Apologies!

Sorry for so long between entries. Things have been a little hectic here and still haven’t calmed down!

On a really good note my boys that hatched this year have got a wonderful new home that they are going to at the end of the month. Butter & Jet are taking their sister Sapphire, Jet’s mum Topaz and Sapphire’s mum Jade with them and will hopefully be very happy in their new home. That will leave me with just “The Boys” Bumble & Bee and their ladies over winter which means I can confine them to their run (over 3sqm per bird so plenty of space and a tree and other shelter spots) for the winter and hopefully reseed my lawn and have grass again come spring!

The three OAP chickens are still doing well and Dolly has even started laying again much to my surprise. All the ducks have stopped laying for the winter already, but before they stopped little Holly did lay me a few eggs so come Spring I should be getting a good selection of colours from the girls since little Doobie (Runner) will be a blue egg layer , Daisy & Holly (Cayuga cross) tinted black/grey eggs and the other girls (Appleyard & Campbell) white eggs. I also have little Pingu who is a Cayuga cross Muscovy and who will be infertile due to the cross – however, I am yet to work out whether this means she will never lay or just that the eggs will not be viable?!?

There is so much to do in preparation for the winter. The duck house needs a deep clean and the chicken house needs reinforcing as they are insisting they stay in the old ark and not the new house as they hate perching. The main run needs the rubber chippings turning over and disinfecting and the galvanised feeder needs fixing as the feed isn’t dropping properly. I have two small feeders and drinkers to go in the chicken ark under run so when it gets cold they don’t have to go into the main run and will have plenty of shelter if they want it (the chickens will still get free range unlike the ducks).

I’m dreading reseeding the lawn as it means 4 weeks of the chickens squawking at the inhumane treatment of keeping them in their run. They hate it and it doesn’t matter how many toys, treats or entertainment I add to the run they will still spend every day pacing the mesh looking put out at me. I have decided though it is a case of being cruel to be kind as by keeping them in for a few weeks when the get let out they will have some lovely grass to go on – or dig up as is more likely – and the area around the runs will be better for me with the lawn back and less mud to trample through every day 🙂

I still have three foster kittens that have been with me for 12 weeks now and still no homes for them 😥  Yesterday they had their little ops as I had caught Casper doing things with his sisters 🙄 that he shouldn’t have been! I hoped for a peaceful evening but not even a general anaesthetic stops these three from playing and I had to separate them for a few hours so they didn’t injure themselves! Thankfully today they seem to be sleeping and recuperating well, but poor Casper can’t sit down to eat as he is clearly a little sore 😆

Well, I guess it is time to lock up the muckers and chooks and yet again time to feed the kitbits and clean the litter trays. I find myself often imagining my life before the endless cleaning of chicken, duck and kitten poop……!!!

Posted in My Chicken Diary

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