FINALLY...

tired of the stinkin' stupid rain.

You'll remember from my week off -

Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, Day 4, Day 5

Last week was a whole lot of rain with major downpours a few days even.

This past Saturday was decent - until the evening and it started up again. The good thing is that we were  at a charity event and having a lot of fun while the rain came down. Then Sunday was fairly decent again with only spits here and there.

On Friday evening, the little ladies were taken on a field trip and got to go out on grass for the first time! It took a minute or so, they weren't sure what exactly they should do. After awhile they figured out that it was warm and they started to forage in the grass...you know, act like chickens. One even found an itty-bitty slug and commenced to run around in their very cramped enclosure. She finally decided to settle down and gulp down her prize. The others were still getting used to the great outdoors and one figured out that being outside meant more than just Chick Starter food.

They were treated to a second trip after church on Sunday. There are no photos, but their enclosure was a little more roomy. I thought why not use the corner posts from the Electric Poultry fence kit for now. So this fence material was zip-tied to the posts at the opening and the bin that we used to transport them was a safe place/block for the open side. While they enjoyed their little trip out and we had to bring out...

The baby duck and baby goose. Yeah, we came home with a couple more birds for the brood. These little ones were 3 days old on Saturday when we brought them home. In all the time that we (my family) had all the chickens, ducks, geese and other winged creatures, I do not remember ducklings or goslings. I'm guessing that we had broody ducks and geese...who  knows? I think there were little ducklings running around the property...how else would we get more?! Anyway - I promptly forgot what breeds we went away with. I want to say that the goose is an Embden, maybe. The duckling? Unsure. Maybe if we find ourselves out at Wilco again I'll see if they still have some of these little guys.

The goose is very sweet and very needy. As of today they are both 6 days old and still very much babies. I have to keep reminding myself of that. They don't have a momma to help them get food or to keep them warm, so we have  to do our best to keep them fed and watered and happy. Boy do they cry A LOT! The moment they lay eyes on us it's time for them to start talking! So we do what needs to be done and then pick them up and give them some attention and a little bit of time out of the box. They will be stuck in the box until they get too big for it and we have to get a bigger bin or until the Jersey's are big enough to get out of the brooder. However, I have a feeling that they will grow faster. Which would be okay, because as soon as they are able to defend themselves better we'll introduce them to the flock and they will need to start living together with some understanding that they both belong.

This coat has a duck pocket!

Another thing that will most likely happen within this week is the addition of some older pullets. We made a trip to Thrifty Feed yesterday to take a look at which breeds they had and about how old they are. I had my eye on the Cuckoo Maran chicks a couple of weeks ago and the fortunate thing is that they still have quite a few in the brooder. YAY!

I found out that these little ladies were delivered to the feed store on March 24th. So they are supposedly all pretty healthy and active. The question now is how many and where do we house them?

Since the Chicken Mobile is essentially finished they could live in there - and I'm thinking that 5 or 6 would be a good start for the egg layers. The reality might be different, but a girl can hope right? However many we end up with will have super deluxe accommodations for sure since the Chicken RV is 6 X 6 and will seat many chickens comfortably as well as the goose and the duck :)

Soooo, the weather forecast for later this week is predicted to be in the 80s. Okay, that's just not right. Why can't we ease into the heat? We are thinking that the weather is just a tease and that it will be back in the high 40s and 50s for a little while longer. Summer will arrive and last precisely one week.

Wouldn't that be awesome? (she said with a sarcastic tone)

It's Friday!

My favorite day of the week, especially when I take a vacation day and the sun is shining! What a nice day...best day all week!

First mission for the day was a trip to Wilco to buy some cat food for Mr. Decaf. However, the moment we walked into the store we could hear the peeping in the middle of the store!! Live poultry!! A shipment of new chicks were delivered this morning and they had several different breeds in the troughs. Since we already got our chicks on Monday we just took a look at the new peepers which included Wyandottes, Marans, Cochins...and gosling and  ducklings!

The point was to get the food, but I can never pass up looking at these little dudes when we visit during the spring.

They had Pomeranian goslings a couple of varieties - the one that we wanted were not available, all were already spoken for. So we went with the other. Yeah, I don't remember the names, but I'll get that later. The woman mentioned that there really needs to be a buddy other than a chicken for the goose and they said that a duck would be fine. They both will co-exist with the chickens so that will work out.

So yeah, we ended up putting a gosling and a duckling on hold. They'll call the hatchery to figure out which are males which is what we want. Hopefully they will have the information before the weekend is over.

The Premier 1 poultry fence kit was due for delivery today and it took all day long for it to arrive. Our UPS driver used to deliver to the Fire Station, so it was nice to see Jeff drive in after dinner. He was curious about what we were doing so I showed him the babies...he thought he would have chicken for dinner, but after seeing them...he decided maybe not...Hahaha!

The boxes waiting to be opened! I've seen that most of our favorite homesteading people on YouTube use this fence, so it must be good, right? We'll see how the energizer gets put together and report back later.

So yeah, this homestead thing is starting to take shape. Tom will be off to do some work tomorrow and my big project for the day will be to get the garage all cleaned up after the construction of the chicken condo. There is always something that needs to be done!

One more chickie pic before I sign off...

Free!

The one thing that comes up time and time again while I'm watching all of my favorite homesteading people is wood chips used for mulch. Free wood chips no less. I thought that we would continue on with our hobby farm without a wood chip ever being incorporated into our garden beds.

Well...that all changed this week!

While watching Justin Rhodes & family visit Honey Tree Homestead their host, Casey, mentioned Chip Drop. When we were first watching the vlog I wasn't really paying attention. However, after another looky-loo it hit me that maybe this is a national type thing. Did a quick Google search and  found the website and last Saturday. I created an account and requested a load of chips to be dropped off and didn't think much more of it until I got an email YESTERDAY which said that there would be a drop made within 48 hours.

Whaaaat?!

This is what we came home to yesterday afternoon

That was seriously cool! Made my day!

How does it work? Go to www.chipdrop.in create an account and follow the instructions to get on the list to get your load of wood chips. There are some options to choose from as this is a service that helps tree service companies and arborists (where my chips came from). You'll indicate if you prefer just woodchips or loads that contain "logs" which look like thin round cuts of logs or just logs. You can also pay for a delivery if you want to get a load sooner than later. We didn't pay and got a delivery within a week, so if you just gotta have it now go ahead and pay. According to the website the majority of people get their chips for free.There is a space to explain where you would like the delivery dumped. Which is great because the delivery could happen while you are away. Which was the case for us.

This load looks so good! We haven't dug into it, so we don't know what treasures might be inside the pile. I'll take it though...didn't cost us any money. Just a few minutes on the computer and a short wait.

Now...if the weather would just cooperate, we could get the garden all lined out and ready for planting.

The Little Ladies

This is the chickies third day with us and it seems like they have grown a lot in the last couple of days. I don't know if they grow THAT quick....

They do a lot of this though...

They all settled down into their huddle and as I watched the one on top did a big ol' stretch and just settled in with wings and legs stretched out. Seriously cute stuff here!

The other thing that I tried out was to switch their feeder option.

When I arrived home last night I noticed that the aluminum tray was almost empty. I guess they enjoy the pan more than the special feeder. Even after I cleaned out the bedding and added more of their feed to the long feeder the little ones still went for the aluminum tray that I had originally had thrown grit into. Except yesterday morning I added some of their food, which they cleaned up! Well, I can only assume that they ate it...while watching them last night I noticed that one of them is a scratcher! So she was happily kicking food all over the place. Now they have two trays and no feeder and as of this morning they have accepted both as their feeders.

These are a little easier to get their bedding and droppings out of so I don't  mind so much, plus the long feeder was just a pain to deal with. I never could just really pop it open that easily. If only all of our problems were this easy to solve - and this was a non-problem.

I'm lovin' these little chickies though...one day we might be able to catch them and maybe hold them so that they will know that we aren't that scary!

Jersey Giant Fact Of The Day

According to the National Jersey Giant Club:

What Color Are They?

Black, Blue  and White are the colors recognized by the American Poultry Association. Splash colored Giants are usually a byproduct of breeding the Blue variety, though Splash should also breed true as a separate variety.

It really is quite early to tell, but I am so happy with this addition to what will be our Modern Homestead. I don't want to say that we are experimenting with these little chickies, because if things don't turn out that's a little costly with the feed and all that is attached to raising up these chicks to be healthy adult chickens. However, now that we have successfully planted and grew a Fall/Winter garden in addition to the regular growing season, added chickies for eggs (eventually) and later on we'll get some "meat" birds to fill the freezer. We'll be on our way to being more self-sufficient (with a lot of our food).

Think Big

Dream Big

Believe Big

and the results

will be Big