Red Dirt Farm and Studio

On a not typical day, by 8:30 A.M.

I baked a loaf of bread and started a second one.

I baked a batch of cookie bars.

  I put beans and a ham bone in the crock pot for dinner.

I opened up the farm stand and set up the displays and filled the cooler with eggs.

  I met two customers and did a farm tour with them.

  I fed the dogs and the cats.

I let the chickens out to free range.

And.

I spent a half hour rescuing a rooster that had hanged himself.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stanley my special old crooked rooster has been having seizures for the past year – most likely as a result of all the injuries that he has sustained over the years.

If y’all have followed along, you know that Stanley is a hero, he has lived through more life-threatening events saving his flock than a rooster should have to live through.  There have been multiple fox and dog attacks, as well as hawks, snakes and other roosters.

He is beyond pathetic looking with patches of bare spots, no tail feathers and permanently bent over not to mention most of his comb is gone from frostbite and is just a bunch of nubs.

 I call him my handsome roo.  You know beauty is in the eye of the beholder and all that stuff.

Apparently at some point during the night he had one of his seizures and lost his footing and manage to slip through the roosting bars and had hanged himself upside down and was stuck.  By the morning when I let everyone out for the day, he was near death.  His color was blue and it didn’t look good for him.

It took a lot of finagling for me to get him back through the bars and upright.  I had to get up on a ladder, which once I finally had a grip on him and upright in my arms, I fell backward off the ladder over the trash cans that hold the feed and into the wall and down on to the 25-pound feeder.  I managed to keep a firm grip on Stanley so he didn’t take any of the impact from the fall.  I lay there amidst the broken feeder, spilled food, chicken poop and at least 50 chickens that had circled me and were squawking and clucking like it was the end of the world, which set the peacock off and he started screaming bloody murder.  The dog stood there licking at me  – it was a comedy right for the taking.

  I think I knocked myself silly, I didn’t move for the longest time.  I kept a firm grip on Stanley while the chickens jumped up on me and pecked at me to get up. Or were they trying to peck at the food that had spilled under me?  Once I finally got up I just stood there holding poor Stanley praying he would be ok.

Stanley has once again lived through a harrowing experience.

I’m bruised from head to toe and my pride is a slight bit screwed.

Recently, I learned that Goat Yoga is a thing.

  Yep, people pay money to go to farms so that they can do yoga around goats.  I read where one farm out on the west coast has a 1500+ person waiting list.

  So whilst, I was splayed out on the ground with those said 50 some chickens jumping up and down on me, I got to thinking.

Chicken Yoga.

Here at the farm.

Yes, folks can bring their yoga mats out to the farm enjoy some zen and be one with the chickens.

Maybe I did knock myself silly…

Y’all have a good week.

 

That’s all for today.