Poor Scarlett

My poor little baby isn't very well. She has an impacted crop.

This happens when they eat something which gets stuck in their crop and causes a blockage. As more food is eaten, it just adds to the blockage, and the poor chicken can't actually get food from the crop to her gizzard. This results in a very hard ball on her chest.

I noticed it around lunchtime on Wednesday, but she'd probably had it for a couple of days by then. I started the recommended treatment of feeding her live white maggots (which, in theory, should then eat the blockage), and some liquid paraffin. A few cc's of this, then massage the crop to try and break up the lump.

Today it looks a bit smaller, but it still isn't right. As it's Friday today, I don't want to risk leaving it over the weekend, so I'll try phoning the Vet to see if I can get an appointment today.

Update: the only appointment available was late this evening, so I've booked that. During the day I've had Scarlett in twice for drops and massage. One of my chicken books recommends warm water, so I switched to that.

It's looking less bad now, but I think I'll still take her to the Vet this evening, just in case.

Solar water heating, step 2

At last, the new water cylinder for the solar water heating has been installed. Our friendly plumber spent yesterday and today,withDHas his lackey,removing the old tank and fitting the new one.

Out back bedroom now has a bit more room in, but the airing cupboard sadly does not. The new tank is much taller than the old one. Although it's not as deep, it does have a few extra pipes coming out of the front, and a couple of extra bits for safety (in case the sun is too hot for too long) so we're struggling to find space to put replacement shelves.

I use - well, I used to - one not very deep shelf to prove my dough. Hopefully we'll be able to squeeze a narrow shelf in for that, even if it means that we don't have anywhere to air towels. Or bed linen.

I'm sure it'll be worth it in the end.

Feather frenzy

Delilah is moulting.

She stopped laying about 10 days ago. First couple of days, I thought she was having a rest. Then I wondered if she was egg bound. Then I found her bluey grey feathers everywhere. All in the poo trays, across the run floor, and - best of all - stuck to Scarlett's beak.

I had a good look at her just now, and she's very naked underneath. She's a good layer, so hopefully that will mean she'll moult and refeather quickly. A bit of extra protein is called for I think, so I'll give the girls some cat food later.

It's a gorgeous Autumn day outside, so I've given the Girls the run of the garden; they are, of course, all up at the house end where the sun is. I've got the kitchen door open, and I'm sitting at my 'puter right by the door. It's a bit chilly willy, but M. Reynard will be very hungry and more likely to take risks at this time of year.

My Girls

Let the girls out to wander the whole garden this morning. DH not amused.

The Girls are very happy though.

Pastry

I haven't made shortcrust pastry since I was a kid. Even then, my mum made it and I just rolled it out.

After much thought, I decided to buy a new food processor. I needed one which manages small quantities (like one egg yolk for foaming hollandaise sauce, ultimate luxury with my poached eggs) as well as large quantities. Anyway. the cashback site I used told me that a department store had increased their cashback, said department store was having a sale, my processor was in the sale.... you can see where this is going, can't you?

First thing I decided to make was "Caramelised Apple Tart". I used the processor to make the pastry, and I couldn't believe it. Shortcrust pastry in a few seconds! I also used it to process the apples. The result: what a tart!

Yesterday was a busy cooking day. I was making Pumpkin Marmalade (using Butternut Squashes), and the processor grated my huge pumpkin in seconds. And sliced the oranges and lemons. And grated the ginger. While the marmalde was cooking, I started on dinner.

More pastry, home made pasties this time. Then it chopped the onions, grated the carrot and potato and mushroom (yes, I know that isn't traditional, I don't care.) It was fantastic.

I'm really happy that I've discovered pastry. Shame it's so fattening really.

And I feel a bit sheepish for getting so excited over a piece of kitchen equipment. Now that we make so much of our food ourselves though, it's really great to find things that make a difference.

Free for all

Although they have free access to a whole area of garden, lately the Girls have preferred to stay in their covered Hen Pen. I don't blame them really, it's a bit damp at the far end at the moment. I'm having to limit where they can go because the grass is getting destroyed beyond recovery, so I move the fencing every day or two to give them fresh grass.

Today I was doing my weekly rake-and-disinfect of the Palace, so I decided to give the Girls free access to the entire garden while I was working. I also took out the Eglu, which we've been using as a sin bin, as we haven't used it for a couple of weeks and I wanted to pressure wash it and put it away.

The pressure washer isn't working. It's not the fuse, it's not the extension. Never mind, I'll leave the Eglu on the terrace for now.

The Girls were having a grand time exploring the whole garden. I had to fence off the veggie patch, but they did manage to get to some lettuces on the paved area by the side of the house. I got the camera out as I've been trying to get a photo of all four of them together to use on my egg boxes, but they don't tend to range as a group yet. Never mind, I have several hundred digital snaps to sort through, I'm sure there will be some good ones amongst them.

Pumpkins

Our Butternut Squash harvest has been poor this year. We've had a couple of teenies, and a couple of good sized ones.

Our friend had a bumper harvest, "a wheelbarrow full", only to discover that he doesn't like them! He kindly gave us a load, and I'm about to turn some into Pumpkin Marmalade.

Except it's a gorgeous day outside. And the Eglu needs washing and putting away, the Cube could do with a proper clean, and the leaves need raking. But I need the marmalade to take with me as we're going to friends for dinner, and K is always asking for Pumpkin Marmalade. (I made some ages ago, and he really liked it; i've never been able to make it the same since, despite following the same recipe!).

Weatherforecast for today AND tomorrow is "Sunny", so I'll be good and do the marmalade today and then I'll do my chicken cleaning tomorrow.

Chicken for dinner

My Girls have a lovely life, and I started to wonder whether I could have a couple of chickens for meat. Obviously I would go for a meat breed, and they would be kept separately from my Girls but still have a lovely free range life. Having the Eglu vacant makes this more of a possibility now.

But I'm a wuss. Would I be able to do the deed, and deal with the chicken afterwards?

Well, Alison from Hook Farm (who supplied Milly and Jasmine) was running a course on how to kill and prepare chickens, so DH and I signed up.

It was an interesting few hours. Both DH and I killed a chicken each, which I did find difficult but I'm really pleased that I now know how to do it humanely (having discovered recently that so called "humane dispatchers" are anything but!).

Then we had to pluck. DH and I shared a chicken to pluck. He did 2/3rds or so, I found it harder to do than I anticipated.

Then we put those birds away for later in the week and Alison produced some she had killed and plucked earlier for us to deal with. This is because you need to leave your dead chicken in tact for a few days before attempting to gut.

I would have been happy to take gut the bird and take it home for roasting. Or maybe to quarter it. However, the plan was to completely debone it. DH did this, I couldn't do it. I could have quartered it and deboned the quarters, but I couldn't cope with this deboning. It was, however, a really good learning exercise. The deboned chicken looked a bit like a babygro.

So, we took the "Blue Peter" chicken home and stuffed and rolled it for dinner. The chicken that I had killed we took home, left it out of the bag to cool down and dry out, then put it back in the bag in the fridge to mature. Unfortunately rigormortis set in, and we'd left the legs elongated, so we ended up putting it in our large salad box.

It was a very educational day. I haven't decided yet whether I could raise my own meat birds, I'll think about that some more after we've gutted this one later in the week.

Apples Identified

We've lived here for 11 years, and today we finally got round to taking some of our apples to be identified.

First up, our "left hand tree", turns out to be a cooking apple. That explains the many pulled faces trying to ascertain whether it was ripe! These "Snow White" apples are apparently "Crawley Beauty".

Next, our "middle tree", which we already knew was a dual purpose: "Golden Noble"; books tell us that this is one of the best tasting cookers, and I'm really pleased. Shame I've missed them all - but there's always next year.

Finally, our "right hand tree", which is a russet. I mistakenly thought it to be an Egremont Russet, but yesterday was put right on this, as Egremeonts are russetty all over whereas ours is russetty in patches. Anyway, the Expert today (who said it was delicious, by the wat) says it's a "Duke of Devonshire". Being a late apple, and being a russett, they are good keepers so, as there are still plenty on the tree, we might try packing some away.


There were lots of apples to try at Waterperry Garden's apple day. I bought a kilo of one really unusual variety, "Pitmaston Pineapple". The texture is wonderfully crisp, but the flavour isn't appley at all. I was racking my brains (and tastebuds) trying to work out what it tasted of. Then I realised. Then I laughed at my stupidity. I bet you know what it is, don't you?

Still more apples

Very tired now.

We processed 75kG of apples today into 6.5 litres of apple juice, and 7 demijohns (4.5 litres each) of cider. One of our friends came over with apples from his tree to add to the crates of apples DH picked yesterday. It took about 5 hours or so - with the chaps disappearing to the pub for an hour ar lunchtime - plus a further half an hour cleaning up ready to put all the equipment away til next year. The juice has all been pasteurised, so it'll last for a couple of months or so.

And then we went on to make sausages. 1 kilo of Gloucester Old Spot belly pork, 1 kilo Gloucester Old Spot shoulder, breadcrumbs, herbs and spices and some water. Sausages for dinner tomorrow (they have to chill for 24 hours before using), and the rest are divided up into small packets for the freezer. And the fat off the belly pork is in the oven now making crackling!

Bring me Sunshine

What a fabulous day!

I took advantage of the unexpected daytime warmth by opening the doors and windows and giving the house a really good airing.

I also raked leaves off the grass. I started by trying to clear the chicken's ranging area, but I just carried on. And on. And on.

As it was stil gorgeous, and I was nicely warmed up, I decided to do a complete empty of the Hen Pen. It's not quite 8 weeks and the flooring actually still looked reasonably OK... but I decided to make hay while the sun shines. The Girls were not too impressed though, as new Aubiose doesn't have any interesting bits of mixed corn or discarded vegetables in it.

After getting myself cleaned up I fed my Christmas cakes, and then did a bit more on DsD's wedding invitations. I'm really pleased with them.

Our borough council has launched a new green waste scheme, whereby residents can pay £29 a year to have a green wheelie bin, and to have it collected every 2 weeks. I've signed up for it. The collections start w/c 3 November, and the bin should be here by then. Hope it arrives soon, as I already have a couple of bags of garden debris in the trailer!

An apple a day...

Our first two batches of cider (the ones we made on our course using Discovery apples) have now finished fermenting and have been racked off into clean demijohns. The first batch of cider made from our own apples is busy fermenting in the back bedroom, and DH has been busy picking apples to start the next batch. We have 5 crates full of apples so far!

My pasteuriser has arrived at last, so I'm keen to try making apple juice as well. Reading about it, I've learned that some apples have a delicate flavour, and these don't tend to make a good juice. I suspect that's what we'll find with ours. I also learned that you need to do your blending at the crushing stage; as I don't know what proportions will produce a good juice, it's a bit late. So, we've decided to produce 2 Litres of each of the three varieties. I can then experiment with blending, and then next time I'll know what proportions to try and use.

I really need to get to an apple day to get my varieties identified. I know that one is a dual purpose apple, one is a russet, and the other is just an eater; I know that all of them are fairly high acidity (we had to measure the pH when we were making them into cider). There aren't many apple days near us, but I might make the effort and go to one a bit further afield.

They look wonderful in their crates:

It continues

Last night, same old routine.

Went out to check on the Girls. The Littlees were huddled in the nestbox. As (has now become) usual, I gently posted them on to the roosting bars. There was a lot of grumbling from the Bigees, and Delilah got up. This time, I growled at her, and warned her that if I saw even ONE attempt, she'd be in the Eglu as fast as my arms could carry her.

She glared (yes, chickens can glare) at the Littlees, then she moved so that Scarlett was between her and the Littlees. Then Scarlet stood up and glared at the Littlees. I gave her the same warning.

All four girls settled down, although I wasn't sure it would last.

A couple of hours later I went out, and found that Jasmine had gone back into the nesting box. I gently popped her back on the roosting bars.

Just before (my) bedtime, I went out again, and all four were still on the bars. "Yay!"

I'll try the same thing again tonight...but the Eglu is staying put, just as a reminder.

Drastic action.

Tonight there was trouble.

Not only were the Bigees making it difficult for the girls to enter the Cube, this time there was squawking (how do you spell that word) going on, and the Littlees were being chased out.

So, DH and I got out the Eglu, put it in the run, scooped up the Bigees and shut them in it.

Tomorrow, if there is any sign of the Bigees not letting the Littlees in, we'll repeat it. And if it continues, we'll simply move the Bigees into it every night before the trouble starts.

I'll need to get up early to let the Bigees out, and I'll have to keep the Eglu door shut during the day as I don't want to risk the Littlees using it.

Milly's new toy?

The Littlees stopped cheeping a few weeks ago, and startedmaking a really bizarre sound, a bit like the Raptors made in the film, Jurassic Park. A few days ago they had both developed very distinguished screeches, so that we could easily tell from insude the house who was making the noise.

Today I went out, shiting the girls in the run first. I came back a couple of hours later and let them out; three ran out into freedom, Milly stayed in the Run. I left her to it, but after a couple of seconds she was screeching as if in a panic. I rushed out, expecting to find a fox - nothing. She stopped. I went in, she started, I went out, no fox. I told her off for crying "fox" too often.

When I was back in the house, she started again. It went on for some time, and then suddenly in the middle of a sqwark he voice changed from a screech to a bok. She seemed to have scared herself, as she then continued to bok furiously, interspersed with mini crows, a bit like the egg laying announcement.

And it went on. And on. And on. She was like a kid with a new toy.

I had to mow the grass, and the noise of the lawnmower stopped her noise. I'm not sorry. It's lovely (although a little sad) to hear her new voice, but you can have too much of a good thing, can't you?

Oh! Oh! Oh!

So. Last night we got back very late, and went straight outside to check whether the poor Littlees had been forced to roost on the perches in the run. My torchlight didn't pick up any birds, so I shone it into the Cube. I could see Delilah and Scarlett, sitting in the doorway as usual, but I couldn't see Jasmine or Milly.

I went round and opened up the egg port door, and there they were - sitting in the nest box.


Tonight, I went out to check the status at about 8.30pm. No lost chickens, so I shone my torch into the Cube...and I nearly dropped it in shock.

Not only were Jasmine and Milly in the Cube.... not only were they actually on the roosting bars instead of the nest box..... but they were the ones sitting at the front with their heads poking out of the door.

I snapped off the torch and rushed away in case I disturbed them and upset things.

Oooh! Is this just a fluke, or is it a good sign??

Watch this space!

Grumpy old women

I tried.

Two nights ago, same old hassle with the Bigees not letting the Littlees in. So, I went and sorted it out, and then later tried moving the Littlees manually onto the roosting bars. It was not succesful. Jasmine didn't like it, and ran back to the nest area.

Last night it was pitch black, and the Littlees gave up and tried roosting on a perch outside. I went out to hoik the Bigees out, but they were very sleepy and didn't want to move AT ALL;it was a bit undignified.

Tonight I thought maybe I was overcomplicating things and decided I'd use the torch method if the Littlees got stuck outside. I was busy looking at embellishments for wedding invitations (thank you, Ebay!), so my DH went out with the torch. But he didn't use it, and we had another undignified ejection.

I'll try the torch tomorrow (and the next night if necessary), and if it doesn't work then I will get the Eglu out and put the Bigees in that at night for a few nights.

Chickens!

Cranky ladies

For goodness sake!

Last night Delilah and Scarlett went to bed first, and then refused entry to Jasmine and Milly. Each time one of the poor Littlees waited outside the door, one of the Bigees gave them a big **peck** on the back. The Littlees tried and tried, without success.

Then Delilah got up, came downstairs and started to eat. Jasmine seized the opportunity and managed to get in to the Cube. Milly was about to make an attempt when there was a sqwark from the Cube, and Jasmine came down the ramp at speed.

Delilah marched upstairs, and we were back to square one.

We decided to intercede at this point. DH opened the eggport door, and shooshed the Biggees out of the Cube and into the Run. Jamine and Milly ran straight up the ramp, and the Bigees followed a few moments later.

When I checked later with atorch they were all in their usual places.

Tonights the last night. If they all go in, and the Littlees are still in the nestbox, I'm going to manually transplant them on to the roosting bars. If the Bigees go in and refuse to let the Littlees in, then I'm getting the Eglu back out and the Bigees will find themselves being put to bed in there, with the door shut, until the Littlees feel more comfortable in the Cube.

A pressing matter

Yesterday our new apple crusher arrived, and so we set about processing our own apples for the first time this year.

We had many kilos of two varieties. The third tree's apples are still not ready, and my eyes water at the memory of my having to sample it. We found we still had to at least halve the apples before crushing them, but it was OK. Having washed, cut and milled the 10 or 11 kilos, we were ready to move on to pressing.

In previous years we've used my multifunction Bosch food machine thingy. I have the fruit press attachment for it (along with numerous other useful attachments, most of which I have had to import from Germany or the US, as the machine is no longer sold in the UK.) We even used it last year, when we processed 120Kg of apples. This year we decided to dig out DH's ancient wine press to use.

It was easy to use, and quicker than the electric pulper, but it didn't do a good job of extracting the juice. We ran the pressed pulp through the Bosch, and got loads more out so we decided to stick with the Bosch.

And part way through the second 10 kilos, it packed up. Horrible smell, worse sound. Likely the motor or the gearing, both of which are uneconomical to replace. We thought about buying a new base from Germany, which was more cost effective than buying the spare parts from Bosch in England. Maybe. Not sure it's really worth it...apart from the numerous attachments I have in various cupboards.

So we went back to the wine press, as I'd already washed and cut the third ten-kilos of apples.

Later, we checked out the Boswch again, and it seems that it might be OK. I'll see what it's like next time I need to use it (which will be next time I make butter). We decided that it's probably pushing our luck trying to use it for apple processing again, so we decided to invest in a proper, decent sized, apple press.

Once again, www.art-of-brewing.co.uk came up trumps. We found them yesterday when we needed to get some bits and pieces (that failed to turn up from another supplier). Although AoB do Next Day Delivery, we want to finish the apples over the weekend if possible, so we drove over there again today to collect the press.

It's all been washed and sterilised; DH is up a ladder collecting a few more crates of apples; and we'll crack on with it tomorrow.

Open Plan

Yesterday I decided to remove the partition that separates the nest box from the roosting bars.

The Littlees went to bed, followed later by the Bigees. I presume the Bigees didn't really liike the new open plan arrangement as they came down the steps again whinging loudly. After a few minutes, the Littlees also got up and came downstairs.

I ignored them. When I checked later, everyone seemed to have gone to bed. Much later, I took a torch and had a peep inside and saw the Littlees were cuddled up in the nesting area, and the Bigees were spread out over the roosting bars. I mean really spread out. "This is MY space" spread out.

This morning there were no cuts or anything, so I assume everything was OK. I'll leave the partition out for the next few days and see what happens. Next step will be to try manually transplanting again, which I'm hoping will be more successfull as they are all in sight of each other anyway. I'm also going to make sure it is pitch black when I do it. I thought it was dark last time, but it might not have been dead of night.

We'll see.