It has been a wicked long week and we are so glad it’s finally Friday! It seems like Monday was about a month ago. Rather than pick one thing to write on, like I did earlier this week, I thought I’d do one of those general run down things that we sometimes do to catch you up on what’s been happening around the farm. Shall we get started then?

We’ve been trying to keep up on the care of Leggs’ bumble foot issue. We gave her another “spa day”, before first aid. I guess the warm water foot bath is really quite relaxing; she always seems to nod off when her feet are soaking. We hold her up with a towel around her tummy, so she isn’t in danger of getting soaked or drowning in two inches of water. We do this to soften up the scab on the bottom of her foot, which allows us to access the infection. This time, her foot really showed some progress. Only a bit of infection remaining in one small spot. Sue cleaned it out and packed it full of antibiotic. Now, we always add a pressure bandage around the bottom of the foot to help hold the meds in and keep the wound nicely covered. Sue has ordered a homeopathic antibiotic for chickens that we’ll be trying next. We’ll first simply unwrap the foot, clean it a bit and spray on the new stuff and see how it helps. We’ll keep at it until everything is healed and there is no longer any sign of infection. We are still keeping her isolated and she hates it! Hopefully she can be reunited with the flock soon.

Next on the list is Bob. His wound continues to heal fantastically.  So well, really, that I think we can finally share a photo. As you can see, there are only two spots that still need healing. The one at the top is obvious, but there is also another spot, still healing, towards the bottom. All the darker marks are where he was either injured initially, or where the skin tore in the first two attempts to stitch him up. Poor little dude. He is getting nearer and nearer to coming out of the cone of shame. We still have to keep him mildly sedated or he just goes crazy! We’re afraid that he’ll open up the parts that have only just begun to heal. He goes back to the vet in a couple of weeks and we really hope we’ll be able to liberate him at that point. Yay, Bob!

While I’ve been having long days at work, Sue continues to work on projects here – well, of course. This week, she’s stared building with adult Legos. Well, really they are cinder blocks. The photo at the right is what her project looked like early yesterday morning. She’s building a small enclosure around some type of control valve for the pump (we just don’t know what it is exactly). Last year, in the coldest days of winter, it would get too cold and make horrific noises before the day warmed up. It didn’t take too much to keep it warm; Sue used a small rubberized carpet to keep the frost off and it seemed to keep the squealing to a minimum. By the end of yesterday, this was the completed project. Should keep things warm and tidy for the winter. She initially contemplated creating some type of gabion enclosure, but then thought that it would be too difficult to take down if something happened and it needed to be accessed for maintenance. Doesn’t need to be pretty, just needs to work!

Today, Sue took some time to fix the electric fence that had gotten a bit mangled when the RCW fell onto it. May be rather a bit difficult to see in the photo here, but she had to by pass some broken strands and splice them into others. She was able to fix all those problems and the fence is on and working fine again. Didn’t take me long to get in the habit of not worrying if it was hooked up or not; just came back in from having to go out to check it – couldn’t remember if I had hooked it back up. Had to check. Of course I didn’t. At least remembering it now saved me from waking up a 2am and having to go out there then! The other thing that Sue took care of today was putting up the braces on both sides of the RCW. These are in case the winds get whipped up and naughty again. You can see them showing, darkly behind the fence in the photo above. They should be sturdy enough, to keep the RCW upright, either direction the wind blows.

Finally for today, on Wednesday we had a surprise visit from a couple of fellow choir members. Zhenya and Carole were out driving near Palominas and thought they’d drop in for some fresh eggs. Carole seems to like chickens, so we took her around the farm – as far as she could go – and visited with those close to the house. Carole hasn’t been doing well, and had just gotten out of the hospital a short time ago. I suppose it was a fine outing for her, even though she seemed to tire quickly. Happy to have people stop by and visit. Ring us up as you’re on the way though, just to make sure that we’re at home.  The weather has been delightful the last couple of days – it’s a wonderful time to check out the farm! Take advantage :). Until then, as always~
Thanks for reading!

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Today’s Weather: Rather mild, temperature wise – around 72°. Warming up from the beginning of the week. Currently, 8:28 p.m., it is 64° and 68% humidity. Looks like we’re expecting an overnight low of 54°.  May be slightly warmer Saturday and Sunday. We may be seeing some rain on Monday and Tuesday, but sometimes that changes the closer we get.

Egg Report: Wednesday – zero goose, zero duck, 21 chicken. Thursday – zero goose, zero duck, 15 chicken. Friday – zero goose, 1 duck, 13 chicken.