Official Squatch Watchers

[Parront]

A funny and a head scratcher to share...

The funny:

Yesterday while hanging out with my 8 older large breed girls while they ran free in the yard hubs hollered out the window "Are you missing a chicken?!?".
A quick glance around showed all birds were accounted for.
He says " Just go out front!". Well since he sounded super serious OK!
Turns out someone was out front carrying a red sex link pullet looking for where it belonged. Nope not mine. Took a bit of thinking to direct him to the myriad of other chicken keepers in the hood. He DID find her home in the end.
I am not sure why when people see a bird loose or parts of a bird on the road/sidewalk they always ring my bell. It has NEVER been one of mine.

The head scratcher:

Again while out with the birds yesterday....All heck broke loose in the hoop run. It was nuts! Full panic! All wings and crazy squawking for almost 5 minutes! It kept going even after I stepped in the run. Nothing at all that I could see to cause it in there. This morning zero birds in that coop are willing to come outside.

Spring in the air? Shadow? They remember being afraid, not what the scare was. When one member of the flock flaps in panic, they all react to the one flock member's fear and will flush like wild birds. Then, it seems like they are more nervous and startle even easier for a week! They Leghorns usually start it here.

 

[21hens-incharge]

Some predator for sure was about.
Owls are hard to spot in a tree and weasels can be everywhere. Didn't know I had them until the dog was after one and it ran up a tree. Only live one I have seen. Found several the dog or cat killed and one hit on the road last year

The hoop run is in the middle of the yard. The dogs were out in their run but were lazing about on the far side away from the hoop run. I had 8 birds (other coop) running loose with me in the yard not even 20' away. Just weird as all get out for that level of freak out.

No one else acted like something was off at all.

 

[21hens-incharge]

Spring in the air? Shadow? They remember being afraid, not what the scare was. When one member of the flock flaps in panic, they all react to the one flock member's fear and will flush like wild birds. Then, it seems like they are more nervous and startle even easier for a week! They Leghorns usually start it here.

Maybe it was a mouse and they all were grabbing their bloomers and screaming.

That group does have 3 leghorn crosses in it....

 

[Molpet]

The hoop run is in the middle of the yard. The dogs were out in their run but were lazing about on the far side away from the hoop run. I had 8 birds (other coop) running loose with me in the yard not even 20' away. Just weird as all get out for that level of freak out.

No one else acted like something was off at all.

Hopefully you never find out what it was.

 

[Parront]

Some predator for sure was about.
Owls are hard to spot in a tree and weasels can be everywhere. Didn't know I had them until the dog was after one and it ran up a tree. Only live one I have seen. Found several the dog or cat killed and one hit on the road last year

This is what starts it, I am sure. The Leghorns are very alert and see everything. Funny, when I am out there with them and they are in the yard, I have not had them panic like they will in the coop. One thing that always sets them off is my husband with a tool like a rake in his hand casting a shadow on the tarp! Big Bird HAWK ALERT. I have tried to help him to be aware of this "bird problem"! It is difficult, I have had parrots and other birds since I was 18 and I just automatically avoid these things.

 

[21hens-incharge]

That may be it......

The run has a plastic cover for winter with the sides lifted 2-3' up. We have several kinds of small birds coming through. Everything from finch to crows. I have seen a lot of blue jays around. Maybe one went over the plastic and created a big scary shadow.

 

[Parront]

Good Morning All! @Fishychix I would be tempted to pay whatever you asked for your kits, if you posted those photos that you put here!
I would agree with the rest here, aim a little high!

 

[Fishychix]

A funny and a head scratcher to share...

The funny:

Yesterday while hanging out with my 8 older large breed girls while they ran free in the yard hubs hollered out the window "Are you missing a chicken?!?".
A quick glance around showed all birds were accounted for.
He says " Just go out front!". Well since he sounded super serious OK!
Turns out someone was out front carrying a red sex link pullet looking for where it belonged. Nope not mine. Took a bit of thinking to direct him to the myriad of other chicken keepers in the hood. He DID find her home in the end.
I am not sure why when people see a bird loose or parts of a bird on the road/sidewalk they always ring my bell. It has NEVER been one of mine.

The head scratcher:

Again while out with the birds yesterday....All heck broke loose in the hoop run. It was nuts! Full panic! All wings and crazy squawking for almost 5 minutes! It kept going even after I stepped in the run. Nothing at all that I could see to cause it in there. This morning zero birds in that coop are willing to come outside.

Huh. Weird. Poor things.

 

[Redhead Rae]

Good afternoon everyone,

We had a fun weekend.

Saturday morning I made up one extra large batch of apple crisp and I divided it into 3 portions. I froze two and cooked one. I tried something different. Rather than hand peeling, coring and dicing 28 apples (7 apples each of 4 different varieties, I like having different textures of apple in my crisp) I decided to use my mechanical corer/slicer. It does have a peeler, but it is crappy. So instead of 3-4 hours to do the apples, I decided to try leaving the skin on and it only took an hour to core/slice the apples. The peels are a bit odd when the crisp is freshly cooked, but when the crisp has been cooled in the fridge, you barely notice the skins at all. I think I'll still hand peel anything not for us. I might look for a slicer/peeler/corer that has a peeler that works.

Saturday evening, we had plans to get a few things done, but at 5-5:30, the power went out. We didn't get it back until noonish yesterday. Thankfully, the cold spell had already broken and it only got down to 58 degrees in the house (46 in my in-laws trailer, but apparently, their gas bottle had run out concurrently with the outage so their house was already getting colder before the power went out. I'm just really glad that I didn't have any eggs in incubators or chicks in brooders. I decided to put off hatching until later in the spring.

We are finally all caught up from the mess we made while the power was out. I'm just glad DH isn't working anymore. This weekend would have been miserable otherwise.

Today is my due date. Not expecting him to come until sometime next week or later since his brothers made me wait that long. Feeling better now that I've been able to get more sleep.

@Redhead Rae looks like Frank is ill
View attachment 2557508

Eeek, That's horrible. I'll be praying for him. If inquiring minds would like to know, my White Cornish Hen came from eggs he shipped to me.

I haven't been on Facebook much recently. It's better for my mental health at the moment.

 

[Redhead Rae]

Obligatory 40 week bump pic.

@Kiki