Ditto Maggie. In in his first year or so our rooster charge me a couple of times. He hasn't since. Now he's nearly 2. I always keep an eye on him. When I first let them out in the morning and he's especially active, I always have a garden tool in hand. When the chickens are following me across the yard I will walk facing him--I don't trust him though he hasn't touched me for several months. When grandkids visit, the roosters are in the pen. You can't be too careful. Sometimes I think it would be easier not to have roosters but they are beautiful and they are part of the natural order (however "natural" their lives are). And this rooster is great with his girls. AS far as agression, our head hen is much more agressive than the rooster. This morning one of the pullets was in the egg laying place (of course the nesting boxes are ignored) in the corner and Hera just kept pecking at the pullet's neck. The pullet almost looked like she was in the submissive position but didn't leave the spot until the egg was layed.

PG, Thanks for the update, sorry to hear it didn't make it. I often wonder if Sans don't show damage of any sort until a good while after you've taken them in. I've had a number of Sans and those of which declined, I wasn't convinced that there wasn't something wrong with them to begin with (our BBS here keep them moist/wet year-round for example). I think they initially look nice and healthy on the outside, roots even, but with such a fast decline as you've experienced (and myself), I can't help but wonder if like you said, it may have been damaged already and you (and I) didn't realize it. Not to compare a cactus to a Sans (they are both succulent type plants though), a couple years ago all my outdoor plants got sprayed when the apt people failed to notify us they hired someone to pressure wash the exterior of apartments/patios. I came home to everything dripping in what smelled like bleach. Long story short, some plants died immediately, my cacti... they took about 6 months before they all declined one by one. I think they suffered damage from the spraying, but it took awhile to manifest. Planto This post was edited by plantomaniac08 on Wed, Jan 8, 14 at 8:41

Hey Mango dog, How's your Maha Chinook doing? Mine has really been impressing me. I had 3 growth flushes this year and maybe I will end up with a 4th. Each time it flushes growth again, I cut the new growth back a few inches. So far, this has really been a benefit for me. Two of the branches that flushed produced 6 or 7 new branches, and one of them has an inflo. I think the power chord on the HPS got yanked on and it snapped the inflo in half..GRR!! I noticed today though that it is still growing and maybe...just MAYBE it will still flower. has yours produced inflos? What do you think of it's growth? Mine doesn't grow really fast but 3 flushes a year, I gained about a foot of new growth. I am all ready looking at this tree wondering how I will keep it in bounds in the future. I can see myself having a dilemna over pruning it. I hate the idea of having to cut it back just so I can winter it over indoors:( Andrew

Just a quick update. We've been to the vet. He did an Xray to confirm heart problems and said that Ginger is Stage 3. According to the vet, this is not too late for medication to give her a good quality of life, although it certainly can't cure the problem. He put her on three medications. One to strengthen her heart. One to lower her blood pressure. One which is a diuretic and she is taking a fairly high dose for several days, and if her coughing goes away he will slowly reduce the amount until it seems right. The medication caused diarrhea the first night. She is still having the spells where her legs give out and they are worse than they were at the beginning. We haven't even taken her outdoors lately. I put puppy pads by her bed, and sometimes just the effort of climbing out of the bed to use the pad will bring on a spell. The vet seems to think that will improve. I hope so because it scares her when it happens. It scares us too, but it's her we're worried about, not us. We hate to see her frightened like this. We are holding on to hope for a little bit, but we won't put her through this indefinitely. Only a little while, as the vet seems to think there is hope and says today's meds are really good. He did say that her tongue is nice and pink and that is a good sign, compared to when the tongue turns bluish for lack of oxygen. Of course, he also reminded us that at 15 1/2 years of age, she is quite elderly and medicine is not expected to keep her feeling good (even if it gets her that way at all) indefinitely. My heart breaks for her. I will let you know how she is doing again later on.