Sitting Pretty

Bea is very serious about her farm security job and she keeps a strong eye out back.  She also watches the sides and the fronts, but she's very vigilant about the back.  She also keeps a close eye on me ;-).

It got bitterly cold last night, down to zero, but the wind wasn't too bad and everyone looked good this morning.  There is still very little wind and the sun is shining so it actually feels warmer than the other day in the 20s.  I even took my coat off while I was out taking pictures.

The cats are all inside and I left The Crowing Hen in the wash room, but if you are in the sun or moving around, you won't be cold.  Go outside and enjoy it :-).

My Favorite Tree...Of The Week...Or All Time

The Crowing Hen and her tiny friend Blondie have been here for almost ten years.  There were originally two tiny hens and the two tinies hung out together and the Crowing Hen, now affectionately called "Yaya" because that's what the bantams sound like when they're talking to me bossing me around, was brave enough to mingle with the big hens.

The two tinies slept each night side by side on one of the beams just over the cart stall in the barn.  Yaya chose the Sheep Chicken's perch in the outside stall.  The big hens are locked securely in the coop.  I've always wished all the chickens would sleep in there, but the bantams have never wanted to do that.

Something happened one night and the two tiny hens moved from their normal perch to way up into the rafters for a few months.  They eventually moved back down and then the silver hen started having trouble getting up into the lower perch.  She let me help her for awhile and then one morning a year or so ago I found her dead.

Blondie continued to sleep over the cart stall for quite a few months and then one night she wasn't there.  I eventually found her sleeping in the rafters over the Easy Breezy stall.  I'm not sure what scared her over there, but she seemed okay with that spot and that's where she's slept for many months.

A month or so ago I found the Crowing Hen with a bare spot on her neck (!).  I'm not sure what happened, but I feel like something had tried to grab her, luckily unsuccessfully.  Because I knew that a. she was pretty comfortable with the big chicken and b. she was in a location I could easily get to, I started picking her up and locking her in the main coop at night.  She still makes me move her each night, but at least she's basically okay with it.

One night last week Blondie moved back over the cart.  There is a nest of fledging barn swallows near where she had been sleeping and I wondered if they'd told her to get lost.  The next night I found her in the tack room.  I made her a perch in there and hoped she'd move in there at night, but the following night I couldn't find her anywhere.

She did show up the next morning (whew!), but that night I again couldn't find her.  That went on for several days.  I tried to be as stealth as I could, watching her every move, trying to clue in to where she was going, but she kept eluding me.  The fifth morning she showed up looking very tired and cold. I really needed to get this figured out.

Tuesday night she walked into the Wool House and looked around, eyeing the loft.  I love this little chicken...but not that much ;-).  I'd seen her poking around a little with the big chickens recently, I think trying to talk herself into moving in to their secure coop, so I tried to stick her in their with them, but she was too scared.  I set up a small cage in the wash room like she'd slept in during the Polar Vortex and she settled right in.

Last night I propped the door open and hoped she'd go in there on her own.  As I walked back up to the barn after dinner I found her heading across the yard.  I stood there quietly, watching, thinking at least now I was going to find out where she'd been sleeping every night.  She headed for the big pine tree and just as she was going to make her big leap, I scooped her up.  

My first thought was how scared she must have been to move out of her long time barn home into the "wilds" and how scared she must have been out there huddled in a tree all night.  No wonder she looked exhausted.  

Then I thought about finding blind Rocky out there after the night he wandered out of the barn and got lost.  And Salt always sleeping under that tree and Ewenice and Renny and Kate and Tilly and sitting out there with bottle lamb after bottle lamb and who knows who else has sought shelter in and under that kind tree.

It's had a rough life.  The top has been ripped out of it time and again by wind and ice and lightning.  Because it's lost it's ability to grow up, it's grown out.  Way too far out.  We've tried pruning it back a few times, but I know it's days are numbered.  It maybe does as well because it's setting a bunch of pine cones this summer.  

I'm hoping I can harvest some seeds from these cones...but I mostly hope I don't need a replacement for a very long time.

From The Department Of...

In what is looking like the summer that will never end, Gladys is not well and I had to take her to the vet last week.  If you are asking yourself how one takes a chicken to the vet, if your chicken is Gladys, you just put a towel down on the front seat and off you go.

"We're going where?!?"

Here is a short video as we headed down the lane.

Once she got used to the movement, she settled down on the edge of the seat and just rode along like she did it every day, looking around the car, out the window, at me, out the window...

Taking Gladys to the vet seems like it should be an entire story all on it's own, but no, there is a whole 'nuther chapter in "This Could Only Happen To Me."  As we were cruising down the bypass, headed home, I spotted a tiny sheep on the side of the road.  Screeeech!

???

After being abandoned on the side of the road since, I'm guessing, the end of July and then picked up and hung on a road side marker, this poor little sheep can only be thinking "What now?", looking up at a big chicken who's just been to the vet and had her car ride home interrupted.

The reason I'm guessing she's been out there since late July is the county fair ribbon tied around her arm.

Is this not the saddest little sheep you've ever seen?  

Three or four washes later and she has a whole new lease on life :-).

"I'm safe and someone loves me and is going to give me a good home :-)"

So what is this little sheep's story?  How did she end up on the side of the road?  Was it purely an accident?  Maybe a toddler tossed her out the window?  A tired parent set it on the roof and forgot it?  Is someone looking for her?  Or is that third place ribbon a clue?  

She looks like she might have been made by a child as a 4-H project.  Was her maker disappointed by a third place ribbon?  Disappointed enough to throw her away?  There is no way to know for sure, but in the off chance that this is what happened, there are a few things I'd like to say to that child.

Well, I'd like to say something about not being a bad sport and would she have been more valued with a blue ribbon and what that might say about a person...but I'm going to leave that be.   

What I am going to say is:  Hey, you made a stuffed sheep toy.  A sheep toy that looked enough like a sheep that I spotted it out of the corner of my eye at 40 miles an hour.  A sheep toy that someone loves and is enjoying playing with.  You made something of value.  Be proud of that!  

"The crazy chicken lady says I'm not the first little sheep she's found and rescued from the side of the road.  I think she's actually a crazy sheep lady!"

Speaking of chickens, Gladys is doing "okay" and while not out of the woods, she did boss around the crowing hen this evening so I'm taking that as a good sign.  I'll keep you posted.

Would He?

While at first glance this appears to be a story about a sheep eating watermelon, I think the better story is actually the chickens.

I took a not super ripe watermelon out to the barn thinking everyone could share it.  The sheep were all asleep so I quietly set it down for the chickens.  Woody popped up immediately, came racing out and started gobbling it all up.  Would he share it?  No, he Woody not.  

"Boy, that sure looks good."

Note Gladys circling and circling while the others watch on in horror as the watermelon quickly disappears.  

"Can't you make him share with us, Gladys?"

"I just can't believe this!"

"Come on, Woody.  Just a little bit?"  

"No."

"The nerve!"

Here comes Andy.

Would Woody share?

"I guess I'll just eat this piece of wilted lettuce."

And Gladys is back...

...for one last attempt.

"Please?"  

"No."

Look at his gluttonous pink nose!  And the disgruntled hens.  I think I'd be a bit afraid to go to sleep tonight, Woody.  And I think I'll go get the girls their very own watermelon tomorrow.