Sad news in the heat

It is very hot here and has been for several days. This is the third day about 44deg C, that is over 110F, and sadly Henrietta Houdan-Hen died in the heat yesterday despite having been given the run of the garden and when last seen alive was under the shade of a tree and pumpkin vines and in fact so cool Mum thought she would go and join them. Both chooks = chickens were given cool showers and iced water with ice cubes in, too. But still Henrietta died. Hannah is now in a temporary house rigged up under the kitchen table so she shares the air conditioning with me - and has an old rug on the tiled floor so she can walk. Apparently lots of chooks are in bathrooms and so on during the heatwave. People have been on talk back radio.. Hannah had two cool baths yesterday too, like many other chooks.

Now Hannah is lonely and Mum is trying to get another friend for her. In a couple of weeks she might get a sister from the same flock as Hannah but the owner is away... and anyway the new hens are not yet old enough to be sorted into hens and roosters.

Let us hope the electricty stays on here - it has so far, but with links to other states to get more electricity failing there has been compulsory two hour blackouts to make sure the whole grid did not collapse in addition to the unintentional ones taking out tens of thousands at times. This added to the problems by cutting out traffic lights and train lines in the areas. Train tracks were buckling, and over 200 trains cancelled due to heat stress on trains, air conditioning, electricity, and so on - they shut down two shorter routes totally and put buses on so they could use those trains on the rest of the lines. Police manned major intersections with the road surface melting and no shade - must have been round 60C = about 140F in the sun for those police. And there are bush fires, lots of them - the firemen are working all round the clock. That must be even hotter. Mum says the fridge is full of food so she hopes the power stays ON. So do I - it is comparatively cool inside with my air conditioner!

Someone checked out the old "fry an egg on the footpath" bit and it worked, only it took 25 minutes.

Bibs.

nice apple

I enjoy all fruit. Especially fresh from "my" garden!

Dog Angela and garden

See my sexy leg! The apple peel I am eating is from an apple from the tree in our back yard and has not had anything sprayed on it. Yum!!!

Don't you think I have more feathers?


I like a kiss and cuddle from Mum.. and guess what? I trust her, so figure that black box thing she points at me sometimes will not hurt me. I remember I used to be scared of it.

Handsome me. I feel like a judge sometimes - and wise, like an owl.

A good boy! ME!!

Hello all

I have had a good time these last few days. Some photos will be coming and three videos too. I look back over the two years almost I have lived here and how I have changed! I now demand, and get, most things I fancy. And instead of just wanting bread and maybe wafer thin apple, I just love apple in chunks, banana, carrot, peaches, eggs in all forms, lettuce, broccoli, celery and all such things. Over Christmas I had a little taste of Christmas pudding and custard and sort of brother gave me nuts too.

And, I think I am wearing more clothes for sure. More fluff in the feather department! I now have something to preen. If you wanted to pop me in the oven you would have to do a bit of feather removal first., Still not much, I know, but I am proud of me growing a few, At this rate, I should be fully feathered again in about 500 years!

Those chooks in the back yard ate lots of apple scraps too. I got some peel and actual apple pieces. OK I had better translate for those non-Australians - chickens, hens, whatever. they lay eggs which Mum likes. So do I! there is I think a short video of them coming soon.

My beak is quite long in these video clips and photos to come - I have another appointment with the vet mMonday. I got some practice in tody when I fell off my perch to the bottom of my cage and my wing became entangled with my food dish. My lound screams brought Mum running but I would not let her help - I screamed louder when she opened my door and tried to help! Gave me quite a turn, that did. A big boy like me falling off my perch indeed. Obviously my balance is not good - I need more feathers so I can fly, at least a little bit.

Dog Angela is very old and grey now, can't take very long walks and spends a lot of the time sleeping. Cat Lucy is no longer a kitten, more like a late teenager, and Henrietta and Hannah Houdan Hen are doing well too. they all send their best wishes.

goodnight

Bibs

Santa and the dogs at the Christmas party

Christmas party to which I was not invited

Christmas update 2008

Hello Folks and I hope you all had a Happy Christmas.

There is much to tell you but in another way, life has been the same for me as ever. For Christmas I got a little bit of Christmas pudding in my seed dish. some celebration, hey? Mum has promised as soon as she sees some nice sweet corn on the cob she will buy me one - and two more for the new residents out the back. She would not buy corn BEFORE Christmas because she said it looked tired and she did not like it. I have been given the odd strawberry, too.

The residents out the back? They come out and walk aboiut and scratch and eat grass and peck at insects and things.. and they give Mum some white things which she is very pleased about. they make a sort of soft clucking noise, which shows their pleasure, and every so often, once a day or so, one of them makes a louder noise too though the neighbours have not herad them. Chooks Mum calls them but I think everywhere else but Australia they are called chickens. these are nice friendly chooks now they are used to Mum. She let Dog Angela out yesterday to meet them 0 the first meeting, soon after they came, did not go so well and one of those chooks became airborn and ended up with her head stuck inthe woodheap and a big fluffy bum sticking out! Mum rescued her but there were no eggs for a day or two. Yesterday though, Mum held Angela and one chook - Hannah, the quieter one, came up and snigffed Angela whilst Angela sniffed her. It looked like Hannah was going to walk through angela's front legs but in the end she veered sideways and went about her grazing business quite unconcerned. Henrietta who is a bit more flighty was unconcerned but did not go near her. Greedy - she just ate. Henrietta and Hannah Houdan-Hen, they are. Houdan hens have a big feathery topknot like a pompon on their heads, and are a reasonably small chook as chooks go, but certainly not a bantam. Not these ones anyway! Mum googled houdan and they apparently came from a village in France originally and almost died out.

Dog Angela and Mum went to a Christmas party - same as last year - at the vet. He only invited well behaved dogs on leads, can you imagine that? People got a sausage, and vet Peter went round and gave all the dogs a liver treat, and the doggie Mums and Dads of course shared their sausages in bread with their dogs. Then Santa came, and gave out a present to all - children AND dogs. Angela got a squeaky hamburger. There are two videos to go on here but SOS has to do it, Mum has never learned. Slow, isn't she? They are currently on my youtube site waiting to come over. You will see there are close to 30 dogs there and more people because they came in family groups sometimes, and the vet staff were there too.

I had a good but quiet Christmas.. I hope you did too! Happy and blessed and peaceful, plenty of food, and very nice. I am indeed fortunate. I wish everyone was as lucky as me.

Love, Bibbie