A recent @YellowCottageHomestead TikTok video of chickens expressing opinions about the treats they were offered:
Cat update for week ending April 3
It’s Caturday!
Two cats in the morning:
Bath time in the cabins:
Porcini:
Spud and Bella waiting for food:
A cat in a tree:
Spud watching me from the steps to the fountain garden:
The cats have been avoiding inside the cat house since Poppy’s passing; this is the first time I saw one inside:
Porcini coming from between the cabins:
A sleeping cabin cat, and Pommie thinking about pouncing on an unwary bird:
Two cats with happy tails:
Spud sitting on the driveway; moments before he had been rolling around:
Finally, Bella emerging from the feeder:
TikTok: ducks quacking away on the lawn
A recent @YellowCottageHomestead TikTok video of our ducks quacking away on the lawn:
Flock Friday for April 2
Just a few flock pics this week.
Starting with a couple of photos of Betty in the grasses:
A slow-mo GIF from a recent @YellowCottageHomestead TikTok video of the chickens, where Domino got impatient for some rice:
Martha is being broody, but often other chickens want to lay their eggs in that box:
Hummingbirds during some surprise light snow:
TIkTok: chickens enjoying treat roller toy
A recent @YellowCottageHomestead TikTok video of our chickens enjoying their new mealworm roller toy (and can you see some ducks on the lawn in the background?):
TikTok: ducks by the pond and on the grass
A recent @YellowCottageHomestead TikTok video of our ducks by the pond and on the grass:
TikTok: ducks in a garden by the pond
A recent @YellowCottageHomestead TikTok video of our ducks rooting around in a garden next to the pond:
First beehive inspection of 2021
Yesterday we did our first inspection of our beehives of the year, now that it’s warming up enough to open the hives.
We started with the Yellow hive:
A frame with some honey:
A brood frame:
The deep frames in the bottom box were all empty; sometimes the bees move up to an upper box, but they don’t usually build downwards, so we swapped the boxes so they could expand into the empty one:
Next was the Turquoise hive:
A bunch of bees on top:
A frame with new honey glistening in the cells:
The Purple hive didn’t look so good:
As we suspected based on activity, the bees were all dead:
Same story on the Orange hive, which we had also suspected was dead… very dead. They may have starved over the winter:
The Hot Pink hive was a bit different — there were several full frames of honey (and signs of robbing, so would have been more over winter):
But no bees; it looks like they had absconded, for some reason; weird, since they had plenty of supplies:
Finally the Cedar hive; it was doing the best of all of them:
A frame with old honey (blackened from being walked on for a long time) and a few drone cells:
A brood frame; if you look closely, you might spot some new bees emerging from cells:
Another brood frame:
We also wiped out and refilled the top feeders with 1:1 sugar water syrup, to help supplement what flowers they can find at this time of year.
We didn’t spot the queens of any hives, but we didn’t look closely; we just wanted to see which ones had survived, and looking for signs of brood and recent laying. We’ll take another look in a few weeks time, weather depending.
So we ended last year with six beehives, but started this year with only three surviving. Not ideal, but we had a feeling that would be the case. We had some concerns about some of the hives, that were a bit weak heading into fall, and we could tell based on activity that it looked like some hadn’t made it. We couldn’t be sure until we opened them up, though.
Here are the remaining hives: Cedar, Turquoise, and Yellow:
Cedar hive:
Turquoise hive:
Yellow hive:
Finally, a picture of Jenn in her bee suit:
Cat update for week ending March 27
This week marked the passing of Poppy, the mother of our other outdoor feral cats. She wasn’t a pet cat, but it’s always sad to lose a cat of any kind. We were also visited by a bobcat for the first time (or rather, the first time I’ve seen one on my cameras).
Let’s start with some pictures of Poppy before her death; here she is with Porcini (left):
And with Spud on the deck:
Here’s a cams app screenshot showing four cats; one in a cabin, one in the feeder, and two in the house:
Porcini looking out the upper back door, and Poppy below:
Porcini and Poppy:
The last ever picture of Poppy, about the time she died; at least it was in the comfort of their heated house:
In the morning, Spud discovered Poppy’s body; it’s good that her offspring saw that, to help them understand that she had died, rather than just mysteriously vanished:
Porcini also saw her:
For the others, life continues. Here’s a cat in a cabin on a rainy morning, watching me walk by:
Porcini outside the cabins, with Spud and Pommie inside:
Porcini joined Spud in the left cabin:
Porcini scratching a tree:
Porcini again:
And again, watching me from a cabin:
A bobcat visited our homestead; this is the first time I’ve seen one (GIF):
Another GIF:
I wouldn’t want to encounter this suddenly:
The bobcat also checked out the cabins, with nobody home (GIF):
A still from that; so tall:
It was a busy night at the cabins; a few minutes later, a possum went into the left cabin:
Yawn, feeling sleepy:
It curled up and slept in there for a couple of hours:
The possum leaving:
A cat checks out the cabins, but decides she doesn’t want to stick around:
Good thing, since a raccoon also wanders by a few minutes later:
Finally this week, Porcini sniffing at the kitchen garden this morning (a sunny day, so bright reflections off the window):
TikTok: chickens with mealworm roller toy
A recent @YellowCottageHomestead TikTok video of chickens with a new mealworm treat roller toy, that they can peck at to dispense treats, to keep them occupied: