Six weeks since Pebbles went

It was six weeks today that Pebbles went. The girls all look healthy and there is no wheezing or sneezing so I think we can cautiously breath a sigh of relief that we have come through this now.

I talked recently about the passage of time and how sometimes time seems to fly by and sometimes it seems to drag. The six weeks until the flock are past contagion from mycoplasma seems to have taken forever. However something in the food cupboard made me realise how time can seem to have flown by.

I made some batches of turkey stew for the freezer to use up the left overs from Christmas. We have been having the stew with potatoes but I thought that dumplings would ring the changes. I like dumplings but my husband isn’t keen so it’s not something we have often.

I said that I would see if there was some suet in the food cupboard. My husband said to check if it was still in date because it’s been a while since I have used it. I said that I clearly remembered buying the suet to make a recipe for a meat cobbler that I had seen in a magazine. In the event I decided that I preferred dumpling mix steamed rather than baked so I didn’t make it again.

I was shocked when I retrieved the suet and checked the date. The use by date was January 2011. It was six years out of date! I could not believe it had been that long since I bought it and used it for the magazine recipe. Surely that memory couldn’t have been from six years ago! Needless to say the suet was thrown in the bin although I have to say it actually looked fine. At the great cost of eighty pence I bought some more today.

Anyway I digress. In the photo below Rusty and Freckles were four months old. I wrote a post about the fact that Caramel and Pebbles had red faces but Rusty and Freckles had white faces. I hadn’t realised at the time that this was because Rusty and Freckles hadn’t matured.

Rusty and Freckles at four months old

In the photo below Rusty and Freckles are seven months old. They now have red faces too.

Rusty and Freckles at seven months old

We were told by the breeder that silky feathered hens take much longer to mature than straight feathered hens. This has proved to be true because Freckles hasn’t changed much but Rusty has changed a lot. Neither of them are laying yet so I know that Freckles isn’t older or she would probably be laying by now. They both still twitter away like young hens.

I wonder when they will start laying as I find it hard to imagine. They still seem so chick like. They are so adorable that as long as they stay healthy I don’t mind waiting for eggs.