A Fish Tale

I came back to the farm last Tuesday evening laden with goodies from the apartment. Dan had given me the kitchen scraps for the compost pile, the table scraps for the chickens and  a broccoli for me. I plopped everything on my kitchen counter and went to bed.

In the morning I composted the kitchen scraps, gave the chickens the table scraps and ignored the broccoli. Big mistake! The rest of Wednesday was spent running errands, etc. But when I got back home in the late afternoon, every square inch (or metre as they say here) reeked of fish - old fish. I did the bloodhound sniffing thing and circled in on the broccoli. I lifted it up and lo and behold there lay a fish head happily rotting away on my counter.

I muttered angrily to myself (expletives deleted) and gave the fish head to its intended recipients: the chickens. You can see how thrilled they were at this largesse. That is the ignored fish head on the right.

 Thursday I spent in Auckland and when I got back I was too tired to track down the continuing fish smell. I figured it was lingering since I had the apartment shut up. On Friday morning my disillusionment was complete. The fish smell was pretty darned strong. So I did the bloodhound thing again and finally found a large pool of fish blood that had spilled down the back of the counter and pooled on the floor underneath. It was big enough for Smudge to swim in. All I can figure is that the fish head was frozen on Tuesday, thawed on Wednesday and dripped, dripped, dripped. I'm not sure about the time line. Whenever I question Dan all that happens is that he has another laughing fit. Wasn't that funny to me.

Until next time.

Yay, Spring!

Things are looking up around the farm. Today is warm and sunny. We even had 1 day last week that also was warm and sunny. It has me itching to start propagating seeds and it has spurred our chickens to greater egg-laying efforts. They now average 6 per day and even Dora contributes her bit. That is Dora looking the opposite way from the other chickens at chow time. She also has not figured out the whole roost thing and will squat and drop her egg in the mud, on the coop floor, etc. The other chickens now treat her with distain but not the active hostility that caused her to be featherless and henpecked (sorry, I really, really couldn't resist).

The sheep have been busy too. Laying lambs, not eggs. So far we have 21 new lambs and had only one death. I am concerned about Starlight and her twin black lambs. They seem spry enough but are awfully thin. Everybody else seems to be thriving. Dan has agreed to move the flock (all 50!!) into the new barn paddock which has the horse stalls and greater protection from the elements. Also I will be able to keep a closer eye on them and see if they need some kind of intervention.

I have been watching but don't see much nursing going on. I just hope that they get enough of what they need that they will be able to move into grass eating and start filling out. I am not sure what the problem is but this is Starlight's 3rd year and it may be her last. I'm not sure how I feel about that but this is a farm and we do raise the sheep as meat. But on the other hand, Starlight was my first lamb and the only one I named. Well, I'll just wait until I figure out what is the least painful option for me and go from there.

Until next time.