Théo and the chickens des Sauches

[MaryJanet]

Maybe the roosters' fighting days are over?

 

[ManueB]

Update on the dead mare
On his way home from work yesterday, my partner collected the cable puller he had lended to the mayor, Guy, for the mare. Guy said they had succeeded with some difficulty to pull her out whole, tying the puller to a dead trunk. I know it's silly but I'm relieved they did not have to cut her up. He said she fell in the canal and couldn't get up. He is captain of one of the hunting team, and as such he followed their federation course on wolves so they could have a dissuasive shooting campaign two years back, so he has an educated opinion. (And he hates the wolves so he would be the first to lay the blame on them if possible.)
So it was a death of old age, if not painless, and now nature will do it's work and the vultures will clean her remains up.
My partner has been there today and thinks the male horse is sad as he was very clingy and would not let him go.

Rosemary Standley is known in France for her rock folk band Moriarty but she also has this duo Birds on a wire, with Brasilian Cellist Don la Nena. They do very eclectic covers ; I think this almost cheerful rendering of passacaglia della vita is rather appropriate on the Memento Mori theme. Lyrics + translation here.

 

[ManueB]

Maybe the roosters' fighting days are over?

We're not quite there yet, but there's definitely a change.
Today Gaston went again several times inside the netting to collect his hens. On two occasions there were hostile discussions with Théo and both times, it was more or less Théo that went away.

Then while they were both inside the netting both roosters stayed away one from the other and demonstratively horded their hens do that they would not go to the other rooster. Of course Chipie once again created disorder as she just had to go play boss with Merle and Léa .
There were other confrontations that didn't go so well during the day but I'm more hopeful than for a long time!

Piou-piou and Léa both wanted to lay at the same time. I was afraid Piou-piou would throw Léa out, but she waited patiently. Cannelle also laid. Merle went on the nest and started doing the broody thing, but no laying. I took her out after a few hours and she didn't go back. And there was no egg from Chipie (she used to lay every other day every other week).

Other than that the ex-batts adventured down to the fig tree and even further. They are getting bolder every day, which makes Théo really anxious, as they don't listen at all to his hoarding calls. Blanche didn't come though, she was quite unwell most of the day.

Merle on the nest

Under the table

Both teams ignoring one another

First bees in the almond tree flowers...not ours, we haven't moved them back home yet.

 

[RoyalChick]

We're not quite there yet, but there's definitely a change.
Today Gaston went again several times inside the netting to collect his hens. On two occasions there were hostile discussions with Théo and both times, it was more or less Théo that went away.

Then while they were both inside the netting both roosters stayed away one from the other and demonstratively horded their hens do that they would not go to the other rooster. Of course Chipie once again created disorder as she just had to go play boss with Merle and Léa .
There were other confrontations that didn't go so well during the day but I'm more hopeful than for a long time!

Piou-piou and Léa both wanted to lay at the same time. I was afraid Piou-piou would throw Léa out, but she waited patiently. Cannelle also laid. Merle went on the nest and started doing the broody thing, but no laying. I took her out after a few hours and she didn't go back. And there was no egg from Chipie (she used to lay every other day every other week).

Other than that the ex-batts adventured down to the fig tree and even further. They are getting bolder every day, which makes Théo really anxious, as they don't listen at all to his hoarding calls. Blanche didn't come though, she was quite unwell most of the day.

Merle on the nest
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Under the table
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Both teams ignoring one another
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First bees in the almond tree flowers...not ours, we haven't moved them back home yet.
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You move the bees for the winter? Where to? I don’t know anything about keeping bees and would love to understand.
I get a lot of honeybees here. I am not sure if they live in a hive with some neighbors nearby and visit, or if they are wild. Maybe both.
How far do bees roam?

 

[ManueB]

You move the bees for the winter? Where to? I don’t know anything about keeping bees and would love to understand.

We move them closer to the sea, at a lower altitude. We became friends years ago with an old man who sold us some of our first hives, and we took our hives to his place in winter and his to ours in summer. He died last year, but we have kept the same arrangements with his children.
The bees can easily survive our winter, and in fact there have been some years when we didn't move them, when we had more than ten hives. Moving them is stressful for the hives. However, where we are there is a big difference in climate going near the sea or up the mountains, and this means they will still have lots of flowers through winter if we take them lower. If it's a good year we can then take honey twice, in spring and in summer, which is unthinkable if we leave them here. On the other hand, everyone take the hives higher in summer because of the asian hornet, which make it very difficult for them here to survive summer under 800m /2600 feet, and higher now with climatic change.

I get a lot of honeybees here. I am not sure if they live in a hive with some neighbors nearby and visit, or if they are wild. Maybe both.
How far do bees roam?

Both is possible. If some of your neighbours have had bees for years, at one point there must have been swarms that they didn't manage to catch and that survive and reproduce in the wild. The usual saying is 4km / 2.6 miles, but that's only an average : if you move a hive you must move it further than that, otherwise they will come back to their original place. However, they can fly much further than that to get water, and they will usually fly much less than that if there is food and water near by.

 

[MaryJanet]

We move them closer to the sea, at a lower altitude. We became friends years ago with an old man who sold us some of our first hives, and we took our hives to his place in winter and his to ours in summer. He died last year, but we have kept the same arrangements with his children.
The bees can easily survive our winter, and in fact there have been some years when we didn't move them, when we had more than ten hives. Moving them is stressful for the hives. However, where we are there is a big difference in climate going near the sea or up the mountains, and this means they will still have lots of flowers through winter if we take them lower. If it's a good year we can then take honey twice, in spring and in summer, which is unthinkable if we leave them here. On the other hand, everyone take the hives higher in summer because of the asian hornet, which make it very difficult for them here to survive summer under 800m /2600 feet, and higher now with climatic change.

Both is possible. If some of your neighbours have had bees for years, at one point there must have been swarms that they didn't manage to catch and that survive and reproduce in the wild. The usual saying is 4km / 2.6 miles, but that's only an average : if you move a hive you must move it further than that, otherwise they will come back to their original place. However, they can fly much further than that to get water, and they will usually fly much less than that if there is food and water near by.

Fascinating. Thanks for explaining!

 

[RoyalChick]

We move them closer to the sea, at a lower altitude. We became friends years ago with an old man who sold us some of our first hives, and we took our hives to his place in winter and his to ours in summer. He died last year, but we have kept the same arrangements with his children.
The bees can easily survive our winter, and in fact there have been some years when we didn't move them, when we had more than ten hives. Moving them is stressful for the hives. However, where we are there is a big difference in climate going near the sea or up the mountains, and this means they will still have lots of flowers through winter if we take them lower. If it's a good year we can then take honey twice, in spring and in summer, which is unthinkable if we leave them here. On the other hand, everyone take the hives higher in summer because of the asian hornet, which make it very difficult for them here to survive summer under 800m /2600 feet, and higher now with climatic change.

Both is possible. If some of your neighbours have had bees for years, at one point there must have been swarms that they didn't manage to catch and that survive and reproduce in the wild. The usual saying is 4km / 2.6 miles, but that's only an average : if you move a hive you must move it further than that, otherwise they will come back to their original place. However, they can fly much further than that to get water, and they will usually fly much less than that if there is food and water near by.

Thank you. Very interesting.
The nearest kept bees I know of are a couple of miles away but there may be some closer if people don’t sell the honey. The usual thing here is to put a sign in the road when honey is available.
Given the nature reserve which has a lot of swamp, pasture and woodland, I would not be surprised if there are wild bees. They love my garlic chives and I always worry that some neighbor’s honey ends up tasting like garlic!

 

[BDutch]

Interesting why you move your bees ManueB. Here people don’t move them for the temperatures (we have no mountains).

I’m not interested in keeping honeybees for the time being, but I do want to make a bee hotel this spring mainly for wild bees. They are great to fertilise fruit blossoms.

I like to make to make one on a pole like this one, but fill it mainly for bees (top) with hollow bamboo and drilled sticks.
In the picture the middle part is for butterflies. The lower part for other insects.

 

[ManueB]

Thank you. Very interesting.
The nearest kept bees I know of are a couple of miles away but there may be some closer if people don’t sell the honey. The usual thing here is to put a sign in the road when honey is available.
Given the nature reserve which has a lot of swamp, pasture and woodland, I would not be surprised if there are wild bees. They love my garlic chives and I always worry that some neighbor’s honey ends up tasting like garlic!

I wouldn't worry, as they are probably in your garlic chives some months before the neighbors collect honey. So the garlic tasting honey is very likely eaten by the bees themselves

Interesting why you move your bees ManueB. Here people don’t move them for the temperatures (we have no mountains).

I’m not interested in keeping honeybees for the time being, but I do want to make a bee hotel this spring mainly for wild bees. They are great to fertilise fruit blossoms.

I like to make to make one on a pole like this one, but fill it mainly for bees (top) with hollow bamboo and drilled sticks.
In the picture the middle part is for butterflies. The lower part for other insects.
View attachment 3422825

If you actually do one of these let us know if it works and what kind of insects decide to roost in there !
I've mentioned it before but we have way more wild bees now due to the fact that we have planted many plants for our bees. But one of the main attraction, the huge lacy phacelia patches we kept from spring to early winter, we will not be able to handle anymore with the lack of water. In fact we will likely not go on long with bee keeping the way things are going.
***********
Once again both teams managed to coexist for something like twice twenty minutes with almost no aggression between the roosters, except one pass of jumping feets forward at each other. Then they stayed away.

However in the afternoon I witnessed something really interesting. I took Théo's team to the field under their yard and while they were on the way, Gaston's team jumped inside the netting. Chipie and Blanche hadn't followed me and were under the laurel tree when Gaston's team arrived. I heard noises and looked up and saw Chipie and Piou-piou fighting. Usually Piou-piou submits to Chipie but this time they were flashing hackles and pecking each other's combs. Gaston ran and intervened by jumping on Piou-piou. However this didn't deter her and the fight began again, so he left! And then what really, really surprised me it that Brune came running back up, and attacked Piou-piou to take Chipie's defense. And when Gaston came back to see what was happening she stood her ground and it was Piou-piou and Gaston that went away.
This is very surprising as the ex-batts always bully Chipie. But maybe they still consider her part of the flock now, as opposed to Gaston's team ? Not sure what that meant.
At roost time, I think Théo was scared to go in the coop where Gaston was roosting!
On the egg front, Piou-piou and Léa, Blanche and Nougat all laid in the morning. Nougat's egg was beautiful for the second time. And still nothing from Chipie!

Both roosters pretending to ignore one another. Once again Chipie is in the middle looking for trouble.

Chipie has again a peck on her comb from her fight with Piou-piou!

 

[MaryJanet]

I wouldn't worry, as they are probably in your garlic chives some months before the neighbors collect honey. So the garlic tasting honey is very likely eaten by the bees themselves

If you actually do one of these let us know if it works and what kind of insects decide to roost in there !
I've mentioned it before but we have way more wild bees now due to the fact that we have planted many plants for our bees. But one of the main attraction, the huge lacy phacelia patches we kept from spring to early winter, we will not be able to handle anymore with the lack of water. In fact we will likely not go on long with bee keeping the way things are going.
***********
Once again both teams managed to coexist for something like twice twenty minutes with almost no aggression between the roosters, except one pass of jumping feets forward at each other. Then they stayed away.

However in the afternoon I witnessed something really interesting. I took Théo's team to the field under their yard and while they were on the way, Gaston's team jumped inside the netting. Chipie and Blanche hadn't followed me and were under the laurel tree when Gaston's team arrived. I heard noises and looked up and saw Chipie and Piou-piou fighting. Usually Piou-piou submits to Chipie but this time they were flashing hackles and pecking each other's combs. Gaston ran and intervened by jumping on Piou-piou. However this didn't deter her and the fight began again, so he left! And then what really, really surprised me it that Brune came running back up, and attacked Piou-piou to take Chipie's defense. And when Gaston came back to see what was happening she stood her ground and it was Piou-piou and Gaston that went away.
This is very surprising as the ex-batts always bully Chipie. But maybe they still consider her part of the flock now, as opposed to Gaston's team ? Not sure what that meant.
At roost time, I think Théo was scared to go in the coop where Gaston was roosting!
On the egg front, Piou-piou and Léa, Blanche and Nougat all laid in the morning. Nougat's egg was beautiful for the second time. And still nothing from Chipie!
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Both roosters pretending to ignore one another. Once again Chipie is in the middle looking for trouble.
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Chipie has again a peck on her comb from her fight with Piou-piou!
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Chipie is the sweet little girl who somehow makes bad friends and ends up with bad attitude to other people. Her family was too small and too busy to be sufficiently attentive for getting her off to a good start in life. Her intellectual capacities were never cultivated. I've got it all worked out