Finally - a new post

I spent much of yesterday morning moving the young chickens into their new home, which was actually the old chicken coop area, which we had cleaned up and added some more nest boxes. There were 3 groups, 6 almost ready to lay pullets, and 2 groups of younger birds totaling 20. Each of those groups had an Ameruacana rooster in it, one of which I wanted to sell. They are several breeds, Ameruacana, Leghorn, Issa Brown, Buff Orpington, and Shaver Black. There were a few hens I had wanted to sell too, but I was tired of maintaining 3 separate groups.

There were some bantams in two of those groups and they were getting a little bullied as the other birds got larger so they were all combined into a separate group. So I still have 2 groups to feed and water- 3 if you count the turkeys and the frizzle rooster that are out roaming the pasture.

I was most worried about the two young roosters getting together. They had both started crowing. And they did indeed square off at each other for an hour or so. Then things seemed to settle down. They separated one at each end of the pen with the group of hens they had been housed with. It seemed like everything was going smoothly later in the day.

When I went out this morning to feed I found all of the younger birds hiding under the nest boxes, which are off the floor about 18 inches. The 6 nearly adult hens were strutting around and every time a younger bird ventured out they chased it back under the nest boxes. Great fun. I had to move the water near their hiding place and add a second feed tray close to them. I threw some weeds off to the other end of the coop to occupy the 6 bullies and the little ones could eat and drink. I am hoping this situation resolves itself soon. We are going to add another 4 feet of space at the end of the coop- probably tomorrow and maybe that will help.

The little banties seemed to integrate pretty well. There are 6 of them, only 1 rooster. There had been a pair of Gold Sebrights but the little rooster was already very aggressive and I decided to give them to my dog groomer as a tip. She loved them. She raises all kinds of birds.

Left behind are a pair of buff cochins and 4 little hens who seem to be Old English Game. Three of them appear to be red pyle - although I am not real familiar with OEG colors. They are white with fine goldish red lacing around the neck. The other is a tiny dark thing with some gold lacing around the neck and who is very aggressive with all the others. I don’t know what color she would be called. She may become a tip somewhere herself.

The turkeys and the frizzle rooster that was left behind when the old hens were given away are unhappy that they can’t come into the coop anymore. They can get inside the horse stall in the back - where the turkeys already spend a lot of time- but they did like to come in the coop at night. I closed off the door to the outside run and put heavy wire on the window- which the turkeys can fly up to and enter. I don’t want them around the new hens because they eat eggs- and teach the hens to do it.

And I do want to start getting those farm fresh eggs again! The oldest of the new birds are just about ready to lay. I expect eggs in a week or so. I am changing them over to layer rations this week.

I was happy to see the big animal that I had glimpsed a few times out behind the barn is a woodchuck. Woodchucks don’t eat meat, the chickens are safe. I was worried it was a coon and I had talked to several people last week who had coons kill some of their chickens. He was stretched out on some old pallets and junk about 3 foot off the ground and I got a good look at him. It’s a healthy large specimen. As long as he puts his holes where Lily can’t step in them he can stay.

I found baby fish in the pond, several sizes. The bluegills that my friend gave me this spring must have survived long enough to breed anyway. I haven’t seen the big fish lately- but then there were only 7 and the pond is large. The pond is shrinking rapidly this year and is full of weeds. Saw deer tracks down there too and there is a night heron nesting somewhere close who screams at me whenever I go down there.

Our garden is doing great. I picked the first ripe tomato today - in June! I bought one plant very early and set it out in a black tub. It’s an Early Girl and the tomato is not much bigger than a cherry tomato but hey -June!

Frogs in the Snow

It’s snowing outside and the frogs have quit singing. On Sunday night at 11 pm it was 40 degrees and I could hear frogs outside my office window. On Monday morning we had six inches of heavy wet snow on the ground and it has snowed on and off since. It’s a good thing the ground was still warm and some of the snow melted or we would have been buried. I hate snow. Poor robins. I put some dried cherries out in the bird feeder but they haven’t found them.

The grass was growing and we had the pasture on the west side all fixed up, ready to move the horses over there, but the forecast made us wait and I’m glad because I would be carrying buckets of water through the snow instead of using a hose. Charlie is getting to be a real little terror. He needs more room to run.

Our poor white pine in the backyard lost more branches due to the heavy snow and so did a scotch pine in the dog kennel. It’s another mess to clean up. By the time you get one winter’s messes cleaned up its time for another winter. I want to start gardening- hauling manure to the beds and making another raised bed rather than shoveling snow. Oh well in Michigan it may be 80 in a few days.

On the nice days we did have I was able to sit at the pond for a short time and once I even made it to the woods. Our pond is the fullest I have ever seen it and when we add the runoff from this last snow it should really be something. I went to the woods to pull up some fence posts out there we don’t use anymore and I noticed new bottles and junk sticking out of the ground so I stayed to bottle hunt a bit.

The woods was where the previous owners of this place all the way back to who knows when threw their trash. Its swampy woods with a steep slope off the pasture. So each year new stuff surfaces, most is broken, like some Depression glass plates I found but sometimes you find a good piece. I need to dig there but its always so busy in spring I never get to it and then the bugs get bad and it gets hot soooo. This time I found some old rusted enamel coated pans and pots. I brought a pair up to use as planters.

The big tree that fell over a few years back has a ground hog burrow under the uprighted root ball. It’s the first groundhog burrow I have seen on our place in a while. And the stump left is sticking out at an angle about 20 feet long. My son cut the tree off where it lay across the old pasture fence and then the remaining stub lifted up so the end is about 6 feet above the ground at an angle. On the underside something has a pretty good sized hole in the trunk, I am hoping a screech owl. I am going to keep an eye on it. That’s one thing our woods has, plenty of dead trees for cavity nesters.

Most of the trees left in the woods are popple and birch. There were some nice elms and ash but they are dead now, lost to their respective pests. I have some small pines and spruce planted and I am trying to get some maples in there. It bothers me that there are no wildflowers there, no trilliums, no bloodroot, no trout lilies. I suspect the deer took care of that long ago. I want to try and get some started in there. I could haul some old fence down there to protect them maybe. But first I need to get the gardens around the house cleaned up.
As a garden writer and teacher I want my gardens to look good but I never seem to have enough time and money to do it right. My resolve this year is to start nothing new and get some of the old beds really renovated. Maybe I will have the time this year, ha. Ha.