Feathered Foremen, Or, Why My Husband Can't Get Anything Done

When my kid was younger, she LOVED sidewalk chalk.  Like LOVED it, and would color anything that stood still.  The 'Welcome' picture on the front page of my chicken site is thanks to her artwork, here she is just getting it started.

As she worked, Wild Child, our Head Hen at the time, came along to watch.  After all, this appeared to be a project, and all human projects require Immediate Chicken Supervision--which means they have to be right there, on the spot.  It's in their union contract or something.  I'm actually surprised that she was the only one to come over, since roosters are well known to be nosey as old ladies and you can normally count on them to stick their beaks right into your business.

She stood there quite a while, soberly observing like she was southern California's pre-eminent art critic.

 Meanwhile, the chalk was spreading...

...and I think Wild Child realized that hey, SHE was a dark object that might look good with streaks of green, purple and pink...and wisely beat feet outta there before the kid noticed her.

She was a smart old bird and knew when to quit while she was ahead.



The chickens also supervised the rototilling of the back yard years ago.  We figured they'd naturally stay out of the way, since the rototiller was a noisy, scary goddamned thing, and bright red to boot.

Well, pretty quick Bear figured out the the Big Red Thing was SCRATCHING AND DIGGING UP WORMS, and anything that was doing that, was A-OK in her book.  She dutifully got right on my husband's heels to have first dibs on any yummy bugs he dredged up.

Hell, after a while the Big Red AutoChicken became their best buddy.


And after that, I had to put down the camera as they became outright enthusiastic when they figured out that when he tilted the front end up to get the tines to dig in they could SEE Digging Ground Zero, and they wanted to get in front of AutoChicken and stick their heads into the tines.

 
No amount of shooing would dissuade them, I had to get a broom and keep waving it in front of AutoChicken to keep anyone from getting mulched.



Once my husband was helping me out and cutting a hole in a piece of wood for a project I had underway. Suddenly I heard him complaining that Geraldine the tortoise was underfoot, which is what Geraldine did anytime you were out trying to do anything but pay attention to her.

An evil thought occurred.
"Hey,"  I told my three year old daughter, "Go see if dad needs any help."
So she did, gently laying her hand on his arm in sympathy to his Tortoise Situation.

"Dad, do you need any help?"

"No," he sighs, "I'm OK."  While shooting me a 'thanks a lot' look.  Meanwhile, Geraldine isn't going anywhere in any big damned hurry.

I can't stop laughing, because I ain't done with him yet.

"Wait," I tell him.  "Something's missing.  You need more help!"
"CHICK CHICK CHICK CHICK!"
From the back of the yard, out of sight, comes a loud burst of excited cackling and the thud of 42 sets of chicken feet.
*cue a chicken stampede as they all come tearing over, flapping to go faster*

They just keep pouring in from all over the yard, looking ashamed not to have been involved right from the get-go, like they've commited an unforgivable social gaff by not providing Immediate Chicken Supervision before now.  At this point he's leaning his head against the board and looking beaten.  Geraldine is helpfully standing on his foot, just in case he really thought he was going to get anything done without all this nonsense.

I'm laughing so hard I can hardly stand up.
Finally I take pity on him and call the kid back indoors, relocate the tortoise to the back of the yard and scatter some chicken goodies away from the work site.

Happiness For Old Ladies

I was cleaning under the birdcages, and rather than vacuum up all the seed and have it go to waste, we brought Bear in for cleaning duty, which she happily did.

Afterwards I got into the frig to get her some spinach greens, she stuck her head right into the vegetable drawer and tried to help herself. She was planning on climbing INTO the drawer but I convinced her otherwise.

After stuffing herself like that, the only thing left to do was to jump up onto dad's lap while he played GTA and hunker down for a snooze.

Bear is our Head Hen and will turn 12 years old in about two months, and has an odd feather right in the middle of her back--instead of being one of her standard brown feathers with a black tip, it goes from black to white to brown.

She also is getting a smattering of white feathers on her head. Going gray, as it were. Old lady face, green spinach beak and all.

I was clearly bugging her when all she wanted to do was to sleep on dad's nice, warm lap, she could hardly keep her eyes open. Her beak is a bit overgrown since it's winter and she has been spending more time in the nice, warm coop with the other old ladies rather than foraging.  When you're an old lady anything 'nice & warm' is a GOOD THING.

Zonked out.

Happiness For Old Ladies

Today it warmed up enough for my husband to take two of the old ladies out for some quality front yard time.  Bear is still going strong as our flock's Head Hen, and the oldest in the flock at 11 years old.  Sugar is 8-9 years old and mostly blind.  Bear took to the beds I'd just weeded for winter and threw herself wholeheartedly into a dust bath while Sugar mostly just hung out.

Then Bear really got into dustbathing, flinging dirt with wild abandon.

Happy, happy old lady face.  Most people will never know the kind of sheer bliss a chicken attains while dustbathing, it's very zen.

Now THIS Is Just Going TOO Far...

More Juniper Death today. Today the kid and I worked on clearing cut branches, and cutting back the grandfather of all these nasty assholes, the one on the far right.  Here it is last June, 'before':

Halfway through cutting it out:

You can see why these are such a damned headache--they've been growing willy-nilly and trapping trash for 40 years. Today it was about 9 miles of baling wire--which you never see, it just gets snarled instantly in the chainsaw, trying to remove your head at the neck. Also a large blue ball, a golf ball and a toy car, plus the usual 40 metric tons of run-of-the-mill trash.

Haha, stupid junipers, think a board with rusty nails is ANY kind of defense against a chainsaw?!

The pink 5 gallon bucket is something we pried out of one of the OTHER junipers the other day, today we found that granddaddy Cthulhu's big brother had RE-eaten it and it was mired deep within it. Good God.

Sadly, it had also eaten one of our Valley Quail, apparently yesterday--she was found dead, tangled in it's branches. That's the final straw...just another reason to hate the damned junipers and cleanse them from the Earth.

The other side of the yard slowly getting cleared. My wheelbarrow is under there somewhere...

The kid poses with ONE of the cut-out branches.

Since a bunch of the trash is little bits & pieces of plastic, metal, broken glass, etc. we are trying to get the yard as chicken safe as possible, which means picking through all this crap by hand and fussing out the trash. One thing I found while raking out gallons of plastic & trash was a HUGE nest of stink bugs. The kid ran and got a cup, and we filled it with yummy stink bugs for the chickens inside about 1 minute. We saw pretty quick that we'd have to bring in the big guns for this one.

This called for a specialist. Bear!

Bear ate some, but pretty clearly couldn't get past the taste. We brought Bloop in, but he was fascinated with courting Bear and ignored the bugs, silly rooboy. Once we get the yard done I'm sure that River and Zip will be glad to clear those suckers out, they LOVED them.

Daddy's Little Helper...

So here I am, MP3 player on and earbuds in, painting away in the living room.

Suddenly my husband returns from HIS project in the back yard, which today is repair of the coop doors, damaged in last week's windstorm. I notice he is scowling.

At me. Uh oh.

So I yank one of the earbuds. He growls, "Your chicken..."

I sigh. Whenever one of them misbehaves, we tell each other: 'Your chicken just...' (insert naughty chicken activity here).

"Which one?"

"Linc!"

"What did she do THIS time?"

He then tells me how while he was trying to work, Linc was constantly underfoot, and completely engrossed by what he was doing. Now, this is how chickens ARE--if you are working around them, they must be intricately involved, like nosy old neighbor ladies. ALL of them. At once.

This can make for lots of chicken-y interference, like today.

"She wouldn't get out of my face!" He wails. Then he says she grabbed the screw off the end of the drill and was off to the races, forcing him to chase her around the run trying to get a potentially deadly screw away from a damned chicken before she swallowed it. This gave all the other birds the idea that Linc had a really cool goodie, so they joined in the parade.

He finally did wrestle the screw away from Linc, much to everyone's disappointment, and finished his project. I remarked on how Linc was just like Bear, our Head Hen, and asked him where Bear was during all this. Turns out Bear was watching the whole escapade fondly, as if Linc was following in her footsteps.

Like some kind of Dollar Store Luke/Yoda thing.

Not Perfect...But Better!

Well today we made inroads towards happier poultry by creating some temporary nests for them. We got some loose hay at the feed store, and rummaging around in the barn yielded a small red basket, a large wicker basket, an old tin washtub and a wooden pear crate--perfect!

No sooner had I installed them than they were thoroughly inspected. Phoenix looks on while Rambo awkwardly stands half in and half out of a nest, nibbling bits of the hay.

Then he just joins in while Rambo remains in her silly pose. Goofy birds.

Even Bear approves!

No eggs since the move, but I expected them to fall out of lay with such a drastic upheaval. Tomorrow we start creating an outdoor run for them, being in the barn all the time is a definite drag for them.

Happy Easter!

Got our Easter egg hunt in before the rain came down, thankfully. The chickens enjoyed this weird, mystifying ritual as usual.

Bear investigates the egg basket...

...and later mugs the kid for an egg.

She also enjoys snuggling with J.--she ONLY does this if he is wearing his robe.

While Phoenix looks on with a jealous stare and whines, which is what HE does every time. When chicken distrusts a situation or wants to keep a close eye on something, they turn their head and look at it with one eye, as he is doing here. That is because they see better this way rather than looking straight on at something.  So while it looks like Phoenix is looking at me, he is actually keeping a watchful eye on Bear and worrying.

Poof the White Crested Black Polish hen shows off her spurs:

Scott heybabies some hens...

A stretch & flap from Smokey.

Yoya the gray Giant Cochin and Phoenix pose for a communist propaganda poster.

'Ya comrade, now heroically look out into the glorious future!'

Bug, who is broody, emerges after a bit to stomp around the yard and be irritated. The other chickens are careful not to make direct eye contact, as broody hens are like the crazy, dangerous homeless guy who hangs out behind the minimart and holds angry conversations with an invisible friend.

We hand out some Easter eggs, of course. While the others look on in amazement, Sora the White Leghorn levitates to get one!

Betty tries it, too!

In the end they all got some yummy hard-boiled eggs are everyone was happy.

Chicken Site Missing For Now!

Argh, my stupid site provider has taken down my chicken info site with no explanation and won't respond to our repeated emails. I KNOW it's all paid up and there are no problems with the site content, so I don't know what the heck is going on--but I suspect the provider is going under. We're working on moving my site to another provider, for now if anyone needs my help with anything chicken just let me know here.

Bloody frustrating though!

Our Head Hen, Bear, who is turning 9 years old this year has been under the weather. I'm not sure what her issue is but I'm treating for for a few likely causes (God, my kingdom for a microscope so I can do fecal smears--!)...but it may simply be her age. Phoenix the Head Roo is fretting for her and staying close by her side. We had her in for a few nights this last week when the temps got really cold overnight and learned after the first night to bring Phoenix in, too. He was SO worried about her the morning after that first night and was overjoyed to see her the next morning, he danced and danced around her for several minutes, chuckling and talking to her. I felt really bad, I didn't realize he'd think the worst the next morning!

We'll have to watch them both closely, I still remember when my first Head Hen, Wild Child, died from old age--my Head Roo, Jack, died about 24 hours later, out of the blue--I'm convinced of a broken heart. Phoenix is Jack's son, and has the same personality. But Bear is looking better the last two days, and the weather is FINALLY cutting us some slack on all the damned rain.

More On The Bags...

Update on the shopping bags, slow but steady...I decided to have some fun and make the hen and roo match the Head Rooster and Head Hen of our flock, Phoenix and Bear. For reference, here is Phoenix:

and Bear...

Here is the finished second bag, 'Old Batch':

I'm pretty happy with the way he came out, although the metallic floss was, again, very hard to work with so I changed my design a bit and didn't use it as much as I'd planned. Here is a better look at the detail:

His hat gave me trouble, it came out looking more like a pancake for some reason.

More trouble came in the form of my 10 year old daughter, who was enjoying an unauthorized snack of black olives, and spilled the bowl on BOTH of the finished bags, staining them with nice, dark, olive juice.

This one, which also shows the finished pocket of the first bag, took the most damage...

The pocket was such a pain to work with I just did the outline on most of it and will keep the pockets simple. I hope (and so does she, believe me!) that this stuff washes right out. I know that these bags WILL take some abuse and pick up dirt in usage, but Hell, I expected them to at least make their initial trip TO the market unscathed. How she managed to nuke the only two finished bags I'll never know!

Latest Weird Nesting Site...

Yesterday I pruned back a bunch of rose bushes, leaving the cuttings out overnight for the tortoise and the chickens to forage in.

This morning...

Bear decided to lay an egg in there, you can just see her little face peeking out. Now--I cannot THINK of a more uncomfortable nest than a pile of pure rose branches, with all those thorns! I SWEAR they have nest boxes, lovely proper wooden ones with loads of fresh straw.

Nope. Nothing will do but this nasty pile of thorny branches. Even Phoenix the rooster was looking at her like she was nuts.

Weirdos.

The Countdown...

...is on! I gave the eggs in the incubator their final turn last night, topped off the water, culled the undeveloped eggs and shifted the remaining 12 eggs to one incubator--the one with the forced air fan. All of the eggs are dark green and too dark to candle except two--a light shelled egg and a light brown egg, both with definitely a chick inside.

Meanwhile, the 5 remaining eggs out under the hens are too dark to candle--except one, which looks to have a chick inside but is also horribly cracked. I chose to leave it be under the hens to give it a chance. Two eggs are under Moet, a buff Frizzle Cochin who has raised chicks before and three are under Bear, our Easter Egger Head Hen. Moet got the cracked one since she is smaller, lighter and more gentle than Bear. When hatch day comes, we'll either put all of the eggs under one hen or leave them be with Moet & Bear--but the mama(s) & eggs will be transferred to a brooder box in the house for the hatching. I'm hoping the hen's eggs hatch, as Moet REALLY screeched at me and pecked me HARD (which she never does) when I checked under her tonight. Hopefully that's a good sign that she knows they are viable.

If any of the incubator eggs hatch, they will be added to the mama hen's chicks, since hens can't count. The way to do it safely is to slip them under her at night, while removing the unhatched eggs at the same time.

Hatch day is in two days, on Sunday. By tomorrow afternoon we should be seeing eggs rock and hearing chicks peep if anything is going to happen. When that occurs, the webcam will start!

I See Baby Chicks Starting!

Some of the eggs are clear--the Polish ones--but others have embryos starting, hurrah! And in BOTH incubators! Can the real culprit be as simple as 'too many eggs in the incubators'? And if it really DOES end up being a '12-20 at the MOST' deal for the incubators, why does Miller Manufacturing say you can place 46 eggs per incubator? The humidity & temps feel MUCH better, too.

Hmmm.... Now if we can only keep the eggs going and get them to hatch--!

As for the broody hens outside...we now have EIGHT hens that have gone broody, including Bear, our Head Hen. I think they've realized that we are leaving eggs for them to hatch and they're all trying to horn in on the action. Bear has succeeded in taking over one nest with three of the eggs, while four other hens are setting two to a nest and have the remaining 4 eggs split up between them. At least the paired off ladies are being nice enough to share an egg apiece. I do think that when hatch time comes, we'll either choose one hen (likely Bear) for mama and give her all of the eggs, or just go with two of the ones who have paired up. I hate to deprive the others of their eggs, but they have already broken three of the initial eggs we set under them by fighting over them, and I don't want to shift things around again just yet and have it start up again.

Two weeks to go!

HEY--!

Today's WTF moment was provided by Bear. I went out onto the back porch for a moment to tell J. something, who was in the garage. As I'm standing there, Bear suddenly leaps up out of nowhere and attempts to knock the root beer popsicle from my fingers.

Happily, she was unsuccessful as it was still in the wrapper, and was shooed away, grumbling.

Seriously, chickens will eat ANYTHING.

Happy Easter!

Our roses are just getting started blooming after I was really late in cutting them back after the first of the year, our 'Peace' rose was, fittingly, the first and only one with a flower this morning:

But the cherry tree is blooming nicely...it has yet to produce a single cherry, mind you, but is a pretty tree just the same.

Meanwhile, N.'s pet bunny, Ace, volunteered to pose as the Easter Bunny this morning.

Bear just eyed the basket skeptically, she's seen this 'colored eggs' nonsense before.

Some of the other hens had better, more interested reactions, and Bear hung around:

The Easter Bunny apparently had fun hiding the eggs, and seems to have a devilish streak when it comes to camoflage:

OK, you saw the red one on the crotch of the tree in the background...but did you see the purple-pink one?