The Poop of the Night Beasts

My curtained sleep provides the creatures of the night free range for all manner of comings and goings. Small festive gatherings of much rejoicing and regaling as fuzzy butts dance and twirl and feast. They laugh and mock the stupid giant hairless ape inside that cave-thing as he snorts and farts. His slumber filled with naive and peaceful dreams. For these night beasts know what the stupid ape-thing will discover in the morning. That tonight is for them.

Tonight they will feast.

Poop of the Night Beasts_WaterfallMy fish had dreams as well. They dreamed of crunchy bits floating on the waters surface, jostling about from the steady cascade of well manicured waterfalls. They dreamed about the next days activities. Like, “let’s all go swim over there now. I think there may be a crunchy bit over there that we missed when we were there five minutes ago”.

I’ve once been told by an old wizened  sailor that fish never truly sleep; that they always keep moving. That sailor was eaten by a shark and is now shark poop. Should’ve heeded his own advice that dark and stormy night off of the Southern coast of Africa. So it goes.

Regardless of Old Stumpy McStinktrout and his unfortunate skinny dipping episode, these fish had dreams! And now they are poop. The poop of the night beasts. So it goes.

Continue reading “The Poop of the Night Beasts”

Teeny Tiny Fuzzy Nuzzlin’ Baby Guinea Keets!

They’ve finally hatched!! Tiny fuzzy squishy fluffballs dripping with cuteness. They beckon me from the spare room with itty bitty peeps and fuzzy nuzzles. I resist the urge to chew on them. What’s with that anyways? Why do I always want to chew on adorable little things? Is it just me? Is there some evolutionary advantage to that instinct? *Nomnomnom*

Regardless, now that Bernie and Hen Solo are finally laying eggs and are part of the main flock and Piper is all happy in her new bully-proof coop, I must admit to succumbing to a little bit of the empty nest blues. So I called upon my friend over at East County Zoo. If you live in the Southern California area and are looking for an amazing breeder, look no further than Aaron over at East County Zoo! Every bird I’ve got from him has been happy, healthy and shiny! Just look at these cuties!!!

Continue reading “Teeny Tiny Fuzzy Nuzzlin’ Baby Guinea Keets!”

Meet Bernie and Hen Solo


The results are in for the Official MYD Name my Hens Contest™ and it was a close one folks! In the end, the hens decided on their favorite names. I had absolutely nothing to do with the decision making here and am but a slave to the whims of tiny dinosaurs.

Congratulations to Miscellinnie and Nury for the name of Bernie for my plucky Rhode Island Red and to Jack Burton for the name of Hen Solo for the adventurous Black Sex Link.

They took their sweet time in deciding too and when I placed the dry-erase board in the coop for their brainstorming sessions, they tended to poop all over it. But, then again, they tend to poop all over everything. However, after much deliberation, they finally have selected their favorites.

Ronald Reagan was the next runner up for the Rhode Island Red so kudos to the husband of Jenny from Bulldog Travels for that brilliant name!

Sasha was finally able to meet the hens face to face too. I wanted to make sure that my training methods still applied to new additions to the flock. They did in spades!

Bernie and Hen Solo 02_Sasha meets the girls face to face

We then did a nice photo session to help celebrate their new names. I’ve photographed a lot of subjects in my life and can safely say that chickens are one of the hardest things to shoot. The only thing harder was when I shot Buffalo Sabers games back in college. So much movement and with a shallow depth of field, damn near impossible to get the eyes in focus. So, out of the 150 photos I took, here are 14 that turned out decent. Enjoy!

And for those of you that are not sick and tired of looking at chicken videos, here’s the girls playing around in the adult section of the chicken run for a supervised play-date with the big mean girls.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TOD4GVj4TiQ&w=1280&h=720]

I love watching them jump around with excitement like the little kids that they are. Especially in the beginning where Hen Solo tries to eat citrus leaves from the satsuma tree. Silly Solo, the scruffy looking nerf-herder.

Thanks again to all those that helped with your amazing submissions!