28 September, 2011

Daily Poultry: Zombirella and One

Zombirella I believe I mentioned here as the young pullet who got the back of her head pecked off down to bone. It turns out chickens are startlingly resilient; we moved her into the house, got her antibiotics and kept her safe from flies and infection, and these days you can’t even tell where the pecking happened since the wound closed up and the feathers are growing back in. She’s become a favorite of ours, since spending those weeks in the house she has decided that people are definitely her friends and comes running to be petted whenever we go out to the Big Chicken Pen.

One is, of course, the first chick ever hatched at the Manor. I swear he’s a cockeral, Daniel claims he’s a pullet. I guess we’ll find out who’s right in the coming months as he finishes growing up!

Zombirella and One step around the corner of the chicken house to regard the camera-wielding thumb monkey. Zombirella is a leggy young bird dressed in multiple shades of brown, with willow-green legs and no comb to speak of. One is equally leggy but his legs are bright yellow and he has a small, pink, wrinkly comb. His head is turned in profile, showing off the beginnings of wattles as well as the lovely dark auburn of his head and the sides of his neck, the front of his neck and his breast being black.

One is actually colored just like their daddy Blackbeard. I should probably bet Daniel money that One is a rooster-to-be, because I am that sure of it. One of these days, One is going to go roostertastic — probably about the time we move Mad Mel the Magnificent into a pen with some beardless silkies in case I want showgirl chicks.

27 September, 2011

Daily Poultry, dog update

Kemuel, a black Modern Game Bantam rooster.
Kemuel stands with his body three-quarters to the camera to the right, and his head turned so his face is three-quarters profile to the left. His black feathers are sort of shabby looking and there are bare spots; this is par for the course with extremely hard-feathered birds like MGBs when they moult. He has very long, elegant legs with three inch spurs curving off his heels, and a long, elegant neck.

Our latest worry on the dog front is Beowulf, who is not only developing a wide variety of lumps (Dobermans, particularly gentleman Dobermans of a certain age, are prone to fatty lipomas, which are benign but sort of weird to feel when you’re petting your dogs) but has also developed a deep, hacking cough that is going to require a vet visit. He turned seven this month, so he is kind of getting up there for a Doberman, passing out of middle age and into “of a certain age” since a Doberman who lives to 10 is doing well and one who goes past it is living on borrowed time.

But he is still a sweet, steady, and dependable boy, if one who is starting to slow down from his adventurous youth, when he and Tink spent many an hour zooming ferociously around the yard. He is still determined to protect us from squirrels, those tiny yard-pirates with their suspiciously fluffy tails. We’re looking forward to years with him yet, just need to figure out what’s going on with that cough and make sure that his latest crop of lumps are, in fact, lipomas and not something more sinister.

26 September, 2011

Let’s try something new!

For a while now over on Google+ I have been doing Daily Poultry, featuring portraits of the chickens who call the Manor of Mixed Blessings home. So I thought I might try Daily Poultry here, and add little blurbs about the rest of the Manor while I’m at it — we have been busy busy busy and my blogging time has been regrettably short. I feel like I am neglecting my Gentle Readers!

So here is Daily Poultry to cheer up your Monday! Melchior, the child of our Easter Egger hen Ayinnanku and our blue showgirl rooster, Mad Mel the Magnificent.

Melchior, who looks kind of like a tiny blue football that has had a naked chicken head and neck stuck on one pointy end. ANd of course, chicken legs stuck on as well; Melchior's are feathery. Actually, he looks kind of like a tiny blue vulture.

Weekend before last we hit up Gilmanor, a huge semiannual chicken and livestock (but mostly chickens) swap down by Richmond. There I was fortunately able to sell off all 13 extra tiny roosters that we had, which means I will not need to feed them for the winter! Hallelujah! Extra roosters are sort of the bane of the chicken-keeper’s existence, because pretty much everyone who wants roosters has all the roosters they want. But an older man who just likes tiny roosters bought ten of mine, half for him and half for his neighbor, who also likes the sound of roosters crowing. Two of the nicer silkies went to someone who had come to Gilmanor looking for nice bearded silkies (there weren’t many there, I see an opportunity!) and one of the hatchery silkies went to a lady whose son loves the neighbor’s silkie.

I also managed to only buy three chickens at Gilmanor, a trio of black Modern Game Bantams, who are elegant, long-legged, tiny chickens. They are also molting right now, which means they look like someone decided to eat them, got halfway through the plucking stage, and gave up.

This past weekend, we picked up a new house for the Big Chickens at the Fredericksburg chicken swap sponsored by Pet Chickens of Virginia and I accidentally bought two baby silkies, a paint and a buff to keep him company. Ah, well, we’re still down 8 tiny roosters, which means our feed bill has dropped precipitously.

16 September, 2011

Gentleman Border Collie seeks Loving Owner

My beloved friend Ellen, who longtime readers will recall as Roo’s Guardian Angel, has had some upheaval in her life and had to make the difficult decision that one of her dogs would be better off in a different home.

His name is Deuce, and he is a gentleman Border Collie who is fully vetted and ready to go. Deuce will not only come to you fully vetted, but housebroken, knowing basic obedience (although there is usually an adjustment period with new owners) and also how to work your herd of sheep. Don’t have a herd of sheep? Deuce would also like to go on walks, preferably walks that take you to a pond where he can splash and wade and swim.

The head of a black and white border collie as he swims through some lovely clear water.

That would make his little doggy day. He will also jog with you if you are into that sort of thing. After the walk, he would like to snuggle with you on the couch while you scritch between his eyes, and then maybe you could take him on a ride in the car, which he adores. He is ready to attend even the classiest occasions in his elegant black and white which will blend right in among tuxedos.

Side view of a handsome black and white gentleman Border Collie.

He is weirded out by thunderstorms, which is the only time Ellen crates him, as having a safe zone makes him feel better about the fact that Big Sky Dog is growling at him.

Deuce gets along with other animals, including the two touchy lady dogs he lives with now, and cats! Although he will try to herd the cats for the first week or so, but then again who doesn’t want to herd cats?

Deuce, on the far left, with a tabby and white cat, a black and white Basenji, and a red Australian cattle dog, everyone happily cuddled up on the couch together.

If another dog in the house would play frisbee so that Deuce could have the fun of bolting out to get to the frisbee first, that would be divine (he doesn’t want to pick it up and bring it back, he just wants to get there first). Dog-savvy kids are also fine. He is impeccably polite about taking treats.

Deuce, on the left, runs beside a red Australian Cattle Dog with a green frisbee in her mouth. He has a HUGE grin on his face.

He’s currently living in the Chicago suburbs, but Ellen will move heaven and earth to get him into the right home[1] so do not let distance deter you if you have been thinking “What my life really needs is a gentleman Border Collie.” Deuce would probably do best in a suburban or rural home, but an owner who is dedicated to helping him adjust and finding somewhere to throw his frisbee could make it work out in an urban home.

If you can’t take in a gentleman Border Collie, can you please at least spread the word, gentle readers?

[1] No, seriously, she will. She drove 8 hours to bring me Roo, and that was after he had pried open the door to her linen closet so he could pee all over her towels and blankets. So she will clearly do no less for a gentleman Border Collie who is not destructive or prone to peeing all over her clean towels.

13 September, 2011

Answering Googled Questions

Yes.

No, seriously, someone googled “Will Andrea find this funny?” and it popped up in my incoming searches on my dashboard. One of you is obviously aware of my obsessive need to check my stats on my dashboard.

11 September, 2011

Mother Nature hates Virginia, possibly.

So I’ve been quiet not because I’ve been busy, or not just because I’ve been busy, but also because Tropical Storm Lee was passing overhead for approximately the past week, dumping a metric crap-ton of rain on us and also obliterating the internet connection here at home. Fun. Only not.

The deluge of rain meant moving most of the silkies into the shed, which was already occupied by the porcelain trio I picked up on our trip to Philadelphia to drop off Coriander with her new person. I was able to get Lucifer in but Asmodeus refused to be caught. Hilariously, with no other adultish roosters in residence, Lucifer not only went all *FOOF*ROOSTERTASTIC*FOOF*[1] and started crowing, but decided that the group of seven juveniles was his little flock. So when I moved them all back outside and tried to put him in the pen with the rest of the chickens, he objected mightily and repeatedly snuck back in with the juveniles. Finally I just left him to it — he seems very happy watching over his little flock of adolescents and is strutting around all “Oh yeah, I’m the big roo.” He even managed to somehow keep them mostly dry when it rained last night, which means I have to worry about them less. A good rooster is a definite blessing to a flock!

While Lucifer was busy going roostertastic in the shed, the dogs were busy driving us nuts indoors because it was too wet and miserable for playing outside. Sid’s training continues apace — yesterday he went to the optometrist with me to order new glasses since Beowulf or Zille one tried to eat my glasses overnight, then to Panera for food and Tractor Supply for chicken food. He was a huge dork at the optometrist, whining and bouncing and otherwise pretending I had never trained him at all, even a little bit, but calmed down by the time we got to Panera. A Weimaraner whose people had pretty obviously never bothered to train him, just slapped a prong collar on and called it good, even barked at him uproariously and all he did was stand up and growl. Well, he did let loose one “woof” but it was practically sotto voce coming from him, so I let it slide. His normal response to being barked at involves a bark so loud and thunderous that his front feet lift off the ground.

Meanwhile, the storms have cleared and theoretically we should be pretty dry for the next week barring hurricanes and tropical storms, which will give me and Daniel a chance to expand the chicken infrastructure as necessary and play tons of fetchy with Zille.

[1] Interestingly, if you have a large group of roosters, the subordinate ones will not rooster out very much at all, which is probably a way of preventing battles to the death, or something. So Lucifer was roostery enough to tell he was a rooster, but not all ROOSTERTASTIC or as roostertastic as silkies get, anyway. A week in the shed with no other mature roos to compete with, and he has started crowing and grown some substantial wattles in a beautiful mulberry shade.

5 September, 2011

Taking the show on the road…

Saturday and Sunday the Best Mother Ever held down things here at the Manor while Daniel and I headed north to drop Constantine and Coriander in their new homes. Siddy went along in his capacity as Official Service Dog In Progress, although I also took a cane because we would be staying overnight right downtown in Philadelphia.

Sid is, after all, a country dog. He doesn’t often see large crowds of people, huge amounts of traffic crawling by right next to him, all the natural occurrences of downtown big-city living are pretty foreign to him. He’s accustomed to being told to ignore squirrels and cats; pigeons were an all-new fascination. He has been to the mall in Fredericksburg, but that didn’t prepare him for the downtown canyons where it got dark early because the buildings blocked out the sun, resulting in the weird light you get from the glow of a thousand beckoning store displays, changing traffic lights, the headlights of cars, the spinning and blinking lights of emergency vehicles. Being a country dog offers him an exciting wealth of smells and sounds, but they are nothing like the sensory overdrive that comes from a crowded city.

So I was a little worried that I might be primarily using the cane while we were there, but figured that the visit alone, even if he didn’t work through it, would provide some excellent experience. As it turned out, though, Siddy was a superstar. He loves high-stimulation, high-activity surroundings, and in fact they let him do his job even better than he normally does because during the endless times when his job consists of “stand still and hold Mom up” or “lie down next to Mom’s chair and don’t bother anyone” all the activity gives him something to look at. He never shied, although he did require a couple stops so he could stare hard at something and try to figure it out (buses gave him pause, and then he decided they were nothing to do with him and ignored them).

The hilarity of the situation is that what I really need to work on, apparently, are his leash skills when he is off-duty. We made multiple trips to a little park so he could relieve himself (his pottying-on-leash skills remain viable, hallelujah, although I think we need to practice them more and I definitely need to get that behavior on cue) and each time he wandered into the person holding his leash, or decided he wanted to walk next to the OTHER person, or decided he really needed to go into shoe stores for reasons that he did not divulge.

In harness, Siddy continued working well above where I’d expect him to for his age and experience level; out of harness he was exactly what you’d expect from a dog just over one year old who doesn’t have city experience: distractible, slightly obnoxious, and inclined to chase pigeons.

He was even excellent on restaurant outings, which was encouraging after our disaster of a trip to Joe’s Crab Shack here in town — we had an excellent dinner Saturday night (Coriander’s new person gives good food recommendations) and a pretty good lunch on Sunday before we picked up some chickens and then headed for home.

Constantine and Coriander, incidentally, are doing well and have settled right in, but we knew they would, didn’t we gentle readers. Constantine was up and exploring and hanging out with his older (at least half-) brother Juniper within a couple hours of being in his new home. Coriander didn’t wait that long, while her new person was giving us restaurant recommendations she wandered out of the room he’d set up for her, touched noses with her two new big brothers, and then explained to her person that he needed to get with the program of petting and tummy tickling because a kitten can’t tickle her own tummy, you know.

All in all, a vastly successful trip from all angles.