Nice Paddle At Jenner and Working On the Peeps Roost

Posted on June 27, 2018 by Bob

Wednesday June 27, 2018 Jenner CA.

Kayaking the Russian River mouth area

I hadn’t been on the river in awhile so with the wind looking like it would be down, I headed on down to Jenner and put my boat in the water.

I paddled across to Penny Island and decided to go down towards the river’s mouth to see what was going on.

Headed down along the edge of Penny Island to the mouth area.river1

 

Mouth is open and deep

I could see the mouth was open and the ocean was just coming off low tide.mouth2

 

I pulled over in front of the open mouth where the river emptied into the ocean and sat in my boat for a bit.

mouth4

 

Harbor seals

Lots of harbor seals resting on the sand and a couple cormorants too.seals3

 

This is another group of harbor seals resting. I think they mostly feed in the ocean in the early morning and come here to rest and digest what they’ve eaten.seals5

 

And there were some geese resting there too.geese6

 

Looking for berries to eat

I didn’t stay too long and headed back up river going up the Penny Island back channel. I was going to land on the island to look for berries, but the tide was still too low and I’d have to go through the mud, so I opted for the shore across from the island on the back channel.

Here’s some of the berries I found and ate. There’s small blackberries and the bigger berries are salmon berries.berries7

 

There weren’t really too many berries there. The berry bushes this close to the ocean tend to burn up rather quickly maybe because of the salt in the air?

Headed up the river

I returned to my boat and headed up the river. The grasses here kept me out of the mud.boat8

 

I just left land and am headed up the river along here.river9

 

I went by these cormorants that seemed to be just resting on the water and not diving for fish. On my return trip they were actively diving but I couldn’t see what they were eating. It must have been something pretty small.cormorants9

 

I continued on up the river along here.landing10

 

And went only as far as here, a place I call muskrat about a mile up the river.sat11

 

Heading back

After sitting for a bit and having a nice break I headed back down the river along here.river12

 

I made it back to the boat ramp and put my boat on the car and headed to Monte Rio and drove up to visit Charlie. I shot the bull with him for awhile and then headed on home.

Watching peeps and working on roosts

After a good nap I went out and watched my peeps for a bit then worked on a way for the chickens to get up to the roost, but forgot to get a picture of that.

But I did get one of the bottom of it. I put the logs there just so the little birds had something to climb on. They are chasing each other for worms right now as I just gave them some. It’ll take some time for them to discover the logs. They tend to like to sit on the logs once their tummies are full and they stop to digest what they’ve eaten.peeps13

 

Need a bird watering system

I did some chair hopping and did some figuring out how to make an automatic water system for the birds.

After another nap I came back outside to pick some blueberries for the freezer, but shortly after I started the sprinkler came on so I gave that up for the day, maybe tomorrow, eh.

That was it for me today. Nice day.

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Watching My Peeps, A Dirt Bike Ride That Wore Me Out and Running Low On Water

Posted on June 26, 2018 by Bob

Tuesday June 26, 2018 Guerneville CA.

Changing Plans and a Lazy Day

I let the chicks out today into the mulch run and closed up the high grass run as I wanted to get them used to the mulch run. They finally went into the mulch run but eventually they wanted back into the high grass run they were in yesterday. This little black one I found sorta caught in the wire as it could barely make it through there. It had gotten into the high grass run and now wanted to get back with the flock. I watched it and after about five minutes it pushed on through the wire.chick1

 

The peeps like the high grass run

Shortly after that I opened the gate to the high grass run and most of them went in and disappeared in the high grass.

Barry shows up

About that time I heard someone coming through my still broken front gate which turned out to be my brother Barry.

We ate some blueberries and my brother didn’t shut the blueberry patch gate when we left so the chicks got in there which I discovered when we got back.barry2

 

Dirt bike ride up in the hills

He asked if I wanted to go for a dirt bike ride which I did so I met him at the garage where his bike was stored.cycles3

 

Once he got all his protective gear on we headed on up the hill me following him. We stopped here at the top of the ridge for a bit then continued on.top4

 

We’d heard one of our neighbors might be selling their place so we rode over to see them but no one was home. Barry stopped here to check his gps as he was a surveyor and is always checking property lines and things.gps5

 

I followed him up and down hills and through the trees.trail8

 

Wore me out

We rode just about every road up here and were out about two or three hours and I was pretty beat up from all the body stretching I was doing on the dirt bike. And my butt was real sore from all the bouncing around on the seat it did.

I left Barry as he took off for some steeper hills and I headed home stopping at our water tanks to check the water level.

Water’s low in our water tanks

I found the water in the tanks low meaning we are using more water than the springs are putting out and dumping into our tanks. Something needs to be done about that or the tanks would run out of water.

I went back up the hill to where one of my springs were and checked things out. I had to walk through this real lush area.spring9

 

From there I headed back down and put the dirt bike away with a well charged battery. The best way to charge up the battery is to go for a ride.

Chicks like the log

Well, I was beat, felt like I got ran over by a big truck so I just sat around and herded the peeps. I left some logs in the run that I was building a roost out of and the chicks seemed to like it real well.roost10

 

Chicks in the blueberry patch

I found the door to the blueberry patch open that Barry didn’t close before we went on a ride. I could hear chicks in there but couldn’t see any. They are small enough that they couldn’t hurt anything in there so I waited for the ones in there to want to get back with the other chicks then shut the door.

 

Here’s some more peeps on a low roost I put in for them for now.roost11

 

Talked to Tom about the water problem

Eventually I found my brother Tom who uses most of the spring water for his garden so I told him either some one left the water running last night or he was using too much water and would  have to cut back.

Or hook one of the wells into his watering system. He choose to  hook the new well into his system but first we had to figure out all the valve boxes to shut the spring water off and connect the well into his watering system.

Figuring out the valve boxes

There were four valve boxes and I couldn’t remember just where they went so we turned on faucets and turned some off until we figured out what valves to set where.

Here’s Tom figuring it out, or trying to.tom12

 

It took awhile but we finally got all the valves right and every thing working, I think.

Chair hopping and planning

I spent the rest of the time chair hopping and trying to figure out how I wanted to make some kind of ladder type thing for the chickens to get up to the roosts I made. I had some ideas but changed my mind on the plan several times. I think I have a plan of what I want, but it may change again.

That was my day for a lazy one except for the bike ride that wore me out.

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