The Old Brown House and the Little Bridge in the Deep Woods

This weekend we went for a visit to "The Old Brown House."  The Old Brown House is a historic abandoned house deep in the woods on our property.  I believe it was built in the early 1800s.  The weather was nice so we thought we'd see how it was doing.  I also was looking for a black vulture nest.  The vultures have been flying around this area quite a bit. 

I think it's kind of large for such an old house.  It has 4 large rooms, 2 upstairs and 2 downstairs.  No bathroom, no kitchen, just rooms.  There are 2 fireplaces so all the rooms had heat back when people used to live in it.  I really like this old house.

Here's The Old Brown House from the side view.  It's skinny, isn't it?

The poor old house is falling apart.  When I look at it I imagine the hands that built it.  Someone put all those boards in place with care.  I imagine the woods were all fields back then, and this was a working farm house.

In the corner of one of the rooms is a pile of old doors and windows.

Wait - look there!  What's that behind the door?  

It's a black vulture nest!

Black vultures are weird birds.  They don't make any kind of nest, they just lay their eggs on the ground.  The vultures were flying around overheard as we walked around inside the old house.  They were not happy with our visit.

I'll keep an eye on the vulture babies as they hatch and grow up.  I love vultures - they are good birds.

We walked outside The Old Brown House looking for the outhouse.  

I know there was once an outhouse, but have not been able to find it.  We figure it must have been destroyed.  It would be neat to find remnants of it.  

While we were walking around we found a turkey feather...

...And a big bunny rabbit.   

The rabbit wasn't afraid of us at all.  She just sat there.  We didn't disturb her, but walked around her carefully.  Maybe she had babies under her, who knows.

We also saw an old teapot.  I don't think this was that old - it certainly doesn't look like it's 200 years old.  There's a lot of trash in the woods where people dumped back in the 1980's.  We're always cleaning up trash.

As we left The Old Brown House we went by The Little Bridge in the Deep Woods.  

It's so cool - it's a little bridge in the middle of the woods.

Again it makes me think of the people who built it.  The bridge is old and falling apart now.  It sits on a dirt road and covers a tiny creek.  Maybe the creek was a larger stream at one time.

Well, that's it for this trip into the woods.  I'll keep an eye on the vulture eggs.  I can't wait to see the babies!

Wild Turkeys and Guineas

Recently a flock of wild turkeys has been visiting us!

They remind me of our Guineas ~ they sort of look similar to Guineas.  But the turkeys are bigger than our young Guineas.  The turkeys have been hanging out in our back yard, while our Guineas have been hanging out in the front yard. 

I didn't see any male turkeys, just females and older baby turkeys.  Here is a mama and one of her babies.  it looks like turkey mamas talk to their young all the time just like chicken mamas do!

Baby turkeys, I know you are big teenagers now, but your mama Turkey is serious, you better listen to her!

What, Mom, did you call us?

Mama turkey is quiet, her children have wandered off without her.  They just don't listen...

We've been banishing our Guineas from the chicken pen, we want them to free range and eat bugs. But they don't want to be free birds, they want to be in the chicken pen still, so they hang close to the chicken area right now. They were raised by chickens, I guess they think they are chickens. If the Guineas saw the wild turkeys I'm concerned they would follow them and leave us behind!  They may then realize there's life outside the chicken pen!

Here's a few pictures I took today of the Guineas beside the chicken pen, on the outside trying to get in.  The Guineas now fly up and sleep in the trees at night, and fly down to the ground in the morning.  In the afternoons we normally open the gate and let them into the chicken pen because they have dutifully sat outside the fence all day, attempting to enter through the gate.  Guess they don't realize they could just fly over the fence to enter the chicken pen!  During they days they often fly up into low branches of trees around the outside of the chicken pen, but none of them have gone over the fence to get in.  One day one of them will realize he can just fly over the fence, and then all the others will follow.