Of Bleeding Hearts and Fading Cherry Blossoms

Cherry blossoms on the ground

The cherry blossoms all drifted to the ground a while back. One late, warm, spring snow to say good bye to winter for good this season.

Bleeding heart blossoms.
Fruiting cherry blossoms

Bleeding hearts and fruiting cherry blossoms take their place. With so many flowers in bloom, the humming bird feeder dangles empty. I might as well put it away until first frost. If I was a humming bird I’d rather sip fresh nectar from flowers instead of bland sugar water. I’m sure the flavors of the different flower nectars are far more interesting than sugar water.

Chicks eating cantaloupe

The Bielefelder chicks keep growing. They love cantaloupe. They also love liver, probably their favorite thing to eat next to earthworms. When I put a plate out piled with slivers of raw liver, it is like feeding sharks. The chicks go wild scarfing up the liver and chasing each other around until every last bit is gone. I’d post a video of it, but it may make you faint. One second you have calm, peaceful chicks. The next second you have blood thirsty carnivores ripping things to shreds. If chickens were the size of ostriches, we’d all be in trouble.

Chickens on hand.

It’s hard to imagine these lovely birds as blood thirsty carnivores. But looks can be deceiving.

Chicks perched on leg.

Or these friendly chicks, hopping all over me. But who knows what they are thinking? Maybe they are just looking for an open sore to start pecking away until I am nothing but a skeleton.

On May 10 they will be a month old.

These are going to be the tamest chickens I’ve ever had. Hopefully when they have young next year or next, they will still be tame and teach their young I am not a monster to be feared.