Again with the baby chicks, I know, but LOOK AT THIS CUTENESS!!!

We ended up with 9 baby silkie bantam chicks, and mom is taking good care of her babies. How fun is this?!

P.S. You can look at my Backyard Chickens flickr set if you want.

We are all very excited about the addition of Silkie Bantam babies to our flock! These little ones are just one day old now. We have seen 7 for sure, and we lost one overnight.. and I could see unhatched eggs under Mom. But we still don’t know for sure how many chicks have hatched successfully. We had 16 eggs at the time she started sitting them. Can’t wait until Momma starts parading them all around so we can get a closer look! Better pics to come when I’m not trying to shoot through a small coop opening so as not to disturb Marie & chickies!

Oscar is a seven year old burrowing owl we met at the Baby Shower fundraising event for Stanislaus Wildlife Care Center‘s many rescued animals. We also saw a baby fox, skunk, snakes, a barn owl and a variety of rescued birds. Had a lovely time on a beautiful day. And I must say- I teared up to think of the amazing volunteer work these wonderful people are doing. Kudos to them!

This is my Catahoula, Cocoa. She’s a hoot! So much so, that I made her a twitter account. Yes, my dog has a twitter account (what of it?!)

You can follow her: @catahoulagan

She doesn’t tweet as often as she used to, what with all this great outside-play weather. But she pops in now and again, usually with something silly to say.

This is Coo Coo. She went through a particularly ugly first molt but still managed to be the kids favorite hen. Unfortunately she came to an early end this week. We don’t have a clue as to what happened, she looked fine- but we have learned to expect a high mortality rate in young chickens. Soon our Silkie hen Marie will be hatching her first clutch- can’t wait to see the new babies! No doubt we’ll be learning more about death and having more chicky funerals soon. I feel that it’s good practice, if unfortunate. The reward of delicious, fresh eggs, and endless entertainment (chickens are funny!) is worth the life lessons.

Cocoa, our Catahoula- and Cupcake, our Boxer / Staffordshire Terrier Mix, love gnashing. They roll and play fight much of the day away. They are both so sweet, but I wouldn’t want to be in the way of those teeth if they were serious!

This mockingbird has a nest in the eaves of my studio. She’s quite animated- always mocking away! Her favorite noises to make are: hawk cries, crow calls, cat meows and frog croaks. She likes to sit on the electrical wire above our patio, and when we whistle to her she whistles right back!