Monsters in my Tub

Just when you think everything is fine

Monsters invade your tub !

Everyone is on alert.

They all run to one side of the tub

and more often than not, hide beneath each other

until they are just a mass of yellow fluff.

 Spring was wet and cold with flooding 

even closing down interstate highways.

Summer only a season on the calender, 

wet then dry but cooler than normal.

Then the wall of heat hit setting records.

The heat index was something like 104.

It was so hot we lost two of the youngest coop members,

one a rooster and the other a pretty buff.

Fortunately I could save Miss Puffy cheeks and two siblings.

The older hens were fine but these younger one

were not ready to take on the full grown hens, 

in fact the group right before this didn't fully integrate

but they have no choice now, they are fully grown.

 These girls had to come into the house to cool off.

 They can't go in with Bird, they would peck his/her only eye.

So our choice was  to put them into the tub with the babies 

for a couple of days.  Monsters to the little babies!

I will say these older birds have been very patient

although they give the little ones a peck now and again,

nothing dangerous, just warning pecks.

About half of the babies will  be gone

by Monday-  going to my husband's boss to boost his layers.

Miss Puffy Cheeks,  sitting in the tub above,

 still remembers to fly onto the edge of the tub

so  I'll take her out to sit on my lap.  She's 

the sweetest ever and I'd love to have her be Bird's companion

but I am too worried about his eye.  

Maybe I could sew a patch for him/her.

I'd have to come up with a good pirate chicken name!

Sleepy Bird

With his belly full, he nestles down in my lap 

closing his lone eye 

and whistling sleepy little chicken tunes.

She (??) is exhausted after the effort it takes

to scoop up her food 

and then struggle with drinking from the eye dropper;

however,

We had another breakthrough!

If I fill up the utility sink

she not only has the cleanest chicken feet in town

but also is able to take her own drinks!

I just wrap her in a towel afterwards

and she's as happy as a . . . lark???

Well, I don't know exactly how happy she is

but she's pretty excited about her new drinking method.

As soon as I put her in the sink she knows exactly what to do.

I have to learn how long to keep her in so she doesn't drink too much.

 Bird is about 4 months old now, still small for her age

but getting along pretty well considering her physical issues.

The new batch of chicks won't be suited for her, 

none of them seem to have a sweet disposition.

My husband thinks most of them are roosters.

The hens will go to his boss for a new batch of layers.

Bird will just hang out with us.

Gadgets- The Pampered Kind

I love gadgets!

The more the better, it's has been my weakness since childhood.

I don't go to home parties much,

no candle parties,

no decor parties 

but I really like Pampered Chef products.

It's a bit pricey sometimes but I find the quality is good.

This incredibly cool container is a salad dressing mixer

complete with directions for various dressings

such as Italian, French, Oriental 

and

what my husband says is NOT Caesar,

there's not an anchovy or raw egg in the mix.

  I'm sure it tastes great- I can do without the little fishies.

We use the Good Seasons dressing a lot so now

it's just the same thing but we use our own ingredients

plus have a mixer/pourer along with it.

The orange thing is an orange peeler, 

saving fingernails when you want to peel oranges, 

tangerines, etc.  Very  helpful.

Then the swively mallet thing mixes and chops meat

while you are cooking. My neighbors have this and love it.

I have been known to put mine through a food grinder

before making my sloppy joes or meat sauces.

I'm just weird that way- it's a texture thing,

you may not understand but it's the same reason

my daughter became a vegetarian.

I have not gone to that extreme.

I love bacon waaay too much! 

Now the box with the apron was my prize in the attendance drawing.

I could  choose between a recipe book or a daiqueri mix.

Guess what I took.

It wasn't the book!

Cheers!

A Bigger Tubby for Bird

Chicken food covered the floor, 

 tossed and kicked for several feet in every direction.

Oh, the problems of having a house chicken!

I decided Bird needed a second layer of defense

as he's grown larger than I had ever imagined.

He could now just step out of the tubby,

and had done so several times.

It seems he likes to take his morning and evening stroll

through the living room

or among the bar height chairs 

or around the breakfast bar into the kitchen!

Then there was the constant sweeping and vacuuming.

So, bird got a new feeding system.

It's a larger tub that I put the smaller one in.

The crumbs are still kicked and tossed but they land

in the second tubby and not all over my floor.

He also doesn't step out quite so easily!

In fact, with this he can even sit on the porch with us

and the cats don't mind at all.

It's still a challenge to give him water,

he can't manage the waterer, mostly because he

can't see it and then gets confused and swishes

his head back and forth.

So for now, I still supplement with the eye dropper.

I hatched somewhere in the neighborhood of 20 chicks

hoping I'd find a good friend for Bird, 

but he keeps stepping on them.

Maybe when they are bigger one will stand out.

 About half of these will go to my husband's employer

who needs more layers.  Once we find the girls we'll 

send them on their way.  My husband is making a larger

chicken coop/yard for the meat birds and the balance

will go there. We'll even keep another rooster on 

that side - layers on the other side with their rooster.

I Hear Babies, Mama

I hear babies, Mama!

That's what Bird must have been saying this morning

as the newly hatched chicks were calling out to whoever was listening.

Bird was in his tubby scooping up breakfast when he hopped out of the tub

and started walking around- to some undetermined location since he

is essentially  blind, but his hearing is excellent.

He would chirp back, a funny little whistling sound since his beak is malformed.

I took him to the incubator so he could hear them a little better

and hopefully they could hear him.

We have three hatched so far-- photos of only two right now.

They will be fine company for Bird who has been pretty lonely since

the last batch got big enough to go into the coop.

He wants to hang out with us, which is sometimes difficult

since he's blind and tends to poop on the floor.

I found some chicken diapers on line, hopefully I'll figure out how to make them.

We're up to 5 hatches now.

I took the dry one out to see Bird and he stepped on it already!

Not a good start for the wee one.

Bird hasn't figured out how to drink without assistance yet

so twice a day he gets lots of droppers full of water.

I mushed up a peach yesterday (he can't peck) and he seemed to enjoy that flavor too. 

More photos of hatchlings as things progress!

One Day I Realized, I Collect Chickens!

The things you discover when you finally get around to taking everything down-

It really happened in the old place  We were painting and once I 

got everything off the cabinet tops, the tables and the walls I discovered

that I collected chickens!  Surprise, surprise!

It wasn't intended, it just happened.

So maybe we don't set out to collect things,

maybe they choose us.

Who would have guessed that one day I'd own chickens

or have a house chick at that!

While this isn't a chicken, it sits on the cabinet tops with them,

propped up so you can see the inside from below.

It's old and I think from my grandmother's place.(??)

What a happy little picture.

A nice little cottage by the water.

Sail boats and birds taking advantage of the breezes.

The sort of place that would be perfect to raise chickens!

PS  This isn't all, I've got figurines, photos, tableware, paintings, etc. 

all over the house!

Shrinking Value

It is a sign of the times.

I always purchase this spaghetti sauce when my store has it on

special  10 for $10, sometimes it can be on sale for even less.

  It's not my normal brand but it's pretty 

good and great to store away in bulk.

Do you see something different about the can on the left?

Yep, when I pulled out a can from storage and compared it to

the newly purchased can there is a size difference.

Not so much that you would immediately notice, especially

if you are in a hurry or distracted.

I'm not singling out this brand either.

You can see this in many other products on store shelves.

Watch the size of cereal boxes, check how much larger the cardboard

core of toilet paper is, compare weights and measurements with

products you have tucked in the back of your cabinets.

Expenses have increased but they can't easily pass along a price increase

 so the keep the price the same or close and then reduce the size just a little bit. 

Over the course of thousands and thousands of sales, it adds up.

This is a 10% reduction. 

Don't think this means the company is raking it in-

they still have fixed costs to cover: salaries, benefits packages, taxes, packaging, transportation, promotional allowances, advertising, etc.  They may be barely breaking even as the dollar is devalued and costs rise.  But you should be aware of these slight changes so you can make wise purchases and get the most value for your money.  

Here is a link from 2011 reviewing this product, notice

that they mention the standard size of 26.5 oz.

Review

Size The net weight of the standard - sized container of Hunt's Traditional Pasta Sauce is 26.5 ounces. According to the product's nutrition facts label, the container holds about six 1/2 cup servings of sauce.

I doubt it will get any better so you may want to stock up

when you find a great sale or take advantage of canning and 

dehydrating when you grow or come across some great vegetables.

Chicken Waterer for Special Needs Chick - Manna Pro

I wanted to share my new chicken waterer for my Special Needs Bird.

As some of you know, he not only has a crossed beak, but is also 

missing one eye and blind or severely visually impaired in the other

which means he has a difficult time finding and drinking his water.

Every morning and evening I make sure he drinks from an eye dropper

after he has his meal.

This feeder/waterer is convertable.

Depending on which side of the base you use it can be used

to feed or water, plus it is large capacity rather than the

mason jar waterer we had been using for the chicks.

I placed a penny in the dish to give you an idea of how deep it is.

This is very important for my chick since he needs to dip and scoop

to be able to eat or drink.  

The flip side is the feeder.

Again you can see how much more shallow it is by the penny.

I would like to say I've been more successful, but I have not.

It has nothing to do with the product, when I assisted him

he was able to drink easily; however, being blind he does not

always "get it."  He also has a skull deformity which may be 

contributing to the problem. He has stopped his seizures but his one eye has changed, 

becoming bulbous and cloudy.

He is fed in a plastic tub which is deeply filled with food 

since he has to scoop it into his beak. 

He hasn't grown much, other than get fatter and

has enormous monster feet that get him in a world of trouble.

I have to get a new feeding tub because he now steps

out of it and walks all over the living room. 

Once he made it around the breakfast bar,

past the chairs that line it 

and into the kitchen to find me.

Here he came around the corner, 

strolling into the kitchen as if it were normal.

I just know he was saying

"Help me Mama, I fell out of my tubby!"

I suppose he is now a house chicken.

I guess I'll have to find out if anyone else has a house chick

or has my mom's worst fears come true,

I've become Elly May, as in Clampett.

The next thing you know I'll be installing a CEment pond out back.

I give him some rocks to perch on, which he loves, 

a little dish of food just in case and then his water. 

When we have our new hatchlings he will once again have company

and someone groom him and keep him warm and snuggly at night.

Fear and Hiding in the Coop

Oooooh, it's been a bad transition !

Not as bad as some in the past but we have an injury 

right off the bat.  This little bird got herself caught

in a corner and the older hens beat her! 

You can see her injury .

She has been moved to protective custody with the new chicks.

Look at the branch roost in the yard- to the left.

All three are NOT leaving the perch! NEVER!

It's a LONG way to the ramp and into the coop.

He's been trying to keep the peace but those

older hens are fast and sneaky.

The new girls run under his tummy when it gets too bad.

The newbies spent their first night in the coop,

in the protective custody section.  They are amazed,

scared, wide eyed and . . . 

Big Cheeked!

Miss Puffy Cheeks, an Araucana mix, normally has a lot of fluff

but check it out now!  Super Puffed!

She was trying to figure out how to get past the wire

so she could get to me .

They are comfortable but it's not the house

and Miss Puffy Cheeks must miss me taking her

out so she can look out the back door-

in the house-

the nice, safe house.

Bird is lonely.

He/she spent a quiet night last night and seemed to enjoy it.

Today he about jumped out of the brooder tub

when we reached in to pick him up.

He got to sit on my lap for awhile after dinner and his drink

but he's not a good lap sitter.  

I'll have to show you the new water bowl I got him,

it's really deep so I hope he will be able to manage it himself

between getting his eye dropper drinks

(He is cross beaked and blind)

Watch for the upcoming post on this Manna Pro feeder/waterer.