Night-Time Hijinks

We had a visitor to the chicken coop last night.  Maybe he didn't know that chickens sleep inside their roost at night, or maybe he was just after a mouse or gopher, but there he was, trapped inside the aviary and mom had to go and get involved.

Fun fact: great horned owls can exert 500 psi of pressure with their feet and talons. 

Fun fact 2: owls know jiu jitsu.

So we stepped out on the deck after a howl-in with the coyotes and were fascinated by the bird flapping around in the chicken yard.  We thought it was the "challenged" Freckles who had forgotten how to get back into the coop.  So we went down to assist and discovered a great horned owl sitting on Pete's tree stump. Mom grabbed the rooster-poker and tried to drive him out the gate, but he just let her poke at him.  We thought he was exhausted, poor thing, and mom thought that she could just pin his wings down and shoo him out the door (in her defense, it was the middle of the night). That's when he pulled the jiu jitsu move.

He flipped onto his back and had a grip on mom's hand, puncturing and exerting that 500 psi on her hand. They were in a standoff, and mom finally convinced him to stop squeezing and driving the talons through her hand and she promised not to let the crazy red dog barking up a storm eat him.  She was an owl whisperer. Eventually he let her pull those talons out of her hand and they went to their respective corners of the ring and watched each other for about ten minutes.  Big yellow eyes, unblinking on Mr. Owl.  Mom finally nudged him towards the door and he figured the rest out himself.  

I should note that no chickens were harmed in the commission of this farce: they were all sleeping peacefully (chicken coma) in their roost.  I suspect he flew in after a mouse and then couldn't figure out how to get out again.

A couple of hours later mom woke up with excruciating pain in her middle finger, bruises on her hand, swelling and no way to use her left hand at all.  So another trip to urgent care this morning for mom.  She got to be the most interesting story of the day!

No broken bones, just soft tissue damage, swelling and a couple of punctures, bruises and scratches.  One-handed keyboarding for awhile.  And penicillin horse pills, 14 of them.

Naptime

Naptime, a photo by East Wind Adventures on Flickr.

SIlly, silly Rooster. I do my best to guard Grandma's lap from him, but sometimes he sneaks up there anyway.

In the Doghouse

A Note From Mom

...so I’m down to three of my hens and have identified Natasha (the “good” dog) as the chicken molester. I wanted to get more bantams, this time three mille fleur pullets for their pretty spangled feathers but my local source won’t have any more until May.

Then I won an auction of 10+ Sicilian Buttercup eggs (12 shipped, but only 10 arrived intact), so I built an incubator at home out of assorted parts from “junk drawers.” Everyone has a junk drawer, don’t they? Or is it just my family?

It is a fine incubator, with a light bulb wired to a hot water heater thermostat, and ventilation from computer fan. The humidity and temperature seem to have stabilized at the appropriate levels. I candled the eggs and nine of the ten seem to look the way a fertile new-laid egg should (one has a lot of speckles on the shell and I am advised that those often do not hatch).

Now I am clucking over the eggs, checking the temp and humidity, fussing over the ventilation, worrying that the vinyl coated hardware cloth may be releasing unhealthy fumes and planning my brooding box (which I admit is rather counting my chickens before they hatch). Sicilian Buttercups are a rare heritage breed—I’d hate to squander the opportunity to perpetuate the breed!

None of my hens are broody—Agatha is laying, but she deposits her egg and takes off for her laps around the coop and her chicken obstacle course in their yard. She is a very athletic hen. Aretha is still a bully, but a close call with Natasha the Chicken Molester has humbled her somewhat and she’s not the leader she once was. And Nondescript Brown Hen #2 is too nondescript to be an effective mother. So it seems that the flock, if they hatch, will imprint on me or my mother and we will be real chicken moms. Egad!

Geoff at sunset

Geoff at sunset, a photo by East Wind (taking some time off) on Flickr.

Mom is playing with her camera again, and you know what that means!

Back to his old self!

Back to his old self!, a photo by East Wind (taking some time off) on Flickr.

Geoffrey is looking ever so much better, one week later.
Unfortunately, I came down with tonsillitis today and had to go to the vet, get shots and pills and have my temperature taken.
Yucky...

Snakebit!

Oh poor Geoff: He was bit by a rattlesnake on Friday morning and had to spend the day at the vet's clinic. When he came home he had this clown face. He was really unhappy, mom was really worried. Geoff never went to avoidance training so he didn't know to stay away from the snake. He had to learn the hard way.

Pele

Pele, a photo by East Wind (taking some time off) on Flickr.

Pele lived with mom for 20 years and joined the family as an adult cat, lost or abandoned at the Wild Animal Park.
She died this week, having lived a good, long life in the company of dogs that outsized and outweighed her many times over. But she never flinched when they barked, snapped or towered over her, and she often slapped them good for their trouble.
We didn't really like each other, but in the end, Pele judged me "tolerable" and I'll miss the kooky old thing.