This summer has taken a toll on our birds, and not just because it’s crazy hot. It started when Nessa decided to nest somewhere outside of our fence. She had been showing up in the yard about once a day to honk and eat/drink, but otherwise was nesting (she nests on the ground) somewhere outside the safe zone.
One morning when I was checking the trail cam, I saw this picture of a coyote carrying something, and I was like, uh-oh, that could be Nessa.
We never saw her again.
It’s sad, but then again, she was never really “ours” and she sure had it good while she hung out here. It was super fun for us too.
And more recently, I opened the coop one morning and….no chickens came out! Super weird as normally they all race out to eat. Well, three of our hens (the young ones) are broody, so they don’t move off the roosts, but normally Matt and the Hash Brown come out. So I was like uh-oh. I looked inside and…there was no Matt. Apparently she never made it in the night before. We had been noticing that she was always the last one in at night and she often will be off somewhere on her own. So likely a raptor or something took her.
Matt was super special, especially as we tended to her during a terrible fowl pox episode when we were sure she was gonna die. Ever since then, she has been 100% not scared of me whereas all the other chickens are wary. So it was really sad that Matt was taken, on the other hand, just a bit weird for us because there was no sign of the attack- no feathers or anything! So it didn’t feel as traumatic as it should. I like to imagine she was swept up and died before she even registered what was happening.
In fact, strangely, I’ve been feeling more badly for the Hash Brown, who is now the last remaining older hen. In the morning, she doesn’t come out for food because she hangs around all the other hens who are all broody and sitting in roosts! The Hash Brown used to follow Matt to the food and during they day they had each other and would cool off under the pool deck. The poor Hash Brown must be feeling really lost right now.
As for the broody hens, I take them out of the roost one-at-a-time a few times a day, often setting them into cool water as it’s burning hot out. Except for SiSi, because she has a mega fit every time and flies out of my arms when I get near the water. I’m sick of them all being broody but I suspect the heat makes it more likely and so this may go on all summer. At least they are still alive- I know a lot of chicken owners have been losing hens to the heat.
So we are zero egg production right now (broody hens don’t lay and the Hash Brown is too old to lay). But earlier this summer, Zsa Zsa laid an egg that was perfectly half-and-half colored! I guess the bloom was heavier on one end than the other.
Rob took a Shakespeare class recently (how to properly deliver the lines aloud) and after that he tried out for the next play the Wimberley Players are putting on, Romeo & Juliet. He is pleased that he got the part for Father Lawrence, and now he’s got a whole lot of lines to memorize! And starting next week he’ll be at rehearsals a few times during the week. I think then it’s a couple of months before the play is actually performed.
We ordered a self-refilling animal waterer which pretty much changed my life. It took a couple days to get the chickens used to it (in picture I sprinkled treats on it to lure them over). But now it works great! No more manually refilling the water! I do put ice cubes in though these days due to the extreme heat.
I’m tracking bird sounds every day and so far I have 49 types of birds on the spreadsheet!
We have a few things in the garden but the heat has baked most things except various peppers. In the front flowerbed our chili petin plant is growing like CRAZY!! Not sure what to do with them all.
We have a new game that’s SO much fun called Klask. It’s fast-paced and about action rather than a lot of rules. Recommend.
Somewhere in my social media there was an ad for a class on Domestika which I bought (real cheap) which is about embroidery on photography. So I kind of learned how to do basic embroidery but I was thinking it would look cool on gelli prints so I’ve done some of that. I’ll put a couple of pics below. Eventually I might embroider on my own pics but I kind of feel like it’s a better fit on gelli prints for some reason.
More pics below.
