Monday, February 28, 2011

A Drill, Peanut Butter, and an Egg

The missing BA hen showed up safe and sound yesterday afternoon. When I went out last night to lock up, I took the drill (yes I finally found it) to temporarily fix the door and a paper plate with peanut butter to set my havaheart trap. Because of the chickens fear of the attack and it's association with the coop, everyone but Chipmunk, Kerenel, George, a WL/EE, and 2 CM were roosting in trees. So I got everyone shaken out, except the BA/EE because she has to high in the tree to shake out.

After all the fun getting them out of trees I collected eggs (3 of them) and made an attempt to fix the coop door and manged to break one of the eggs in the process. But I got it secured for the moment and set my havaheart trap using the peanut butter and the broken egg.

This morning when I finally went out this morning (I was home sick Friday and am again today), all the birds where fine. The trap had been sprung and the all the bait (including the paper plate the peanut butter was on) was gone, but nothing was in the trap. So we will try again tonight.

Sunday, February 27, 2011

Not my Morning

My mom woke me up this morning because the chickens where lose and seemed very upset. I get outside and Chipmunk is standing on the porch crowing (the first time I've heard him crow in weeks), but fine. Get out towards the coop all the roosters are accounted for and like Chipmunk agitated. Then I start counting hens, 2 CMs on the broken attempt at a chicken tractor and 2 CM, 2 WL/EE, and my BA/EE over by the old tractor tire. Meaning that Dolly (BR), a CM, my last BA, and George (RIR) are missing.

I start looking around checking for blood, feathers, prints, etc. I found some prints which I'll take pictures of when I buy batteries. I found some black feather in the one nesting box, which might be from my missing BA. After my first attempts at finding anything, George comes running down the hill at full speed. I checked her out and she is fine no injures just freaked out. I go to check out the field were she came out of and find a patch of CM feathers. Do a quick check on the rest of the field and down the road, and go back to the feather spot and glance a little to the right, there is another feather spot so I go to it and about a foot from there is a blood spot.

I didn't find anything else, but I presuming that I have lost my 1st CM and we will give it a couple days before we declare Dolly and the BA gone. Also it looks like Caramel has damaged his leg, he is limping and it's swollen in a spot, but doesn't have any breaks that I can feel.

Saturday, February 26, 2011

The Land of Painted Caves

I got my copy of The Land of Painted Caves on Feb. 16 as part of the Goodreads giveaway program 
Here is my review as written on Goodreads:

I won this in a Goodreads give away. It just arrived Feb. 16, 2011 I need to finish rereading Shelters of Stone and then I'm starting!

Page 98- So far not much new info and lots of repeating, from the other books and from earlier in this book.

Page 342- I am honestly getting bored, too much repeating and the story isn't moving that much, the beginning is when Jonayla a baby then skips ahead 4 years at page 307.

Page 474- I'm still not seeing much of a point or good story, and I'm sick of hearing how wonderful Ayla is it's talked about almost every chapter.

Page 704- Part 2 ended up being just as bad as part one, but part 3 starting on page 511 is the series I fell in love with and it might save the book from getting 2 stars.

For the first two sections of the book I hated it,I wanted to burn it, through it at a wall, something to show my frustration and as far as I'm concerned they should have just deleted those parts. But the third as I said above is the series I feel in love with. It wrapped up the story and stuck true to the heart of the story. But Jean M. Auel you should have skipped the first to sections and just added a chapter or two to the third to sum them up.




I ended up giving it 3 stars because of the last section (and the fact Goodreads doesn't have half stars). I wouldn't buy this book, I would just get it from the library and that about sums up my feelings towards this book.

Tuesday, February 22, 2011

I hate snow...

Yesterday the plan was to take Carmel and Butterscotch to the vet to get rabies shots so they could get neutered, get my allergy shots, and then get me to play practice. While it didn't happen that way.

It started out fine Mom got home with two new cat carriers because we needed new ones. Pack up the cats and head out, end op forgetting my serum so I can't get my allergy shots. We get the cats to the vet sit in the waiting room watching the other animals, a big brown mutt, 2 what might have been bad quality retrievers one an adult the other a puppy, a black and white mutt, a couple orange cats, a few gray strip cats, what appeared to be Persian kittens, and a little black and white dog. Got the boys taken care of and scheduled for neutering the same day as Nick (Nick was in Friday for shots, and getting scheduled). And we headed out.

It had started to snow, but we weren't that worried, we are in Western PA snow happens. We went to Burger King (which has the most tasteless food, but some what fast) to eat, getting a little worried about how fast it was falling because we weren't to get a lot until night. But we head out in the hope of getting me to play practice. We start down the road and the hill that is one of the ways to get to town is blocked off by several vehicles, so we turn off and decide to go cross country.

We are going slowly because of the snow blowing so hard that we can barely see. We get to another steep hill and a Bug is skidding on it, they end up turning around a going back down and we mange to get back up. And start down the road, get to the next hill and 3 or 4 cars and trucks are backing down it. The little Bug is back and realizing it can't go up the hill, at least right now, it pulls into a church parking lot. We end up backing up and joining it while the others get off the hill.

We try at the hill once the other vehicles got off and failed. So we park again and wait in the hope a snow plow will come through. So we sit and wait, and talk and I read by the streetlights in the parking lot. Nothing comes, even after waiting an hour. So we try again, and then turn around and see if the original hill is cleared off. All the vehicles are gone and we just mange to climb the hill and stay on the road to get to town.

Having long ago given up on play practice, we head to the ambulance garage (my dads a paramedic so we have been there a lot)  to use the bathroom and to call our neighbor with his truck to come get us. But we got home safe and sound in the end.      

Monday, February 21, 2011

So much for that....

Yesterday I was going to post a post about how almost all the snow had melted and we could see grass, then it did this:

Thursday, February 17, 2011

Seeds

My seed order came yesterday from RareSeeds.com , they are all here plus a free packet of celery:
 My ordered seeds plus the seeds I bought at Walmart, I had thought I had removed Bottle Gourds from my online order but I apparently didn't so I'll see which does better Rareseeds or Burpee seeds from Walmart:
 and what I was trying to describe the other day, little seed starting things 3 boxes of them from Walmart:

Wednesday, February 16, 2011

George

George during her stay inside, escape from her cage twice. The first time I came home and she was sitting on my top shelve, surrounded by poop. Second time my mom found her and lured her back in her cage with water.


She has feathered out some and has started to lay again, here is a picture from about 2 weeks ago:

But today with our warm weather I moved her outside and besides some chasing from the roosters all went well. I took all her old bedding (newspaper) and dumped on the garden, and then vacuumed my room. She had recently started to scratch through the newspaper causing my rug to get disgusting. I'll post some pictures of her new feather growth soon.

Monday, February 14, 2011

It's Warm, Well Warmer....

Today it is 40 degrees! It doesn't sound that warm but feels wonderful after our freezing cold weather. The coop door broke more and I'm still looking for the drill. But George apparently likes her space she layed an egg yesterday.

When I got home yesterday there was 6 eggs in the nest boxes plus George's, my thought being "Oh mom missed some eggs when gathering" which is something that happens when I'm not here. But today when I watered them (that makes them sound like plants doesn't it?) there was 6 eggs, 4 in a box I am sure I emptied and the other 2 I might have missed last night. But that means laying is going up either way.  

Sunday, February 13, 2011

I Can't Wait Until Spring....

First I'm sorry I haven't posted much things got busy. But I put in my major order of seeds to Rareseeds.com to the tune of $50. Then at Walmart yesterday I spent about $12 on some more seeds that I hadn't ordered online and 3 boxes of little seed start things (I post pictures later I can't describe them) with 36 in each box. But I still have to order seed potatoes.

George is still in my room but is doing well and is growing new feathers. But the coop isn't doing so well, because of the ice freezing under it and lifting it up, and me trying to pull it open farther then the few inches it was stuck at, it is broken. To make matters worse the drill was misplaced, so I haven't fixed it yet.

In other words I can't wait until spring and warm weather!

Wednesday, February 2, 2011

Do we need a sequel?


I really liked 13 Little Blue Envelopes, it was a good read, with a good ending. Never ever thought she would write a sequel or need to, but today I found out she has. It is titled The Last Little Blue Envelope and it releases April 26th. I can tell you where the title comes from, (Spoiler!) at the end of 13 Little Blue Envelopes the last envelope is stolen and is never recovered. Apparently a boy in this book is holding it ransom, for what we don't know. So we will see how this all works out....

Snow days....

Yesterday and today have been snow days here. We have been getting freezing rain and are to get at least a couple inches on top of it. The chickens are staying locked up for at least a little bit longer, maybe all day, because they can't really do much outside.

George last night at about 9:30-10:00 just freaked out, so I got up and picked her up and held her and got her calmed down. Then sit here down on the floor to move around while I was up, she looked around and jumped on top of her cage and continued to look around. I let her do that for awhile and just watched, then tried to pick her up to put her back in her cage. She freaked and I had to hold her (for some reason getting picked up freaks her out but holding her close calms her) and I final got her in the cage and calmed down.