Night Harvest

Have you ever wondered what you can harvest from your veggie garden at night?

Slugs of course!

After dark your garden comes alive. Ours, unfortunately at the moment, is alive with slimy gross ravenous slugs. Fortunately they are delicious... to chooks... so we harvest them.

And here's how...

You will need:

1. A disposable glove
2. A plastic container with a lid
3. A head torch

What to do:

Don a bright head torch and a disposable glove and wander out into the darkness. The slugs will shine in the torch light which makes them easy to spot.

Pop a juicy leaf or two into the plastic container for their final meal. We're not barbarians. And have yourself a good old fashioned slug hunt! They don't move fast so get picking. (With the gloved hand... but feel free to go bare if you prefer it that way, you saucy minx!) You will find they curl up at your touch and if you drop them when curled they are hard to find again. Slippery little suckers.

I once harvested some not-so-standard-garden-variety slugs in our old garden and they used to secrete a disgusting yellow slime and stank something awful! These are not so bad. But they do leave your glove quite sticky - hence the use of disposables.

Once you've harvested a sufficient amount, plus the odd caterpillar or centipede for good measure, make sure you pop the lid on tight, or you'll have escapees.

In the morning, they will all have hidden on the underside of the leaf and you can just throw the lot into the chook pen and watch the carnage! Yum!

Mavis' Story

So, a couple of days ago we got a mammoth egg from one of our chooks. 110g in fact!

And that egg, as we suspected, was a "double yolker", seen here for breakfast:

Though we didn't know which hen laid the mammoth egg, we might now after yesterday's events...

Mavis was looking a bit worse for wear for a couple of days. First signs were that she was very fluffed up and looking fatter than usual. The more obvious sign that something sinister was up was that when a bowl full of delicious grated carrot was tossed into the pen, unlike her sisters, Mavis decided that sitting on the food was far more appealing than scratching around and eating it... like a normal chook would do.

So a little amateur Google diagnosis led us to believe she may be "egg bound". This means the poor hen may have an egg stuck inside that she is having trouble passing. Among other reasons, it can happen when she is laying over large eggs... Oops!

Some of the signs are:

• That she is restless and visiting the nest often but not producing.
• She will appear a little "swollen" or a bit lopsided, and may look like she is having trouble walking.
• After a while she may become very lethargic, as no doubt trying to pass an egg that won't come will really take it out of you!
• She may go off her food or drink also.

And Mavis was displaying all of the above. So what do you do about it?

Well... To start with, we had a feel around her abdomen for any hard egg like lumps. Unsure. Then it's recommended you warm her up and relax the muscles around the cloaca (vent the egg comes out of). To do this we opted for a warm bath... not the salts and scented candles type, but for a chook I'm sure it would be equally enjoyable. If the chook is indeed egg bound it's likely she will nestle down into the warm water herself. If not, and she is just ill, she'll probably stay standing in the water looking at you wondering "why the devil have you just submerged my bottom half, you crazy human?" Fair enough. But Mavis nestled immediately.

If you're lucky, the chook may relax enough to lay the egg herself right there in the water. If not, and we weren't, you may need to do a little coaxing; have a feel for the egg and push it down to help her along... Yep. That meant some olive oil on a well lubricated finger and pop! In it goes! Though, like I said before, we're amateurs, so we didn't really know what we were feeling for, but nothing felt like an egg. So last resort was to give the vet a call for some advice.

Unfortunately, it wasn't necessary, as poor Mavis passed on mid phone call... with my finger up her bottom! I suppose it was a fairly decent way to go though, a nice warm bath and a little anal stimulation. I'd be happy with that.

R.I.P. Mavis the Chook

Weird and Wonderful #1

Sometimes you find some really weird and wonderful little surprises in the garden! Here's one... He's a little creepy! Good inspiration for some fantasy creatures though.

Today's Harvest

Today's harvest consisted of 2 medium sized swedes, half a basket full of snow peas (some of which were greedily eaten straight off the plant), a handful of orange and purple heirloom carrots, a dozen little Brussels sprouts, and some of the last of the seasons broccoli.

Yum! What shall we cook tonight?

New Record Egg

Our hens are great! They eat all our scraps, they fertilise our garden beds ready for planting, they make an absolute delicacy out of those pesky slugs and still manage to poop out an egg a day for us to enjoy. What an amazing little factory they are! But I've really got to feel for them... one of the girls - don't know which one - laid an egg weighing 110 grams the other day! (Last standing record holder weighed in at a measly 100g. Ouch!) I suspect whoever she was had a well earned rest the next day because we only got 3 eggs.