First day of Fall

And a beautiful day it is too. Temperatures in the high 70's, and not a cloud in the sky. I opted to do the semi-annual cleanup of the chicken coop today. It is a bit of a nasty job: dusty mainly, because it is always so dry here. Barbara enhances her own compost pile with the chicken manure from under the roost, so she was there to lend a hand.


I know there are other inhabitants of the coop, in addition to the hens, but they are usually too fast for me. I must have scooped up a mouse nest because a little blind mouse poked his head up from the manure in the wheelbarrow. I would have titled this post "one blind mouse", but the picture turned out so bad Dan had to convince me to include it anyway. Just acknowledge stupidity: I should have used the macro setting.


The mouse travelled in Barbara's shirt pocket until we decided what to do with him, which is put him back in new straw under the roost. His mother, I presume, was already trying to gain entry from the outside.

Meanwhile, I did sow the rest of the winter vegetable seeds in the garden: endive, kale, chard, Chinese cabbage. I hope there is still enough time for them to grow into mature vegetables.