Peacock Owners for a Day

Yesterday after picking my daughter up at school we drove home to find a peacock resting on our front lawn.  Definitely a first for both of us.  He was very skittish but would come closer when I threw a few handfuls of chicken scratch his way.

He actually got relaxed enough to hop onto our front deck and rest for awhile.

But after a few hours he decided we weren't exciting enough for him and he hit the road heading north.  We checked all the local papers and CraigsList to see if anyone was missing a peacock but there was no one missing their bird. Hope the coyotes don't get him. 

Another Walk in the Woods

Went for another walk in the woods yesterday.  We saw one turkey that was running away but I did get some pictures of things more willing to sit still for their picture.

 There's water everywhere and frogs in every puddle.

 

This beautiful teal was patient enough for me to get his close up.

In this muddy spot there was a multitude of tracks from deer, elk and moose.

Here's my big size 10 boot next to one of the moose tracks.

This little green fellow was sitting on top of the lay of much, too light to make an impression upon it.

Just Working Around the Farm Today

We had wonderful, rainless weather today and we worked outside almost all of it.  But before I when out to work I had to take my batch of 17 Black Copper Marans eggs out of the turner and increase the humidity since they are due to hatch on Tuesday.

Garden #2 is almost completely planted today with the exception of one part which I'm going to plant sunflowers after the danger of frost has passed.  What I did plant was carrots, beets, turnips, rutabagas, parsley, dill and several types of lettuce.  As you can see, we started lining the walkway surrounding the bed with newspaper and straw but I ran out of straw.  I'll get more on Monday.

On my way to the barn, I noticed that some great-horned owls babies in a nest on our neighbors place have finally grown big enough to be seen.  They are right about 20 yards from our fence line very close to where my chickens free-range.  We have seen the parents hunting rodents out in our cattle pasture and they are yet to snatch one of my birds.  I'll be keeping my fingers crossed on that one.

The First Morel and Other Fun Today

 

Today was a special day because my daughter Emma found the first morel mushroom of the year.  Just one, but one more than none!

Also, Emma had her first "customers" at her homemade thistle feeder today.  She made it using a 2 liter soda bottle and wooden skewers.

And just for fun, we made Bentley into a prehistoric creature.  Those are rooster spurs by the way.

Wild Canaries

Goldfinches made their first showing here today on our feeder.  I never saw a goldfinch before until I moved here.  My dad says when he was a kid growing up in Ohio, they called them "wild canaries".  If found that really cute for some reason.

Nature Never Ceases to Amaze

I was topping off the cattle troth Saturday evening and I just happened to look down and see this beautiful little nest that must have blown out of one of the big grand firs in our yard. What a thing of beauty it was! I had to run in and grab my camera so I could take a picture of it before the sun slipped behind the hills.

Look at all the materials this little bird collected to build this nest: moss, horse hair, sticks, grass and even a few chicken feathers, too. Nature is simply one continuous ongoing miracle that never ceases to amaze and inspire me.

Chicken Update

I apologize for not making a post for over a week but my new hobby has taken up all of my time lately. What may this new hobby be you may ask? It's called being sick! I have had the worst bout with illness for the last week that I wouldn't wish on my worst enemies. It's started with the flu almost three weeks ago and ended up with a bevy of secondary infections including sinus and conjunctivitis in both eyes.

But enough about me, I want to give an update about my chicken hatching hobby. The ones that I hatched a little over a month are huge and way too big to be inside but it's way too cold to move them outside to the chicken coop. So, we have them in the basement in a big galvanized trough until it warms up enough.
They are a mellow group of babies. Their daddy is our buff orpington rooster, John who is a mellow fellow himself.

Now for an update on the incubating eggs. I candled them on day 7. Candling is a method of holding an egg in front of a focused bright light to see what's going on inside. I used a bright small flash light and hold it to the top of the egg. It works pretty good but I'm also very new at this. So, I'm not always 100% certain at what I am seeing at this early stage. Especially with the dark marans eggs which are much harder for me to understand what I'm seeing.

Here's a tally for the 24 eggs that we started incubating on 3/3/09:

4 eggs have been culled, 2 due to infertility and 2 were what we call "quitters." They stop developing in their first week of development for unknown reasons, possibly bacterial infection.

17 eggs (8 cuckoo marans & 9 from our own flock) look like they have developing embryos. The little buggers actually move a bit...it's really exciting to see them!

3 of the cuckoo marans eggs I'm giving a big"?" because I do believe that I am not seeing any chicks in them but they are too dark for me to be certain.

I crack my eggs into a cup when I cull them to see if there is any development and to reaffirm that I made the correct assessment. I haven't been wrong in my short career as an egg candler but I am so afraid that I might make a bad call on these dark eggs and kill an embryo that was developing. I'm going to give them a day or two more before I decide to cull or not. It's a double-edged sword because with the inside of the incubator at 99.5F you could either be growing a chick or one heck of a stink bomb! If a rotten egg explodes and splatters on the good eggs they could become damaged by any bacteria or toxins from the bad egg. It's not a good thing.

I'll have to get off the fence at one point! I will keep everyone posted on the three "?" eggs.
To be continued....