Not Again

Another overly warm day for March, in this, the year of no real winter at all, and it seems the birds, after a relatively bug free winter diet, are totally focused in their search for more and more of the constantly emerging tasty little morsels. So unknown to us, they wander off down to the field, heads down and happily pecking away, no doubt following the pond run off that not only leads straight through the field, but is chock a block full of bird goodies as well.

the goody loaded trench that leads birds from the safety of trees to the dreaded field

.........and then it happened.....another hawk attack, witnessed this time, so NO, we are NOT crazy, that is what’s picking off our birds.

I'm inside when my phone rings, Bob the Builder on the other end, calling from the field and telling ( yelling ) for me to get down there quick because he needs help.......this is from a guy who notoriously does NOT ask for help, even when he should, so I'm picturing the worst.  

In a matter of seconds this blissful bug picking adventure has turned into a chaos zone. One of the as yet un-named chickens is injured, missing a load of feathers and hiding under a tree, either Joan or Elvira was last seen running for all her worth to the cover of the spruces with a hawk on her tail, Ruckus the Rooster and the other two girls are nowhere to be found. Bob's gotten a shot off and the hawk was diverted and flown off, but the chicken may or may not know that.

And the 3 remaining ducks have FINALLY found the river......we have been hoping that they would find the river someday and make that their new home, saving us the whole Duckponics issue, so I quickly abandoned the idea of getting them back, seems we finally had them just where we wanted them and they were joyfully discovering all kinds of goodies in the tall grass on the banks. So I was happy thinking there's some good in everything.

Injured chicken then proceeds to give me a really good run for for my money, through what little ( wet, heavy, slushy ) snow that remains amidst all the mud, trying to keep her from frantically running straight into the river, because I'm pretty sure that even though that river may be a ducks dream, it's got to be chicken hell, and I had NO intention of jumping in to get her even if I could catch her in that current. If it came to that, I would probably have better luck running all the way back up the hill from hell, getting in the car and scooping her out at the first bridge down the road with the fish net that I was really wishing I had brought down here right now. So I just kept running.........and so did she, in no particular direction, but all of them taking her closer to the river. In the end, she was captured, without the help of the fish net. So there I was, soaked and muddy from the knees down, sweating from the waist up, trying to get control of a flapping, hysterical chicken that was making enough noise to call in every predator in the township at that point. I finally calmed her down and I think the two of us just sat there wondering which one of us was going to have the heart attack first. 

So we now have one chicken headed for the coop to hopefully recover, Elvira is MIA, Ruckus and the 2 other girls were found hiding in the garage and 3 ducks finally in the river.

3 hours later...........injured hen is getting severely picked on by the others, so they are all locked out for the night, injured has the coop, the rest of them have the run, good thing it’s warm out, but who knows where tomorrows eggs are going to be. MIA chicken managed to sneak back home without anyone noticing, and she seems just fine. All is calm again, just hoping that injured chicken makes it through the night.

AND THEN THE DUCKS CAME HOME.........................I really think that sometimes they just pretend to be stupid.

TMI ( too much information )

When we started on this bird adventure, our only source of information to start with was the internet which we surfed endlessly, followed by some emails and visits to others that were already doing this........I mean these are living creatures and for sure we want to do everything right for them. So with what we learnt we built them the Chicken Hilton which, we were told if we were to be doing this egg adventure in the winter, would need to be insulated, so we did.

There was lots of information about the lighting shedule required for them to lay eggs, so lights with timers were installed. This being Canada and the temps having the possibility of falling well into the negatives ( well not this year....2012, the year of the non-winter, regardless ) we installed a heat lamp with a thermostat. Of course providing food and water is always a given, and we have adopted the deep litter method for the coop, with a good coop scooping to happen in the spring.

In our mind we provided them with everything a chicken could want ( except a rooster ), and we did the same for the ducks too, including a pond.

So as winter sets in everything is working fine, the ducks have abandoned the run of the Hilton in favour of living either in the pond or underneath the Hilton. The spring is still running madly so water for them is not an issue. The lights and heating in the coop are working fine, eggs are getting laid, and we haven't found a chicken frozen solid yet, so the heat must be working, and we know for a fact that the hydro bill is working just fine.

Not having a rooster has been a problem as the girls are not following the standard information that we recieved about "free run" chickens that they just simply go home at night. This has resulted in the loss of a few birds, in particular Little Lucy, so they are now being locked up much to my dismay and more so theirs.

.......so our only issue so far is that the water still freezes up rock solid overnight and the chickens are thirsty in the morning. We have an automtic waterer for them in the summer which obviously will not work all year. We tried the chicken waterers and surfed again to find all kinds of elaborate ways to make them stop freezing up, all of which would require more wiring and $$$. In the end we chose to go with a dog waterer instead.....the kind that has the one litre pop bottle attached, pop bottles bought for this reason only BTW. Things were still freezing up overnight so we moved it a bit closer to the heat lamp...........which promptly melted the darn bottle. So now instead of just taking a replacement out to them, we have to run back and forth with the one remaining bottle, not really an issue except that someone decided to put the chicken coop downhill.

And then one day all things changed..........we got a rooster!!!

How does a rooster stop water from freezing you ask, well he doesn't, but the "old hand, I've been doing this for years, lets take the simple approach to all of this" farmer that gave us the rooster, also gave us the biggest, most useful, piece of advice yet by simply saying..............

" I just give them a bucket of snow"

REALLY!!!..........it's so stupidly simple that it makes total sense.
It makes you realize that sometimes you can just overthink things

It's so stupidly simple that it makes a person feel like an idiot for not figuring this out themselves........I'm just glad it wasn't one of my kids that came up with this.........then I'd feel really stupid!!!

Say Hello to Ruckus

so this is our new Rooster, Ruckus.

I mentally named him that even before he arrived, because that is what I was expecting from him, but to be honest.............he's really not living up to that, I've barely heard squat from him. But seeing that it's February and we sleep in the basement probably helps, so I'll let you know if I still feel the same way come July with the windows open all night..........and more importantly, the very early AM.

We got him for free from a laid back and experienced farmer that Bob the Builder was working for who had too many. He easily parted with an extra rooster. So easily that by the time I returned the call about whether or not we wanted to do this.......it was already a mute point.............the rooster was already in the box, in the truck.

I didn't really want a rooster, didn't think we needed one, and didn't want to tick off the neighbours any more than the dogs have already done. But with the girls wanting to stay out and party all night leaving us to run around in the dark trying to round them up, and with predators lurking at dusk despite the 2 dogs on the property, and with them seeming to think that I was the rooster, and after losing Little Lucy, which broke my heart......we had to give in and get them a "man of the house".

But seriously, did chicken girls not get the memo from the 70's where we don't need to blindly follow a guy around!!?? Did we really do all that bra burning only for the human species?? Seems so.

So, a week into it, and after a bit of a rough start, Big Ruckus is doing his job.

A few days of him not wanting to come out of the coop, the same coop the girls have been locked up in for weeks since Lucy disappeared, the same coop that the girls tried not to let him in, and the one that he spent a few days sitting under with the ducks ( while his girls ran wild around the property enjoying their freedom again, at last ) he's finally out and about with them and more importantly............he has everyone home long before the dreaded dusk falls.

................last time I looked, he was still sleeping out in the run while the 4 girls are tucked away in the coop, but my real question is........

why are we now getting 5 eggs a day????

Soft Hearts get pooped on.

So there's nothing like a garage full of bird manure to remind a newbie that they really are livestock, not pets.( Shhh, don't tell the insurance company that I'm admitting to this) 

Yesterday was our first really cold day this winter, minus 24 C with the windchill, the day before it was plus 5 and pouring rain, as it was for quite a few days before that. So this is the first real winter experience that the birds have had, being born in July and all. And this was the first time that the ducks were showing signs of feeling it.......I mean really feeling it, windchill and all. They were all set to run for the food as usual in the morning but could only make it a few steps without having to hunker down and stop. A few more steps. Stop. A few more, another stop.

So with the weather being as goofy as can be this year, I mean really, one day it's like April and then the next day it's like Arctic..........I'm not sure if the birds have had a real chance to acclimate to all of this.

And that 's where Soft Heart kicked in, and not just mine BTW, Bob the Builders too, and for the first time we didn't shoo them out of the garage. Heck, I even donated an old comforter to the cause because they were, all 9 of them, trying to sit on one little old rag that fell off the workbench. And have I mentioned that their combined IQ is in the negatives, because after that they still all tried to use the rag instead of the comforter!!??

Now if Rational Brain had of been able to over-ride Soft Heart, the conclusion would have been made that we have already built them a $1000.00 Quacker Box that they have decided to sleep under instead of in. We have since Typar-ed three sides of the underneath part and laid down a good layer of straw for them in what can really only be called swamp, and yet, that's where they prefer to reside. Rational Brain would have said that's plenty, let them deal with it ............Rational Brain would have said that the bottom of the Quacker Box with the windshield and the straw cannot possibly be any colder than a slab of concrete in the garage.

But OH Noooo............. Soft Heart won that argument, and an absolutely ridiculous amount of duck doo in the garage later..........I've come to the conclusion that Rational Brain needs a good talking to about becoming a little bit more assertive.

NOT NICE

So it’s Christmas Eve and we have my parents over for turkey dinner.

Meanwhile our 6 chickens, Lucy, Elvira, Joan and the three as yet un-named teenagers are still "free ranging" and the ducks, well, they are probably happily pooping in the pond. Both dogs and the cat are in the house hoping for fallout out of Christmas cookies on the carpet for later cleanup.

Somewhere between dessert and dishes, Bob the Builder goes out to lock up the chickens and finds that there are only 4 in the coop.

Not long afterwards, the neighbors drop by for drinks.

A couple more trips to lock up the chickens and there are still only 4.

After a few hours, the neighbours head home, and a little while later, so do my parents.

Still only 4 chickens in the coop, 9 ducks pooping in the pond, 2 dogs cleaning the carpet, one cat cleaning himself, and there may or may not be a partridge in my pear tree, but that’s way down in the field and I’m not going down to look. More worried about where these 2 chickens are.

Midnight, still only 4 chickens, We go to bed, but leave the hole to the coop open just in case.

Next morning, Christmas morning btw, and here comes one chicken, chicken jogging down the driveway, like the kid that stays out too late and is trying to sneak in before you notice. ...........so, did she go party with the neighbours last night ??

So five chickens accounted for, one that would be grounded if it was one of our kids, and one still missing.

Not long afterwards, Bob the Builder finds the answer to the missing chicken under a big grove of Spruce trees, closest thing we have to a Christmas tree this year, and very close to the house. Somewhat ironic that while we were enjoying turkey, something else was enjoying chicken for Christmas dinner. Poor little girl, she’d never even gotten a name yet and had just laid her first egg that morning.

I just don’t understand how this can happen with 9 slow moving, flightless, IQ challenged, can’t give them away on Kijiji, perpetually pooping, pieces of coyote bait right there out front. Not to mention 2 large dogs on the property………….oh, yeah, well, there was the Christmas cookie crumb distraction for them at work.

But I must be getting better at this as I didn’t cry this time or get all sick feeling about it.

Maybe that’s because this is the chicken that had me running around in the mud the other night till I cornered her in the garage to take her back to the safety of the coop and realized that she was not the sharpest tool in the shed.

Or, maybe I’m starting to realize that it’s not all fun and games out here.

Stompin Tom Chicken.

I so did not expect this,

I’m working in the garden one day, and Lucy, Joan and Elvira are on my heels "helping" and I take a sudden step sideways. Instead of doing the normal squawking scared chicken jog down the driveway as usual, Elvira hunkers down and starts stomping her feet. I thought it was kinda comical , apologized for scaring her and went about what it was I was doing. As the days go by, this stomping thing happens again and again, and now Lucy is doing it too.

So, keep in mind that I have, as yet, never been able to catch these chickens without a net, but this one time Elvira is hunkered down and stompin, right in front of me, so I figure what the heck, and I bend down and scoop her up. A few days later Lucy runs up to me and starts stompin, so I bend down and give her a petting and then a little scratch on the back, and she’s just lovin this…………..her wings go out, her tail goes up, her feathers all fluff up……………..it’s cute, and comical, and I go on about my business.

So just a few days after this, on Dec 5^th, we get 3 eggs. Amazing, right on cue, Internet says, 20 weeks till they lay an egg, they were born on July 5^th, all 3 of them lay an egg on Dec 5^th,

So by these calculations, we’re expecting the three as yet un-named teenagers to lay their first egg on Jan 17^th.

Long before Jan 17^th, one of the teenagers does the stompin thing to Bob the builder, and he mentions that he figures she’s getting ready to lay eggs, as in hindsight, we are starting to make the connection. Next morning, Holy Cow, 4 eggs, one teenager stompin in front of me and letting me touch her. By the end of the week, we are getting 5 eggs a day.

So we have one hen that is not laying yet, and with this years unseasonal weather, we have 6 hens that want to stay out and party all night. 5 of them let me pick them up and put them away, and one makes me run through the dark and muddy hills trying to catch her till I finally corner her in the garage and win the battle.

So just guessing here, but my money is on her being the one that is not laying an egg every day, because according to the Internet, she’s the only one that doesn’t think that

....................I’M THE ROOSTER !!??

　

　
　

　　

　

Soooo the wrong footwear

OK. so, tested and proved ( like there was ever any doubt )

CROCS are SO NOT the right footwear for winter, no matter how short the trip is supposed to be, cuz once you set out there in them……….it’s going to be an uncomfortable and much longer trip than you expected.

Never mind the obvious………. holes on top that scoop snow down into your toes, the same holes that scoop top soil into the same place all summer, but between them, and the "who decided to put the chicken coop down hill" factor……………yup, slide ride it was, missed the duck pond, landed safely at the bottom, sporting a muddy butt and snowy toes.

So this was supposed to be just a quick trip to let the chickens out, but now I’m at the bottom of the hill, wearing pretty much a pair of highly ventilated jelly beans on my feet and I still have to get back up……….apparently, among other things, to dig out my ever so fashionable (NOT) heavy duty grippy soled winter boots from summer storage.

So when I do get back up there, I start to wonder ……….why do I own these things.

I mean really, they are not at all attractive, the grippy soled snow boots put them to shame in that department. Summer or winter, something is falling through those holes to wedge or melt between your toes. They come in the most ridiculous colors, mine are purple……mauve if you want to get all fashionista about it…and if that’s the case, your whole fashion sense needs to be evaluated.............. by a therapist.

If you do wear them for a full weekend, they give you the silliest sandal tan…….a week of polka dot feet. The same holes that did that, I know what they are supposed to do, but they don’t, your feet still sweat like a pig………well not in the snow I guess, but freezing is just as uncomfortable, if not more.

So why do I own them???

Well they are pretty much go anywhere, don’t need to stop for a footwear change, into the river, out of the river, across the field, into the garden, go scoop manure,  indestructible, and if you do destruct them, who cares, kind of shoes. They also work well in the kitchen as a built in stress mat.

Other than that…….they suck, but I’m keeping then anyways.

A comedian once said about them "there are people all over the world wearing fanny packs that are laughing at you"

I think of that every time I put them on, and make damn sure I take them off before I leave the property.

　

　

Me and My Tractor

Nut Date…………………………………………………………October 23, 2011

So, every country girl needs a tractor ………right??

OK, first off, before we go any further, MY tractor, well, it’s a lawn tractor, with a mowing deck, …. .’nuff said.

But, it’s shiny black, gets me where I need to go, and keeps me from having to hike the "hill from hell", aka … the buns of steel work-out, booty boot camp, holy heart attack, the stairs didn’t friggin help, etc.

My Tractor comes with nifty rabbit and turtle settings, has a "safety" butt weight shut-off feature ( that thankfully someone found a way around )

And best yet, it has a handy trailer attachment to carry everything I need.

It gets me where I want to go, unless of course, there’s a lump in the way that hooks up the mower deck, or a slight, non - gravel incline, that turns it into a spin factory, or God forbid, I need to back it up with the trailer attached.

Now backing up this trailer is beyond ridiculous. With such a short length, it doesn’t matter which way you turn, it goes left, unless of course you want it to go left, then it goes right, but most times, it just fully jack-knifes and it’s back side ends up right beside your knee cap. Which, at this point it’s not an issue, unless of course, you happen to be next to a tree. Better still, next to a tree on a hill.

At this point there are 2 choices.

1. play the "I need Help" card….or
2. I deal with it.

Either way………I’m screwed.

1. I get to watch someone do a 757 point turn and effortlessly get out of this situation with a trailer that now magically turns right on command.
2. I get to lay in the dirt and unhitch the trailer.

Now for all you men out there reading this thinking " why doesn’t she just lift the back end of the trailer and move it……………well, for the purposes of this example of said stupid trailer, we are assuming that I have already filled it beyond my lifting capacity, otherwise, I would for sure pick the damn thing up and throw it to wherever I thought it belonged at that given point in time.

So ya’ll are thinkin’ ………..go for #2, … right.!!??!!

Now let me explain to you this trailer hitch.

This is not the regular "put the cup on the ball, hope it’s the right size, if it isn’t, it’s interchangeable, no big deal, flip the lock, put in the pin, add 2 safety chains and away ya go" kinda hitch.

Ohhhhh Nooooo ,

This is the "who in their right friggin’ mind came up with this" kinda hitch.

First you have, somewhere, just inches south of the back axle, a piece of metal with a hole in it. The hole is, oh, just guessing, about ½ inch diameter. Unless you lay down in the dirt, gravel, manure or whatever the situation you’ve gotten yourself into, you cannot see this prize piece of metal because of a series of weights on the back of the trailer. Now I have never asked what these weights are for, I’m just assuming that they are necessary, because they are not at all attractive and seriously in the way of viewing the sought after hole. If I ever find out that they are just decorative, then somebody, maybe even me, needs to be smacked.

So, now that you can’t see the hole you’re aiming for on the tractor, you have the hitch on the trailer……….a U shaped metal thing, with the matching ½ inch holes, about 2 ½ inches apart.

And you have a pin, just a hair shy of ½’ diameter, with a tiny hole in the end of it.

The idea is to thread the pin through the three holes, from the bottom up and secure it with yet another smaller pin.

Now, apparently, this HAS to be done from the bottom up. Regardless of the fact that gravity being what it is, and that vision doesn’t even come into play here, and that the top of the U shape will naturally rest on the metal piece of the trailer end, and you could use your finger to line those 2 holes and drop the pin down, and chances are, it will find the third hole, thus leaving one hand free, maybe even 2,.. ( go stretch, pick the manure out of your ear, whatever.)

But no, this has to be done from the bottom up. So when you do get venus to align with mars, and get the big pin through all 3 holes, you now need one hand to hold it there. Now if you didn’t already have manure in your ear, you will now, because the only way to see that little wee hole in the end of the pin that is now way up there somewhere between the back axle and those pretty weights, is to put your head down there between those wheels.

And why can we not go from the top down???

Because, the last piece of this puzzle, the man size squiggly version of a bastardized safety pin that now has to go through that last little hole is

…."Too difficult to remove from the bottom".!!!

So now who’s with me on picking option #1???

………Thought so.

But don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining about my tractor, that’s my choice, because the alternative is the 4 wheeler that tried to kill me.
　

time to go home....................just this tiny little hill to get up

me trying to back this thing up, you can see where I'm headed and just how well I'm doing with that......and it's now getting dark.

Done!!!....well, OK, maybe that's not exactly what I said when I decided to use this approach, but, hey, they don't put doors in both ends of these things for nothing you know.

So how did this all start……

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My Onkel, aka Father Goose, circa  1970

Years ago, my Onkel, at the ripe ol’ age of twenty something, found this 100 acre property, got his heart set on it and off he went to the lumber camps, saved his pennies and returned to buy it. Being a bachelor at the time, he built a small cabin and proceeded to aquire his flocks and herds and eventually a family. It was a place that as children we loved to visit, especially at Easter because the egg hunt covered a ridiculous amout of property. I have some very vague memories of him hatching eggs in his oven at the start and I seriously remember the day that we were to have a family outing to his homestead to help process the ducks, .............the thing I remember most about this was pulling out every procrastination skill that I had, just so that we would be able to arrive after the actual killing was done. And much later, as a teenager, with a summer job that required me to cross his field every afternoon to return home, I distinctly remember his crazed horse Rhubarb would catch sight of me at the far end of the field ( I always had to figure out where that stupid critter was and plan my approach accordingly ) and then he'd start all the cows into a stampede headed straight for me..........me that was running madly to reach the far side and very ungraciously launch myself into the bush in true WingNut fashion. It's no wonder that I always excelled at the 100 yard dash, or maybe excelling at it is why I am still here to talk about it.


But the reality now is that this is the total extent of my experience with anything farmlike or livestockish.


A small corner of the acreage was severed off for my parents when I was 16, and the building of This My Parents Old House began………….and like any true teenager…………I was soooo NOT paying attention to how beautiful this property is or anything else except for the fact that by the time we were moving in, I was 18 and there was NO PHONE. A year later I was off to colllege and I never lived in the house again.

So 6 years ago, my parents were straddling the 80yr old mark in their lives and they announced that they wanted to "talk"……………..you know this is going to have an impact of some sort, you just don’t know what.

We had just months earlier moved to a new house and were literally going through boxes in the garage to find the dishes to pull off this dinner and "talk". I was bracing myself for health issues.

I so did not see it coming when my, "I love my land, and healthy as an ox", Dad said that they had come to a point in their lives where they want to move to town…………...and they want the property to stay in the "family".

Frig!!!, I’m an only child, "family" would be me !! There are no brothers or sisters sitting at this table that I could turn to and say "you do it" There were so many thoughts going through my head at that minute, they all came together, crashed, exploded, rolled down my spine and regrouped in the pit of my stomach to make me feel physically ill…………..and we hadn’t even started to eat yet.
　

I mean, really, who in their right mind would want to live way out there, in a house that is reminiscent of an episode of The 70’s Show, with 2 teenagers in high school, 45 minutes away by car, 2 hours by bus. I mean really, who would want to do that,

I lied…………..and said, yes, I would.

And I’ve never looked back.

This is not the learning channel..........

If you’re tuning in here thinking that this is the learning channel then you’ve taken a big left turn and need to correct your course. This is more like the what not to learn channel, or learning at the school of Hard Knocks. It’s a blog about the learning curve towards the goal of being self-sufficient, the gardens that feed us and the crazy ride that we started when we added birds.......the many mistakes made, lessons learned and the chuckles along the way.

The curve, BTW, is not really a curve, it’s more like a Muskoka road, leading to the cottage. It has twists and turns, hills and bumps and the occasional dip in the road that askes your stomach whether or not you still want to hang on or just bail.

But just like that Muskoka road…………….the destination is awesome,

Are you ready to come along for the ride. ???