Life is full of random moments. Sometimes I ponder the moments and wonder.... What would everyone else (in bloggersville) think of these moments? Would they have random ideas and hop down bunny trails like I do?
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| "around the water cooler...." |
These little guys cracked me up so much here. There has to be a better caption for it than just "around the water cooler." But it sure does look like they ae catching up on all the latest work-place gossip around the water cooler! I just had to snap a photo because my first thought was, "what should this moment be captioned?" In order to be captioned, I have to first capture it. So here it is. What do you see when you look at this photo? Does it make you think there's some secret story being told?
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| February 28, the day that Duke came home with us. |
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| March 26, it's about 4 weeks later, and he has grown so much! |
So my little Dukey-boy, really he's just Duke, has been with us for almost four weeks. He is a sweet pup, and he's learned a lot. He was about the size of the baby goats when we got them. We got them two days after we got Duke, and they were all about the same size. One of the kids, Lillie, got pretty sick from being weaned too young. The other one, Marlie, took a bottle from us, and so even though she's younger than Lillie (I often call her Lilz), she did not suffer any malnutrition. In fact, she's a chunk. And you'd never know she's a week younger than Lillie. So anyway, the babies are all growing and Duke is growing the most rapidly. He's got the most progress to make I guess. He is needing some correcting and our zappy collar doesn't really zap very well with all his THICK fur. But he feels the vibrate button and doesn't like it. So that is working to some extent. I figured out how to turn it up a little tonight too.
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| A sneak peak, or a preview... |
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| and then there is one... |
Not even last night, but the night before already, Monday night, there was this first pipped/zipped egg. I was SO excited.... but alas, you never know about those things found in nature. That little guy has not emerged yet, and there's a pretty good chance he will not survive if he hasn't broken free yet. But then this morning, there was one.
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Minutes later, here this little guy is,
emerging from his shell. |
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This photo shows three and if you
look at the bottom left corner,
you see one egg that is "zipped,"
of pipped, but all around the shell. |
I love, love, love hatch day. This batch of silkies could go to auction as soon as this weekend. Hatch day is like Christmas, you have some idea what's coming, but there's always some element of surprise and excitement.
These are my three hens. And I don't know if it's just Springtime and mating season and everyone is just crazy or what, but they thought they didn't have to head into the pen for night and would just sleep in the water dishes. When I was putting the goats away and giving them a little hay for overnight, this is where these ladies were. I don't even own a drake. So I know its not something from actual mating activity. But it made me laugh. And you know they had some choice quacks for me when I told them in no uncertain terms that they would "go home." Apollo, the brown one with the white on the back of her neck, is especially vocal and sassy. Well, they all three have their moments, but Apollo has plenty of sass! Last fall we sold almost all our ducks. I can't remember if it we sold 15 of 18 or 18 of 21. But we only kept the three hens. The other brown one, I know she's a khaki campbell. Okay, I think she's a khaki campbell. Apollo, I used to be sure she was a Rouen, and her markings were consistent with that at first. But look at her now. So I don't know anymore about her. But Apollo is my OG girl. She was one of two ducks that we got during the Covid shutdown. And she's currently five years old. Which isn't necessarily old, but it's long past her prime for laying. So it's no surprise that I wasn't getting eggs from her over winter. Then Ivory broke her foot and was in the barn for much of the winter. And she quit laying. So our only layer was the duck named Goose. And when you start a tradition called "French Toast Sunday" and one of your kiddos is allergic to chicken egg yolk, you really need more than one egg layer to keep up the supply! This is probably all more random information that what y'all need, but this is how my brain works, so lucky you.
I love that we started French Toast Sunday. We usually have bacon and french toast. And sometimes we have eggs along side of that all. My girl with the yolk sensitivity also just doesn't care for the yolk (probably because as a child she would throw up if she ate them). So when she asks me to fry her an egg, she is really requesting egg whites. And I usually do two of the duck eggs fried together into one round fried egg shape. So if we have french toast and eggs, that is a minimum of 8 duck eggs being used, and one layer isn't going to give me 8 eggs in 7 days.
But we recently switched feed, and with that, egg production increased and currently all 3 girls are giving us an egg a day! That is sort of amazing to me. And we have plenty of duck eggs now! Which makes me happy.
I guess it's time to get this published. Because even though Duke looks like he's half grown, he's still pretty much of a puppy. And he needs to go to bed. He is currently bedding down in a dog crate in the chicken pen. I'm looking forward to the day when he will be mature enough to roam the premises at night. It's fun to watch him growing and changing every day. This afternoon when we were walking around he was discovering smells that were new to him and it was fun to watch him take it all in. I don't know what he smelled exactly, but the little dogs were barking like there was some sort of critter out there. And you never know out in the country. Which also makes me think I should hurry up and get out there. I have this theory (and we have cameras so I know my theory is not all that correct) that the wild things (skunks and opposums and raccoons) will come out more the later it is. So I'm off to get the pup and walk him aroud a little so maybe he'll dooky before bedtime. Get it? Dukey goes dooky. har har har....
That's my very random slice of life today.
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