Forty eggs in a week - now getting five or six eggs a day. A couple of the Wyandottes have started to lay, bringing the numbers up.

Saturday I butchered the White Rock that had cataracts. It was debilitated enough that it couldn't get around in the barnyard - it kept bumping into walls and getting into places in the barn that it couldn't get out of again. I'd been keeping it in a cage in the tack room, where it could find food and water, but I didn't want to keep it there that way. So Saturday I did the deed. We had it last night for dinner and what do you know - it tasted just like chicken.

I also spent some time goat-proofing part of the barn. The goats would hop up on the manger in their stall, come down the other side, then go to the fence in the tack room and help themselves to hay from the bales stored there. So I built a framework that allowed them to eat from the manger, but kept them from jumping up into it. I feel like I really accomplished something, armed with my father-in-law's electric screwdriver.

Evenings I have also been helping my daughter train the goats on harness and cart-pulling in preparation for the fair at the end of the month. Lewis, the bigger of the twin goats, seems to be better and listening to commands and responding to the tug of the reins. Clark is more rebellious, but when I take the lead line out front, he reads my motions and responds accordingly. Since my daughter wants to give goat cart rides to children, she decided this trait made Clark better for that task, and for pulling a cart filled with manure to the garden (my idea) while the stronger Lewis would be better for cart-pulling showmanship and pulling a cultivator to plow the garden (her idea).

The tack room is now filled with fresh hay for the fall/winter. The vet came by to vaccinate and worm them, and work on de-horning the one remaining horn that Lewis is sporting to make him more presentable at the fair. The hens are laying, the roosters are jumping them, and everything at this point seems to be going as it should.

(Holds breath now to see what goes wrong.)