We've got a problem...

We've got rats in the chicken coop!!!  Well, this isn't really new, we've known for a while, but they kinda scared me today.  I went out to the coop to tuck them in for the night, and as I rounded the corner, I saw at least two scurrying away.  One of them even ran head first into the door.  It was really funny.

We knew that they were in getting in the first time the coop flooded in November since we found little poops here and there.  We plugged up a hole that we thought they were getting in from and noticed that the feed was lasting longer.  But, over the last several months, we've seen evidence of them here and there, including some poops that we found last time we cleaned the coop due to a flood.  One even ran over Shawn's foot a couple weeks ago when he was in there in the dark.  Spooky.  I can just see my mom squirming right now.

So even though I've known about them for a while, now that I've seen them I'm officially considering it a problem.  I don't really know what to do other than start the ladies on a meal regimen.  When they're free-ranging, they're door is wide open with the food just sitting there, pretty much inviting the rats in.  I don't really like the idea because that means more work for us and we have to make sure to be home to feed them all the time.  I guess I don't really have a choice at this point.  Boo.

Oh, I know what a rotten egg looks and smells like now.  I was snooping around the coop today looking for rat entrances and found a Frannie egg behind the nest box.  I did the float test and it got about a C+.  My sister and her bf told me to open it so I did out of curiosity.  Big fail.  The white had a tinge of green and it smelled really bad.  Some got on my shirt too.  Gross.  Maybe my mom is squirming again... My sis and her bf, even though they were the reason I opened the damn thing, were out of the kitchen in a flash.  Thanks for the support, jerks.

Oh my broccoli has sprouted.  Everything else, well... the spring that showed up for a couple days decided to go away again, so that's leaving the rest of the stuff dormant, even in the greenhouse.  sigh...

I haven't posted a picture of Nikolai in a while...

Hangin' out.