Quack

Well when Patrick came home yesterday he had 2 little friends with him, so now we have 2 ducklings. Aren't they sweet. they were very cuddly last night sitting in my lap in the back yard.

New Babes

Well this year I tried to get all girls. Like I said before I don't like that we have more boys than girls now, and the whole reason we are doing this is for the eggs anyway.

I found a couple different pictures about it that I used to figure it out. Hopefully I did it right. I guess only time will tell.

We got 8 new chickens.

They are all breeds that we don't already have.

We got 2 Cochin Bantams they have feathers on their legs, which is neat, they are different from all the rest of our Chickens.

2 Barred Plymouth Rocks which are going to look really cool when they get big.

We also got 4 Americanas (they lay Blue eggs)

I am excited about our new additions!

Brooder

Well last year we started a little late in the summer before we got chickens and that made it a little hard. We had issues with preditors and with the weather. We are wanting to get some more girls his year and we are going to start earlier so that he babes will be fatter when the weather turns cold again. Our roosters out number our hens at the moment and we want to get our numbers back the other way.

Our latest project is to make a brooder. Last year we used mineral buckets and then When they got big enough he would fly out and make us chase them around the house while the pooped everywhere.

We are being smarter this year now that we have experience. 

It's such an improvement!

EGGS!!!

Spring is just around the corner! Atleast that's what I keep telling myself, the weather has been crazy a around here. We go back and forth between negative temperatures and 60 degree weather. 

We'll on one of our pretty days last week one of our lovely ladies decided to do something new. TaDa we have eggs. 

I think it's funny some times she lays for almost a week straight and then she won't, hopefully the cold will be over soon and the other ladies will start to lay as well.  We have gotten 7 eggs so far and it is a new and exciting time at the homestead. 

A New Year and a Bigger and Better Garden

So. I am not one who typically makes New Years Resolutions, but I've been thinking that I want to be better at gardening especially since I really want it to be a good source of food for us. So why not make it my New Years Resolution, to become a better gardener?

When it started getting colder and our garden from last year was ending I started to make a list of vegetables that I wanted to plant this year. Here is what I came up with:

Carrots

Green beans

Okra

Tomatoes

Peppers

Cucumber 

Strawberry

Spinach

Watermelon

Cantaloupe 

Pumpkins

Corn

Potatoes

Peas

Rosemary

Dill

Parsley

Chives

Onion

Artichoke

Garlic

We grew some of these last year. some with more success than others and the ones that we had good success with we didn't have very many plants to harvest from. So this year we need to determine how much of each vegetable that we should plant.

So far we have started Spinach, Sweet Peppers, Hot Peppers, Carrots and Tomatoes

This is a spinach seed over 3 days.

buying one of these trays and some seed packets is so much cheaper than buying plants that are already started in the spring.

Here's to a happy healthy garden!

Food Preservation

So as you guys know we have been working on preserving foods. We have been dabbling in canning. 

and Dehydration.

Well for Christmas we got a vacuum sealer. I am ready to kiss freezer burn good bye. :-*

 We also got our deep freeze moved over from the old house and set up.

I cant wait to fill 'er up! The freezer in our kitchen was so full that if you shut the fridge too hard the freezer door would pop open. I moved all the stuff we don't need in there out. There is so much room I can even have ice again! The freezer has been to full since Patrick brought home the deer.

Cold Weather

I have never hated cold weather and snow so much in my life as I do now that we have chickens. Don't get me wrong I think it's pretty and I like snow days but...

I love in the summer when you can let the chickens out and I can watch them from the Kitchen window and all of the happy clucking and pecking. However I do NOT like going outside in negative deg weather to let them out / feed them. 

Even though they can leave their coop they don't and they don't like the weather anymore than I do. Cold winds, Frozen water, snow = cold chicken feet. Nope I don't think any of us are happy about this.

I have never been so happy for mid 30 degree weather in my life. We have even gotten some 50's and 60's the last few days we are not going to be happy when this ends :(

Is it Spring yet?