Hair Cutting Time

I recently decided to give myself a haircut.  I have been cutting my own hair since I was about 13 years old so it is nothing really new, except the reasons are different to keep it relatively short now.

It has been hot and humid, my hair has a lot of natural curl to it and the older I get the more coarse it becomes and I guess you could say frizzy.  I have been working outside a lot and it is hard to wear a hat a lot of the time, they blow off or a turkey may grab one off my head.  I tried wearing a bandana over my hair to try and keep pine needles and cedar stuff out, but they come off too.  I found myself spending a lot of time in the shower picking things out of my hair, cedar fronds, pine shavings and needles and no telling what else.  I cut it pretty short, my husband doesn't like it...he didn't say that, but reserving judgement until I fix it...well that doesn't sound promising.

I didn't intend for it to be as short as it is, but sometimes when you cut your own hair it is difficult to get the back of your hair looking right and I had some issues with it being short in the middle and long on the sides, or shorter on one side than the other.  It grows pretty fast though, it will be OK, I don't mind it being this short.  I use to wear it short when I was on the swim team in High School or when I was working a ton of hours, I have pretty thick hair and cutting it short is a time saver...it would take 30 to 45 minutes to blow dry it and style it.  Lol, not that I do either very often any more.  I use to color it too, don't do that or wear makeup much any more either.  Very few people see me now and I don't inspect myself in the mirror very often either.  I guess I should pay a bit more attention to what I look like at times, since I am afraid I may scare customers off...but, as long as I am clean and my teeth are brushed I don't bother with makeup or hair gel and such.

I am thinking about cutting my husbands hair today.  He tried to get a haircut a few times in town before, there are a few places in Atlanta that are suppose to cut hair.  Finding one that is open when you want a haircut is the trick...we went in one shop, the lights were on but nobody was there.  We waited for awhile, we thought maybe they were using the restroom or something.  No one ever came out from the back or responded to our hello, anyone here?  We went to another place and they were closed.  In this place, it seems like people don't really have much competition like in Dallas...it seems like they don't care most of the time.  The sign may say what hours they are open for business, but I think a lot of places just don't care and come in for work when they have nothing better to do sometimes.  I don't think my husband has gotten a haircut out her from anyone but me...just trying to get it done before getting busy doing other things is tricky.  

I always have a lot to do...I got busy, he got busy...and it didn't happen today.  Oh, and I tried Walmarts salon before...that probably won't happen again.

Easter Egg Hunt Every Day

I believe I started raising chickens in July or August 2013?  In the beginning I only had two roosters and four hens...it was pretty easy to start.  I raised them in a chicken tractor we built.  It was really heavy, still is...but we use to move it around every few days.  It has been stationary for awhile now, it sunk into the ground in soft sand and I can't move it by myself, it will take a tractor and a couple of people to get it out the wheels on it have sunk into the ground about six inches at least.  My chicken tractor was fine for the six, but because we only got one or two eggs a day the first winter...we got four more chickens to add to our flock...it has kind of snowballed since then but I built an extension to the tractor that I could drag around to fresh ground that gave my chickens additional space.  There are four nest boxes in my chicken tractor...they stayed enclosed so no real hunting was involved for eggs, although they did lay eggs in the run sometimes.  My husband got the bright idea to use a golf ball retriever to get the ones in the run, great job honey!

Anyway, after my hens started going broody and we let them sit and hatch chicks, we decided to build a big coop to house them all.  In the mean time we got some baby ducks!  After brooding the ducks I needed a place to put the ducks while they were growing.  I built a grow out pen.  The grow out pen I made so that it could be moved fairly easily, four panels with rings that I could drop metal rods down into...it was a bit heavy to move each panel, but it was possible.  I actually had the ducks set up in the backyard, at the time it was the only area that was fenced.  This grow out pen was later used to make my "Rooster Condo"...it has all been a learning process.  I also found geese at a feed store and those soon were added.

Oh gosh, getting off track...but, my poultry yard and area has expanded a lot. In the beginning I just fenced around the chicken tractor.  I then fenced around my garden area next to that area, then after we built the big chicken coop, we fenced off an area for the ducks, then around the coop and another couple of garden areas and added a large gate to be able to mow the area.  I added dividers inside the area so that I could separate roosters or different ages of chickens too.  Then after hatching a lot of chicks this year, adding more ducks, more geese and turkeys...I fenced an even larger area and this is the area we have started having to hunt for eggs.

My older chickens still lay in nest boxes for the most part.  I had some issues when I had so many broody hens, but I added more nest boxes to fix that.  Now the chicks that hatched in February are starting to lay, they lay in the bushes, clumps of grass, next to the wood pile, in flower pots, under the nest boxes, in the turkey pen, in the chicken coops run, under the roosts, behind rain barrels, the ducks and geese lay in dewberry patches or sometimes under a tree that has some bushes around it and vines.  Some days I will be out filling pools and waterers and all the sudden I will turn around and there will be an egg practically laying at my feet.  I even found one on top of my patio table just laying there suddenly.  The ducks have laid in their pools before, and if I disturb an area they like to lay by putting straw or soft grass or something down over the dirt, they will move to another area sometimes...so, it is a constant hunt, my husband calls it an Easter Egg hunt, but the poultry are the ones hiding the eggs!

I am going to make a couple of large ground nest boxes big enough for the geese, ducks or turkeys to lay in...hopefully they will figure out what they are for.  I have one made that the frame is made from 1"x6" wood but I put cage wire as the bottom and raised it up off the ground a touch so the nest will stay dry.  Time will tell if they will use it.

Supervisory Help Makes Things Tough

I really have to be flexible in my planning and yesterday was one of those days, it looked like it was going to rain and he first half of the day.  I after selling eggs to my customer I went and said hello to the geese at my gate...I had a hen outside the fence, she ran right through the cattle panel gate when I chased her.  I decided I needed to get some smaller wire over the cattle panel to keep them from escaping so easily.  I have been meaning to do it, it has just been so hot most of the time the poultry doesn't come over to that section of the yard because there is no shade...today was different.

I debated what type of wire to use on the cattle panel, it is four feet tall so I thought about just using the 2"x4" opening fencing that I fenced the chicken yard with...but it is hard to move 100 foot roll by myself and rabbits can still run through it.  I have some cage wire, but it is a lot more expensive than hardware cloth and I have two hundred foot rolls to ad to the bottom of the garden areas...so I decided to use it.  I used my safety wire pliers and galvanized steel wire to attach the hardware cloth to the cattle panel.

If you don't know anything about turkeys...they are very curious creatures, not afraid of anything either...they have been exploring a lot, I have had to get them off of the solar panels in the backyard, round them up and chase them out of the back yard so the dogs can go out...and catch them and get them back in the fenced area when they fly over.  It seems like they realize were the food is and wait for me to come out with some, it is pretty much what I do to get them out of the yard.  I get a scoop of food, shake it they come running and so do the chickens that fly over the backyard fence.  

They have to check out everything I am doing, no matter what it is...and they peck everything that shines.  Well, today I was work with tools and wire...they had to check it out and they pecked at my hands a lot while I was trying to get the wire through the cattle panel and grabbed with the safety wire pliers for twisting.  I have twelve turkeys and they would reach through the fence and try and grab tools or wire, they pecked at my hand as I reached through the fence and tried to get the wire in the right spot to twist. Then the geese came over after the turkeys showed interest in what I was doing and as I was sitting on the ground they reached through areas and groomed me...which basically means they grabbed my shoes, they grabbed my jeans leg and nibbled on my ankle as I was sitting there working...sometimes they grabbed my sock and pulled on it.  If I got to close to the fence the turkeys would pull my hair.  I am sure anyone that drove by were curious to find out why I had so many critters lined up at the fence, I do sometimes cuss up a storm if they hurt me or pull a tool through the fence to the other side.  I had to make sure they couldn't reach through the fence and pick up the bits of wire that I cut off too, they pretty much test everything to see if it is edible.  It was pretty funny with all of them right there watching me...even some of the babies were curious and came to check out what I was doing.  

I feel sorry for the young chickens, they sometimes get under the geese trying to pick up scratch grains when we throw them out to the mob and get stepped on. The geese honk loudly wanting scratch grains out of the scoop and all five will try and stick their heads into it to get some and the Ducks will stand up and crane their necks trying to get at them too.  My husband has created monsters, it seems their sole purpose is to get to the scoop and eat out of it now.  Yesterday I had a chicken fly to it land on the edge while I was walking with it and start eating scratch grains directly out of it.  I do up a special mix for the turkeys and carry a five gallon bucket out to their house to feed them, it is dry food...they eat the fermented feed if they can get to it, but when they see me with the big bucket most of them come running and follow me to their house.  I throw a few handfuls to the other poultry to keep them occupied while I round up the turkeys.  There are usually a couple of stragglers that have to be picked up and hand carried to the door. If I don't throw enough feed out to the chickens, ducks and geese...they will attempt to go into the turkey house to get their food too.  Many a young chicken have spent the night with the turkeys, they hide in the milk crates I have the food and water sitting on top of.  The milk crates were modified so that the could be used as nest boxes and have an opening on one side.

Achy Bones & Laziness

I didn't do much of anything over this past weekend, we had the rain for brief periods but most of the time that doesn't stop me from doing things.  I have a lot I need to get done but took it easier than normal yesterday too.  I had a weird thing happen on Sunday morning, I guess it may be called a Thunderclap Headache that was a bit scary.  Intense pain at the base of my skull suddenly, the bad pain only lasted minutes but it made my neck hurt and my left eye and ear would get sharp sudden pains.  I am thinking it is related to my degenerative disk disease.  For some strange reason, I ache in other parts of my body, nothing bad...but almost like I worked out and am sore.  I waited until after 4:30PM to work outside yesterday, then I just fed and watered and cleaned my coop called the "Condo".  I had to, the poop was getting bad so I scraped it all out, leveled the ground and spread some straw for my babies...they are getting big though.  

Today I need to tackle cleaning my big coop, I don't like to clean it if there is a chance it will rain...because it won't stay clean long.  My chickens will spend the day in the coop if it rains much and it doesn't take very long to get nasty when they don't free range.  It is cloudy out and I think we have a 30% chance of rain today, I may just clean the nest boxes out and put fresh pine shavings in them and turn the liter today.  I want to shovel the liter out, wash the walls and roosts but...if it does rain, they will be in the coop and I can't do it with a bunch of chickens mobbing me.  Maybe I will go look for small trees to use for new roosts...I need more roost space for them, the reason I have to clean the nest boxes is because they are roosting on the bars on the front of them.  I have more roost space in the coop itself, but they like sleeping in the run in the summer, it is covered by Polybarbonate panels so they are protected from rain somewhat, but the walls are just hardware cloth and they catch any breezes there are.  The top roost is the most popular in the coop, it is the same height as the windows.  I may change the roosts in the coop and make more at the same level as the windows.  I change my mind a lot and re-engineer things based on how my poultry behaves sometimes.  

I need to get more roosters out of my coop too, I am thinking about moving the younger chickens in with the hens to the big coop and using the Condo and the grow out pen to house the ones I want for breeding purposes.  Some of the young hens will be laying age before long and I have no nest boxes in either the Condo or Grow Out pen.  Lots to think about and I am procrastinating today.

I am also kind of sad, one of my best egg customers is moving away, she is a sweet lady and came by with her neighbor today to buy eggs.  She asked if she could come visit when she was in town again and asked if she could just sit and watch my chickens sometime.  Oh...that reminds me, I need to put some wire over the cattle panel we are using as a gate!  Lol, my chickens have discovered they can walk through the holes on it, maybe I will do that first, there is a cat that comes and visits sometimes and it would probably help to keep it out and the chickens in...while my customers were here, I walked to the fence and noticed I had a chicken out in the non-fenced area that ran back through the holes when I went over to the gate, rabbits tend to run through the 2"x4" fence holes too...I don't have enough hardware cloth to keep them out, maybe just my upper garden though...they ate all my green bean plants so I will have to do something if I want any veggies.

Raining in August?!

August in Texas is generally the driest month of the year.  It had been dry for a few weeks in my little corner of the world, and even though it made the heat more bareable because the humidity was low, we needed rain very badly.  I have been having to water my fruit trees every few days to keep them alive, they are fairly new and if I don't water leaves start browning and falling off.

Well, we did get rain...after a few days of clouds and not a drop...we had a few downpours in two days time we received 3-1/4 inches.  The thing is, it is extremely humid now and every time I walk out the door, a few minutes later I am soaking wet.  I am working when that happens, and it is from sweat.  It also made the poultry area rather nasty and stinky.  I am ready for Fall, cooler temperatures and changing leaves, it is much easier to work outside in the Fall in Texas.  Yes, it is usually still pretty warm out during the day, but 80's is better than 100's.  I still have not finished my Goose house...and I need to get it done.  I have to make another house for what is currently my chicken tractor area, I have been using what I call my Lowboy for roosters...when we got all the rain it collapsed the top of it from the weight of the water.  It actually tore the metal hardware cloth and broke the wood too.  So I will have to make a new structure for that area.  I started putting younger roosters into pens now, some have figured out how to escape though, so I will have to fix that area.

I still have far too many roosters running around with my hens, it is getting better...I think I have about 35 in separated into the pens now, but the two in the Lowboy are out now until that gets replaced.  I have some young roosters coming of age that are not being very nice to young hens that I need to catch and separate.  I really need to construct more roosts for my big coop too, if I do that, I will be able to move more into it.  I have to start thinking about winterizing too.

I need to try and set up an area to process chickens too.  Lots to think about, only about seven of the roosters I have separated will be kept for breeding purposes.  So I have at least 25 chicken dinners coming.

Hard Decisions

I am a softy, I will admit...I try and save any of my poultry who have been injured, born with a deformity, or get sick.  Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't and sometimes it is just an impossible task to keep going for long.

I have had a few chickens with minor foot injuries, a case of Bumblefoot and a torn comb and waddle.  There was no option but to remove the rest of the comb, I couldn't do it...my husband did while I held the injured rooster named Napoleon.  I was able to perform the Bumblefoot surgery on my own on my hen Brown Racer, but I found out it was not that easy to get all of the infection out with the tools I had to use...I ordered a few items so maybe the next time it will be easier.

I even tried to save eggs that had embryos growing in them...some were born nice and healthy, others were not...one of my ducks that hatched under a broody hen had leg issues and did not grow, it's legs twisted in such a way that it scooted around the brooder, it stayed small and the others picked on it.  We kept it in a separate brooder for weeks, it just got worse.  My husband would take it out and hold it, watched TV with it and carried it around in his pocket.  It started developing sores on it's hocks, it could not swim...yet we tried to help it anyway.  I gave it extra vitamins, mixed up a special mixture of food for it, cooked it boiled eggs and oats for days.

We had some extremely hot weather and I lost a Salmon Favorelle young hen and my Rhode Island Red hen, Red Racer...I found her laying on the floor of the coop and she was stiff, yet she opened her eyes when I picked her up.  I took her and tried to cool her down by laying her in cool water in the shade, I tried to get her to drink but she couldn't stand up.  She died during the night.  I also found a chick that succumbed to what I thought was heat, but it ended up have a severe case of wry/limber neck.  I worked on the chick and hand fed it, for days...every two hours or so, I gave it droppers full of a Nutridrench, vitamins and a product called DYNE.  The chick did not get better, it's neck twisted so badly that it could barely swallow, it's crop filled and did not empty the mixture I had given the chick ran out of its mouth when it was picked up...you could see the poor things bones through its skin.

This is where the hard decisions come in, if one of my special poultry does not get better fairly quickly, I have to decide if I want to keep up treatment or not.  When my husband suggested culling the duck and the chick with wry neck, I was heart broken...but agreed that neither of them would live without extraordinary measures for the rest of their life.  I was spending far to much time, feeding and caring for the special needs poultry and not paying enough attention to the healthy ones...I think that is why I lost the two to heat.  

I agreed to his suggestion, it pains me greatly to have to put one down...even if my husband is actually the one who does it.  

Rooster Wrangling 101

I still have not completed my goose and duck house, I was going out to work on it but decided to check on all my chickens.  It takes me quite awhile to fill up waterers and clean waterers, but yesterday I did clean and refill a couple of pools too.  Then I decided to clean the Condo.  The coop we call the Condo...

I generally make several trips from the house were we store feed back out to the poultry yard, yesterday was no exception.  Here lately the roosters have been very active and amorous towards the ladies, the ladies decide to jump the fence and go outside of the penned area.  I have been having to chase several of them down and put them back over the fence, it is not exactly safe for them jumping the fence...we have predators.  If they are hungry or think I have treats for them they get impatient sometimes too.  Yesterday one of my Barnevelder hens decided to jump the fence into the backyard with the three dogs.  It is not good when a chicken jumps into the backyard...my dog Bailee, at least here lately has decided to try and catch them.  She has killed a chicken before, one of my many roosters...apparently it got into the back yard while I had gone to town.  Bailee believes it is her job to chase chickens and if she catches them, she will hold them down and I think possibly they have a heart attack.  She didn't eat the last one, it was found dead by the corner of the fence.  Most of the time, the geese can stick their heads through the fence and pick at the grass and the dogs don't bother them.  Yesterday, I heard a commotion when I was getting feed and knew a chick had flown over the fence.  

Bailee, is fast and she goes into chase mode when a chicken flies over the fence.  Then I have to kick it into high gear to get to it before she does, she doesn't listen very well when she is busy running after and trying to stop the chicken.  I scream at her NO, Bailee...and it is like she doesn't hear me...she runs from one end of the yard to the other with the chicken running for it's life...and it is.  I was in hot pursuit yesterday, trying to get the Barnvelder hen so Bailee would not harm it.  Bailee caught it several times and held it down but it would flap it's wings and get away.  Chickens actually have pretty powerful wings, they hurt when they hit you in the face too.  Anyway, I continued to try and get the chicken, running around like a banshee, screaming at the dogs to leave my chicken alone and at one point tackled Bailee, it just kind of happened, Kensie and Sophie gained interest but they listen a bit better than Bailee.  I was actually on the ground with my arms wrapped around Bailee and the other two started after the chicken.

I hurt hitting the ground...so I was limping a bit.  I got Bailee on the porch and started yelling at the other dogs to leave the chicken alone, it is MY chicken!  Bailee was sitting on the porch, Kensie and Sophie were close to the chicken and I kept having to tell Bailee to stay because she kept getting up like she was going to join me for the chase.  I finally got the gate opened and the Barnevelder out of the backyard.  I decided to grab food for the chicks in the grow out pen and check on them.  I kept seeing roosters attacking my hens...so, I decided to do a rooster round up.

It is not easy catching chickens.  I am fifty six years old, not a spring chicken myself any more...and here I am chasing chickens in the heat of the day.  My knee is aching from hitting the ground when I tackled Bailee...Bailee is my Catahoula Mix dog, they are called Hog Dogs...because they are generally trained to catch and take down wild hogs.  She is a stout, muscular dog, very strong and can be stubborn as an Ox.  We have been filling up the pens I built for breeding, with roosters.  Yesterday, I observed several that were less than gentlemanly towards the ladies and proceeded to run after them, wrangle if you will...and catch them one by one and put them in pens.  If the other roosters attacked them too badly, I let them out and tried another pen.  

One pen is full of Sex-linked roosters, one pen has one Polish we call Pompadour and a few others that are mixes my husband calls the Bros, we caught a lot of young Cream Legbars over the weekend and a few of the Dorking roosters and they are in a pen together, and some of the roosters we took out of the Rooster Condo to begin with are in another pen, and I ran around and caught some more Polish roosters and put them in yet another pen...a couple of those are part of the Shady Hill gang.  All in all my breeding pens now have about 30 roosters in them and I still have more to catch.  I have three empty pens left, but I will have to make more gates to be able to use them.

Oh, and the easiest way to catch a rooster...wait until they jump a hen to try and mate them, you only have a few seconds to grab them...but it is a whole lot easier than chasing them everywhere.  That, or trapping them in a coop or run, although that is never easy and you can bang your head on roost bars or nest boxes.

Construction Time

I have finally started construction of the Goose and Duck house!  My husband found a Cattle Panel Greenhouse that he thought would work for Our poultry houses.  I watched the video on construction of one on YouTube, but the ones I have been building are modified and heavier construction than those used for greenhouses.  I have to have mine strong enough to keep predators out of it and need hardware cloth attached to it.  The ones I am building are about 8 feet by 8 feet at the base and tall enough in the center for me to stand up in.

After making the one we are using for the turkey house, I modified the design a bit more and made the wall panel sections out on the back porch, then put them together in place to basically make the foundation part of the house.  I used 4 - 2"x6" pieces of pressure treated wood for the bottom and then cut 13 - pieces 21 inches tall to use on the walls.  I used 4 - 2"x4" for the top rail and attached the 21 inch pieces at the ends and center of 3 of the walls, the front I used 4 pieces, because of the doorway.  I then carried out the panels and attached them together using angled steel pieces.  I also ran long screws through for extra strength along the edge pieces.  I left the front panel off until I got the cattle panels placed inside then attached it too.  I used large fence staples and lifted up the cattle panels about 3 or 4 inches off the ground and hammered the staples in to hold them in place.  The panels overlap, so I used wire and safety wire pliers and wired the pieces together.  I also put long pieces of 2"x4" wood to make a doorframe to hang the door on, I also stapled the cattle panel onto the door frame too.

Today I will try and get the door made and get the wire attached to the top section and connect it to the cattle panel, I will need to add a couple more long pieces of wood at the back to staple the hardware cloth to and help with stability.  I guess I should get out there while there is a slight break in the heat and get busy.  One of these days I will add pictures...I just write on my iPad and have not figured out how to upload pictures from it on the Google Blogger site.