So my little Houdan, Einstein, managed to get some string wrapped around her leg last weekend. I discovered it last Sunday after my husband came in and said she was hiding from the other birds behind the feed bucket. The string must have inhibited her from getting around normally or eating. Because she looked weak, I guess the rest of the girls ganged up on her and pecked at her. I separated her into her own coop this past week to give her a break.

But she still looked sad and wasn't eating much, only drinking. Her buddy Phyllis went in to see for for a little bit. So cute.

Last night I checked her crop, but it felt normal, checked and cleaned her vent..no egg impaction. I gave her a bit of flax oil but this morning she was the same so we went ahead and took her to a vet that specializes in birds. Apparently, the stress of getting ganged up on by the other gals and not eating caused her to have high bacteria levels in her GI tract.

This is her swallowing some of the antibiotics and baby bird food I'll have to feed every day. Poor thing...Hopefully we'll be able to get her healthy again over the next week or so and can then reintegrate her back into the flock.

For the last few days I've found Phyllis squeezed into the laying boxes with the other gals while they are trying to lay. This evening I found her sitting on all the eggs! So, I do believe my lovely Polish has gone broody on me.

So that's where all my darn eggs are!

We used a very simple trim, but I'm already thinking of some funkier alternatives, and sourcing some more deep, detailed carving from our Antique scrap dealers. Now, while these were being completed, the cuttings from Friday were waiting patiently on the drying screens, fully calloused and ready to go:

via terraingarden.typepad.com

I LOVE their succulent boxes!

This has been a bang up year for snakes, at least in Texas. I'm a herp enthusiast so I'm always happy to find reptiles or amphibians in my garden. I've had so many snakes this year it's been crazy! These are Rough Earth snakes. They are usually mature at about a foot to 14", are non-venomous and totally harmless. They love living in gardens with cultivated soil because their primary diet is earthworms.

Unfortunately for the snakes, my biggest (and meanest) chicken Eunicehas quite a talent for rooting out their nests and swallowing themwhole! But, lucky for this little one, he/she was in the front yard andcan go back to rooting around in the flower beds all it likes.

I planted this Oakleaf Hydrangea last year in my new shade bed. It's just popped into flower this past week. So lovely...

Still getting some decent lettuce from the 'Red Sails', 'Black Seeded Simpson' lettuce and a few other varieties, including a burgundy test lettuce. I imagine that they'll only last another week or two with the heat.

Here is one of my salad beds...a crazy mix of greens around the edge with carrots and some Apricota poppies (Papaver rupifragum) in the center. The poppies are just starting to bud. Should be lovely once they come into flower...

I seeded some Nasturtium as a border to one of the veggie beds...just because I had a packet of seeds kicking around. They just decided to pop into bloom yesterday...

A lovely orange Nasturtium with some purple-leafed test lettuce in the background.

A yellow Nasturtium at dusk...