Its 2am....

...and my skin is on fire and I can't sleep because of it and the fact that someone we shan't mention is snoring like a sodding train in my ear.

So I am up and sat in a very cold kitchen with a cup of that 40 calorie fake hot chocolate stuff (pre-Menorca diet), itchng and scratching as I, at the tender age of 38 have shingles!! I thought it was for more er...mature folk but nope, the doc who kindly saw us at 2am wednesday morning diagnosed it within 5 minutes of me being wheeled through the doors of the local hospital.

However, I will not grumble any more as I'd had a pretty outstanding few days prior to this and the memory is enough to keep me smiling for a few days yet.

IMPORTANT NEWS! Landrover finally passed its MOT!! Hurrah! I could have cried with joy. Its now taxed as well and I went for an inaugural spin to the farm down the road and back (not too far as I feel like death warmed up). Tomorrow I may venture as far as the village Post Office!

Sunday and Monday I was down by the river taking full photographic advantage of the amazingly good weather we've been having here and chatting to fishermen from afar. Some photos to follow via flickr bloggy thing. Now of course I am pretty much housebound (well house and garden) so the birds who come to the feeders have been photographed from every angle and in every style known to man, or bird.

The greenhouse is living up to its name and its a mass of exciting sprouting things. Most notably the french beans which literally grew 2 inches overnight. Quite scary actually. If you don't hear from me for a few days, please check behind the gro-bags!

Its now 2.41am. Shall I try to go back to bed? Or will I end up ripping the blankets from the bed in a fit of pain-filled-pique again....perhaps another hot fake-chocolate and some more pondering first. If I ponder out loud to you guys then perhaps theres less in my head to keep me occupied up there.

Chickens are fine. First day of spring worming today. I use Verm-X liquid so theres no egg withdrawl period. Which is nice. We're contemplating selling some of the eggs to friends and family - £1 a dozen maybe. We have too many eggs. Even given the fact I've pickled and turned into quiches and god knows what, I still have millions left.

My cunning plan of marking the three ex-rescue jobs going to my friend Jo didn't exactly work. I bought some good old gentian violet to spray the backsides of the poor sods we're keeping that had been pecked to smithereens at their previous abode. They are fairly obvious by their lack of ass feathers so I thought hey, why not mark Jo's chooks-to-be so theres no faffing when she comes to pick them up. They'll be the ones with feather AND purple bums. HAH! The three of them are faster than greased lightning when you point anything at them especially a bright purple spray tube of GV. They may remain unmarked.

Rocky, I think, has issues. Nicks came in last night muttering about 'highly strung' birds and even pondered the possibility of Rocky being female (he's not, but my husband lost brownie points for being uncharacteristically sexist) - but I do have to admit, I've never come across a more high maintenance bird. If he were human, he'd be Alan Carr...

2.57am and Sara has popped into my head. My gorgeous daughter and equally gorgeous grand-daughter are off to join their husband/father in Germany as of first week in July. Sara broke the news to me tonight and I have to say, my reaction was not expected. I cried - I cried buckets, rivers, nay whole fucking lochs of tears. I know I shouldn't have. I knew I should have just fought it back and just tried to sound pleased but it hit me like a brick. I thought I was going to be braver. Well actually, maybe thats the problem - to be honest, I'd tried not to think about it at all. I knew they'd go but it was at a date faaaaaaaaaaaaaar in the distance. And now its not. Now its in words, and on a calendar. Double BAH! Now I understand those TV parents who cry into hankies and things as the kids drive off to uni..

Right, thats 3.03am - enough is enough. I'm going to try again....

Easter

Happy Easter and all that. I'm not overly religious - I have this inbuilt Christian thing thanks to many years of forced Sunday school, where if I or others are in deep doo doo I pray to God but at the end of the day I don't think he/she/it sits there being all benevolent and looking like, well anything really. At the end of the day we die, we rot and we do get reborn but at a microbiological level as we simply become part of the earths eco system once again. I prefer to think of Easter as a time where things are new and fresh and a time for birth - following the whole egg-as-a-symbol-of-rebirth thing. Anyhoooooo, moving on swiftly because thats just a bit heavy for a Sunday night really isn't it.

I have spent the weekend outside. Its been glorious! Ranging from a slightly windy but otherwise very sunny 14 deg C to a tropically oppressive 31 deg C in the greenhouse.

Yesterday I fenced about 50 m along the western perimeter of our land - joining in the gap between the stone dykes - this is mainly because the farmer next door has put all the surrounding land to barley and its just popped through and is green heaven for hungry chickens but not at all fair for the poor farmer. That and the fox is getting bolder and now sunbathing on the riverbank whilst keeping a beady eye on my girls. We'd shoot it but we don't have the shooting rights on that bit. Anyway, thats it fenced now and so the girls are now enclosed - still very much free range its just their free ranging has been curtailed to about 1000m2 :) All are well and the 13 rescue girls are looking so well and chirpy. One of them though has started pecking some of the less-feathered girls and is now marked first for the pot. I hadn't planned on eating them as not sure of their drug past but I'll not suffer a pecker and I'll not waste a good carcass.

Speaking of carcasses - Nick and I became a mobile chicken dispatching unit for a friend today. She had far too many cockerels. We left them hanging (the cockerel, not our friends) awaiting their post-mortem future as cock-a-leekie soup. Below is our friends Dorking (which we didn't bump off)

Then it was a visit to Nicks parents and then via M***** Plant where I once again fell over at the prices but bought some books and my Chicken porn mag (Practical Poultry) and then to BA Stores where James persuaded me to buy even more wild bird food and I discovered that check shirts are only ever stocked in Medium and XXXXXXL and certainly don't go down to a girly Small. BAH! Nick however bought a new exhaust for the tractor and fitted that 10 mins ago.

I still have no Landrover. It failed the first MOT mainly on a hole in an outrigger which Nick duly repaired. It also failed on two dodgy tyres (oooops) and you'd think it'd be a case of slap some new one soon and off you go eh! Not so. Unfortunately I was running on 750 R16's which are IMPOSSIBLE to find nowadays according to the garage (even though I am sitting here looking at a page of 750r16 remoulds - but of course a garage can't fit them) and so have had to replace all four tyres to 205s. But still waiting....... If not done by tuesday coming am taking it home and doing it ourselves (which probably should have done initially but didn't because we thought it'd be quicker) I miss it! I also miss driving to work instead of taking the bus AND I've lost money because I've not been able to do any baking for the shop because I can't take it on the bus!

I am also tired and have a killer sore throat so that explains my moaning mood this evening :)

Garden wise, leeks, oregano, onions, brussel sprouts, lettuce, rocket and french beans are through and I've planted 2 tomato seeds. 2, yes, 2 because last year I planted them all and we had 400 tonnes of sodding tomatoes. We may also be getting some tomato plants from friends so best not to go OTT anyway.

Oooh yes, I saw a Goldfinch this morning too. Not that common round these parts though apparently something akin to buses... (none for years then all come at once)

Right am off for a bath before I attempt to recreate John Torodes Fish Pie for tea.

Some of the Rescue girls looking a bit happier than they did.




Rocky, looking sexy in the sunlight. Well sexy to other chickens anyway...

Rocky VIIII - the Return

He's here....meet Rocky, my new Indian Game cockerel. 21 inches of pure muscle with an ego to match.

I bought him from our good friends Carol and Sandy because I'd like to a) try to breed some very tasty, well meated dinner birds and Light Sussex x Indian Game are supposed to be AWESOME and b) intoduce something other than Light Sussex or ISA Brown/Random hybrid to the existing flock.

I fell in love with a teeny wee Japanese midget something they had too that looked like a Wellsummer cockerel but only 6 inches high - unfortunately (but quite rightly) I was dissuaded from taking him too as he'd never have survived introduction. I have plans for a midget flock though consisting entirely of Japanese bantams.

Hector, the er...head honcho of our lot had a go at Rocky tonight when I let him out the box but he got a helluva fright when Rocky failed to back down and gave him an earful. There was a lot of squawking and shreiking for about 5 minutes then went quiet. I left Rocky saying hi to some of our rescued hybrids and Hector telling his Woman how he would have easily had Rocky if it wasn't so cold and well, with his dodgy knee and arthritis...

From Omlet.com

Indian Game birds are bred in Cornwall and have been since the 19th century. They are sometimes referred to as Cornish. They do prefer to live where the climate is mild. The bird descends from an Asil, an Indian breed of bird whose name means aristocratic. Although the bird looks fierce and stout it has never been used as a fighting bird. They were and still are very popular due to their very large proportion of breast meat. They are used for cross breeding purposes for their meat. Although called Indian Game they are not classed as game at exhibition standard. The shortness of the legs and the increased width of the bird is something that has been developed over this century. Earlier birds had longer legs. Crossbreeds of this bird are what we find in our supermarket shelves today.

Behaviour
The Indian Game is both sensible and tame and very confident in character. Their strange shape does make them vulnerable to lice and mite infestation as they find it hard to preen under their tails. As its purpose is mainly cross breeding for meat it does not lay that many eggs. It can become broody and protective. A full grown bird can become tricky to pick up due to its width. They do need to have low perches and large pop holes to get through.

Varieties
Standard colours for this bird are dark, jubilee and blue laced. The plumage on the females gives a very elegant look. The feathers are hard, close and double laced. The cock bird in dark colour does not have the lacing but a beetle green shine on his back feathers. The jubilee has white where the dark has black and the females again are well laced. The blue laced is the most attractive of the three. It has blue where the dark has black. Over the breastbone there usually is an area with no feathers. The eyes are pale red or pearl. The earlobes are red and the legs are orange or yellow.