A Soft Shelled Egg

The sky threatened rain again this evening...it thundered and darkened and the wind picked up. I called my friends Becca and Tom at the front of the ranch, "You getting any rain up there?" When they answered in the affirmative, I wasn't surprised as I could see the rain two hills over and I watched it heading my way. Before it made it to the next hill it fizzled out. But it cooled down nicely. Oh well. I went out to the garden to see if anything I planted last week was up yet and was greeted by some radish sprouts and tiny beet leaves. I'd left the gate to the garden open and the Buff chicken tried to sneak in, but I beat her to the gate and closed it behind me. Thinking I could herd the chickens into the coop (yeah, right) I walked over there. They followed for awhile, but abandoned me when our old cat, Negrito walked into the run. I went into the coop and checked for eggs and found two from the brown leghorns. On top of the laying boxes was something that caught my eye. Wow! A soft shelled egg. I've only seen two in my 15 years of raising chickens. Kinda' creepy in a way, it is malleable and translucent and I carried it inside to show it to Scott. He'd never seen one. His thrill for the night...

When I slit it open, it was almost all yolk. I fed it to Negrito and I could hear him purring in between lapping it up.

The mornings have been beautiful lately. Cool and misty. Even if I don't get out to walk until 8:30 or so, it is still comfortable. This morning a heavy cloud hung over the valley and when I walked to the dead end, I wished I had remembered to bring the camera. So I walked back home, grabbed the digital and headed back out. Sophie was wondering what was going on...two walks back to back? Always up for a walk, she bounded down the driveway ahead of me. By the time I got back to the dead end, much of the cloud had lifted, but the scenery still

looked luscious, so I took this picture looking across the valley. Even with just 2" of rain, it looks so lush...