Hunting and pecking

Risa is starting to put her nose out the door more often now that the latest storm has abated. Yesterday, rundling around with the wheelbarrow, she planted four late-bearing storage-apple trees in the orchard/chicken moat, spread some wood chips on the blueberries, picked up some stray potatoes that had been shoveled out of the garden beds by the ducks, gathered some bricks and pots that were languishing in the garden, and picked a few new-growth top leaves from the giant collards.

She chopped up one of the leaves and added this to about a quart of baby potatoes in water in a wood-handled saucepan with lid, and set the pan on the woodstove to simmer down into a soup. Then gathered some eggs and put the birds away in the barn for the night.

A starling was roosting with the hens! Risa, bad girl, couldn't resist giving the little thing a bit of a tug on the tail feathers. With an indignant squawk, the starling flew out into the darkness.

Today, Risa  mucked out the barn bedding onto some garden beds, after scything down some surplus favas --

-- and brought in new straw. Now she's sitting by the fire, hunting and pecking.