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Realising that today was the last of my summer days off and not having done much constructive all week, I rushed out to the garden first thing, yea, ok, about 11.30am *yawns*, to see what I could do on my own about putting a second pop-hole in the shed so we can use the other half for chickens instead of the storage that has been there so far. During the course of the day I managed to get it all done, despite dodging showers and having to wait for ages for the cordless drill to recharge. Stoopid machine.
Piece-of-pride-of-the-day is the door I made from slats of perfectly good wood found at the recycling centre the last time I was there. Waste not, want not.
The shed is split in two with chicken wire down the middle and the two runs on either side of the shed can be locked so I can now have two different sets of chickens in the same garden.
Last week I had a horrible panic when I found red mite in the nest box. Then red mite under the lino. And more in the cracks in the walls. It is a horrible horrible thing to find and awfully dangerous to the chickens. The mites live in the wood during the day and then scurry to the birds at night. Normally the chooks should show a dislike of going to bed at night but mine never did. If you have chicks in the same box, the mites have been known to drain them so quickly that they die before morning.
I always knew the risk was high when I made the decision to have a shed rather than a plastic Eglu. But you kinda live in a haze of “It’ll never happen to me” don’t you?
For three solid days the chickens were removed from the shed while I sprayed EVERYwhere with a solution of Jeyes fluid, about twice as strong as the recommended dose, and, funnily enough, about twice the strength recommended for treating Bird Flu from your coop! I have been smelling of Jeyes all week. Please keep your fingers crossed that they have been dealt with successfully. Now I know we can get it, I will be spraying more often. Obviously the powder I have been sprinkling hasn’t been doing the job.
There are many theories about where they come from. My fear that the last girls purchased brought it in seems unfounded – more likely to be from the wild birds which have been taking advantage of the chickens being fed outdoors during this last while of good weather.
I have come up with an idea for a plastic nest box which I am hoping I can put into place this week. When it is up and running I’ll let you know how successful it has been. Anything to get away from the mite-prone wooden nest box.
In the meantime, the Pekin eggs we got from Ethan and Granda’s farm are well and truly under Summer now. I put the other eggs in with her as well but I suppose 19 eggs was a tad ambitious and she managed to break one of the not-so-important eggs under her. I don’t have the most faith in her as a broody hen. I still think she managed to kill off a hatching chick last time and now this broken egg – if any one else becomes broody the Pekin eggs will be moved out from under her as quickly as possibe.
The kittens continue to grow and make mischief. They have now learned that they can crawl behind the tv unit and climb up the cables, through a hole in the back of the unit, to appear on the shelf on top of the dvd player. This is not endearing them to Iain, it has to be said. Jessica and I spent a good 10 minutes today trying to extract Flossie from there. No sooner had we done that but there was another kitten there. . . and so it went on until we realised that extracting them back into the room wasn’t working. They had to be locked in the kitchen before they stopped reappearing!
Just so you know, there is no way they are being fed at the table, no way they are having anything other than their own food, and no way they are being allowed to eat out of our plates. Just so you know.