BBQ with the Flock, not of the flock
We spent Saturday night having a BBQ at the farm with a multitude of family. The day had been hot but the table, chairs, and picnic blanket were in the shade of the house and as early evening settled in the temperature went from hot to warm. Burgers, hot dogs, lentils cooked ala beans, fruit salad and good company, human and otherwise. The birds on this farm are free range and like the goats and piggies, they think they are dogs or maybe even people and they slowly cluck around all the chairs waiting for a morsel to drop or for a small girl to run off and leave her plate unattended. They were in luck Saturday. These are the half grown turkeys who hang out with the chicks.
And here are some of the chickens, laying hens for the most part. And these little girls lay the most delicious eggs I've ever had in my life. The shells are something, really hard to crack, not like the grocery store eggs. Thank you ladies. Somewhere out there is a totally out of control Banty rooster named Mr. Fuzzy. Mr. Fuzzy is the terror of most of the grandgirls. He has some competition now, a new little rooster named Friendly, who is just tiny. We also get some duck eggs now and again which are large and speckly and also tasty. Unfortunately last weekend a raccoon or some similar critter did in one of the duck ladies. Later we also had a visitation by two very plump does grazing in the hay field.
Then came the after dinner entertainment. My youngest son has purchased himself a new (to him) farmer toy, a harrow bed, wot? You can tell I'm not a farm girl. (The rural places I started out in had fishing boats and loggers, punctuated by sojourns in big cities). So it scoops up a bale with the whatsit, and then it lifts it up with whoozit and the next bale scooped up shoots the previous bale out onto the trailer, somehow, kind of, I guess. The whole idea is to avoid bucking bales by hand. It's 50 years old but seems to be in good shape. That's him below with his oldest girl (hoping to drive) and an uncle figuring out how it goes. One of the several black house cats is perched on a hay bale supervising. http://dalanfarm.blogspot.com/ this is his blog with a much better explanation than mine.
And here are some of the chickens, laying hens for the most part. And these little girls lay the most delicious eggs I've ever had in my life. The shells are something, really hard to crack, not like the grocery store eggs. Thank you ladies. Somewhere out there is a totally out of control Banty rooster named Mr. Fuzzy. Mr. Fuzzy is the terror of most of the grandgirls. He has some competition now, a new little rooster named Friendly, who is just tiny. We also get some duck eggs now and again which are large and speckly and also tasty. Unfortunately last weekend a raccoon or some similar critter did in one of the duck ladies. Later we also had a visitation by two very plump does grazing in the hay field.
Then came the after dinner entertainment. My youngest son has purchased himself a new (to him) farmer toy, a harrow bed, wot? You can tell I'm not a farm girl. (The rural places I started out in had fishing boats and loggers, punctuated by sojourns in big cities). So it scoops up a bale with the whatsit, and then it lifts it up with whoozit and the next bale scooped up shoots the previous bale out onto the trailer, somehow, kind of, I guess. The whole idea is to avoid bucking bales by hand. It's 50 years old but seems to be in good shape. That's him below with his oldest girl (hoping to drive) and an uncle figuring out how it goes. One of the several black house cats is perched on a hay bale supervising. http://dalanfarm.blogspot.com/ this is his blog with a much better explanation than mine.
posted by Celia | June 01, 2009
5 Comments:
sounds like great fun at the farm! i would love being around all the animals.
we had the cutest little chicken who apparently ran away from her home and began to live in our cul de sac. she slept at night in the lower thick branches of a cedar tree in our side yard. i bought her feed and a chicken water tube and kept an eye on her since we see raccoons frequently. i worried about her safety. soon a neighbor with young boys took her in, built her a coop, bought her 2 friends, and enjoyed having her eggs. they apparently did not build the coop with protective wire underneath, and a raccoon killed all 3 last summer. it broke my heart into a zillion pieces. now i have a metal sculpture of a chicken in the little picket fenced area where her nighttime cedar tree is. we call that area of our yard "Matilda's yard," the name i gave her. :(
Charming. Looks like he is living out his dream.
Sky, so sorry about your little chicken. Raccoons are nasty, and clever at getting into things. They do in sorts of small critters, and make terrible messes. We covered our gardens with shredded Fels Naphtha soap to keep them from making the garden into their personal potty and it worked. They carry parasites as well that are dangerous to humans. For the most part my son's critters have been safe, but it is out in the country.
Oh gee raccoons. They reached right through the wire and ate the heads off a flock of my first flock of baby chicks. I learned from it, but it was gruesome. I always loved Theresa my bronze turkey, ducks, chickens and geese too numerous to count. Those were good days and great experience for our sons.
The BBQ was a lot of fun, thanks again for coming :)
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