It's the time of year where production in the garden can come to a standstill. The hot days have left a lot of sunburnt plants in their wake. Everything is looking rather strained which is probably a reflection of myself of late. The heat puts strain on just about everything and it wasn't helped by the loss of one of the rabbit kittens at 11 days old.
... and then there were three...
Sadly we lost the brown one.
Death is unfortunately interlinked with life and the more life you have around you then it goes that the more death you will also have to deal with.
We also had a quail die this week, but they aren't long lived anyway and they can be either as tough as old boots or incredibly fragile. You can never quite tell when they're going to keel over, but then they can be absolutely fine after having been rolled around like a football in a storm!
I have some quail eggs in the incubator to add some young blood to the flock and two broody hens are sitting on chicken eggs. One's a proven mother, but the other is a first timer and she's a viciously protective broody. I don't know if that's a good or bad thing yet.
Buffy is back in the brood!
On the positive side I advertised our 5 four month old Easter Egger pullets and they were snapped up. Point of lay pullets (that's young female chickens, for those that might not know) have always been easy to sell anyway, but I've never found it this easy! So I guess it’s been worth the effort we've put into the training of our araucana rooster, Zeus.
A hard thing about growing chicks up for selling is they are so easy to get attached to, especially when they're as sweet natured as these guys have been.
Speaking of Zeus, I'm pleased to be able to say that he has improved so much lately. He's stopped trying to challenge and attack my youngest daughter, meaning that she can help me out outside again without him going off. It feels like were getting our cuddly boy back again. I'm hoping as he ages he'll mellow even more.
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