Rainy Sunday

The chickens passed another milestone last week. They are now 16 weeks old and are eating pelleted “layer feed” instead of chick crumbles. As the names suggest, the adult food bits are bigger than the chick bits. The “layer” here refers not to stratifications (which is what first popped into my mind) but to laying hens. Layer feed has somewhat less protein than chick feed.

I made a video of the chickens going after an ear of too-ripe corn. Hilda and I cleaned out the corn patch on Friday, ate what was salvageable and saved the rest for the girls. They LOVE corn. I imagine chicken dialog as I watch them: “CORN! Corn, corn, corn, corn. MY corn. No, MINE. Give that back!”

The pumpkins are nearly ready for harvest a month early. All the vines are dying back to reveal a pretty good crop.

About half of the pumpkin patch

My little Johnny-jump-ups are blooming bravely despite the drought and heat we’ve had this summer.

Johnny Jump-ups

We are enjoying a glorious and long-awaited rainy day today. I can almost hear the oaks sigh with relief.

The fifth oak rejoicing in the rain

We see the turkeys just about every morning. As they cruise through the tall grass with their heads down and their backs hunched, they look more like a herd of raccoons or anteaters, even. Not bird-like, in any case. They visit all the oaks, eating the numerous acorns that have fallen.  They hunkered down beneath the river birch for awhile this afternoon. It doesn’t seem like much shelter to me, but it seems to work for them just fine. The chickens, snug in their coop, are much drier.

Our turkey flock (usually two hens and 10 chicks)



Hunkered down under the river birch