The veterans in my family

Thanks to all who serve. From my family that would be:

My Grandfather on my Dad's side - James Arthur, drafted to fight in France during WWI. He's the fine looking man holding the baby.

Great Uncle Doland (Dad's uncle) who fought in the Pacific during WWII.

My Dad, who ran away and joined the National Guard after his shotgun wedding to my Mom. Luckily he just missed Korea, and was too early for Vietnam. Good thing, if he'd run off and got shot up, they might never have had ME, which is all that matters.

My Grandpa on my Mom's side, Carl, who was drafted into the army and fought in Italy during WWII. Standing next to him is my grandma, who told me that the time she spent with her infant daughter in the home for military wives while he was gone was the best and worst time of her life. She said they all lived together in a group home, and helped each other raise their kids, and they were all very close through good and bad.

Since we're mentioning the women back home, I would also like to mention my great aunt Dorma Lee (the one on the right), Doland's sister. She ran off to work in the airplane plants in Wichita as part of the war effort, which was very adventurous for a lady her age back then. She was a 'Rosie the Riveter'! Her scrapbook is full of the fun times she had with the girls in their off hours, adventuring around without men to boss them around! At least that's how she described it :) She enjoyed her independence for the rest of her life, preferring to remain unwed and help her sister raise the kids. I spent a lot of great times hanging out with Aunt Lee, she was a really great lady.

No one in my family were in the military for a career. In fact I think they were all drafted (except my dad). Just regular people, doing what they had to do at the time, and happy to go back to their regular lives when it was over. I can't even imagine what that must have been like.Unfortunately I never got to hear what that was like from them, Doland, Jim, and Carl all passed away long before I was born.

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My lovely flock

I spent a bit of time outside yesterday visiting with my lovely flock. Even the babies are getting quite grown up - in fact I have a hard time telling my late summer chicks from the early summer chicks. I think the early summer chicks have started laying, so I guess I should call them hens now :)

My young rooster is one of the buff and gold chicks. He's too young to perform any rooster-ly duties yet, but soon. I'm hoping I'll be able to produce a line of blue/buff chickens, but it's my first time experimenting with breeding, so we'll see.

He's a pretty boy, I think he'll really look nice when he gets his tail in. 

The girls are all looking fat & fluffy

Sunny days are perfect for a bit of primping and preening!

This is the other baby roo, he is sort of blue and buff, but he has a black tail. 

All my mix girls are either blue/buff or black/buff, and I have to say that's a pretty striking combination as well.

Here are two of my old buff hens. Look at the difference in the color of their combs. The bright red girl is laying, and pale pink girl has retired.

And this older girl grew in her feathers in a mottled pattern. She was solid before!

They all seem happy, that's all that matters.

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Putting it all together

I returned the egg trays to the incubator (they have been out of it since we brought it home) and suddenly the remaining spare parts all made sense.

The long skinny pieces were dividers for the egg trays

The weird piece with the holes drilled in it is the lock to keep the egg trays in place as the drum tips forward. It also has the remains of a sticker that says 'DO NOT DESTROY' so I figured it must be something important!

So now I can see it all assembled, and it really looks like everything is all there.

Even the holes on the bottom door, which I thought were fixed shut...

Are actually cleverly hinged little sliders for ventilation.

I have determined that the timer is not working, though I have located a replacement for about $100 - as soon as I have that kind of money to spend on this little project. I can still push the on/off button to make the drum rotate. So here's a demonstration:

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It's alive! (The Incubator, that is!)

Yesterday I finally finished putting new casters on the bottom of the incubator (the old ones were rusty and broken). I dug around in my spare parts drawer and found a set of heavy casters that were perfect for it. Now that it was mobile I could roll it around. Dave's only request was that I not plug it in for the first time in the garage, it needed to be out in the driveway so if it burst into flames it wouldn't burn down the garage.

It was a beautiful day today, so I went ahead and wired the new cord into the fusebox (the old one looked like it had been mowed over and cut off). I rolled it out in to the driveway and hesitantly plugged it in. The fan came to life inside the drum. The light came on as the heater warmed up. Finally I threw the switch for the drum motor, and the whole thing slowly hummed as it tilted forward! It works!

Take a bow - giant drum!

I'm overjoyed to see the fan, heater, and motor working. Now I just need to replace the weatherstripping and see if the thermostat is working to hold a temperature, and if the timer works to rotate the drum back and forth. If it can hold a steady temp and humidity, and handle turning the drum, then I'll get some fertile eggs and give it a try.

Update: the timer seems to be DOA - but it's made by a company that is still in business and sells the exact same unit, so I might be able to get a new one to just swap in, or get the old one fixed. I have a call in.

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Chicken chasing

I've been home sick all weekend with a nasty head cold/sinus thing - yuk!

This evening I woke up after a long afternoon nap and decided to go out and check on the chickens and count to make sure they were all still there (Dave has been feeding them while I was sick). Everyone was there, and I checked the nest box and they'd even left an egg! So I reached in to get the egg and Navi slipped by me and ran into the coop, and one of the young hens got scared and jumped off the perch and she started running around in circles, flapping and sqwaking, while Navi chased her around and around the coop trying to pounce on her. The hen finally made for the door into the shed and blasted past me, and on the way by I caught Navi and tucked her under my arm.

Unfortunately for the hen, Jack and Barclay were in the shed, and they immediately chased the poor little hen out into the darkness and rain. I hauled Navi up to the house and tossed her inside and grabbed the flashlight, and went back out. In the dark I could just make out Barclay down by the lilac bush, poking something with his foot. I went down, expecting to see a dead chicken, and there was the hen, huddled under the bush, wet and miserable. Barclay didn't want to catch her, or he easily could have, he just wanted to make her run some more so he could chase her! I picked her up and took her back to the coop and checked her over in the light. She looked fine, just scared. So I put her back in the coop, counted everyone one last time, and went back inside. Too much excitement for one evening - I should have stayed in bed!

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