A Little Farm News

This morning when I went to the coop to tend the chickens, I heard a new sound. A rooster sound! A cock-a-doodle-doo sound!! Mr. Bernie is behaving more like a rooster every day, and this morning he had his first vocalization!

Bernie is a handsome Ameraucana,

Adam enjoys watching the chickens erupt from the coop 

each morning when I open their door. 

This morning they chose to perch on the garden chair.

Ethel is my Barred Rock that's facing the camera. 

See how red her face/comb/wattles are?

That means she'll soon begin laying.

Lucy (another Barred Rock below) may be my favorite. Her face is still pink, not red. She's skittish and won't let me touch her feathers, but she'll cautiously let me stroke her beak. And she'll come to me and look at me and get close. Ethel would never do that. She doesn't always hang with the other chickens and seems to march to her own drummer.

This is Punkin, my Ameraucana hen. She's also a little independent. Each morning she stays in the coop last after the others leave and eats the layer pellets peacefully by herself. Chicken Introvert.

In the corner by the chicken yard and the orchard this gourd plant has overrun everything.
It's more than massive. Adam let it grow from the doggies' graves from sentimental feeling because they used to play with the gourds and leave the seeds everywhere. If he'd known how obstructive it would become, he would have yanked it from the ground long ago!

Still, it's producing some large, bright yellow "fruit."

When the plant is dry, and the gourds are too, 

I hope to sell them at the market if anyone's interested.

Humans and dogs have trampled the vines in the middle.

This evening we put squash and zucchini seedlings into the veggie bed

where the lettuce and garlic used to be.

We have such a long growing season that there's time for another planting.

We won't get a frost until mid-November.

A ripe pear came off easily in my hand today. 

We're wondering when they'll be ready.

I'm about done canning fig preserves. The birds and insects are consuming them.

The moisture and heat cause the fruit to become fuzzy like little animals

while hanging on the tree.

The ground is slimy with rotting figs.

I made a final pint and a half today.

I'm sad to say that Adam is leaving in the morning for a long, long drive to Louisiana.

He's going to a family wedding where he will be performing the ceremony as a pastor.

It's a very long way, and he'll drive straight through.

I'm not used to having him gone.

He's renting a car, which we picked up today.

He'd reserved a little econo-box, but they had none left,

so they upgraded him to a nice car at no more cost!

He'll hardly know how to behave :)