whew

ok, seems the archive function in my blogger account was messed up.. so turned it off, published page, fixed problem.. turned it back on, republished.. archives are now fixed and working and so are all my messages.. damm i hate computers!!!! LOL

found a really nice barebones system on ebay i’m gonna buy on the 30th.. 2.6 gig mb, 2 gig chip and fan, nice case included.. for only $150 including shipping.. not too bad of a deal.. comes with builtin sound and graphics but i have a new graphic card so will have to turn that off before i load it up first time.. got the new dvdr drives, new floppy, two harddrives, modem, etc.. just need a better mb.   so hopefully, in little over 2 wks, i’ll have a newer, better working piece of $hit and throw this pos in the dumpster! *s*  i’ll let ya know how it turns out.

Here’s a new pic of Charlotte.  Turned the babies out in the big pen yesterday, and Charlotte is sooooooo jealous!!!  I had to sit in the pen with them for a couple hours to keep her from attacking them all the time.. they were having a blast exploring their new larger space.. and fighting with the ducks over the corner of the fence! lol.. just gotta luv em!

Hugggggggggglez!

well heck

i posted two updates in the last week and neither of them are showing on the page.. hmmm.. wonder what is going on here.. oh well, here we go again in a nutshell sotaspeak

only one egg hatched out of the last batch.. something killed them all when i took them out of the egg turner… arghhh.. so not a single aracuana chick, just one of my red mixes.. dammit.. oh well, will try again with the delaware eggs i got yesterday and see how they do.  the 7 babies from 2 hatches ago are doing great, gonna turn em out to the big pen tomorrow.. let them run around the pen all day while the big girls are out, and then see how they do when their mama’s come in to roost at nite *s*.. should be fun.. lol

the 3 baby ducks are doin very well, i put them in the big pen last weekend cuz i needed the cage for the chicks.. they were driving Mr Nibbles nutty and wouldn’t let him eat, so he was losing too much weight.. just have the one baby in with him now and she doesn’t bother him much.  anyway, back to the ducks, Jack still doesn’t acknowledge them as being part of his species so he hasn’t adopted them into his harem yet.. Spidergirl keeps chasin em so i think she knows they are females and she doesn’t want ANY competition from them!!! lol.. i named em Daisie, Ditzi, and Dora.. Dora was named by my g-nephew who i ‘gave’ her too.. since big brother Jake owns Spidergirl. 

Charlotte is doing wonderful, she follows me around every time i go outside and really gets upset if i leave ‘the yard’.. lol.. she’s a real character.. i’m goin to try and find her a boyfriend soon so she can raise some babies of her own maybe.  she’ll prolly start laying in another couple months, so will have goose eggs to eat !! yummm.. don’t know if they are as rich as duck and turkey eggs, but am assuming they are.

k well that’s it for this week.  ya’ll have fun!

well the new graphic card i bought in march.. died on me.. kept crashing this stupid pos every 2 mins.. grrrrrr.. so took it back to office max and got a new one.. couldn’t find my receipt anywhere.. put in a ‘safe’ place and now can’t find where it is.. lol.. u know how that goes right?  but they looked up on their computer and saw where i bought it, so no problem.  sure glad i paid the extra 12 bucks for the 1 yr warranty now.. i’ll never buy another hardware piece from them without it!!

not much else goin on.. the baby chicks (7) are growing well and will be putting them out with the big girls prolly this weekend.. was gonna do it this weekend but Alberto blew thru with lots of rain (which we badly needed!!!!) and so kept em in the pen a little longer.. i did move them out of Mr Nibbles house though, he’s been losing weight cuz they won’t let him eat anything! lol.. so Sweetie is the only one in with him now, she’s just 1 wk old (yesterday), and not sure what to make of Mr Nibbles yet.. i hold and pet her a lot, gonna make her a pet.

that’s it for now, have a great week!

oh happy days!

just a quick update that i hope i can get posted before this pocrapola computer crashes on me again.. has been a helluva week.

first, got my new dvdr drives this week.. and as soon as i installed them and booted up WinXPsux, windows ate itself.. grrrrrrr.. so had to format.. again.. and reinstall the pos program again.. i hate windows.. i think i’ll switch to linux .  anyway, i accidently hit the cpu fan with my finger (BIGOUCHIE) and busted a couple blades off and so now the damm thing makes a hellacious racket and vibrates so much that the memory card gits loose and crashes this po$hit!  I am sooooo fed up with this piece of $hit!  but.. the good news is.. the drives work great! lol.. when i can keep this pos running that is.  oh, did i fergit to mention i got the drives on Tuesday.. the 6/6/06th?  yeah.. the devil did it alright!

Another good thing on Tuesday, one of my chicks hatched.  A female, red mix, and doing great.  Had a black chick trying to hatch yesterday, and never got out of the shell.. dammit.  Don’t know why the black chicks all die before they finish hatching, or soon after.  Is a mystery, but the black sex-link hens mixed with my rhode island rooster isn’t working too well.  .sigh.  well i still have 11 aracauna eggs due to hatch today.. so far nothing cheeping with them.. and about 1/2 doz of my rhodeisland crosses to hatch also.  will let u know in the next few days what happens with them.

and that’s the news fit to print so far this week.  and how has ur week been?

the babies!

here’s a pic of the babies i took a few days ago.. they are growing so fast!  Mr Nibbles loves to cuddle with them, and they are finally used to him and they hop all over him all day long, picking bugs off his fur and snuggling with him at nite. 

have more eggs in the incubator, candled em yesterday and most of them seem to be fertile and making babies.. have 14 aracauna eggs i ordered from ebay in there this time.. i love aracauna chickens.. they are just the sweetest birds! and of course, they lay beautiful pastel colored eggs *smile*.  I love Delaware chickens also, had a few in texas and one especially was such a pet! she’d sit on my lap every morning and eat her ‘snacks’ from me then she’d come in the house and eat cockroaches.. lol.  and she was housebroke, never pooped on the floor! i want some more of the delaware breed, they lay awesome huge brown eggs.  hopefully, i’ll get a rooster from the delawares or the aracuanas and can replace Freckles.  He’s gotten sooooo mean, even tho i clipped his spurs.. he still attacks kids and people constantly and it’s very annoying.

On a personal note, thank you daughter for the Mother’s Day phone calls! I love you!! I was zonked out asleep when u called, which is why i didn’t answer the phone, but i sure appreciate ur calling sweetie!!!!  I was in shock all week and I was so proud of you! Love you always, “Mom”.

Have a great week!

Charlotte

well i feel dumb.. laffin.. Charlotte is a brown chinese GOOSE, not a duck.. i could have sworn the lady at the feed store said she was a duck.. but maybe that’s just what i ‘heard’ and not what she said at all.  oh well, anyway, Charlotte continues to grow.. she’s so funny.. she’s scared of the chickens and Jack the drake.. but she chases Spider girl duck all over the place.. harrasses her no end.. i told spider she’d regret chasing Charlotte when she was smaller.. lol.. i love my babies!

had 8 chicks hatch, but 7 are surviving.  the one that died was a black chick and they picked on her so much, wouldn’t let her eat.. then she caught a cold and died pretty quickly, even tho i gave her medicine and all.  sigh.  But the other 7 are doing great, have moved them out with Mr Nibbles and he’s taking good care of them.  He loves baby chickens, and has successfully raised over 2 doz of them.

Update

well has been a few weeks.. the babies from my first hatch expired when they were a few days old.. i think they caught a cold from my grand-nephew.. cry.  But, good news, is i have 7 babies so far from the 2nd hatching, and more still hatching, and they are all doing well.   I’ll post pictures in a few days, after they git fuzzier *hehehe*.

Here’s a pic i just took a short while ago of Charlotte and Yeller the chick.  They are growing so much every day.  Charlotte still thinks she’s a chicken, and the chicks still think they are ducks.. they haven’t started socializing with the older birds at all yet, even though they are staying in the big pen with them at night now.  Charlotte still follows me around everywhere i go outside, but she doesn’t let me pick her up as much as before.  She is sooooo cute tho as u can see by the picture below. *grin*.  Toodles and God Bless You.

27 April 06

well.. as for hatching eggs, all i can say it has been a few years since i did it, and you could call this first batch a moderate success.  LOL.  out of roughly 40 eggs, 8 hatched, but only 3 lived for more than 24 hrs.  some died right after hatching, some died while they were trying to get out of their shells, and most died before they broke the shell.  Not sure if it was the irregular temperature problem i was having or what.. but i’ll fix that with buying a temp regulator that will maintain the temp that its sposed to be without my having to adjust it.. as well as buying a forced air fan attachment.. that should help hatching also.  Also gonna buy a real candler, so the lightbulb i was using doesn’t ‘fry’ the babies in the shell.   anyway, the 3 babies that lived after 3 days.. died on the 5th day.  I had let my nephew hold them the day before, not knowing he had a bad cold, and i guess they caught it and they all died quickly after that.   they were doing so well too.  oh well, i’ll know better next time not to let anyone near them till they are at least a week old.

here’s a pic of Yeller II, Rosie II, and Charlotte the duck.  I bought them from the feed store where i get my feed at now.. they hatch babies all year long.  i bought these 3 the first week of march, charlotte a week later, and they are doing great, as you can see.  Turned them ‘out’ today for the first time and they all had a blast.  i think charlotte thinks she’s a chicken, or the chickens think they are ducks, cuz they stick together and don’t wander far from each other.. laffin.  they were a joy to watch all day, discovering dirt and taking baths, chasing flies, eating grass (they mowed the lawn bigtime today! lol).  They’ll be ready to put in the big pen soon with the big girls, soon as RosieII starts ‘roosting’.. Yeller roosts, but Rosie still sleeps on the bottom of the pen with Charlotte.  Is hilarious, Charlotte tries to get on the roost with Yeller, and can’t figure out why she can’t.. laffin.

have a great week! Huggggggggglez.

Poultry update

well down to 11 chickens, freckles and 10 girls.. but all of them are laying, so i get an average of 8 eggs a day.. when the squirrels and snakes don’t get em.. grrrrrr

still have the two baby buff chicks and they are growing fast.  bought a baby brown chinese duck, named her Charlotte.. she’s growing very well.. have all 3 in with Mr Nibbles and he snuggles em and cleans em and takes care of them.. he loves taking care of ‘babies’.. prolly a little odd for a rabbit to do that, but he’s a very good ‘father’.

Spider is growing rapidly.. turns out she’s a female, just like i thought and told my sister, but of course, she knows better.. LOL.. but she’s WRONG again.   Goblin died on the 8th of April, no idea why, went out to their ‘pen’ that morning and he was stretched out and stiff, Spider along side him keeping him company i guess.. Spider was pretty upset all day, so I kept her in the house with me all day and night, and then put her outside on Sunday.. by Monday she had found “Jack” the mallard and has been following him around ever since.  He protects her, takes her to all his feeding spots, and keeps the chickens from pecking her.. is so funny to watch the two of them together.. Jack finally has a girlfriend again, and he’s very happy.

None of the eggs i was trying to hatch worked out.. threw em in the woods for the snakes.. bought a real incubator on the 1st and put about 3 doz eggs in it.. hopefully this time next week i’ll have maybe half of them hatch!  Will let you know, not sure they are going to do right, cuz i couldnt get the temperature set right for the first few days.  I was using the thermometer from my aquarium because the one with the incubator was missing, and i’d have the aq therm at the right temp but the one for the incubator was showing 10 degrees lower, so by the time i got everything adjusted to the right temp, i don’t think the eggs are any good anymore.. oh well.. will find out in a week if any are going to hatch or not, and if not, will just start over with fresh eggs.

so that’s it for now.  Happy Easter to everyone and hope you have a great finish to this month!

 

3rd wk of March

Well i have 9 eggs in a homemade incubator, and i candled em yesterday and looks like all of them are developing normally.  so another two weeks and i should have chicks hatching.  Bought a couple buff orpington chicks from a feed store i found out north of town, they hatch a bunch all the time out of their own incubator.  I want to start raising aracaunas and delaware’s tho, so i have to order chicks from a hatchery online.  will build an extension onto the existing chicken house and fence it off so that they don’t interbreed with the rhode islands and black rocks. *s*

My sister bought a couple duck babies at the flea market over the weekend, so now i have 4 babies i’m raising for the moment.  Will be several months before they are big enough to join the rest of the flock.

Update on my girl that died and another i had to put down.  Turns out it wasn’t any disease, it was anti-freeze poisoning!  My brilliant brother-in-law drained some antifreeze out of my sister’s car and just left it on the ground.. so naturally, my chickens got under there and got enough to make two of them bad sick.  A third, “gramma”, got a little of it, but she seems to be recovering.  She had some vomit for a couple days, but no paralysis and lethargy like the other two, and she’s eating and drinking normally now.  So some good news at least.  But i’m down to just 11 girls and Freckles the rooster now.. until my chicks hatch and grow and the new chicks i’ll be ordering come in. 

So that’s pretty much it for this week.  May God Bless u and keep u safe.