On top of Mt. Walker for a Mother's Day weekend treat - such a fun time with my three men! Mt. Rainier is just to the right of my head - maybe you can see its faint outline. Click photo for more pictures.

It has been VERY exciting around here! Two hens have gone broody for Mother’s Day weekend and are crammed into the same nesting box every night helping share egg warming duty. And I have seen three viable embryos squirming around in their shells (in the incubator). Merlin is assuming his fatherly role with great seriousness, too. I try to linger at the coop during tuck-in so I can talk sweetly to Jersey (the broody hen) and commend her. But Merlin leans way over and looks upside-down under his roost to check on the two hens crammed into the nesting box. Seeing them there, he then glances over at me and hops right off his roost, landing with a thud on the floor (because he is so big) and comes over to the coop door and sharpens his beak menacingly while glaring at me sideways from under his floppy comb. I back up and start closing the door, assuring him I am just looking after the food and water. Then I go to the other door to check on the food and he ker-thunks his way over there to glare at me until I close the door. I am going to start wearing my chaps down there because it’s getting warm here and if he decides to use that beak on my bare legs it won’t be fun! He has small claws on his feet but they are growing, too. As is his spur. Funny guy – such a real character! It is so interesting to watch!

I’ve already had a wonderful breakfast made by Dave – as he always does here – and the boys are all outside playing or working in the sun. I wanted to get these pictures up for family far away, but near to our hearts, so you could be part of the day. I hope you’ve enjoyed your Mother’s Day as well and know we are thinking of you! I had fun talking to Mary and my mom this morning, with the loud racket of boys in the background. And I’ve left a few surprise Mother’s Day calls to dear friends – and fellow mothers 🙂 Love you all!

UPDATE UPDATE! Dave just reported in that there are BABIES now in the robin’s nest (not sure if she is a robin) and the kids just found TADPOLES in their little tub they’ve been watching for over a month! BIG tadpoles swimming around! It’s magic here!

Ben is helping me turn the eggs at least three times a day. He is looking forward to meeting some baby peeps next Sunday!

Last night when I candled the eggs (with a new contraption I made from a flashlight, a box, and a piece of wood, and a lot of tape – see box at right of this photo) I got to see some embryos MOVING AROUND! It was like holding a piece of the Creation moment right in your hand. Or watching an alien on a space ship. It was so cool! I am so excited to see some life in there at last. My candling efforts had been difficult the last few days – it has to be pretty dark, and you have to block out almost all the light from the candling source so your eyes can focus on the egg contents only (otherwise they’re too stimulated by the contrast between light and dark and your rods can’t help you pick up the subtle movements). It is getting really exciting here!

Then the most exciting finding of all this morning...Jersey is broody! She and HollyRamona had snuggled into the same nesting box last night (the most preferred one in the back corner) and I couldn't get the eggs out. So I came out this morning and found Jersey still there, carefully concentrating on those eggs. She wouldn't even blink when I opened the hatch and offered some corn. They say you need to move broody hens somewhere quiet but she sure looks happy and just fine in her box. She is a big hen so she put her rump out to the open area and I put a bunch of new shavings in up against her so she would feel cozy and private. We'll see if she sticks with it. This is so exciting! So 21 days from now could be interesting, too!

Here are all the eggs, and the largest one in the front with the HR on it was found this morning - it is from HollyRamona I am nearly certain! She is the only other blue egg layer, and it's bigger than the "girls'" eggs who just started laying. Finally, I found it on the coop floor - she lays her eggs from the roosting bar at night and that would explain why many of them have broken depending on which roost she's on (how high up and how many shavings to cushion the landing). SOOOO exciting to see our girl doing well and even laying! So of course I trotted it right into the warmer and we'll see if we can hatch another factory of sweet.

We are on day 7 of our incubation adventure and we saw the vitelline vessels were visible on about half of them (at least) when we candled the eggs last night! So exciting! It basically looks like a little spider sitting on top of the egg yolk. We are not sure how many of our eggs were fertilized by Merlin, so we don’t know how many of the dozen will hatch. I have them marked X on top and O on the bottom so I know if I’ve turned them. You need to alternate the overnight sides so they don’t spend the overnight on the same side each night. The hen turns the eggs about every 35 minutes, but in an incubator you shoot for at least 3 times a day, always odd number of turnings (to alternate the side exposed to the heat source each night). I also keep water in the incubator to ensure humidity levels are about right. I don’t have a hygrometer, only a thermometer, but these incubators have been around a long time so I’m hoping for the best. And this time I AM actually following directions! Ben will hopefully have a peep or two pip out on his birthday May 21! I will try to attach a picture of candling this evening so you can see. Here’s a link to what we saw just in case I can’t get a good shot: http://www.giffsfarm.com/candledeggs.html

Dave getting some compost for the garden beds, and the chickens very happy to help out!

You’d think it would be very easy – dump manure and bedding into a pile, turn over, wait, and ba-da-bing, you’ve got black gold – high-nitrogen fertilizer for your garden.

Unfortunately, it’s a bit more complicated than it sounds, especially when you’re trying to compost fresh chicken manure which is reportedly among the highest N-containing manures. I apparently didn’t turn the compost enough, so it didn’t all turn into black gold. You have to really get three piles together in three stages – new stuff, medium stuff, old stuff. It takes 4-5 months for the compost to turn into soil. If you harvest it too early, the N will be off the charts, you’ll burn your plants, and potentially contaminate them with E. coli or salmonella.

Today I bought a compost thermometer to make sure the inside core gets to 160+ to kill weed seeds and pathogens. And I’ve got multiple piles going. And I’m studying the nitrogen cycle along with Sam. Did you know that plants can’t use atmospheric nitrogen (N2)? Some plants (legumes) have a friendly bacteria (Rhizobium) which can convert N2 into NH3 which the plants can use. This is why cover crops planted over the winter are so helpful. Chicken manure and coffee grounds are also very effective in replenishing N. Our beds were pretty good with respect to P and K, according to my soil testing last week. Cross your fingers this amateur gardener can get her act together and grow something which doesn’t sicken the family. I plan to grow stuff with goes UP in the contaminated bed – tomatoes, peas? Any other ideas?

After a 4.6 mile bike/run down to the beach on a bike path, we all relaxed under Richard's corkscrew will tree, like the chickens taking a dust bath! Dave napped on that lounge chair, so now Ben is checking it out with Eagle. 🙂

We are on Spring Break, visiting mom and Richard in southern California! It is SUNNY! Our legs are WHITE! We haven’t seen them in 9 months. None of us can see in the sun, so we grasp frantically for our sunglasses 🙂 Our neighbors are taking care of our chickens and we have gotten nearly daily reports on their doings – so sweet to hear from them as they learn chicken-tending first-hand! We are on day 3 here and Ben just woke up from a 13 hour rest, catching up after several days of fun! Now we’re off to figure out what to do with the day. The original plan was San Diego for the zoo! Sam just finished building a huge Lego Technic flatbed truck with over 1,000 pieces – he spent a total of about 6 hours on it yesterday, never taking a break for food or water! I had to bring it to him and literally put food and water to his lips – such a dedicated worker! He is tireless and focused. And we still managed to get our bike/run adventure in with all that building 🙂 We have had so many laughs – one of them made me nearly choke to death on a melon. That inspired me to actually look up whether one can literally “die laughing” and it is true – apparently someone in Britain died laughing watching a goofy TV show “The Goodies”. Who knows if true or not, but it made me laugh again! My friend Ang asked how my experience with security at the airport went…so reprinted here for your enjoyment is my recounting of a fruitless attempt to get through security without causing a scene:

three violations:

1. left sam’s bag unattended at security and had to go back through and get it

2. forgot to take my own shoes off, was standing there dumbly all smiles thinkin’ I’d just licked this one and gotten everything right only to be told by the lady “ah, ma’am, your shoes?”

3. my purse  had to be scanned and rescanned then inspected – finally figured out it was the bones I had stashed in there – seal jaw bone and crab claw (huge).

Sam and Holly Ramona - Merlin doesn't like it when another "rooster" picks up one of his hens!

Sam to Merlin after fending off his posturing advances with a long pole: “I question why you PECK MY FEET!” (From Madagascar) I just died laughing.

Ben to Merlin upon seeing him mate one hen a second time: “Merlin! It’s not time to mate again!”

And earlier today at the market, Ben was holding Eagle up to the racks of salmon at the fish counter at T&C making Eagle talk: “Oh! I like salmon!” (This is Grownup Eagle talking.) Then he throws his whole body back and laughs a ridiculous belly laugh – a fake laugh that he’s been cultivating for a few days now. We got lots of looks! Ben is just so outrageous sometimes that he makes me laugh even though it’s embarrassing!

Do you remember this picture? The great bone mystery was resolved today!

I got a call this morning that my dentist had a cancellation for 9am – could I make it? Yes! I was overdue. So off Ben and I went. I hadn’t eaten anything yet but had exercised – figured that was perfect, nothing in my teeth. Ben was so good at the appointment, reading a book, talking to Grownup Eagle, checking out the window with Eagle for “mice” (pine cones), and chatting up the hygienist. Well – it all got very funny when she was asking him questions while I was unable to refute anything! She said “So Ben do you go to preschool?” He leaned back and bellowed out in a gruff voice “NOOO-HO-HO!” with a big smile on. “I go to preschool in my HOME!” I giggled with mouth propped open. Then she said “Soooo…does your mama work with you then?” “Yes!” I was hoping she wouldn’t ask any other questions which I might need to correct as his clarity is not so good – related to breakfast 90 min prior, he only got part of it correct – waffles with jam. But forgot the white creamy stuff – yogurt! I was hoping he wouldn’t just pop out with strange stories which might get misconstrued, like doing pushups right in front of the Pavilion in town in lieu of timeout  or something.  Anyway, from there we went to Bay Hay for more bedding for the chickens, coffee (should have been a half-caff but I have my doubts now) and a carrot muffin. All fired up on caffeine and very little food (remember that bit about not eating before the dentist?) we decided it was high time to figure out what this bone was. So we gassed up the truck and began our query with the Wildlife Shelter. Turns out it is NOT a CLAW! The biologist there very kindly redirected me to the right taxonomy – the class of Mammalia. Hmmm…mystery thickens. So off to the vet – who is very nice. I disrupted their staff meeting because they were all curious, helping Google various jaw bones. We finally settled on a young seal. So interesting! Which brings me back to my own jaws. The xray revealed some interesting stuff on the roots of my teeth which are likely benign tumors. (I always review my own x-rays – one just never knows, and I have learned by experience that you are not necessarily told things unless you ask – these tumors have likely been there for years but it would have been good if I had resident knowledge of that vs tracking down x rays from three moves ago!) Anyway – I sent this jaw to my dentist for laughs. The poor guy is probably wondering…and as my mom just said on the phone she can just picture my red hairs all standing straight up with caffeine all the way out to the tips (redheads are very sensitive to drugs – we metabolize them differently so that often they are more bioavailable than the norm). I hope I settle down by the time Dave gets home…off to chicken chores and figuring out how to cook trout!