Deadly Chickens And Turkeys

Good evening to all my friends and family! I had a somewhat normal day.

Today, I got up and made my own pot of coffee for the first time in almost two weeks! My brother-in-law, Gabe, always made us coffee each morning. I kind of miss that! I did set my coffee pot to brew at 7:00. That'll be nice to wake up to that aroma wafting through the house!

I spent today trying to pick up from all our company. Just about got that done. Tomorrow, I hope to get to organizing my bedroom and master closet. I also need to harvest my pumpkins and store them in my root cellar. If I am able to wake up before everyone else, I might just go and milk the animals! We'll see though...

Back when we started up our farm, we only had chickens. I thought they were pretty cute. I had never raised chickens before. They were tiny little balls of fluff. Then they started growing...

I did not grow up around chickens at all. Before I moved out of my parents house and got married, my parents owned several chickens. They would send me to go gather the eggs. They had a few mean hens. They would chase me! They would peck me! They'd see me coming and they'd ruffle their feathers at me! I think this was where I learned that I DO NOT LIKE CHICKENS! They are mean AND they are fast!

So we ordered a bunch of day-old chicks. They were cute when we got them, but as soon as they started feathering out, they started chasing me. I don't know what it is about me they don't like or what, but I was not happy about it.

Then, my ever thoughtful hubby, wanted to try his hand at raising our own turkeys for meat. Who was i to say no? i had never been around a turkey. We got the day-old turkeys in. I thought they were absolutely adorable! When they started feathering out, guess what? I wasn't afraid of them! I learned to make the sounds of their calls. I would call to them and they would answer back to me! I thought that was pretty cool! They would follow me around as I did chores. I would call and they would all line up in a single file and follow me like the pied-piper.

One day, we came home from going to town and all 16 turkeys were missing. I was frantic. We looked all over the property. I told the boys to hop on the two quads and start looking for signs of a mass massacre...feathers, blood, anything that would show us what happened. I thought maybe a dog had gotten a hold of them all. I was on the cell phone with my parents asking for them to pray that I would find our turkeys. The wind was blowing a bit, but I thought I heard a faint turkey call. I listened, but I didn't hear anything but the wind. I called the turkeys and waited. I heard several faint answers. I called again and strained to hear the direction from which the sounds were coming. I kept calling and they were getting louder. Finally, I found all sixteen of them huddled together in a ditch in the front yard. I guess they either went into it to get out of the wind, or one fell in and the others followed. No one was hurt and everyone was found safe and sound.

The older the turkeys got, the meaner and more mischievous they became. In the summer, I usually run around the farm in flip-flops. This particular summer, I was into wearing toe rings. One day while I was out doing chores, I guess one of the turkeys discovered I was wearing a shiny silver toe ring. The silly thing scared me half to death by pecking my toe. The dumb bird missed the ring and got my toe. I completely came UNGLUED!!! I started running away and it decided to chase me. Then when the rest of the turkeys saw the one turkey running, they decided to follow the turkey and they were all chasing after me. I was scared out of my mind. I knew they thought they were still my "babies", but NO WAY! We actually had quite a few toms, but the main one was totally mean and nasty to me. Any time I went outside to do chores and feed the animals, if he saw me, he would turn his ugly old head and cock one beady little eye at me and hop towards me as if he were challenging me. The times he managed to get close enough, he would try and spur me. I don't understand! What did I ever do to him???

Well, back to chickens. I just don't like them because they are way to fast. If they decide to run in your direction, I just can't run fast enough in the opposite direction!

We now have seven ducks and nine Guinea hens (in addition to our ten laying hens and 160 pullets). The guinea hens free range all over the property. My adorable youngest son Jordan (loves to pull pranks on anyone as long as he can get away with it) and my ever considerate hubby, have this thing about teasing me about my fear of birds. When Nathan and I are walking outside, he'll grasp my hand and lead me purposefully towards the guineas. As soon as we get close enough for them to see me and I finally notice what Nathan is up to, they sound their alarm! It freaks me out! Nathan always tells me that they are just wanting to say hi to me. I just tell him they can just get lost!!! Jordan thinks its hilarious! Just this morning, the guineas were standing on the back porch and Jordan opened the back door and started calling guineas to come into the house to chase me! When he said, "Here guineas, guineas, guineas...", they sounded their alarm!!! I told Jordan it wasn't that funny, but I don't think he heard me between him laughing so hard and Nathan chuckling behind me.

Oh well...maybe I'll dream about putting a thousand pound bull in his place tonight...sounds like a sweet dream to me!

Well, hope you got a laugh at my expense! Sleep well. God bless!