Quail Hatch

I am pretty sure that if our species had to hatch out of eggs we would all just give up and die in the shell. It is absolutely amazing what a little chick goes through to hatch. This little quail chick pipped yesterday which means it broke a tiny dent in the shell. That's it. It sat there all day and all night and almost all day today and only broke the shell a tiny bit more. Then this evening it finally started to zip which means it started breaking all the way around the shell. If you sit there and watch them do this you will be so tempted to reach in and help them out. They take so long and sometimes they seem to stall and don't get anywhere for several tries. But the chick is so much better off if you don't help unless you absolutely need to. So my little chick zipped almost all around the egg, then it struggled and struggled and finally managed to push its head out.

All seemed well now except that it was stuck because it hadn't quite zipped all the way around. It struggled and pushed over and over again. It broke off some of the shell with its feet. I really, really wanted to help but I waited.

 It pushed and pushed some more. I bet it took another 10 minutes before it finally started to lift its back end out of the shell.

Then it was only a few more pushes and it was out completely.

I hope this is the first of many tonight. There are a lot of pips in there. If so it will be my first really successful quail hatch this year.

Driving Lesson

Michelle has to learn to drive. A few years ago Georgia made a law that everyone under 18 had to take a driver training class but, of course, they cost. Good ones cost..a lot.  So now anyone who can't afford it waits until their child is 18 and they go and take a written test for a learner's permit. This is what we have had to do with Michelle. John and Buddy got their learner's permits before that law came along. I was not as involved in their driver's training because Buddy's dad took him driving and Phil ended up working with John (before he went in the Army)and he had John learn by driving them to work.
I have to say that I would so much rather have sent her to driving school. I would rather kill snakes all day or take boat rides (I have an unreasonable fear of boats) than take her for driving lessons. It is not just her. I really hate having anyone drive me. It seriously didn't help that on our first lesson I told her to step on the brake and she looked at me and said, "That's the big one, right?" I almost quit right there but we have struggled through several lessons down the dirt roads and today she got her first paved road lesson. I made Phil go with us in case I had trouble dealing with it (I do have a heart condition).
We took a long dirt road that lead to a paved back road that we knew would have little traffic. She did just fine and we turned around and went back. We gave her the option of driving all the way home which would have meant going on a much more traveled (faster) road but she decided she didn't feel ready yet (I was so glad!).
So next weekend we are planning a longer drive on more paved roads. Wish us luck!

Some Days Aren't All That Idyllic

I hear people say it all the time, "I was born 100 years too late," really well not me. I had trouble dealing with a broken hose this morning. I can't imagine living in a time where I had to go dip the water out of the well or the stream carry it to the animals and water them that way. I would hate to imagine what I would have to do to feed quail, ducks, chickens, baby ducks, chicks and quail plus pigs. Nope not me. I am pretty happy I wasn't born 100 years ago. Most people say that because the look at the scenes in the picture here and think everything was idyllic and wonderful. They don't see what work it takes to keep that horse healthy, even the work just to hitch it to the buggy, let alone what work is waiting once they get back home after church. These pictures are all over my walls. I may not want to live 100 years ago but I do love the pictures anyway.

I did have a plan this morning. I should never even make one. My plan was to butcher several of these bantam roosters and maybe a few quail.

There are only three hens in this pen and about twice as many roosters but once the hose broke things got more complicated and by the time everything was done, it was hot already.
It was not just the hose that was broken but also the splitter that was broken. I have two hoses that run from the spigot. One hose is for filling up the duck "pool", washing out the fountain after the ducks mess it up every day, and watering the few plants in the back yard. The other hose runs into the back shed and connects to a nice deep sink that is in there. It is where I wash and  fill all the waters except the duck water pan.

I knew the duck pool hose had a hole in it. I have fixed one already and it developed another but it just sprays under the porch and doesn't hurt anything though I do plan on fixing it as soon as I remember to buy a hose mender thing to fix it with, but today I noticed a puddle in the back shed (it has a dirt floor--which is now mud, of course), I had already turned that hose on and reached down and pulled the hose up out of the dirt and mud, it sprayed like a damn geyser right up to the roof of the tin roof of the back shed....after hitting me and spraying muck all over me of course. It is hard to be mad about getting sprayed, even with muck, it will still make you laugh at yourself a bit. Anyway, I turned the water to that side off and went to use the other hose which meant I had to carry all the waters out to it and didn't get the luxury of my nice sink However,when coming back in to the shed with the pigs water, I notice the puddle had still gotten bigger and there was still water coming out of that hole in the hose. Back out to the spigot to check the splitter. Yup, this is the off position and there shouldn't be any water coming out.

Now I have another splitter in the house....somewhere...of course, never to be found this morning. So I unhooked that hose, put a bucket under that side and still used the other leaky hose to do all the waterers.

The pigs, however, had seen that I had a pan of leftovers this morning. They were quite ready for me.

This is one up on the pallet barrier with his face pressed against the chain link door. They, of course, had one of the hanging feeders off. Every day they seem to manage to get on of the four hanging feeders off which I nail back on every day. I used two of them for water and two for feed. They didn't want to give the feeder back and just insisted on getting in the way when I reached for it and putting their nasty snouts all over my hands and arms, which I have to snatch back since they seem to think my fingers might be food. Since they had been up on the barrier it was all nasty too and I had to lean over it to get the feeder so yeah, I smelled mighty "piggy" afterwards.

So the animals got fed and watered. Then I am looking at the back raised bed and the spinach that is left in it. It is trying to go to seed and just as I am thinking I need to get that picked, Simba walks over turns around and sprays it. Yup, so we apparently don't need any more spinach from that bed. Thank you Simba.

 I then turn on the spigot on the rain barrel so that I can water the garden but it is running out really slowly and I don't have the patience today. I get the pliers, take the splitter off the spigot by the house and attach the rain barrel hose to it, take wand in hand and go down and water the garden. I'm sure now that I watered it will rain. We had a chance of rain yesterday evening and I was hoping, but we didn't get any.

The garden is the only good part of the morning. Right off I noticed my first tomatoes had started to form. I have tomatoes on the hanging basket tomatoes but these are the first standard sized tomatoes. Sorry for the blurry picture but I am not walking back down to the garden to get another one.

And here are the squash. In past years I have had a lot of problem with the small squash just falling off but I am quite hopeful for these this year.

The basil is looking good though I did see a few eaten spots on the inside leaves so the bugs may finally be finding it.

And since it started warming up the pink blueberries have send out several new shoots.

So, no it isn't all idyllic but since I am now relaxing inside in the air conditioning and all the hard nasty work is done I am still better off than those who lived 100 years ago. Now to go check on that quail hatch...