One-handed Milking

The damned Bald Faced hornets are back.  It seems that the hotter the weather, the more of them there are.  I have to milk with one hand and hold a fly swatter in my other hand in order to avoid getting dive bombed every twelve seconds.  I’m averaging two hornet-kills per milking & I’m milking both morning & evenings now.  Unfortunately my hornet smashing abilities seem to be no match for the queen’s reproductive capabilities as there seems to be no end to their buzzing blitzkrieg.  I went out around the outskirts of the woods to see if I could find the nest, but of course came up with nothing.  I wonder if I could somehow capture a live hornet, tie a long string to it & then release it in order to follow it home.  Wouldn’t that be an interesting you-tube video?

My sister’s gray Silkie hen had gone broody.  She took up residence in the corner of the kidding pen and hasn’t seemed to have moved in at least four days.  I figured she had a few eggs under her, but when I picked her up, there wasn’t a single one.  So I let her be for another two days and checked again.  Nada.  Not sure what she’s waiting for.  The other Silkie that managed to hatch out a single chick has started laying again, so I considered taking a few of hers and shoving them under the gray Silkie.  But before I could get more than two, the weather turned Suicidal Squirrel hot and the gray Silkie deserted her post.  Not that I blame her; it was like a sauna in the kidding pen. 

I’ve also started a batch of incubator eggs.  Put them in over almost two weeks ago……I think.  There was company over, lots going on, mind a mess, so really, I’m not sure of the exact date.  Better start thinking about it though because I’ll have to take the eggs out of the turner a day or two before they are supposed to hatch.  The last time I attempted incubating eggs turned out to be a total flop.  Not a single one was alive after two weeks.  Not sure what I did wrong, but they all had started developing but then just stopped. 

I’ve got twenty-nine eggs in there.  My thinking is that half of them won’t make it to hatching and of those that do hatch, half will be roosters.  So hopefully I’ll get seven or eight hens and some roosters for the freezer.  They are going to be your typical hillbilly barnyard mutts, but if the hens lay eggs in a somewhat regular fashion and the roosters taste good in the soup pot, I’m perfectly happy.  Besides, I like getting “surprise” chickens that I didn’t have to pay for.