Pending Abundance

Summer isn't technically here yet, but the garden is getting ready to explode. Two days ago, I was weeding around the tomato plants, and I saw this:

I was excited, because I've been looking forward to eating fresh tomatoes since I planted these seeds back in late January. Today, I got home from sumer school with one thought in mind - BLT's for lunch! I picked the 3 that were most ripe, and there were 4 more that will be good in a couple of days. A quick look around the tomato plants show that this is just the tip of the iceberg.

My blackberry plants that I put in 2 years ago are loaded with berries that are just now starting to ripen.

This is Das Cluckhaus 2. It is currently housing the 10 chicks that came from 2 different kindergarten classes this Spring. The 4 older ones are 7 weeks old, and the younger 6 are just over a month. I plan on butchering all of them (assuming the roosters don't get too noisy before that point). I've read that they should be good to go at 3-4 months of age, so that puts D-day sometime in early September. Good thing I don't have anything else going on that time of year...oh, wait.....

Hatch day update

Today is the official hatch day for the eggs that Tater Tot's class were incubating. Renee called this morning to let me know that when she dropped Tater off, 5 of the chicks had hatched, and 2-3 more looked like they were in the process. So this Friday, we'll be getting another shipment of up to 8 more chicks. It's a good thing that the earlier batch were moved out to Cluckhaus 2 yesterday. It's an A-frame tractor style coop that should serve as a good transition home for the new chooks. Once I get the roof shingled this afternoon, I'll post some pictures.

New Arrivals

Tater and Erik smile for the camera, while Alex tries to put a voodoo hex on the chicks.

Right about 1 year ago, we got a delivery of 10 chicks from the kindergarten class at my children's school. 5 of those (4 hens and Brown Spot, a rooster with permanent laryngitis) are currently hiding from the soggy weather in the chicken coop out back. Well, a friend of the kindergarten teacher decided to hatch chicks for her class, and about a week ago they moved over to the 'Burbstead. The kids were all very excited to get more chickens. I had to explain to them that we weren't going to be keeping all, if any, of them. Our current flock lays more then enough eggs for our family. Besides that, at least a couple of them are going to be roosters who will no doubt be noisier than Erik's beloved Brown Spot. We'll have to wait and see how many boys and girls we get before we make any plans. We also have to wait for...Tater Tot's class eggs.

Tater is in kindergarten at the same school that Alex and Erik go to, and the teacher is once again hatching a dozen eggs. The estimated hatch day is April 30. So in about 2 weeks, we'll have a whole bunch more chicks. Hmmm, I smell a mid-Summer butcher day coming...

The latest 'Burbstead additions warming up under the lamp

Incubatin'

Last week one of our hens, Scratchy, died. I knew something was up with her the day before, when she hadn't come bounding out of the coop as I opened the door. Rather, she quietly hung out in the chicken run drinking water and occasionally pecking at the food. This was the first I'd noticed anything being amiss with her, and by the next day she was dead. That same day, the kids noticed that one of the white chickens we had raised from the batch of chicks this past Spring had hidden a few eggs in the leaves under our wood rack. In light of Scratchy's passing, they asked if we could try to hatch a new baby chick. Having looked into the matter previously, I was a bit dubious about our prospects for two reasons:

1. Incubating eggs is surprisingly tricky, and seemed best done by either a store bought incubator or a live chicken.

2. Brown Spot, our rooster, is so hen pecked - both by actual hens and our well intentioned children - that I doubt he has actually gotten his groove on enough fertilize many eggs.

Nevertheless, it seemed like a fun project to do with the kids on a day off school. We built the incubator completely out of materials that were laying around the house. The only thing we had to purchase was a 25 watt light bulb. Everything was put together, and in went the 3 eggs. We counted out the 21 days it should take for them to grow, and as luck would have it, the prospective hatch day is the boys' 8th birthday. Will anything come of this? I hope so, but I'm not going to hold my breath.

A productive weekend

The high temperature for this past Thursday, Friday, and Saturday all reached triple digits and set local records. A cold front came in Saturday evening, and dropped temps by nearly 30 degrees. The weather yesterday and today was gorgeous, sunny and mid-70's. The nice weather and holiday gave me a chance to get outside and bang away on the hoop house. I now have all but the back wall framed in. It's pretty cool to see it so close to finished. The next step is to prepare the beds and start planting. September 21st is less than 3 weeks away, and I need to get cracking. The rest of the garden looks like shit, and is likely going to get a serious haircut in the near future.

I was also pleasantly surprised to find 4 little pullet eggs in the coop on Thursday, and I've since found 2 more. If Scratchy and Carmella don't start laying eggs soon, I'm seriously thinking about lining them up when Brown Spot bites it here in a few weeks. Having 4 layers ought to be sufficient, and if not, I suppose I could always buy a couple more chickens that, you know, lay eggs. Just a thought.

July 2011 Update

July is nearly over, I need to finish my art supply orders, and next week I have faculty meetings…school is right around the corner. Gak! Where did summer go? I’m about a month past due for a mid-year check up on my goals for the ‘Burbstead, so let’s see how things are progressing.

1. Egg Patch: The turnips failed to germinate. The carrots, while producing lovely tops, have only managed to make roots the size of my pinky finger (and they’re supposed to be 6-8” long). They taste good, but they aren’t going to feed many chickens. The okra is up and doing nicely, so I should wind up with a good bit if seed. I planted Bloody Butcher and Hopi Blue field corn. The Blue is for seed, since I only had a small handful to begin with. Any of the Bloody Butcher that produces ears will go to the chooks. This fall, I’m going to have another go at turnips and beets. I’m also going to try growing the Dinosaur kale that Autonomy Acres recommended. I may have had some bad luck early in the Spring, but I need to do better. Grade: C-

2. Season Extension: The peas, lettuce, and radishes that were planted under cover came in really well and way ahead of last year. I transplanted a bunch of Silvery Fir Tree and Amish paste tomatoes under a tunnel in April. The SFT’s are going strong, and they’re a couple weeks ahead of last year as well. As for the hoop house, I knocked together the base back in the Spring, and I found another trampoline frame. I have the hardware sitting in my car, and I dug up some lumber that will work for runners. I need to assemble the frame here in the next couple of weeks before school and football really get into full swing. Grade: A-

3. Growing more herbs: I wound up deciding against putting an herb spiral into the garden, but I used some pots that were laying around to make an impromptu herb garden on a patio table. I planted Sage, Thyme, Basil, Cilantro, and Mint. It was looking pretty good…until we went to Branson for 5 days. The temperatures were in the mid – upper 90’s the whole time we were gone with no rain. When we got back, most of the plants were fried to a crisp. I should have gotten some of those little water globe things they advertise on tv. The Sage is still good, some of the Thyme is straggling by, and one of the Basil plants is still green-ish. Hopefully they will bounce back with plenty of H2O. I also have dill and cilantro sprinkled throughout the garden. That’s doing good. Grade: B

Herbs before

Herbs after

4. Documenting my harvest: In the past I’ve done a fair job keeping track of planting and harvest times and other garden notes. I wanted to do that, plus keep more specific track of how much food I was actually growing. Then, sometime in early May, I lost my garden notebook. Rather than making a new one, I just stopped doing it all together. Shame on me for being a lazy bastard. Grade: F

5. Front yard gardening: My efforts in the front yard this year have been largely experimental, but I think they’ll set the stage for more robust planting in the future. I planted a couple of rows of kidney beans along the front of our side yard fence. Next to the driveway, I planted corn, amaranth, lettuce, herbs, and flowers. It’s interesting to see how slight variations in the amount of daylight can affect the growth of the plants. Also, the wabbits have pretty much left the plants alone. Next year, I want to have a more substantial front yard garden, but so far, I’m happy with what I’ve gotten. Grade: A-

Front yard beans

Front yard corn and amaranth

6. Rain Catchment: Oh right, that…errr… Grade: F-

7. Clean the chimney: So I borrowed my Uncle Randy’s chimney sweeping tools, and spent a Saturday afternoon on the roof and in the fireplace cleaning a few years worth of squirrel nest out of the chimney. I got it to the point where I could see clear out the top. I lit a fire, and there was still a lot of smoke coming into the living. This fall I may have to call on the services of someone who is better trained than I am. Grade: B

8. Ramp up / organize food storage: I’ve just started my food preservation efforts for the year, and I’ve already put away a bit more pickles than I did last year (including my first go at Bread and Butter pickles). I have enough tomatoes now that I can start making some sauces and salsas and preserves. I need to hit up the farmer’s market for some more food, because I have yet to press my dehydrator into service. This year, I would like to try drying some strawberries and peppers, making peach jam, and freezing more squash and okra. I need to make sure I don’t get lazy on this. Grade: B+

Pickles July 2011

9. Solar drying / cooking: Ok, I haven’t done any solar drying or cooking this year, even though this summer has been pretty much perfect for it (perhaps a bit humid, but still hotter than blazes). However, I have managed to take advantage of the sun’s energy in a different way. When June got here, I finally broke down and turned on the AC. In an effort to offset the increased electric bill a little bit, I strung some clothesline up on the kids’ jungle gym in the back yard. It won’t completely negate the cost off running the AC, but the dryer is the next biggest electricity hog, so minimizing its usage can’t hurt. Grade: B

Swing set-clothesline

10. Meat chickens: Well, we didn’t get a bunch of meat chickens, but we did manage to increase the size of our layer flock. At one point, we had 13 chickens. The white hen Cookie succumbed to the heat (I think), and I took 5 of the new chickens to my parents’ when it became obvious that they were roosters. That puts us at 7 chickens. However, upon further review, one of the remaining pullets turned out to be a roo. At this point, he’s not very good at crowing, so I think I’m going keep him a little while longer until he’s big enough to butcher here. That will mean that I raised a meat chicken on the ‘Burbstead. Here’s to meeting the most unlikely of goals, even if it is by a technicality. Grade: A

My final "GPA" winds up being a 2.65 (C+). The two F's really hurt, but there's room improvement pretty much everywhere. By the end of the year, I'd like to be up to a B or better.

M

Back in (the egg) Business!!!

As previously mentioned, our hens survived a near miss possum attack a little over a month ago. Since that time they had not laid a single egg. During the 41-ish day egg drought, we became reacquainted with the inferiority of store bought eggs. Gak!

Yesterday, however, as I was giving the chooks breakfast, a brownish orb caught my eye in the corner of the run. Sure enough, it was a fresh egg courtesy of Scratchy. It seemed like a silly thing to be excited about, but I was jacked up. My threat about the new chicks laying eggs and a soup pot wasn't made in jest. You can argue about the economics of store vs. backyard eggs, but non-laying hens are pretty much a sure fire money sink.

Things continued to improve today when I found an off-white egg in the girls' coop. That means that either Cookie or Carmella has also gotten over her traumatic experience. In short order, we should hopefully be back to our previous 2 egg-per-day average. No more concentration camp produced eggs for us. Sweet!

This is where the "farm fresh" eggs in the grocery store come from.

This is where my breakfast came from.

Frühstück von heute Morgen.

Kids and the art of Chicken Wrangling

One of the many fringe benefits that come with owning small livestock is the opportunity for your kids to interact with animals. They (the kids) learn responsibility by feeding and taking care of them, they learn where food actually comes from, and they get a chance to connect with a living, breathing part of nature (as opposed to staring at yet another blinking screen).

Each of our kids has their own chicken, and they love to hold and pet them when they get the chance. The chickens, however, are not always as enthused. To that effect, each of the kids has developed their own unique style of chicken wrangling.

Tater Tot opts for a gentle, "Poultry Whisperer" approach when petting Carmella.

Erik, on the other hand, is more of a chicken cowboy.

Alex loves to hold Scratchy.

Erik finally caught Cookie.

Winterizing the garden

The chickens had fun rummaging around in the remains of the tomato beds.

Temps are starting to dip a bit here in St.Louis. October 30 is our average 1st frost date, and last Thursday the 28th Jack Frost showed up right on time. This past weekend was the first time in over a month that we weren't out of town or doing something at school, so I finally had time to clean up around the 'burbstead. I puled out the last of the tomato plants, put the cages and hoses away, and put up a row of hoops over the bed of winter greens. I mowed the grass, leaves and all, and filled the two semi-raised beds with the clippings so it could all compost in place over the winter. Das Cluck Haus is back in the garden where it gets moved around all winter long. It's kinda odd to look out at the space that was so packed full of vegetation just a few weeks ago and see it more or less cut back and bare now. Everything is cyclical though, and my mind has already started planning for the end of winter and the beginning of next spring. Oh the possibilities...

The last haul of tomatoes and peppers from the garden.

R.I.P. Turkey Boy

This past Saturday evening our 'Burbstead was the scene of a minor tragedy. As I was preparing to take the kids to a basketball game, I went to close up the chicken coop and noticed that one of our girls (Turkey Boy) was missing. A flashlight search around the yard ensued without any results. I set the kids up inside and went back out to look some more. I found her in the corner of the chicken run, laying in some mud and half covered in leaves. She was freezing cold and barely breathing. I took her inside, cleaned her off, and set her in a laundry basket full of straw with some warm towels on top. She seemed to be breathing a little better before I went to sleep, but the next morning she was dead.

Turkey Boy was a big, gangly, weird looking chicken. She belonged to my son Alex, and he was understandably upset when she died. We buried her in the garden, and I told Alex that when it gets warmer we'll plant a special flower there for her. On the scale of traumatic childhood pet experiences, I suppose this falls somewhere in between flushing a school-carnival goldfish and having to shoot Old Yeller. It provided an interesting opportunity to talk to my kids about the natural cycle of life. They seemed to grasp the concept that nothing lasts forever and everything is connected to everything else a little easier than most adults probably do. After he finished crying, Alex's first question was if we could cut Turkey Boy up and eat her. :)

For the record, the remaining six chickens appear to be unfazed by their coopmate's passing.