Happy Harvest Blog
How is Cheeks?
Cheeks is great! Her brief supervised outings and chaperoned dates quickly turned into twice a day solo forays that got longer and longer. At first she would come in wiped out, eat (or skip eating), drop into her banana box and sleep for hours. You could see her building strength though, and she could stay out longer and longer before wanting to come in. She was more of a solo chicken at first, as the other chickens still lived in the greenhouse and gravitated towards their food dishes over there, while she stayed very near the house.
miracle on banana box st.
Cheeks has been doing very well. She still lives in the house, as she has for months, continuing to be low maintenance (except for a predilection for beak-sweeping her food); and self regulating, staying in her banana box or on her Rubbermaid (her proscribed territory) and moving between the two on her own. She has been doing better than ever, although the swelling on the top of her foot continues to grow. It's a bubble that looks about to drain every day.
Next I would like to try poached
Cheeks' condition is about the same. She seems quite well, other than her foot, which she only sometimes uses. HW is starting to accuse her of just milking it. Cheeks gets a fried egg.
Operation Cheeks
Cheeks is well. She needed her afflicted foot addressed, and redressed.HW likes to hold her up sitting on her tail, and that it makes her look like a little person. She is surprisingly very ok with this. Whatever you do, don't put these pictures on the internet! From this upright position, she is very involved in the whole operation. Quiet and still, but watching it all up close. I had to flush her wound and try to squeeze out any pus.
Cheeks the stork
Cheeks is doing much better than when this photo was taken a few days ago, and that aloe in the background is doing much worse. She’s done quite a bit of standing on both feet today, which is an improvement. She really likes to roost on the edge of the box when she’s done eating. She spends a lot of the day there, watching us come and go. She doesn’t miss anything, and I can tell when she wants to go in her banana box for a nap.
I feel like some aloe today
Says Cheeks. She took a whole arm off of this plant (right), and a couple of beak shaped bites out of another arm. Then she took the tip off another plant. She really ate quite a lot of it, despite the bits she left behind. Apparently, today she just wanted some aloe. It’s good for her. No one else is eating it (I’ve tried, I find it bitter). This is the box she stands on, to eat, and just to hang out for a lot of the day.
Then there were eight - nine
Last night when I yoohooed Galahad and crew in to the open greenhouse door, I was horrified. Only eight keets came with him! He did his doorway pause, and satisfied, he went in and they proceeded to shuttle up to their perch. But! You're missing two! Where are they?! A white and a grey one were missing. I came upon the grey one hunched in the weeds nearby. Immediately I knew he was hurt, and when I tried to coach him to the door, he demonstrated a limp on the right side, and more alarmingly,
Auntie Apples- the end of the house chicken era
The little crippled chick was feeling much better today. She started the day with some demanding chirps, so I tucked her in with HW, which always makes chicks happy. After a cozy nap, she got restless and I put her back in her box. I desperately needed more sleep. We had a big driving day and it's not good waking up feeling nauseously sleep deprived. But she wasn't having the box. Cheep! Cheep! CHEEP! CHEEP! CHEEPCHEEPCHEEPCHEEPCHEEPCHEEP! Chicks are loud. Arrgh. I shuffled downstairs, wrapped her in my t-shirt, and tried to go back to sleep with her tucked in against me.
It's practically a bird hospital around here.
So there I was, a bird in the hand, scorching hot day, heavy bicycle, a kilometer from home. What to do?I rode home one handed, with the bird in the other hand. I sort of displayed her in front of me, somehow hoping that a passing driver would stop and offer assistance. Is that a bird? Can I help?
Jailbird
On Saturday I was shocked awake by a bird smashing into a window with the force of a snowball. I ran outside and found the bird gasping and quivering on its back, scooped it up, and took it in, holding it for several minutes, with my whole hand wrapped in a towel for dark, soothing.
Instagram.
I may not make a blog post every day, but at least I Insta.
Bite size.
