Our First Hatch

You guys. We hatched our very first set of chicks via an incubator! And the moms and dad were from OUR farm which to me makes it even more special. I know, I know, I'm probably overly excited about this but I don't care. We've had a broody hatch out a single chick and that was pretty fun but this is so different. To be so involved in the process was absolutely fascinating. Waiting and waiting was such torture but Sunday evening when I went in to check on the temps in the incubator and saw that first little pip made it SO worth it. I can't even put into words how excited I was. I could have stayed up all night staring at the incubator. I'd read that it can take anywhere from one hour to twenty four hours for a chick to fully hatch out so reluctantly I went on to bed.

Look what was waiting for me when I woke up the next morning!

My goal was to produce wee little Olive Egger chicks. In the incubator I set one blue egg from this lady, my EE Hazel.

And six green eggs from my two Olive Egger girls, Nutmeg and Esmé.

Esmés egg is on the left, and Nutmegs is on the right. 

And here's the proud papa. Handsome, eh?

Our first generation Olive Egger, Dandelion. She definitely takes after her beautiful mama. I just can't get over how pretty she is!

 Basil, the first to hatch and one of four second generation Olive Eggers.

The whole gang freshly hatched and mostly fluffed out. Absolute perfection.

I'm ALREADY collecting eggs for another hatch. This incubator thing is addictive!

Catching Up

Hey there! I've been away for a while and thought I'd catch you guys up on what's going on with the farm. 

We moved! While our farm in Missouri was absolutely beautiful, it was far away from our family and friends. It was certainly an adventure but we realized where we needed to be. So we bought a new place just outside of our hometown, packed up the animals and headed West! We haven't put our old place on the market yet but we'll eventually get around to it. We're slackers. 

We had to rush like crazy to get all the fencing put in for the dogs, goats, and chickens. We had a two day window to do so and we were pooped at the end of it all. 

They were pretty pleased with their new digs. The chickens immediately went to work eating, and the goats destroying everything they could. They're helpful like that.

We lost about half of our flock in Missouri to foxes and coyotes. So right away we got to work replenishing. We found a nearby breeder and picked up pretty much my 'what dreams are made of' wishlist of chickens: two Welsummers, one French Black Copper Marans, one French Blue Copper Marans, one Lavender Orpington, one black Ameracauna, and this fabulous little girl, a Chocolate Orpington bantam whom we lovingly named Truffle. She does the best 'Truffle Shuffle' in all the land. She may be small but she ain't skerd of nuthin'!

The cats took over the house.

I decided I wanted an incubator. I planned on just getting a small inexpensive one to hatch out a few chicks here and there. Turns out, all the small inexpensive ones are pretty much crap. Ultimately I splurged on the Brinsea Mini Advance because during my research I never found a negative review of it. Twelve days to go until hatch day. The anticipation is KILLING ME. In it are three speckled olive eggs from my girls Esme, three green eggs from Nutmeg, and one pretty blue egg from Hazel, one of our Easter Eggers. This picture doesn't do the color of the eggs justice, they're really a sight to behold. The father is a Black Copper Marans. The offspring should lay some totally gorgeous eggs.

Here's one of Esmes eggs sans bloom. See? Told ya they were pretty!

We got chicks! I ordered various breeds from a hatchery back in November and had been counting down the days until their arrival. This is by far my friendliest batch of chicks. 

Marmalade would roost on me all day long if I let her. 

Cherry and I started a six gallon batch of mead. I haven't made wine in eons, and I don't really know why. It's so much fun to make, and especially drink!

Up until a week ago this has been a very mild winter. Most days hovered around 40 degrees F. So naturally I got the gardening bug, ordered seeds, and excitedly began planning it.

I started my seeds on time, and was just sure Spring was around the corner. I can deal with winter if it's like this!

Then it happened. Snow. Negative temperatures. And the forecast for the next ten days isn't looking so great. It's as if winter decided to cram four months of winter into a two week period. Bitch.

But hey, I guess as long as I'm pulling these beauties out of the nesting box everyday, I'll be a happy girl. Spring will shove winter out of the limelight soon enough.

Farm Update

It's been a while since I've posted. I haven't posted much in general in the last few months. Forgive me, it's a busy time of year, ya know. There are way more chores, and work to be done now that the weather is nice. I love it! I can say with utmost certainty that farm livin' is the life for me. 

Marmalade, out and about on the farm, looking for an afternoon snack.

Speaking of chickens (as always), the weekend before last, we gave the coop a fresh coat of paint. Random tip for anyone out there considering the same: get a paint sprayer! Something that would have taken us two days to do, took my husband twenty minutes. And it was HOT that day, so we were happy to get it done quickly.

Afterward, we cooled off by taking a dip in the pond. I'm not gonna lie, it took my husband a good twenty minutes of coaxing to get me to step foot in the water, and an additional twenty to get waste deep. The water felt so good on that hot day, but I'm a little more than freaked out by the thought of water snakes, and snapping turtles. Really though, can you blame me!?

 Our little girls are out free-ranging in the big world now. Two months old, and growing!

We have several Easter Eggers, and Olive Eggers, but I just couldn't wait another two months to get a blue egg. I'm impatient, okay? So I found a woman that had six pullets for sale (two blue egg layers in the mix). Though Priscilla here (a Silver Laced Wyandotte) lays a brown egg, she's pretty and very inquisitive; so she came home with me, too.

Whilst mowing the lawn back by the chicken coop one day last week, I spotted a very large bed of asparagus. Then quickly squealed with delight like a little girl. I love, love, love asparagus. It takes so long to establish, and with all the other stuff going on, I just didn't mess with planting any this year. This was a wonderful and tasty surprise that we enjoyed for dinner that night.

My fifty foot row of yard long beans have sprouted.

I planted a fifty foot row of three different types of cucumbers. I'm especially excited for the Mexican Sour Gherkins.

Three fifty foot rows of tomatoes went in a couple weeks ago. Seventy-two tomato plants in total. Can you say mega-super-ultra canning fun this summer?

This morning I spotted the first tomato bloom. Ripe, juicy, garden fresh heirloom tomatoes; need I say more?

 The garden so far. Right now it just looks like a somewhat tilled patch of dirt, but I promise there are plants in there! This weekend we'll be expanding the garden to make room for pumpkins, watermelon, and winter squash.

The fruit trees have long since lost their blooms, and now have tiny fruit. Peaches are one of my favorite fruits to preserve. Luckily it appears our peach tree will give us a good harvest this summer.

Good thing I make wine, otherwise I don't know what I'd do with all of the grapes we're going to get. I'm gonna be a wine making (and drinking) fool. You won't hear me complaining! You may not hear me at all; I may be off by myself, tipsy, and happily rolling around in the grass.

"Can I have some of those grapes you were talking about?" Broomhilda, you have something on your, uh... never mind.

And finally, my favorite chore of the day: collecting fresh, beautiful eggs. It just doesn't get any better than farm life, folks.

Farm In Bloom

Last week I moved the ducks down to the pond. And they haven't left. Seriously, they are refusing to go back to the coop. I didn't have much time to spend with them while they were 'growing up' (they're two months old now, and pretty much fully grown, its insane), so they aren't the tamest of creatures. I mean, they know I'm the woman that brings them food, but they're not tripping over themselves to snuggle in my lap. Which isn't a biggie, I enjoy having ducks on the pond so we'll always have a handful, but I doubt we'll be raising a ton of them over the years. If they start gettin' busy makin' babies (fingers crossed!), we've talked about processing ducks for meat in the future. But lets not talk about all that business... instead, look at how majestic they look floating on the pond! And who can blame them for not wanting to leave? They have a peaceful little pond all to themselves, complete with a mountain view. Lucky ducks.

Fishies! Feed them, and they will come. They remind me of the dogs when they hear me open something up that has a wrapper. We have several large catfish in here as well. I actually had to pull a frighteningly large, dead one out of the pond last week. My guess is that he froze during the winter, and died. He was pretty decomposed. Smelled great.

Our fruit trees are blooming. It seems that the whole farm is blooming really. Things are coming to life, and its just gorgeous. Nature leaves me in awe every spring. Each seemingly more beautiful than the last. I was going to add to our little orchard this spring, but I'm gonna wait and see what we have first. Based on the shape of the tree, and the pink bloom, I think this first one is a cherry tree. Fingers crossed!

I discovered a random patch of rhubarb in the yard. Its in the strangest place too, back by the chicken coop. I know nothing about growing rhubarb, so my plan is to just check on it every once in a while and hope for the best. Strawberry rhubarb jam, perhaps?

Hope you laid a pretty egg for me today Clover.
Clover: "So you're the egg thief!? How dare you!"

The little ones are ten weeks old now. They're getting so big, and sassy.

My pride and joy: my tomato plants. After a few years of unsuccessful attempts at growing plants from seed, this year I finally got it right. And you know what the secret is? Fluorescent lamps. If you live in a colder climate in which you have to start seeds indoors in late February/Early March, you must have grow lights to have strong, healthy plants. I fought it for so long because I didn't want to spend the money, but boy, oh boy was it worth it. I just moved them out to the greenhouse yesterday because the temps have been in the high fifteens/low sixties. These twenty beauties, and their fifty-two tomato sisters will be going in the ground in two weeks, and need to be slowly hardened off to the outdoors.

Thank sweet baby jesus, my peas are finally coming up. Three weeks ago I planted a packet each of snow peas, sugar snap peas, and shell peas in the ground. The next day it snowed. The weather went from sunny, mid sixties, to overcast and mid forties for the following week and a half. So I was quite annoyed, and worried my little peas would rot in the ground. This row of sprouting peas I found over the weekend was a sight for sore eyes. I'm relieved!

I've never been much of a flower kinda girl, but apparently the folks who used to live here really enjoyed them. We have daffodils, hyacinth, and rose bushes all over the yard. They're quite beautiful, they smell heavenly, and just might convert me over to the flower loving dark side. I'm dying to see what other surprises are waiting to spring up all over our property. I'm crossing my fingers for some honeysuckle, elderberry, and wild blackberry bushes. I hear wild wines calling my name.

Fear the Chicken

I am Daisy, the giant Barred Rock. Fear me, tiny human!

Wait, is my microphone on?