Wildlife Sanctuary

I've been keeping an eye on the pond for the past several days, because we've been finding little toads floating in it.  They plop in because they love water, and then they can't get back out because the sides are too steep--toads aren't as good at climbing as their frog cousins.  I'm thinking of building some kind of ramp for them, but in the meantime, I just keep an eye out and remove them.

So I'm looking into the pond several times a day, and yesterday afternoon I saw worms.  Huge worms!  I don't know where they came from, because as you know, I was fairly certain I had removed all of them on Saturday.  So either I was wrong, and I didn't remove them all (they could have been hiding in the water lily), or those egg cases hatched (it's possible they've hatched, but not likely that these huge worms hatched just days ago), or the worms liked it so much they came back.

I'm going with option number 3 right now.  I like being known as a sanctuary to the neighborhood beasts (except the bears...and maybe the foxes...and definitely the coyotes (they're LOUD)).

Speaking of being a wildlife sanctuary, Hubby saw a gorgeous fox walking past the partially constructed hen house yesterday.  Just, you know, casing the joint, looking for vulnerabilities.  Hubby looks at me a little funny when I tell him we need the run to be predator-proof, like what predators do you think we have around here, woman?  I mean, he sees the hawks, so he knows the ladies need protection from above, but I don't think he's quite bought in to the we-need-to-bury-hardware-cloth-around-the-run-to-protect-from-digging-predators argument.  Don't get me wrong--he is willing to indulge me, but I can tell he's not sure it's necessary.  Foxes dig.  Foxes like to eat chicken.  With as much emotion at least two of us have invested in this flock, we need the chickens to live.

Speaking of chickens, I'm picking them up three weeks from today.  They just went into the incubator yesterday (chicken eggs take 21 days to hatch, and our birds will be one day old when we get them).  I was taken aback when I realized that our chicks' eggs probably had not even been laid yet when we ordered them.  Crazy.

Also crazy is how much I need to do.  I mean, it's not all that much to do, but I haven't done any of it yet.  A lot of planning, and asking friends to borrow various things, but no action as of yet.  At least I know what I'm doing for a brooder, food, water, bedding, and heat--I just haven't done it yet.  I need to get moving.