More sweet things

Wait a second....

...that's not a duckling!

Guess who hatched out TEN CHICKS yesterday?! Yep, Emma Muff. Good lord, that makes 27 chickens for us, but my friend Pierre wants to start a laying flock so I am going to foist some of these off on him this fall! They are so tiny and adorable.

How did I know they hatched? Well, Emma had her nest on top of the stone foundation in the lower barn (as per usual), about nine feet off the ground. I had put a kiddy pool filled with straw in that corner, because I know from experience that she makes her chicks do a death-leap (well, no one ever dies! I think they float down, they're so light!) after hatching.

I heard frenzied peeping the barn yesterday, looked over at the corner and saw two female ducks lounging in the straw, looking calmly at a frantic little white chick who had done the death leap but left everyone else still up top. And Emma apparently didn't give a damn!

I got a ladder and a bucket, put all the chicks in the bucket, grabbed Emma, and relocated everyone to the second duckhouse outside, where they can grow up safely!

But I know you still want ducklings, sooooo....

They all dove in for a swim shortly after this!

And today I was bottling honey. This is just the tip of the honey harvest iceberg. Tomorrow I am taking off eleven more supers (boxes) of honey, and there's quite a bit more to come after that. I will be spending a lot of time extracting and bottling over the next little while.

This batch was light and very tasty (the honey at the bottom isn't actually as dark as it looks. That's the countertop colour affecting it.) Really tasty stuff! Right now my bees are working acres and acres of alfalfa in bloom just across the road.

Divine!

Have a great weekend.