her chicks to follow her, they fly pretty good at this age.   We have a big open ditch in the yard where we are repairing a septic line that broke.   It’s been so hot that work is progressing slowly there.  I’m afraid the chicks would get in and drown, although the water isn’t too deep.  That should be finished in a day or so and hopefully she can be turned free. 

It’s interesting that in these 3 chicks we have one bourbon red, one bronze and one that looks like it will be white, or nearly white.  Turkey genetics are not like chicken genetics, they don’t always breed true to color.  Some people believe that turkey breeds are actually just color variations.  I would concur except to say there are at least two body types, the broad breasted and normal breasted and those might be better classified as two different breeds.  Some people list the midget white as another body type.

 I am hoping to get another batch of chicks hatched in the next few days.  That would be the turkey hen sitting out by the pond under a thorny quince bush.   Since they are predicting storms in a few days, that’s probably when they will hatch and get soaked.  I think that’s why we had so few hatch from the last bunch. The day they were hatching we had a big rainstorm.  Even though I had a little cover over her on the nest the nest still got soaked.  It’s a catch 22-  we need rain but I would like some more turkeys too.  And I will have to herd or lure this bunch into the chicken yard where I can feed them, I can’t put feed out where they are because of the horses having access there.  And they are close to the dog yards, if the chicks go through the fence they’ll get eaten. I may catch the chicks and brood them inside.   That’s a young hen and I would like her to raise some chicks so she gets the experience.  Should be fun.