chickens – Page 4 – The Hermits' Rest

Is There an Ideal Week?

Describe your ideal week.

I thought about this all day long today, and I had plenty of time to think as I worked in the actual Dell Technologies offices today. The scenery didn’t distract me, even though I had a window view.

Ooh, look, the 45 Toll Road! It leads straight to my dentist, which is why I was in the area.

I’m sure there’s some Golden Perfect week that involves riding horses on the beach, bathing in a spring-fed pond, working on the Great Sunarian Novel, knitting in a hammock on a porch with bird feeders nearby, and eating nothing but oysters, fish, fresh veggies and ripe fruit…but that’s not realistic.

Excuse me, you forgot to mention petting dogs.

Realistically, I think I’ve got all the ingredients it takes to make for a perfect week, right here in scenic Milam County, Texas. Here are the components of my perfect week, which might not all occur in any one week:

Meaningful work. I’m glad I have a job I like to bring in money and challenge me.
Writing. I’ll have to write every day, line I do now.
Reading. I read constantly when not knitting, writing, or horsing.
Horses. Every day I want quality time with horses, to make up for the years I didn’t have any. I will keep riding and learning.
Other pets. I have to be with the doggies and chickens to remind myself there are so many ways to live and love.
Volunteer work. I like my Master Naturalist work and want to do it as much as I can squeeze in.
Swimming. I never used to like it, but I enjoy it all year now.
Meditation. As I wrote about earlier, it’s part of any ideal week.
Travel. Not every week, but often, I want to go camping, or to a condo in a new place.
Friends. I love that I have scheduled times to see friends in person and Zoom every week.
Family. Time just talking and laughing with Lee hard to happen regularly. I’m hoping tune with the rest of the family will become regular soon.
Hanging out in nature. It’s a must or I get all irritated and irritating. I need to feel like I’m a small part of the big picture.

Wow. I just kept going there. The good news is that I usually have most of these things every week, so my life is now ideal. Yay, I made it to where I hoped I’d be when I was younger!

Note: in any ideal week the temperature will NOT be over 100°F nor will there be a polar vortex. But, thanks, humanity, you’ve guaranteed extremes for the rest of my life. That’s not ideal, is it?

Summer Is Hard

Geez. It’s crispy here. And it’s unbearably hot for people, animals, and plants. The horses got new hay today, which sure made them happy.

The horses and I are trying our best to get some exercise other than running up to greet me (only Droodles and Apache do that). We have been walking around over pieces of wood, trotting a little, and getting minimally groomed. I go out early and late as possible to see them, since I’m still reacting poorly to the heat.

We had our first summer casualty, too. Some kind of predator must have gotten at the chickens when they were cooling off at the horse troughs, and it got my matriarch, Bertie Lee. She was my oldest hen. The only clue I found was a large feather that looks unlike any hawk or owl I have seen. Ugh. There were only feathers left.

I’m glad I made a point of saying bye to her before I left. I sure am glad everyone else is okay. There were some yellow feathers, but Blondie seems fine.

I will get more hens when/if it cools off. I’m getting doubtful about that. The hens look so sad every day when it’s so hot, but they have access to the coolest spots possible and lots of fresh water.

September is coming. I’d say we have three to four more weeks before the weather breaks, but it can come sooner and I won’t complain.

I tried to make things feel cooler with blue nails and stars.

More intellectual content will come soon. All my smart thoughts have drained through sweat.

All Is Well in the Bird Kingdom

This morning when I went out, the black vulture was still on top of the rock pile. It looked like some of the water that had been left after Drew messed with it was gone. Good sign.

The rocks, the bird, and the water dish.

I watched the bird a while. It’s black eyes were bright and it kept stretching its wings. They both looked more similar than last night. Still, I was worried about it.

While the bits of flight were a good sign, I still decided to call the folks at All Things Wild. The woman I spoke with said we could catch to trap it and bring it in, but that would be traumatic. She suggested we keep offering water and give it some raw chicken necks or backs. I put those on the grocery list.

Meanwhile, I did find Billie Idyll under the tack room. She is not as good with heat as the other hens. Poor dear. They all just hunker down near water in the heat of the day and run around around sunrise and sunset. seems smart.

The great blue heron, as you can see a above, was stretching himself into interesting positions all morning. I wondered if he was showing off for the female, but I didn’t see her.

It was very hard to get a cow-free photo.

I went back out to check on the vulture around noon, and I was relieved to see it had flown off. I guess its injuries were better and it could go seek a tree or deeper cover. I called off the order for chicken parts, and was glad I didn’t have to throw a blanket over it and stick it in a box to go to Georgetown.

The heron wants nothing to do with that!

All is well with the birds, at least. Dogs and horses are fine, too. And the fish. Yep, they’re just fine, because they are in the shade.

My Conspiracy Theory

Today I went out to work with the horses and saw a black vulture sitting on our rock pile. That confused me.

Bird, leftover limestone, and sunflowers gone to seed.

Why was it there, I wondered? Then I noticed I didn’t see any of the chickens. Usually they’re over by the pens that time of day, scratching at horse poop, taking dirt baths, and drinking out of the troughs. Living the grand chicken life, for certain. No chickens, just vulture.

When I went back to cool off in the pool, I looked under all the trailers, under the motorhome, and in the garage. No chickens. I started developing conspiracy theories. Something ate all my hens and the vulture was there to snack on remains. Was it a fox? Coyotes? Owls? Hawks? A Bad Person?

Lee thought I was very funny. But something had to have enticed the vulture. But why just one? When the roadrunner got bonked in the windstorm, there were a dozen vultures. Hmm. I did my usual wild imagination of the worst-case scenario. When will I learn?

I went back out to feed the horses and was so distracted that I forgot Apache’s Zyrtec. Oops. As they ate, I went to the back of the pile of rocks and found nothing dead. Just the vulture hopping around. Then I saw this.

Out from under the tack room came these four.

There went my conspiracy theory. Nothing wiped out the hen population. Around the corner, under the air conditioner condensation, I found Bertie Lee. So only Billie Idyll was still hiding. I think she was behind Bertie Lee. Whew.

So, I still wondered what was up with the vulture. That mystery was solved later, when I found out an injured vulture had been seen across the road. Sure enough, when I tried to take it some water (Drew drank it), I saw it had a hurt wing and couldn’t fly well.

So, if it’s still there tomorrow, I’ll call the animal rescue folks near Georgetown and get their recommendations. It’s doing well enough to get food and can hop up enough to get water from the trough once the horses aren’t gathered there, so I’m not too worried. It may just need to rest and heal a bit, and the rock pike is a good place for it.

I need to rest and heal, too. The heat is making me queasy, so I’ve had to cut back on horse stuff. Even this morning I couldn’t do much other than groom some. I think we all need to take it easy.

What’s Up with the Hermits’ Rest Aviary?

The fact that it’s boiling hot (figuratively) outside has not stopped our local birds from churning out new little bug-eating machines. Who am I to stop them? Besides, they’re darned entertaining!

The beautiful barn swallows may not get all the publicity that purple martins get, but their shiny navy blue backs, orange breasts, and striking forked tails entertain us just fine.

They are everywhere, eating bugs and feeding babies.

I sure enjoy watching them. It’s fun watching them build nests and raise babies. We must have a dozen nests around our house. They build mud nests in high places. Bridges are very popular, but so are the very front porches suburban homes. People in my old neighborhood hated them. They do poop a lot.

I’m glad we get more of the barn swallows every year, even with the poop. All you have to do is power wash the patio after they migrate.

Not all the swallow nests contain swallows, however. Our newest aviary residents, the house sparrows, are no longer content to just build giant, grassy nests in the dead light fixtures.

No, the incessant chirpers also co-opted a couple of swallow nests that aren’t being used by their creators. Of course, the busy non-native invaders have to add their special flair.

The decorations stayed even through the big wind storm last week.

These aren’t my favorite birds, I must say. We didn’t have any until a couple years ago when they must have flown over from Sara’s house (where they drive her husband crazy) and discovered my chicken scratch strongly resembles bird seed. Now I’m afraid I feed them as much as the hens. Sigh.

There will soon be more sparrows. This nest was chirping.

There’s a new exhibit at the aviary, though. A family of wrens has joined the porch crowd. It’s a Carolina wren group, judging from the song and they eye stripes. But I don’t have any photos of them, because they tend to bop around when I’m in the pool and phone-less. It’s the only time I don’t have a camera!

I guess it’s good that I put some drink trays from our chairs in this box so they wouldn’t blow away. It made a perfect nest area for wrens, who love to nest in human constructions (we’ve had them in flower pots, a wagon, and an old grill).

That’s the nest. I see an egg, I think, or babies and an unhatched egg. Hard to tell.

Since watching wrens bopping around and flicking their is something I enjoy a lot, I’m quite pleased with this new part of the aviary. I believe there ARE babies in there, because I got to see insect delivery this afternoon. It’s like Wild Kingdom around here.

The indoor part of our zoo features French kissing dogs. Eww.

Back to birds, I have a cute chicken story for you, from Lee. He had two pieces of stale bread, and thought he’d give them to the chickens, our traveling domestic exhibit. One piece fell under the shade of our evergreen tree and one fell in the sun.

When he came back later, the shady piece was gone, but the one in the sun was still there. He picked it up and tossed it into the shade, and the girls pounced on it.

The hens are glad we’re back from camping, because the coolest place they can find seems to be under Seneca the motorhome. He also drips water from the air conditioner that they prefer to their trough, though I refill it daily. I’m glad they’re taking care of themselves!

And that’s all the news from the aviary. Hope you’re safe from heat, smoke, or whatever climate issue is happening near you.

A Mighty Huntress Is Our Dog (and the reptile exhibit expands)

Hi there, readers. Sorry there was no blog yesterday, but I’ll be honest, I was not really feeling like writing about the happenings of the day. The Circle of Life is real, and it certainly becomes clear here at the Hermits’ Rest.

I tried to write this on our newly assembled loveseat, but that lasted five minutes.

I don’t think Great Danes have a reputation for being hunting dogs, but I guess they are bred to protect their property. We’re thinking of renaming Goldie to Artemis, because she truly is a mighty huntress.

Yesterday I went out to survey my domain and feed the chickens, as I normally do, and I saw Goldie intently watching something that looked to me like a bunny. I watched it slowly “hopping” away from the fenced-in area.

But when I got closer, I saw it was not a rabbit, but an injured armadillo. I knew who’d injured it right away, our mighty dog-goddess of the hunt. Goldie could no longer get to her, so my hope was that she could make it to her hole and heal up.

But I forgot that we have an actual hunting dog on the property, Vlassic. Apparently, he also got to the poor thing and hurt it a lot more. He was seen chomping away on the armadillo (which I didn’t see, or I would have stopped it).

By the time I came out in the afternoon, the dillo had made it to the front pond, where she got away from Vlassic, but couldn’t swim anymore. For some reason, this made me incredibly sad, like when the sick coyote died.

I guess I’m just too soft hearted when it comes to animals. Also, since I had just gotten the news that my late friend Christi’s son had just been indicted for her murder and I was still reeling from my two recent friend deaths, I think I am a little more open to sadness than usual. I feel imbalanced, like the scales that are usually balanced between life and death are tipped heavily over to the death side.

I was really sad when Goldie killed this, too. It was a snapping turtle. My favorite huge one.

I know it will pass. But it’s no fun right now. On the other hand, I did get a chance to examine an armadillo up close. It’s cool to see how many hairs they have. I thank the armadillo for the chance to see her. Don’t worry, I didn’t touch her, and she was disposed of properly.

So, our little zoo is still bringing me interesting surprises. This morning I found dozens of caterpillars on the sorrelvine behind the house. I recognized them as black swallowtails. With this many babies, we should have quite a display of butterflies when they emerge from their chrysalises.

But the biggest surprise was in the chicken house. When I went in this morning, I saw that my snake friend was still there from yesterday. I love the snake’s smiling face.

I came back later to see if I’d been left any eggs, and thought to myself, wow, that snake is really long, even for a rat snake (they get to be over six feet long).

Aha, I realized why it was so long. It had two heads. Yes, both my snake friends were actually hanging out in one of the nest boxes. There went my egg supply for the day (but they didn’t get Bertie Lee’s egg, which is always laid on the floor next to their exit door).

I wonder if they are a pair? I’ve seen two together over by the horse pens before.

Our reptile exhibit certainly is exciting. However, I am extra glad we haven’t had any copperheads or rattlesnakes showing up. On the other side of the river, there are lots of copperheads. We should be seeing rattlesnakes now, but I have only seen one this year (and I briskly left the vicinity).

I wish it weren’t so incredibly hot, smoky, and unpleasant outside. But, we’ll get through it. I want to be able to make more use of that new outdoor furniture. But the pool is always there to help me, especially after horse work!

Nature Discoveries Liven Up Our Day with Joy

Describe one simple thing you do that brings joy to your life.

I can answer today’s blog prompt easily, because it fits in so well with what I wanted to talk about, anyway. If you didn’t already know this about me, I’ll tell you what I do that brings me joy: it’s discovering new things about the nature around me. Today was a great example.

Today I’d intended to relax and recover from yesterday, but the life around here kept pulling me in. I’ve been careful where I go lately, since scorpions appear to be this year’s plague. I found one in my bath towel, then one in an outdoor chair cushion, and finally one out in the grass, where they should be. That didn’t bring much joy, though.

What brought me great joy today were two discoveries. First, I found a plant I’d never noticed before!

Nodding green violet *Pombalia verticillata*

It’s tiny! I know I’ve seen the plant, but never these beautiful flowers. I was extra disappointed to see it has no Wikipedia article. It appears to be native to the southwestern US and northern Mexico. I just adore it’s secret beauty.

The second nature observation came when Anita and I were sitting by the pool drinking wine, since I was too tired to cook a big dinner. Anita said something like what the hell is that, and I looked over to see a weird creature.

We quickly realized it was a wasp dragging a large wolf spider. It was making progress, too. At one point the wasp left, so I could get good photos of them separately. The first thing I did was find out what kind of wasp it was. I knew it was pretty, with a striped abdomen and blue-black wings.

Well, duh, it was a spider wasp! I looked deeper into these wasps (so glad I had my phone right there) and found out this was a female wasp, and that these wasps prey on large wolf spiders. They take them to their nests, which are shallow depressions in the dirt, and lay their eggs in the spider. Mmm.

Anita said I should get a video, so I did, forgetting to turn the camera sideways. The link is on Facebook because I can’t get it to load here. But it’s cool to see how fast the wasp drags the spider and how she climbs stairs with it. We were glad when she finally found the edge of the patio!

That was really fun. Besides that, we got to see a great blue heron right in the other side of the fence, and, right after I played the call of the yellow billed cuckoo for Anita, one flew over and made its call. I hope it hadn’t heard me.

I had other fun with domestic animals, too. The chickens were something else. Sigh. I found a small mouse in their feed, so I got it in a cup and tossed it outside, thinking I’d done a good deed. Oops. I looked out the door and realized Buttercup had instantly pounced on it. Who needs a cat, right?

Buttercup, center, points out that mice are more nutritious than tortilla chips, which Lee gave them.

In a cuter chicken anecdote, I was hanging out with Bertie Lee, the smartest chicken, and she drank out of my cup of water. I love watching them drink. She won’t let me pet her, but Billie Idyll will. They are all so different!

The horses were glad I was home and back into our normal routine. I found them conferring about it today.

Yes, things ARE much nicer when Suna is here to give us food and treats.

Apache wasn’t even grumpy from working so hard yesterday! That brought me joy, too.

Love, Herons, and Horses

Sorry folks, I’m running out of stuff that’s not navel gazing and depressing. I’ve got to stop dwelling on the end of democracy and the worship of guns over people. When did the second amendment become so much more important than the first? What a world. Ok. Last incriminating expression of opinion and back to cute animals.

Another cute picture of Vlassic as edited by Lee.

So, I’m concentrating on love outside of the hate-filled realm of humans. Yesterday afternoon, Sara came over to do her farrier thing and trim Apache and Drew. While she was working on Apache, Droodles did everything he could to get attention. His head kept coming through the hole in the pens and poking us. Luckily, Mabel was in the pen with him, so she distracted him some. They just did calm friendship things together. Lots of rubbing and nuzzling. It was sweet.

Everyone got lots of fly spray, since Haggard the bill was also hanging out, and like most cattle, he was covered in flies. Droodles immediately rolled his spray off. At least he rolled in a dry spot.

That’s better! You should roll too, Mabel. No thanks, I would rather swish my tail.

When Drew tired of Mabel, he bonded with his other friend, the bull. They played for quite a while. The horses have enjoyed him while he’s been over here.

Apache was just sighing and getting his feet done through all this. Both horses look much better now. I’m glad it dried up enough to get this done. It rained overnight of course.

After the trimmings I was hot as heck. It’s so humid. So I jumped into the pool. Suddenly, I heard an unfamiliar squawk. I looked over at the pond behind the house, and sure enough, there was a large bird at the very top.

I thought to myself, ah, that must be one of the green herons who are building a nest in there. I’ve been seeing them flying around together, and just recently saw them bringing large sticks over to what I figure must be a nest deep in the trees. I’m pretty excited about it. So, I took pictures.

Hold on, that bird has a neck and is not brown and green.

So, I dripped my way into the house and grabbed the binoculars. HA! That’s a male yellow crowned night heron in breeding plumage! Dang! How beautiful. I wish I had a real camera and good lens, because this guy was gorgeous. As I watched him, there was movement slightly lower on the tree. I saw a bill and realized his mate was also there.

That means there were two pairs of herons together. I confirmed it when the Merlin app identified them both during a squawking episode. I never saw the green ones, though.

The best part of my poolside bird watching was when the pair took off. They flew right over me, and with my binoculars I could see the beautiful female really well. Ah, love.

Speaking of love. We have at least ten nest boxes, but these ladies wanted to lay their eggs together. One blue egg, one white egg, one pinkish brown egg.

Encouragement and Gifts of Service

Naturally, I’m feeling a bit better today. A lot of it is because my friends and family have been so supportive and encouraging. Thanks to everyone who’s reminded me of my humanity and that there ARE plenty of folks not out there judging me (and that judgmental people’s judgments aren’t worth spending time on).

This view of where I live is worth dwelling on.

Today was productive in so many ways. I really enjoyed work today, though I have to say the interruptions were even better.

I interrupt you to share a fiery skipper on a thistle. Skippers are everywhere now that it stopped raining for a bit.

The first interruption was this guy here.

Hey, what’s he doing? (The dogs asked that a lot).

It was Brenham Iron Works coming to fix our gate, which has been beeping at us for over a year, then when we finally got it to shut, had a car push it open. Poor gate (and car). At the moment, it works!

Yay, horses can be kept in if they escape their gate again. Note that blue sky!

It was fun watching the nice guy fix it, and the company got more business when the neighbor across the road got all excited that we actually got a repair person in that she came over and got their info. They have a similar nice gate just a year or two older than ours.

He worked a long time on this. Welding occurred.

The next minor interruption was my Becker Vineyards wine delivery. I got two old favorites so I didn’t complain. A much more fun interruption was a visit from a guy who’s interested in growing some vegetables here. It sounds like a fun project, if it goes through. I’ll tell you more if it goes through. It’s just a possibility but it made me happy to just imagine it.

Picture a vegetable garden on the right?

Lee even suggested that we use our gardener friend’s expertise to spruce up the pool area and such. He’d do way better than us! Now, this is my kind of gift. A gift of service. I was quite tickled at this development.

It made my heart skip like a skipper. I think this is a female sachem. I could be wrong.

I love having something to look forward to, though I’ve learned not to count on anything until it happens. There are just so many sudden changes and pivots these days that it’s just the new normal. That’s fine! I’ll enjoy every day and see what happens! I feel so loved.

And it didn’t rain. The sun even shone for a while. For that reason I ended up just walking around and enjoying late afternoon light, flowers, and birds. I love it when the nighthawks come out. They’re so graceful. I’ll skip my bad bird photos, but do enjoy the other things I saw.

Thanks for bearing with me! I appreciate my community, both in person and online.

Detente

So, this rat snake has been hanging out in the chicken house. The thing is, we’ve been getting plenty of eggs.

Kathleen and I agree that this snake can hang out with the chickens and take care of the mouse issue in the chicken coop. I have a feeling the fact that it scares away mice is a real bonus.

I’ll do my job and let you have the eggs. Most of them.

I just go in and pick up eggs, and the snake just watches. It’s fine with me. I took care of my son’s pet rat snake for years. It was always fine with me around. Snakes do their jobs!

So, I guess we have a partner in the chicken house. And that’s great.

In sad news, poor Betty got egg bound again. She managed to pass the egg, but it did her in. I really didn’t want her to live the rest of her life in pain, anyway. I sure appreciate her, though.