Chickens: I Hate To Even Go Here, But I Must…

Yes, another installment to the story of our chickens. 

As you remember, we added five little hens to our flock of three, bringing the total to eight.  And everything was going very well.

Until one day last week.

When I heard one of them crowing.  Drat!

This morning I staked out the pen to see who the culprit was, and discovered there were TWO separate crowers.

Double drat!!

So I came back in to do some online research and discovered I likely had THREE roosters out there.

Triple drat!!! 

Here are the five as they look now.

And here are the three “hens” that I now think are roosters.

The first one has tufts of feathers sticking out of the sides of it’s head.  He cracks me up.

This next one is kind of the dominant one.  If there is any food to be given, he is first in line.  No ifs ands or buts.

This last one is my favorite.  It is the most mild mannered out of the three, and I think the most beautiful.

And alas, I just got confirmation from several people on Backyard Chickens that I have three boys and two girls.  Shoot.

Now I just need to figure out what to do with them, lol!

Anyone have any ideas?????

Anyone want one???

This Yellow Jacket Nest Has Got To Go!

We could really use some advice!  Yellow jackets have built a nest in the soffit above our porch.  There is no good access point to spray them. And no easy way to take the soffit down--it’s nailed, not screwed.

This is the Bigger Picture from a different angle.  The bees are coming in and out at the right end behind the face board.  There is a seam about a foot to the left of the gutter, and then a vent on back further.  We aren’t sure how far back the nest extends. But we think it goes pretty far.

A few nights ago, he used a fine tube to spray a small amount of gasoline (yes, you read that right) as far in as he could from the end and it didn’t kill the nest.  In the past, he has had great success using this method as the fumes kill the ones on down in the nest pretty fast.  But no such luck this time.

Any ideas???

There is only one thing worse than dealing with a sprawling nest of angry bees, and that’s doing so from a ladder!

Chickens Part 3: Home. Now What??

We parked by the road while we wandered the property looking for the best spot to put the coop—which, we decided, would be by the garden.
By the time we got back to the van, the first neighbor had arrived to see what we had.  He smiled and just shook his head.  But he helped my husband unload it with our skid loader.  They put a chain around it’s belly and hoisted it in the air.  We thanked him profusely!
Then he went home, apparently to call Neighbor-Number-Two.  Good grief. 
Neighbor-Number-Two appeared shortly thereafter to laugh his head off.  Said he had just gotten a call from Neighbor-Number-One. 
The rest of our neighbors showed more restraint.  They simply filled our dead end road with traffic as they walked, jogged, or took to their golf carts to get a better look.  
I did my best to ignore them while we worked.  However, I began to regret that we didn’t put it farther back on the property!
We put the puppy’s kennel around the coop.  Then we added  a wire covering, and used the loader to dump 6 inches of extra dirt around the edges . 
Finally, we put the coop back together, painted it, and called it quits.  If they survived, they survived.  They would already be dead if we hadn’t brought them home.

The girls seemed to like it just fine! 
See the cardboard in the corners?
Neighbor-Number-Two told us that raccoons will stand at the corners and reach their grubby little hands in to grab a chicken.  He said they would pull a leg right through the fence.  Nice.  Apparently chickens aren’t bright enough to retreat to the middle.  They would just run from corner to corner.  In keeping with our redneck theme, cardboard was the only thing we had on hand to give them some cover.   
We left the next morning for Pennsylvania.
Two days later, I got the following text from my friend along with this picture:

“Look! Three eggs and three live chickens!  My husband wanted to know if I was going to put them in your fridge, I said no way!  I’m eating these!  Lol!”

Two days later I got another text from my friend:

“Three eggs yesterday, two today.  Somebody is slacking off!”

You’ve got to love good friends!
We have found two eggs every day since.  I guess two out of three isn’t bad.  It pretty much keeps us in eggs.

But our chicken saga isn’t over.  I know you wish it was!  Lol!
But, thanks to Craig’s List (I really need intervention!), there is a Chickens Part 4, and provides proof positive or our lunacy.

Chickens Part 2: The Ride Home

I watched in the side view mirror fully expecting to see our free coop, along with our free hens, go free-falling around one of the next bends in the road. 
We were going all of about 25 mph. 
I watched the cars pull up behind us then back off till it was clear to pass.  No doubt they were trying to avoid our trail of feathers and poo-dust.  Not to be confused with star dust.
My husband began to quote random Jeff Foxworthy.  I don’t know why.  And he wouldn’t stop.
The insanity of what we were doing had us laughing to the point of tears.  
Yet my deep-seated type A core knew it would be great if we arrived home with at least half a plan for what we were going to do.  I got out a scrap of paper and pen, and put on my serious-plan-face.

• First of all, where are we going to put it?  Back yard?  Side yard?  Near the garden?  Hmmm.  Not sure.  We’ll have to walk around and look.  Just not close enough to the house to smell…
• How are we going to get it off the trailer?  Pull it to the end of the trailer with the loader.  But then what? The two of us sure couldn’t budge it alone.  We’ll keep thinking about that one.
• Clean out the coop.  Easy, but SO not looking forward to this new job.
• Tools we’ll need from the garage to repair the door… Screw gun, screws.
• For the actual pen part?  Have the boys drag the kennel panels up from out back.
• And finally, something to put over the pen to keep the hawks, eagles and owls from dining on our new fine feathered friends.   Pick up a roll of fence from Rural King… 

With at least a few plans in place, we addressed the inevitable.  Someone was going to have to look in on these girls while we were away.
I pulled out my phone and texted my good friend and neighbor.  “Hey girl, do you think your husband would mind checking on a few more critters when he feeds our cats next week?”
I included a grainy picture of the hens in their crate.
When we got to the house (and yes, we did make it all the way home with our cargo intact), there was a message from my friend on our machine. 
“Hello, are those CHICKENS???  Call me.”
Lol! 
We will never live this one down.
Stay tuned for Chickens Part 3:  Home.  Now What??

Tulip Tree Scale Bugs: Making A Mess!

I can only hope that where you live, your poplar trees are not infected with these bugs!  Here in Indiana, our mild winter has allowed the tree scale bug population to explode.  These tiny bugs attach to twigs where they suck out the sap and cause a sticky rain to coat everything beneath its canopy in a sticky gross mess!   If you walk beneath the trees, it literally feels like it is raining!

When the boys come in from playing soccer, their shoes are black and sticky.  Their legs are black and sticky.  The ball is black and sticky.  And the puppy, who likes to play along, needs a bath BIG TIME!! 

The sticky rain is called honey dew—though there is nothing sweet about the mess it is making everywhere!!! 

The stressed trees put out fewer leaves and a sooty mold begins to cover the sticky stuff secreted by the bugs—on the trees, on the vegetation beneath, …on everything.   The trees will likely die if left untreated. 

I’ve read that one way to treat them is to spray the entire tree with a tree-friendly oil that coats the immobile bugs and smothers them.  Unfortunately, that’s something that can cost BIG bucks (PER TREE) to do properly because you need the tall equipment to reach the tops.  :( We have way too many trees to even consider this.

I’ve also read that systemic insecticides might be effective applied in the fall.  But that doesn’t help us now.  I don’t claim to be a tree expert.  If the bugs are in your area, you’ll want to do your own research.  But if you know of something we can do to combat this that won’t cost an arm and a leg, please share about it!

Sadly, we’ve had to take a number of the worst trees down.   

Cleanup on these things was one of the worst jobs ever!  The gooey sticky branches and their gooey sticky leaves stuck to our hands, arms, legs and clothes.  They stuck to the tractors, wagons, rakes and wheels.  It was hysterical to hear the leaves flapping round and round on the tires as the kids drove the wagonloads of branches to the burn pile. 

I didn’t dare bring my camera out for that part.  The sticky would have coated that as well!  But it was a sight!  Trust me!

A neighbor who came by to help fell the trees didn’t stick around for the clean up.  He laughed and said he hated to run (yeah, right!).  He had a craving for pancakes and syrup! Lol! 

That is exactly the kind of sticky that covered everything!!

By the time we were done, we had to strip in the garage and take our black sticky selves straight to the showers.

We now have several HUGE brush piles.  I guess at some point we’ll have to divide them up and burn them a little at a time.

The sad part is, we will miss their shade until we can grow some replacements. 

The even sadder part is that we still have a number of trees we need to take down.   I can’t even tell you how much I am NOT looking forward to THAT!

Mystery Lizard

I rescued this little lizard from my cat the other day and put him in an ice cream pail to show the boys.  When my little guy reached in to pick him up, the ungrateful reptile whipped around and tried to bite him, mouth open wide.  Crazy thing!  Here’s a better picture of him.

He was probably about 7 or 8 inches long (before his tail split off).  He looked like a garter snake with legs and his little toes were very sticky.  In grass, he slithered the same way a snake would and was quick to tunnel beneath the thatch. 

When we let him go, he scrambled over the edge of the log, down and around it’s circumference, and straight into a hole he found in the wood.  He was one fast lizard!!!

I spent some time trying to identify him, but came up with nothing.  Anyone know what kind he was?  I’d love to know!

Name-That-Critter Contest!

For more than a week (just ask my muscles), we’ve been raking out flower beds and releasing spring blooms from their winter blanket of leaves.  Although I have been enjoying the early spring, the critters I’ve uncovered are less than thrilled!  Lol!

Which brings me to my contest! There is absolutely no prize for this.  Just the satisfaction of knowing more than me!! :)

Since I had my cell phone on my hip, (and didn’t lose it in the leaves, Yay!) I was able to photograph some of the sleepy critters I found.

First you have to find them!  Then, see if you can name them!  See how many you know!  Keep in mind we live in Indiana.

1.

2.  This one is really different!

3.  Bet you can’t find the next one!  Lol!

4.  Or this one!

5. This one was the hardest for my boys to find.

6.  For the last picture, I didn’t see the critter, but I saw what it left behind in the tall grass.  I have a pretty good idea what he looked like, though!  :)

What??  You don’t see it?  Look down into the grass.

That’s a mighty large egg!!  Lol!

Hope you find some sunshine today!

What?  Did you think I would list the names of all these critters at the bottom for you?  The best I would be able to do is…cold salamander, strange frog, big beetle, etc.!  I wasn’t kidding when I said you would know more than me if you could name them!!

Spring Hiking: McCormick’s Creek State Park

The other day, a friend invited me to go walking with her at McCormick’s Creek State Park.  It was absolutely perfect weather!

In spite of living so close, I’ve only been there a handful of times.  We really need to enjoy this park more often!

This was walking along the Wolf Cave trail.  Look at the moss on the path!  I wish the picture did it more justice.  It was so bright!  And there was a green sheen over the entire path—not just the edges.  And slippery!  You wouldn’t believe how slippery!

This pretty little spot is just one of the places we stopped to let my friend’s two dogs play in the water.  They had their eye on a squirrel, though.   And I’m pretty sure they would much rather have taken a romp through those woods!  Lol!

We saw this tree along the path.  My friend told me she has a picture of her husband standing inside the trunk with his head showing through the hole.  All I could think about were how many webs and spiders might lurk inside.  Sorry, guys.  You couldn’t PAY me to put my head up in that tree!  Lol!

Speaking of spiders.  My oldest son called the middle man into his room last night to see a whopper spider on the wall.  (I stayed clear, of course). 

But I heard all kinds of laughing in there.  Apparently, they knocked it down behind his bed and lost it.  LOST it!!  How can you lose a man-eating spider behind your bed and LAUGH?????    And it didn’t bother him to craw into said bed 5 minutes later and fall fast asleep?!!!! 

I closed his door and just barely refrained from jamming a towel at the base of it.  Lol! 

BOYS!

So what have you been doing to enjoy the weather?

Creative Teenager Versus Determined Raccoons

I’m sorry to bore you with another critter post, but this cracked me up.

If you’ve been following this blog for any length of time, you know that we live in the country with deer, possums, coyotes and raccoons. 

Well, it would seem that a family of ill-mannered raccoons have moved into the space beneath one of our sheds.  Again.  Or maybe this new set of pests is related to the rascals we dealt with last year.

Whatever the case, they found our trash cans unsecured over Christmas and they have been ripping into them like clockwork ever since.  They even know when it’s trash day and take their appetite to the curb. It’s INCREDIBLY frustrating.  Especially for my oldest son who often has to clean it up. 

Highly motivated to catch the culprits, he has been setting the trap almost every night.  He uses peanut butter, peanuts, marshmallows, cat food, fish leftovers—you name it!!  You would THINK that any one of these snacks would be irresistible!   However, the crazy little things totally ignore the trap.  Instead, they single-mindedly go for the mystery-treasures in the triple-bungeed trash cans.

Lately, my son has been hiding the cans to try to throw them off.

But all to no avail. 

The raccoons find them every time.

Picking up trash in the yard has remained a daily chore

Until this morning. 

As I pulled out of the garage, I had to laugh at my son’s creative new hiding place!

How long do you think the trash will stay safe here?  …And I wonder what my son plans to do with the other THREE cans as we fill them, lol!  Gotta love his creativity!  :)

Hey, just a heads up.  I’m working on a pretty cool giveaway for later in the week.  If you love to scrapbook, wish you had time to scrapbook, or even if you hate to scrapbook, you will LOVE this giveaway!!! 

Garden Raiders!

Get set for a rant on the overpopulation of deer in our neck of the woods. 

Seeing deer in my garden would normally have me bursting out the door like a wild woman to run them off.  I’ve even been know to cut through the yard with my Subaru to scatter a herd like bowling pins.  Just ask the boys.  They’re usually in the back seat YEEEH-HAW-ing.

But considering my garden is sleeping for the winter, I let these two does slide the other day.  But look at them!  They checked out every pepper cage, sniffed at every cucumber mound, and walked every row as if they were walking the isles of a super market! 

And when they found the pickings slim (ha!), they wandered across our driveway, looking towards the house as if to say, “Hello in there, where’s the salad?”

Because they reek so much devastation on my garden and young trees, I’m not fond of deer at all.  Like I said, if I catch them in my yard, it’s all-out-war and the chase is on!  Lol! 

If you can relate, and you are looking for a way to keep deer from destroying the vegetation in your yard, check out these ideas.  They worked pretty well for us! 

This girl came right up to the house and wandered around under my window.  She checked for any flowers prematurely growing in my flower beds, and even checked to see if my red maple had any tender buds yet.  Grrr.

Like I said, I let them slide today.  But they better wear their running shoes if they want to dine in my yard come spring!  The wild lady will be back.  Lol!

Five Pictures From My Bus-Stop-Run This Morning

We live on a ridge, and our bus stop is about a mile down our road, just off the main highway.   On our way down this morning, this was the view through the trees.  I’m glad my phone takes decent pictures!

The river mist blanketed the valley under the crisp blue sky.

After we parked at the bottom of the hill, I snapped this shot through my front windshield. 

My son’s friend said it looked like we were under water looking up at giant lily pads.  We all laughed at the thought of a giant frog jumping through them into our world. 

After the kids got on the bus, I went home.  As I pulled into the driveway, I decided to turn around and go back.  The sun was just enough higher that it was making the tops of the trees glow. 

This time on the way down, I got a bonus.  :) 

Just before the big hill, a family of deer was grazing along the road.  I wondered if I could get a picture before they ran.  So I slowed to a stop.They looked up, and then went right on grazing.   They didn’t  care a bit that I was watching them!

It wasn’t until I pulled forward again that they took off across the road and into a field on my right.

I made my way back down the hill, turned around, and saw what I came back for.  This is at the bottom of the same hill, looking up.

I love fall!  And the color show is just beginning here.  :)

How about you?  Do you have a favorite season?

Do you like how I just ignored the fact that I took a mini vacation from blogging?  Lol!  It’s just been a crazy couple of weeks.  I plan to write about some of the things that have kept me so busy—complete with pictures.  Pictures make it all better, right?  :)

Teeny Tiny Toads By The Loads!

This year, we’ve had so many baby toads that at times, you just hated to walk across the yard for fear of crushing one with every step.

They were EVERYWHERE!  Lol! 

Mowing the yard was super tedious.  Every time I saw one, (which was everywhere I looked), I had to either wait for it to hop to safety, or get off the tractor and move it to a flower bed.  Because I’m that kind of girl.

And they didn’t cooperate very well.

You’d think they would.  But they didn’t.

And you’d think they would be easy to catch.  But they weren’t. 

And you’d have to be careful, or you’d… Well…  You just had to be careful.

I mean, look how tiny these things were!  This little toad is sitting in my seven-year-old’s tiny little hands!

Did any of you experience a bumper crop of baby toads this year?   

A Robin Moth In Our Own Front Yard!

We love finding odd or unusual critters in our yard.  The other day, my middle man spotted this beautiful moth on the trunk of a dogwood tree. I must have taken a thousand pictures of it! I just couldn’t get over how BIG its body was (easily two of my thumbs wide!)   Or how furry!  Or colorful! 

Or beautiful!

I came in and looked it up online.  As far as I can tell, it is a Cecropia Silkmoth, North America’s largest silkmoth, commonly called the Robin moth. 

In my research, I found a few interesting facts. 

Did you know…

• The adults do not feed.  (We were wondering what they ate as we were taking pictures.) Once they reach the moth stage, they live only long enough to mate and lay eggs and then die. They actually have only rudimentary mouth parts.
• In a few weeks, the eggs, laid on the favored food plant, hatch out into their caterpillar form (silk worm).
• The caterpillars feed fore several weeks, then spin silky cocoons on twigs.  They then spend the Winter maturing and waiting to emerge as beautiful moths in the spring or early summer.  So there is only one generation per year to come out.
• Host trees include box elders, sugar maples, wild cherries and plums, apples, alder and birch, dogwoods, and willows.
• They range from Maine to Florida, and from the eastern United States to the Rocky Mountains.
• The population of these moths is actually very secure.  You just rarely see one! 

The day after we spotted our moth, I sat down to write this post.  And I got to thinking…darn, I didn’t actually measure it to see how big it really was.  I wonder if it is still out there?

So I picked up my ruler and headed out to the dogwood tree. 

I looked around the base of the tree and was sad to see it had flown away. 

But as I was turning to go, I scanned the top of the small tree and did a double-take.  Our beautiful moth had simply flown to a higher perch. 

And she had company!  Lol! 

I say she, because (now that I could compare an obviously male and female couple), I could see that the newcomer was definitely the male.  He was smaller, and he had huge antennae (which I read could help him locate a female from up to a half mile away!!!)

I didn’t want to disturb them.  However, I really wanted to get some pictures to compare the two. 

Note the male on the left.  You can see that his antennae are noticeably wider.

Here he is up close.

  Compared to the female, below. 

Still.  She was larger in every other way and definitely the beauty queen in my opinion.  She looked as soft as a newborn kitten!   :)   

In this last picture, you can kind of see how much larger she was.

I never did measure her.  Lol!  But she was as big as my hand spread wide.  Trust me.

God certainly created some beautiful creatures, didn’t He? 

A Mystery That Is Bugging Me

This giant prehistoric looking bug was lying in the stones under our faucet outside.  I have no idea what he is.  Besides scary looking.

He was already dead, or we wouldn’t have braved picking him up. 

And for all we know, he could be a she. 

Can anyone tell me what he is? 

Seriously.

I have him in a peanut butter jar on the porch and I show everyone who stops by.  But no one has ever seen such a thing. 

I’d also like to know what those tusks in front of his eyes are. 

You’ll totally make my day if you can tell me something (anything!!) about him!  So far, he’s just a big old mystery.

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