Recent Happenings ...

After recovering from the flu, life around the B house has been ... um, ... anything but routine.  We unfortunately continue to be be plagued with automobile trouble.  Last Friday, the children and I sat in a dealership waiting room for 3 hours while our vehicle was once again repaired for the SAME EXACT problem we experienced on our trip to Great Falls.  Yesterday, as we drove home from OG's music lesson the EXACT SAME issues began with our vehicle again.  OH! how I miss my Texas mechanic!   ... And it gets worse ...Can you believe that after "limping" home in our troubled vehicle I heard a hissing as I got out to open the garage door?  Can you imagine my frustration as I leaned down to see a small piece of metal sticking out of my tire?  By the way, my tires are NEW - they have less than 3,000 miles on them.

 Here's what my tire currently looks like ... AAA is on the way change it for me & I have scheduled another appointment for repairs to the engine.

On a brighter note, we once again have chickens!  Here they are, 7 weeks old.  They are currently housed in a temporary shelter as our "plan A" for chicken housing did not work out.  Grandpa and I will be spending the next few weekends building a new hen house and coop.

Here's a photo of EJ with one of our new young chickens.  Since he and OG used to complain about caring for the chickens we had in Texas, I have been pleasantly surprised at how happy and excited he is to have another flock.  Can you believe he's been feeding and watering them each morning and evening without being reminded?

The Wages of Sin is Death

Even after numerous warnings, James continued to "attack" and spur, even drawing blood on several occasions, Mr. B, all our children, several friends and our neighbors. As time passed James became more and more aggressive. Leading me to suggest that Mr. B needed to "pass judgement" upon him. Yesterday evening, James attempted to "attack" me when I entered the coop at feeding time. Consequently, I took it upon myself to "pass judgment".

Since Mr. B was not home, Dad was gracious enough to clean James up and get him ready for the crock pot.

I added a few seasonings, some onion, carrot and celery, and a good amount of water. Set the temperature to high and before bed turned it down to low.

This morning, James had yielded 5 c. deboned chicken and 2 qt. broth.

I was concerned that the girls had been traumatized by witnessing the public execution of James. However, judging from today's egg production, they are in agreement with the sentencing.

Accidental Home Educator, Continued

Amimal Husbandry - The Hen House (science and active living history) Anyone who has livestock knows that keeping their housing clean is an important aspect of maintaining healthy animals and food products. This is a task we perform on a regular basis.

Last week, EJ eagerly helped me clean the hen house. He removed the soiled hay from the lower nesting boxes and helped me rake and shovel it into our wheelbarrow, which was then dumped into the compost bins. After a couple months of rain and turning, this animal bedding and waste will become excellent fertilizer for our garden.

One of our Henny Penny's calling her roommates to come see the clean fresh hay.

EJ was a big helper and I think he performed an outstanding job filling the nesting boxes with fresh hay. OG cleaned out the feeders and filled them with fresh feed.

Accidental Home Educator, Continued

BOTANY in the Garden (science & active living history)We harvested nearly 5lb. of spinach last week. Note: If your spinach begins to wilt in the hot sun before getting it into the house, don't fret. Fill your kitchen sink with cold water, plunge the spinach into the cold water, agitate, remove to a colander to drain. I then remove the excess water by spinning the spinach leaves in a salad spinner. Finally, I place the spinach in a Debbie Myers Green Bag, along with a folded paper towel, squeeze out the excess air, close with a twist tie and refrigerate. Within a couple hours I have crisp, crunchy fresh spinach.

It looks like it's time to harvest and dry some garlic chives and oregano.

A photo of our spinach and lettuce patch. When I harvest spinach and lettuce, I do not pull the plants out of the ground. Instead, I use a pair of scissors and cut the leaves, leaving the base of the plant. My spinach and lettuce then grow new leaves and I again, have fresh salad green within a couple weeks.

Our green beans are coming along nicely. These are Mr. B's favorite.

Our yellow squash and zucchini are looking good. I pray they continue doing well. The last couple years I've lost all varieties of squash right before the first harvest.

The Chicks Are Here!!

The post office phoned at 7:15 this morning to tell us the chicks had arrived. Around here new chicks are always exciting and absolutely CUTE!

Chickens are one of the easiest farm animals to care for. When we are expecting a new arrival of chicks we always get our "chick pen" ready a couple days before they are scheduled to arrive. We plan ahead so we can make sure we have everything needed to care for them. We certainly don't want to loose any because we were ill prepared. If you are interested in raising some chicks, here's how we do it.

1. We grow our chicks in an old rabbit cage that we elevate on two saw horses. We place it in the "grower" pen attached to the barn. Our grower pen is a fully enclosed coop that has a roof, walls on two sides and chicken wire on two sides. It is where we raise our broilers. We either have broilers OR chicks in there - never both. We place the chicks cage in the corner where the two solid walls meet. This helps protect them from colder winds in the spring and/or blowing rain during thunder storms. A cold or wet chick equals a dead chick. Also, elevating the chick pen on saw horses and placing it in an enclosed area provides additional protection from opossums, raccoons and snakes.
2. We line the rabbit cage with excelsior pads. As you can see from the photo, the excelsior pads are made from a textured material. These pads provide the chicks with stable footing. Never use newspaper to line a chick's cage, box or other container. The newspaper is too slick and will promote "sprawl leg", a fatal condition.
3. If you look closely, you will be able to see a pink tint on the excelsior pads near the yellow waterers. This tint is caused by a red heat lamp. When the chicks are young they have difficulty maintaining their body heat. We hang the heat lamp above the cage so the chicks can gather under it to stay warm. If they get too warm they will move to the other end of the cage where it is cooler. Notice that we also keep the waterers and feed near the heat lamp. This encourages the chicks to stay where it is warm.
4. We use two quart size mason jar waterers for our chicks and we prefer the covered chick feeders as the feed will stay cleaner. We also add a poultry trace mineral feed supplement to our chicks' water - it's like a vitamin. Remember to dunk every chick's beak in water as soon as your chicks arrive to teach them to drink water. We feed our chicks starter ration for the first 4-6 weeks. Over the course of a week we then begin mixing in grower ration until the feed is fully converted. They will eat grower feed until they are 20-24 weeks old. The pullets' feed is then converted to lay ration.
5. It is very important to keep the chick's water and feed clean. We will change their water 3-4 times per day. To help prevent waste we only fill the feeders half way. We also replenish the feed 3-4 times per day. Chicks need a constant source of food and water. We never allow our chicks' feeder or waterer to become empty.
6. This time around we ordered only pullets. When they grow too large for the rabbit cage we will line an area of the "grower" pen with hay and they will live in there until they are 20-22 weeks. We will then begin introducing them into the older flock. We will know the difference between the younger and older chickens because our older chickens are barred rocks and our new chicks are black austalorps.
7. Next summer our barred rocks will be two years old. Their egg production will have peeked and they will begin laying considerably less than they do today. When that happens, they are too expensive to keep, as feed is about 2/3 the cost of raising chickens.

Everyone has his own way of raising and caring for livestock. If you ever decided to raise chicks, it is most important to provide them with clean water, feed, bedding (never cedar), and a heat source. Our chickens have been a great source of fun and an educational tool for our children. Nothing beats a fresh yard egg for breakfast!

Feeding the "Girls"

Pictured at the right are a couple of the "girls". For quite a while we've worked out what we thought was a pretty good deal with them. They give us eggs in exchange for feed, water and a little house lined with hay. However, recently, the increased cost of their feed had caused me to wonder who was actually getting the better deal. We'd always kept them in a large enclosed coop because we worried Alice, our barking guardian, would try to eat them - like she used to do with the rabbits. However, a couple months ago one of the children left the coop door open, by accident. The girls saw their chance at new adventure and boy oh boy did they take it! After a bit of sniffing and a few minutes of chasing, Alice decided a few yard companions would suit her. Now, every morning we let them out into the yard. Since they now have lots of grass (yes, chickens eat grass), and more of a variety of bugs to scratch up, their feed consumption has been reduced by about half. Since they were raised in the hen house and coop they automatically go back into the hen house to lay eggs. In the evening I carry a bucket of kitchen scraps out to the coop and call them in for the night - they all come running. With more room to roam and a larger variety of bugs, the girls are definitely happier. With the feed bill reduced, I am again confident that we've struck a pretty good bargain with them.