Waiting....

I don't know who's more excited, me or Caroline.

Moon Myth

http://news.yahoo.com/who-knew/huge-moon-26885908.html

 I hope this works.  Just found this interesting.

Just Waiting

Can't sleep.  Just waiting...

Our Latest Experience with Animal Husbandry

A couple of days ago, I noticed one of our chickens was behaving a little strange.  Upon closer inspection I found that poor little Rosetta's bum was extremely distended (I won't gross you out with pictures).  So, of course, off I go to research what her malady could be...thank goodness for the internet.  She was egg bound and it was life threatening.  I couldn't justify a visit to the vet (not even for sweet Rosetta) and looked up home remedies.  I brought her in and gave her a warm bath for 20 minutes, followed by rest on a heating pad to help relax her.  She spent most of the day in a tote under the watchful eyes of Caroline, Lili, and Tater.  According to most of the sites I visited, this might need to be done several times to really work.  Another option was lubricating the internal area with olive oil.  And if this didn't work, the egg would need to be carefully broken and hopefully expelled without injury to internal organs.
Well, the soak didn't work and Brett decided to skip the lubricating step.  Our surgical tools included a cordless drill, latex gloves, seringe, and tweezers.  I held Rosetta wrapped in a towel with her head under my arm.  Holding her tail feathers out of the way, we could see the egg in the vent hole.  Brett drilled a hole in the egg, used the seringe to get rid of the egg contents, and the tweezers to get the egg shell out.  All said and done, Rosetta is quickly recovering with her chicken pals out in the yard foraging and scratching.

Long Awaited Luna Moth

For those that don't know the story behind this post...Caroline and I rescued an injured female luna moth a few months ago.  She was wet due to the rain we had had and one of her wings was broken.  Caroline ID'd the moth as a female and when we returned from errands she had moved to the door frame and laid a couple of eggs.  In researching the moths, we found out that the giant silk moths when mature only live about 5-10 days, and in that time they mate, lay eggs, and die.   They don't even eat.  So, we looked up the "approved" method of harvesting the eggs and put her in the paper bag, folded the top over and went on our vacation to FL.  Upon our return we found that the eggs had hatched and many of the tiny caterpillars had already escaped to their doom (the bag was on top of the frig and the escapees had crawled into the freezer-they were that tiny).  Anyway, about twenty were still hanging about in the bag; we put them in an old fish tank and began the chore of collecting black walnut leaves (their preferred food) every day.  Our only source for these leaves was my father-in-laws tree and let me tell you, these little buggers can eat!  For the month it took them to get to cocoon stage, my in laws tree's lower branches are bare; it got to the point we had to use pole loppers to get the leaves.  Only 7 caterpillars cocooned and 5 have hatched at this point.  The following pictures chronicle our experience.

Heat Wave Happenings

While this heat wave has been great for the electricity providers, people up here are not well prepared.  They don't drink enough water and are suffering from the effects of heat exhaustion and even worse, heat stroke.  Meanwhile, Caroline and I have been doing our outside chores in the early am and then hitting the local swimming hole in the afternoons.  We may be turning into brown prunes, but the spring fed pond keeps us cool.  My gardens don't seem any worse for the heat and are doing surprisingly well; especially the day lilies.

Flowers for My Dear Friend that Needs Some Cheering Up