We hid all our painted rocks at a local park, so we came home and painted some more. I’d seen some face rocks on Pinterest that were painted with just shades of black and white, using the natural rock as the skin tone. I tried one, but I like painting eyes better. I may try the whole face again if the right rock rolls in. I will coat these in Helmsman before we hide them.
Navi the hen has slipped this mortal coil. She has been struggling with impacted crop probably since last August. She was fine over the winter, crop heavy, but behaviorally fine, but the heat of summer caused her crop to expand until she was laying down more than walking. It came to two choices, put her down or try crop surgery. Turns out it wasn’t either/or. My eldest and I performed the crop surgery as described in Gail Damerow’s “Chicken Health Handbook”. We worked for 30 minutes before we couldn’t take the smell anymore and I couldn’t get anymore of the impacted material out. We cleaned her up and put her in the isolation ward. At first she seemed much better and was alert and more active. As time progressed, however, she was laying down again. Her crop was still full of matter, about the size of a billiard ball (this after we cleaned at least that much out). We made the decision to end her suffering. I followed Gail Damerow’s advice again this time from the book “Raising Chickens” and used the “suitable time-honored method” of dislocating her neck. It was not easy for me, but it was easy for Navi. I attempted a necropsy, enough to see that her crop was indeed still completely impacted with decaying grass and she would not have improved. My eldest joined me for the necropsy, and we even used masks infused with peppermint oil to mask the scent. It didn’t. I could not bring myself to do a complete autopsy. She was nothing but skin and bones and had been starving for a very long time. We built her a funeral pyre in the fire pit. We even added some twig boats to speed her journey. My youngest decided we needed a eulogy, so we shared some nice things about Navi the chicken, and my youngest is also working on gravestone designs. It is going to take me awhile to stop counting to 12.
We have a nice brick mail box, with no mail pick up flag. I tried attaching one of those plastic retrofit flags, but refused to fix it again the second time it broke. While looking for possibilities, I saw a magnet that attaches to the front of the box. I can make that. I whipped up a simple graphic, laminated it, and used a section of self adhesive magnet tape on the back.
I was a little apprehensive to see how the mail person reacted, but when I went to check, there was the magnet, set neatly with my incoming mail, and the letter to go out was gone. Phew! And if it ever does go missing, it is easy and cheap to remake. If you want to make your own, print the graphic below on card stock (I printed mine 5” wide), laminate it (I used a heat laminator, but two pieces of clear shipping tape would work), and attach a self adhesive magnet to the back (available at craft or hobby stores).
Since the snake visited, the favorite nest boxes have changed. No one is laying in the floor nest boxes, and the new favorite is the right side of the old metal nest box I refurbished. Before snake, no hens laid in that box. Ever. Now they wait their turn for it. And they make themselves fit! Egg production is still way down, or being eaten.
My eldest has a 2-year-old corn snake that has learned to open her (maybe his) own cage! She bumps the latch to turn it and eventually gets it open. Sophie the cat found her under her cage table one morning, so we had to come up with a way to lock it down, but still get it open relatively easy. We used a shoelace.
We ran the shoe lace so that we can open it without unlacing it. When it is closed, we tie it with a bow. So far the cats have not been able to get on top of the cage, so the bow should be secure for awhile. Clever snek.
