Chicks, Man!

That title would only make sense to you if you watched Talk Soup on E! back in the 90s with Joel McHale. There was a segment that he would start with “Let’s talk about Chicks, Man.” Oh how I love Joel McHale. Did you watch his Tiger King interview last spring? Alright, I’ll stop.

Back in December, while home for about 10 days between Christmas and the New Year, I was getting excited about the spring and ways I was going to expand my garden and homesteading efforts. I just described a new garden row in this last post. My other goal was to identify five foods I no longer want to buy from a store and will instead grow and make myself. On that list are jelly, green beans, diced tomatoes, tomato paste, and eggs. The first four are garden focused and I’ll keep you posted on those efforts this summer. Eggs are the other item I don’t ever want to buy again.

So I set off on a journey to create my “dream flock” with all the breeds I find beautiful and interesting. Up til now I’ve been pretty basic with white leghorns and brown bovans (we won’t talk about my Wyandottes that dropped dead). And I haven’t had the best success with choosing hens and have ended up with nearly 50% roosters when I get chicks at Tractor Supply. I did a little research on the different hatcheries and decided to go with Murray McMurray because 1) I could choose females and 2) I could buy the exact quantity I wanted without having to meet a minimum.

I decided to order 15 birds, to add to the 8 I already have so that I would get approximately two dozen eggs a day. My thinking here is to hopefully start selling eggs and cover my costs. This would get me roughly 14 dozen eggs/week, of which I will hopefully sell 12. If I charge anywhere from $4.50 to $5/dozen that will cover what I’m spending on feed and scratch. I do have some more calculations to firm this up since I’m not sure how much they will all eat once full grown.

Here’s what I ordered:

3 golden wyandottes – gorgeous, just gorgeous
3 buff orpingtons – they remind me of golden retrievers and are supposed to be very friendly
4 barred rocks – I’ve always loved these – just the quintessential chicken
3 speckled sussex – I love there feather patterns
2 dominiques – I can’t quite figure out how these are different from Barred Rocks, so will see if I can tell.

They threw in a “free surprise chick” and 17 chicks ended up arriving in total so you do the math 😊 I will say McMurray Hatchery was great to buy from. I got an email reminder about a month out and then some text message reminders as well. All chicks came alive and chipper. I immediately gave them some water with Hydro Hen 3-in-1 mixed in and they are all doing well.

With all of the chicks in my bathtub, I am a bit nervous I bit off more than I can chew but nothing ventured, nothing gained right?

What about you? What do-it-yourself business have you tried and how did it work out? What do you wish you had known?

Keeping Busy, Staying Sane

Well this is not how I pictured April panning out. I’m not one to plan out my life weeks in advance, but not leaving my house for four weeks straight was certainly not my ideal scenario, or yours I’m guessing. Regardless, I hope you are healthy and safe wherever you are. I hope you have food to eat and loved ones to check in with. As many negatives as this situation is presenting, there are definitely some significant positives. However, I’m not about to sugar coat it. Lots of ups and downs in our household. Thankfully more ups. I don’t have any answers or solutions but I can say Cactus and I do infinitely better on the days when we each get an hour of ‘me’ time. Preferably outside, with some fresh air, doing something active. It clears my head, helps me slow down the thoughts that were starting to go on over drive, and gives me the mental re-boot to make the rest of the day more enjoyable.

Besides checking the calendar to remind myself what day it is, here’s what I’ve been up.

Nursing my seedlings. I’d say about 50% of my seedlings are going strong. The peppers are on fire. A bunch of my tomatoes and peas fizzled out and I think I’m to blame. I put them out on a really warm day for some fresh air and I think it shocked them. If you are approaching your last frost date, be sure you do the hardening off gradually. Like 2 hours one day, then 3 hours, then 5 hours, then 6 hours, etc. It takes a little more attention but it’s worth it to not kill the plants you were just babying for the last 8 weeks.

Pepper and tomato seedlings that are strong healthy — 8 week old pepper (left) and tomato (right) seedlings doing just fine…

Pea, pepper and tomato seedlings that are struggling — 8 week old pepper (top) and pea (bottom) seedlings doing less than fine (there was not that much space between them – I’ve lost about 10 plants).

Planted my cool crops. I sowed my kale, onions, carrots, beets, cauliflower and broccoli directly in the ground in the beginning of April. Last year, I didn’t attempt a Spring garden so I’m curious to see if they take hold. I had a great kale and beet harvest, but I did them in the Summer just a single time with no succession planting for the Fall. I’m hoping that my rotation and all the manure and compost I’ve added make a difference. Even though I have read about 100 times that soil testing is a must, I have not yet done it. I am promising myself I will do it at the end of the season this year so I can amend as needed for next year.

Homemade teepee trellis. I experimented making a teepee trellis with some old blackberry canes. I’m not sure how sturdy this will be. I really want to use bamboo and I see walls of bamboo in yards when I drive around town, but I haven’t had the courage to knock on someone’s door and ask “Can I cut a few of your bamboo stalks?”

Blackberry canes lying on the ground — Some blackberry canes that I pruned for a potential teepee.

Four blackberry canes standing up to be secured as a teepee trellis — Four blackberry canes standing up for a teepee trellis.

Teepee trellis made out of four blackberry canes — Securing the four blackberry canes with twine.

Chick wrangling. Our four chicks (2 Isa Browns and 2 Gold Leaf Wyandottes) are alive and well in the bathtub. They are getting pretty big and almost all of their fluffy down is gone so we’ll be ready to take them out and introduce them to the rest of the flock in the next two weeks I think. I’m a little disheartened that two appear to be roosters. I could be wrong *fingers crossed*.

One month old 2 Isa Brown and 2 Gold Leaf Wyandottes chicks in white bath tub — Look at the comb coming in so strong on the dark one in the back – grrrrr. You better not be a rooster!

Spring-A-Ding-Ding

There aren’t many years when my birthday falls on the first day of Spring – thanks Leap Year! In light of that, I wanted to share a positive and cheery post to celebrate since I didn’t have a big get together. No matter where you are in the world, you are being impacted by Covid-19. Kind of a crazy statement when I think about it. But aside from the nearly minute-by-minute updates on this virus, I have to believe there are still beautiful and wonderful things happening all around us every day.

Here are a few examples right from my backyard, literally. Have you looked in your backyard, front yard, sidewalk, or parking lot? I’m sure there are at least five things to bring a smile to your face in an instant. I like to live life to the loudest (and fullest) so Corona isn’t gonna stop that – I’ll just be doing it from 6 feet away 😊