Good Morning! 2019

[Ontario Chick]

Thank goodness for PTO otherwise I woul think you aren't talking to me.

[WLLady]

Good morning everyone
last night i had MMA rural style. I now have a nice little ziplock baggie in the fridge that is labelled "as-ho-- 2019". Guess who will be dinner in the coming weeks? I am not impressed. He was a super nice looking blue wheaten ameraucana. i guess this is just validation that dementia can also affect birds. holy crap. so after a panicked run over to the neighbour to see if she had some makeup i could borrow for today's work...and then deciding it likely wasn't worth it, i'm waiting for the comments. why do you look like you need stitches on both sides of your face? argh! bastard.

i need some holidays.
but now i'm glad that the buyer that wanted that line didn't show. Because i would have felt super bad.....
well, step daughter arrives tonight! super excited!
she's on the plane already.....

[Killerbunny]

What is it with boys this year? This week I culled 3 GLW boys for attitude. I caught one of them beating on the BR boys badly so I processed him. Then the 2nd one started to wait for me when I went into the pen, big mistake. He and his brother were ganging up on the others. One of them was pulling the BRs off the roosts and trapping them and beating them. It's more peaceful now and the BRs are settling. I haven't seen this behaviour since Miss Mouses' boys went bad.

[windwalkingwolf]

Good morning all!
There's been a lot of adventures here lately. A little while ago, I had a three-month-old pullet present with classic Marek's symptoms...she started to limp, then drag a foot, then the wing on that side started to droop, then she lost the use of that one leg all together and just lay on her side doing the splits. It went from slightly limping to paralyzed in about four days. I isolated her as soon as I suspected something worse than a pulled muscle, but if it had been something nasty, it would have been spread around by then. Luckily it seems to have been a one-off, but I am still watching my birds like a hawk weeks later. The one that went down was always a little weird: sometimes she'd choke on her food to the point of unconsciousness, and sometimes as a chick she'd move her body as if she had a strong wind at her back...so I'm thinking she had some neurological issues right from the get-go. I didn't necropsy her, unfortunately. As soon as I realized she couldn't get up, I broomsticked her and buried deep in the manure pile.

Richard is in the process of moving his antiques/collectibles store home, so we are cleaning out the cover-all. Yesterday he was moving a pile of stuff and scared a huge, beautiful eastern fox snake. He's a bit of an ophidiophobe and sent his sister (who was completely freaking out) to come get me to I.D. "The giant rattlesnake" while he watched to make sure it wasn't going to crawl inside any of his stuff. It slowed work considerably as I did my best to move stuff out so as not to crush her, while the man supposed to be moving stuff was standing wayyyy back and my sister-in-law had already headed for the hills after she got me. It wasn't the first one I've seen here, but the biggest so far at over four feet long. Supposedly, they are threatened in Western Ontario, endangered in Georgian Bay, and do not exist here in Eastern Ontario, but so far this year I've seen more Eastern Fox snakes than Leopard frogs, which are listed as "not at risk", despite the fact that I've seen exactly ONE leopard frog this year. ONE. In years past, my weedy garden would be hopping with them. Perhaps the fox snakes have moved in and are eating all the frogs I'm quite happy to let them, as we have an overabundance of mice and rats, and I would not say "no" to any creature offering to eat the little vermin.

And speaking of vermin, I had a skunk family. They got into the chick coop (my fault, I didn't latch the door) and killed eleven chicks, left three alive (one later died, the other two are slowly recovering) and ate two additional ones. The ones that were killed just looked like they were sleeping; no blood, no feathers, no signs of struggle and if I hadn't looked REALLY closely, I never would have figured out how they died. Tiny, tiny punctures to the bag of the head. The commotion woke me at 4 a.m. and I came barrelling out, whereupon one skunk sprayed my coop. They all hid underneath it, and sprayed repeatedly as I tried to convince them to give me a clear shot. Laying on the ground in an open housecoat. One of the recovering chicks had it's outer drumstick muscle eaten out with surgical precision--tendons and ligaments left completely intact. I decided to try and save it. Today, a couple weeks later, she is starting to use that leg, YAY! Never got any skunks that night, but the dog harrassed them until dog tired of the standoff, and I figured they'd move on to easier prey. Nope, mama just decided to leave the kids behind next time. A few nights later, mama skunk came back and broke into my main layer coop, and took a chick right out from under it's mother. There's a light in there, or it might have been much worse, but because there's a light in there, all the birds could see the threat and raised Cain (and me) with their noise. looked at me when I came in and just put it's head back down and kept on eating my baby chick. Penny and I harassed the dirty little thief for a bit. She sprayed at least 7 times. For the record, skunk spray is fluorescent yellow. Neither of us were hit directly...Penny was a pro! She made sure the skunk wasn't getting away, and got two good hard bites in while avoiding the business end like a quarterback. Poor dog, every time the skunk sprayed, Penny would salivate and have to take a break, so she'd run out of the coop, roll in the grass, and then quickly check the rat tunnel the skunk used as an entrance, to make sure it hadn't used it as an exit, then she'd come right back in and go at it again. I love that dog, wish I could clone her. My only complaint is that she doesn't kill like Wendyll Whiner, who is quick and efficient--grab and shake. She's never made a kill. She just dashes in and bites, dashes out again, and repeats until it leaves or until Wendyll or I show up. But anyway, I just had an air rifle, and I waited until I deemed Mrs. Skunk sufficiently empty of fresh stank (I don't trust my own end run skills) so I could put my gun right to her foramen magnum. Her kits were still nursing, and I hate to say it but I rather hope they die, though I doubt it after the hunting lesson she gave them.
If I hadn't caught the skunks at it, I would have been stymied as to what killed the ones with no marks, and suspected rats for the rest. I would never suspect skunks of wholesale slaughter. My coops are stinky but Penny and I are not, and that particular little won't be back.

[Farrier1987]

Getting only about 4 eggs a day. Three broodies setting right now. And 4 or 5 running about with chicks, so not producing eggs. But soon should be back. Probably only about two three more go broody before fall. I have never had a year like this for broody hens, and quite successful, very little mortality. Need some rain here, not in trouble, but everything fairly dry.

Still milking the one goat. Enough milk for us and about once a week have a gallon and a half extra that I make into cheese. Been adding chopped up onion to it last few times, and its really good. Neighbor loves it wants me to sell him some regularly. I might, but I dont want to run a fowl of the law, they look for stuff like that.

Planted some Kenebec potatoes about mid june, just started eating new potatoes again. I have never grown them before, but I like them so far. But of course, whats not to like about just about any new potato? Not real prolific, but a decent size maybe three size of my hand per hill, nice clear skin, shallow eyes.

[Killerbunny]

Just had a fun day trying out Stand Up Paddleboarding. Didn't know what to expect and really enjoyed it. We are going to have another lesson very soon. For the record you notice later that you really used those core muscles!
And on the subject of potatoes mine have all died back really early, Yukon Gold, Red Pontiac and Kennebec, good potatoes just done early and I got them in late too. Anyone else had this experience?

[JimW]

Good evening. Just got home from a quick trip to SW Ontario. Visited my cousin before he heads back to Australia, went to the car races at Delaware Speedway. Was hoping to go fishing on Lake Erie but too windy. Picked up some quail for a friend on the way home and a bunch of metal sheets for my new coops. I was hoping to go visit the Sea Buckthorn Orchard down that way but ran out of time. I want to plant some on our property, oh well next trip.

Two weeks until back to teaching.

I hope everyone has a great start to their week.

JimW

[Ontario Chick]

Good morning,
Another day of peculiar weather, humid and overcast, perfect weather for weeding accept that the air doesn't seem to contain any oxygen
On a gardening front I would like to announce that I have developed a completely new rare form of pumpkin plant absolutely guaranteed not to produce any pumpkins at all.
Last year I planted seeds saved from 2017 pumpkins on a manure pile and there were no pumpkins, but I assumed they didn't like the location and that was that.
This year planted a butter squash and had one space left, remembered the left over 2017 pumpkin seed and poped some in, and viola, butternut squash happy growing baby squashes, pumpkin blooming and no fruit.
There is still few seeds of this rare variety left, so if you always wanted to grow a pumpkin plant without the pesky pumpkins, I am your man
The egg fridge humming and the hens still laying, so all well so far, but boy what a bedraggled lot they are, might be time for another "ugly molt" pictures.
Have a sunny one!

[Happy]

Several of my girls have decided to molt early this year. My 8 year olds are all in some form of undress. Probably a smart idea on their part to avoid nakedness in November. Most of my Old English are molting-I find they always molt earlier than the big birds.
Our garden is HORRIBLE this year. Not one red tomatoe yet unless you count the cherries that the bantams snuck in and ate. I think we've picked maybe 6 cucumbers. Peppers are doing fairly well but they are grown predominately for salsa and unless we buy tomatoes I'm not seeing that happening this year. Beans are still producing well. Unless it stays in the 20's until December I think this year's garden was more for excersize than nutrition.

[Kbr42]

Our garden has been a challenge this year. Tomatoes have rot from not being water enough. Our cucumbers and pepers have been awesome. We put them in containers this year and put them in the front of the house. They have been spot watered which seemed to be enough for them. My young birds discovered the lasts of the growing cucumbers and helped themselves..lol going to be a hot one today.