Delightful ducklings!

Now I love my chicklets to pieces. I've loved them since they were tiny balls of fluff & I love them even more now that they're grown up, beautiful, on-the-soppy-side-of-friendly birds. But, in terms of baby birds, there is nothing quite like ducklings!! Alongside lambs, ducklings have to be my all time favourite Spring babies. I'm sure they hatch smiling & each & every day they seek out new adventures & pleasures in life. They are playful, exuberant & joyous! To be in the company of ducklings is to grin from ear to ear & feel your heart swell with love for them.

Daffy, Dougie, Pip, Eve, Orville & Scrummycupcake melt my heart completely. I treasure time spent with them. I can't wait to get home from a day in the office to connect with them again. Because they're hand reared they love being cuddled, & cuddled they certainly are, at any given opportunity! They grow at such a rate that you could almost swear you could see it happen! But each & every day they grow sweeter & cuter as their little personalities develop. They have lovely rounded bellies now, but are so tame that you can indulge that impulse to turn them upside down & blow delicious raspberries into that rounded fluffiness & they don't mind one little bit! It's heavenly!

When you hand rear ducklings it is very important to remember that although they are natural water babies they do not have a Mother Duck to transfer oils to their fluff & waterproof them, so when they are ready to be introduced to water it must at first be shallow & they must be supervised at all times. Their duckling fluff can become waterlogged & it is possible for them to drown in just couple of centimetres of water. So after week one, I decided to let them have their first paddle & hubby bought them a couple of paint roller tray which are absolutely ideal for the job. Can you imagine how excited they were? Well multiply that three-fold & that is just how happy they were to be able to splash about! They had a marvellous time! After their bath time I carefully dried them in a towel & made sure they were warm & cosy. Ducklings can easily chill when they're young. Now, just a few days later, they have out grown their paint trays, so last night I filled our shower tray with just a few centimetres of water for them to play about it. That was just the ticket! But they amused me no end by nosing about in my basket of bathroom products as if to say can we have some conditioner now please mum, oh & some talc would make us lovely & dry! Bless their buttons.

The new chicken ark has arrived for the chicklets & bantams, so this weekend they will be moved from the back garden up to their new enclosure in our little field. I have very mixed emotions about this! It has been so lovely to be able to look out of the kitchen window & see them happily bobbing about. However, it has been impossible to grown anything out there & my poor raised beds have been devoid of the delights of home grown vegetables for a couple of years now. So it does make sense to move them, & of course, I will have the ducklings out there shortly until they are big enough to join the rest of the ducks. Oh & then there will hopefully be some Croad Langshan chicks out there for a while if the eggs in my incubator hatch in a week's time. Then a second lot of ducklings, so lot’s to keep me busy & I guess I'm just being a big baby about it really!

After my Croad Langshan eggs & second batch of duck eggs hatch I have offered to hatch out some Scots Grey & Dumpy chickens on behalf of Caithness Rare Breeds charity which works to preserve native livestock & wildlife of the Highlands & Islands of Scotland. This came about after Stephen from the charity asked via Twitter if anyone knew where to source these poultry breeds. I knew where you could get hold of some hatching eggs, but he didn’t have the means to incubate them, hence my offer. Stephen is just trying to source a good poultry courier now so that we can go ahead. (If you know of one, do please let me know – thank you)

Croad Langshan chickens are sadly on the critical list of the Rare Breeds Survival Trust so I hope to be able to establish my own small breeding flock of these big, docile birds. I’m very excited about this little project, so wish me luck with my first hatching!

In other news, I was pleased to hear from Compassion in World Farming that Morrisons supermarkets had decided that all of it's own brand eggs should become free-range. Encouraging news that will hopefully prompt other supermarkets to follow. CIWF encouraged it's supporters to write to Morrisons to applaud the move, which I did but asked when they would extend this free range policy to all chicken meat it sells & also to it's own brand chilled & frozen ready meals. I was pleasantly surprised to get this response back the next day.

‘Good Afternoon Mrs Burton,

Thank you for contacting us regarding your concerns about the care and welfare of chickens. Please be assured that we take animal welfare extremely seriously.

We offer an own-brand range of RSPCA Freedom Food accredited chicken. The Freedom Food mark ensures that the chicken has been reared on a farm that meets higher welfare standards set by the RSPCA.

Freedom Food and Morrison’s have worked together for years to deliver the widest range of RSPCA Freedom Food accredited chicken and we currently offer the smallest price difference between this range and our regular own brand range, making it affordable for everyone.

All of our own brand fresh and frozen chicken is British and sourced from reputable suppliers who produce to recognised standards.

We are committed to providing our customers with a wide choice of poultry which is produced to nationally recognised standards, each standard having an animal welfare aspect embedded within it. Our product range includes Organic chicken which meets the Soil Association standards and is identified on pack by the Soil Association logo and RSPCA Freedom Food chicken which meets RSPCA standards and is identified on pack by their logo. Throughout our wide product offering we can competitively deliver on freshness, variety, quality and price.

We are currently working with suppliers to further extend our range of RSPCA Freedom Food poultry products (further information on Freedom Food poultry can be found at: www.supportchickennow.co.uk/freedomfood).

In addition to selling Freedom Food fresh chicken, 100% of our fresh duck range is free range and is RSPCA Freedom Food accredited, we also sell Freedom Food organic salmon and Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) accredited fresh fish.

Our premium range, ‘The Best’, contains only free range eggs in its ingredients as do some other own label products, for example fresh egg noodles. We are currently investigating the feasibility of extending this policy to other own brand products.

I trust this addresses the points you raise and we thank you for sharing your views with us.

Yours Sincerely
C Ruddick
--
Customer Services Department
WM Morrison Supermarkets PLC’

I really hope that in the not to distant future battery farming of any animal, not just chickens, is a thing of the past.

To celebrate Earth Day on 22 April I joined the Greenpeace Airplot campaign to try & prevent the expansion of Heathrow Airport. I’m now, along with thousands of others, a beneficial owner of the plot of land Greenpeace own on the proposed site for the third runway. Just click on the link in the side bar of my blog if you want to join in or find out more about it.

Well, the sun is shining & I have lovely plants to put into my front garden, so I will love & leave you for now & hope that wherever you are you are enjoying the sunshine & able to enjoy the wonders of Nature’s Spring time babies.

Bright blessings,

Sara xx

Dear Blog.......

Dear Blog, I am so sorry for neglecting you during March after you provided me with much comfort & joy & brought such lovely new people into my life. When things were busy & chaotic I ignored you for quick updates on Twitter & for that I beg forgiveness. I will make amends now by bringing you up to date with some of the stuff that's been going on in my life.........

Personally I've been on a bit of a journey recently. I 'found' Paganism & embarked upon a solitary hedgewitch path. This has brought such peace & beauty to my life & yet at the same time lots of questions & learning to be done. It has awaken the old activist side of me! I used to be quite heavily into animal rights when I was younger, but having my own children kind of buried all those feelings as the kids became the centre of my Universe. Now my soul has a home in Paganism I seem to feel keenly again all the hurt & unjustness in the world, especially where that relates to Nature & in particular animals. I have been an on / off vegetarian since my early teens but now I have become committed to a meat & dairy free diet, eating only my own free range eggs now by way of an animal product. I have strengthened my resolve to become as green as possible in all that I do. My lovely mum recently bought me some laundry products made by Ecozone that have really helped me on my way. You can read about just how much they reduce the environmental damage caused by washing & drying laundry by following this link - Ecozone - & I can personally vouch that they do really work!

I also found out just how much I love my children! Eldest Son contacted me from Uni to let me know that he had been mugged! Now fortunately he wasn't hurt & all that was taken was his mobile phone but clearly this would shake anyone up. Then it transpired that he was having health issues due to stress & anxiety caused by the pressure of his degree course & the fact that he wasn't sleeping at all well due to sharing with noisy, late night partying house mates. He was having some quite scary symptoms like nose bleeds & heart palpitations & his blood pressure was very high. Now he was dealing with all of those things very sensibly & had been to see the Welfare Dept at Uni about getting one of his work deadlines extended & had registered with a local Dr to get his physical symptoms dealt with, but I cannot tell you how much it broke my heart. I was OK when he told me as I was being strong & giving out sympathy & mum's advice, but the next day at work I just could not stop crying. I would have done anything to take the stress & illness away from him & to have erased his nasty mugging experience. The pain in my heart was more intense than anything I had experienced through troubles of my own. I just wanted to be able to fix everything for him! He's going to be just fine now I think. He's on medication to reduce his high blood pressure & he's at home for Easter at the moment enjoying some time out, some good sleep & of course, shed loads of TLC. Just his exams to get through & then it will be the long Summer break. He had already decided to part company from his current housemates & has a new house lined up for his final year with a new & hopefully much nicer, quieter crowd. The current year of his degree course is known to be the most intense so hopefully next year won't be quite so stressful for him. I know that no matter how old & grown up he is I love him right through to the very core of me & that come what may I will always be there for him, as I will be for my other 2 lads.

In animal news, lots has been happening! George & Mildred turkey are thriving and have totally wormed their way into my heart. Mildred has just come into lay & George has started 'displaying'. Now some people say turkeys are ugly, but if you get to know them they are really quite beautiful! They have the biggest, brown, soulful eyes for a start. When George displays he fan out his tail feathers like peacock, drops his snood down over his beak, puffs out his chest & stands proudly as much to say 'look at me, aren't I just so magnificent?'! He really is quite a sight to behold.

The 2 Silkies that my friend Andy collected both turned out to be cockerels can you believe it?! Silkies are such a hard breed to sex accurately! So Andy came down to visit again with another of my Twitter friends Jo (@amethysdragon) who is just such a lovely lady with an immensely warm heart & I was so glad to have met her. We had a wonderful afternoon together nattering & exchanging chook news & stories. Andy got to see how his cockerels Spicy, Snapdragon, Mr Dorking & Mulder were doing & Jo got to meet my infamous mad chicklets! Time passed all too quickly & soon it was time to exchange Amy & Patsy #1 (who are now named Patrick & Charlie!) with Amy & Patsy #2, my remaining confirmed Silkie girls.

So this left a huge dilemma with my beloved chicklets. I now had Teddy, Patrick & Charlie - Silkie cockerels. Alfie & Heathcliffe - D'Uccle cockerels. Bonkers & Big Bird - Polish cockerels. And not forgetting Rumpelstiltskin the Crele Pekin bantam that I had bought in a weak moment. With my lovely, lovely boys I only had my 3 Polish chicklet hens Conkers, Tiny & Cassie left & the other hens I had bought in - 3 Pekin girls Florence, Tilly & Tabby, my Buff Orpington bantam Clover & Barnevelder bantam Minnie. YIKES!! 8 cockerels with only 8 hens! As Patrick & Charlie had been happily co-existing at Andy's I decided to house them with Daisy & Seymour the Aylesbury ducks & George & Mildred turkey. This seems to have worked. Daisy duck loves the boys & can often be seen sat beside them in a maternal posture - very sweet! The boys were initially wary of the huge, scary looking turkeys but soon realised they were gentle & harmless. Some of my big hens hop over the divide from the main enclosure to admire & flirt with Charlie & Patrick so there are girls available to the boys if they can pluck up enough courage to woe them! However, they both seem content with their own company. They have a very strange relationship. Patrick is much bigger than Charlie & by far the more dominant of the two. Charlie is almost hen-like in his behaviour, although definitely a cockerel. So, due to this charming relationship, this housing arrangement is working a treat.


So that left 6 bantam cockerels with 8 bantam girls down in the back garden! Tensions were starting to show between the cockerels & although they weren't hurting each other skirmishes were breaking out more & more frequently. Fortunately, Jess over at the lovely Lavender & Thyme blog had very kindly offered me 3 Silkie cross hens. Phew! I really didn't want to part with any of my bantam boys, especially my chicklet boys. As a bonus it provided another opportunity to meet up with another virtual friend! So hubs & I tootled off down to Jess's place last Saturday to collect the new girls. What a treat it was to meet Jess. I can honestly say she is absolutely as lovely as she comes across in her blog & I really hope we get to meet up again. I could chat away to her for hours & hours & hours about all things chook! And it was all I could do to stop from stealing her gorgeous dog Alfie (the under gardener!) away with me! I even got to meet Syd the Muscovy duck that regularly visits the field opposite for his afternoon feed. He's a darling character! After tea & cake (yummy homemade carrot cake!) it was time to pop up to Jess's field, meet all her chickens & collect the Silkie cross hens. Jess had such a generous surprise waiting for me! Not just 3 Silkie cross hens, but 4 with my name on!! I was so grateful & they were such pretty looking things that I instantly fell in love with them. Seeing Jess's cockerels made me realise that my young cockerels (from Andy) still have a bit of growing to do. Jess has the most gorgeous & humongous Light Sussex sussex cockerel named Ben! Now he really is a magnificent boy!

So here's a little peek at the new girls on the block Snow White, Ginger, Cinnamon & Nutmeg. They have settled in very well & instantly the atmosphere between the back garden boys has become calmer! They all swooned over the new girls. So a 2:1 cockerel to hen ratio is much better, but I still really need another 6 bantam hens to ensure that the peace remains. It's a hard life! ;-)

As Spring arrived the incubator that had been stashed carefully way in the loft started calling to me. How could I resist? 6 Cayuga duck hatching eggs caught my eye on Ebay & arrived in the post before I could stop them! It seemed only proper to pop in a few of our own duck's eggs with them. 2 of the Cayuga eggs turned out to be infertile but I patiently waited for 4 Cayuga eggs, 1 Daisy & Seymour Aylesbury egg & 3 unknown duckzilla crosses to hatch. And I waited..... and I waited..... Day 28, hatch day, came along. Nothing. So I waited & waited, not so patiently! The tension was unbearable, but finally some of the eggs started to rock & I could hear ducklings tapping away on the inside of their shells. Then came cheeping! After lots of time spent on my hands & knees cheeping encouragement at the incubator, finally on Day 33, 2 tiny black Cayuga ducklings hatched! I think ducklings are one of Mother Nature's sweetest Spring babies along with lambs. Right from when they hatch they are delightful! They are inquisitive & full of the joy of life beginning. What struck me straight away was the difference between these ducklings from domesticated breeds & the little wild Mallard ducklings we rescued last Summer. The ducklings that hatched were instantly trusting & calm, something that moved me to tears & made me vow to be the best Mother Duck I could be to them. A further 3 agonisingly slow days later another 3 ducklings hatched, 2 of our own duckzillas which I suspect are Cherry Valley / Muscovy crosses & another duckling broke free from what was supposedly another Cayuga egg. But it was immediately apparent that this little duckling was definitely NOT a Cayuga. It's colouring & markings were so different. After contacting the breeder it turns out that he must have mistakenly sent me a Silver Appleyard egg in my half dozen! I wasn't complaining - Silver Appleyards are very beautiful ducks. Unfortunately at this stage I had to discard the 4th Cayuga egg & also our Aylesbury egg as they showed no sign of life. So one egg remained. It had externally pipped but was making slow progress & the humidity in the incubator was proving difficult to maintain. So eventually I gave this last little duckling a bit of a gentle helping hand by moistening the shell membranes that had stuck to it like glue & removing a small piece of shell to assist it's immense battle to fight it's way out into this world. Finally on Day 38, our last duckzilla duckling hatched! This one I'm not at all sure about in terms of it's parentage. I don't think it's a Muscovy cross as it's much smaller & darker than the other 2 duckzillas. I think it will be a case of wait & see as it grows. Whatever it's breeding it's incredibly pretty& very sweet natured. All 6 of the little munchkins are doing very well. They are as bright as buttons & full of exuberance. They crave our company & recognise my whistle from the hours I spent cheeping at them in the egg & quite literally throw themselves against the wire sides of their brooder to see me. They love being cuddled, which has meant a very special bond has grown not only between me & the ducklings, but also between those little cuties & my lads & hubs. We are all sharing in their incredible journey!



What else has happened? Well........

As well as being lucky enough to meet up with Andy, Jo & Jess I also had the opportunity to meet another 2 animal loving Twitter friends Rebecca (@vegebexy) & Jeni (@seren9) last week at Rebecca's invite. Mum has also joined the World of Twitter & came along with hubs & I. I was in heaven at Rebecca's place. I adore pigs! I would love to have a couple one day when we have a little more room, but for now just enjoy patting our neighbour's pigs through the fence. Bex has about 70 of them!! Mostly rescued pigs & all different shapes & sizes. Many were roaming free & everywhere you looked a happy piggy face was to be seen! I think that maybe I squealed more than the pigs that afternoon. It was just a fab day. The sun shone, we were in beautiful surroundings, in great company & chatter & laughter flowed freely. Bex & Jeni are both the loveliest of people & I'm sure we will be meeting up again. It is so thrilling when you get to meet someone in person with lots of hopes & expectations & you are not one bit disappointed! Oh, & Jeni & I swapped duck hatching eggs before we left!

So I have the social media of Blogland & Twitterverse to thank for bringing Andy, David, Jo, Jess, Rebecca & Jeni firmly into my life, along with friendships that I am sure will last forever. I think I've said this before, but if you feel a particular affinity with someone you meet online it might just be worth being brave & meeting up with them in real life. Just do it with safety in mind. Of course, you don't have to meet someone in the flesh to develop a meaningful friendship with them online. One of my favourite ladies to Tweet with is @scrummycupcake. She loves chooks & totally understands how daft I get with over my chicklets. We get on famously! When I had my last fibromyalgia flare she so very kindly sent me a set of aromatherapy oils which she had blended herself! It was such a thoughtful gesture & really touched me. The oils were gorgeous too & I burnt lots of the relaxing blend when I was waiting for those naughty ducklings to hatch! When she bought a 3 egg incubator of her own she sent me & Jeni some much cosseted Pekin Frizzle hatching eggs out of 6 she had bought, & some from from her own hens just after her beloved Crele Pekin Dave had sadly died, in the hope that we could hatch a mini Dave between us. Unfortunately my eggs didn't make it as I had to put them in makeshift incubator made out of a converted plant propagator because I didn't want to disturb the duck eggs. It was such a shame. But then shortly afterwards she sent me 6 replacement Frizzle eggs that the breeder had offered as compensation for what had been an overall low fertility rate of the original eggs. She's truly one of life's angels! The friendship she has shown me has been a bright light in my life recently & I treasure her kindness & online companionship enormously.



So in my incubator now are the 6 replacement Frizzle Pekin eggs from @scrummycupcake, 6 duck eggs from Jeni & also 6 Croad Langhan hatching eggs that I bought. I have chosen black Croad Langshan chickens as a bit of a breeding enterprise. They are a rare breed & I love the fact that they are big, yet docile birds. Due to the late hatching of my ducklings the Pekin & Croad Langshan eggs had to be stored much longer that I would have liked, so I'm keeping everything crossed that they will still be fertile & viable.

And that Dear Blog, just about brings me up to date. I promise to bring more cute duckling pictures soon & I leave you with the thought that is keeping me warm inside .....

As much as my heart feels the pain of the Goddess at the harm that mankind is doing to the planet & the suffering that is caused to animals, I also feel hope that things are beginning to change for the better because there are so many people who really do care & want to make a difference. As I make my pledge to make a difference I know lots of other people across the globe are doing so too, including those with a lot more power & influence than me. Let's hope the tide is turning!


Bright blessings


Sara xx

Back to normal I hope

OK, so after a bit of a manic time things looked like they were settling down. Mulder cockerel had settled in well with his brothers & new lady friends, the new Pekin trio had settled in with the chicklets plus Florence & Clover, George & Mildred turkey had won every one's hearts with their comical ways & all chicken sickness seemed to have been banished! All was peaceful bliss in our happy world of poultry. Also the work to finish the repairs to our house after our water leak had finally been scheduled to begin after months of waiting.

Then I noticed Cassie chicklet seemed a bit under the weather. Nothing really specific but when you have a close relationship with your birds you just know when some thing's not right. So I was keeping a watchful eye on her. Then a couple of mornings later I found my little sweetheart huddled in the corner of the bantam shed. Her head was all bloodied where feathers had been pulled from her head & she was very depressed & frightened. Poor Cassie chicklet! She's been through a lot in her short life to date, having already survived two near death experiences. I gently gathered her up into my arms & she cuddled against me. Chickens can be so mean to one another! I brought her indoors, popped her into a box with some food & water & treated her poor sore head with Violet Septi Cleanse spray. She seemed to have a bit of a snuffle but she was quite perky & tucked into the chick crumbs I'd given her with gusto. For such a little chicklet who has been through a lot she shows an amazing will to live! Polands are prone to hypothermia due to their unusual head feathers & thin skulls so I knew she wouldn't be able to go back outside with a poor bald bonce & wondered what I could do. What I needed was an egg cosy or something similar to use as a little hat for her. So when I got a chance I popped onto Twitter & asked the lovely people of the Twitterverse if anyone had a spare cosy they could send me! A lovely Twitter friend & fellow lover of critters (@seren9 if you want to find her on Twitter) immediately offered me 2 little hats she'd saved from Innocent Smoothie bottles when they had been running their Help the Aged campaign - perfect! How very kind people can be! There are lots of people on Twitter who love hens & they are just the loveliest of people to chat away to & don't think you're at all weird to hug your chooks or have them in the house when they are poorly - yes, there are others as nuts as me out there, really there are!!

So little Cassie chicklet was in our bedroom in her box, with a poor bald violet dyed head & being treated with Colloidal silver which is a natural antiseptic / antibiotic treatment - I thoroughly recommend it. She was down in the dumps but well enough to perch on the edge of her box when it was sleep time so I hoped to be able to get her back outside as soon as possible when her little hats came. Then this happened.....

Four to five inches of snow fell very rapidly! Brrrr! It created a beautiful Winter Wonderland but meant we were snowed in again. Hubby was on his way back from a business meeting in Brussells & I was really worried about him driving home in the treacherous conditions, but he ignored my suggestion of staying overnight in a hotel near to Gatwick & insisted on making the journey home. It was lovely that he wanted to be home but I did worry about him! Anyway, he got to within a mile of our house & had to abandon his car, which being a rear wheel drive is just hopeless in snow & ice. I tried picking him up in my little car but got it stuck in our drive way! What a pickle! But at least hubby was home safely. After a day or two enough of the snow had melted to enable us to get my car out & about. I was glad it didn't hang about this time. It just makes conditions so hard for the birds when it lies on the ground for any length of time

There was no way Cassie chicklet could go outside in the snowy conditions, especially as she wouldn't wear the darling little hats that arrived in the post, so she remained indoors being pampered & enjoying lots of cuddles. Her sniffles got a little worse but she remained quite lively & I wasn't concerned about her. I felt a little under the weather myself & despite having been so well for so long I recognised the signs of a fibromyalgia / cfs flare up on it's way. Normally I would just have taken to my bed for a day & fended it off, but the workmen then arrived to start the repairs to our house. This meant our bedroom was out of bounds & doors to the house being left open in the chilly weather as workmen busily cut tiles & carried paint, tools & equipment in & out. By Monday morning I felt really poorly & could do nothing but lock myself away in our living room & try to rest as best as possible. What bad timing!

Anyway, these things are sent to try us but in the scheme of things they are minor inconveniences really, aren't they? Cassie chicklet soon perked up & fortunately her head feathers grew back extremely quickly so after a brief spell hopping about our utility room during her recuperation she was strong enough to go back outside. I was a little worried about how her reintroduction would go but darling Big Bird, who has grown up into such a handsome & lovely natured chap, took to protecting her during her first couple of days back with the bantams & all went well.

The workmen took 4 days to repair & redecorate the house & then I was finally able to get the proper rest I needed to get better.

So here we are. Let's hope this time that it really is back to business as usual!

Light & dark

Crumbs - it's been ages since I posted on my poor neglected blog & so much has happened! Some sorrow, some joy & lots of blessings.

Now I hope I get this in the right order of events:

First of all we had a new arrival. Sadly for my friend Andy, Mulder, the cockerel he was desperately hoping to keep, started crowing very loudly at all hours of the day, sadly not acceptable where he lives, so I offered him a home with his 'brothers'. Mulder is a special bird, not just because of the touching relationship he formed with Andy, but because of the unusual way that he grew. You can read about it on Andy's blog. It doesn't matter one jot to me - he's just a much-loved member of my wonderful chicken family. He's certainly a character, that I can tell you! When Andy & his partner David brought Mulder down to us it was also time to say goodbye to two of the Silkie chicklet girls as I had promised them by way of a thank you for the gorgeous cockerels. This affected more than I expected it to. So, although it was just fantastic to meet up with Andy & David again & for Andy to see how well his other boys were doing & where they were living, it was a bitter sweet day for both of us - Andy being parted from his beloved Mulder & me waving goodbye to my babies.

Because of the exceptional, close & cosseted relationship Mulder had with Andy I knew that winning him over would be a challenge, as I thought reintroducing him to his 'brothers' after such a long parting would be. This first point I was correct about, but after a week or two of constant attention, praise & admittedly bribery with all manner of good things to eat, Mulder decided that, although I wasn't Andy, I'd do! The second point I needn't have worried about one jot, because amazingly Snapdragon, Spicy & Merlin seemed to remember Mulder! It was really moving to see this in cockerels, who can be quite fearsome when introducing a new male to a flock. They showed no aggression to him whatsoever & I was able to integrate Mulder from day one.

So, after Mr Dorking's recovery from illness & the successful introduction of Mulder, I was in heaven watching the boys grow more & more handsome each day. Then, suddenly & unexpectedly, 3 weeks after Mr Dorking's illness Merlin fell sick with the same symptoms. I wasn't too concerned as I had caught him while he was still relatively strong, eating & drinking & on his feet, but I brought him indoors in the warm & gave him the same TLC as I had Mr D. He fell sick on a Sunday, but I felt sure he would be fine until I could get him some antibiotics from the vet the next day. The only thing I didn't do, as he seemed a lot less sick than Mr Dorking had been, was leave our central heating on for him overnight. It was, therefore, an awful shock when I found him dead the next morning! I was devastated! I cradled him in my arms as though I could warm his body & bring him back to me, but he was long gone. I cannot tell you how sad I am that his life was so short. He was the first of Andy's cockerels to befriend me & he was such a vibrant, zesty character that it does not seem fair that he's no longer crowing his heart out or busily run around our little field. I miss him terribly.

At the same time, poor Andy had hen troubles of his own with an egg-bound girl & a girl with a nasty abscess . He was quite exhausted with nursing them, so I just felt that I couldn't break the bad news to him at the time. It wouldn't have been fair.

Now, in the meanwhile, young Katherine chicklet dismayed me by crowing! So Katherine was quickly renamed Alfie, but it became apparent that we had a chicklet problem with 6 roosters & only 5 pullets. My original intention in hatching the chicklet eggs was to sell any excess roosters & then buy in unrelated hens so that I could begin to sell my own hatching eggs. So after much agonising I made the sensible decision to part with one of my Silkie roosters, Alfie & one of my Poland roosters. To soften the blow of parting with them I successfully bid on a gorgeous trio of Crele Pekin bantams in an online poultry auction that I could also sell hatching eggs from. Everything was planned. It all made sense. But I should have listened more carefully to my heart. The tears I shed over parting with my 2 Silkie chicklets even though they were going to a wonderful home with Andy should have told me this was never going to work in practice. One afternoon, hubby found me sitting with my chicklets with tears in my eyes & gently said to me that he thought it would be a shame to part with any of the birds we had hand reared. He suggested we could section off an area of our little field for them. He is also fond of the chicklets you see, but more than that he knows how much they mean to me and he's a wonderful hubby.

I put a message out on Twitter explaining that I needed more hens to keep my chicklet boys happy & lovely blogger Jess very kindly offered me 3 Silkie x girls! How lucky was I? That's so very sweet of her. I also discovered a local chicken breeder with bantams for sale so on the following Saturday we went & picked up 3 new bantam girls to begin to even out the boy:girl ratio. They are Minnie, a Barnevelder, Clover, a Buff Orpington & Florence a black Pekin with a pretty gold 'necklace'. The new girls are adorable & settled in straight away.

It was then that Merlin's illness hit & the excitement of having the new girls quickly turned to sorrow at losing him. I think having the new girls to watch over was certainly some comfort in the days after his death. Seeing Mr Dorking starting to blossom again was also good medicine. When the time came to tell Andy of Merlin's death because his hens were thankfully well on the road to recovery he was, of course, very sad. But he was very kind to me & this was also a great comfort.

I watched Mulder & my other chickens like a hawk for any signs of illness in the days to follow. After Merlin's death I had telephoned my Vet for advice as I wondered if I should give all my birds a course of antibiotics. She strongly advised against this course of action as none of the other birds were showing any symptoms. Fortunately Mulder remained healthy & strong over the next few days & I allowed myself a sigh of relief. In fact, all of the birds looked incredibly healthy despite the awful weather & the extremely late moult of some of my hens.

Something exciting then happened - I found some turkeys for sale very cheaply at a farm quite close to us. Hubby & I have always wanted turkeys & in a very weak moment I put us down for one! And, of course, there was still the Crele Pekin trio to collect (although after deciding to keep all the chicklets this clearly had not been a very good purchase after all!). Then Eldest son asked to come home from Uni for the weekend, so we travelled up to Leicester to collect the Pekins, down to Birmingham to pick up eldest son & then homeward with a detour to collect the turkey. Now I had been mithering as to whether it was fair to keep just one turkey, even with ducks for company & a telephone conversation with their breeder confirmed that it would be better to have a pair. Fortunately hubby was in agreement so 1 son, 3 Pekins & 2 turkeys came home with us! It was a wonderful weekend.

Typing all this out I realise how mad it all was! And how understanding my hubby is! And that maybe I have a poultry addiction! Hmmmmmmm.

Anyway, to bring everything up to date, we now have 4 cockerels and 22 hens up in our little field with the ducks & geese. We have George & Mildred the Bronze turkeys in with Daisy & Seymour, who seem quite taken with their new companions. And last, but by no means least, we have an assortment of 17 chicklets & bantams in the back garden. All are doing just fine and dandy. That's going to be it now for a while. Oh, except that we still need to increase our hen numbers in the back garden to keep the little roosters happy ;-)

Snowed in!

Yesterday it snowed quite heavily in a short period of time, enough to cause Youngest son's school to be closed at lunch time enforcing an early finish from work for me. By late afternoon we were surrounded by a Winter Wonderland! Hubby made it home safely from work, driving all the way back from Head Office in Surrey, but had to leave his car at the neighbouring farmhouse as he couldn't get down our driveway. Last night more snow fell & when we measured this morning we had 8 inches of beautiful, clean, crisp white snow lying all around us! The dogs all bounded out into the garden & came to a rapid halt! It was way deeper than it looked. Maggie just about managed with some extra bounce in her step but poor Mabel being of diminutive proportions (OK, she's a real short-arse!) had to bounce like a Tiggery thing to get about. Poor Polo soon grew heavy snow boots - great clods of snow sticking to the fine fur on her legs. Not good when you're 10 & have arthritis in your back legs! So it was decided that just big Meggie dog should go out for a walk in the snow drifts. She did enjoy it so & played like a puppy!

There was certainly no way that any of us were going anywhere fast, so whilst poor hubby had to work at the kitchen table the lads & I ventured out into this Winter Wonderland to dig the critters out & make sure they were all fed & watered & kept safe and snug.

Once they had been dug out of their houses the ducks & geese all ventured out. The ducks greeted the snow like excited children, the geese a little grumpier as they couldn't get to the grass to graze. A good sprinkling of grated parsnip on the snow soon cheered them up. Big Cheese certainly didn't lose his smile over the chilly stuff!

However, we did discover that white ducks don't look so white in the snow!

Most of the hens were very sensible & stayed in their house which, although decorated with icicles on the outside, was cosy on the inside.

Snapdragon & Spicy the two young Welsummer cockerels, now feeling macho as they begin to mature, did bravely venture out - but not very far! Hattie was brave, or foolish enough to go further, but she hopped about very gingerly in the cold stuff.

The chicklets were all snuggled up in the shed & tucked into some corn in the afternoon to help them generate extra body heat to keep them warm overnight. Poor Cassie had another near death experience after Xmas that again I was thankfully able to bring her back from, so it has meant that the chicklets have had their heat lamp back on overnight. It just takes the edge off during the freezing nights. The cold doesn't seem to bother them one bit during the day time when they are their active & inquisitive selves!

Once the birds were all taken care of it was time for some fun, but I did get worried when it looked like this great big snowball was headed my way!

My sons made lovely snow people. I thought the one on the right looked a little magical, then later when I was snuggled up inside reading another enlightening chapter of 'Hedgewitch' it struck me that it was a little like a crude representation of the Horned God - was this a sign that witchcraft is the Pagan path intended for me? I have learned that witchcraft is a beautiful, healing path of Nature 'magic' based around worship of two main symbolisms of Nature - the Goddess, representing Mother Earth & the Horned God representing her consort, the Father of all Life. The Horned God I have learned, just like withcraft, is nothing to be feared or suspicious about & has nothing whatsoever to do with evil or the devil. The God's horns are a powerful image of vitality, wildness & life force - the same emotions the vision of a magnificent stag might bring to your heart.

I feel uplifted & invigorated by what I am reading & learning. I am also expecting some introductory literature on Druidry in the post to see how it sits with me. It's like a candle flame within my soul is suddenly burning more brightly with a beautiful white golden flame. A flame of cleansing maybe, to prepare me for my path. A flame that will light my way. I hope so.

The snow has brought other thoughts to me. Snow is so beautiful when it first lies on the ground, virgin & white. It doesn't take long for us to turn it to dirty slush. Mother Nature is at her most beautiful when untouched by our hand. It has made me feel more resolved to take a more active role in caring for this planet & being gentle to Mother Earth. I am resolved to grow more of my own produce this year, regardless of whether the garden is also home to chickens or ducks. I can use mesh to protect my plantings. I will try & be more eco-friendly in my daily life. I will write to my MP's urging them to make the right decisions when it comes to 'Green issues' & take part in campaigns. It may all seem like feeble efforts against the hugely daunting & frightening disaster that Global Warming is, but each & everyone must surely do something so that we can say to our children that we acted.

Whatever path you may be on or what plans you may have for 2010 I do hope that you feel inspired & ready to make a good start.

Blessed be x

Mother hen's journey

I was talking to my Mum recently about how wonderfully tame & cuddly my little chicklets are. She said it's hardly surprising since they've seen me every single day since they hatched! I realised that's absolutely true. Each & every day for the last 11/12 weeks I have nurtured, watched over & cared for them. I have fed them & watered them, but much more than that I have been surrogate Mother Hen to them. As well as time spent with them during the day, I have sat out with them each & every evening & they have come & cuddled up to me. I have learned their moods & their little personalities. I have a synergy with them. It's hard to explain. I can pick any one of them up & within a moment of holding them I sense how they feel, my grip adjusts accordingly & my fingers know how fast or slow to stroke their feathers. I can sense if they're playful & just want to climb on me. I can sense when they need some comfort & want to be held close. They are far more than just little chicks to me - they are little souls.

From the day they hatched to today I have loved them fiercely every step of the way.

It's been an amazing journey & those little chicklets have given me a very special gift in return. I've learned a lot about myself. This closeness to this miracle of Nature, this very beginning of the Cycle of Life, has reinforced all my personal beliefs & it's helped me understand my spirituality. Being in touch with new Pagan friends has also helped me work out my place in this Universe. Last night I looked up at the sliver of Moon in the sky & knew who I was.