Coffee Monday

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Good morning!

This Monday deserves two coffee quotes.  Our internet service has been so unreliable lately.  It has felt like dial-up.  Oh the horror.   When I saw this quote I had to share it.

I hope you all have a  fantastic, sufficiently caffeinated, reliable internet, kind of day.

Coffee reliable

and now (thinking of our internet problems)

morning-coffee-31

Flower mutation

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I left a patch of wildflowers in the yard (yard is loosely used here as it is mostly weeds, wildflowers and rocks anyway).  I noticed that a rather strange-looking stalk and flower head had grown up from this  little Coreopsis lanceolata, or Tickseed.  The flower stalk is usually  round and very thin and delicate looking with the flower shaped similar to a sunflower.  This stalk is thick and flat like a ribbon and the flower head is rounded over as if multiple flowers are growing together.  I have seen other wildflowers with the flower head in various mutated forms, but not like this.

Has anyone ever seen something like this?

Mutant flower?

Mutant flower?

closer

closer

Close up 1

Close up 1

Closeup 2

Closeup 2

Raising chickens

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Good morning!

We purchased twelve, three-day-old chicks on March 09, 2016.  They are red sex links.  Click here for more on this breed of chicken The Lowdown on Red Sex Links

Here they are at six days old.

What are you looking at? Red Sex Link chicks 6 days old.

What are you looking at?
Red Sex Link chicks 6 days old.

 

Red Sex Link Chicks at 15 days old.

Red Sex Link Chicks at 15 days old. They are getting feathers!

 

Red Sex Link Chicks Approximately twenty days old. They are now getting some color to their feathers, more red is showing and they have sparse tail feathers.

Red Sex Link Chicks Approximately twenty days old. They are now getting some color to their feathers, more red is showing and they have sparse tail feathers.

This is a good link for beginners to learn about raising chickens Backyard Chicken.com Frequently asked questions of raising chickens

We have raised chickens before.  We started while living in town. Truly a backyard chicken venture.  Then we moved to a place with some land and allowed the chickens to free range.  They loved it!  We loved that they kept the insect population under control.   We made sure we closed everything up at night and all went well for the first two years.  Then hens started to go missing.   We finally discovered that a fox and her kits had taken up residence close to the house in a rock pile (go figure).  She and her kits were well fed but we lost all of our hens.  She attacked during the day while the hens free ranged.   We also lost the rooster to a different predator that came in the evening before we had the coop closed up.  We have since built a new coop with some added safety features and hopefully these chicks will live long happy lives.

The new coop is ready to go and has a large run.  These babies will not go outside (except for field trips)  until they are fully feathered out and the temperatures stay above 65 degrees.  We have an automatic door now that opens at dawn (or a little after) and closes at dusk.  We hope that this will prevent the door from being left open after the hens have put themselves to bed if we are not home.  The plan is to not allow the hens to free range unless we are home.  We know that we have fox, racoon and opossums in the area (in the yard some nights).

Side view of new coop and run

Side view of new coop and run

Looking from roosting area to front of run

Looking from roosting area to front of run

Looking from front of run to roosting box

Looking from front of run to roosting box

Automatic door

Automatic door

Chicks on their first field trip outside – 22 days old

 

Chicks in the bluebonnets

We still need to build the nest boxes and set up the feed and water for the new coop.  there are so many ways to set this up and I just haven’t made up my mind which system I want to try.

I would love to hear any suggestions on nest boxes, feed or water systems you may have tried.

Melyna

 

 

Wildflowers

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With our mild winter and plentiful rain, the wildflowers are beautiful this year.  If you happen to be in central Texas this week, take a drive through the hill country.  The colors are amazing.

Bluebonnets and paintbrushes, Texas Hill Country by Lake Buchanan

Bluebonnets and paintbrushes in the Texas Hill Country by Lake Buchanan

Roadside wildflowers

Roadside wildflowers

White and Bluebonnets

White and Bluebonnets

 

White bonnet close up

White bonnet close up

Closeup of paintbrush

Closeup of Texas Paintbrush – Castilleja indivisa

 

purple phlox

purple phlox

 

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Texas Baby Blue Eyes Nemophila phacelioides