Yet another harbinger!

IT'S AN EGG FROM SHELLY!!!!

It was around 45 degrees yesterday . . . warm enough to get a little white egg.

WOO HOO!!


Yeah, I'm a little excited.

Spring cleaning

When Hubby built the coop he put it on 2 ft. legs so the hens could have protection from the rain and later have access to the garage annex.

Over the last couple of weeks, however, the ladies have kicked all of the straw out of the annex - all out the door and under the coop. The space was then barely 6 inches.

So I spent a good hour on my knees raking and forking straw from under the coop. (I love Carhart overalls! They make kneeling in the snow comfortable!)

While I was doing this, I heard a loud squeal/skweek. Yeah - I thought - take that mouse. They have been awful this winter - so bad we have even considered giving entrance for the local feral cats into the garage.

Then I went into the garage, where all the hens were glaring at me from the dog kennel/annex. I enticed them back outside with a handful of grain, blocked their doorway and cleaned all the straw from the garage floor.

It was not until I picked up the kennel to shop vac under that I saw the dead mouse. It hadn't been me, the small rodent had dared to intrude on the hens. They dispatched it and left it.

I guess it is not rugby season.

The hens are much happier now - they can now reach the bare ground under the compost bins.


Under all that raked out straw is snow.

Obsessing

I love forsythia. It is usually blooming along with the crocuses before snow has actually melted. And some genus are hardy from Zone 2 (that would be Northern CANADA) to Zone 8 (Georgia)

So it surprises me how few bushes I have seen here in the tundra of Minnesota.

This bunch, forced into blooming on my dining room table, is from Costco. But it is feeding my spring obsession admirably.

(BTW - the fence outside the window is 8' - I don't expect to see my crocuses for a while, June maybe)

Also, yellow flowers are a much more pleasant harbinger of spring than say . . .
(that would be last year's pumpkin plant container)

What the . . !!!

So, as you know, I have 5 hens.

Shelly lays white eggs.
Tweety lays brown eggs
Jane Doe lays green eggs

Only the 2 naked necks lay eggs this color.
And NEVER more than 1 a day.

Today I cleaned the hen house and annex, taking out all the old straw and laying down new so these have not been collecting in some mysterious new nest. I found these this evening when I went out to close them up for the night. This many eggs from 2 hens??? The darker one could have been from Tweety, but she stopped laying in October with the first snow.

I am sitting here humming the theme from The Twilight Zone.

DO-do-do-do DO-do-do-do

Why Hubby Rocks

Yes, it is what it looks like.

The girls wanted to make homemade valentines for class the next day.

Snowed in

Hibernating

There is a definite line of demarcation here. Below the crunchy compact icy snow from the last few months, above - well, it has been a lovely weekend to stay indoors with a movie and my knitting.

Well, after digging out the cars anyway.

Granted we are not the Eastern Seaboard with their storms, but we got just enough snow to slow everything way down.

Not that it is so exciting around here once the temperature drops below freezing. We don't really see anyone who lives near us in the 'Hood from November to April. I ran into one of my neighbors at the library a couple weeks ago and it took me a good 10 minutes to figure out how I knew her.

This is all leading up to the last of posts. Yes, I dare say it, updates here are as scarce as hens' teeth. (Ow I know I know)

Frankly nothing has really changed other than the level of snow in the hen yard.

Between that and my reluctance to use the basement office computer with its photo software (It's cold down there! - yeah that was a whine) Not to mention the growing stack of garden catalogs sitting so invitingly next to my favorite chair.

Outside my girls peer out from under their protective coop and chastise me for their lack of running space. Meanwhile the pile of alternate layers of snow and straw in said running space looms taller and taller (currently snow is the king of that mountain). Mina and Daffodil have had a change of heart and allow the others to roost next to them. Jane Doe watches the other 4 disdainfully from one of the nest boxes.

I get a sense of deja vu. We are all in a state of limbo, waiting for spring.