Thursday, June 7, 2018

Let's Use Up Some Pictures


The hens have been very busy re-arranging my flower pots. 


Forcing me to resort to this!!!

I have forks in some pots, spoons in the others. 

They can't settle now!

That doesn't mean I am not still finding eggs in other odd 
places, I heard cackling from the sheep barn this morning, so 
will be checking in there.... and I found two in a zinnia bed yesterday. 


Here is your blogger at Island Creek Schoolhouse last week 
for class for a tour. 
It was MIGHTY warm that day, notice my unbuttoned collar.   I had 
windows and the back door open, but my dress was soaked at the end of the tours. 

I have to admit I was glad to change back into shorts and a shirt, how did they ever do it? 


I try to be there early, so it was very peaceful that morning... for a while. 


African Violets are blooming like crazy on my east-facing 
kitchen window sill.  We had actually had a tiny bit of rain the night before. 


The six Gold Comet babies love to nest together in their feed bowl at night. 


I might have bought a few more plants at a 50% off sale. 


Two weeks ago, I started giving this to Lilly, who has a torn ACL and is not a candidate for surgery, due to her age and weight.  At the end of April, I had actually made an appointment for her 
euthanization, but decided to try to make her comfortable and give her a few more months. 

My gosh.  

She is now limping only slightly, bearing weight on that leg, has enough 
pep that I literally have to keep an eye on where she is when she is 
outside, because she is going after Singleton, who gets out daily. 

The other morning she CAUGHT a chick.  (she dropped it on command, and it lived) 

The following video is from the hen house, she could not even get up the five steps into it a few weeks ago.  She actually caught a mouse as soon as I stopped taking, but dropped it as she got back out to the yard. 



I thought you might enjoy seeing pictures from the game camera. 


A very pregnant raccoon has been coming to eat nightly. I thought she 
was already nursing, but I am not so sure. 


This was taken the night before last, she looks pretty pooped out. 


While I have the standing feeder out in the pasture, I leave some at the front of the 
hen house for Harley to find.  


Petey eats in the pasture feeder every night, 
so does the Tabby cat, and also Rusty and Spooky. 

Here let me say that I was feeding up to four sacks of 
cat food weekly, there were so many wildings eating it. 

I use maybe one a week now, MAYBE. 

I do still feed some wet food. 

I am studying how to cut back on my wild bird feeding, it is by far the most expensive feed I buy.  There is a huge portion uneaten, and I am studying it daily to see what IS being eaten. 


I cut the pasture on Tuesday. 


Every time I drove under a mulberry tree, I had to stop to eat. 


Here are the Cayuga ducklings at 5 weeks.  I have them in a separate cage now. 
However, I am dying to put them with the teenagers.



The Gold Comets at five weeks. 

These chicks are some of the most excitable I have EVER handled. 

I can't explain to you all how badly the hen yard is smelling because of the 
baby ducks being confined there. 

IF you have a chance to raise ducklings DON'T.  I 
have always had adult ducks... these confined babies are 
just almost beyond tolerating, cute as they are.  They are poop machines and I am PRAYING my neighbors cannot smell them. 

No one wants to be near them, let alone me.  I have to change their 
water four times a day... UGH. 

And, here, just to prove that I really DO drive Thunder, 

I am coming in the gate, with a load of paint and a piece of siding for the haybarn.  Grandson Chris took this picture. 


And just as an aside, every single time I tried to load a picture of the 
DUCK HELL HOLE in my hen yard, it would not load.  I tried at least seven times. 

Interesting! 













5 comments:

  1. Hari OM
    ...does it mean even the sight of the smell would have us fainting??? &*> I know the smell of ducks; uncle tried that one year as a 'novelty' on the farm. The decision was made that diversification might take other forms!!! Then came the feral geese... this was after the crazy-crook cockeral. Hmmm, and perheps we could all do with a dose of 'pet releaf'!!! YAM xx

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  2. I love moss rose but refuse to plant it. If you want something that reseeds forever, you've found your plant!

    Might take a look at the chart below. I think if you customize your bird feed to what birds are visiting, you'll have less waste. Be sure you have something big to mix your concoction in!

    https://www.almanac.com/content/wild-bird-food-preferences

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  3. Great to see pictures of what is happening. I will confess, that I looked at the ducks and chicks at the feed store. When he said that they were all straight run and the fact that the whole place stunk so bad, made me change my mind.

    Happy weekend.

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  4. Glad to see you are keeping busy and happy there. You have a lot of things to take pictures of there for sure. Always good to see what you've been up to.

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  5. that is just the best news about lilly! i am so happy she is doing so well. i had ducks when i was little and they take your breath away!

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