Cooler Weather At Last!

It has been really nice this past week.  The humidity has been low and the temperatures have only been in the eighties for the highs, bright sunshiny days too...lows in the sixties at night.  I enjoy spending time outside when it is like this.  I did some yard work, mowing, trimming, weeding, watering...loved standing in the sun with all the turkeys following me making their happy noises and gobbling when I talked to them.  The chickens come out and investigate when I am watering the trees, all of them follow me down the fence line, chasing bugs and toads through the grass.  I still have some tilling to do...I want to get the ground prepared somewhat for planting in the spring.  I have been saving cardboard to cover areas to keep the weeds down.  The weeds are a constant battle...well, not where the chickens congregate. 

Poultry doesn't like tall grass either, they tend to avoid areas that it is over 8 inches or so...unless it is laying over.  Most areas that have shade are bare or close to it, they have eaten everything down to the ground in their main areas.  There is still a lot of grass in the bigger fenced section of the yard, we still have to mow it, but they love scratching around in the piles of grass looking for bugs afterward.  The ducks and geese are constantly eating, if I dump water out they dig a hole...we have a lot of holes in the yard, change out water every day...dump the nasty water, wash the containers and refill them...pools too.  I rake up the yard fairly often too...but if I don't remove what I rake...the chickens spread it all over the yard within minutes, if I turn my back on them.  

The turkeys are discovering they can fly, they have been flying up into the trees lately, flying on top of my big coop and walking around on the roof...they jump down onto the shade cloth I have hanging up too.  They are getting heavy, I am afraid they will break the polycarbonate roof panels over the run.  They have been jumping on the tarps too...and tearing them up...the shade cloth is a bit tougher I suppose.  I have a feeling it would be cheaper in the long run to use metal roof panels on the coops than to keep buying tarps to replace what is being torn up.  Turkeys are large heavy birds, yesterday I was having a hard time getting them all to go into their house to eat...so I caught some and carried them to their house.  I didn't get a good hold on one and he got his wings loose and started flapping wildly, dirt started flying everywhere and I was getting beat by his wings.  He got me once or twice on the head and face...but I held on.  Probably a mistake, but I got him to calm down and got him in the turkey house.  It is no wonder I have bruises and scratches on my arms most of the time...most of the time I have a bird fly up and grab my arm trying to get to the feed...I have small round bruises from the chickens toenails on both arms...and now a few new scratches that bled from getting raked with the turkeys toenails.  

The turkeys are good about trying to clean me up too.  Since I feed fermented feed, I use large five gallon buckets to mix it in.  When I go out to feed, I stir the buckets to mix it up well before I give it to my poultry...sometimes it splashes on my jeans.  Once I start pouring it, sometimes it will get on the outside of the bucket and they are heavy so it will rub off on me...the buckets weigh 35 to 40 pounds...then a chicken will jump up and in the bucket sometimes.  Needless to say, I get covered in food sometimes...I find myself getting pecked at a lot...when the turkeys see the food on me, they feel abliged to get it off and clean me up.  I guess the geese do too sometimes, but not as much as the turkeys...I will be somewhat surrounded by them and they will peck any area that has food on it, whether it be the side of my leg, the front of my shirt, or the seat of my pants...my best bet sometimes is just to stand still and let them clean me up.  They tend to grab my jeans sometimes trying to get at the food, the geese have goosed me pretty good a few times and getting pecked by a turkey on the butt can be a little painful at times.  But when a chicken gets into the feed bucket and I am carrying two of them and surrounded by hundreds of poultry so that I can't see the ground...or set the buckets down...they sometimes hit the food and flap wildly trying to get out.  There have been several instances that I get food from the top of my head to my toes!  Splattered all over my glasses, my arms...all over my clothes, in my hair...and the grooming starts.  I have had my glasses removed from my face, my hair pulled, the geese have actually pulled a shoe off before...so, I recommend if you wear Sloggers to make sure you have them on your feet properly!  I tend to use mine more like slides a lot.  Quick to slide on and off!  I try not to wear my shoes in the house, so I keep them by the back door to slide on when I go feed or have an egg customer drive up.

Anyway, I do enjoy the cooler weather...try and spend more time outside getting things done before the heat comes back.  It got down in the mid fifties last night and the high today is suppose to be around eighty.  In a few days it will be going back up into the nineties, so I need to get some more building done.  I don't mind hard work...good thing too, because I have a lot to get done before it gets cold.