We are expecting

OK... Murbella and Leto my Nigerian Dwarf goats are expecting.  Took Murbella to the vet for an ultrasound and they confirms two heart beats.  There may even be a third.  Three kids is not uncommon for Nigerian Dwarf goats.

Expecting at the end of April.

Raising Chickens 101

I will be presenting a free seminar on raising and keeping chickens on Monday March 20th at Kentucky Horse Supply: 13010 Middletown Industrial Blvd, Middletown KY 40223.


The seminar will begin at 6:00pm and a light supper will be provided. Please RSVP by calling 502-254-3705 or email to info@kentuckyhourseupply.biz.

Come and learn why everyone should have a few chickens in their backyard.

Hungry Hungry Hungry - Cornish Rock Chicks have arrived.

Cornish Rocks are meat chickens and are nothing like raising egg layers.  They are designed to eat and eat and eat, so they can grow as fast as possible.  While it's a difficult process it is rewarding to know that not only can you provide your family with a full year's worth of chickens in just 9-10 weeks but you've also given these birds a better life, short as it is.


In only a few days they needed a bigger brooder, larger food and water containers just to get them through the day.  And they still attack the food dish like they are starving....even if there's food left.

Chicks, Where Do They Come From

No, this is not a post about the birds and bees.  Spring is well on the way and may of us chicken folk already have chicks.  But chickens breed and lay all year round.  So you can get chicks almost anytime.

I've gotten chicks from the local Tractor Supply Store, from several different hatcheries and of course I've hatch eggs bought online and from my own hens.

Hatching is a lot of fun and well worth the time.  For the cost of an inexpensive $40 foam incubator you can experience the joy of seeing a baby chick peck it's way out of its shell.  The also peep inside the shell which is said to signal the other chicks it's time to hatch.  And maybe to let mom know they are on the way.


This morning I decided to do the last way to get chicks.  Let a chicken hatch them.  If you've had a hen go broody, you know how hard it is to get her to stop.  Well one of my better layers has gone broody and for the past 2 weeks hasn't laid any eggs and I can't get her to stop setting.

So I gave in.  I grabbed a few just laid eggs and slid them under her.  I moved the other nest box to the other side of the coop to keep her from switching nests when the other hens lay and set my calendar for 21 days.  It will be fun to see her with chicks in tow.

Spring Planting

I managed to get a few things planted before the rain the other day and good thing to.  While the daily rain and gray skies don't do much for me personally, the garden loves it to get new things started.

So far I've planted the following;

Cucumbers - for pickles

Leeks

Onions

Tomatoes - 5 different kinds (all Heirlooms)

Radishes

Lettuce (Romain, Boston, Red leaf and Butter Crunch)

Kale


Bell Peppers (red, orange and green)
Yukon Gold Potatoes

Squash - Spaghetti, Acorn, Butternut and Scalloped

Carrots - the short variety because my bed isn't very deep.

Herbs: (Parsley, Lemon Verbena, Basil, Rosemary - to replace the one that dies), Stevia and Dill).

I still have green beens and marigolds to plant.  And I also have a few garlic plants that lived through the winter,  There's also Orengano and Thyme in the herb bed that made it through winter.

I'm still waiting for the asparagus bed to produce something worth eating.  This is year three and I was hoping for more sprouts but only got a few and I'm letting them grow out.  Hopefully next year there will be some for eating.

It looks like a long list but I don't plant very many of each and I do companion planting in raised beds so I can crowd my plants a bit.  With chickens, quail and now goats I have lots of manure and compost to add to my beds. I do fall composting directly in my plant beds so by spring the soil is full of nutrients and ready for more plants.  I hate turning the compost. Look for my next post "The lazy composter".

I plant the marigolds in every bed to help keep the pests away.  They don't like the smell, neither do I but they are pretty little flowers and the color in nice in the mostly green beds.

That leaves me with one 4 x 10 ft bed with nothing in it.  I'm sure I'll find something,  You can always use more Tomatoes if nothing else comes to mind.

If you haven't started your garden yet, or if you are just thinking about starting one, Now is a great time.  Big or small, one favorite veg or a bunch of different things like me.  Dig a hole, plant something.

Leave me comments if you have ideas on what to put in my last bed.


Next is the flower beds and the containers on the desk.  Flowers? Vegetables? Herbs?  Or maybe a mixture of all.

Get Chick Smart - Teaching another Chicken 101 class

I was lucky enough to be asked to teach another Chicken 101 class at Kentucky Horse Supply in Middletown, KY. 

Met some great people at the last event and looking forward to doing it again on May 16th.  Visit their Facebook page and hope to see you there.

https://www.facebook.com/kentuckyhorsesupply/

Chickens for Beginners

Yesterday I was fortunate enough to lead a discussion about raising chickens to a group of new chicken owners.  The nice people at Kentucky Horse Supply were kind enough to let me take over their class. 


For more information about Kentucky Horse Supply go to http://www.kentuckyhorsesupply.biz/


It was a great way to meet other people interested in raising chickens and I hope I gave the attendees some valuable information.  I know I learned a few things.

Kentucky Horse Supply gets pullets in every spring and hold several of these learning events.  If you get a chance to attend it's well worth it and perhaps I will see you there.



Hatching is it worth the trouble?

There is nothing more exciting than seeing that first chick pip through the shell and start its new life.  A couple of months ago I decided to add a few more Crested Crème Legbars to my backyard flock.  They are one of my favorite breeds. 

Wonderful blue eggs.



and funny little tuffs of feathers on the hen's head like a fancy ladies bonnet.

So I ordered 24 eggs from eBay, picked a very reputable seller and fired up my incubator. 

I usually have pretty good results with my incubator even thought it's a low end foam model from TSC. 

The seller was nice enough to send me plenty of extra eggs and only a few were broken when the box arrived.

Day 21 came and while I was excited to see the first few chicks break out of their shells, I was disappointed that only 5 hatched.

I've had 90% hatch rates in the past and my incubator stayed on temp and I was careful about my humidity so I was hoping for better than 5 out of 30.  But the chicks are doing well and another wonderful thing about Crested Crème Legbars is that you can tell the boys from the girls when they hatch.  The markings are different.  4 girls and 1 boy.  The perfect breeding flock.

This week I'm trying it again with my second favorite breed French Black Copper Marans.  14 in the incubator hoping for 10 or more.  Another few days and I will know.

High hatch rates or low, sometimes you do everything right and it works out great, sometimes not so great. 


But there's nothing greater than hearing that chick peeping inside the shell and knowing in a few hours you will have a new life to take care of.

It's well worth doing even with the disappointments. 

Chick Days

Chicks Chicks everywhere.  I've overdone it again this year ordering too many chicks.  So far I have the following chicks;

• 25 Cornish Rock
• 25 Mixed Brown Egg Layers
• 10 Cuckoo Marans pullets
• 10 Araucanas pullets
• 6 Speckled Susex pullets
• 32 Cream Legbar eggs in the incubator.

Add that to the 8 Red Stars, Creeam Legbar hen, Cream Legbar Rooster, Black Copper Marans hen, 2 Royal Palm turkeys and 3 White Midget turkeys.

Yes I realize it's a bit over board. But they are almost all pullets and they are easy to give away.

The Autumnal Equinox - September 23rd - First Day of Autumn

According to www.weather.com during the autumnal equinox, day and night are balanced to about 12 hours each all over the world. Instead of the Earth tilting away from or toward the sun, its axis of rotation becomes perpendicular to the line connecting the centers of the Earth and the sun.

“This change in the tilt causes the change in seasons with the northern hemisphere moving from the warmth of summer to the chill of winter,” said weather.com digital meteorologist Linda Lam. “This process includes a shift in the overall location of the jet stream which plays an important role in weather conditions.”

From that point on, daylight in the Northern Hemisphere gradually becomes shorter up until the winter solstice. This is the opposite of what occurs in the Southern Hemisphere, where daylight won’t grow any longer.

Here in Kentucky the days will now start getting shorter and it's time to make those last fall planting and anything that may winter over.

                                                                                      

Kentucky State Fair - Eggs, Eggs, Eggs... It's all about the eggs this year.

Not much exciting at the Kentucky State Fair as far as rabbits and chickens go.  I had a few entries (nothing I thought would do well) but I had to work late the day they needed to be taken in so I missed the entry window.

I did however get to enter the egg contest for the first time.  I entered a dozen in the brown egg category and a dozen in the pastel egg category.

Fourth Place in the brown egg category.  Not to bad for first time entering.  Next year I will enter 2 dozen in both the brown and pastel.  I don't have white layers so I can't enter that category.

It would be great to see my eggs in that display case.


The Kentucky State Fair is a great event.  Lots of entertainment, education and interesting things to look at.  From contest exhibits to the animals and of course the midway.

I did spend a lot of time talking to a great couple who raise Nigerian Dwarf goats.  They were very informative and have pushed me even closer to getting a few goats.  Visit their web site to see their goats. www.hilltopfarmsky.com

There was also a Dragon

And Jack climbing his beanstalk

Not much of a harvest so far this year

Tomatoes have been very disappointing this year.  Flowers just didn't seem to get pollinated.  I'm guessing it was all the rain.  Same with green been, cucumbers and peppers.  Just not a lot of fruit on the plants.  Though the plants seem healthy enough.

The one thing that did rather well were the root crops.  Carrots were big and tasty and the Yukon Gold potatoes were great.  Still waiting to pull the sweet potatoes.  The vines are everywhere so hopefully they are doing good as well.

Started a second crop of green beans so hopefully they will do better.  Still plenty of time to get a second round of vegetables in the ground here in Kentucky.

Rain....Rain....and More Rain

It's been a pretty wet spring here in Kentucky.  The grass is green and the garden is growing.  A bit too fast however.

Most of the lettuce bolted during the earlier than expected 92 degree days.  I did plant some corn and while it doesn't seem to be doing that well, it has shaded a few radicchio plants that seem to be developing ok and haven't bolted yet.

Some early cucumbers and lots of flowers.  My hope is that there's enough pollinators buzzing around during the few sunny moments to pollinate.

The herbs however love the rainy days and are growing like crazy. And the chickens aren't so crazy about all the rain either.

Spring planting time is here

Spring is here and it's time to get planting here in Kentucky.  So far I have the following planted:

• Tomatoes (cherry, grape, early girl, big boy, celebrity)
• Radishes
• Lettuce (romaine, butter-head,)
• Corn (first time growing)
• Bell Peppers (red, green, yellow)
• Carrots (short variety)
• Yukon Gold Potatoes
• Asparagus 
• Parsley
• Rosemary (replant - this year's cold winter killed existing plant)
• Basil
• Stevia (sweetener)
• Dill
• Nasturtiums (edible flowers)
• Sage (replant - this year's cold winter killed existing plant)

Still to be planted are:

• Onions
• Pumpkin
• Cucumbers (pickling)
• Squash (acorn, butternut)
• Green Beans
• Lima Beans
• Sweet potatoes
• Seedless Green Grape vine

Still lots to do but things are growing, humming birds are back so I got the feeders our quickly and it's getting hotter by the day.  Going to be a short spring and an early summer here in Kentucky.

Gobble Gobble Gobble - Adding Turkeys this year

                                            

Adding turkeys to the backyard flock this year.

Like their chicken relatives turkeys have been breed specifically for the dinner table.  They come in many colors.  I have just received 12 white broad breasted turkeys.  These are the same ones that are raised for the grocery store.

The chicks are very cute and sweet.  They almost seem to enjoy human company.  They have a different kind of peep than chickens which is much easier on the ears.

They also have a cute bump on their beaks which will turn into a rather ugly thing called a "snood".  The ugly stuff hanging under their chin is called a "wattle".

Not so cute once they get older.

In as little as 20 weeks the hens should be 22 lbs and the toms should be a whopping 34 lbs.  That's a lot of turkey.  I've only named two (Christmas and Thanksgiving), probably won't name the rest.  

I know you might that's cruel, but what will you be eating on Christmas and Thanksgiving?  

I will be eating a bird that was raised humanly, given the run of my small but green and sunshine filled little urban farm and getting to eat feed, grass, bugs and all the things turkeys are supposed to eat. 

Cross turkey off the grocery store list.

Sad and Gruesome

Chicken is the worlds number one source of protein.  More chickens are eaten than any other animal.  And I love the taste of chicken and wouldn't give it up for anything.  If you've seen some of my early posts you've seen the horrible way factory raised chickens are treated.

It was my hope that these videos were old and that the poultry industry had cleaned up it's act and I'm sure some of the processing plants have done a much better job than they did in the past.

But the reality is that factory chickens still live in horrible conditions and meet and cruel end just so we can enjoy chicken fingers, chicken wings and of course our Sunday dinner of roast chicken.

I have to warn you this video is pretty gruesome and illustrates that not every poultry processing plant has made improvements.

Do not show this to your children.  The date of this YouTube post is March 14, 2015.

Click on this link to watch the YouTube video.

The Way Chickens are Killed is Hell on Earth and Legal.

If you don't currently raise your own chickens for meat, consider it.  Do some research there's a lot out there.  You can start with my earlier posts and ask me any questions you have.  I'm happy to help.

While chickens will still have to die to provide us food, There's no reason their short lives have to be any harder than they have to be.  If you raise your own meat chickens you can decide how they live and how they die.  And yes it can be done humanely and with as little stress and anguish on the chicken and on you.

Take charge of the food you eat and responsibility for getting it to your table. 

Visit to Bluegrass Aquaponics

I've been working on my own aquaponics project for a while now.  Still working on the greenhouse so the smaller proof of concept system I put up is still in the garage.  But I was fortunate enough to get a personal tour at Bluegrass Aquaponics in Versailles, Kentucky.

I was meet by Lora Ginter (her husband and co-owner Ed was not available) and shown back to the greenhouse.  

The have a terrific setup with media beds, raft beds, seed starting and of course lots and lots of fish tanks.  It was obvious that Lora knew a lot about aquaponics and walked me through their extensive setup.   My backyard setup is going to be a lot simpler.  

I learned a lot about media beds (check out growrock as an alternative to expanded clay and/or gravel), filtering and how to handle the solid wastes.  They have several extra filtering tanks that aren't mentioned in most of the documentation that I've read.  I was very impressed.  Also got some great ideas about planting.  Things l would not have thought about planting Lora and Ed are having success with.  

They are growing lots of lettuce, tomatoes, kale, other greens and even brussel sprouts and cabbage.  I love brussel sprout and have never been able to grow cabbage that tthose pesky cabbage worms didn't get to first.  Can't wait to try both.

And soon they will be offering live tilapia.  You should have seen the size of these fish.  I plan on going back when they do and getting a few.  I not only love tilapia it will give me some practice on filleting them.  Can't get much fresher than that. 

Lora and Ed (met Ed as we were wrapping up the tour) are enthusiastic about aquaponics, sustainability and providing the best possible product to their customers.  I purchased some of the lettuce they are growing (they were delicious).

Visit their Bluegrass Aquaponics Facebook page for more information.  Be sure to follow their progress as their business grows.

Hope my own project works out as well.  Thanks again Lora and Ed for letting me take a look at your system.  I enjoyed it immensely.

Know where your food comes from, know how it gets from farm to table.

It's Friday the 13th. Wonder what the chickens are up to.

Visit to Chicken Ridge Farm

A couple of weeks ago, I noticed an add on Craigslist about some French Black Copper Marans chicks available.  Marans being one of my favorite breeds of chickens I had to check it out.

French Black Copper Marans

Marans are not only colorful birds but lay the darkest eggs of any chickens.  These birds are always refered to as marans even if there is only one.  Must be a French thing.








 After several emails and text messages I got to meet Julie the owner of Chicken Ridge Farm.

It was a 90 minutes drive each way but it was definitely worth it.  Julie has a great collection of rare chickens.  Several of which I brought home with me.  One of the breeds she raises is

English Chocolate Cuckoo Orpington

The picture does do this bird justice.  The coloring is awesome and would look great in anyone flock. Julie also is starting to raise one of the strangest chickens around.

AYAM
CEMANI

These birds are totally black inside and out.  Julie held one while I opened it's beak and the tongue and inside of the mouth is also black as night.  Reportedly all the internal organs are also black.  Though we didn't test that.  Oddly enough this bird lays white eggs.  Go figure.

And now to my favorite breed.  Or at least it's my favorite at the moment.  Julie has some spectactular Crested Crème Legbars.

Crested Cream Legbar

There are three things I love about these chickens.  The color of the eggs.




The fact that the chicks are easily sexed at birth.

The girls have a chipmunk stripe and the boys have a spot on their heads.










And of course the funny little tuft or crest of feathers on their heads.








Check out the Chicken Ridge Farm's web site. www.chickenridgefarm.com And if you get a chance to talk to Julie, tell her Bob says hi and thanks for the great birds.

What to do with extra Sunflow Seeds

I planted giant sunflowers and had an abundance of sunflower seed.  What to do with them..... ?

Watch how big his cheeks get.  He ran off and came back for bowl after bowl.  I hope I don't have sunflowers popping up everywhere next spring.  No telling where he stored them.