~ Retired and Starting My Future In The Foothills ~

[theoldchick]

I enjoyed the photos!

 

[gryeyes]

Vacation is NICE. Perhaps I should be more like a busy bee and bustle about unpacking and moving things around. Hmmmm.

Nah. There are chickens and ducks and geese in the yard! I haven't found a minute of today during which SOMETHING of interest didn't occur in the flock.

My friend and I recovered a wooden bench with a storage seat from the rental yesterday and loaded it into the back of my car. (Many items of yard furniture have been moved into or around the shed I built in the side pasture, "okay" to pick up anytime, no set schedule. Today we unloaded it from the car and placed it on the veranda.

Other than watching John the contractor working on the gutter installation for most of the day, we didn't do a darned thing other than what I've mentioned. Nice chatter together, nice chatter with John when he wasn't wearing protective ear cover, nice discussions with every chicken, duck or goose passing by us.

Soose1 is slightly upset about the fate of the minions. She continues to beg me to keep them. Regardless of my laying out these facts: I do NOT need ANY MORE roosters. We already know any chicks which are hatched here will stay even if they are cockerels, so there WILL be more anyway. They are being sheltered, well fed, allowed free range of the property with the rest of the flock, all the bugs they can catch. They just aren't named and they will go away to be humanely dispatched. They will then be processed into food. Good life, good end.

Yah... that's the ticket. Ummm hmmmmm.

Well. One of the minions is actually a pullet, so she's not leaving. (She may have a name; more on that in a bit.)

And, well, there's been this one really sharp looking minion I've been watching. His feathers are a deeper mahogany and he's matured a little more than have the rest of the minions. Nicely shaped comb and wattles. Big, tall, gangly RIR cockerel, but with a good stance.

Almost everybody in my flock has named him/herself. Their names just come to me. Sometimes folks suggest names, and occasionally one of those names will "fit." More often than not, the name just comes to me as appropriate. I dunno HOW it works, it just happens.

I wasn't going to get friendly with or name any of the minions. I've just noticed this one, in comparison to his brothers.

This afternoon, he crowed. I wasn't looking in that direction, so I just announced (to my friend) "Oh, I've got a new crower!" (This is a statement that makes NO sense to a non-keeper of chickens, I learned.)

So, in turning around to 'splain the whole picture, I gestured across the yard and as my hand - like a pointer - passed over this one minion standing on a little hummock of earth, he crowed again.

His name is Riley.

 

[gryeyes]

Yesterday, while John the contractor was working on the gutter installation (taking time because he had to remove rotted wood, put up and paint fascia board, etc.), he paused for a moment to ask, "Can I name a chicken?"

He knows the youngsters aren't named until their personalities emerge. His request warmed my heart. "Any specific chicken you want to name?"

"Not really, just provide a name for one of them.... Beatrice."
.
Ooooh, cool.

As the day progressed, I kept an eye out for a prospective Beatrice.

Suddenly there was a fracas - one of the roosters cornered the only pullet in the group of minions (RIR "packing peanuts") and mounted her against her will. Her squawking drew the geese, who do NOT like conflict in the flock. Unfortunately, they target the noisy "combatant" which was the pullet, not the rooster. I had to rescue her as the geese were pulling feathers right off her.

She calmed down in my arms. John said, "Could that be a Beatrice? Plain girls need fancy names."

Sure.

But when I put her down at last, she had trouble walking. She stumbled and wobbled away, having difficulty with her right leg. I am hoping it's just a bruise or dislocation, not something permanently wrong. John said, "Perhaps it would be best to hold off on naming her Beatrice......"

Today she limped when she walked, and she spent most of the day sitting in the Chicken Bush with others utilizing the same cover. (There's this one bush all the tweenagers sit under, climb into, perch upon, and generally congregate in and around.) Depending upon her progress, her name may stick.

 

[maclady]

Love these posts. I check for this thread every time I get on here. I hope "Beatrice" is going to be ok. Have a good day.

 

[Kansaseq]

I hope Beatrice is walking better now; it's a shame to ad injury to insult

 

[gryeyes]

Beatrice is able to move about, she got from the coop to the napping bush and back again a few times, but there is obviously something wrong with her right leg. I don't know what a broken leg looks like unless it's an obviously deformation. She's eating, drinking, I imagine she's pooping but haven't been LOOKING for that, per se. As with any injury, I know rest and good nutrition has a lot to do with healing. I don't know if I should put her in the Infirmary Coop or not. She's quite social and when she's resting in the napping bush, she's surrounded by many tweenagers napping with her.

It's still a wait and see situation.

The front gutter is completely installed, with debris guards and two downspouts. Looks marvelous. The back gutter is installed, also with the debris guards, but the downspouts aren't yet attached. John is going to dig a trench for the flex-pipe and get that set up before he puts up the downspouts to match where the flexi-pipe needs to be attached to 'em.

My friend, Soose1, also likes him. "He's nice! And funny."

Day before yesterday, John determined I have an excellent grasp of the obvious. Hey, I've never seen gutter parts before, dis-assembled! I was fascinated as he cut the metal to the exact dimensions and attached the supports, end caps, downspouts, spacers, etc. I'd point to a piece and say something like, "So, that fits into that, and that part is the end piece, right?" Yes, Linda, you're exactly right. I'd beam, he'd smile indulgently, and then I'd do it again with something else.

Yesterday evening, two loose BIG dogs were at my fence, moving back and forth from the gate along the front fence, obviously trying to see an easy way onto the property. Soose1's dog, Maggie - a German Shepherd mix - barked at them and as I called her to walk down the driveway to check out the possible canine intruders, I heard a sound and then the retiree living next door shouting, "Git! Git!" The dogs got.

He was halfway down his driveway, carrying a long-barreled gun. "Oh, hi, Linda. I didn't know you were home. I popped one good. Who's the big dog with you?" So I explained about my visitor and her dog; Maggie wagged her tail at him. He told me the black dog was commonly loose in this area and the grey dog "meant business."

I thought it was awfully nice of him to feel like protecting my flock!!

When I told John that story, he explained it was perfectly legal to shoot any dog "annoying, harassing or attacking your livestock." I pretty much knew that, and told him about the air pistol I bought, which shoots metal pellets. He had me demonstrate it, said it was a nice popgun, but out here I needed a shotgun. Single barrel, open stock loading, simple. "Break it open, put in the shell, close it and fire. Nobody will mess with you and it's safe, because once it's fired it's "unloaded.""

He'll be back tomorrow to dig the trench and finish the back gutter.

It's been a restful day here, as I am having one of my "fibro" days. Annoys me it is occurring during my vacation. But far better than during the work week, I guess, because that would be very unpleasant. Retirement is looking pretty good for next September.

 

[caspernc]

 

[sfw2]

I've never even met John, and I like him. He sounds like a great, down-to-earth guy.

Hope Beatrice is all better, soon. Hopefully it's just a sprain.

 

[gryeyes]

Beatrice can get around, but that leg is a real problem. Because she spends a lot of time sitting, she is an easy target for testosterone-charged cockerels. I rescued her from another rapist rooster and comforted her in my arms in the house for a while. (Watching TV actually IN the house, on a screen, not my favorite Chicken TV outside.) I had already set up the Infirmary Coop with fresh shavings, food and water, and she's now segregated in there to heal without being harassed. She laid an egg this morning. (John said, "Well, that's an entirely different function than using her legs, in case you weren't aware of that....")

My friend and I went down the hill yesterday to pick up my glasses at the optometrist's office and pick up my mail (and packages) at the UPS Store where I have it delivered. We stopped in Plymouth on the way and ate brunch at Glen & Marlene's Dead Fly Diner. OMG. I will be eating there again! Home style comfort food! Plus they serve mimosas and Bloody Mary's! (Didn't imbibe this time... but it's on my radar!) She's never eaten Eggs Benedict before. She has now enjoyed that indulgence. (They must use local eggs, because these were NOT regular old store eggs.)

I am so much more comfortable with my glasses. In the interim, I've been using "readers" for computer work or reading labels ... or text messages on my iPhone. It was a pain to remember where I put the readers and to put them on, take them off... My progressive tri-focals with auto-darkening tint are just so convenient - put 'em on, leave 'em on, take 'em off at night. Heaven.

Yesterday, Amy and Albert discovered the stored Styrofoam and decided they needed some.

Later, Amy lured Hitchcock up onto that box after I'd covered it, so they used the platform as a jumping off point to get into one of the cedars.

Then Hitchcock jumped up to a higher branch, from where he could survey much of the yard.

That left Amy to peer down at me as I took their pictures.

We stopped at Green Acres, a wonderful nursery, where I bought a crape myrtle tree in a five gallon container.

I bought another grape vine (Seedless Flame this time), and a Willamette Raspberry vine. And I HAD to have a small metal rooster on a stick for the yard.... a miniature version of the much larger scrap metal roosters also for sale.

It's REALLY cute.

At a little antique and garden shop in Plymouth (which I love) I also found a really nice sundial top, in metal, with a dragonfly figurine. The tail of the dragonfly is the gnomon (the part that sticks up and creates the shadow). I did not purchase it, but I may very well splurge and get it at a later date.

John is finishing up the gutter project. Soose1 and I are gonna go to the grocery store for some laundry detergent. I've been washing clothes like a mad-woman, to rid them of the musty smell of their months long storage in the rental.

 

[maple]

Lookin good!