When the Garden is Done

The garden that produced so much for us and is still actually producing some stuff is finally winding down. Last weekend we started to pull up plants, harvest Sunflower heads, clean up some hardware and then let the feathered creatures come in and enjoy some gleaning.

For weeks, I had been trying to get Walter & Leona to come into the garden and root around for stuff. They had a chance to come in a few weeks ago, but found it too intimidating I guess because they wouldn't follow me in.

This was the one and only time this summer that we had waterfowl in the garden:

At that time they just hid out behind the Three Sisters corn and when it was time to get them to go, they showed how stubborn they can be, very stubborn.

The geese are so veggie-centric that I KNEW that they would have to stay out. Until now.

Gus & Greta can't believe their good fortune

When they first walked into the garden, they just stood there not understanding what they should do. Then they saw the bean plants and that was it...they started to nibble on the leaves. This is a surprising thing about these two, they are not 100% into the bean leaves, but they LOOOVE the beans. Lenny was the opposite, loved the leaves and couldn't understand that the bean was food too. Since the weekend they have been able to come and go into the garden whenever they please. Of course that is available while we are home.

The other day I suggested to Tom that they be corralled into the garden when he has to leave for an extended period of time. That works out well because it is a sad sight to see them in their house and when they are in with the ducks the ducks are unhappy. This is the perfect solution. Well, until the garden is planted again.

The only thing that I will put in the garden this fall is the garlic when it finally is delivered. The season between the fall stuff and getting the spring/summer crops in can be a little on the longer side. This way we won't have to put the chickens in the garden...not just yet anyway. The chickens do great at tilling and spreading things like compost around.

I do like to put tarp down over the garden to smother weeds that have come up and give the garden a chance to recover during the late winter, so the critters will have to stay out. I might put down some cover crop after all of the plants are out, but I haven't decided for sure just yet.

Anyway, the feathered critters have been enjoying their smorgasbord of leftover beans and some sunflower seeds and corn stalks. The geeses REALLY like the corn stalks. I'm not sure what it is...maybe they like the feel of the leaves. They are so weird...they try out everything!

All of the waterfowl including Betty

Betty and the duckies she hatched

There are a couple of Butternut squash still on the vine, so I'll have to wait until they are appropriately ripe before pulling up the three sisters plants. I would like to dry the corn stalks and maybe line the rest of the fence with them. We'll see.

This time of year is always a little sad, but I still try to grow something during the Fall and Winter. Then I'll start planning my 2020 garden!

Farm Life - growing food for people and animals!

New Babies

Sunday morning we had a nice surprise of two ducklings under Betty. At first when Tom came in to tell me he didn't know that there were two. Later on I went out to take a look (or listen) and I thought there were two.

So, I REALLY wanted to see what she had going on underneath her, but I didn't want to disturb her too much - she's a serious momma! When Tom came out I asked him to lift her up so that I could take a photo of the duckling(s).

As it turns out, both of the eggs that Tom gave her about 4 weeks ago hatched...

Fully satisfied with the photo I had taken Tom placed Betty back in her box. Then I went back to doing this, that and the other thing outside.

This is where things went sideways. I don't remember what all happened after taking the photos, but I do remember that after a brief discussion, I thought that maybe all three of them should go into the brooder. I think this is what happened next...I helped Tom bring the brooder into the garage. Seriously that morning really was a blur. I went back into the house and was playing a game on my kindle and he came in a short while later to say that one of the ducklings had died. I don't know if this was inevitable or if we contributed to its early demise, but that's just the way things go.

It is possible that when she was being returned to the box that she put all of her weight on one of them. Possible, but really how plausible. I would think that she would have felt the baby underneath her somehow. Or maybe that one got smothered somehow and maybe just revealing them was just coincidental or something.

We'll never know, but I do know that we just can't beat ourselves up. Maybe we're only meant to add one extra duckling this time - who knows for certain?

After a brief period of grieving...I decided that I need to move forward with my plan. Going to Wilco to pick out some chicks that we'll use to replace some of the older ladies. Also, I was trying to figure out if Betty would accept babies from her own kind. After church I made my way over to Wilco in Battle Ground to take a look at what they had in the store. I wanted to get chicks that hadn't been in the store for a long period of time so that the chicks and the duckling would be of similar size for a minute.

My first choice was a White Leghorn. A nice white chick to add to the bunch, but these chicks were already starting to develop their first flight feathers, so I decided against them. Then I thought that maybe I needed to add a different colored chicken to the flock and one that would lay something other than a brown egg. There were Ameraucanas and Olive Eggers - both expensive. I didn't want to spend a lot of money for what I feel is like a novelty egg color. The Olive Eggers were $7.99 each - YIKES!

Besides price the other deciding factor is whether or not a chicken breed is a heritage breed or not. The Olive Egger is a breed that is a cross between a dark brown egg laying chicken and an Ameraucana (I think). I don't like the look of the Ameraucana, I don't care what color the egg is...the muffs are weird. So the next choice that was interesting to me AND heritage, the Sicilian Buttercup.

These littles are so cute! I absolutely love the markings! The Mottled Javas were cute with their little "capes." The markings on their faces are so unique. They will look like this:

photo credit chickencoopplans.com

It's hard to tell what size this little hen is. Is she a bantam is she regular size? I can't tell. They do come in "regular" size and bantam. The sign at Wilco did not say bantam, so I can assume that they will be a regular sized hen. The comb will be interesting to see. They don't have a single comb, but two single combs that joins in the front and in the back - forming somewhat of a crown. Their legs are also supposed to be a willow green color.

So, I get the chicks and arrive home to introduce one of them to Betty. As it turns out Miss Betty didn't want to accept the chicks. What I realize now is that I probably should have introduced them to her at night, but that wasn't really an option as we had our Small Group Sunday night and the last thing I wanted to do is try to put chicks underneath Betty. Especially since she is so very sensitive about us being around anyway. We just get the evil eye from her...

This is the look only a little more mean.

So, I'll be raising the Buttercups for now and then at some point we'll have to come up with a different set up for them. It will be a while before we can integrate them into the flock anyway.

We love the babies! So much that I had a dream that we were trying to craftily slip some new ducklings under Betty. Which I thought about when I woke up and thought it was for real!

Oh...babies everywhere! Fun times on the farm!

Favorite

Photo from the weekend...

Grandpa Ott's Morning Glory from Seed Savers Exchange

This pretty Morning Glory is all over my fence and it is such a pretty bloom. I love it!

Betty

Betty is back at it!

A few weeks ago I said out loud that I didn't want to try to break Betty's broody the next time it comes around. I wasn't thinking that a few weeks after uttering those words that she would want to sit. She must have heard me...tricksey little hen! Then she went broody and Tom said that he would like to give Betty a couple of eggs.

What would be great is that these will be females. With my luck we'll get two drakes. What would be good is that the eggs hatch at all. Not that we doubt they will, there is a chance that they won't. If they do hatch that would happen around September 24. My thought is that I could get some chicks from the local farm store and take the ducklings from her and raise them with the chicks. We ended up raising W & L after 4 weeks so it seems like maybe we should just raise them from the beginning. Of course the problem with that plan would be that she is the momma and she was a good one to the first two that she hatched. So, I need to think about this carefully over the next few weeks before the eggs hatch.

What we have observed is that W & L are more duck like than the Magpie Squad who were hatched and then shipped to the feed store. They had to figure out things on their own. Other than showing them the water and their food, they followed their instinct and that really only goes so far. The thing that I do like about the Squad is that they are not totally skittish around us.

Betty is great though - every couple of days she will totally tear out of her nesting box (which is a tote) and get down to business. Eating, getting hydrated and get in a dust bath. Each task is done with great urgency. Unfortunately I usually don't get to witness her time OFF of the eggs because I am at work most of the time she goes into this routine. So, the garage door HAS to be open just wide enough so she can get out of there!

Growing the Magpie Squad wasn't something that I thought would really happen. However, it looks like Betty is our ticket to the charming and delightful Magpie Duck. I am glad to add a couple more, but what would be really great - one of the magpie girls going broody and hatching her own clutch of eggs. I guess this will have to do for now.

Life on the farm is time well spent.

TBT

It has been a while since I did a throw-back post. Honestly I haven't been feeling creative, so this works out.

This morning we woke up to A LOT of thunder and lightning action. It was nearly constant. It has been quite a while since we had this much weather activity of this variety so early in the morning. When Tom went out to feed the critters, the geese did not want to leave the safety of their shelter. Smart critters!

The weather as it happened at 7:30 this morning

Later in the morning as I was getting ready to head out for the day the baby Magpies were a nervous wreck running around looking for a safe place to hang out. I'm hoping that they made it back into the hoop house, but that is not likely - they are not THAT smart.

In looking back at what I had posted a year ago it was a post for the whole week and not just August 29. Check it out HERE.

Enjoy the weekend wherever you call home!

Pests

A couple of weeks ago I discovered a wasps nest in the hoop house. Actually, I really didn't discover them until after I had disturbed their nest or the thing that the nest was attached to. I immediately was stung by one of them. Tom got the hose and sprayed the nest like crazy and the wasps were gone, for the moment.

Since then we have been trying to rid the hoop house of them. I had no idea that they would come back to the same place and look for the nest. Now that I think of it, why wouldn't they? A few days after the first nest was destroyed they had already started to build a new one - sorry wasps, you gotta go! More hose action please.

THEN last weekend I was tending to some of my seedlings for my Fall/Winter garden and I noticed a wasp flying in and then flying into the tube of row cover cloth on the shelf right in front of me. Yup, right in front of me. When Tom came back outside I told him what I had seen and then he went and got a couple of towels to plug the ends of the tube and then was able to spray the heck out of the tube. Turns out there were a couple of nests in the tube. Swell.

Not too long later the wasps that survived the blast of water returned to the hoop house. Here we go again. 

They're baaaack!

This time Tom remembered that we had some sort of Raid spray. It was for ants and roaches, but it worked on the wasps pretty good.

After a couple of squirt of the chemical spray

After a while I decided to start looking around for more nests in the hoop house and I found another small nest in a stack of the plastic pots that I use for transplanting older seedlings. That nest also got the water treatment. Once those wasps/nest were destroyed I started thinking about how much I didn't want to use the spray around my tomato plants so I had to come up with a new solution. A quick search on Google and I found a safe way to deal with the wasps in a more plant friendly manner.

You gotta love Googlepedia

So the recipe that I decided to go with is:

•  16 oz of white vinegar
•  16 oz of water
•  several drops of dish soap 
•  A LOT of peppermint essential oil. 

I had a spare spray bottle sitting around which is kinda weird because in the spring I couldn't find ONE.

Anyway, I poured everything into the bottle, gave it a shake or two and off I went looking for the straggler wasps that still insisted on returning to the Hoop House.

It amazes me how these little creatures will go back to their last known address and try to set up shop again. In the short couple of weeks since we started to battle the wasps they have returned to all of the spots that they built nests before and even tried to start a new nest above the door.

Once I came across a few wasps all congregated on one of the shelves that I stored some of my plastic pots on and gave them a few squirts of my new wasp spray. Surprise, surprise...they didn't like it. They started to writhe on the ground in a manner that suggested that they were not comfortable. After a couple of minutes they finally stopped moving....for good.

This was very exciting for me as I am able to use this spray around my plants and not worry about what sort of chemicals are going into the air or potentially harming my veggie plants.

Wasps have not returned to the hoop house in the past week. I'm not sure if I'm happy or not - mostly because I rather enjoyed spraying them and watching them drop to the ground or the potting bench and try to cling to life only to eventually die.

I love me a new pest remedy.

Something Has Got To Go

Grandpa Ott's Morning Glory from Seed Savers

There have been several times when I sit down to do a post here and I'm fresh out of thoughts, imagine that, or I have other things that require my attention. If I had my way this is what my life would be:

• Turn off my alarm and wake up anytime I want.
• Go for a run or a ride.
• Take care of the critters.
• Nap.
• Plan all of my gardening adventures as the year goes on.
• Play in the garden and make the yard and surrounding areas pretty.
• Cook Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner.
• Go to bed whenever I feel like it.

Looks like a life without working away from home right? It's a dream for me at this point. 

As it is I spend 40 hours out of my week away from home. Actually more because lunch breaks and travel time don't count into those 40 hours. Depending on the time of year and how my morning starts off as I wake up for the day I will either head out after coffee and bible reading. Lately I have not been going outside to help with the chores. I have been known to head outside for morning chores on the weekends though, so I'm not a total deadbeat "mom." 

Gus & Greta checking out the home improvement project

The evenings are fairly enjoyable - arrive home and eat dinner then head outside to give the feathered creatures a treat or just sit and watch them be who they are. The Magpie Squad and the Geese are usually penned up by 7 or 7:30 and the two Magpie Babies get some extra time to play in the pool before it's time for them to go to bed. 

If I want the routine of a person who doesn't go to work everyday I'll take vacation to get away from the crazy. I took vacation time during the first full week of this month and boy I did not want to go back to work. Especially since my supervisor would be on vacation when my vacation time was over.

sigh.

The past two weeks I have been back to the regular work routine and now the weekend is upon us again and this weekend I have even less time to hang out at home. It's all good though. We'll be heading out to the Swan Island Dahlia Festival tomorrow with some friends and then Sunday I have a couple of responsibilities at church that I will need to do before we have home time. Although I have a feeling that my afternoon will involve going to a local building center to pick up some decking materials that are on discount.

oh well.

This is the life of a full-time office assistant/part-time farmer-homesteader. One day I'll leave work and never return.

one day.

First Spookie sugar pumpkin

Most Liked Post

Trying to think how to make posting on Blogger a little more interesting.

What I want to do - link my Instagram account 

and

What happens when I try - it no workies

Yeah, I'm a techno-wiz....NOT.

Adventurous me said "Let's google this and see how that works."
It is high time that I learn something new.

Found a site that gives step by step directions and I STILL couldn't get it to work.
I followed the directions! I must be crazy...

So back to what I know. I'll just link the post I'm trying to highlight because I know THAT will work. Well, it did before I thought I might make my blog kinda cool. So let's do this...

To see the most liked photo on my Instagram go HERE.

In the meantime I'll be trying to figure out how to link the instagram to this space.

Farm life is so much easier compared to figuring out computer-y stuff.

Freezer

In October 2016 we were out for a walk and on our way back I happened to look and see a FREE freezer at a house in the subdivision across the street from us. 

FREE?!

A beauty...all for FREE!

We were close to home so Tom went and got his truck and I went and knocked on our friends door - who lived a couple of doors down and asked for a hand with the freezer. According to our friend the guy who was giving the freezer away had used it for making cheese or something and must have decided to move on to other hobbies.

After we got it home we set it up in the garage and there it sat. At least for a couple of years before we put anything in it. Last year after we brought home the pigs I was told that we could pay a small fee and bring home a bunch of bread from the Franz Outlet. Which we did...until last fall, almost two years after bringing home of the freezer. Last September we processed our first batch of Freedom Rangers last year.

These days you'll find a healthy supply of homemade bone broth, homegrown chicken and the innards of those chickens. There are a few loaves of bread and packages of bagels still showing up as well.

We are set up for a little while. 

Right now, we have a little bit of pork that Tom brought home from a pig butchery class that he participated in last Sunday. 

Just so much pork

With chicken and pork in the freezer, all we need is a little bit of grass-fed beef to round things out. For now we will have to stick with Butcher Box. We could make a change in how we source our beef and go with a local farm that raises grass-fed beef not far from our home and that would eliminate the subscription service. Also, the beef would be local and we could choose what cuts we would like most.

Another thing, as the season goes on I'll need to make some adjustments as I have great plans to add vegetables to the freezer. I am hoping to at least get some fresh beans out of the garden and into the freezer this season. There wasn't nearly enough from last year - so I planted a double row of beans this year.

Farm Life is a good life...with good food!

I Am Not Crazy

Whoa...where am I going with this...???

Okay, when I go through a seed catalog or look at websites that peddle seeds I am very specific about what I am looking for. So while I was looking at beans that I wanted to try out I found one called Tiger's Eye HERE. It is a bean that can be eaten while it is still tender or shelled later and stored. I liked the color and I liked that it was a bush variety. Not that I have something against pole type beans, but I have had a lot of luck with the bush variety of beans in the past couple of years.

Anyway...I popped these seeds into the ground while getting the big garden planted and was excited to see that most of the seeds germinated! A good thing since I don't know how much we'll yield from one plant. Anymore my motto is "more is better!"

This past weekend I was doing some weeding in the garden, because it was overdue and I looked at the beans and I saw LONG stems growing upwards. WHAT?! It was suprising to me because I thought for sure they were bush beans.

OH SNAP!

July 15, 2019

I didn't have the seed packet, but I knew that I had a few more leftover so the packet wasn't in the garbage. When I finally did find the packet I looked at the planting instructions which stated it would need a trellis/support.

SWELL...

Yesterday Tom went out to Lowe's via Wilco and came away with some T-Posts and some EMT to create the top bar of the trellis. Those were installed and once I arrived home I attached the remainder of the Roller Hooks that I ordered a couple of years ago, but only just recently started really using in the garden.

A better photo...

When you visit the Seed Savers website (as well as a couple of others) it states that this variety of bean is bush habit.

This is confirmation that I am not crazy!

Farm life - it is confusing...

Natural Pest Control

A couple of weeks ago I noticed some cabbageworm damage on my....cabbage - duh.

Besides geese that eat anything and everything and bunnies that squeeze through the fence the other pest we have in the garden would be cabbageworms. Rather than letting the little buggers continue eating my plants I decided it was time to fight back. Checked into Mr. Google-Pants and found a couple of different things that could work. One of the remedies required more ingredients than I was willing to put into the spray, but the other...well, it was the winner.

My search for Essential Oils and cabbageworms took me to MIGardener and an all-purpose garden pest control spray. This recipe only required three different essential oils, some dish soap and water. That's it! So easy! Go HERE to get more details on the recipe.

BUT...The real test would be how effective is the spray in action?

So I ordered up my inexpensive essential oils (marigold, peppermint and rosemary) each cost 10ml bottle was less than $10 - thank you very much Amazon. Received the delivery on July 3rd and mixed up the solution and sprayed my plants on the 4th. As I sprayed I made note of how many worms I saw and the damage that had already been done. At that time the damage wasn't extensive, but I'm sure that the worms would be back in no time to munch more of the plants. We gotta put an end to that! By the weekend I noticed that there wasn't MORE damage - ALRIGHT! The first spray was a little on the light side so I decided to spray the plants a little more. Couldn't hurt right?

It rained a little this week so yesterday I spray the plants a little more. Checking underneath most of the leaves I found that the damage didn't increase AND only found one green worm trying to make a meal of my plant. Sorry dude...spritz, spritz, spritz!

July 9, 2019

Now, the total cost of the essential oils was $25.47, but the solution is concentrated, so only a small portion would be used to mix up a gallon of the spray (although, I only have a quart size spray bottle right now). Essential oils are super powerful, so even the tiniest amount makes a difference. The fact that I'm not using chemicals in the garden is worth it though. If I don't spray this is what might happen:

photo credit storyblocks video

It's not a pretty sight, but it's also one that I don't want in my garden.

What kind of pest control do you use? Comment below :)

Farm Life is the best life - bugs and all!

Feeding the Pigs

Rex with Fiona in the distance.

Over the past few months we have noticed Mr. Rex starting to bully poor Fiona at meal time. They each get the same stuff in their bowls and one doesn't get more than the other. We have also been trying to monitor their weight as they were completely overweight about 6 or 7 months ago. Our bad, they wanted ALL THE FOOD and we gave them A LOT.

Back to the issue at hand. When they get their food and they will mostly happily gobble up the goodies and stuff, but Rex was a little quicker with the inhaling of his food and will sometimes wander over to Fionas area. Then he will literally push her out of the way and eat her ration.

Seriously?!

This became hard to watch and a few days ago so we decided (or I decided) it was time to put some distance between them. Thus making feeding the pigs a two person deal. So yeah, I need to get out and be more involved anyway.

The trick is to catch the attention of one of them and have the other person lure the other further down the paddock. It's only been like three days with 2 feedings per day and they seem to be getting the hang of the new routine. With time I hope that they will get the routine down and we won't have to try to get someone's attention and walk to a specific spot while avoiding their poo.

By the weekend there will be a new section of Premier 1 fencing and we can separate them and make sure that Rex will leave his missus alone during feeding time and Fiona will have the opportunity to eat in peace.

This would be ideal as we are wondering if she is actually pregnant and would definitely require the extra food/nutrition.

BUT - THAT  is an issue for another day.

M.I.A.

Okay...I've stayed away long enough! Not on purpose, just a little busy the past few weeks and feeling oh so tired a lot. Like A LOT! So, I decided that I'm going to post a little bit of something several times a week.

This past weekend we went to a local running shop and we both got ourselves some new running shoes!

New Balance 880 for me

New Balance 1080 for Tom

The last shoes that I had for three years were not that great. I didn't feel 100% comfortable and just felt like running was turning into a chore. So over the next couple of years with those shoes our running routine kept dwindling down until we weren't getting out early at all. 

The good thing is that the guy that helped us with our new shoes brought these out for me to try out and it was like the heavens opened up and the angels sang...for real! 

Okay, they felt REALLY good. There was a second pair that I didn't like as much and when I had one of each on I definitely knew that I had to go with the New Balance! Come to think of it, I don't even know what brand the other pair was. Oh well. 

While I was checking out my two pair of shoes, Tom had a stack of men's shoes that were his size just sitting there waiting to be tried on! So he did his own assessment while Fit Right Ron was helping me out. After a few pairs he settled on the New Balance as well. 

This is not my first pair of New Balance shoes. My first pair was from way back when I was starting to run a bit more and like it at the same time - imagine that. I just remember that pair being really stiff, but still fit well and allowed me to actually feel like a runner.

So for now we are just fitting in quick walk/runs in the early morning hours. Today was the second time out and it was GREAT! We did a kind of race thing (okay maybe I was racing in my mind). We did the same route, but in opposite directions. I wanted to figure out where we would pass each other on the route. I actually did alright and felt pretty good about my second time out after not getting out hardly at all for the past couple of years for sure.

Actually using my sport watch for more than just keeping time.

Anyway, this is what is on my mind today. I see that it is sprinkling out right now, so my outside time might be limited to just getting the pigs fed. THAT is now a chore that takes the both of us.

More on that tomorrow...

I promise not to disappear...for a while anyway.

2019 Freedom Ranger Project

March 5, 2019

In the last few months I have been reading different books and watching documentaries and YouTube vids on food. I am realizing how messed up the food is that you can buy at your local store. Sure I knew that organic food choices would be better, but until now I couldn't justify paying so much more for food that is not only certified organic, but non-GMO on top of that. I'm not going to go into the perils of the food that we put into our shopping carts and then onto our tables. I'll leave that to anyone who is reading this. This all started with Nourishing Traditions a cookbook with a very compelling introduction. Then came In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan and then to really top things of we watched a documentary called Secret Ingredients. If you have ever seen the "dirty foods" list this film will really make you think. As I mentioned before I will not go into any of the things that are so compelling in regards to our (or anyone's) food journey. That will be up to you - I have included the links for your convenience.

We try to make better choices and we also grow a portion of the food that ends up on our own table. At first it was just a variety of favorite vegetables that are always best fresh from the garden (or the Farmer's Market if you don't garden). I also subscribe to Imperfect Produce to fill in the gaps here and there. Last year we added Butcher Box to have some meat choices in the freezer.

Then in the spring of 2017 when we added our first flock of supposed laying hens and found out by the end of summer that half were cockerels. We had to put a stop to that. We butchered our first chickens the fall of 2017. It wasn't a great experience, but we (or I) decided that maybe we could do this. Raising chickens is quite easy, why not raise chickens for meat?

In 2018 we took our first step toward growing meat for food to fill our freezer and it was not a bad experience. We still have one chicken left in the freezer from our September harvest. The only thing that was not good about last year's harvest...our own inexperience. Growing laying hens isn't much different than meat chickens. A chicken is a chicken and they will eat if there is food to be had. We made a big mistake and fed the meat chickens an evening ration (although not quite equal to their morning ration) and it was not necessarily a good thing. We had a big fail in that the chicks grew so fast that their little bodies would grow like crazy, but their little hearts couldn't keep up. We ended up losing nine chicks to over-feeding. Imagine that! HUGE fail. Even with the fail we were pleased with the outcome. We had put homegrown meat in the freezer!

The changes that we made:

FEEDING SCHEDULE

First we did not over feed the chicks. They received two feedings a day for the first few weeks, up until we put them outside full time. That worked out great! Once they were big enough to handle a little extra food in the evening - which really was a bedtime snack of some scratch. We would throw some scratch into the chicken tractor as a way to get them to go in for the night. Yeah, chickens will naturally put themselves to bed - even the meaties, but it was just easier to do it while it was still light out so we only had one flock to deal with later in the evening. They got used to that routine in no time flat! Extra food for a growing meat chicken, they will not turn their beaks up to that. Also, this year's meaties were able to run around and eat grass and chase after bugs to help fill their bellies throughout the day (spoiler alert we got them a special fence).

GROW-OUT TIME

The other thing we did was give this batch of chicks an extra couple of weeks to get good and fat. So instead of harvesting them at 11 weeks old we did the harvest at 13 1/2 weeks. Even then, in the last few days I thought we would have some fatty's for sure and I was a little surprised that there wasn't a chicken that was six pounds! There was one that was close though. They really were quite large too. Our two littlest meaties were both 3lb 15oz. and the largest at 5lb 13oz. Not too shabby really. All in all we ended up with 115lbs 8oz of meat in the freezer.

Chicks first day on Grass

FREE TO ROAM (sort of)

The last thing that really made a difference would be the Shock or Not fence from Premier1 Supplies. First saw this on the Justin Rhodes channel last year. I saw how they could get their chicks out on grass much sooner than norm. This netting is a real game changer! The chicks were relocated from the Brooder to the chicken tractor at not quite 4 weeks old. They enjoyed days out on grass and evenings in the chicken tractor with the heat lamps on. It was still pretty chilly at the end of March so we kept the lights on them for a few more weeks. During the day they were free to explore their enclosed area and were happy to be outdoors. Last year's poor littles didn't have that opportunity. They had a teeny-tiny space that was more of a courtyard, a tiny one, to come out and look at something other than each other and to pick at some clean grass. They couldn't even get away from their own stinky poo. It would have been nice to have this fence last year, but it wasn't in the budget.

Processing day was fairly uneventful and we were able to finish the job with the help of our neighbor/friend in about two and a half hours. It took two hours for Tom to complete the killing, scalding and plucking and a few minutes longer for Julie and I to finish up the evisceration. I had a couple of other people who said they would come, but they didn't show. Which is fine, but it would have been nice to know that they would not be coming. In the end just having the three of us was nice as we didn't have to do any sort of instructions at the beginning - that would have definitely slowed us down. We'll be ready next year for new peeps though. Last weekedn I chatted with a friend of mine who asked me if this was something that she should do. I told her it's not for everyone, but at least knowing how the chicks are raised and observing the process wouldn't be a bad idea. We'll see - next year might be the teaching year.

With the changes that we made from last year's big fail, we ended up with 24 plump chickens. All brined, bagged, weighed and sitting in the freezer for a future meal. HUGE WIN!

Twenty-Four Chickens ready for the freezer.

Having no meaties to take care of in the evening is both good and bad. Good in that we are now not spending the extra money to grow them out. Bad because I got used to hanging out with them and watching them while they were out in the field. I'm not going to lie, it is bittersweet. The first kill is a little sad, but then as you move forward you have to remember that these chicks were raised for a purpose. To put good, clean food into the freezer and then onto our table.

June 8, 2019

New Babies!

A month ago we stuck some duck eggs under our broody hen, Betty...go HERE for that post.

Last Friday morning as I started to do the morning chores I decided to check in on Miss Betty and I saw this:

So exciting! Our broody-hen-hatching-duck-egg experiment worked! Well, I didn't doubt her ability to sit on the eggs until they hatched...just what she would do when they actually came out and they were NOT chicks.

She seems to be doing alright with them and is very protective, because they are her babies. However, I have observed her clucking at them as she would if she had chicks instead and they are not responding. It would be nice to know if she thinks that this is weird or not. She's just doing what comes natural and the ducklings are doing what comes natural to them. Maybe I'm overthinking this whole thing for her.

The ducklings are doing fine and they spend time underneath momma when they are in the garage - they do play around a little too. They are both quite active and got to spend the majority of the day outside with Betty yesterday. She does a good job at protecting them. Even with the ducks and goslings hanging around.

It will be fun to see how they progress over the next few weeks. I hope that they will transition to being part of the flock when the time comes. That should be in a few weeks - they are only 4 days old at this point.

Betty my be our ticket to more Magpie Ducks! A couple of weeks ago Miss Bernadette thought that she wanted to be broody and spent one day - about 8 hours - sitting on some eggs. Toward the end of the day, her empty stomach won and she left the nest and hasn't gone back.

Little Stinker!

It would have been nice to have one of the Magpie Girls sit on eggs, but evidently that is something that is not a part of their constitution. Good thing we have a surrogate in Betty. We'll increase the Magpie population yet!

Farm Life is best with baby waterfowl!

Been A Little Distracted

A week ago we added a couple of babies to the farm/homestead. So I've been a little distracted and doing the most minimal possible around the farm. Actually, that's not true - I've tried to incorporate these two into a routine...

These two came home on May 1 and oh baby...they are so much fun!

Starting on the weekend these two would be liberated from jail (the brooder) and hang out nearby while I worked in the garden in the early morning on Saturday. Tom who is the breakfast king went and got breakfast ready while I supervised the mini-hoodlums.

Since the weekend I have been going about my business and doing the chores as usual and they had been doing a pretty good job at sticking close to me. In the last couple of days they have gotten even MORE independent - which is fine - but they have been lagging behind whenever I am interested in them following me to a different part of the farm. Little stinkers!

Up until a couple of days ago the routine was to get them out early in the morning to let them forage a little and run around a bit then back into the brooder. A couple of days ago while I was in the hoop house they were with me just nibbling on the greens in the garden bed. Right then, I had the thought that they could just stay in the hoop house during the day. I was starting to feel bad that they would have to go back into the stinky box. In the dark.I'm a thinker...

They LOVE the hoop house and all the space. Most of all I'm glad that they have fresh air and some sunlight to keep them warm - although today is a little too warm with outside temperatures in the 80s and the hoop house temps are usually much higher. Even for a little stinker who can hide in the shade. Even though that is an option, I don't think that they are THAT smart and probably don't sit under the bench.

Anyway, we got new babies and I've been distracted. I'm doing my best to incorporate them into the morning and evening routine so that they know that things happen. So far they are not affected by noise coming from a string trimmer or a lawn mower. They are pretty chill and do their own thing...until they figure out that someone has left. That someone is usually me. This was confirmed the other day while I was scrooping up some wood chips they realized that there was no one around. Tom came walking up and they walked toward him for a second and then realized that I wasn't him. They started crying again until I called out and then all of a sudden they both came running to the chip pile.

It's good to be popular :)

I'll have to actually buckle down and get to work on the garden (boxes and free range). This means that the Goslings will need to either be locked up or penned up. I'm not wild about either option, but it will have to happen that way. Otherwise the distraction will continue.

The littles made short work of my greens in the hoop house.
I'll have to let them clean the hoop house bed all of the time!

This farm life is awesome!

The Harvest of...

animals....more specifically ones with feathers.

A few people are aware that we raise chickens for meat and that the piglets that may come will also become bacon and ham.

The reactions are varied, but mostly whoever we might be chatting with will undoubtedly say "Oh, I couldn't do that!" Well, we usually aren't asking anyone to participate in our crazy ways unless they show a little bit of interest. Also, we try to steer the conversation away from the chopping the head off of a chicken and try to explain the humane way of doing the deed. Still no one wants to hear that there is a better(?) way.

You know, I have to say that I probably would be that person too. However, when you grow up with chickens and ducks inevitably one or more of those birds will end up in the soup pot. Which they did and my mom was tricksey about it and didn't say so ahead of time.

OH MY GOODNESS....

Well, the old chickens have to go sometime right? I imagine that his one had outlived it's productive tendencies and was just taking up space. Back then I never thought about it. It was just something that my mom did. At that time I don't think that I had much to do with the process. I think I may have been present for one of the slaughters...but I don't remember.

So fast forward a lot of years and here I am growing my own food. We (Tom and I) are growing a lot of our food. Not all though and I will be the first to say that we could do better, but we are growing more than we ever used to.

We are more that halfway to the next Freedom Ranger harvest date. On June 8th we'll be harvesting our 24 Meaties. Over the next several weeks I'll be testing the waters and looking to see who we might recruit to help with the big day. I already have a couple of people who are interested, but more hands is always a good thing.

There is no delicate way to ask someone to join in the experience. When we do just ask out right it's fairly easy to tell which camp someone is in. If we hear "Ummm...no...I couldn't do that." or just a adamant head shaking. Okay, that's probably a no. Then there are those who say "Yeah, that would be interesting I'll come watch." I also know who NOT to ask - I do want to keep certain friendships intact.

You get the idea.

So I do have a couple of neighbors who I hope will be able to come help. One is a woman who helped us last year and she was all over the evisceration of the chickens. The other is a neighbor down the street from us who is very curious about raising chickens for meat and would like to come and learn. If he has done what I suggested, maybe he'll have a couple of his own birds to harvest also.

I'm very excited that we have gotten to eight weeks with 24 chicks. I am optimistic that we will get through the next five weeks with 24.

Farm Life - it's not so bad...in fact it's awesome!

Broody Happens

It's just best to not fight nature.

We have one Java hen who routinely jumps the fence and forages all over the place.

Every. Single. Day.

If she doesn't jump the fence - which is rare - it might just be weather related. We could have tried to keep her penned up, but it doesn't do any good.

Over the past few days I have been observing her and I started to get the idea that she just might be broody. Well, yesterday I wanted to get her egg and get her back to the others. So I did what I needed to do which is get too close to her nest. She jumped out and got all agitated. She was running outside with all her feathers ruffled and puffed up. However, the attitude adjustment came when she realized that she would be heading back and getting some scratch with the other hens. She's not so dumb.

This morning, I went out to take care of the girls and released them from the coop and after they settled down I started to count the hens, just to make sure that they all made it in last night. First I started by counting the Javas. It's not hard to count them as they are black and white instead of black like the Jerseys and the Australorps. I kept coming up with five hens...there should be six. After looking in the coop, like one would still be in there, I realized that the daily escapee was out all night. My hope was that she made her way to the garage before we closed it up for the night - she did. Tom mentioned that he didn't see her earlier as she was totally hunkered down. Plus we don't expect to see her in the garage that early.

Okay...Now what?

We don't have a rooster so there is no opportunity to have her hatch out chicken eggs, BUT we do have ducks - 3 hens and a Drake. A few months ago, I thought that maybe if we had a broody hen that we should pop a couple of duck eggs under them and let them hatch out ducklings. It doesn't seem likely that one of the ducks will go broody. Plus we wouldn't even know what that looks like. After a brief discussion, Tom agreed and went it to retrieve a couple of eggs from the house, those being the freshest ones from this weekend actually.

Mind you I have never done anything like this. When I was growing up, the hens just collected up the eggs that they wanted without any help from me or my mom. So I went in with the two eggs and placed them right next to her and as I was violating her space she squawked and pecked at me, as expected. After a few seconds she evaluated the situation she took the eggs and slipped them under her warm little body and hunkered right down.

Good girl!

We call her Betty - Broody Betty

The average time period to hatch chicken eggs is 21 days. Hopefully our hen doesn't have an internal clock that tells her to get off her nest at 21 days as it take 28 days for ducks. I suspect she'll stay on the nest until something happens. She does look happy now. Also, I have gotten close to her to place some food and water next to her nest and she didn't get all crazy. Tomorrow we'll add a couple of extra eggs just to make sure that she has some success.

We tried breaking broody hens last year and it was hard to capture them to confine them. Plus I just felt bad for them. They were just trying to do what comes natural. May as well go with nature.

Farm life is the best life with broody hens!

Curb Appeal

Some people have nicely manicured front lawns. Maybe a flower bed or a tree or two. Or maybe you live out in the far reaches of the county and no one can see your front yard so you plant a car out there. Well, we were the people with just a tree and really sad grass and something that once resembled a flower bed. As much as I would like to have a nice front yard to sit in and watch the world go by, it's just something that we have never done. Sitting in the front yard sounds like such a nice activity...(sigh)

These days we have no grass and if there is anything out there it's the overgrown cover crop that should have been tilled under weeks ago. We don't even have a curb! Tom has tried to use the space as a garden for the past 3 seasons. There was some success, but mostly things that gave it a good try and then gave up. Plus it's the front yard - and we really don't spend time out there. Also, the tree that's in the middle doesn't help out much. Things that are planted around the edge of the yard usually does well. Most other things not so much. Although, there was a zucchini plant out there last year. Zucchini probably isn't too picky...just stick a plant in the soil and it will take off!

After a couple of seasons with chickens I have decided that it would be okay to go ahead and let the girls work the front yard garden. I mean really, if we aren't going to enjoy the space we may as well let the chickens hang out there. Up until this season I have been a little reluctant to have the chickens smack dab in the middle of the front yard. We are already a bit of a spectacle as it is. We don't need help in that area. In just the past couple of months the ducks and the pigs had been hanging out in the front yard for the cover crops which the pigs enjoy or what might be hiding under the fallen leaves. The ducks love to root around in the leaves!

The poor girls had a mud pit up until this past Monday

Now that it has been a few days, I'm okay with them in front of the house. They don't seem to mind much either.

The chicken's new space

The girls were patiently waiting to be set free to explore their new space.

 I'm not sure where we'll move them to next. We'll keep them out front at least a month, maybe a little longer or less depending on how much they tear up the mediocre lawn and the cover crop in the garden.

Whenever we can get the chickens (or any critter) to do the work for us, the better!

Farm Life is the best when you put chickens in the front yard.

Starting Seeds

Okay, so growing our own vegetables isn't entirely foreign to me. We have grown all sorts of gardens large and small over the years. Some were very elaborate like a potager garden - fancy for kitchen garden or very free form, which I like to call the free range garden. All of my gardens have been a combination of store bought plants and us starting seeds at home. Either way, I have always had a fair amount of success.

A couple of years ago the big garden on the street side of the privacy fence was a disaster. I couldn't get anything to germinate - not even flowers! It was extremely frustrating. How could I NOT be able to grow any flowers?! The things that did come up were celebrated one day and then a couple of days later I would find that they were eaten by a critter. Stupid deer. So the end of that garden season was very disappointing with few veggies to count as a success. Seriously...no flowers that year.

The following year we decided to run the chickens through the garden and let them "do the work." Hello permaculture. Last year's garden was FABULOUS! Most things were from seed. Those that I started in the hoop house a few weeks before transplanting. I was giddy! We tried new things and even the things that didn't do that great were minimal and I know to start certain things like the Three Sisters garden a little sooner than we did last year.

So, what is my beef this season? Well, my seed starting skills are not what they once were and I don't know why. By mid-March I had a few trays of seeds started, nothing terribly exotic. The success rate was mediocre at best. The things that did sprout were tomatoes. Which was great, but over the next couple of weeks some of the tomatoes started to wither. Which is fine, I always plant more just in case. I ended up with a dozen of pretty healthy seedlings which were transplanted into pots over the weekend:

Some of these looked a bit sad when I first transplanted them. I was hopeful that they would perk up and they did!

Here is an example of what didn't work:

Some of the seeds in this one came up, but I think that was somewhat accidental. The soil I used for these soil blocks wasn't ideal. It ended up being really heavy and solid blocks. Not awesome. I won't be picking up that soil mix again.

Another thing that I tried out for the first time ever was making little pots out of toilet paper tubes. I was getting tired of dumping something that could possibly be used somehow. After a search on Pinterest I found the post that led to this:

So they worked out pretty well. I think the key here was that fact that the soil wasn't totally packed into these little cups. These are Romanesco (left) and Kohlrabi (right). This part is the success part, we'll see what happens once they are transplanted into bigger pots or even straight into the ground.

Of the 5 trays that I prepared throughout the month of March only two were semi-successful. This morning I spent some time getting the cell packs out and ready for seeds. The one tray that didn't work included the free tomato seeds that were included in my order from Baker Creek Heirloom seeds and the Shishito peppers - a favorite and the really cool Royal Golden Watermelon. The other tray is all herbs and some squash.

In the transplants and the cell packs I used the cheapest potting soil I have ever seen and it seems so much better than the last stuff that we found at Lowe's. We are kind of experimenting here. We bought and planted three varieties of blueberry plants (one of each) into the yard bed along with the Olympian Fig that I got a couple of years ago. The blueberry plants along with the soil were from Walmart. I have never thought to buy garden supplies at WM - so this year will be interesting If all works out, I think I'll have to stock up on the soil. Anyway, we'll see how things turn out in the days to come.

I came to the conclusion that maybe soil blocks might be the better way to go for my fall crops. Which I will start by mid-summer. The hoop house get's a lot of heat, so I'll have to set up some trays in the garage so that they will have a little bit of a chance of surviving.

Growing a garden is my jam...it's what makes Farm Life the best!

Ever Get The Feeling...

that you might be the weird one? Not only are we the "weird" ones, we also live in a very unique situation.

When you think of homesteading or homesteaders what do you think of? Up until about four or five years ago I never had the thought of either homesteading or homesteaders or considered myself in those categories. Actually, I wouldn't have considered myself a farmer or think of us as living on a farm. In my mind I was growing a garden and it was mostly for fun, but we did enjoy plucking ripe tomatoes off the vine and harvesting some beans or whatever for a meal we would cook later. So, no, not a farmer - not even a little. Farmers have animals and big gardens and maybe even a tractor. What we have is a riding lawn mower...which usually requires the tires to be filled and the battery to be charged. In fact I didn't even know any farmers!

Until...

Tom discovered Justin Rhodes YouTube channel and he thought that what they were doing was pretty cool. It took me a little longer to see the value in those videos. After a few videos and Justin saying that he was the Permaculture Chicken Ninja (or something close) I got an idea.

You see, I've been wanting some chickens for a little while, but couldn't convince Mr. Tom that it would be a good thing. He was well aware of the amount of chickens my mom had accumulated during our time on the house in Fern Prairie. I assured him that I would not be that crazy - our house was the landmark for anyone giving directions to go somewhere, "Yeah, you know that house with all of the chickens?"

Anyway...

So, now we are watching this guy name Justin Rhodes who is living on a farm (homestead) with his family. They raise chickens and have cows and have a vegetable garden. We watched a lot of his videos and I was getting the bug...I could see chickens in our future. I don't know what happened, probably a lot of me saying "you know, we could get chickens" and still assuring him by saying,  "I won't be the crazy chicken lady, like my mom." The next season we started building a Justin Rhodes chick shaw, because I not so secretly found the plans on his website and presented them to Tom. I'm not that sneaky, but I do know what I want. After a few weeks we had 95% of the coop ready to go - we were waiting on something, but I don't remember what. It might have been the wheels. Anyway, while we waited on those, Tom built a brooder and we were off to Pioneer to pick up some chicks.

I'm pretty sure I had an idea of what I wanted for our first chickens which were Australorps, but Pioneer did not have them. What they did have were Jersey Giant chicks - they would have to do, since they were the only ones that were less than a week old at the time. Go HERE for that post. Since half of the chicks turned out to be little roos, we "had" to get some more chicks. Yeah, I'm still not a crazy chicken lady...

A search on craigslist and I connected with a woman who raises chicks on her farm in Woodland and the pullets would be closer to laying age AND she had Australorps. SCORE! We made arrangements and met her at the Safeway and completed the transaction like a drug deal going down in broad daylight...hehe...and we were on our way.

Thus was the beginning of our farm.

That season we added a gosling and duckling. Some people might just stop with chickens and waterfowl. Nope, not me...the following season which was last year, we added more chickens, pigs and more ducklings. We even grew our first batch of broiler chicks last year.

All of this would make sense for someone who might live out in the "country" someplace more rural at least. We live in a house on a piece of property that was once a farm many years ago. Our portion of the original farm is 2.71 acres. I'm unsure how much property made up the farm in the beginning. The fortunate thing for us is that we are just beyond the Urban Growth Area of Clark County and we are not bound to the rules of those who live within that area. In a way it feels like getting into this house/property was part of a greater plan.

Our home sits directly across the street from a newer subdivision of 15 or 16 cookie cutter homes. In more recent years we had been trying to figure out how to make this property more interesting and to connect to the world around us. More simply to our neighbors. Having neighbors is a fairly new thing for us as we have not had neighbors that we could actually observe from our front yard or from our living room at least.

Because these neighbors have witnessed the transformation of our property from a house on a couple of acres to a small farm. We truly are a spectacle. Anyone who walks to the mailbox at the corner across from our house can clearly see what is happening over here and will comment on it if we happen to be walking down their street.

The folks that live across the street are an interesting mix of retirees with grandchildren and families with young children. All with very different goals in life. Some are enjoying life without the daily grind of work and others just growing up their families as best they can.

We have connected with a couple of the families and have invited the kids across the street (along with Dad) to come observe/help with our last chicken harvest. One of the boys was a little traumatized at first and the other totally into helping - albeit brief. In time I hope that there might be just a little more interest - at least with the younger neighbors. An interest to learn exactly how their food is grown.

There is so much more to this story that I can't even begin to address in one blog post. Stay tuned and maybe learn a little more of what drives us. It's all very exciting for me...the reluctant homesteader.

Farm Life...it really is the BEST!