animal management

I have spotted the rat out during the day a few times. Just for the sake of grammatical comfort, let's assume there is just one really fat rat that I'm dealing with here. I saw another path of travel it uses. I'll move the bait station to that one, and later, over to the worm bin area. I cleaned out the coop and put the wood chips in a spot where I'd like the kitchen compost pile. I set the live trap on there, adjoining a cinder block I saw the rat climb through. This morning the live trap was sprung, but I don't know if it was chickens or Mona doing her ditz run through the coop area.

I gave the chickens scratch inside the coop. Blackie and Yellow Cheep both went inside. I came out onto the patio so they'd get used to me being out there while they are inside. I came out later when Little Red was inside the coop, too. Tomorrow I am going to get two of them inside and then shut them in. I'll probably have to catch at least one chicken, unfortunately. I don't know how long I will need to jail them in there. One, I want to know if anybody is laying. Two,
I want to cut the rat off from the chicken food. We'll see if that makes the bait or the peanut butter more tempting to the rat. I should also get a glue trap too.

Rat Sighting!

I saw the rat. It was fat. It jumped easily, and then strolled down the stairs. The chickens were making a racket at the time. That's why I went out there, and the rat jumped out of the coop and hid. I set the live trap, right where it has been sitting for a long time. I expect it to get knocked by something other than a rat, but hopefully that big wad of peanut butter will be irresistible to the rat.

I have some photos I recently uploaded. I have yet to figure out how I can organize my things on the web. I started a site with google. I am hoping that each photo I uploaded to google-owned sites would magically appear in their picasa program. Here they are just in case:

Oregon grape, or mehonium

One morning I got three eggs. Did I post this? This is the only blue egg I have gotten to date. I thought it could have been reduced egg production due to excessive heat. Obviously that is no longer the case. It could be the rat issue. But anyway, wasn't this a beautiful morning in terms of eggs?

Ben and Kayleigh jammed out in a duet of piano and guitar. It was rather melancholy in tone, but went on and on, beautifully. I was afraid taking photos would disrupt it, but they even played through the flash. I love the view out that window.

Finally, I took a photo of my beloved border collie, sleeping.

who says roosters are noisy?

The chickens get really noisy every so often, usually in the morning. Then the dog barks and there's no sleeping after that.

home again, home again

I was pleased to return to the chickens being just fine. They were not roosting in the rhododendron near the house, nor in the coop, for awhile. I took that to mean they missed us.

A day or two later, I checked the coop and saw a rat sauntering slowly out the back door. Eeeeuw! So, I placed the poison in the bait station and replaced the chicken feeder with the bait station. Since then, the chickens have been using the coop. I have opened the door on Red Cheep, who scurried out of there, alarmed. Just this morning I opened the door on Yellow Cheep (formerly known as Black Cheep), who just sat there as I calmly closed the door back up. Later I went out and found three eggs! And one of them was blue!

I am happy to know they are starting to lay, and using the coop. While I was gone there were no eggs for my beloved chicken checker. I was concerned that they were laying in the garden somewhere. Now I am just curious who is laying what. There was one small brown egg, one large brown egg, and one large blue egg.

smart chickies

The new tenants stopped by yesterday, and we had the pleasure of sharing blackberries from the bush. I swear they ripened between morning and mid-afternoon. While we were chatting and snacking around the bush, Blackie came to investigate. She figured out that we were eating and worked on getting to the ripe berries. No wonder they were all there, ripening! The chickens had not caught on. Later I saw Blackie and the other chickens working on the berries. So far they have not jumped up to the top. They eat the unripe ones low down.

Paul picked up Mona yesterday afternoon. He left rather suddenly and I already miss Mona. It's funny how conditioned it is: I tickle Kayleigh and expect to be jumped on and licked. Nope, nothing. No dog. We fly out on the red eye tonight.

see you later, aligator

I gave Mona a good brushing today, and it was nice. She likes it, but then gets tired of it and wanders away. I had to call her back twice, but I produced a huge amount of hair. I am sure she feels better in this hot weather. Plus, the contact is nice, especially right before I leave her for over a week. She's beautiful and glowing.

I'll be out of town and not posting, so I am going to leave a few photos from my berry patch. I can't believe the berries are still there and not eaten by birds. I watered them for the first time today. I was skeptical that they would ripen, but today I wanted to help them out.

"Thunder and lightening, the Gods take revenge..."

Mona is pretty upset about the thunder storms. I was awakened at 6 am because it was so loud, just rolling on and on with sharp cracks here and there. I knew she was hiding in her cage, poor girl. I am pleased that she is using her cage again, after ceding it to Daphne for a year. It was just a day or two before she went in it, but when Daf was here Mona never went in it at all. When Mona was a pup and first heard thunder, she was inconsolable. She looked at me as if to say, "Don't you lie to me and say it's okay. You can't save me from that out there!"

Anyway, when the thunder is not going, Mona is still tentative because it could start up again. Plus, it is Independence Day. Hopefully this new neighborhood will be quieter than our last one, where the fire crackers started in May and went through September.

I took her to the lake yesterday so at least she had some fun before these days when she'll be staying in more. I met this great woman who was promoting fabbseattle.com, Families Against Breed Bans. I saw a poster in my neighborhood and was excited that we have that kind of vibe here. She's pretty serious-- she staked out and caught a couple vandals who were trying to deface the sign. Glad to meet her! I want to get more connected with right-on dog people in the north end. I sure miss Family Dog, but it's a relief not to drive so far weekly.

Just in case anyone is reading, don't forget to confine your dogs for July 4th!