Grounded again......

A few days after the surgery Fondoo was looking a bit uncomfortable and we realized that the stitches so expertly put it had failed to hold the wound which has now broken down. We sprayed with antiseptic spray powder and decided that the doo should take it's chances out side as there seemed to be nothing more I could do. He was flying OK but was getting bullied by the others this had also happened when we had a doo in the house for a day or two and when Hindoo reappeared after her chimney adventure. Anyway this has not gone well and after one night out we found Fondoo tucked down on the ground by the log store so yet again he is inside in the cat cage. He is looking quite perky, is eating and drinking well and it maybe that the open wound needs more time to heal, it will be healing open but with daily dry sprays it should heal and he should be able to fly.

Post op Day 1

This is Fondoo today a day after her op. The stitches look good and clean although he/she is somewhat bruised. The wound edges have come together nicely and we hope that Fondoo will soon be back out with the big birds.

Casualty Moonzie Style

Well what a day for me, new job and an injured doo to deal with. Yesterday we spotted one of the newest doos, Fondoo, was limping badly. Falling over onto one leg in fact and through the binoculars we saw that he had lost feathers from his breast and had a large open wound at the top of his leg. Luckily Fondoo is one of the few doos that sleeps in the cote so after he went to bed I was able to catch him. The wound looked awful so we kept him in the new cat cage and today I contacted Harry my lovely Pigeon Pal.

Harry has just left after coming and instructing me in the fine art of doo stitching. Firstly we cleaned the wound and then removed all the torn feathers, then pulling the edges of the gaping wound open I put in four silk stitches. Harry held the doo as he knew how to restrain it without crushing it! Luckily I had surgical sutures in sealed packs with attached surgical needles. The reason I had the suture sets was that when we bought the boat in it we found the worlds oldest First Aid Kit, it contained such delights as a Umbilical Cord Clamp, lots of suture sets, expiry date 1965, a silver tracheostomy tube, Brooks Airways various sizes, Mucous Extractors and a War Office , Army Medical Department Shell Dressing dated April September 1945. The previous owner of the boat had been a Doctor funnily enough.

Anyway Fondoo is now in recovery and will remain inside for a week or so until he puts his leg down, he seemed quite unperturbed about the sewing going on and should make a full recovery. the stitches will remain and be absorbed eventually.

I thought that the hawk had had a go at Fondoo but Harry seemed to think it was more likely a close encounter with a wire or a branch or a particularly bad landing into a tree. Fondoo had only been out of the nest box a week so maybe was just inept at landing and should not have been flying solo just yet!

Tomorrow I will attempt to get some good gory close up pictures for the blog.

Poppy died

Yesterday Poppy was looking really tired and was sleeping most of the time, in the afternoon I picked her up and put her into the Little Hilton House so that she was off the muddy ground but could still see out of the door. She had given up eating and could not even be tempted by grapes or strawberries, not a good sign. She was as light as a feather and had lost more than half her weight. I went back after a couple of hours and she had died, I like to think that it was calm and peaceful and that she just snoozed away. Sad thing as she was the oldest of the girls and the friendliest and funniest.

Life goes on, she has been cremated with all due ceremony and the ashes will be floated off down the burn. Just three hens left Peggy, Roxy and Ronnie. Yesterday one of them laid a double yolker at 90 grams by way of consolation.

New Style created at Moonzie

This is the new addition to our garden, a style so that weary pub goers do not have so far to trek

and also to aid in getting Diane home safely, we had to resort to a wheelbarrow recently so think the tipping her over a style may be tad easier.

It is built to last ( of course) and with a few weeks weathering should fit in very nicely.

On the dove front we have managed to call a halt to the egg laying and just have the final two babies in the nest box. In fact both have been out but seem to prefer to be in the nest box and both go back in to hide at every available time. We have seen a lot of the female sparrowhawk flying around and one morning she was perched on the telephone wires right outside Tamara's house. No doo attacks so far but there has been a lot of wild racing off so I think all concerned are aware of the hawks proximity. We have also had an osprey

Moonzie has been having some improvements of late, on Thursday we got a Velux window into the kitchen roof, what a difference it has made, the kitchen looks bigger and brighter and even warmer when the sun shines. Herb also fitted new down lighters in the ceiling. However on the downside the new illumination has caused me to see filth that I never knew was there before. I have spent the last couple of days cleaning like mad. On the same day we had the window fitted we also got a new wood burning stove fitted in the lounge, this involved a huge amount of mess, soot and dust and while the stove looks brilliant the wall behind it is a mess. I attempted to wash some sooty hand prints from the wall and have to had to now redecorate the whole thing!

Poppy the old hens life is coming to an end I think, she has no energy and does not even free range with the others. I think the time may come soon for her to go for the big sleep and join Daisy in Chicken Heaven. Good job the boys are home!

A new place in the Country

This is the one of the new dove cotes and after three weeks of studiously ignoring it the birds have now taken to it really well. In fact if you look closely you can see two doves in one nest box on the left of the picture. I think they liked it better after we put a perch on the post that we had recycled when we eventually removed the homing cage surround from the original dove cote.

After thinking I was being very clever blocking off nest boxes in the original dove cote I had to uncover one as the bird that had been on the plastic eggs decided to move in with the squabs who are not yet flying and Mum doo was not impressed. There was a lot of squabbling and pecking and I was worried for the safety of the babies so uncovered a single nest hole and the intruder moved out and promptly built a nest in the new box. She has laid one egg which today I removed and replaced with another plastic egg. She had also laid a softy so that was never going to hatch anyway and she had kicked it out. So in about a months time I will remove the plastic egg and we will start the cycle all over again.

The chooks are coming to the end of their free ranging month with Roly being on holiday, they have loved it and the egg production is excellent.

The figs are coming in thick and fast now as are the tomatoes and other veg. The Cabbage White Butterfly has wreaked havoc with my brassicas so no prize winners this year. The blackbird has taken to eating the blueberries even before they are ripe and I am fighting a losing battle keeping her off, despite the net. I suppose at £1.99 a punnet I should accept defeat , take the nets off and give her a treat and just buy my own.

It is very warm outside but and it looks like a thundery sky. Rain we don't need.