Betty decorates for Halloween

So I walked out to the garage this morning, a little later than normal and as I approached the interior my initial thought was, "How many of the chickens are dead".

There was blood everywhere.

Blood all over the place in the nest box. 

This is their feeder. There is normally no red on it except for the very bottom.  The rest is blood. 

After a quick head count I discovered all 5 of my chickens were acting completely normal and very alive. Letting my heart rate drop down a little I started looking for what in the world was going on. Grabbing one at a time I checked each chicken over for a wound. Then I found where the blood was coming from. Of course it was Betty. Her white feathers were streaked crimson from a what was to be discover as a small (I mean SMALL) nick in one of the points of her comb. It was still bleeding everywhere. I set Betty down and ran inside to grab cornstarch and put on a darker colored jacket because I knew I was going to get bloody. Betty seemed completely unconcerned with the blood constantly dripping off her face. She would just shake her head flinging blood everywhere and move on. I picked her up and started to attempt to apply corn starch to the wound (which I couldn't find at the moment because her whole head was bleeding it seemed). Betty seemed mostly interested in trying to eat the cornstarch out of my hand and was not real thrilled about me throwing it in her face and eyes, but she was relatively cooperative. One hour, one can of tuna and 6 or 7 corn starch applications later the bleeding finally slowed. Betty was not to pleased with me keeping her separated for a few hours to let the blood dry so the other wouldn't pick at the new scab.

It was a good thing I did't have to work! The whole ordeal took about two hours.

Betty dressed up as Zombie Betty for Halloween.

The worst part was- chicken blood smells EXACTLY like raw chicken..... I take one step closer to never eating chicken again today.

Fall

This weekend was a blessing. My first two days off back to back since I tore my ACL August 30th. Yesterday Dan and I slept in and then went to the Renaissance festival. On our way there we stopped at a tiny antique store called Mary Ann's Antiques in Barn. After the festival we went to Caesars Creek lake and walked around for a bit and then stopped a a farmers stand where we bought our pumpkins, apple cider, and a 1/2 peck of apples. He also sold this stuff he called "slush" which was apple cider in slushie form. It was delicious. I think the name of the market was "Lamb's Appleberry Farms". We came home and had a wonderful fire and relaxed.

Today was just as awesome and a bit more productive. Slept in and then had the amazing beef and rosemary stew Dan made yesterday (stew tips, bacon seasons, potatoes, carrots, onion, cayenne peppers, rosemary, oregano, garlic, curry, salt, pepper, water) . Then we mowed the lawn and did some yard chores that included trimming back a lot of the rose of sharons. I also harvested a good amount of my herbs so I can preserve them for the winter. It's mostly stevia, chives, curry and oregano this year.

The chickens also got to hang out in the lawn all day today which is a treat for them since I've been home so little. Dan lit a fire in the pit and burned a lot of the downed wood that had accumulated over the summer and some of the stuff we had just cut during our yard work. Then we made smores :) We went for a walk back in the nature preserve and I slipped around a bit but my knee seemed to do just fine which is really exciting for me. For right now I think I made the right choice to go non surgical. I just need to keep up with the exercises and keep my strength up to support the knee.

Right now we are working on bottling our Christmas Ale!