vacationYes, it is that time of year when many people – especially those with kids out of school – take a summer vacation. They go visit their folks in Kansas (Hi, Mrs. Higbee), they send kids off to camp or to visit their relatives, they go camping, they go to beach, or Alaska, or, or, or.  I just want to remind you that, when you go on vacation, your local egg supplier is left with extra eggs to sell. Just sayin’.

This evening we boxed up eggs to be delivered the next couple of days. We boxed up 14 dozen and still have 10 dozen to find homes for! That’s a lot of extras, and we already sold 6 dozen on Sunday.  It doesn’t seem like we’re getting tons of eggs, but I guess we are. Summer is just a fickle time of year.

Not only does summer mean that more people are on vacation, it also means that the temperatures rise and we see more chicken fatalities. In the last few weeks, we’ve lost 6 chickens. Two were meat birds, who sometimes have a lot of difficulty with the heat because they are just so huge… and the remainders were simply done in. We always see a rise in deaths during the summer. Sue has already ordered some more layers to come in the fall so we can replenish what we’ll lose over the next few months.

The-Disabled-List-LogoWhen the days are long and hot, and often accompanied by hot winds, there’s just not too much you can do about it. We still have a few birds that are on the DL and we’re watching them. I think we’re gonna have to bring Leggs back in for a bumble foot treatment, we just can seem to get her 100% clear. One of the apple ducks hurt her leg and she is in isolation inside the Coop. They do better when they are around their compatriots. She’s been in about 6 days and we hope that, if she keeps resting and keeping movement to a minimum, we’ll be able to release her shortly. We have an Easter Egger (whom we’ve dubbed “Weezie”) that has some type of upper respiratory illness, which is almost gone; we’ve been dosing her with naturally derived herbal antibiotics and putting Nutri-drench in her water (another herbal supplement) – maybe in another week or so we’ll be able to place her back in GenPop. The final bird is a Leghorn that was attacked yesterday – I found her in shock under the RCW. She’s now in a cat carrier slowly coming out of it. We’re hoping if we give her a couple of days of isolation that she’ll snap back. We’re never really sure what causes them to attack, but she got it good.

summer thank youWe always do our best to nurse them back to health, but sometimes they just give up. We’ll keep you posted on the DL with periodic updates as things improve – or not. Until then, as always~
Thanks for reading!

Today’s Weather: Rather a nice day. Hot, around 95°, but Sue says it was a cool 95°.  The winds helped with that.  Currently at 8:55 p.m., it is 76° with 10% humidity and winds sw at 8 mph. Overnight low will only get down to 55°. Sunrise was at 5:15 and sunset was at 7:26. Only 3 more days until summer is officially with us.

Egg Report: Monday – 36 chicken, 2 duck. Tuesday – 35 chicken, 4 duck.