chickens – Page 15 – The Hermits' Rest

An Evening with a Black Dachshund Mix

Hi, readers of Mama Suna’s blog! I’m Vlassic, and I’ve been hanging around the Hermits’ Rest Ranch for the past two years. I like it here a lot. Wanna know why?

I’m long, but I have longer legs so I can jump high.

I have so many friends! At night I sleep in Jim’s RV. He is so nice to me, and feeds me (I don’t go in the big house because Penney acts weird in there). When I go outside, I spend half my time with my bird buddies, Bertie Lee, Gertie, Fancy Pants, and Clarence. We like how cool it is.

Stay out of our coop, dog! The black chickens don’t like me so much.

The rest of the time I spend with my new friends, the Bull calves. It’s SO much fun there! Calf poop is so delicious, and they have a wonderful water bucket just the size for me to cool off my black coat.

Wait, Rip, it’s my turn! Photo by Meghan Land.

On good days, Mama Suna takes me with her to visit my other friends. Sometimes we ride the little bumpy car. Tonight, though, we walked. It was a beautiful night.

I chased two of the 18 series cows, but just a little, to remind them of how we used to play when they were babies. Mostly I was good, though, because I wanted to see my friends.

Here are two friends, Big Red and Apache. The horse is jealous, because the hen gets fed first.

I love this place! There are so many smells of cattle dogs! I have many places where I simply must pee. They need to know Vlassic rules…when they aren’t here.

There are other fun smells here, too. I especially like donkey poop. Mmm. Thanks, Fiona. Sigh, I was disappointed she didn’t get to come out and play. I love making her put her head down and shake it.

I sure love poop. Why does Mama sweep it up?

The other great thing about where my friends live is that they have an even bigger water tub! I like to swim in it, but not when it’s full.

Big Red and I like to drink from it when it’s full!

After all the friends were fed, we went back. I had to investigate this new hay. It looks funny and smells different. Mama said it’s sorghum, whatever that is. I made sure to pee on it, so it won’t smell so new next time I come.

As we passed the cabin, Copper the dog came outside, so I ran like the wind.

I ran and ran. Meanwhile, Mama saw a new cow patty on the road, that had appeared since we came by before.

As she got closer, she realized it was a turtle crossing the driveway. She told it hello, but for some reason, she did NOT call me over to introduce me! Geez! I’m nice to all the other animals!

After rolling a bit in some silage (it’s an acquired smell, but I’ve acquired it!), I ran back to Rip, Poop Nugget, and Buster, to see if they’d pooped any more.

Then, to end the evening right, Lee and the other dogs showed up! We played! Then it rained a little. Not enough, but it made Lee and Suna smile. We need rain, because my pond is gone!

Self Care and Pottery

I had nothing on my agenda today, so rather than lounge around the house, I decided to do whatever I wanted to.

I went over and visited the calves, and got to feed Rip while the new guys were worked on. Then I just sat and watched the chickens. Why not? It’s fun. I got a few more portraits. Because it’s fun.

After that excitement, I drove off and daringly went to the local nursery all by myself. I wanted a few more little plants for the office. Instead I got two small plants and a monster. Meet Eduardo!

He’s a basket plant, I think. He will be spectacular in the window with the spider plant.

A tiny angel wing begonia and uh, a succulent rounded out the plant fun.

Look to the right of those plants and you’ll see I brought my stained glass windows over, too. I cleaned them all up so maybe Chris can hang them next week, if there’s time. I also brought down the hanging lamp to put up in the reading nook. It’s all clean and ready to go up, too!

I didn’t take pictures of those, so here’s the pothos I put in Tubby Jr. with some wandering Jew I found on the ground at the nursery. The guy laughed when I asked what it cost.

As if that wasn’t enough fun, I next went to my friend Pamela’s studio and had fun with clay. It’s hard to concentrate, though, because she has such cool stuff.

Anyway, she’d made some soap dishes large enough to hold those huge Posh bars I have. She asked what colors I wanted, then suggested I come select my glazes. That sounded fun.

Little did I know that she was also going to let me glaze them myself! It’s been so long since I got to do that. So, I made one orange and gold and one red and pink. I did a bunch of layers, so we will see if they show up or not.

This is orange and gold, believe it or not.

In the past, I have failed as many times as I succeeded in my glazing, but I always do it that way, anyway. Besides, the soap dishes Pamela made are so pretty that my glaze won’t mess them up.

This is two shades of pink with red under it. Hope it comes out!

Well that’s self care. I got to see someone but not too close! The studio is open to the air, too. Fun times. Good for the soul.

New Chicken Knowledge

I have both new knowledge about chickens as well as knowledge about my new chickens, so the ambiguity in the post title is appropriate (otherwise, if my friend Bill read my blog, he would pick on me about it). Where am I?

Yes! I’ve learned a few things about chickens in the past couple of days. For one, did you know they enjoy wading? At least our littlest Ancona, Henley, likes to. She’s been bullied by Clarence recently. In fact, I thought he’d killed her Saturday night after I brought the flock in to roost. I got her out of the outside roost and set her inside, so she’d be safe, and he jumped all over her, finally making her yell in the far corner of the hen house.

I got all upset, because I thought he’d killed her, but when I saw she was still breathing, I crawled in there (not easy) and got her out. I laid her in the pine shavings where the two remaining new pullets were, and hoped for the best.

Star (left) and Sapphire (right) are doing great.

I was thrilled to see her up and around the next morning. That evening, my sister and I went out to see the new ones and give everyone some water (discovering water EVERYWHERE because the hose had come undone, oops). But, I put the larger water holder in there, one with two basins, originally intended to feed and water dogs. No sooner did I set it down than Henley marched over and plopped in one of the basins. She then started drinking from the shallow indentation in there. Star and Sapphire were so surprised they had to come check her out. We laughed a lot.

Ahh, this siitz bath is perfect for a sore cloacha.

Trying Again with the Butter Series

Today, I headed back to the chicken vendor to get a replacement for the late Butternut. There, I learned even more new chicken knowledge, and also got two new pullets. Gene got me the biggest Welsummers in the bunch, so I hope that helps out. I know it is also helpful that it’s ten degrees cooler today than it was on Saturday.

I have buttery feet and a buttery neck. I’ll be Butternut2.

I got there while he was giving the young hens their vaccinations. I asked how they do it, so he showed me. They give them a little shot of something blue in each wing. That protects from a whole lot of bad chicken things. I’m glad of that. Then they put Ivermectin on them topically; just a tiny bit. That’s a wormer; we use it on the horses.

Now I wonder if I should be worming the chickens. Hmm. Research time.

Butterscotch would not hold still for a portrait, so you just get to see her happily foraging, as Henley looks on. Gertie and Springsteen are saying hi.

In any case, I now have Butternut2 and Buttercup. I guess if I get another Welsummer, it will be Butterscotch. I can’t tell these two apart yet, but I’ll work on it. The new ones immediately started eating and interacting with Star, Sapphire, and Henley. And Bruce crowed his head off at them. He can’t get to them for quite some time, though. They are still delicate teens.

Behind Star, who says, “cluck,” is a metal rooster that fell down in the big wind last night. It blew in cool air.

World’s Hottest Socially Distant Photo Shoot

What? I had visitors? I was careful! My work friend, Heather, and her daughter, Emily, wanted to come see our ranch animals, especially Rip in his baby adorableness. We figured if we were mostly outdoors and wore masks, we could safely manage it.

So they drove up, and even brought me my mail from work AND a chocolate pound cake. Homemade. Yep. It’s divine.

Horses and donkeys are on the mantel at the moment.

I have them a tour of the new office, which was a lot of fun. All my animal stuff went over well with Emily, who rides hunter-jumper and volunteers at a very cute farm. And all the shiplap, metal, and brick!

Then it was off to the ranch! It’s good they used to have a Great Dane, because it made all the dogs palatable. Alfred LOVED them. Heather couldn’t get his picture, because he kept going back and forth between the two of them.

Since I got no dog pictures, here’s a leaf-footed bug Emily found.

We then headed to see the chickens. That was sort of sad, since we discovered Butternut had passed away. I think the others huddled on top of her and she overheated. I couldn’t figure out what to do, so I put her in the garage fridge. Sigh. the hottest day of the year is not a good day to get chickens.

Bye, little one. I’m am glad they’ll replace her, and maybe I can get another one.

Heather took a zillion pictures (actual total, 127). Many were of Fancy Pants, who let Emily carry her all over the place. It was really fun watching the chickens with Emily. Here are just a couple of my favorites of her chicken photos.

Off we went to see the cutest calf ever, Baby Rip. That was also a teen animal lover’s dream come true. Since I wasn’t holding a dead pullet, I could get a couple of pictures.

Of course, Heather got a real keeper with the good camera!

Beautiful baby! *Photo by Heather Westmoreland.*

Here are a couple more of my pictures. Rip is so curious and cute!

We saved the best for last, and headed over to the horses. Guess who they loved? Fiona! She and Apache were both on their best behavior.

It’s because I am cute and nice. Photo by Heather Westmoreland.

We had a lot of fun trying to get glamour photos of them with Emily. Neither of them was real interested in getting in the good light, of course. After all, it was 104 degrees outside! But, we persevered. Here are some highlights (the last three are by me, the rest by Heather).

My favorite picture, maybe ever, of me and Apache was taken by Heather, and I am going to try to get a print of it.

Me and my buddy. Eight years ago today I learned to put his halter on.

Everyone was having a great time, so we rewarded Apache and Fiona with some grazing time over by the cabin, and went over to see the 18 cows. Guess who was front and center, as always? 18-1. A few of the others also came up to say hi.

Before we left, I asked Heather to take some pictures of R45, since she is getting way up there for a mama cow. She hasn’t had a calf in a couple of years, and is in her decline. But she sure produced some great calves! And she’s still built like a 1970s Buick. Big and wide.

We fed the horses and Big Red, then headed back to the house as the sun was going down. I had a lot of fun talking to Emily about all the supplements the horses get, and she told me a lot about the farm where she volunteers and the place where she rides giant warmbloods. I’m glad Heather is giving her these opportunities to work with animals.

And I’m glad to have given Heather some opportunities to take photos, because she’s taken some real beauties where Emily rides. Looking forward to more! You can see more photos on Facebook, since Heather tagged me on the ones she uploaded.

My heart is full from getting to show off my animal friends, and I am so glad it was so breezy outside. If we had germs, they all got blown away! Tomorrow, I’m looking forward to getting replacement hens (Butternut2, perhaps?).

Rare Friend Sighting! Plus, More Hens

This will be a fun weekend! It’s already been great, because I got to go meet my friend Janet at Bird and Bee Farm, because she needed new hens. Her “ladies” are all retired. I’ve known Janet since soon after I moved to Austin, and we have had many adventures together. Many adventures. She now lives in Groesbeck with her partner and horses, just far enough away to make visiting not too easy. So, we haven’t seen each other in a while.

So, we were glad to see each other at the chicken farm. I showed Janet all the hard work our Master Naturalist team had done with the Wildscape project, and she really liked some of Catherine and Rosie’s great recycled decor ideas.

This chair fountain’s particularly cute.

I was all excited about some butterflies, and tried really hard to get good pictures, but these pipevine swallowtails are not the kind that sits still. My best picture had something weird in the background.

It was one of the resident guinea fowl, just clucking away at me and peeping over the flowers.

Eventually we got in, after we convinced Gene I wasn’t here just for Master Naturalist stuff. Janet was after black hens, because apparently hawks don’t go after them, because they look like crows, and crows are mean to hawks. Huh. She got three young Jersey Giants and three australorps, all lovely and dusky beauties.

Native Rio Grande turkeys, since I didn’t get photos of Janet’s new pullets.

Well, I couldn’t exactly go there and come up empty handed, especially since our hen to rooster ratio is so low. I needed three hens. Conveniently, the oldest pullets they had were beautiful, as well. They are called Blue Star or Sapphire Gem, and apparently are a new heat-tolerant breed from Czech breeders. I got two of them, one of which has some gold in her neck feathers. She’s Star and the other is Sapphire. I am not creative today.

At least one is in the sun here. That’s Star.
Sapphire is in front. Bruce wants some action.
You can sorta see the pretty feathers.

My favorite thing about them is that they are large. They won’t have to stay separated too long, though they need growth food another month or two. They have beautiful dark brown eyes, too.

The other pullet I got is a Welsummer, which I had one of before in my first batch, but didn’t last too long due to the owl. No owl will get Butternut, though! She’s safe with us in the cage. I love her buttery yellow legs, which gave her the name, and she has cool light brown eyes that match her body feathers. She’s a bit smaller than the other two, and pretty friendly.

I’ll need to re-hook the water hose, and maybe move one of the pipe feeders over to the baby area, but otherwise, they should be fine. Now if I can just figure out how to stop Clarence from crowing under Jim’s RV. That has to be loud!

Anyhow, it was wonderful to catch up with Janet, who I’m going to spend more time with not on a mission very soon. We just wish we could set and eat a meal together, but neither of us wants to chance the germs.

Chicken Surprise (not a recipe)

I think my high school cafeteria used to serve “tuna surprise,” and I want to assure you that I’m not eating my chickens. But I did get a nice surprise this morning!

I went out to let the chickens and guinea fowl out this morning before work, and was chatting with Fancy Pants, Bertie, and Gertie as usual, when I heard the sounds of some rooster-on-hen action going on. I turned my head to see Clarence working away on a black-and-white hen. Since I have three of those, I couldn’t tell who it was until the act was finished.

hen — There’s a reason I’m running, and it’s not to get a grasshopper.

Lo and behold, it was Hedley, the former Hedy, who I’d renamed because I thought they were a rooster. Well, I guess not, since neither of the other roosters has shown an interest in each other, which rules out rooster love. This is a real relief for me, since my hen to rooster ratio is already a bit off (need more hens). AND we have discovered that Gray Gertie is a guinea cock, not a guinea hen (based on his calls, and now his unfortunate hen-chasing behavior).

Gertie is a growing boy, so now poor Hedly has to run from both him and Clarence (and Bruce, who was lollygagging in the henhouse when I took this).

Now I know who’s laying the white eggs, too, since Hedley is way bigger than Henley, the other Ancona hen, who has a pink comb (for those of you keeping notes). It’s always something with these guys. At least all is well in the world of Big Red, the hen who is a member of the horse herd.

rooster — I’m a horse. A shiny red horse.

I got this photo of her yesterday, running over to the water bucket when she realized it was her favorite time of day: when the water is fresh and full for her easy access. That is one pampered solo hen, with her special feed bag of treats and water bucket.

Nothing but Goofy Chickens

Here are some fun pictures I got from the game cam. Too bad I didn’t realize I needed new batteries, so some have weird colors. Have fun with these! I hope you like pink!

Happy Farming

Everyone is finally settling in at the ranch. All the chickens seem to get along fine now that they’re free ranging. And a sign of this happiness was we had a three-egg day today, the first since Lacy Legs passed a few months ago. I’m grateful to whichever new pullet is finally laying!

They are tons of fun to watch outside, and are friendly as heck. I gave them a big overripe tomato this evening, which led to great joy.

And little Rip is hungry as heck, which is great.

He even sucked on my finger today. He has a cute little black tongue and is quite gentle. I obviously could not get a photo of that, so here are his milky little lips.

More Little Bits of Goodness

Today has not sucked. Chris is back at work on the Pope house, so I got a glimpse of the stair rail progress. Ooh.

And I got an awesome mask from my friend Angela in Austin, who knows I love The Who. She made me one like her husband’s. I looked better in the picture where it’s upside down, so you get two pictures.

I look much less tired in the exercise photo.

Plus! Look what I found today! That’s right, one of the “new” hens finally went into production! I think they may all have white eggs, so I don’t know who laid it. But yay.

And…it rained a little. Enough to cheer up the free ranging chickens (and guinea).

I hope you had some small bits of goodness today.

That Didn’t Work as Planned

Two things didn’t work out quite as planned.

Freeing the Chickens

First, we decided it was time to let the chickens out to eat some bugs. You know, the whole free range thing. Of course the first thing happened was Clarence the super stud went after Bertie with a vengeance. What’s cool is that Bruce came to her rescue.

Bruce is about to go after Clarence for his unwanted advances.

That led to the two roosters going into the pen and chasing each other, flying around and such. All that got everyone in a tizzy. Poor Hedley the little Roo-ish one got chased outside and hid with Henley.

Hedley did manage to get some grasshopper eating in, along with Springsteen.

Eventually the three bravest birds started going after bugs, Bertie, Fancy Pants, and Gray Greta. The guinea just loves her fluffy, white buddy.

Fancy Pants finally has a chick to dote on, even though it’s her size.

They all went out some, but it wasn’t the mad dash to freedom I’d envisioned. Probably because it’s hot outside and the chicken pen has all the shade.

The part that DID turn out well was that when I got home from horse activity and went to shut them back in, everyone was roosting quietly. And! Clarence had gone to his outside roost! He thinks that’s his house! Hooray.

I’m not always chasing everyone under the henhouse so I can strut around crowing in victory. Just sometimes.

Walking the Calf

This afternoon Chris and I went out around the property looking for trees to potentially transplant near the house. We found some cool Osage orange trees we might take cuttings of, and lots of cedar elms.

We also enjoyed seeing herons and egrets, including a little night heron!

We heard shouting. That’s weird around our house. It turned out Kathleen had come home from work and decided to take Rip for a walk after his bottle of milk. We finally saw them. It appeared a lot of his walking was lying down.

We got back to the house and I went to check on them. Rip was ensconced in some tall grass, slowly munching.

I chatted a while, took pictures of some bugs and plants, and discovered it was time to go see Sara and feed horses. So I left them, right where I found them.

Just before I left the horses, I got a text. Kathleen never got Rip to move, so Chris came and got them. He picked up the calf and put him in the back of Hilda the utility vehicle.

Chris says Rip finished his milk and went to sleep in Hilda! They had to make him wake up to go back to his pen. Nope, that’s not how Kathleen had planned for their first walk to go!

But, I think we all actually had fun today.