Well, its been a long time since I did any updates, so I thought I would get to it.

Sugar has come a long way from a chicken catcher to a decent watch dog. She watches the chickens closely, maybe a little to close sometimes, but mostly watches. She likes to sit in the morning and watch for squirrels, which she will terrorize if they set foot on her ground. She has settled down some, minds fairly well and has even learned to play in the water some. A long road for us from rescued to chicken protector. She hates the crows, if a crow comes near she stalks them and rushes in for the kill, misses them but tries so hard. Yep a long road but well worth it.

This is one of the mommies, we have had several this spring, but she has taken them outside for the day. Sugar likes the babies way more then the mommy likes, but so far no chicken nuggets for her.

Here some of the chickens are getting a drink, its been hot here so they group up around the water.
The bee yard is expanding. I now have a hive of Russians, they seem to get on well with the Italians. several hives have gotten hot this year. They boil out when you open the top, it can be startling the first time you experience it.
More chickens, here the Americana rooster and a hen are walking around.

I'll post more later.

new hope

Well I found a new dog today at the humane soc. Her name is Sugar, she's 3 years old and was abandoned and found 2 months later in an apartment. The vet says she's a 3 year old puppy, o joy, but the high energy can be fund to watch except she wants to catch the chickens. I may have to rename her Sugar the sanguineator. Other then that she's the spitting image of Ginger. We will see how it goes but looks like a lot of training. O happy day

A Hard Loss

I just wanted to let everyone know, the Mighty Ginger has fallen.

I rescued her from the pound when she was about 3 and had her for 5 years or so, and while she didnt do much, she was always there and happy to see me.

I will miss you my old friend.

The years end

This was an interesting picture to get. It seems that for all her liking the lime light, she didn't want me to catch her sporting antlers. But it the time of year when all deers that can, grow horns. So ...

From Grumpy and the Dogdeer, Mary Christmas and Happy New Year

Baby Adventures

It seems the babies are flying better then ever. As you can see there is one on the eves of the coop, when I went to get the pictures there were three of them sitting up on top. They seem to enjoy stretching there wings.

Bad Buzzzzz

O this is bad, this is wax moth damage. As you can see they have eaten wax and made tunnels.


This hive was very weak. It went queen less for several weeks and had few bees and no brood. I added a queen and some extra bees but it seems it was not enough to hold off the pest. I will sanitize this hive and frames ad reuse in the spring.

On a happier note, some of the white rocks are laying, I think, here's a pic of one of them, she posed nicely for the camera.

Always something to do

The babies are growing bigger everyday, as you can see. They are now eating about 5 lbs of feed a day for the 25 of them. They have discovered that they like pumpkin, while the adults seem to not eat it, they babies devour it. Yellow squash and zucenni is also high on there list of favorites.

I've recently added some new concrete pads for the bee hives. I didn't like the leaning block foundations so i poured some larger pads. 1 pad will hold the block for 1 hive so it will be more level then before and more stable. The bees get lost if you move the hive a Short distance like this so I move it a foot or so every 2 days. This way they can find there way home and soon the hives will be on new foundations.