Jeopardy party

I celebrated my (early) birthday with a second Jeopardy party with my friends. (First one was for my birthday two years ago.) It was a great time  - A+, plan to host again next year.

Easily reusable board - each clue slots into an envelope.

I prepped five sets of six categories each. Two more sets were supplied by friends so that I could be a contestant, too.

Halley and Chimera enjoyed the party, too.

More hats and updated hats

Two recently completed beanies:

Am I cute or what?!

Both of these hats have rabbit fur pom poms purchased at The Black Squirrel. Once I've finally gotten the hang of breaking hides, I definitely want to make my own fur pom poms.

I also added two fur pom poms to the Bobble & Twist Hood:

And a yarn pom pom to the NOPE beanie:

Second rabbit mating

The rabbit buck and doe spent a few days together this week. Expecting the next litter around September 12th.

I also replaced their standard rodent water bottles (which I'd gotten for free, but were small and leaked) with 2 gallon buckets with metal nipples to drink from.

Chicken injury and recovery

One recent morning I did my livestock rounds and found the Black Australorp lying on the ground with her legs splayed behind her. She couldn't move them much and couldn't stand up at all. She would definitely die from exposure and dehydration if I didn't give her any support, so I brought her indoors. I laid out a towel for traction in the bathtub, and propped her against a food bowl and water.

She perked up immediately after drinking water. Over the next three days, she steadily gained strength in her legs (left one more quickly). She started being able to shuffle around on her "hocks." She'd had diarrhea at first, but it cleared up after 24 hours. She started preening her feathers after 48 hours. I did little rehab exercises by holding her above the floor and slowly lowering her down, so she would try to engage her muscles to support herself.

Three days after the incident, I had to leave for the weekend. I didn't want to leave her in the bathtub in case she knocked over her water bowl (which had happened once before), and so that she didn't poop and then smear it all over herself. I arranged for my local vet to board her.

Fortunately, on the morning I was leaving, she was able to stand and take a few wobbly steps at a time. With that milestone, I felt comfortable putting her outside into one of the old animal pens. She continued to gain strength while I was gone and could walk up to a few feet before resting.

She is now back with the flock and has even been able to get onto the roosting bars at night.

Yarn spinning progress

I don't spend as much time at my spinning wheel as I wish I could. On Sunday I drove down to the Black Squirrel for the new monthly spinning circle. It turned out that the group is meeting on the second Sunday of the month, not the first. I stayed anyway and got 3 hours of spinning done. I'm finally close to finishing the "MLP" roving I bought two years ago. I think it will only take 1 or maybe 2 hours more.

Once I'm done spinning up the roving, I will ply the three spindles together.

Dead baby bunnies

Well that turned quickly. This morning I saw the doe in the box with her babies. In the afternoon I decided that it was time to check on them again. There were seven - one was smaller and I hadn’t felt it earlier. They were all totally cold. Their bellies were big and squishy, not emaciated. I think that mom was taking care of them fine, but either disease or environment killed them. One of my local friends suggested that it was the bad air quality from nearby fires. I will wait until the air clears up so that the adults aren’t stressed, then rebreed then. In the meantime I’ve thoroughly sprayed the nesting box with bleach.

Baby bunnies!

I am so excited to welcome my first litter of rabbits! The doe was due to kindle between Tuesday and Friday, and waited until Friday morning. Then I held out for only 24 hours before checking on the nest. I'll leave them alone again for the next few days since rabbit moms eat their babies if they're overly stressed. (yikes)

There are 3 dark gray babies and 3 pink ones. They don't have any fur yet and their eyes and ears are closed, but they had full bellies. They startled and wriggled violently when they felt my hands reaching around and picking them up, but would calm down after I'd held them for a couple of seconds. I picked up a few for just a few seconds each, counted everyone, then covered them back up with mom's fur. She checked on them after I left.

Next batch of broiler chicks

Raising chicks is so much fun! The next batch of 25 arrived a couple weeks ago. It's been so hot that I haven't turned on the heat lamp for them after the first few nights. No deaths in this batch. (Last set had 3.)

Baby pictures:

This one has an injured left eye.

For the most part I can't tell what breeds I have, but I got 3 of these hideous Turkens!

Why do they have naked butts??

So ugly.