Four hens a-laying

The hens don't seem to be missing their erstwhile lord and master too much. We got a record-breaking eight eggs from them yesterday and they've been queuing up to use the nest boxes today, too.

And then there were ten

It was an odd journey to work yesterday. Next to me in the passenger seat was one of our roosters, on his way to Deseronto with me. We ended up with two male birds in our batch of twelve supposed-females and I had been thinking that we would have to kill one of them until I heard that another Buff Orpington-keeper might be interested in taking one off our hands as breeding stock for his hens.

The dominant one (known as Cocky) has been acting increasingly aggressively towards me (less so to Mike), so there was little debate as to which of the two would be sent off. Consequently, I packed him into a cardboard box yesterday morning and drove off to work with him next to me. I was worried that he would try to escape from the box and generally be a road-safety hazard, but he was as good as he is golden. Which made me feel guilty about getting rid of him.

When I arrived at his new home I was greeted by the man who was to take custody of him. He had blood on his boots as, he explained, he had just killed one of his own roosters. One that had been acting aggressively. I hope Cocky behaves himself...

Here he is in a photo taken last week, in characteristic 'king of the castle' pose with some of his harem around him. The pretender to his throne is also in this picture. Things should be more peaceful in the hen house now.

Growing tips

One of our neighbours gave me some amaryllis bulbs last month. I've never nursed amaryllis plants into life before, so have been watching them with interest. One of the five seemed unresponsive to my tender care but this morning I spotted a small green shoot emerging from it. Usually I'm hopeless at looking after houseplants. Keeping these in the kitchen where I notice them more often seems to be helping. I dug the rosemary plant out of the garden last week and have placed it next to the amaryllis pots. So far, that is surviving, too, unlike last year's specimen which I put in the basement and completely forgot about.

It's good to have something that's actively growing while everything outside is frozen and white.

Another sunrise

So, what I was saying yesterday about it not being long before the lake would be frozen turned out to be more accurate than I expected. Couldn't resist taking a chilly walk along the side of it this morning to catch the sunrise reflected in the ice (before it gets covered with snow!).

Treebeards

The lake is not yet frozen, although it won't be long before it is. The cold weather and the waves generated by the high winds last week have left some strange and beautiful ice-sculptures along its banks. I like the Santa-beard on our neighbours' bent willow tree:

All down the lake the trees have been decorated in sparkly dangles of ice:

The shapely icicles on this fallen branch look striking with the light behind them:

Ice creatures

Cold enough this morning (-15°C/5°F) for delicate ice forms to appear inside the double-glazing. This could be a moth, or maybe a bird:

This one looks like two spiders:

Turkey trot*

A soothing mixture of colours at the almost-frozen pond yesterday.

The area was being visited by a group of wild turkeys when I turned up with the dog. When he arrived they took off into the trees, with much heavy beating of wings. I've never managed to get a close look at them, thanks to Toby, but did manage to grab a distant shot of one, before it flew further away.

They left behind ample evidence of their visit. The footprints made me feel as though I were following a treasure-trail created by someone who was determined that I shouldn't lose my way.

*I was interested to learn from Wikipedia that the original dance of this name gained its popularity after being denounced by the Vatican (a pre-Internet version of the Streisand effect?). According to the New York Times, the newly-elected US president, Woodrow Wilson, cancelled the traditional Inaugural Ball in 1913 because

he feared there would be indulgence in the "turkey trot," the "bunny hug," and other ragtime dances, and thus provoke what might amount to a National scandal.

New layer

It is hard to know how many of the chickens are laying (or not laying) now, but I think we can assume that the egg on the left here is from a hen who is fairly new to the game!

The egg was the perfect size to make an egg wash for the batch of mince pies I made this morning. The mincemeat filling was a cranberry and orange one, based on a recipe from Lakeland. You cook the apples before making the mincemeat, which wasn't a method I'd used before, but the results were fantastic. I'd go as far as to say that this is the best mincemeat I've ever tasted. The only changes I made were to replace the regular suet with vegetable suet and I didn't have any walnuts, so I put slivered almonds in there instead.

Snowy sunset

I was whining earlier this month about how cold it was as I waited for a decent photograph of the setting sun. While taking today's photo, the wind was blowing at 22 miles per hour and the outside temperature was -6°C/22°F. The 'feels like' temperature was a brisk -17°C/1.4°F. I don't know what I was complaining about on Sunday when the equivalent temperature was a positively warm -4°C/28°F.