A few days ago, I started to loose my mind. It had to do with a certain chicken named Julia Childs who was acting a lot like a rooster. She was territorial, and aggressive, she had definitely given my hand a few hard pecks at times when I was trying to hold her and give her a look over. But most importantly, she crowed, like a rooster, and lately more often and louder and louder...it was really only slightly annoying, but it gave me so much anxiety that someone would complain. So this weekend I called the man who sold me the chicken and on Monday I drove Julia back and exchanged her for a French Black Copper Maran, a female this time! We named her Madame Chocolate. After two days adjusting to her new environment and crying a few tears for the beautiful rooster she left behind, she began to give us eggs! Beautiful big dark brown eggs! We love Madame Chocolate! Ruby Rose is getting quite big, her comb developing, so I think she'll be laying really soon as well. This afternoon I found my third egg and I must say that discovering them truly feels like finding a treasure, a jewel.
I opened our new beehive for the third time today. The first time was a big endeavor, cutting comb growing from the lid and repositioning it into frames like you would do rescuing a hive from an undesired location. The next time I opened the hive I was a bit worried by what I saw, heavy pieces of comb sagging and bowing out of the frames. But today could see the comb beginning to take better shape within the frames and it had developed enough integrity that I was able to adjust the comb a bit better into the frames without it all falling apart. I also had more poise today and had developed my bee suit well so I was able to spend more time calmly observing all of the comb. I was able to find the queen, to distinguish the drones, and at one moment I saw a young bee literally being born out from her little prism of comb! The bees have not begun to explore the upper hive box I placed in inspection 2, next time I open the hive I will try Ron's pyramid technique to encourage the bees to build out the second story of their hive.
It was a satisfying week on my little farm by the beach. The bees are doing well and with a change to our chicken community we now have eggs!
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