Ducklings and other critters

The day started overcast and drizzley, we had some much needed rain overnight and the flowers were all perky, with the exception of the peonies which always look so bedraggled after a rain.   Since it was too wet to work outside I mopped the floors then drove to town on the back road for a newspaper.  A doe with two young fawns meandered across the road in front of me.  She was in no big hurry and I fumbled to get my camera out of the case but I had it on close-up focus and before I could switch it to landscape they had disappeared over the hill of a corn field they were in.  I get pretty decent flower pictures but animal pictures elude me.

A woodchuck was in the road further down the way, eating something in the road.  He moved as the car came close but when I came back there he was nibbling on the dirt in the road.  I don’t know what they nibble on in the road; I see it all the time.  All I can think of is that it’s salt from the stuff they put on to settle the dust.  They don’t salt the dirt roads in the winter, but I think they brine them in the summer.   It was just the kind of overcast morning that keeps the wildlife out and about.

Baby Muscovy ducklings

It’s been a better week on the farm as far as birds go, a duck hatched 14 ducklings Wednesday and a turkey hatched at least one chick yesterday.   I was going to throw her eggs out and make her start over so she hatched something in the nick of time.  I put a divider in the corner of the barn where she was sitting to protect the baby for a few days.  The ducklings went in a pen with their mom.    Last year the cats were still young and they didn’t bother the babies too much, but they have a whole season of hunting behind them and they kill things as large as rabbits so I am a bit leery.

The other two turkey hens have nests started with some eggs but aren’t sitting good yet.  The red hen has eggs in a dog house close to the barn but the bronze hen went a ways out along the fence line under the flowering quince to make a nest.  I just hope nothing gets their eggs as we have an egg eater again.  I put a pail of eggs I removed from the frizzles, they had some 50 eggs in one nest again , just outside the barn door last night and this morning a lot of them had been eaten. 

We have noticed a decrease in table eggs again and I had set up a radio to come on at 6 am to scare whatever is coming in the barn off.   It has to come after the hens lay in the morning and before I get out there in the am.  I am slow getting outside in the morning, I am not a morning person to begin with and then I have arthritis which makes me stiff and sore in the morning.  I hate to keep killing critters which are just trying to feed themselves but I will not feed chickens just to buy store eggs.   We have smelled skunk a few nights and I worry that if I set a trap I just might catch one instead of a possum.   I am going to buy a trail camera; I need to know what is eating the eggs. 

I have a hen sitting on 6 eggs in the hen nest boxes.  I marked the eggs with a marker and remove any new ones, which still get laid in there for some reason, despite that there are plenty of nest boxes.  She had 7 to begin with, but something got one of those.  Yet the duck who was on the floor under the nest boxes sitting, managed to hatch 14 ducklings with several eggs left over.

Another critter problem is the squirrels.  I came into the porch one evening and heard something scratching in an aluminum garbage can that I store the wild bird feed in.  I opened the lid to see 3 tiny baby red squirrels.  Now the squirrels are a big problem for us, they are in the attic and dropping nuts into our sewer vent pipes and getting into the furnace room etc.  They aggravate me no end.  But here were these teeny babies looking at me with their big eyes.  I don’t know how they got in there.  I had taken sunflower seeds out earlier in the day, but had closed the lid, obviously not well enough.  Two were able to get out but the last tiny one needed help, so I stuck the broom handle in there for him to climb.  Back they went into my ceiling, leaving walnuts in the garbage can for some reason, maybe a trade.  I should have killed them or let the dogs do it, but I just turned soft, looking at their baby cuteness.

A day later I was out working in the yard next to the hollow catalpa tree the squirrels favor and down comes a baby squirrel.  He was coming awfully close to me as I worked, as if he trusted me, I like to think it was the one I helped.  Most of the red squirrels are very wary and mean as hell.  This one was crossing to the bird feeder to get sunflower seeds and coming back to the tree without being afraid or scolding me.  That one is probably not long for the world, as they say, he was too trusting or naïve.    Maybe his momma left him and his siblings early.  I warned them when I let them live following the trash can incident that was the last time I would give them a free pass.

Then there is Fluffy’s kitten.  She had one kitten in a chicken nest box close to a month ago.  After about a week I saw her carry it over the fence into a fenced off pile of old fence and other junk.  I haven’t seen it since, though I suspected she was still nursing, a couple days ago I heard it mew as she went over the fence.  I worry about the poor little thing, alone so much of the time.   Fluffy is a friendly cat, you would think she would bring her baby closer to home.  The other female has her 4 kittens, a week younger, in a box right in the middle of the barn.  They seem just fine. 

House bird update, the female parakeet died.  I have no idea how old she was and she was probably injured when the dogs overturned their cage chasing a night invader who entered through the screen in my office where the birds are.  They didn’t catch whatever it was but the parakeets ended up on the floor under their seed cups.  She had not seemed healthy since then.   I moved “miss always ready to nest” canary with the old male after she laid 4 more eggs in the cage I had put her in by herself to rest.  And I moved old guy Petey and her across the room from her old flame.   She is quite busy building a new nest.   Now if she will accept Petey as her mate we may still get babies. Neither of the other 2 canary hens is interested in nesting it seems.

Where are my babies?

Nothing on the radar yet but it could be a stormy afternoon for us.  Such awful weather the country has been having especially in Oklahoma and Kansas- tornadoes everywhere.  I worked outside this morning while it was still overcast doing some gardening.   Mosquito spray kept away the mosquitoes but the ants were biting me all over.  I used to have a border of log pieces around the big flower bed but they have rotted away pretty much.  But it’s in those rotted pieces that the ants live and they really dislike being disturbed.  They were crawling up my arms and biting me in the armpit, on my neck, back, torture.  The sun started coming out and I gave up.

We are doing our best to keep up with the gardening and mowing right now.  I did too much walking with the push mower last week and really got my arthritis acting up.   The corn is coming up in our garden and in the fields a sure sign summer is near.  Farmers are getting ready to do first cutting of hay if the rains let up.

We have more kittens.  The first cat had kittens in a chicken nest; this one had them in the feed bag.  There was still feed in it, I had to go to town and get some more for the chickens.  I had put several boxes with straw in them around the barn but no, had to have them in a bag.  I picked up the whole bag and put it in a box to better protect it.  I didn’t want Steve running over it in his wheel chair.   Yesterday I cut the bag down the side because it was so hot and I wanted to get a look at the babies.  Four fat healthy looking kittens. 

The cat that had the kitten in the chicken nest moved it, I saw her trying to get through the gate with it  in her mouth.  She managed to fit through then climbed over a fence with it and went to where we had fenced in some junk and disappeared in there.  I haven’t heard it since, don’t know if it’s alive or not.

Still no ducks hatched.  I threw out two nests of eggs.  The duck hen that was sitting in my garden wagon with hers pecked at my feet for two days after I pulled that out of there.  It was nasty and the eggs smelled to high heaven.  There was one under it too so both nests went.  I still have one sitting in the back of the barn that is probably a lost cause and one under the chicken nest boxes that will probably hatch hers.

No turkeys hatched either.  I thought the dark hen was going to sit but that only lasted one night.  I think there are still eggs in the doghouse she chose.  One red turkey hen is still sitting on a pile of mostly chicken eggs.  I am about to toss them too.  I wish one of them would get it together and hatch me some babies.  Everyone wants to buy turkeys.  I like to watch them with their babies. 

I have a black hen sitting in the chicken coop.  She’s an old hen who has hatched eggs before.  I let her have some eggs but the others are still laying in there so I need to mark eggs and then keep the others picked up.  I am about ready to throw out more frizzle eggs too, they just lay too many to sit on.

Inside, also no luck with birds.  I moved the canary hens again, giving the young male another hen who he is mostly just picking on.    The parakeets have been doing some kissing but haven’t been in the nest  box yet that I can tell and the hen looks a little listless to me.  I hope she isn’t sick.   I know they are old, maybe real old, who knows.  But it’s certainly not a good year bird wise for me.

Flowers are looking great and I am winding down my planting.  Still have to move some things around and edge a bed but I’m seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.   I’ll move the house plants out next week, after our next cold front pushes through early in the week.

Slow start with the birds this spring

The weather has been gorgeous here but it is due to change overnight and we are in for a bit of rain and cooler temps.  We actually need the rain, after last month I didn’t think I’d be saying that soon but the soil surface anyway is dry.  The farmers are back in the fields though and they may want the dry spell to last a bit longer. 

The mile of dirt road leading from pavement to our house is lined on one side exclusively with farm fields and it’s interesting that this year it all seems to be planted with wheat.  The field closest to us was being plowed up yesterday, the stand of wheat didn’t look real good so I guess they are replanting with something else so there will be one area of diversity. 

We have been working to get the new veggie garden in, trying to fill raised beds, mulch paths and plant at the same time.  Sometimes at this time of year it feels like there is more to do than can be done.  The fruit trees are blooming, the beach plum tree was literally covered with bees this morning.  The sour cherry and one of the apples is in bloom with the other apples soon to bloom.  My new strawberry bed is starting to look good and the new grapes have leafed out well.

The chicks I ordered have been here a little over a week now and I am starting to be able to guess what the banty assortment holds.  There are two porcelains, I hope male and female, several seabrights and some very tiny white chicks that I can’t ID yet.  It’s amazing how fast chicks grow.  They have their wing feathers coming in and are jumping up on top of the small box I put in the brooder and on top of the water bottle.

I expected to have baby ducks by now but so far nothing.  All of them are sitting; the last one to sit has her nest under the hens nests.  The duck males are now together on the turkey side of the barrier and only occasionally fighting.  The old red turkey tom still looks ratty, but the bronze tom is beautiful. I love watching him strut, which he does for me every time I sit down out in the yard to watch them.  All the red turkey hens are sitting although I’m not sure how many turkey eggs they are actually sitting on.  One is taking turns with a duck that has her nest in my garden wagon.  They fight over who gets to sit when and sometimes end up together in the wagon.

The bronze turkey hen has just started to think about nesting and she spent a whole morning walking the fence last week complaining because we added netting to the top and she couldn’t jump over into the yard.  She has nested in my garden each summer and raised nice chicks, but she and they roam a little too much and this year I wanted to keep them more confined.  I don’t know where she decided to lay finally; she has a whole pasture with lilac bushes, low spreading pines and other interesting places to choose from.  I added two doghouses with straw in them out in the run.  I hope she isn’t adding her eggs to the pile in the garden wagon.  But she isn’t complaining anymore so she found somewhere to lay.  She is still roosting inside at night so she isn’t ready to sit tight.

The one red turkey hen that hatched the chicks two weeks ago went right back to sitting in the doghouse in the back part of the barn. I took the two chicks and put them in the brooder.  I had emptied all the eggs that were left there out but she already has quite a pile and I see that they are mostly olive colored hens eggs from the two little hens that hang around out back.  We’ll get baby chicks if nothing else. 

The frizzles have such a huge pile of eggs that I doubt any will hatch.  In a week I am going to dump that box if nothing hatches and this time I will limit the eggs.  One little hen is sitting on probably 30 eggs, maybe more.  Another hen has started sitting on a few on the floor.  They are darn good layers, even if the eggs are small. 

I picked up a pair of pretty parakeets at a swap meet a couple weeks ago and I added a nest box to the parakeet cage. So far only mild interest in it.   My canary is sitting on 5 eggs but we will see if anything hatches this time.  I have been adding egg food and soaked seed every day to their cage anticipating a hatch.  If nothing hatches in a week then I am moving the male, despite his wishes to be with that hen.  One of the other hens is mildly interested in nesting and maybe he could breed her.    I don’t seem to be having any luck hatching birds this spring.

Woods and birds

The weather has been letting us get some work done here and there around the farm.  Thursday I heard chicks peeping when I went to the barn to feed in the morning.  I determined that the sound came from the red turkey sitting in a doghouse in the back of the barn.  After breakfast I went out to check on her again and found her wandering around in a light rain out by the pond with two babies.  So I set up the brooder in the barn, caught the two little ones and put them in.  I will need the brooder for the chicks I ordered next week anyway.

One of the chicks was dark brown with stripes and the other lighter golden with stripes.  When I handled them I realized they weren’t newly hatched, feathers were coming in on the wings already so they were probably a week old or nearly so.  The cold, rainy weather kept me inside and the turkey hen must not have went far with the chicks so I missed their hatch.  I felt a little sorry for her but I want those chicks to live so they were put in a warmer, safer area.   The cats were way too interested when they saw the chicks.  Now she’s back sitting on the eggs that didn’t hatch, I need to clean that out. 

The babies seem to be settling down and doing well in the brooder.  I put a small cardboard box in there for them to hide in, since they had spent a lot of time under mom’s body in the dark.  I hope all goes well when I introduce the new chicks in a few days.  I have some new  production layer pullets and some banty chicks coming. Baby ducks should be hatching out any time now, but they will stay with mom.

I went to a swap meet yesterday and came home with two parakeets, a yellow and green male and blue female.  They are small American types and they are mature- who knows how old.  Steve was saying he missed parakeets; we raised English budgies many years ago.  They are in my office with the canaries, separate cages of course.  The dogs are going nuts trying to get to them.  They pretty much ignore the canaries now so why two more small birds should be so interesting is beyond me.  Once the dogs get used to them we may move them to the living room where we can watch their antics.

My barn swallows are back, I saw them last evening as I sat by the pond.  Today before the rain started I went around and put up 3 bluebird houses and repaired an older one.  I haven’t seen bluebirds in a few years around here but I am hoping that maybe they will pass through and see a good place to nest.  If they don’t use the boxes maybe tree swallows will.  The robins and starlings are already nesting.

While putting up the nest boxes I found a dead deer, pretty decomposed, up next to the fence, in a little hollow between the fence and a small hill.  It was in a direct line, about 200 feet from my neighbors bird feeder, where she told me the deer regularly eat.  I think it was probably the doe with the broken leg that was around but I didn’t investigate the corpse.  Hopefully the crows and vultures will clean it up.

I also investigated the woods a little.  It’s hard for me to navigate the uneven ground in the pasture that slopes down to the wooded area because I cannot lift my legs well anymore to clear logs and vines.  So I didn’t get far into the woods but it was interesting as it’s still open and clear as the trees haven’t leafed out.   It’s very swampy this year, with open water on the west side.  There are lots of dead trees in there, some ash that were killed by the borer and some dead poplar.  There was one tall straight dead tree with several holes in it and lots of chickadees popping in and out of them.  And there is one very oddly contorted aspen, still growing, I remember seeing it before but it really got twisted over the past year.   I kept wishing I had brought my camera. 

The swampy woods used to be the dump for the farm in days past and I found a couple of interesting objects I brought back to the house.  One was a white metal pot, holes rusted through in several places that was an odd shape and I thought maybe would work as garden art.  The other was an odd shaped oval object about 8 inches long made of aluminum, with wires sticking out of the top and bottom.  I told my husband it was a bomb, but he thinks it was some kind of insulator or connector for electric or phone wires.  I don’t know what I will do with that.  I have brought a lot of odd things back out of that dump.

Being out in the pasture made me nostalgic for the animals we used to keep, especially my horses.  I could still see their poop piles here and there and the paths they wore to their favorite spots.  I hope they are doing well where they are.  What will eat our grass now?

The pond is filling up-but so is the basement!

The weather here is very trying.  Its 34 degrees here today and we had snow overnight that left a coating on the grass and car.  Thursday before the deluge it was 75 degrees.   We had about 2 inches of rain in a short time on top of saturated soil from heavy rains earlier in the week.  The ditch by the road was overflowing, which is a signal to us that our little dug out basement had water in it.  Sure enough when we lifted the hatch in the bathroom which leads to the dugout we saw lots of water.  We have pumped it out 3 times so far.    The far corner of our yard near the road is under water.  The grass is growing but we won’t be able to get a mower on that wet ground for a while.

At least the pond is really getting full.  On Thursday I got to sit by it for a few minutes before the storms started.  I saw one tiny fish and heard bullfrogs singing.  No signs of turtles yet which is odd, there were so many last year.  Two kingfishers were out there, flying around and scolding me.  I have seen one around the last couple years, but this is the first time I have seen two, hopefully it’s a mate and they will nest here.  My odd little duck is back also.  I still haven’t quite figured out what type of duck it is.  

The arrow shows where the pond edge was in the fall.

My own ducks are all sitting.  One is in my garden wagon in the barn, with a nest of down all around her.  I won’t be using that for a while.  If the eggs are good I should have some baby Muscovies hatching in about a week from the first duck that started sitting.  That’s about the time my new chicks are scheduled to arrive.  

Both of my Bourbon Red turkeys are sitting but I doubt they will hatch anything.  The dark turkey hen never sits this early.  But when she does sit she generally hatches and raises her babies.  She likes to nest out in the yard somewhere, generally in one of my garden beds.  Last year she started sitting in late May.  The dark tom turkey is beautiful right now, his colors are brilliant.  The older Red tom is looking scruffy just like last spring.  He is growing new feathers though and he’s gobbling like crazy just like the young tom.

All the wild birds are building nests.  The Red winged blackbirds are thick and noisy around here.  Doves are building nests in several trees.  Now if I could just get my inside canaries to successfully nest I’d be happy.  One hen laid but the eggs didn’t hatch.  One hen just plays around a bit with nest material and never gets serious.  Both males are singing furiously and I saw the young male mating with his hen, who is the unsuccessful nester.  I’m not sure the older male is actually mating with his hen, which may be why she isn’t too diligent in building a nest.

I have been trying to come up with a good solution to keeping the cats away from the bird feeders outside.  One in particular spends all her time underneath the feeders or the ramp nearby.  I think if the weather will just stay warm I may hook up a sprinkler I can turn on whenever I see her out there.  We only used half the bird feed we used last year-because the birds don’t come around or she has eaten them all. 

Our garden efforts are proceeding slowly.  Between the weather and our physical problems it seems like we are just poking along there.  But I have got a peach tree, strawberries, saskatoons and grapes planted.

One day it will be 80 degrees and we will suddenly have spring.  Ah, Michigan.

Yesterday I saw a turkey buzzard, a solitary bird floating in the sky, a sure sign its spring even though its cold and we have been having flurries all day today.  I hope it knows spring is coming because I am having difficulties seeing it.  But yesterday when it was a bit warmer I also heard red winged blackbirds singing another good sign.  But when the frogs sing- then I’ll know for sure.

I am getting estimates on having the huge spruce by our barn taken down.  I sure hate to do it but the tree is now dead two thirds of the way up.   I decided to take it down and put my new vegetable beds in that spot.  The estimates include chipping the branches and leaving me the wood chips, which will mean I won’t have to buy wood chips and that kind of offsets the cost of taking the tree down.   We were going to put new veggie beds in the old horse pasture but this spot is closer to the house and water.

I went out to the barn yesterday morning and Brandy, the Jack Russell left in the barn was barking.  I opened the door to the kennel area and stepped into the small room.  Brandy kept barking at something behind me so I turned to look and saw a possum trying to hide behind the chair in there.   I opened Brandies kennel door and let her at it.  She chased it into Sarah’s old kennel which was open and nailed it, shook it until it went limp, then she went back to her kennel to eat her breakfast.  I noticed the possum was still breathing but I wasn’t sure it was playing possum or just dying. 

I went to feed the chickens and in a moment I heard Brandy barking again.  The possum had revived and was behind the doghouse in Sarah’s kennel.  I moved the doghouse and Brandy ran in and grabbed the possum again.  This time she shook it for several minutes, biting it in several places.  It went limp and she once more abandoned it.  I returned to chicken feeding but when I went back to check the possum was once more hiding behind the doghouse.  I got a rabbit carrier and managed to chase it into the carrier with a stick.  It was growling and snapping pretty good.  I couldn’t see but one puncture wound on it from all that dog mauling.

It looked at me and its coat was so pretty, a soft gray, nice from eating all my eggs and cat food.   I started having second thoughts about killing it, maybe dragging the cage out to the woods and releasing it.  But I knew I couldn’t drag it far and that it would just come back.  I really do hate killing things but I have had possums in the barn before who just ate cat food and chicken feed and left my eggs alone.  I left them alone too. These last possums are very greedy buggers; they are eating our table eggs as well as killing potential baby turkeys and ducks.  I am worried that if I buy chicks, they might eat those too.   So I went inside and informed Steve and he loaded the gun and dispatched it after breakfast.  I do hope it’s the last one.  That makes three.  Just stay away possums, so I don’t have to kill you.

I have opened the back barn door and gave the turkeys and ducks the option of going outside, but there is still snow and ice behind the barn and they haven’t been outside much.  Both Bourbon Red turkey hens are sitting, although I know the one only has 4 eggs, courtesy of the possums, and I think they are duck eggs.  I can’t see what the other hen has as she sits very tight when I’m around and is way back in a corner behind, not in a nest box.   

Look at the size of this egg we managed to keep from the possums.

One of the ducks is also sitting on a huge pile of eggs, some of which are chicken eggs.  She was very clever in that she squeezed behind a net pen divider that was leaning against the wall to make a nest and is well protected from possums and such- hopefully.  Since she just started sitting she won't hatch until mid April- which should be nicer weather. My canary should be hatching eggs if she is going to-I’ll give her another day or two. 

Still no kittens or signs that any of the cats are pg and that’s a bit unusual. Usually by March kittens are being born.  Maybe I’ll get lucky and they are all infertile.  I can’t afford to spay them.  My experience with barn cats is that as soon as you spay or neuter one it disappears or dies.  I am going to have the youngest dog we have, Tina, spayed soon though, when she is out of heat, because she is a monster when she is in heat.  All the dogs have been in heat and it’s been hell.   Some of them are quite old, Sadie is 15, you would think they would go through menopause or something.

where is the sun?

The one bad thing about living in Michigan’s thumb area is the lack of sunshine in the winter.  We get this perpetual cloudy sky- light flurries thing from the lake effect (Lake Huron).  I am so sick of gloomy days I could scream. A bad case of cabin fever is setting in.  It’s too cold and icy to work much outside; I just want to get outside off by myself for a while.  Supposedly we will get some sun and warmer temps this week, but at this time of the year a warmer pattern usually means clouds.

We have been getting more eggs lately although I suspect a possum is still around.  The lights come on in the coop at 5:30 am and it takes a little while for the hens to start laying.  Now it’s getting light outside as they lay so I think it cuts down on possum visits as they come out in the dark.  I got a huge egg two days ago- see the picture.  That must have hurt as it was laid.  The next day I found a tiny pullet sized egg and today I picked up the smallest egg I ever saw from a chicken- more like a canary egg.  I don’t know if it’s from the hen who laid the large egg- compensating – or another hen.

Two of my turkeys are sitting, although I don’t know what kind of eggs they are sitting on.   The ducks and chickens were all laying in those nests with them.  We could get a whole range of babies. And my horny little canary girl already has eggs and is sitting on them.

The dogs and cats are in heat.  There will be no puppies but if the cats get bred at least in two months it should be reasonably warm enough for kittens.   I have debated on having the old dogs spayed.  They are getting old to weather the surgery. You would think that they would stop coming in heat at 16, 15, and 14 years of age but there is no dog menopause. Our two males are neutered and two of the females, but the others are still whole females.  It’s such a mess when they are in heat and they fight more than usual.  And they all come into heat at once.  I just may start spaying them after this round is over.

A red squirrel has been visiting the back porch again, eating my plants out there and digging in the pots.  The dogs can see it from the window in the kitchen and hear it but its back in the ceiling as soon as we open the door to let them out there.  The squirrels get in some way through the soffits outside.  We have them fixed every year but they manage to get inside anyway.  We hope to re-do the ceiling out there- maybe I’ll put up metal on the inside roof.  I set a rat trap but the thing sprung it without getting caught.  That’s one animal I could sure do without.  Steve wants to sit out front and shoot them with the 22 but I think it’s too close to the road.

We have had a ton of cardinals at the feeder this year.  I have never seen so many.  What I am not seeing is English sparrows. I think the cats may have killed most of them.  They tend to roost in the barn and the other birds don’t.  They are easy for the cats to catch in there. We also have a lot of nuthatches this year both red breasted and white breasted.  I am waiting to see or hear a red winged blackbird – my sign of spring.

It’s my husband’s birthday and I suggested we go out to eat.  You know where he wants to go?  McDonalds.  Sunday dinner at McDonalds.  You can see he doesn’t get junk food very often.  I will be making him his favorite banana cake with cream cheese frosting though.