A day off work is never really a day off

Today is a Pro-D Day, which means no school for the kids, no work for me. I fell asleep last night excited about sleeping-in (I don’t want to brag but I am an excellent sleeper),  the kids were equally excited to sleep-in (I may have passed my excellent sleeping skills on to my daughter).  Of course, you all know what happens on sleep-in days.  I was awake bright and early.  The horses were galloping around and their thundering hooves was as good of an alarm as any.  They’re not small horses and the pasture is beside my bedroom, I could probably feel the pounding of their hooves before I heard it.  The sound of running horses is always a reason to leap out of bed and check that the gates were still closed.  Luckily they were only playing with each other!  Galloping, biting, rearing, kicking, striking, being magnificent and 100% contained in their pasture.  But I was now fully awake and ready to tackle a  few of my morning farm chores.

I fed the boys their breakfast and headed over to my chicken “duplex”.  I had my flock separated, 15 on one side and 22 on the other side, until last night when my son and I moved the “chicks” (they’re now 7 weeks old and need more space) into the smaller side of the duplex.  I wanted to let the hens out into the run early now that there are so many hens on one side.  I opened the door to the coop as I looked up into the nearby Elm tree and there perched at the top is our new friend from yesterday, a massive Bald Eagle.

Yes, he is magnificent.  Yes, he is majestic.  Yes, it is really, really cool that he is so close. Yes, I could watch him all day.  And yes, he wants to eat my chickens.  After a quick count of my flock, I am missing one of my beautiful new Bovans Brown pullets.  Usually I count them every night but I forgot to last night, fingers crossed that she missed curfew and found somewhere else to sleep but Mr. Eagle is suspect #1.

I spent about 15 minutes in the run with my chooks, talking to them and counting them, watching Mr. Eagle.  I managed to spook him out of the tree and watched him soar through the back field.

I hope, for my flock (and my cat’s) sake, that he finds a river full of delicious fish and never comes back.

I headed back into the house, emptied and reloaded the dishwasher and tuned off my 7:15 a.m. alarm.

Time to put on a pot of coffee, it’s going to be a long day.

Meg

Once a farm girl, always a farm girl.

Follow my farm adventures on Instagram @once_a_farm_girl