Quince update

Oh my goodness!

This morning, the juice was still a pale pink colour, and not at all clear. It looked like the juice from a pink grapefruit.

I went ahead with the recipe,  heating the juice with the equivalent amount of sugar (1 litre of juice, 1 kilo of sugar), and a bit of lemon juice.  I heated it gently to help the sugar dissolve, and then suddenly it went clear!

I boiled rapidly to reach setting point, and I now have the most amazing amber coloured jelly!  It's quite sharp tasting, so I think my friend Kevin will be happy. It looked very soft set when I potted it,  I'm hoping it will increase in firmness as it cools down.

I'm really looking forward to giving my neighbour her half!

Quince

I have a quince tree.  It was a birthday present from DH, some years ago. It was a year od or so when he bought it.   We knew that it takes some years before Quinces become productive, so we weren't surprised when in our first (it was 2) we had nothing; our 2nd year (aged 3) we had only 1 fruit;  year 3 (aged 4), 3 fruits.   We had expected year 4 (aged 5) would be a bumper year, but it wasn't.  Quinces (and many apples) suffered with the weather.


This year we had one fruit, very low down.  It got henpecked.


Last year, my neighbour asked me if I could make anything with her ornamental quinces (japonicas). I made some unimpressive jam.   This year, despite last year's less-than-successful attempt, she brought more japonicas round. 


So, I decided to try Japonica Jelly.  I started to follow an online recipe, one which sepcifically mentioned Japonicas.   It said to wash the japonicas, and chop roughly. No need to peel, core, de-seed or destalk.

I used the food processor to chop them up, which it did magnificently and rapidly.  I put them on to simmer, set the timer for 2 hours (2 hours!)i  and I suddenly wondered if I could pressure cook them.  Surely, even if I just gave them a head start, it would be better than 2 hours! 

Margeurite Patten (un the excellent Basic Basics Pressure Cooking) doesn't mention quinces, but she does mention crab apples. Not the same, but not dissimilar.  So, I put them on to pressure cook instead.

The smell filled the kitchen...it was heavenly!   And after 8 minutes steaming, I turned the heat off and let the pressure cooker return to room temperature at its own pace.   Then I schlooped all the pulp - and it was lovely and mushy - into a straining bag.  The liquid is a gorgeous pink colour - but it isn't clear.  That's a shame.  I tasted some of the pulp. I've tried to find a smilie which shows a lemon-sucking face, but I can't.  

So, I have to leave it dripping overnight, and then I'll make Jelly tomorrow.  It's always tricky to do this and to keep both the receptacle and the straining bag protected from flies...but this year, I have my pressure canner.  So I've stood the bowl, with the strainer on top, inside the canner. And I can get the lid on, so all will be protected.


Roll on tomorrow.


I have lots more Japonicas, so I'm really hoping this tastes good. If I make a second batch, I might try NOT chopping the japonicas up first.   But  I am tempted to try Japonica vodka.  I could perhaps adapt my Blackcurrant Vodka recipe, which is a bit farty, but gives a really intense flavour.  Mm. Maybe.  Let's see what the Jelly tastes like first.

Diffusing the situation

Milly has been running around with soggy knickers.   I managed to surprise her today, and brought her in the house to clean her up.  I could see that it was beyond the wet-cotton-wool-pad option, more drastic action was called for.


A minute later I had Milly standing on a towel on the draining board,eating cat food and corn, while I put some warm water in the sink.  A couple of minutes after that, and she was in the sink having her knickers washed.   Not my favourite job.


The promised sunny weather failed to arrive,  so I decided to use a hair dryer on her.  I used to use a hairdryer on Scarlett, and she really liked it. I wasn't sure about Milly.     i dug the hairdryer out of the chicken cupboard (I don't use one on my hair), and I eventually managed to find the diffuser, which I find essential for making sure that the feathers dry without singeing the hen.


To my surprise, Milly seemed to quite like it.  I was able to hold the hairdryer in one hand, and use the other hand to flick throgh ther feathers to help them dry.  She didn't show signs of wanting to escape.


As I put her back in the garden, I saw that Custard was also claggy.  Flushed with the Milly success, I had no hesitation in bringing her in and standing her on the towel while I ran fresh water.  She wasn't so happy.


She didn't mind standing in the warm water, but she did object to me cleaning her nether regions.   And she wasn't too keen on the dryer.  Not frightened, but she was a bit stressed about being inside.  She ended up on the windowsill, and I dried her while she was there.

Of course the clearing up isn't half as  much fun as the hen washing, especially as I have to disinfect the sink area and the surrounding worktop.  (And, thanks to Custard, the windowsill). 

Hope they stay clean for a little while.

De-sensitising

So, the de-sensitisation process has begun.

Armed with a cup of corn, anNette and I went out into the garden.  anNette was standing by my side discreetly, and all the Girls came running up expectantly. I threw corn. The Girls descended on the corn.  I moved anNette a bit, and everyone ran shrieking under the shrub.

I realised that anNette doesn't look so much like the Grim Reaper, she/it looks like a Big Black Bird of Prey. No wonder they were scared.

With one arm out holding anNette, still upright, but the wind blowing the net out lile a windsock, I attempted to thrown corn with the other hand.  I clicked, I called, I chirrped, I threw.

Eventually, Lily came out.  Then a few others.  Tilda and Delilah remained under the bay tree, refusing to budge.  I moved Net.  Everyone ran away.  More calling, more corn.  

Then I turned round and walked in.

I can see this is going to take some time.

Grim Reaper

Four of the Girls (two oldies nd two nebies) are impossible to catch.  Up to now I've just accepted that oldies Delilah and Milly aren't interested in being picked up. But I worked hard with Lily and Daisy, and they associate being picked up with being given corn, so they are always happy to be caught.  Tilda and Custard are similar.  I've made no progress with Florence and Roobarb, and if I can't catch them I can't teach them to associate being caught with being given corn.


So I decided to give in and add a "Poultry Catching Net" to my recent FlytesoFancy order.  It arrived this afternoon.


I went out with it...and all hell broke lose.  Chickens scattered eveywhere.  No one would stay hidden though. As soon as I got within 20 feet of whichever bush they were sheltering under, they would break cover and then run at speed.  This was accompanied by that bok bokking alarm that chickens give when they want to warn the rest of the flock of impending danger.


So, I strolled around the garden with my net in hand (upright).  Hopeless.  I mean, it made me giggle, because real chickens really running is very similar to watching cartoon chickens.  But I couldn't get near any of them. 


I realise that I might need to stroll around the pen, net in hand, while I feed them, just to get them used to its presence before I try and actually catch anyone.


I gave up and walked back to the house. Wash was sitting in the doorway living up to his name (having a good old Wash), and he stared at me.  Then he stared at the net and did a double take.  Then he ran.


As I came through the doorway, I caught site of my reflection.

Definite ringer for the Grim Reaper.

Winter prep

A break in the rain today, so I took the opportunity to scrub the roof panels on the Run,  and I also replaced the summer covers/shades with a waterproof winter tarpaulin on the Cube run part.

It's a bit of a balancing act.  I want to weatherproof that part of the run, but I need to allow it to breathe as well.  The fantastic heavy duty clear tarp that I bought is superb at the weatherproofing, but hopeless at breathability.

So I faffed about for ages before I cut the tarp to size (it was 3m x4m, and I was dithering about the best way to cut it to leave me a useable piece for the spare run).

In the end, I decided to use Omlet wind shades along the bottom of one side, to provide breathability but some protection,  and the tarpaulin over ther rest.  For the moment, I've left the area immediately under the Cube cover free,  I will add the wind shades to this as the weather worsens.

The Girls were very excited.  Lily "helped" me where I was pulling the bungee cords through the weldmesh (fortunately her beak isn't too sharp these days),;and Florence decided to test the side of the new panels for edibility.    When Florence announced that  it wasn't edible,  'Tilda came to have a look and tested it herself, just in case

It's hard to get a decent pic of the whole setup - I'm pleased I cleaned the roof panels before I took this one..

  

 One of the good things about the new Tarp is that Iit's possible to see through it, a little bit anyway.  You can see the Cube ladder through it in the picture above. 

And while I was upstairs taking this, I spied Izzy on a shed roof...

 

Where are we now

Sorry for the long gap.   I work on an ad hoc conultancy basis, and the work I do is very Autumn and Spring focussed.  It's been a busy month, and I haven't had much time for anything other than work.

Luckily for me, I work from home; this means I can coninue to keep an eye on the Girls,  and squeeze in preserving stuff in between.


The integration continues.

Everyone goes to bed, just a few minor squabbles.   Roobard, 'Tilda and Florence are consigned to the nestbox, with Florence sitting on the separator between the nest box and roosting bars;  Custard (who has been in-lay for some time now) is allowed on the roosting bars.


The running away and chasing continues during the day, but more often than not everyone gets on with it, as long as the Littlees keep themselves to themselves.  

Roobarb (the Welsh Black egg that was laid en route when we were bringing Rose and Ruby from Wales to their new home) is just amazing, but completely scared of her own shadow. At treat time, she grabs a treea then runs off into a quiet corner. It takes her forever to eat it, and sometimes she picks it up and streaks across the garden with it. By this time, the others have finished scoffing, and chase her.  If only she kept quiet and got on with eating it, she'd be fine!


I've seen Custard (Sasso) peck 'Tilda (Sasso, disabled) on the top of the head, and that really did make me sad.


I sometimes wish I'd just kept them all separate. The Littlees were a happy little flock They (presumably) had their own pecking order, but they'd grown up with it.  Anyway, it's pointless thinking about that because 2 separate flocks would mean problems with free ranging areas, especially in the winter when the grass isn't renewing itself.

I've been trying to tame the Littlees.  Custard has been much more friendly since she came in to lay. She crouches for me, and I can pick her up without too much trouble.    The other 3, especially Roobarb,  continue to be completely panic stricken.  Florence (Australorp) is so funny. She's an enormous bird but completely unaware of the fact that she's so much bigger than everyone else.  She is stunning.



The Old Girls are moulting, so I've been giving them cat food every few days. Was a bit concerned it migght bring out their aggressiveness even more, but I'm not sure that it does really.


Down on the allotment, the established flocks are moulting as well.  We'd really like to take the saddles off the 3 breeding girls, but we aren't sure what's happening with Roo treading.   I've been finding out more about trimming toes and spurs, so we might do that with Roo and then removed the Girls' saddles for the winter.

Integration Update

I've given up scooshing the littlees out of the nest box on to the roosting bars.


Custard, who now lays a teeny weeny egg most days,  seems to be allowed on to the roosting bars with the Big Girls.  So, I've decided to leave things as they are  and see if coming into lay affords then roosting bar privileges.


Out and about, the Littlees still get chased away, but mostly things are OK. We can't decide whether poor little Roobarb (the Welsh Black) is bottom, or the disabled Matilda is bottom.


We've been trying to pick each hen up for a few seconds each day. Easier than it sounds.  Custard is fine, she crouches as soon as I get near her.  Florence, Matilda and Roobarb are much harder to get hold of.  As are Milly and Delilah, the Big Girls.  Lily and Daisy continue to be very cooperative.


I don't worry too much about having to leave them all shut in, but we do still have feeding and water stations everywhere.

Egg Custard

After a couple of practice attempts, Custard has laid her first "proper" egg.

It's tiny. It's beautiful.

Clever girl!

Top Cat

This morning I needed to go to a local shop to buy celery and carrot (to make chicken stock), bagels for breakfast, and I needed to pay the paper bill.   So I decided to walk kto the paper shop, which also has a convenience store attached.  This is in one direction from my house.

When I got there, there was no celery. And no bagels.  But I was able to pay my paper bil.   I then had to go to the Village's other convenience shop,  which was in the opposite direction.  Annoyingly, I have to walk all the way back and past my house to get there.

As I came around the corner, our lovely ginger cat, Wash, was coming out of a neighbours garden and was walking across the road in my direction. He stopped dead in the middle of the road when he saw me. I stopped.  We looked at each other.  

I decided the best option was to ignore him and continued.  It didn't work.  He ran after me, and followed me.

I wondered if he would get bored and go home.  This didn't seem likely.

I pictured me having to pick him up and carry him into the CoOp.  That would not end well.  Even if it did, I didn't really want to introduce him to an even wider ranging territory than he already patrolled.  There was nothing for it.  I turned round and walked home.


We had a pleasant stroll together.  Both our cats love to be outside with us, and having Mum for company on patrol seemed to be an especial treat. We reached our drive, and Wash went bombing up it, stopping at the front door.


I opened the door, let him in....then I shut the door and made a run for it.

Chicken for dinner

Since we started on this raising chickens for the table malarkey, we've found it very difficult to buy chicken - even free range, organic.    I think we've bought chicken breasts twice this year.    So, this means that we don't have chicken for dinner very often.


And when it's one of ours, we do our best to not waste anything.  


This week was the first time we had culled one of the new cross (Sasso x Welsh Black). We had high hopes for this, because the Welsh Black mums are half Indian Game, and Indian Game was said to make for a very good table cross.


It really did.  


The flavour was very strong without being at all gamey.   He was 15 weeks old and dressed out at 4 pounds 3 oz.   Looking at him prepped for the oven, I thought about all the farmed chickens who are that size at only 5 weeks old.  It made me shudder, and went a bit towards making me feel less miserable at  eating a bird I had known personally. 

We had roast chicken on Wednesday, and had only one breast betweeen us.   The flavour was sfabukous, and we really didn't need anymore.

On Thursday, we used the leg meat to make some gorgeous Fajitas.  They were much more delicious than I expected them to be. I've made delicious fajitas with chicken breast before, I was just a bit dubious about using leg meat.  This will definitely be my preferred choice for Chicken Day 2 in the future.  We were very greedy, and we ate far more than we needed to. This could easily have spread into another pair of meals.


On Friday, I was out, and DH ate the whole of the other chicken breast.


We picked over the remains today while preparing to make stock, and have enough meat to make a chicken pasta bake for dinner tonight.   


I'm using the pressure cooker.  I haven't made stock in a pressure cooker before, but I have high hopes of a rich stock in only 30 minutes, without making the house smell of chicken soup.

You might wonder how we don't get bored, having chicken for 4 consecutive nights.    It's not difficult as all the meals are so different.   If we were going to have similar meals, I'd simply have something else in between.


Besides, we only have 2 more birds until next year's eggs are hatched, and raised (about July time, I guess)  so that makes chicken something of a luxury to be appreciated.

If it can, it will

I'm having one of those days.

It's my own fault.  I'm reading "The Girl Who Played WIth Fire", and last night I just couldn't put it down.  Hopeless really, as I knew there was no way I'd finish it, but I kept thinking "jut a bit more, just a bit more...."    

I had to be up early as I had some Work to do first thing, and then a client meeting to go to.    I took a brand new Bravissimo top out the wardrobe and cut the tag off. I pput it on, and the loops inside chafed my neck.  I cut them out.  The I realised that the top was actually too big.  Can't send it back now, best I can hope for is an Ebay sale.

Downstairs to do some Work. The initial bit of Work seemed OK, but then I found a couple of odd things...  I can't explain anymore, it's not a disaster, it's just irritating. I was still sorting them out when it was time to leave.

And then I couldn't get a parking space at the Client company, had to park on the road, and I was almost late for my meeting. 

Meeting went well, got home... well, let's just say it's been one silly thing after another.   I uploaded a data file, and I ulpploaded an old version.  Not a problem, only affects me, and all I needed to do was to upload again using the correct file.  Just a bit of a waste of time and effort.

And then there were the really silly things. Like making coffee, and putting the empty coffee brewhead onto the machine instead of the full one,  and of course using it for my DH who has sugar.   And putting the washing machine on at the wrong temperature.    And starting to sort out tonight's dinner before remembering I'm going out.   And breaking a wine glass. 


Still, on the bright side, I don't often have days like this...

Hen in a Manger

I was watching the Girls through my kitchen window.

We have a large fruit bed (with raspberries, gooseberries, blackcurrants, a jostaberry and a tayberry) and we've removed all the netting so the Girls can scratch around inside it.

Custard (LG), who is a very compact-but-heavy girl, decided that one of the leaves at the tip of a raspberry cane was irresistable.   She jumped up and caught it, bending the cane over. It sprang back as soon as she loosened her beak to get a better grip.  She tried again. And again.

Florence (LG) pootled over to see what Custard had (or, didn't have). They both tried.

Lily (BG) could see that they were having fun, and came rushing over, shooing them away from HER raspberry cane.   She wasn't interested in it, she turned her back as soon as they had gone.

Custard snuck back and was mid leap when Lily turned round.   Lily was furious, and ran at Custard, who tried to run away whilst her beak was clamped around the top of the cane.

She let go. 


I don't know who was more surprised at the rebound, Custard or Lily.

Under Pressure

A little while ago I bought a state-of-the-art Kuhn Rikon (KR) pressure cooker. The extra tall model, with short handles.


I decided that I wanted to move on to pressure canning (from hot water bath pasteurising), and I had contacted numerous pressure cooker manufacturers to find out if their cookers were suitable for this.  The only one who came back positve, was KR.


So, for the past month we've been using this. 4 Kilner jars fit in perfectly, and it is big enough to double up as a water bath for bottling.

I'd also been testing it as a pressure cooker, and it is brilliant.  Much less scary than the one my mum had, and the one I had some years ago. No more hissing spitting and jiggling.(edited to add: I was referring to the behaviour of the pressure cooker. Not me. I don't hiss and spit. Although I might jiggle from time to time, especially when stressed.)


Then our tomato harvest got serious. Almost all our large greenhouse is given over to tomato production, including the separate section at the end where DH uses hydroponic bits & pieces.   We were processing 12 bottles of passata at a go,  which was 3 goes in the KR.

So, I decided to get a pressure canner from the US.  I tried on Ebay, but the costs including shipping (and duty and VAT) were prohibitive. Then I found an excellent site which specialised in bringing stuff from the US to the UK.  The price they charged was a bit more than my KR,  but they guaranteed no extra duty or VAT to pay.  I was happy with the price, and placed my order.


The Presto Canner, now christened Preston,  arrived yesterday.  It is ENORMOUS.   In fact, it is so big that ENORMOUS is too small a word to describe it.


We used it for the first time today, processing 12 jars in one go.  Fab, fab, fab.


I've now retired my electric pasteruriser. It's sitting in the spare bedroom, while I consider what to do with it.    It has some advantages over Preston - it's automatic, it's electric, it has a timer, it has a thermometer.  But I only have space in my kitchen for one ENORMOUS pot thing. And that has to be Preston.


You can use him as a pressure cooker as well, but I can't imagine what sized houshold would need a pressure cooker he size of him  (23 Litres).

The downside of using Preston (or the KR for that matter) is that only Kilner - or the US equivalent Mason - jars can be used. The ones with the metal lid and metal screwband.  I've purchased (and used) 36 jars so far. 

In the meantime I have an army of 500ml and 1L Le Parfait jars taking up precious cupboard space.

Sad

3 of the cockerels went yesterday.


I have their leg rings on the worktop, ready to sterilise and put away. It is so sad.  I have to make myself remember that these chickens had a really happy life, much longer than the life of most table chickens.  And that all chickens are chickens and have personalities, irrespective of whether I knew them personally or not.

I was updating our Chick Records, and realised that the blue ring belonged to the only cockerel with a pea comb.  He was the one who was the spitting image of his mum, Rose.  

This part of the cycle just doesn't get easier.  I guess it's better in some ways that it doesn't,  as it keeps me very aware of what I eat,  and determined not to waste anything.
 
Luckily for me, DH does the gutting.  

Sausages Again

Did I mention that when my Dad was a very young man, he worked at a Butchers?  He started to make sausages for the Butcher, and these became very, very popular.  By the time he left, he was making 1 ton of sausages a week!


We thought he might like to re-live his youth, and to make sausages with us.  So, on his 75th birthday, we lugged all our sausage making gear (everything, including rusk, the seasonings, the casings, the food mixer to do the mincing, and the vacuum sealer to seal the finished sausages) down (up?) to my parents house in Wales.


We stopped en route at a fantastic butchers shop in Llandeilo (Julian Cooper, Carmarthen Street), who specialise in sausages anyway.  We bought a large quantity of both pork shoulder and belly pork from him, and that's what we took with us to turn into sausages.

 

Once the meat was skinned and chopped up, it was minced, athe rusk and flavourings added (we did two different mixes) and then each mix was packed into our sausage stuffer...

 DH worked the handle, and Dad guided out the sausages....

..and then Dad turned them into Butchers Links....

We had a mountain of sausages.  I counted out some  of each for Dinner, (for Dad, Mum, Me, DH, DB2 - darling brother 2), and then some more for a snack for DB1 who would be arriving the next day. We portioned the rest up and put them in the freezer.  I made special "Mum" sized portions of the Garlic & Herb ones, as Dad wasn't sure whether he'd like them. 

I think Mum and Dad quite possiby have enough sausages to last them (and any visitors) for months.


DB1 didn't get to try the sausages. They were delicious. Dad developed quite a taste for the Garlic & Herb ones.   All but one were eaten at Dinner.  And the "but one" was given, as a special treat, to Bonny.  Mum and Dad's dog.


Yum!

Feeling fruity!

The apples on our middle tree (Golden Noble,  one of the world's best cookers according to by Rosanne Sanders apple book) are ripe. 

They've been ripe for some time,  and they announce this quite loudly by falling on the roof of the chicken run and making everyone jump.

Many of them have been ruined by the parakeets, already rotten before they fall.  The Girls have been scrumping on windfalls for weeks. I normally clear the rotting ones each day.  Yesterday I caught Daisy pecking at one of the rotten ones which I had missed. I had visions of what an intoxicated chicken might get up to, and took it away from her.

DH has been apple picking for the last few days, packing the apples carefully between layers of newspaper in plastic crates.   We did have some apple boxes in the shed, but we threw them away one day in the summer when having a clearout - we associated boxes with chickens, and couldn't imagine why we had that shaped box for chooks. (One of the perils of getting middle aged.)

We will have to do some pruning this year, as some of the branches are just too far away, even with the apple picker fully extended

Anyway.  36kg of apples were stacked neatly in our kitchen, and yesterday we  started the process of turning them them into Cider.   Firstly, they were washed... 

 .. then crushed in our electric mill, then pressed to extract the juice.  The Specific Gravity of the juice was measured, so we now how much sugar to add.

We now have about 20 Litres of juice fermenting in a big fermenting barrel on the kitchen floor.

I need to pick a few more of these apples to make Dorset Apple Cake,  and I'd also like to stew some and freeze it for apple-y things in winter. I need to be in a preserving mood to do it. Maybe next week.

Stretching

I've been seeing a Chiropractor for a while now.

It started when I ricked my neck moving the Eglu Go.  A few sessions sorted that out, but I had some other stiffness (the top of my neck and up into my skull), so I continued to go to see her to work on that.  That got resolved, and I haven't had migraines (from pain there) since.


I then asked her to concentrate on the stiffness across my shoulders, and she found a deep rooted problem in my other shoulder.   The problem with these things is that they came on gradually, crept up on me without me noticing.  My body adjusted itself to cope,  and in doing so created other problems elsewhere.  
 
I'm having acupuncture on my shoulder, which is working really well.   because so much of me feels much more flexible, I decided to introduce a daily stretching routine.  I used the stretching exercises I learned when I was a (ir)regular visitor to Curves.  Managed to find a copy on the Internet to refresh myself, and started.

The upper body ones were fine. The chiropractic treatment I had been receiving had made a big difference.

I did the first 8 exercises, which involve standing,  without hesitation. But then it came to doing the ones where I have to sit on the floor.  The floor seemed a long way away.  And it looked hard.    For the first 3 days, I kidded myself that I would do the sitting down exercises Later. In the living room on the rug.  When my body had warmed up.  In the evening while I was watching TV. Just before I go to bed.

Of course, I didn't do them.

In the end, I made myself do them in the morning.  I knew it was unlikely to be good news - all that procrastinating was my body's way of trying to protect itself.  

And they were awful.  Especially the one where I have to sit down, legs extended, and touch my toes.  I couldn't get much past my knee.  I pulled one knee up, so I had only one leg extended.  This is a bit of a cheat, but it helps to do this in the early days. I still couldn't reach my toes.  I was mortified.  I had realised I was stiff, but this was DREADFUL.   

I haven't been this bad since I first discovered I had a problem with my sacral illiac muscle/joint thing.

So, at my most recent treatment, I asked my Chiropractor to take a look at my lower back particularly.   The problem appears to be a little bit higher up than the sacral illiac joint (SIJ) -  although I suspect that the SIJ is the cause, and the immobility of the vertebrae above it is just a symptom.

So, I'm making myself do my exercise routine, AND I'm adding back in the exercises I used to help with the SIJ.

I imagine that progress will be gradual and almost unnoticeable, so I thought I'd make some notes here about how far I can stretch.  I'm not going to bore you with every exercise, I'm particularly interested in the progress of the sitting stretch.

And writing it here may "force" me to do it.

6th Night

Left the Green Cube locked shut all day, and waited to see what would happen at BedTime.

I crept out at about 7, and could see that the Big Girls were in the Orange Cube, and the Littlees were still milling about.  There were some abortive attempts to get inside.

At 7.15, it looked as though Tilda had managed to get in the Cube,

At 7.25, Roobarb was still out.  I tried to catch her, she ran away shrieking loudly, and ran up the Cube steps.  Daisy pushed her off the steps as she came out.

At 7.30, everyone seemed to be in the Cube. I opened the door to see all 4 Littlees crammed into the nestbox.  I pushed them into the main part of the Cube.

At 7.35, 3 of them were back in the nestbox.

At 8.00 when it was dark,  3 of them were in the nestbox.  I opened the back of the cube and saw Tilda sitting quietly in one corner, minding her own business.  I removed each Littlee from the nestbox in turn, and popped them in through the back.  Roobarb went bananas, and managed to escape.  It was dark though, so she was disorientated and easy to catch.

The insertions caused a disturbance. Tilda moved, and got pecked (quite nastily) by Lily.  I leant in and pushed Lily down, gently but firmly.

I shut the back, and came in.

So, a definite step forward.  The Littlees managed to get into the Cube without assistance - even if it did mean they had to seek refuge in the nestbox. 

One step forward.

5th Night

So today we kept the run for the Green Cube closed all day.  I cleaned out the Orange Cube, raked up the Aubiose in the main run, Stalosaned, and put itback down. I hetwashed the rubber chippings under the Cube, and Stalosaned.  Topped up the dust bath.  Jet washed the bench and log.  Hung up some more treats.  Jet washed the drinkers...

A bit before bedtime, I opened the door of the Green Cube run so that the BGs wouldh have a choice of where to sleep. Although not much of a choice really: if they chose the green cube, they would be relocated when dark anyway.   Of course everyone then had to get into the Green run,  just to have a look around,  just because they had been excluded from it all day.

Later I checked who had gone where. Daisy, Lily, Delilah were all in the Orange Cube.  Lily was in the Green.  The Littlees were milling about in the Orange run, unable to get in to the Cube.

I scooped up LIly and put her in the Orange Run so that she could go to bed.  She wasn't amused. She didn't climb the ladder.  She had a peck at one of the treat blocks.  She stood watching the Littlees.

Custard tried to get into the Cube, but was rebuffed. at the top of the  ladder.  Tilda, Florence and Roobard sat underneath the Cube.


I caught Florence, opened the back of the Cube and tried to insert her.  She didn't want to be inserted, and flew off.  Custard was again trying the ladder, so I gently nudged Milly out of the way of the door.  Milly took ubrage and went down the ladder, followed by Daisy and Delilah.


I walked back round into the run, and picked up Custard and inserted her into the Cube. Then Tilda.   Then I tried, unsuccessfully, to catch Florence.  Roobarb came up the ladder.  Eventually, Florence succumbed.  I went in the house.


Later,  everyone was in the CUbe.  When it was dark, DH went out to check, and found Custard, Roobarb and Florence in the nestbox. He pushed them back into the main run and shut the nestbox door.  A few seconds later he opened it again, to see that Custard had crept back.  He put her back onto the roosting bars.

I'll remove the Green Cube and run completely in the next day or two.