Today

It's another day with LOTS that needs done. It's 32* though and misty rain. The snow is melting! YAA! We still have about a foot of snow but with the melting it's compacted down and easy enough to walk on. It's also easy enough to pull a loaded sled with warm jugs of water without it tipping over. Our road is a dirt road and it's now slick ice, making the curves and turns a challenge. We now have flood warnings as the rain combined with melting snow is raising the water level in the rivers, etc. That being, it's almost MUD season!

I'm having a terrible time with the TSC chick order form. I'd LOVE to order 10 chicks of each of the 3 Brahma colors and 10 of each of the Cochin colors, excluding blue and black (have those!). I can't afford that many chicks and I have the "want it now" syndrome! Getting some this year and some next year is the more sensible way, but when it comes to chicks, common sense is a challenge for me! Which I want most is not getting me far at all either! What a conundrum!

Pictured above is a Brahma hen (white with black trim) and a blue Cochin roo. Would some buff Brahmas in that pretty buff/gold with black trim be gorgeous? YES, of course they would! I do have about 20 birds for sale so there will be room!

One of my goals is to have my purebred birds so that I can sell some hatching eggs from to help pay for feed. I'd also like to have some chicks to sell from my own hatchings. The Brahmas and Cochins are very calm and friendly so they are popular breeds.

The does are making some "serious" changes in their pregnancies. I'm wondering if Monique will be the first to kid. She has a "whole" udder and teats are separated. It just needs to fill up now with all that rich colostrum. I'm now sure who will kid next as they are all so closely due. Spirit is filling up a bit faster than Claire and Kendra isn't as far along but has had the most kiddings. While doing chores last night, I thought that I probably should have looked for a few sweat shirts or sweat pants at the Good Will Last Chance Store for cutting the arms and legs off for kid coats. I need to get a few extra bags of shavings for extra bedding to sop up the wet spots. I'd like to get a couple bags of the pelleted bedding too at that works wonders in wet spots. I like to bed with the pellets and then the shavings on top. Then the pellets contain the extra fluids in a smaller spot and are easier to fork it up and then fluff the shavings back over the top and waalaa, dry bedding.

The ice has weighted the chicken wire down in the outside pen. There's another reason that Susan's idea of cattle panels being a good idea. The cattle panels would also support tarps for covering part of the pen for protection from the rain and wet snows. I've got a job to do there to fix that up! I don't have the money for cattle panels right now (and yet I want to buy chicks - I think I have a priority issue here). I'd love to find some 2nd hand ones! There are 4 trees in the pen so I think I'll try lashing some trimmed branches between the trees and help support it with them. I also have a bit of field fencing that should help. I do need the center to be elevated to get it too high for Bandit to reach. He's being destructive with his horns.

Yes, there's a lot of post Winter work now needing done! Guess who's going to get to do it!!