Oh, Deer

Every evening we have two deer that visit us, they always show up while we are doing the evening feeding, they aren't the least bit concerned about us. Angel would bark at them when they first started showing up but she has gotten use to it and now ignores them. They know they have a safe haven here.

Well, we were blessed this evening with all of our Kids and Grandkids coming for a visit and they just happened to be out target shooting with a new BB gun that my Grandson got for Christmas. I just hope that our deer weren't too traumatized and will come back tomorrow night. I also hope that my sons will mature some day.

Bobcat

I only found one good footprint frozen in the mud after our visitation Tuesday night. I am thinking Bobcat, I pointed it out to my DH and he thinks so too. I looked at tracking websites and this track matches the Bobcat track pretty closely. It was mostly a round track with round toes and no claw marks.

Maude is struggling to stay alive, her breathing is very labored, but she did get up and eat some this evening. My new rooster also has some injuries but nothing serious, he lost some feathers and has some bloody spots on his head.

I took some pictures of the track but I haven't transfered them to the computer yet, so I don't know if they turned out or not. I will post them here, if they did.

Nighttime Visitor

You know what they say about Indiana weather? If you stick around long enough it will change. I went to my favorite weather forecast website this evening and there was every kind of warning and advisory that you could imagine, except for a heat advisory. They had a Severe Thunderstorm Warning, Wind Advisory, Hail, Winter Weather Advisory and a Wind Chill Warning.

I dutifully shut down my computer and waited for the storm to hit, I didn't have a long wait. The thunder and lightning started, I went out without even a jacket on, it was so warm, a couple of minutes later it started pouring rain and hail. I mean it was coming down violently.

My husband had left me home alone, so I turned on my handy, dandy Police scanner and they were getting 911 calls for damage all over the county. Trees were down, two houses were flattened, power lines down and roads closed, trees down on houses and cars. But as they went door to door in hard hit areas they didn't find any injuries.

I called to check on my kids, then settled back with a good book (an instruction manual). All was quiet for awhile, the wind was still blowing but not as bad. Then my LGD, Angel the Great Pyrenees, started barking like she meant it. I figured that she was barking at the wind but then I heard the sound of something hitting the chain link fence on the dog kennel that holds Maude and Ethel.

I put my book aside just in time to hear Maude and Ethel start screaming bloody murder. I grabbed my handy, dandy Black and Decker Spotlight and ran out the door in just my night gown, only to discover that the temperature had dropped about 30º and it was snowing.

I was yelling as I ran out the door to scare whatever it was away. When I got there I found a lot of chicken feathers in the doghouse and Maude and Ethel behind the doghouse. My new rooster and one of my banty hens were cowering in the opposite corner together.

Maude walked out of hiding when she seen me and most of her feathers on one side were gone and she had large puncture wounds on her back side. I looked around with my spotlight and didn't see anything. Then my handy, dandy Black and Decker Spotlight went out. So, don't rush out and buy one on my recommendation because they do not hold a charge worth anything and they don't give you a warning before they die.

It was a dark and stormy night and there was something out there....

I finally made it back to the house in the pitch darkness, but I was still wondering what had been in that pen and what could have made those big holes in her flesh.

I put on more appropriate clothing for the sub-zero weather that had just blown in. I went out and started the Blazer, turned it around to face the kennel, so that I would have lighting. That was when I noticed that there were no horses around the big bale feeders, anyone that knows horses knows that they are always around big bales.

Not only were they not around the feeders but they were down farther away in the pasture, in a big group, snorting and blowing, with there ears forward at attention, so again I wondered just who our visitor had been. I gathered up the hens and rooster, one at a time and took them through the ankle deep mud into the goat/chicken shed for Angel to watch over for the rest of the night. It was the first time that I had attempted to pick up Maude, she is one heavy bird.

I will look for tracks tomorrow morning. We have coyotes here all of the time, we have even walked up on them while they lay in the middle to the herd on a foggy night. I find it hard to believe that the horses would react the way they did tonight, if it had been a coyote.

Mille Fleur d'uccle

Here it is, the moment that you all have been waiting for, the introduction of my new Rooster. I haven't named him yet, as a matter of fact, I haven't even named my other rooster yet. The new rooster needs a French name. The other rooster is a Booted Bantam, so I guess he needs a Pirate, Cowboy or Harley Rider name. Any and all suggestions would be appreciated.

He spent the night with Maude and Ethel, they are my big cornish hens, he has never had his freedom, so he didn't know that he just needed to fly up and out of the pen. Maude and Ethel are too heavy to fly, so that is where they live full time. All of my other Chickens are free rangers, but they do get in and out of Maude and Ethel's pen occasionally.

Maude and Ethel

Just Stay Home

I have made my decision, I am not going anywhere ever again. A few weeks ago, I was sitting in the waiting room of my Doctor's office, when I looked down at the floor and discovered small clumps of straw and manure under my feet. Well, I knew that the appointment was for 8:30 am, so chances were that I was the first person to occupy that seat for the day.

I went to the restroom and cleaned off my shoes then went back to the waiting room and pushed the mess up under the chair as inconspicuously as possible.

This evening I went to Church and the same thing happened, it isn't my fault that the chickens aren't more careful about where they eliminate waste. They leave an undetectable trap right outside the passenger side door of our truck for my nice clean Church shoes.

Another thing worrying me is that I don't notice my billy goat having an odor anymore, this could mean that I have been desensitized to his smell, in which case, I might not notice that I smell like a billy goat. Hopefully some close family member would tell me. I might be safe though, maybe he is just out of the rut and doesn't stink anymore, after all, no strangers have asked me if I raise goats lately.

I hope I am not becoming one of those old pathetic Chicken and Goat Farmers that everyone makes fun of, that would be embarrassing. People tend to admire horse and cattle ranchers but goat and chicken farmers are a very discriminated against minority. If you are one, you never admit to it. People always snicker when you tell them or ask you why (that is another reason to stay home and not go anywhere).

When you meet other people like yourself, you instantly bond and sympathize with each other. We are an intelligent group though, I just spelled, decision, inconspicuously, eliminate, passenger, desensitized, discriminated, sympathize and intelligent, my spell checker has confirmed that I was correct.