Firstly, I just want to say thank you everybody for your kind comments about Cynthia. I am starting to get used to the fact that she’s not around anymore. I’ve had a few teary moments and blubbed a bit over the past couple of days, but I know that it was the best thing for her. She had a good life here and that’s what is the most important thing for me to remember.

Pattie doesn’t seem to be getting any better, nor does she seem much worse, save for the fact that she’s not drinking so much water and she’s gone off her food a little. She’s quite a bit quieter now and we suspect she has an impacted crop, or there is some sort of blockage further down the track that could be causing problems. So we’re massaging her crop, tried to get her to eat live maggots (the white ones from the fishing shop, foreign territory for me the anti-hunting anti-fishing vegetarian softie that I am), but she ended up squishing most of the ones she did eat in her beak before swallowing them down. The idea is that these particular maggots have an insinct to wriggle and bore downwards, which can help to dislodge and break up any impacted material in the crop.

Long grass and vegetation can sometimes curl into a ball, simply because it’s long and tangled or because there’s a problem in the crop, such as canker or mycosis. Then again it could be a digestive tract problem. We’re still waiting on Pattie’s fecal results (she was squitting water and little bits of poo earlier on this week when she was drinking like a fish) to see if there’s anything going on there. She may have to have x-rays to see if there’s a blockage, or bloods taken if it’s a kidney problem. She doesn’t seem to be drinking so much anymore, but her crop is impacted - like hard dough - in the mornings, so not everything is getting through. This can affect the amount of nutrition she’s getting, obviously the less she’s getting through, the weaker and more lethargic she feels. So I can’t see the vet bills stopping any time soon unfortunately.

Big sigh.

Rich has been steadily working on the new wooden compost bins. Hens shouldn’t have access to compost really, and ours regularly infiltrate the barriers and merrily spend half an afternoon scrabbling all over it before they’re discovered. So Rich has designed some very nice large wooden compost bins with lots of breathing space. There are basically two types of organism that thrive in compost heaps - those that thrive in aerobic (access to air, water etc) conditions and those that are perfectly happy in anaerobic (no air) conditions. We’ve decided to leave the compost bins with gaps inbetween the wood planks. Not because aerobic organisms are any better at breaking down compost, purely because it’s cheaper to use less wood. Rich has also designed a sloping lid with hinges to keep the hens off the top, as well as a gated front so empyting, turning and generally getting to the compost is much easier. They’ll also smarten that corner of the Smallest Smallholding up no end.

I’ve also got some seeds that suddenly germinated in the conservatory, but I have no idea what they are. I stupidly stuck the torn packet labels in as makeshift temporary plant labels, but in all the wind they blew away. What an idiot. So now I’m not exactly sure what is what. I only know what’s in the pots and which tray has aubergines in, and which tray is full of tabasco chilli seeds. The others are anybody’s guess. I think some of the cabbages might be coming through. I’ll try and post a picture of the seeds to see if anyone can help me identify them. It’s nothing to do with the picture attached to this post, that’s merely for aesthetic purposes.

One last request - I am cleaning and disinfecting my greenhouse (and henhouse) with special disinfectant from the farm shop (it’s fine for use alongside the hens). I was clearing up the greenhouse a bit today and noticed that my chives that have been growing in there all winter are infested with greenfly. I don’t like those sticky pad things, and again being a softie vegetarian I’m more into preventative actio or deterrents rather than chemicals that KILL!KILL!KILL!!!! Anybody know how I can discourage the greenfly from coming back? I was hoping to grow my tomatoes in there this year…

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 3rd, 2008 at 7:38 pm and is filed under plans, seeds, hens. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.