Well, the big expensive vacation that I’d been planning to take with ol’ Nevah after the Chase County Fair — financed by all the big bucks I planned to take home via the cash premiums my garden entries would earn in the open division of the fair — alas, will have to be cancelled.
My entries earned a few premiums, but not nearly enuf to finance a big vacation. However, I might have earned enuf to cover the cost of a couple of cheeseburgers. Maybe!
Here are the results of my seven garden entries: Both my white and red potatoes won first-in-class blue ribbons; my white onions won a first-in-class blue ribbon, but my yellow onions only garnered a red ribbon; one of my green bean entries earned a blue first-in-class ribbon, but the other only got a lowly white ribbon, and my entry of green pods for dry black beans got the lowest ribbon in the miscellaneous class.
I will mention that I didn’t have enuf tomatoes worthy of entering because I planted them so late last spring. And the zucchinis I planned to enter went for naught because I clumsily broke off the stems when I picked them from the vine.
I will mention that Nevah won a blue ribbon with the quilt she made for one of our granddaughters to take back to college next month.
So, all in all, it was a pretty “blah” showing at the county fair. But, it still wuz fun — in spite of the stifling heat.
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I’ll mention the sauna-like weather we’ve been enduring for the past week. The temps have hovered around 100 every day and the humidity around 90%. That’s what I call “wilt-down” weather. You sweat licking the roof of your mouth.
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The hot weather didn’t keep two old hens from pulling off successful hatchings of new chicks. I wuz brooding them separately in the “Chick Condo” this time to keep the hens from getting their chicks mixed up. I put eight eggs under each hen and the ol’ red biddy hatched all eight and the other white one hatched seven — 15 total chicks.
However, if I hadn’t been vigilant the first evening after the chicks were hatched, the number of live chicks would have suffered. That’s becuz when I went down to check on them at dusk, what did I spy slithering up on one of the new broods but a chick-hungry big black snake?
Usually, I’m pretty tolerant of non-venomous snakes because they eat a lot of rats and mice. But, chick-killing snakes have got to go and this one is now residing in one of my compost piles.
I have to chuckle at what happened right after I dispatched the black snake. I noticed that the red hen, who has always been extremely grouchy and aggressive when she’s broody, was sitting so near the door of her brood box that three of the new chicks had falling out and couldn’t get back in the box and under the hen. I knew they’d die before morning if I didn’t get them back under their mama.
So, since it wuz near dark, I figgered it would be safe to kneel down and slowly lift the chicks and put them into the brood box. Wrong! The instant I touched the first chick, “Old Grouchy” noisily and aggressively exploded out of the nest box right into my face and I received a first-class “hen flogging.”
Even after I extricated my face from danger, the ol’ hen still attacked my shin bones. I can report that after that dust up, all the chicks got safely into the brood box and survived the night.
Since the black snake had been sneaking up on the white hen and chicks next door, I wondered what would have happened if he’d tried the same sneak attach on “Old Grouchy.” Based upon her fearlessness in attacking me, that hen might have pecked that snake to death
Another interesting thing about these hatchings. First, the white hen is a hybrid egg-layer named a California White. It is a sex-linked hybrid which means that all the hybrid rooster chicks are black and all the female chicks are yellow when hatched. Also, the mature hens are not supposed to go broody — but one of mine did — which is a first.
Some of the eggs hatched were from the Whites. So, it’s interesting that five of the 15 new chicks are black, and I have no black “sire” roosters in my flock at the present time. It will be interesting to see if all the new black chicks grow into roosters. Only time will tell.
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Three men — a lawyer, a farmer, and a health insurance agent — were standing in front of the Pearly Gates. St. Peter asked they why he should let them in. The lawyer replied he saved many innocent people from jail. He was allowed to enter. The farmer replied he had fed untold thousands of people in his lifetime. He was allowed to enter. The insurance man said “I helped keep the price of health insurance low for the benefit of all.” St. Peter replied, “OK, you may enter, but you can stay for only for three days.”
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Words of wisdom for the week: The easiest exercises to do are diddly-squats.” Have a good ‘un.
