1st Poultry & Plant Swap at the Farm…

Posted on by May 25, 2012

Last Sunday, our homesteading clan had it’s first official gathering here at the farm!

It was a lovely day… and we had all sorts of goodies ready to swap and sell. We had a few homesteading books… some plants, rocks and some cool bags I made from feed sacks! And of course, bunnies!!!

We didn’t have many chickens for the swap, we’re a bit low on selling birds at the moment. We did end up selling a pair of hens to a friend but that was prearranged and already in the works.

J & J brought some neat Indian runner ducks and some bantys and roos. Others brought hens and pullets and we had a nice selection of poultry available for swapping.

Of course, our resident sign maker Maggie got to work on a quick sign for the road… she plans to upgrade it for the next swap!

Our friend Kelly brought a wonderful display of plants! We are happy to say that we have many of her babies to plant in our garden! And she took home two of our hens for a friend!

Cody Pony got trotted out for girl child beauty salon fun and he adored every moment of it. By the time they were done, he was all braids up and down his mane! And of course, just the happiest pony around from all the hugs and pets and good scratching. He is such a good pony around people, just gentle as can be. He has SO learned that being a good boy means TONS of good attention, treats and loving.

Maggie had mowed down the west front pasture so we had plenty of room for everyone to pull up a car, truck or van and sell and swap out of the backs. Most ended up setting up in the shady areas.

Jessy brought out her bunnies for sale and their momma and then in no time she had a lovely group of youngsters all playing with them and plucking wool and finger spinning it! She was giving classes in wool gathering!!!

We gave out several of our deluxe 50 cent farm tours and everyone loved the baby pigs for sure! They are so adorable right now and bottle feeding the gang was a real hit for sure. I love having kids here at the homestead. It’s such a perfect match! I wish that we can have kids visit often because it’s just such a natural match.
After awhile, Jessy brought out some sheep wool and the hand carders and was showing the kids how to card wool! I’m not sure but I see workshops and classes starting up at the homestead eventually… what about you? Jessy is an awesome teacher, she’s calm and patient with little people.

I made a great trade with this neat young man Braden, he is a turkey and chicken whisperer! He loves poultry and he recently got a nice young turkey jake and was hoping to find a turkey girl for him. When he saw my lovely Turkey Girl he was ready to swap and trade. At one point he wanted to bring his turkey boy over for m girl but then I thought, naw, how about we swap and so he traded me a bunch of 8 little Black Star pullets for our lovely TG. I am saying goodbye to her and I know she went to an awesome home! Braden and his dad are awesome homesteaders too and we are sure to be good friends. He really would like to get one of Jessy’s bunny babies and I believe we might be doing a deal soon on the lovely little gray doe that is left.

My chicken whispering kid was pleased with the swap. She has more turkeys coming up in the ranks and we needed a few more pullets for sure! The little Black Stars are so cute, they are very tame and follow her all over in the lil’ coop and yard!

I was gifted with a lovely pair of Mille Flueur banty rooster brothers! My friends Chris and Kelly got a batch of banty chicks and these two were in the bunch. They live in the city and can’t keep roosters, so they asked if they could come live on the farm! Of course! I adore Mille Fleurs! I am calling them Parsley and Sage… okay, herbs instead of flowers, but I couldn’t think of any really manly flower names! haha… I think I want to build a little fairy tale, fantasy Medieval chicken coop for them… all the banties can go in there!!! It’s a goal of mine… we’ll see how I can make it happen!

In the end, it was such a wonderful day! We had probably 15 or so people come and we ended up in lawn chairs under the shade tree, drinking lemonade and just chatting away, visiting and laughing and learning. We agreed that we need to do this monthly and so we have made plans for our June swap! It was just a wonderful Sunday afternoon at the homestead with friends!!! So nice!!!

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Nestboxes of Windhaven…

Posted on by May 24, 2012

We have several different nest boxes on the homestead, and some seem to work better than others. They are more preferred by the ladies!

The most favorite is this simple tote bucket with a hole cut in the long side. They love these! Stuff some hay in and you have hen frenzy! And they are cheap, $5 at the dollar store, and last pretty much forever. Takes about 5 minutes to cut the hole and poof! You’re done. You can stack them or even screw them up to the wall. We just set our ups on a cabinet and they love it.

But here are a few others we have tried!

Here in the lil’ coop, we have three different boxes. And of course, they love the tote best. I bought that nice preformed nest box on the wall, the grey one. And of course, they hate it. Not a single egg has been laid in it. We’ve moved it around, and nada. Even put a nest egg in there, nothing. Disappointing. I think we are going to move it to the feed room and see if anyone in there will give it a whirl.

Now the wooden crate and all, they like it, but it’s almost a little toooo short for some of the larger girls. Since there are a lot of pullets in there, it works for them. Someone keeps laying on the top! Just there in the roosting mess… silly birds. Guess it works for them.

This is the most favorite of the tote boxes. In the feed room, this one is always full of eggs and always has hens pacing about, waiting for their turn. Funny thing, I had set a few flakes of hay on top to wait for Gideon’s meals and one of the impatient hens jumped up and scratched out a nest! So I left it and son of a gun, that nest is about half as busy as the bottom part, from lower ranking hens that don’t want to wait for the box! haha….

I like to watch where hens will make their own nests and then let them utilize the space if it makes sense. They started to lay on a stack of old feed bags, in the feed room of the big barn, in this old cabinet that we really didn’t use. It doesn’t have any doors on it. So I took out the feed sacks and added hay for a nicer nest. And then Maggie screwed in a old piece of board to the front so that the hay and the eggs would stay in better. And then we added that little shelf thing to the other side and now we have two really nice little cozy spots that the free range hens love! You just gotta let them find their happy places sometimes! The payoff is happy hens and more eggs!!!

We built these in the very beginning and they lay in them, sometimes. We have to have it TOTALLY stuffed with hay or else they don’t really like it. I think it is a little too big. I’m thinking about just getting a few tote boxes, cutting the holes and tucking them in here. It would work better. Because if we stuff them with hay, then the sheep and pony will often mosey in there to eat out of the boxes!!! Not that it’s a huge problem, but the hens don’t like to be in there setting and have a big old pony nose taking out their hay! They get all bent out of shape and ticked off hens do not lay nicely! Still, it is available for them, so we like to keep it nice as we can.

And in the end… if Angus approves, then it should be just fine, eh?

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WATER!!!!!

Posted on by May 19, 2012


When you see five wonderful fellows all standing around a little hole in your yard, you rejoice, you sing high praises to the Lord, and then you pay a bunch of money and then you get to do the happy naked shower dance for JOY in your own BATHROOM….

YES!!!!! We have WATER!!! RUNNING WATER!!!! It’s so nice.

Really.

It is.

Very very very nice.

Now, I will say, that yes, it took us a long time to get to this point. And we did have help… Steve added to the financial side of the equation and our fantastic neighbors and their family provided the know-how and the parts at cost and the labor, totally totally low… It nearly made me cry how wonderful everyone has been to help out and make this happen. It’s so wonderful and such a sweet blessing. Summer is a low sales time for us, and while we’ve gotten by fine for day to day things, it’s just been hard to gather up so much money for one single need. The pump was actually bad and needed to be replaced. On the good side? It should last us years and years now! We shouldn’t have an issue with the well for a good decade or more! In fact, who knows how long that pump was down there working… years and years by the looks of it.

This was a huge hurdle in our pathway and with the help of family and friends, we cleared that baby, sailing over it without a tumble or a fall. Thank you everyone!!!!!

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