As you can see, we've gotten a LOT of progress done on the barn since my last post. Got the siding up, stalls are getting completed, and got the barn painted (more painted than the picture above shows.. I haven't gotten a new far away picture yet, that one was from a couple days ago I think).

I think that color is a very pretty, almost rustic red. Not nearly as bright a red as our other buildings are painted in, I think they were done in something called "polished apple".

As you can probably tell from the pictures above, Megan is still here with us, and should probably be here till the end of October (Yay!). We've already went on a bike ride out to the Bumpass Park (the flower pictures were taken on the way home) and taken a walk through the woods, and at the end of that walk we had to rush home because … … you should be able to guess the answer. We must've managed to walk through a patch of seedticks!

They didn't attach on anyone else but me, and I've got at least 25 bites around my right ankle. And they sure do itch! LOL! We did get to see something exciting though when we took that walk, something we've never got to see before. ^^ It's up above on the bottom row of the pictures between the daisies and the thistle. Baby raccoons! Two of them, at that!

A couple of days ago we had to put down three of our pets / animals. Light-bill (our oldest duck), Jack (our male duck), and Tiny (the half-blind guinea girl, that was now completely blind in one eye 'cause something must've pecked her in it). That was sad, but at least they are no longer suffering here.

You probably remember in my last post that I said my Aunt Mel was going to be coming down soon and bringing us a cat. Well, she did so last week.. as a matter a fact it was this day last week, I believe! And she did bring us our cat, and I just finally got a couple good pictures of him yesterday. He absolutely loves it outside. Right now we are keeping him in the barn until he gets used to the place and everything (not that I think he'd run off too far, but a running cat is kind of hard to chase down!), but he already knows how to push the barn door open, so we have to keep the latch over the door while he's in there!

There's my little kitty! We had a terrible time thinking of a name for him. Levi, Megan, and I were leaning toward either Theodore or Alfred (so we could call him either Teddy or Alfy, lol), but neither Mom or Dad liked that, so we eventually decided on Sunshine… and we get to call him Sunny for short!

Which I think is kind of funny, since our last cat was named Stormy.. and now we have Sunny!

And, to top it all off, Megan has shared some exciting news over at her blog, which some of you may have already heard about. But if you haven't, I'm going to keep you in suspense until you go read Megan's post!

I was looking through my little photo album the other day, and I found some various old pictures that I asked Mom to scan in on the computer ~ among them was George.

George was one of our male ducks from our first batch of ducks (Light-bill is the only remaining duck from that bunch) and believe me, he was the most strangest looking duck that I've ever seen. In the picture above, that's him all the way on the left.
Darker face and that strange tuff of white fluff on his head. Makes for quite an interesting duck, doesn't he?

George eventually became a problem duck and we had to get rid of him. I'm glad someone got pictures of him while we had him, though! Just looking at him kinda makes me chuckle. He certainly was a sight!

There's Georgie, all grown up. He still never seemed to shed that fluff on his head! Don't ask me how he aquired the name George Washington, I don't remember back that far. All the other ducks in that bunch were normal.. I don't know what happened to poor George! LOL

And, of course, while Mom had the camera out, we went ahead and got some individual pictures, though only two of them are worth posting! Mom had me stand up on her chair in her bedroom so the border at the top of the wall would be behind my head, which doesn't look too bad, I guess. And out of all the pictures she took of Levi, that's basically the only one that turned out clear, the rest of them were fuzzy because she wasn't using the flash.

And one of Levi and I together. These kind of pictures are usually hard for us to get, since it's either me or Levi usually taking the pictures!

Jack and Light-bill have been out together for a couple of days, since Jack's leg is hurt he doesn't try to get on her or anything, and since he is behaving so well I've even been letting them both sleep in the Duck Pen together. I can tell Lighty likes his company, and he is very protective of her! He even tries to 'charge' me if I get to close! Besides, they can both keep each other warm on these cold nights!

Dad is busy putting some outside lights around the building right now, and putting some up in the 'attic'. I think him and Levi are up in the attic right now, probably wiring something up!

Well, here is the Monday 'What Am I?':

What Am I?

1. I go where I want to go.
2. In Proverbs it is said that my northern relative drives away rain.

And my November Scripture Wallpaper! I tried to pick a nice fall looking picture to fit in with November. Leaves are falling everywhere around here now! Light-bill loves it when I make her a nice leaf bed, since it keeps her nice and warm from the cold temperatures at night.

Revelation 4:11 KJV

November 24th will mean we've had Gabriel for a year already! It seems just like yesterday that he was riding home in the truck on the backseat between Mom and I. He was awfully small then!

We dug stumps this weekend, buried pipes along the house (not finished entirely yet) and had company! Dad is burying the water pipes from the gutter (spouting, or whatever it's called) under the ground so the gutter takes all the water away from the house.

The ditch is dug, and one pipe is completed, we just have to do the other side now, I believe.

And, the chicks are doing great! We've actually had them outside for a couple of days now, even at night, since the weather's been warm, even though it did get a little chilly last night. They're doing great, and they love it outside!

The guineas and Jack aren't too happy about being turned out of their pen, but oh well. We've put the guineas in with the hens (the hens aren't happy about that) and Jack is in Lighty's pen, and Lighty is in the hen pen. I've been putting Dove (my pet hen) and Puffy Buffy (our half-blind Bufforpington.. however you spell that) in with them sometimes, and they're doing fine with them. The chicks are very curious about the other hen's feet, but Dove and Puffy Buffy peck them if they get too rambunctious.

I've had Gabriel in with them too, and he loves them! He walks them around, while a few of them try to peck his name tag on his collar. One has actually pecked his nose too!

I'll get some pictures of them today, we've just been so busy I haven't had time.

Chickens

Chickens are very good for eggs and meat, and eating bugs. Basically it usually depends on what you're going to do with them, on what breed you get. There's the Cornish hens that are good for meat, others that are great egglayers, etc.

Personally, I prefer Rhode Island Reds. They are friendly, curious, and good egg layers. They're a reddish brown with some beautiful green and some dark blue scattered throughout their feathers.

They can be easily spoiled too, we had a rooster once who thought he was a dog — I mean he actually came up and ate with our collie, Prince, out of the same bowl. And he ate chicken! Unfortunately he was beheaded by my lab mix, Woofie. Stuck his head through the fence a bit too far.

The roosters, of course, like to fight (if you have more than one) and sometimes you might have to separate them though this usually isn't too much of a problem, but you do have to watch if one rooster is inside a fence and the other one isn't. Our rooster once got his spur stuck in the fence and was hanging there until I found him, his leg was quite asleep by that time.

And whatever you do, don't let your chickens eat mice. Don't even throw one in to see what they will do. My favorite hen died by eating a mouse. I guess she couldn't digest it.

We've butchered them before when I was younger, but not lately. We'd put their heads on a chopping block between two nails, and hit it with an axe. Even with their heads cut off, they fly and flop around on their nerves. If you don't like to watch animals die, this would not be a good thing to watch. Then, after that's done, I think we dipped them in a bucket of hot water, to loosen the feathers and plucked them. I don't remember much after that.

We use the eggs for eating, and cooking. Making cakes, stuff like that. If we have lots and lots of eggs, we'll give some to the neighbors.

Guinea Birds

These birds are not something to get if you have close neighbors or not enough land for them to roam on. They're loud, with their screeching and other noises, but great "watch-dogs". They will certainly alert you if something is coming on your property that they are not familiar with.

One thing to beware of though, when it gets warm, the females go nesting. In the woods, brush piles, etc. Sometimes it can be very difficult to find them, and then you have to get them back to their pens.
Occasionally the males *might* stand guard over them, but not too often. It is good to have a good dog that knows the word "guineas" and can sniff them out for you, and then help you get them back.

And do not, whatever you do, don't put guineas in with chickens or roosters. They will try to keep them from food and water and run them to death. Our male guinea is the *head* of all our animals (except the ducks) and he charges them to get them out of the way.
Guineas are also good bug eaters, and mosquito eaters. We noticed a good drop on bugs after we got our guineas. Of course, now that we only have two left, the bugs are coming back.

And I don't think we've ever had a problem with guineas in the garden, instead of eating the plants they eat the bugs off the plants, so actually they helped us.

Oh, and some more advice, guinea's necks are fragile. Don't try to swing at them with a stick and accidentally hit their neck; chances are it'll kill them (it happened to our guinea "No-Tail") And you can't catch them, unless it's in pitch black darkness, and they do fly. If left out at night, they will roost in trees. And when herding them, try to stay calm and not really chase them too much unless they're running to fast, because they frighten easily that way.
Currently our two guineas are housed in the "Rooster Pen" with our male duck Jack. He isn't afraid of them.

And, um, if you have fences around your property, that doesn't keep these guys in. They'll either fly them or find some way around them.

Ducks

Right now, we only have two ducks, an old female whom we call Light-Bill (or Lighty for short) and a young male named Jack. Light-bill is in a small, fenced, open building type thing build for the ducks (or was it the rabbits? I can't remember) and Jack is in the Rooster Pen with the guineas.

They love mud, water, and earthworms. It's pure joy to them if you let them out in a rain storm! Unfortunately we can only let one duck out at a time, since if we let both of them out together Jack will cripple Lighty by getting on her back, since she is so old. So we alternate — Jack gets out one day, Lighty the next, and so on and so forth.

If you want to give them a treat, feed them some earthworms.

I have also found out that ducks appear to have wonderful memories. So don't make one angry and expect to be forgiven later. I learned that with Jack, and the duck still hates me. I used to dunk him underwater to give him a *bath* and he actually bit me on the face once. And now he just charges me and –get this– hisses!

We just keep woodchips in Lighty's pen, and in the winter put hay (or dry leaves like a nest) in the back for her to snuggle in. The pen gets cleaned out at least monthly, depending on how bad it is or how much rain we got (cause that makes it really smell bad)

Turkeys

Unless you intend on eating them, don't get them. Our female *wanders* away, out in the woods, over to the neighbors house, and requires a constant watch if let out. And, of course, the males follow her wherever she goes. We only have three turkeys left out of twenty that we used to have. Now, babysitting 20 turkeys wasn't fun at all, especially when the males didn't like me.

But, anyway, they are big eaters. And, like ducks, they have great memories. Don't ever, ever, make a male mad by kicking at it, or whatever, unless you intend to pay for it in the future. They'll flop you, chase you, peck you, and it hurts. They have very sharp beaks. And, be sure, they'll remember it forever.

But, like I said, don't get them unless you intend to eat them, because they eat lots of food and require a lot of attention. We've been putting the males and female up in our old dog pen (currently unoccupied) where there's grass, food and water, so the female doesn't wander.

We used to have two white male turkeys, and I mean, they were MEAN! I had to actually have them chase me to the upper end of the garden, pour some feed on the ground and run back to do my animal chores, because they would trap me in the duck building and I didn't dare go out unless Levi rescued me. Thankfully, we got rid of them.

for butchering these guys, I would suppose you do it in a similar way that you do chickens, but I don't know for sure since we've never done it.

I *think* I covered it all.