Speaking of animals, we adopted a dog. He's a wonderful stray Chihuahua mix. He was 24 hours away from being euthanized in an L.A. Animal Shelter when a rescue shelter swooped in and brought him up to WA (picture to the right is from the shelter). He's still quite skinny and full of all sorts of infections, worms and parasites but he's the sweetest little guy every.Paco is about 10 months old and is housebroken and crate trained and is just a big lovebug. I'm assuming he was someone's pet and just lost his way, but I'm happy that we've been able to take care of him since he brings so much joy to us. And, he makes for a good therapy dog :)
I'll be posting rather sporadically while things settle down here. Expect there to be a ton of posts on dog related stuff, both non-toxic, natural care and regarding homemade food.My back is better, but I still haven't been able to do much in the garden which is growing out of control. The chickens are definitely benefiting from all my overplanting earlier in the spring. It's a freaking jungle back there!
Sarah, our White Orpington chicken, has decided to brood it up in everyone's favorite nesting box. This started a few days ago. The first night, I implemented operation egg rescue and reached under her and stole the eggs. The second night, she was a little less inviting.
Yesterday, with the help of my co-chicken wrangler, we removed her from the box, pulled up the ramp and put her in the bottom run to get a chance to eat and drink, poof herself up 10x her natural size and make weird clucking noises. As soon as I put the ramp back down last night, she went right back to the box. Oh well, at least I got the chance to clean out the coop which hasn't happened in far longer than I care to admit.
Since our weather has been downright COLD, I've given up on a number of things, namely tomatoes. This year is worse than usual and even the cucumbers and zucchinis just aren't having any of it. The swiss chard, bok choi and other greens are doing well in the cool weather, though.
How's your garden growing?
Related post: The pets in your pet food
14 Crunchy Thoughts:
yeah Crunchy!! Glad for an update. Paco is super cute!
We have had moderate temps here on the prairie,my garden is growing like crazy! I can practically stand in the window and watch the cucumber vines climb. Strawberries are done for the season, raspberries are just starting, and the rhubarb is nearly ready for a second harvest. Veggies should be following shortly. Lots of blooms, but that's about it so far.
Thank you for rescuing Paco!
We have three rescues, all dachshunds. So glad to see you support animal rescue and that you opened your heart and your home to that adorable pup!
Welcome back.
A small cuddly animal can sometimes do as much good as anything big pharma has created. I'm glad you and Paco found each other. Round here, it is also cold and super wet. Most things aren't growing at all, and the things that are, are mostly being eaten by bugs. Most discouraging for our first year in our new garden. Struggling to maintain some kind of perspective on it.
Great to see you back, and I totally noticed you were gone! Glad all is well. Your dog is freaking adorable! Our tomatoes in the greenhouse are starting to get blossoms finally. Those in the raised beds are, well, pathetic to say the least! The zukes are so so, and everything else seems to be faring well: Loads of lettuce, carrots, peas, potatoes. Our blueberries are ripening very slowly. We're just now getting decent weather so I'm finishing all of my painting projects finally.
Apparently if you get a bucketful of cool water and dunk the chook's bottom in, it stops them feeling broody. You might have to do this a couple of times but people here swear by it.
I haven't had to do it yet... none of my girls have been broody.
Yay! A dog! Welcome Paco! (As a home-cooker for the dog, I look forward to your take on it. How big is he? Got freezer space? It'll be easy to cook/prep for weeks at time for one so small.)
My zukes have exploded, I am on track for tomatoes by the Fourth (omg! and Yay! first time ever getting red by the fourth.) And I'm going to have lots of peppers this year. But my cucumbers are lifeless and the basil is (again!) slow starting.
Good to see you back - may things settle soon.
Welcome back - and love the pic of sleeping Paco.
A long, cold, wet spring has wreaked havoc with my garden. Things are s-l-o-w-l-y starting to poke their heads up out of the ground .....herbs, particularly basil and parsley, are sulking themselves right out of existence. Sun is a rare visitor and has been for months. Strawberries just started appearing locally but raspberries and blueberries nowhere in sight. Weeds doing marvellously well.
Nice pup; good you have a little something to cuddle without any secondary considerations. Our current easy cuddle is our only in-out cat Domino. The 6 barn cats are always problematic, and our 2 rescue dogs are big; like 50-60 lbs. Would they love to cuddle in your lap? Sure. But.
I've got the inverse problem with the chickens; I WANT my hens to go broody; and brood. But I've been having trouble with my housing; the Poultry Palace is not really finished inside, and the next boxes are iffy for the long term. The first hen to go broody was incredibly serious about if- for about 2 weeks. Then she got sloppy about handling the eggs, and few of them were actually under her all day. Gave up, there.
Learning curves are such a pain in the butt!
We could use a little dog perspective sometimes - most important things are play, love & food.
Prairiemom - Our strawberries are just getting started and I harvested a bunch this week.
Frogdancer - We're planning on doing the chicken dunk this weekend if she continues this nonsense.
Bullwinkle - He's 8.5 lbs but probably should be 10-11 lbs. His ribs are still sticking out! We have a large chest freezer in the basement so I'll be freezing big batches for the little guy.
Greenpa - I'll trade you. She's pretty stupid (for a chicken) but she's a big, fluffy girl who is a master at heating up eggs.
Two recommended resources: a breed-specific listserv and The Whole Dog Journal. I've found the dachshund listservs (yes, plural! :-) to be a source of infinite wisdom wrt all things dachshund. There are also knowledgeable (reputable) breeders on there that make their own dog food. We did that for a while. But I found it just too much hassle, so I concentrated on finding a high-quality kibble. The Whole Dog Journal (among its other valuable info) rates commercial dog foods, and also writes about what to look for in a good food. Have fun with your new addition to the family!
Like taking a drive through a countryside with no trees, it just doesn't seem natural not to have Crunchy Chicken updates. I'm glad you're back. The blogosphere missed you.
We went from normal to super hot and dry almost overnight. A few things dried up before I noticed (like one of the two pistachio trees my son sent for Mother's Day). Decided to grow white patty pans because they don't suffer from squash bugs and I was really tired of squash bugs and they're growing like gangbusters and I don't find white vegetables appealing to my palate. Chard is keeping us in salads, along with cukes, yellow beets, and baby pans.
Not much in the tomato department yet and maybe won't get much due to the heat.
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