Trouble on the Western Front

It seems like my allies, aka neighbors, have decided to abandon the fight against evil.  Namely my neighbor to the west has done nothing at all to curb the dreaded gopher that wrecked his yard.  Predictably, his appeasement of this vile varmint has led to its blitzkrieg across the border into my yard and is wreaking havoc in my backyard.  This is outrageous!

Rightly, the Web-mistress has shown herself to be an apt deputy minister of war.  We were recently at Cabelas when she decided to see if that fine establishment carried gopher traps.  She specifically told the helpful staff member that she was looking for traps the offending gopher would not survive.  No catch and release here.  Unfortunately, that is not the sort of trapping they supply.  Not to worry, Tractor Supply Co. has what we are looking for.  As an aside, we learned within a couple of months that if you were looking for just about anything for the homestead, that was the first place to try.  I can’t even tell you the number of times an internet search would lead us to TSC for some random project.  We have gotten to the place where that is just about always the first place we go and are seldom disappointed.

Anyways, we will mount a critter defense in depth.  I will let you know how things turn out.

Your minister of defense.

Andy

Ornamental Chickens

The ring on the left isn't as nice as the one on the right but costs the same.

Since this blog purports to be about chickens, let me introduce you to my flock.  We picked up eight chicks from Tractor Supply Company in early March that were labeled pullets.  Funny thing, I haven’t seen any eggs yet.  So what I really bought were glorified lawn ornaments.  Given what I have spent building their coop and run, I am currently producing the most expensive compost around.  When August rolls around and they allegedly start laying, I will give them credit for pulling their own weight.  Until then, though, they are merely helping my four year old fulfill his lifelong (I know, right) dream of becoming a “chicken farmer”.

Now, we went with TSC chicks because, never having done this before, it seemed best to not pay a whole lot for each bird.  I mean, should they all have just up and died I would rather be in for $10 rather than $40.  I will admit I was probably too invested in their survival.  Between the stressing over every degree of movement in the temperature being read out on the digital thermometer and the countless trips to the garage to check on the babies, you would have thought I was running a NICU ward.  I finally had to remind myself that people have been raising chickens for thousands of years with much less technology and I should probably relax.

So we will see what sort of eggs these eventually produce.  As best I can tell, we bought Isa Brown chickens.  Anyone have any favorite layers I should consider for next time?