Good Morning!

[ross]

Bundle up Shnookie , 6 more weeks . Canadian winter ehh ?

[TomK]

I feel kinda selfish in relishing my -5C winter days...stay warm Shnookie

[Bayvistafarm]

ha ha ha.

[WLLady]

-21 here seems balmy in comparison @Shnookie ! stay warm if you can!!!!
all my "heated" waterers were frozen solid this morning. GAH. is it so hard to make a heated water bucket? really? the horse trough was okay, it has a floating heater. so far our hydrant hasn't frozen (there's still time....haha). looks like cold for the rest of the week too. we walked through our west ravine yesterday looking for standing dead trees, and thankfully only found 9 that have to come out. not like the north west bush where every other tree is dead or dying from that ash borer. hopefully the part will come for the tractor in the next day or two, and i can 1) stop forking hay for the horse 3 times a day; 2) DH can install the part on the coldest part of the year (of course); and 3) we can get some of these trees down before we're turned into muck up to our eyeballs for the spring. i swear the cold just makes everything hard.
i've witnessed -50 exactly ONCE in my life. i never, never, never, EVER, EVER want to see that ever again. EVER.

[Ontario Chick]

Good morning,
Polar vortex revisited I guess, it could be worse judging by @Shnookie post
reminds me of a friend visiting Norther Yukon, the thermometer outside read -55C, he wanted to take a picture of it and the lens in the camera shattered.
Me and the pup are getting in 3 walks a day, me freezing my butt, puppy apparently doesn't feel a thing

[Shnookie]

Right now the sun is out, there is blowing snow (60-70 kph), temp is -29 and the wind chill is -46. The forecast is for about one more week of extreme cold, then slightly warmer. My almost 8 year old Ameraucana rooster is fluffed and a bit stiff (not dead), but the rest are doing okay. Frost on the muffs and beards of Ameraucanas though. I only have 6 EO hens with single combs, and so far none have been frozen. My chickens are in a large metal building with a dirt floor. It has clear panels near the top of the walls and a clear ridge cap so they get some sun and a bit of heat through them. None of the pens are against the wall. They have shavings on the floor and a roost to sit on. Pens are covered partly with plastic and partly with wood for the winter. They do not have heat lamps. WLLady I am using heated dog/cat dishes for my chickens. Even today they are not frozen. There is some frost around the top edge and a bit of surface ice. Most of them are small green dishes from Princess Auto. They do get dirt in them, but they are easy to clean. The cat has a larger one. I have been nuking his food to warm it up. One good thing is that the wind has been coming from the north west a lot lately so it is blowing snow into my dugouts. :)

[Brebis]

Well a tragic day on the chicken front, a mink killed 8 of my 9 chickens overnight and this morning. My stepson had gone over after Sam (the fellow who owns the farm where they are) had called to say something had killed 5 of them and the other 3 were killed before he got there and the mink was still in the pen. My stepson almost got it with a pitchfork as it was trying to escape but it managed to dodge it. The one remaining Welsummer has been rehomed to a new home. I had fortified the pen when the raccoons and then the rats were a problem so not quite sure how it managed it but they’re determined and strong enough to pry the wire if it’s not secured well.

So, I guess that’s the end of chickens for me. I’m in the middle of a move to Kingston this week and not planning on getting anymore. I’ll miss them I must admit, especially the fresh eggs and their antics.

[Killerbunny]

Oh no so sorry to hear that!

[WLLady]

so sorry to hear brebis! argh! hopefully you can find someone with fresh eggs so you don't have to succumb to (gasp) store bought eggs!

another nippy morning out there. 2 waterers needed warm water this morning. a balmy -19C this morning and the horse was doing just fine (food? food? food? hurry up....food!). and there are 15 guineas in the barn. including a buff guinea that is mostly wild....someone is losing guineas....lol. I suspect that the white one that keeps sleeping on the barn roof is also not mine....and this buff one was up in the drive mechanism of the manure spreader last night hiding from everyone else that were in the rafters of the barn. who knows. i sure don't. i can't wait for an end to the -20 (and i sure shouldn't be complaining given what's going on out west!!!!)...the part finally came in for the tractor...DH was putting it together last night and it was just too cold to turn it over....so today once the barn heats up in the sun and with the block heater etc....hopefully nothing breaks when he turns it over the first time! (i'm always scared in these temps of breaking things turning them on). sigh. hopefully hopefully hopefully by this afternoon we'll have a working tractor again!

we have coyote and fox prints everywhere right now. i'm not letting birds out because it's simply too cold outside for them right now (and the chicken doors are frozen shut). i am considering a coyote hunting session some time on a weekend....i'm just a little adverse to getting cold. OH, DH bought me a heated vest for my birthday! OMG it's the BEST THING EVER!!!! and for christmas i got some qiviut wool, and made myself a pair of gloves, and they are AWESOME warm!!!! (just means i'm too old to tough it out anymore....lol)

[labradors]

So sorry Brebis. Kingston does allow chickens though :).

Linda