Christmas Eve

I have been working on the pallet coop for a few weeks now.  It is getting closer to being able to get some chickens in it...I got the roof on with the turkey's help.  They really like to spend time with me when I try and get anything done.  I was trying to wait on my husband to help with getting the roof on but because of rain and my impatience I did it by myself.  I did have some problems, the roof decking is pretty awkward and heavy for one person to lift up into place, but I managed...but, the turkeys jumped on one piece and it was a bit windy that day...two turkeys jumped on the 4'x8' piece as I was trying to position it...and the combination of the wind and almost 50 lbs of turkeys twisted it and it fell back and hit me on the side of my head and shoulder before I could get control of it again.  Yep, I got a big bruise on the right side of my forehead...but no bruise on my shoulder.

I got the decking up and my husband went and got tar paper for me after work...and I was able to get it stapled on before the rain hit the next day.  I moved the metal for the roof one day and was able to get the pieces of metal up after the rain dried up a bit...it took me a total of three days to get the roof on, but I still needed supports, and because it overhangs...I will have to add even more on the outer edges.  The turkeys are able to fly over the fence and on top of this coop too...I had three helpers when I was putting on the tar paper, but only two when I started putting the metal on it.  I guess they don't like the he slick surface as much.  I had on turkey hen that would sit on my leg while I was scooting around putting screws in the metal to attach it.  the turkeys punched holes in the roof on the chicken tractor too...so while I was getting metal for the new coop,I got enough to do that small coop part too.  I also used some that I had gotten for the outside of the chicken condo and replaced the poly carbonate with parts I had used for the old duck house.  The turkeys kept getting on it too and I kept having to punch the pieces back into place.  I figured it was a good time to change it...before they tore it up.  I will use the polycarbonate on the run to the big coop where there is a good sized gap.  Recycling in action...lol, they are small pieces from what we had cut off of a project for our house in Dallas.  They have come in handy.  We may have to put some caulk in some of the holes if it doesn't line up right when we fix the run roof...or when I fix it.  It is suppose to rain again this weekend, so, my husband may get out of that project too.  I am impatient and trying to get things done before it gets too cold.

Today is Christmas Eve, I worked on the pallet coop again today.  I stapled feed bags to the outside of it, they are about like the weight of a light tarp.  It will help block the wind and rain until I can get some kind of siding material for the coop.  My son gave me a gift card for Christmas and I purchased a small pancake compressor to replace my broken one...so I will be able to use the air stapler to get the rest of the hardware cloth up on it.  My fingers are still sore from putting up the hardware cloth with the hammer-in type staples.  I got another heavy duty regular hand stapler too...that is what I used to put up the feed bags with.  I am not sure what wood those pallets are made of, but I had a lot of problems getting those feed bags up.  I had enough feed bags to do all but about half of one side of the coop.  I split the feed bags so they would cover more area, so in another week...maybe I will have enough to finish lining the outside of the coop.  I still have the hardware cloth to put up and a door to build too, so it will still be a little while until I am ready to put chickens in it anyway.  I have to build roosts too.

Oh well, it is almost dinner time, I will close for now.  Enjoy your Christmas Eve!

Ouch That Hurt!

I have a new injury, around here I get them a lot.  Ever since we moved in, I have been busy doing things I have never done before.  When we were trying to get the house ready to move into we mostly just worked our butts off, cleaning and making repairs to the walls, caulking and painting...things like that.  We both got to the point we could barely walk and we would go back to the house in Dallas.  I cut my finger pretty badly one day while my husband went to go get some things from the store I had to ask him to get bandaging material and butterfly bandages.  I was using a carpet knife to remove old caulk around a window...I hit a nail and the knife twisted and caught the top of my index finger.  I probably could have used a few stitches, but was able to stop the bleeding and put the butterfly bandages on and it healed up pretty good, it took awhile for my fingernail to grow out, but it did.  Most of my injuries now are animal related. Just that cut and backing into sheet metal when wind caught some plywood and it fell on me cutting my elbow...on that one, I did go get 7 stitches or something...and a tetanus shot, my husband had to come home to take me to the doctor...I thought if I could get them to stitch me up I wouldn't have to go to the emergency room.

I have learned it is good to wear long sleeves, heavy jeans, boots and gloves...even that is not enough protection sometimes.  I have been beaten with goose wings...and turkey wings...turkeys are stronger it seems, either that or more determined.  I am pretty stubborn and if it takes me awhile to catch one...I don't want them to get loose again.  I am getting better at pinning wings and soothing the big birds...I am surprised they have not broken my nose or blackened an eye.  I have been raked by claws a few times though, they have very big feet and I am thankful that most of their claws are worn somewhat round and are not as sharp as they were in the beginning...so I mostly get bruises instead of cuts from them.  My turkeys have started pulling my hair, I have already cut it pretty short and wear a bandana a lot of the time.  I have been pecked on the head several times and they have snatched my glasses off several times too.  I had to get one of those sports bands that hold your glasses on.  One of the girl turkeys snatched an earring out of my ear too...not good when you have pierced ears.

Lately my injuries have been either bites from startled roosters that leave cuts and bruises on me...usually a hand or forearm.  My partially blind chickens, if I reach in and scare them they will grab ahold of me.  Buddy Chicken got me pretty good on the top of my arm a few weeks ago.  A few days ago, I reached down and grabbed a hold of a rooster that was making one of my smaller hens scream...there were others yanking on her comb and neck feathers, I grabbed the one on top of her and another one got ahold of my thumb at the joint to my hand...it would not let go.  I have a cut, a knot under the cut...and a bruise an inch and a half across...it was very tender the first few days, but the swelling has gone down...it looks a little like a target now, the scab in the middle, a ring of pink, almost normal skin, then a ring of green bruise.  I usually run around with several bruises these days. I have the one on my thumb, a bruise on the top of my foot from, I think our dog stepping on my bare foot, and I noticed I have a few small bruises on my forearm, probably from catching turkeys.  I guess I might have gotten them from construction...maybe?  Some of our chickens will jump up on my arm when I go out to feed them, so far they haven't made me drop the bucket but they really like jumping on the scoop with scratch grains, they start eating it as soon as they do.  I have had a turkey jump on my shoulder too...not so bad when they are smaller, but when one of our females was in my lap and a male came over, she jumped to my shoulder, the male jumped in my lap...and then she got on my head!  I guess I didn't expect to look like a fighter most the time, between the bruises and the ant and bug bites I just look a mess most of the time.

I just never know what surprises my day will bring.

Mitigating Turkey Damage

I really didn't think about additional poultry, so I didn't exactly build things to handle the weight of a mass of turkeys jumping on anything.  I am glad the big coop was built very sturdy, and with a metal roof and decking underneath it...it is holding up well so far, other structures are not.  Turkeys are curious creatures and they like to be up high...and not all of my coops are built that well.  I am having to rework my chicken tractor because it can't handle the weight.  I used a roofing product called Ondura on the top of the coop section, the turkeys have gotten on top of it and torn holes in the stuff.  The best I can describe it would be an asphalt infused, coragated heavy cloth like rubbery roofing material.  Kind of like asphalt shingle but with gauze infused into it and none of the gravely stuff...I do not recommend it, it tears and in hot months it gets really pliable...but, I don't have a decking material under it, that doesn't help.

It is what I am trying to replace now, it has holes and tears in it and now the coop leaks.  We put polycarbonate over the run on the chicken tractor too...I changed it out today.  The roof on it just has small joists two feet apart...the polycarbonate was the end pieces from another project.  Not solid, lots of two foot pieces.  The weight of the turkeys on that part was bending the pieces and distorting them so that I had to punch them frequently on the inside to pop them back into shape.  I have done it a lot over the past 8 months.  I was afraid that they too would start breaking or tearing...today I removed it, put a piece of roof decking with a raidient barrier coating on it that I took off of the duck house I tore down, and used the metal from that project on top of it.  It doesn't really work right, but the turkeys have already gotten on top of it and walked around, it is sturdy enough to hold at least two.  I will have to work on it a bit more because the overlapping doesn't work right for the distance and it makes it short about 10 inches.  It will work for now, but I will have to improvise to cover the rest of the decking.

I didn't finish writing yesterday, so this is a continuation...I worked on the chicken tractors roof to the coop part today.  I had to cut a piece of decking to fit the metal I purchased for it.  I removed the Ondura roof and may use it on a wall someplace to block the wind a bit, it is about a four foot by 6 foot solid piece of material.  It may not be totally waterproof any more but it is waterproof and I took metal that was blocking the wind from behind the ducks house and the turkey house.  I will have to hang a tarp or something now on those, I didn't get it done and it is raining tonight but it is fairly warm so they should be fine, they still have a roof over their head.  I also worked on the pallet coop too, I had to fill in a hole in the back wall...so I had to use a circular saw and cut a pallet to fit in the hole...I had some issues because nothing is straight, so I had to cut bits and pieces off and probably made seven trips back and forth trying not to cut off too much...but making it a tight fit.  Took awhile, so I didn't get much else done, I took a nest box off of the outside of the chicken tractor and moved it into the new coop...but, a little hen didn't like the height of it nor the placement.  She stood in front of it screaming and hollering at me and pacing in front of it.  I thought it may be too high so I leaned a pallet up against the wall next to it and she tested it out...only went up a few of the pallet boards and started yelling at me again, and jumped down.  I decided to move it to the front wall of the coop and not so high up.  I didn't hear anything more out of her...I wonder if she will lay in that nest box tomorrow?  Time will tell.

The rain is suppose to be worse tomorrow, so we probably will put up the Christmas tree...can't do roofing in the rain.  I am not sure if I could get the decking into place on my own, not sure if I will attempt it or not.  The decking is pretty heavy and I would have to be up on a ladder to get it up on top of the pallet coop.  It probably wouldn't be wise, but I need to get it roofed soon.  I still need to side it too, I have been saving plastic feed bags to side it well enough to block the wind and rain, only the front wall and 3/4 of the back wall is made with almost solid pallets...but that little hen that was hollering at me...she could walk through the spacing on a side wall.  I will probably have to add some boards, or cover the inside with wire to keep the chickens inside this coop.  I still need to put hardware cloth on the top section of the walls too.  I have been doing all of this with help from the turkeys too.  I am not sure how many screws they ran off with today...or how many times I had to make them get off of the roof.

Global Warming?

I don't know about the rest of the country, but here...it is cooler than normal, it has rained over 20 inches in two months and I imagine we will get some pretty good snowfall this year.  I am in Texas, we don't usually get a lot of snow in Texas...maybe the panhandle...but this is the South, and we generally only have about two weeks of real cold weather and that usually doesn't happen until January or February.  Weather patterns change, they always have...some years we may get temperatures in the Summer up to 108, and we may get temperatures in the teens in the worst of winters...in my 56 years of life in Texas, there are usually more mild days than super hot or cold.  But I have seen as low as 6 degrees and as high as 114 degrees.  I have seen ice almost two inches thick one winter with the lowest of temperatures...and that was in the early 80's.  But so was the most days of over 100 degree temperatures.

I am talking about this because I am not really ready for the colder temperatures.  I need better housing for my roosters and with all the rain we have had I just can't work outside in the mud.  I set up a GoFundMe campaign for a tractor, but no one donated.  It was a long shot anyway.  But, I will have to just try and do what I can with a tiller and a shovel and my garden cart.  It would be so much easier with a tractor, but we can't afford one.  I will till and move the dirt by hand when it dries out, I may have to cut down some trees or figure out how to move the pile of railroad ties we found by the lake.  I need a retaining wall built and a level area for my critters housing.  I did it for my big coop, but I need a bigger level area that will drain higher up or to create better drainage.  It is awfully muddy in my rooster pens.  I need to go scrape all the muck off the pallets in them and put down straw.  I need to figure out how to divert water away from the big coop with what materials I have on hand too

I acquired two really long pallets yesterday at Tractor Supply.  They are at least ten feet long, and I got a couple of 2"x4"x12' pieces of wood from the pile.  It will help with the roof on the pallet coop I am building.  I still need more pallets, but I did get a few more pallets last week...they are just not the almost solid kind so I can't use them for the flooring without something over them.  I only have so much to work with right now, I am getting things here and there, like screws and staples, but I had run out.  I am going to use plastic feed bags on the north wall to block the wind...I think.  At least until I can get some kind of siding...I am leaning towards skinning it in metal, but that is not something I can do until I sell a treadmill or my elliptical machine.  I can try and get some crafts made to sell, but that takes time too.  There just never seems to be enough time in the days to get everything I want to do, done.

None of the 12 goose eggs I set were fertile, but I was told the males will wait until the spring before they "tread" the females.  Geese don't normally lay in the Fall, but I have one that is.  Only five of the duck eggs hatched and one of the ducklings died, something happened with the egg sack on it yolk is all over in the bottom of the incubator.  The four ducks that did hatch are doing well...they look like Khaki Campbell's, and since we actually started eating duck eggs...that is a good thing.  They lay almost every day, so even if my chickens need 14 hours of daylight to produce an egg...the ducks don't seem to have that issue.  They were all molting and didn't lay for almost two months, but the chickens were laying like gangbusters then...but now a lot of them are molting still and some days I only get seven chicken eggs, some twenty...just depends on how sunny it is and for how long.  I sold five dozen eggs yesterday and four dozen this morning and I don't have any more to sell right now...except two dozen duck eggs.  Baby ducks are so cute...but very messy, I am hoping to have a broody duck one of these days...it would be nice if they hatched them instead of me doing it and raising them in the house brooder.  I need to dispose of the infertile eggs and clean the incubator, I have two more goose eggs to try...and maybe she will lay today too, I may put more duck eggs in the incubator and maybe some chicken eggs.  I need to make some money somehow, I just need something to sell.

More Rain

We moved to one of the wettest areas of Texas, we are having record amounts of rain this year...the month of November we had about 12 inches of rain.  The first year we moved in, it was a drought year, and so was last year...but, there were times we got 4 to 8 inches of rain in one day.  Most of the time, when we get that much rain, it comes down so hard and fast we have rivers running through the yard.  I took the dogs for a walk this morning and water was running on the path in several areas and there were pools of standing water about a foot deep.  I only went as far as the creek at the back of the property, it was too wide for me to jump and foamy, the dogs wouldn't cross it...so I didn't try.

I have been trying to think about some way to house my millions of roosters to get them out of the mud.  It is almost like liquefaction in their pens...it is very wet and it didn't rain today.  We got close to 4 inches of rain this last go round.  It was cloudy today, but it didn't rain...it also didn't dry out in the pens.  I do have a pallet in each pen, I put straw in half of them to give them something to stand on besides the pallet, the also have roosts...but a lot off them choose to stand in a puddle.  So, I need to do something...I am afraid they will start having foot issues.  I may have to rebuild pens in another location...and build small coops with floors for each pen, I am gonna need a lot more pallets.  I haven't been able to work on my bigger coop because of the rain.

Today I put all the heavy paper feed bags I have been saving down in my smallest garden, that and cardboard boxes I have been saving...why?  I will tell you...weed control, hopefully anyway.  One of my main problems has been weeds growing 3 feet tall very quickly in all of my gardens...when it rains a lot...they get big very fast.  When it dries out, I have to cut them...then till several times to get rid of them...can't do it if it rains, I sink in the mud...even if I manage to get it tilled and it rains before I plant anything, the weeds grow back before it dries out enough to plant anything.  I wasn't able to plant anything in my bigger garden because of weeds and rain this year.  The pigs that visited stayed in that garden and took care of most of them for me and the poultry has been keeping the weeds down since then.  But, the poultry will eat anything I plant in there too, so I will have to close it off and try to keep them out next Spring...I will need weed control so, I figured if I save the feed sacks and cardboard and use them as mulch it would help.  Right now there is water standing in my lower garden...but, I have water still running down the hill and have big puddles the ducks and geese are loving playing in.  It is bad when ducks can actually paddle around in rain puddles.

I will probably try and start a garden in a different area.  The largest chicken coop and run will have composted chicken manure that I can use for fertilizer, plus I started a good sized new compost pile this summer.  The chickens got into my last compost pile and spread it out over their yard.  Hey, I am learning...note to self, chickens do fly...so do turkeys...and a four foot fence will not stop them if they want something on the other side.  Yes...yes, they got into my little garden too.  Yep, ate almost everything...if I had not picked all the green tomatoes, between my poultry jumping the fence and the rabbits...I would have gotten nothing at all out of my Fall garden.  Lesson learned, I will have to extend my fence up and possibly cover it with bird netting...or move my garden elsewhere, maybe someplace they can't see.  I may have to make raised beds and put them in the side yard...or front yard.  I just need to be able to water wherever I put them...if we have another drought year.  If it is really wet again...raised beds should fix that.  I was hoping to be able to plant a large garden...but until I can afford to fence another area and get dirt amended so that vegetables will grow in it, I will have to stick with a smaller garden or take the risk of loosing crops to rabbits and other wildlife.

Ahhh well...I only have a small hand tiller anyway, I wanted to grow enough so that I could supplement my poultries feed.  I guess that won't happen until I can get a tractor...it just about killed me tilling my 2 big gardens so many times with the hand tiller, and hey we're only about 30 feet by 65 feet too.  My neighbor tilled a small area for me and hit concrete in the ground...so, I am sure there is probably more crap scattered around the land.  The previous owners buried a bunch of stuff, every time I dig...I find metal, glass, concrete and evidence of a burn pit.  I have been using a digging fork and turning dirt too, I found a lot of rocks that were a good size for edging a flowerbed.  Too bad the chickens, ducks, geese and turkeys wrecked my flowerbed and all the flowers.  They even move the smaller rocks...I had no idea they would move rocks...or could move rocks.  They dig holes everywhere too, big holes...I use to fill them up and move the rocks back into place...I gave up.  I may have to get a taller fence for around the area that I would like to keep decent looking, and we have discussed building an enclosed screen porch with a solid roof eventually...we have a 20' by 20' slab and have a gazebo on it now, they tore up the top on it.  I have a shade sail over it now...they haven't wrecked it yet.  It is a temporary fix, I hope.  I just needed a place to rest when I am building or gardening, or whatever.  The poultry has taken it over...and it usually has a lot of poop all over the place.  We try and hose it off every night, but since the time change I have skipped several days between cleanings...it just gets dark before I can get it done.

Score!

There is nothing like finding useable materials for chicken coops for free.  I have been worried about my roosters that are just in the fenced pens with tarps over the top since we have been having so much rain.  It is starting to get cold too, ok...cold for Texas.  It is suppose to start getting down in the 30's and with the ground being so wet, my roosters need up off the ground and a way to keep out of the north wind.

I was able to get materials for another cattle panel coop, but after finding a source for free pallets I decided to make a bigger coop that could be divided into sections and use the cattle panels for the top.  I found a source for pallets recently, some have boards really close together and make good walls.  I have created a decent sized start of a coop so far, it is about 8'x12' and it will have a pallet floor in it to get chickens up off of the ground.  I need solid walls to keep rain and wind out...the north and south walls are made with the more solid wood pallets, the East and West walls are the more open panels that will have to be covered with wire and some kind of waterproof materials.  I have been using some of the feed bags to cover coop windows, I will probably do the same thing for the walls on this new one and a tarp over the top for now.

The coop that I am working on held up in some high winds we had with yet another storm system.  The rooster pens are rather wet and I did get a couple of pallets in the worst of them.  I need to get some more out there, this weekend is suppose to get down close to freezing.  I stopped by the place I picked up the first two batches of pallets and picked up about 20 more.  These are not big pallets, they are only about two feet wide and four to almost five feet long.  They are not exactly the same sizes either, some are close to the same size, but not square, I am not sure what they were made to hold either.  Some of the pallets have large spaces between the boards and others are close together, some are light in weight and others are very heavy.  I loaded up as many as I could, then took some out and changed things around so I could get more into my truck.  I had to make sure everything was strapped in well and would not shift.  I did not want to loose my free pallets!  I also found a place that I can get pallets for three dollars each...so if I am not able to get enough pallets of the free variety to do what I need to do, maybe I can get cheap pallets to finish up the job.

I will say that I have had to make quite a few repairs to the pallets I am using, most of them have loose boards, or missing boards, or the runners are cracked, broken or parts missing.  A lot of them are made of what looks like dog eared fencing or they actually have tree bark on them...kinda log cabin looking.  This coop is going to look very rustic, not going to be very square or level.  But if it can keep my poultry realatively warm and dry...I can live with that.

I am starting to imagine what else I can use pallets for...I have seen a lot of great ideas and inspiration enough to wonder about making all kinds of things.

Give Thanks Every Day

Since the time change and "Falling" back an hour, I have been getting up early...5:00 to 5:30am early.  Sometimes I put on a pot of coffee and clean or organize something...today I write.  I got up and my dog Kensie wanted outside...I took Kensie and Bailee out and Bailee stayed on the porch by the back door and Kensie ran out in the yard to do her business.  I looked up at the stars and said a little prayer, the sky is clear, the air is cool and I can see the Big Dipper right outside of my back porch in the sky above my head.

We received almost three inches of rain yesterday, I am thankful that my poultry is doing well.  With all the mud and getting wet, I have only had one loss of a mixed breed rooster...not sure why, but I found him on the ground in a coop and he was so still and cold I thought he was dead already, but his eyes opened.  He didn't live long after that though he was very cold and already stiff  when I found him.  Normally I try a multitude of things to help a chicken I found like this.  He is probably the third one in three years that has done this.  When they get to this point they are too far gone to save. I have prolonged their agony before but once they can't stand up, and basically have rigor setting in...I am not going to try and nurse them back to health anymore. He was only about six months old, I think he was a Gold Laced Polish and Black Sex-link cross...he was always kind of weird looking and stayed off by himself.  I saw a lot of bruising on his skin when I inspected him, there are a lot of roosters in that pen with him, he may have gotten beat up...but I didn't see any cuts on him though. Roosters can be rather mean to the weakest amongst them.

I performed a Bumblefoot surgery of sorts yesterday.  A Black Sex-linked hen has been on my porch for the past few weeks, I sprayed her feet and legs with Scarlex Scarlet Oil a few times a day.  The infection on a chicken like this is a staph infection caused by an abrasion or cut on the foot, a cheesy material forms and must come out to heal totally.  A sore formed between the toes on her left foot and part of the infection protruded out, a week ago I removed some of it.  I kept spraying the oil and yesterday noticed a large scab protruding out and got all the supplies together to remove the rest.  I picked at it with tweezers and pressed the bottom of her foot, I could see it rise up through the area I removed the scabbed part.  I had her wrapped in a towel, had my nitrile gloves on and switched to forceps...I had her wrapped fairly tight because I didn't have her tight enough and she was able to flap her wings...made a mess on my kitchen floor...she is molting and feathers flew all over the place. I wrapped her tight and laid her on her back, she calmed down and I braced her with my forearm while I pressed up on the bottom of her foot, and the core of cheesy material started protruding enough to grab it with the forceps.  It took about four tries, the first few times pieces broke off.  I had to press up a bit harder and my chicken was struggling a little, but I finely got a good hold of the plug...and wiggled and pulled on it with the forceps until it finely came out.  I sprayed more scarlet oil on her feet and put her back in the cage on the back porch...I found myself saying another prayer that I was able to do the surgery.

I am thankful, every day...I thank God to give me the strength and the wisdom to get through another day here on the farm.  I am fortunate that I get to see the sunrise every day, and thankful every morning to wake up.  There was a time when I was afraid that I wouldn't wake up.  I still have a lot of pain some days, but pain tends to keep me more active...if I keep busy, and not just sit in my recliner watching TV or on the computer I feel better.  The sunshine and fresh air help, as does moving...whether it be, feeding the chickens, gardening, or building...it doesn't really matter.  I rest more often these days, but I work hard too.  Stepping outside and seeing so many stars makes me smile.  I chose this way of life and I enjoy it.  Some days I may cuss my poultry...for some reason, whether it be getting flogged in the face by a turkeys flapping wings, or getting bit by a rooster I snatch up to separate...in that moment I may hurt, I may be bruised, I may even have a cut...but I am alive and well and thankful that at the ripe old age of fifty-six...I can pick up a thirty pound turkey or chase and capture an overly aggressive rooster, or a goose that is limping...and build things to house them.

I found a place I was able to get free pallets, I am working on another chicken coop made primarily of those pallets...well, I was until it rained anyway.

Poor Muddy Roosters!

We have gotten more rain, the area under "The Big Top" is rather squishy.  The rain is washing the dirt down the hill, picking up the pine needles and settling in the fence and against the coops and pens.  It is holding the moisture now, several of my breeding pens have a few inches of muck in them.  It rained a half inch in fifteen minutes with the last front.  The good part is, the grass is starting to grow again.  I have been trying to find perennial rye grass to reseed it, so far I have had no luck.  I can special order some, but it is $85 for a bag and they said if it doesn't come up the first time, it won't be back next year and there are no guarantees.  I may have to get some in Texarkana.  I would have to keep the the poultry off of it while it started growing too.  I would rather not buy a fifty pound bag of seed.  If I can get a ten pound bag and see if I can get it growing first, then I might invest in more.  I may look on Amazon, they have pretty much everything on there...why not grass seed?

My husband and I are both realizing we need another big coop, we don't really have the money to build one right now but, it must be built before winter sets in good.  I found some free pallets and may try and go get another big load of them.  I will attempt to make a coop out of pallets.  I found a feed store that sells them for three dollars each too.   Whatever I end up building, I will be constructing by myself, so It can't be too terribly heavy...it must be durable though.  This will be for the roosters, and they fight so it also needs to be divided into sections and easy to clean.  My mind has been working ninety to nothing for several days trying to figure out an inexpensive way to construct the house/s.  It has to be able to handle a snow load, we got snow twice last year and the second time was about ten inches.  That doesn't happen very often in Texas...well, not in the Fort Worth/Dallas area anyway.  I want to use cattle panels in the construction, they are pretty sturdy and the curve I will put in them will shed snow pretty well with just heavy duty tarps as the roofing material.  If I order the white tarps, they will get more light inside of them, that is what I got for the side of the big run on the Big Coop.

I am having issues with the last batch of roosters that hatched out now. I need to separate them too, they are mating machines and they pick on the most vulnerable of my hens.  I still have about ten hens that have no feathers on the lower part of their backs, because of the roosters.  The quantity of eggs I was getting has gone way down too.  Light plays a factor in egg production, hens need 14 hours of daylight to produce an egg, but I think that and the stress of so many roosters wanting to mate is causing havoc in the hen house.  I am beginning to understand why hatcheries cull the roosters as babies.  I don't know how to sex chicks, but with Sex-links you can tell visually between the sexes.  I may have to hatch a batch of sex-linked chickens...there is an egg shortage and I need layers...not roosters!  It seems like I get a greater number of roosters every time I hatch chicks.  I would like more Marans, they are a more docile breed and since my dog Bailey killed one of my white Marans hens, it would be good to have a few to replace the ones I have lost, I lost a white Leghorn looking one too.  My broody hen Brown Racers baby, she had started laying and I really liked her...but, I guess Bailee does not want chickens going in the backyard.  She has killed any chicken that has jumped the fence when I wasn't there to intervene.

I rooster Buddy Chicken bit me on the arm while I was cleaning his cage, it was almost healed up and yesterday I grabbed up a rooster terrorizing multiple hens.  I guess he was pretty pissed off that I grabbed him off of her while he was busy with her.  A surprised rooster equals another bite and bruise on my arm...just above the spot that was almost healed...I grabbed him by the wings and let go of one to grab him by the legs...that was a mistake.  He flapped his loose wing and was able to get me good...not only about an inch and a half cut/abrasion but about a two inch bruise around it that is swollen.  I washed it well and have been applying tea tree oil.  I have been tempted to use Scarlex Scarlet Oil, which is an animal wound dressing that I use on the chickens.  I have a hen on my back porch that I have been spraying her feet with it for a staph infection called Bumblefoot.

So Much To Get Done

I have a rule...take care of live animals before doing anything else.  My husband feeds the poultry in the mornings and most of the time I check on them a few times during the day, I change water or clean or whatever I need to do.  Strange things happen sometimes, like finding a chicken hanging upside down from a gate, or a turkey with the neck caught in the fence...or chickens with wounds I notice.  I have two turkeys separated right now because they were getting picked on and I found them bloodied. I have two hens that have swollen areas on their feet one has Bumblefoot, but the other one doesn't have the scabby part...it is just swollen.  I feed my special needs chickens and Doctor them if needed while my husband is feeding the other poultry most of the time.  I have two chickens that are blind in one eye that I am keeping on my porch at the moment.  So I basically hit the floor running a lot of the time.  Today was no different.

We have had a lot of rain lately, I have hung tarps and plastic on coops trying to keep rain out it doesn't work when you get 5-1/2 inches of rain in two days and it gets worse when you get even more rain a few days after that and it is 1-3/4 inches and it all comes in about 15 minutes.  That happened early this morning, my husband baled out tarps and reset t-posts and pounded them back in...but I will have to do something more, we are suppose to get even more rain the next couple of days.  I went and raided the trees we cut down trying to clear some around the pond.  I am going to try and tent the pens that I have roosters separated in...until I can get something else figured out, you never know I may end up having to go cut down a bunch of trees and make more coops out of the small trees...Lol, I wonder if I could make little log cabins for them?  Hmmm, probably not before winter gets here.

Sitting on a hill has both advantages and disadvantages, our house is up high enough that it will probably never flood, but the chicken pens and coops are much lower although still fairly high on our land.  I have never seen the areas flood that I put them on, but some of them are only about 50 feet from a small creek.  Even when we had 8 inches of rain in a few days, the creek only left it's banks further down on our land and only as far out of them as about 20 feet.  But, when we get a lot of rain very fast and hard water rushes down the hill pretty fast and will build up on the backside of whatever blocks it.  Our house for one, all of the chicken coops too...but, being sandy soil the sand washes down and builds up on the uphill sides, even if I dig trenches to divert the water they end up collapsing and I may have to go out several times in extended periods of rain.  I am no engineer, but whomever built this house should have built the foundation thicker and higher so that this washing effect might keep the water from the inside of the house better.  They planted a lot of bushes on the uphill side also...so it will not be easy to correct the drainage issue or seal the base of the house better.  Our house is a steel building sitting on a cement slab and I don't think the slab is very thick...if it is, you can't tell because it is pretty much even with the ground.  I don't think that is a good thing.  There is a silicone seal at the base of the metal panels, but the bushes are so close to the house I am not sure if I could reapply the silicone if it fails....we may have to remove all of the bushes over there and they are the full length of the house and about six feet tall.

I started this post several days ago, we have had more rain since I started writing...and I have been trying to figure out what I can do to get more housing built for a lot of chickens.  I may just get a carport built and then enclose it.  I have been trying not to make big purchases on my credit card, but it is the only way I could do it right now.  I looked into building something similar and I think it may be the easier route to getting it done in time for winter.  I figured up the cost for wood and metal to build something from scratch...it is almost $1000 for the size I need in wood and metal alone, not to mention what I might need for hardware, I construct things with screws...it is easier on me than banging a lot of nails into wood.  Our compressor has been having issues, so we may have to get another one of those too.  The one I bought several years ago was refurbished, we may need a larger capacity compressor, my husband tried using our current compressor to ratchet off nuts on our lawn tractor and truck and the pressure was not good enough to get them off...the valve would release the pressure before he could use it to get the job done.  He finally got them off by timing it just right...but the last time I used it for the staple gun...the pressure gauge maxed out and the adjustment would just not work any more...every few minutes it would release the pressures do then it would come back on and fill it back up!  That thing is loud too.

Anyway, I will be busy and may or may not write for awhile...unless it rains a lot.  The time changed and it gets dark really early now so I have to do the night feeding around 3:30 or 4:00pm now.  I had to catch all of the turkeys yesterday and get them into their house.  We are due to get more rain tonight with a cold front that will give us daytime highs in the 50's for a few days.  I need to do a lot of work before tonight.

Remnants of a Hurricane

I am sorry I haven't written lately, as usual I have been rather busy.  We had some chilly temperatures that prompted me to get my rear in gear and start getting the chicken coops ready for winter.  I got some tarps hung before the rain started from Hurricane Patricia and cleaned a few out...but didn't get finished.  It has been raining for days now an I have been trying to get more done in the rain.  I got two more gates built for my breeding pens and shade cloth hung over them, and then a tarp...but when it started raining the tarps caught so much rain it bent the t-posts and the tarps were so full of water they were almost on the ground...the roosters in the pens were on the sides of the pens and I had to bail the water out to even get the gates to open.  I was able to basically put a pole in the center of some sort of the pens to get the rain to drain off...but a few actually broke under the weight of the water.  I will have to rethink those pens, they were meant as breeding pens not to house any chickens long term, but they have a lot of roosters in them and a couple of turkeys that were injured.

The rain is causing issues...because the chickens have stripped all of the vegetation out of their yards. We are on something of a hill and a lot of the dirt is washing down the hill and blocking gates, getting deep around the coops and holes are opening up in spots.  Not sure what I am going to do, I don't have any way to move it...except one shovel at a time.  After all the bailing out of the tarps, I can't do that...I hurt myself and have to wait to try.  So I may have to actually take the gates off and rehang them and hope all of the roosters I have penned up in them, don't get out.  Why are they locked up?  Well, I hatched a lot of eggs this past Spring...I don't know how to sex chicks and the ones I didn't sell got to grow up, there are a lot of them.  My male to female ratio in some batches was two or three to one, in a small batch of Polish I hatched one female and 5 males!  I have seven of the eight pens full of roosters...there are at least 60 in the pens.  If a rooster is overly aggressive towards the hens or participates in basically gang raping a hen...I will snatch them up and separate them from the rest of the flock.  At this moment, I have quite a few hens that are bald on their backs because of the roosters.  I am trying to get them out any way I can and most of these roosters will be processed and eaten for dinner.  I just want to make sure that I save the best of them for breeding purposes.  I still have a lot of roosters running around in the yard too.

This city girl gone country should have done more homework and realized how hard it would be to get everything done in a timely matter...that is a big fail for me.  I always thought I was pretty tough and could always get things done with very little to work with.  That may be true of some things but the country is NOT the city.  I cannot get everything I need at the drop of a hat and it is harder for me because we only have one vehicle.  Although I sell eggs and chickens, those sales don't bring in much money, some weeks I may not sell anything at all.  This past week has been pretty good, but I only sold $55 dollars worth of eggs, since I spent about $175 on feed and parts for gates and feed pans, that is not a good ratio.  It takes 50 lbs of feed a day to feed our almost 300 poultry, if it was not for my husbands business doing better the past few weeks I would have a bunch of hungry poultry.  They free range during the day, and even though the main part of their yard has no grass left...I fenced a large portion beyond that, that still does have grass.  It was looking pretty bad because of the drought, but with the rain we are getting it will green up nicely and give them some more supplemental greens.    The fence I used came from a garden area that I made that stays too wet when it rains like it has been.  So far we have gotten over 5 - 1/4 inches of rain out of Hurricane Patricia's remnants in a couple of days time.  It is still raining too.  It has been a fairly steady and gentle rain for the most part, but the temperature dropped yesterday when a cold front came through and the wind picked up and it always worries me when it has rained a lot and the wind gets up over 20 miles an hour...trees start falling.

I can see a lot of roots around the trees in the poultry yard, these are large trees and I am just hoping none of them fall.  I positioned the coops under those trees.  I am going to have to get some type of winter forage planted for the poultry and to hold the soil in place.  The good news is a lot of my poultry is finely venturing out the gate into the larger fenced area with the grass.  I guess it helps that I go out there and throw scratch grains out there and they run to me when I go out.  They see grasshoppers and such and go after them...so they are finely getting the hang of it.

Rooster Roundup Time!

At this moment, I have six pens full of roosters...I think a total of 41 since one escaped a pen, they are pretty good at that.  I have a bunch more that need to be separated out and I had one disappear...it was a Salmon Favorelle and I am upset about it being just gone...I had two, and it was the better looking of the two.  I am trying to keep at least two of each breed, but a lot of these that need to be rounded up are young, but becoming sexually active so, they have to be penned up.  

I need to do an inventory of breeds, I am afraid we may be having someone helping themselves to my chickens. I may be missing a Double Laced Blue Barnevelder and a Blue Splash Maran too, possibly a Buff Orpington and Gold Laced Wyandotte, Speckled Sussex...and Dominiques.  I have a list of what I hatched and ordered...the only chickens I sold were mixed breed...none have died either.  My husband said he would have told me if he found any.  We lock them up at night, but have found doors open, gates open and even part of the fence undone.  The trail camera needs to be moved over into the area again.  I may need to electrify the fence too.  Most of my chickens stay in the fenced area, any that get out run the fence and don't stray far.  I have been leaving my dogs out more and letting them into the larger fenced area, they are fairly good at not chasing the poultry.  The only one that they may have killed was not eaten, had no bite marks...it flew over the fence to the backyard, they probably chased it and it had a heart attack.  They help round them up sometimes and have removed a few feathers in the process, but most of the time I can go out and the dogs will be laying in the yard with chickens and turkeys walking around them.

Anyway, today I need to work on the pens so I can round up more roosters.  I have two more built, but need to put shade cloth over the top and have tarps to cover them with too...and build gates.  We need to process a bunch of the roosters but we need to set up a processing station to do it.  I have felt kind of lazy lately and done more in the house than outside projects.  That needs to change, I need to get a lot done before it gets cold and figure out coop winterization.  Our geese and a few ducks have decided they like the big chicken coop and have been sleeping in it instead of their house, if they keep it up I may put roosts in it and use their house for chickens!  If I can get the pens done by this weekend, I can probably get my hubby to help me round up roosters, he is much better using the net than me.

Took A Day Off - Sort Of

I never really take a full day off...I just don't do as much, or everything I planned on.  I had some pain in my back Saturday, so I took it fairly easy for most of the day.  I cooked breakfast, unloaded the dish washer, fed the animals, folded clothes...paid some bills.  Then sat and chatted on Facebook, tried to answer some questions for fellow chicken lovers.  My husband was working so I just semi-rested a bit.  I had planned on getting the tools out and finishing dismantling the Lowboy chicken tractor...but decided it could wait.  Thought about peeling these 20 or so pounds of pears my husband brought home, but didn't do that either...they were free and we are thinking about making cider with them.

When my husband got home we took the dogs for a walk, discussed how bad we needed to clear some of the trees growing around the lake...I skipped trimming trees for several months and all the work I did last year...well, it is hard to tell this year.  The vines and weeds are all grown back, you can still tell I trimmed all of the branches up on the trees around the shooting range, but the piles of dead branches are still laying up there waiting to get burned.  We are under a burn ban now...so it won't be happening any time soon.  Trees have grown up on the shooting range in the markers, they need to be removed before they get larger, Sycamores and willows grow really fast, trees that were not there last year are ten to twenty feet tall!  I need some small trees for roosts anyway, so maybe next week I will get some cut down...I had cut one young Sycamore tree from beside the lake but it was hard to get to and there are a lot of trees around an area there were none.  I thinned out some red maples too, the smooth barked trees are easier on poultries feet than rough bark.  Some of the younger oaks are smooth too...so a lot of the trees we cut will be used for something...roosts or I may try and make gates out of some of the straighter trees, most of these young trees only have about a two to three inch trunk.

Today I may crack some more pecans...I did it last Sunday too, I got about a half gallon of meats out in about three hours while I was watching football.  Crew is smoking a Pork Butt today, it is nice out and cool...he opened all the windows and you can smell the meat pretty good all through the house.  We need some sort of press to squeeze the juice out of the pears, I need to think about it some, I have found a few scratters and presses on the internet that look pretty easy to make, if I make a press maybe I can use it for cheese too?  I don't know...I saw some on eBay too...a metal one would probably last a lot longer, maybe I can get one on eBay for less than constructing one.  I still need to make a top bar beehive too.  I would love to have our own honey bees, but that too will be a learning process...I have a lot of wants...dreams I guess, it will all come together eventually.  I still need to build another chicken structure too.  We have some metal posts and angle iron behind the shed I am thinking about trying to use, I just need to prioritize everything and get to work.

Cooler Weather At Last!

It has been really nice this past week.  The humidity has been low and the temperatures have only been in the eighties for the highs, bright sunshiny days too...lows in the sixties at night.  I enjoy spending time outside when it is like this.  I did some yard work, mowing, trimming, weeding, watering...loved standing in the sun with all the turkeys following me making their happy noises and gobbling when I talked to them.  The chickens come out and investigate when I am watering the trees, all of them follow me down the fence line, chasing bugs and toads through the grass.  I still have some tilling to do...I want to get the ground prepared somewhat for planting in the spring.  I have been saving cardboard to cover areas to keep the weeds down.  The weeds are a constant battle...well, not where the chickens congregate. 

Poultry doesn't like tall grass either, they tend to avoid areas that it is over 8 inches or so...unless it is laying over.  Most areas that have shade are bare or close to it, they have eaten everything down to the ground in their main areas.  There is still a lot of grass in the bigger fenced section of the yard, we still have to mow it, but they love scratching around in the piles of grass looking for bugs afterward.  The ducks and geese are constantly eating, if I dump water out they dig a hole...we have a lot of holes in the yard, change out water every day...dump the nasty water, wash the containers and refill them...pools too.  I rake up the yard fairly often too...but if I don't remove what I rake...the chickens spread it all over the yard within minutes, if I turn my back on them.  

The turkeys are discovering they can fly, they have been flying up into the trees lately, flying on top of my big coop and walking around on the roof...they jump down onto the shade cloth I have hanging up too.  They are getting heavy, I am afraid they will break the polycarbonate roof panels over the run.  They have been jumping on the tarps too...and tearing them up...the shade cloth is a bit tougher I suppose.  I have a feeling it would be cheaper in the long run to use metal roof panels on the coops than to keep buying tarps to replace what is being torn up.  Turkeys are large heavy birds, yesterday I was having a hard time getting them all to go into their house to eat...so I caught some and carried them to their house.  I didn't get a good hold on one and he got his wings loose and started flapping wildly, dirt started flying everywhere and I was getting beat by his wings.  He got me once or twice on the head and face...but I held on.  Probably a mistake, but I got him to calm down and got him in the turkey house.  It is no wonder I have bruises and scratches on my arms most of the time...most of the time I have a bird fly up and grab my arm trying to get to the feed...I have small round bruises from the chickens toenails on both arms...and now a few new scratches that bled from getting raked with the turkeys toenails.  

The turkeys are good about trying to clean me up too.  Since I feed fermented feed, I use large five gallon buckets to mix it in.  When I go out to feed, I stir the buckets to mix it up well before I give it to my poultry...sometimes it splashes on my jeans.  Once I start pouring it, sometimes it will get on the outside of the bucket and they are heavy so it will rub off on me...the buckets weigh 35 to 40 pounds...then a chicken will jump up and in the bucket sometimes.  Needless to say, I get covered in food sometimes...I find myself getting pecked at a lot...when the turkeys see the food on me, they feel abliged to get it off and clean me up.  I guess the geese do too sometimes, but not as much as the turkeys...I will be somewhat surrounded by them and they will peck any area that has food on it, whether it be the side of my leg, the front of my shirt, or the seat of my pants...my best bet sometimes is just to stand still and let them clean me up.  They tend to grab my jeans sometimes trying to get at the food, the geese have goosed me pretty good a few times and getting pecked by a turkey on the butt can be a little painful at times.  But when a chicken gets into the feed bucket and I am carrying two of them and surrounded by hundreds of poultry so that I can't see the ground...or set the buckets down...they sometimes hit the food and flap wildly trying to get out.  There have been several instances that I get food from the top of my head to my toes!  Splattered all over my glasses, my arms...all over my clothes, in my hair...and the grooming starts.  I have had my glasses removed from my face, my hair pulled, the geese have actually pulled a shoe off before...so, I recommend if you wear Sloggers to make sure you have them on your feet properly!  I tend to use mine more like slides a lot.  Quick to slide on and off!  I try not to wear my shoes in the house, so I keep them by the back door to slide on when I go feed or have an egg customer drive up.

Anyway, I do enjoy the cooler weather...try and spend more time outside getting things done before the heat comes back.  It got down in the mid fifties last night and the high today is suppose to be around eighty.  In a few days it will be going back up into the nineties, so I need to get some more building done.  I don't mind hard work...good thing too, because I have a lot to get done before it gets cold.

Git R Done!

Sometimes I wonder if I will ever really have a day off again...and I don't even have a "job"!

There is an even greater appreciation here, of everyone that has ever worked on a farm or raised farm animals.  Maybe it is because I am learning, maybe it is because I love all these birds I have hatched and raised, I work my rear end off and the days fly by for the most part.  This past week has been really busy, and I am not finished re-arranging my coop.  I dismantled the roosts and re-worked them and my nest boxes, so that I have more places for my chickens to roost...well, kind of anyway.  They like roosting high, so even having 52 feet of roosts in my big coop, they only roosted on 1/3 of the roosts...the top bars of my ladder style roosts.  Live and learn...I moved nest boxes to one end and removed the waterer from the wall to make room.  I redid the roosts down from the door to the far right wall, the stretch from window to window four feet off the ground and 8 feet across.  I have two bars running a foot out from the window on both sides...then the roosts are about every 14 inches for eight feet, but they can also sit on the side bars too. So I went from two and a half 8 foot roosts they actually used to seven 8 foot roosts.  I have a 10 hole nest box on the wall on the far side of the coop and one 4 hole one that I will put where I took the waterer down from.

I moved a set of three nest boxes mounted on the front of the run by the door to the left side of the run with the 6 hole nest box I took from the inside of the coop.  I moved the waterer I took out of the inside, to the front of the run...the rain barrel that feeds it, I moved to the right of the entry door and I put one nipple type PVC waterer on the inside of the run and one on the outside of the run.  I took one nest box and moved it to what we call the condo too.  I have found eggs in the Condo, so maybe whoever is laying will use it instead of the floor.  I also hung a shade sail that I had gotten for the gun range shooting station...but forgot about...on the front of the coop over the rain barrel to give them some shade.  The shade cloth is probably at least 8' by 10', much better than the two chairs they were laying under for shade!  I am just hoping that the turkeys don't use it as a trampoline like they do the ones over my breeding/rooster pens.  Speaking of roosters...my husband and I caught more and I think I have around 43 rooster in those pens now.  I still have a lot of roosters running around too!  Lots of them are still young and not "active", if you know what I mean..but taking so many out of the coop and yard I hope my poor girls will grow all their feathers back before it gets cold.  Around here, it does not usually freeze until late November or early December...maybe they will quit molting too, my hens hatched last Spring look pretty awful, at least the popular girls do.  Some of them even have a sunburn on their bald spots.  I had chicken saddles on them, but some have gotten torn up and some just got ripped off.  I should have separated roosters out sooner, but I just didn't have anywhere to do it until I built the pens...and finished them with doors and tops.  

When I build, rearrange, or tear down anything...I still have all my other chores to do.  I partially tore apart the "Lowboy" chicken tractor that was damaged from the weight of water on the tarp I covered it with, I partially cleaned my feed room (where I mix up fermented feed and store it), broke down a lot of boxes to use around plants to try and keep weeds down, plus laundry, dishes, vacuuming, cooking, shopping, feeding, watering, cleaning...well, you know...every day chores.  My husband has been feeding the poultry in the mornings, so it gives me a bit more time to do some morning chores in the house and he helps in the evenings when I don't get them fed before he gets home from work.  I try and feed them around 3:30 or 4:00pm to give them time to eat and digest some before he gets home and gives them scratch grains.  I finally got a shade cloth hung over our back patio too...so we can have a shady spot to sit.  We sat out and rested between our activities yesterday.  My husband replaced some pullies and a spindle on the mower deck and mowed some yesterday, while I was working on the shade cloth and waterers.  It was nice yesterday, there was a breeze and even though it was still really warm...it felt pretty good in the shade.

My husband has been working with the dogs, trying to get them so they don't chase the poultry.  Yesterday they got to actually go into the large fenced portion of the yard with all of our poultry, it was interesting watching them.  Bailee is really the only dog we worry about chasing and possibly killing anything.  She is our Catahoula mix, our Hog Dog. We had to keep reinforcing no chasing, be a good dog and praising her when she behaved.  She had turkeys and geese, ducks and chickens all around her...my husband was basically playing fetch with Sophie and Kensie was mainly interested in sitting in one of the large water buckets.  We have a few turkeys that like to sit in our laps and they decided to do it yesterday...I had a female in my lap at one point and a male decided he wanted up in my lap, she jumped up on my shoulder then tried to get on top of my head!  These are not small turkeys, they have good sized claws too.  I got her off my head but he stayed laying in my lap and enjoyed having his neck rubbed for awhile longer.  You can tell how much they like it...they stretch their neck out and close their eyes when you rub their waddles or the back of their neck.  I think the females probably weigh at least ten to twelve pound now and the males fifteen to twenty pounds...no I have not weighed them, I am estimating.  They are a it over four mo this old now.

I cleaned cages on the back porch on Friday, I have a bald Silver Wyandotte chicken hen up there and Pop-Eye the Salmon Favorelle and Buddy Chicken the Cream Legbar both of them have eye issues, I brought them on the porch to make sure they were getting enough to eat...they seemed thin.  Pop-Eye is completely blind in one eye, she had a bad eye infection when she was hatched.  Buddy Chicken has one eyeball that is way back in the socket and flat...like he has no cornea?  I think he can see out of it, just not extremely well...he does not run around in circles like Pop-Eye does.  We have one rooster my husband has stuck with the name Blind Melon, he appears to have cataracts on both eyes but he gets around well, eats well and is a very good looking rooster he just gets special treatment...my husband will give him food and set him right in front of it or treats to make sure he gets enough to eat.  He is blossoming, he is getting out of the coop and interacting more, has grown well and is a good healthy weight.

I need to get busy, I just woke up early and decided to write today.  I still have a lot to do, I am trying to get some building and changes made before the time change occurs November 1st.  I plan on trying to get some garden chores done too, need to ad a wire mesh to the bottom of my garden so rabbits can't get in and eat everything, and make a new gate...the current gate is actually part of a fence and my chickens keep getting in the garden it doesn't latch well and I have had to wire it shut...we had to chase a lot of chickens out of it yesterday.  I have a plan to move blueberry bushes too...

Playing Catch Up

It is very easy to get behind on chores and duties here on our little farm.  I am playing catch up, I always get behind on chores when I build things or it rains a lot.  I take care of live animals first and foremost...so, sometimes other things slide, like folding laundry and putting it away, or scrubbing toilets, maybe dusting...well, I don't like doing that stuff anyway...but, I do it.  I am behind on a lot...but, I try and prioritize things and get some stuff done while the weather is decent.  I weeded the garden I planted...I had to, you could not see anything but weeds...but there is corn planted in there...was green beans, asparagus, carrots, cantaloupe, watermelon...it was covered up with weeds.  I had to hand pull weeds that were 4 feet tall, it took awhile...I was trying not to pull up my vegetables with them.  I think the only reason there were any left was because of the weeds...the gate became unlatched and the chickens and turkeys decided they needed to check out the garden...I got lucky, they ate mostly the weeds.

I worked on watering today, our lawn tractor is broken again...parts are on order...so instead of filling up my pump sprayer, I had to drag hoses and water by hand.  My fruit trees needed it and so did all my potted plants, that took awhile, I transplanted plum trees last year and am trying to keep them alive, my apple trees, pears and grapevines needed it bad too.  I pulled up a bunch of weeds in a flower bed too, trying to find these red Spider Lily things that are blooming in other peoples yards...we had them bloom last year, but I think they may have been mowed over this year...oh well.  One of these days I will do up the flower beds right to keep that from happening...out here I have already gotten poison ivy really bad trying to clean this flower bed.

I decided I needed to work on the chicken coop.  Winter is coming and I need to increase roost space inside my big coop and move chickens around.  I am trying to figure out how to get more roosts the same height with more capacity...but still be able to clean easily.  I moved a 10 hole nest box inside the coop, I will probably remove the smaller ones and use them in the run or another coop.  But I had to clean the walls and didn't get it finished, I had to reinstall a roost tonight in the coop...the second one I put in the run and the chickens started perching on it and it is not attached to anything.  I was worried that they would be confused and not find a place to sleep, but they did good.  I just hope when I finish the modifications more of them will go into that coop!  I am thinking about moving the rain barrel that supplies water to the big coop too, the chickens will stand on the grate underneath the PVC pipe and play with the watering nipples and flood the floor and stand in the water.  They make a big mess and I am trying to think of ways to keep that from happening and make sure they have clean water available all the times.  Right now it takes a long time to fill all of the waterers I have and to clean them out.  But the PVC waterers will explode if they freeze. Ask me how I know this?!

Small Taste of Piggies

There is nothing like being thrown into a situation that you have no idea how to deal with, but I think we did a pretty good job of taking care of the pigs that came wandering into my yard.  Today was the 9th day...after I had a conversation with a neighbor down the street who works at a local feed store I found out who they might belong to...today was the first time my husband saw that someone was home and he went over to talk to the neighbor.  They were hers, she described them to a T, they had been missing since the day before they came wandering into my yard.  My neighbor thought they were in someone's freezer by now, she heard several shots and figured since they escaped someone probably shot them. We told her we took good care of them but went through the Sheriff's Office and she would have to call them because we needed to be reimbursed for feed and care...she agreed to pay me back for the feed, she was just happy to get them back safe and sound.  My neighbor and her daughter came over with a small bucket of food...dog food.  I showed her the pigs and she was so happy to see them alive and well.  We talked a bit, she moved here from Dallas too!  She too is new to raising farm animals but has three pigs and a few chickens.

She had to repair her pen before she got her pigs and I told her that was fine, they had already been fed and it would probably be easier if she came and got them when they were hungry, that we had been feeding them around five or so.  I was not ready when she came by to get them.  All of my poultry was out and after she put a rope on one and it went crazy and started bucking like a bronco to get the rope off...I figured I should put up my birds.  I really didn't want them getting hurt while she was trying to retrieve her pigs. The pigs were not huge but an 80 pound pig could do so major damage to a five pound chicken or a 15 pound goose or turkey.  My husband tried to help her while I was doing a mass poultry roundup.  It did not go well.  I was busy rounding up chickens, ducks, geese and turkeys and I would look over and she would be getting dragged around the pen.  At one point she was on the ground rubbed down the male...my husband said it was having a panic attack or something.  

We tried different tactics, she left and came back with a heavy duty cage, one of her friends showed up and they tried getting one pig in the cage, they got the big one in the cage but the side door was not latched well and it popped open and she escaped.  She tried to get one to follow her home with food...but it came running back to my house.  I went and got the bucket of food I had ready and we both tried to get her to follow us to her house, we got almost to the driveway and a car drove by and the pig hi-tailed it back to my yard.  It ran up and down the fence driving my dogs nuts.  Then it took off down the side of my fenced area and around the back of my poultry area trying to get back to the pen with it's buddy.  I figured it would be better to be inside the fenced area and I was able to coax it back into the larger area, but then it started flopping down in the mud and running up and down the backyard fence driving the dogs crazy again...and then I found out pigs like to eat rose bushes.  The guys finally got the male pig into the cage and loaded onto the cart, up the hill and I was able to get the big gate opened and they moved the cage next to the SUV...all four of us lifted the cage into the back of the SUV but the little pigs foot went through the bottom of the cage and the weight of it hurt him and he squealed something awful...I noticed his foot and our neighbor was able to work the foot back into the cage while we held it up.  Boy was I glad when they drove away with him...one down, one to go!

I went and put the dogs into the house since the pig was running the fence and driving them nuts.  It was easier to get it to come to me and I kept scratching it's back and it really enjoyed that so it stayed close...lol, it stretched way out like a dog does when you scratch them on the back almost to the tail...it was pretty funny, but it sure made it easier to keep it from running the yard.  It found a wet spot and enjoyed rubbing in the mud...so it was pretty much covered and her owner ended up pretty much covered in mud too.  Miss Piggy decided to run once again when she saw the cage, my husband suggested marshmallows to coax her into the cage so I ran and got some...my neighbor tried to get her into the cage using them, but that pig knew not to go into it...that it was a trap.  Our neighbor said she wished she had beef jerky...because the pig loved it.  I just happened to have some beef jerky...between it and the giant marshmallows Miss Piggy finally went into the cage, ok, it took more than one piece of jerky...the pig and the owner had a bit of a tug of war with the first one.  We repeated the loading process using the piano dolly...she was heavier and at least she didn't have any parts going through the bars on the cage...the only one that got hurt was my husband getting his hand somewhat smashed during loading.  He is fine, nothing too bad..but I will tell you this, it will be awhile before we are ready for pigs.  

When we were out feeding the poultry I noticed the rope and the leash were left behind...so I imagine I will see the neighbor lady again before too long...especially if she didn't get her pen fixed good enough, I think the pigs were very happy here on their mini-vacation...they had about a 36'x65' garden area to root around in...ate well and got a lot of attention..they may be back, but at least I know where they belong now.

Oh My, Pigs Are Messy!

Pigs like to wallow in mud, but I didn't know they would create their own mud by dumping every container of water we put into the enclosure.  We moved the pigs from the backyard because they kept rubbing up against the fence, the house and anything else they could.  They dug pits to lay in too, and rooted up around the slab on the house and out at the patio.

We currently have them in a garden area, it is overgrown with weeds...but they can root around all they want out there.  It is just 2"x4" field fence though.  They escaped the first time we got them in the garden, the gate was very flimsy.  I made a sturdy gate and got it hung up and so far it is holding.  I think as long as they have food and mud, and shade they will stay in the garden.  They will follow you if you have food, but I got my foot stepped on and got pretty muddy yesterday trying to get it set up for them...and I put their food in dog dishes...kinda silly, but easier to carry.  So far they like dog food pretty well, I put corn and oats with it and most of those were left on the ground.  I guess we have picky eaters.

I thought they had escaped yesterday, I couldn't see them...the pool was overturned and so was the 20 gallon barrel...I went in the enclosure and next thing you know these empty containers started moving...and the two pigs came out.  They were well camouflaged with thick mud.  I went and got some dog food and cracked corn for them and ended up getting my foot stepped on and mud rubbed all over me.  After I put down the food I tried getting the containers flipped back over and refilled.  I got an old tarp and we strung it up to give them some shade.  It was in bad shape and was sort of falling apart, but it worked until today...they pulled it and it tore more, so I put a new tarp up over the rooster pens, and took the smaller tarps down and used one of them for shade for the pigs...I picked one that was also not in the best shape, but if they can reach it...I didn't want to waste a new tarp finding out.

I think both of the containers they dumped totaled about 75 gallons, maybe more...they made a couple of good sized mud pits after the water softened up the ground and they rooted up all the grass.  The pits are deep enough that it is hard to tell anything is wallowing in the mud, until they move.  We took the 20 gallon container out and replaced it with the bigger Rubbermaid trough we had in the goose area...I think it holds 55 gallons and is large enough for one of the pigs to lay in.  So far they have not flipped it over.  My husband got the hose and refilled their mud holes today, squirted them down a little too...they really enjoy that.  I can't really blame them wanting in the mud, since they have been here, these great big huge horse flies have been getting on them.  I thought about spraying some bug repellent on the poor things, but I am not sure if it would hurt them.  So for now, mud is their best protection.

Oh, and I remember the stench of the pig farm that use to be off of Highway 30 and Beach Street when I was a kid, so far it doesn't smell that bad...but pig poop does stink.  I am sure it will be smelling pretty gross if they are here much longer.  If they clean up the weeds out in the garden and turn the soil well, it is soft enough and the area is big enough for the two of them it shouldn't get too awful.  Once the weeds are gone, I can rake the area easier anyway.  In our heat here in Texas, things usually dry up fast and break down pretty quickly...but in the mean time my garden plot is getting fertilized and aerated pretty well.  If we end up being pig owners I will have to build a shelter in the shade for them a bit further away from the house and the chicken yard.  Maybe down by the creek someplace so I don't have to supply as much mud water for them...lol, we shall see what happens.  I still wonder if someone dropped them off because they couldn't feed them any more?  Who knows, in the mean time they are safe and sound...they won't get hit by a logging truck going 60 miles an hour and I feel better knowing a coyote won't be eating them for dinner.

Well...They Didn't Escape

I woke up this morning thinking maybe the pigs I have in my fenced backyard may have escaped...they did not.  They did root around a bit, one section of my fence line won't have to be weeded for awhile.  We gave them some more dog food for breakfast this morning and scratch grains, I don't happen to have any pig feed handy and they didn't care for the chicken feed I gave them yesterday.  One of my Facebook friends said they need five to eight pounds of food a day each...I guess it is a good thing I just got a 55 pound bag of dog food.  My husband went and talked to more neighbors to see if anyone was missing any pigs...so far we have not found the owners.  

They are friendly pigs, they like getting squirted with the water hose, like being scratched on their ears.  My dogs got out in the backyard for a minute with them, Sophie barked at them, Kensie wagged her tail, and Bailee has the shock collar on and didn't approach them or bark at them...she is my hog dog, and a hunter...I thought it was necessary.  I wouldn't mind keeping them if we had a proper place to do it, we have discussed other farm animals but we need the money to feed them too.  I am not sure how big these will get, but from what my Facebook friends said, they are between 3 and 4 months old.  One of my neighbors has a pig at least 5 feet long...they are not his pigs and he told us good luck feeding them!

I am not real sure what we will do with them, but I don't want to keep them in my backyard forever.  If we kept them they would need a pen of some sort, that is a bit more sturdy than our current fencing.  They probably would need a house too, it does get cold here...but I am not real sure how hardy pigs are.  I guess I should read up on them and find out.  My husband went to work...I wonder if he will come home with pig food?

I have chores to get done, but it is already hot outside.  I wet down an area in the yard with some shade and hosed them down already.  I may post a found add on the Trading Post and on some local Facebook sites.  We have gotten no calls from the Deputy, no neighbors are missing and pigs.  

I built a sturdy gate for my lower garden area, after much running around we finely got the pigs moved, have pool setup in the garden and a half barrel full of water.  Hopefully they won't escape tonight either.  I am hoping they will eat the weeds in there, I gave them more dog food but I will buy some pig chow as soon as I can get to town.  I keep wondering if pigs are suppose to be tagged or tattooed or something for identification purposes, I have not found any markings or tattoos, but I have not examined them really closely but I am still a little afraid of them.  They can flip 25 gallon containers of water over easily and I imagine it would hurt pretty badly if they ran into me or stepped on my foot.  I will hang some shade cloth so they have shade all day out there and if no one claims them I may put up a structure for them to get out of the weather...I can use the parts from my old duck house that I just took apart.

I wonder if pigs like carrots?  I need to make friends with them...it would probably be easier to bribe them to get them to follow me, I guess I will learn about pigs next.  I thought my first bigger animal might be a goat, but...I don't know anything about pigs or goats yet.

Some Days Are Very Interesting...

Today started off normal, but certainly didn't end that way.

I went out and did some normal chores, filling up waterers, making sure the animals are all doing well, picking up things...let the turkeys out because hubby forgot, checked on the baby ducks...things like that.  I decided to dismantle the "Lowboy" that was damaged, went and got keys to the shed and collected tools to start to work on it.  Sometimes it seems bad to build things well, especially if you want to reuse parts...the Lowboy was basically made from 2"x2" and 2"x4" pressure treated pine, the sides just had chicken wire stapled to them, the top was already torn hardware cloth.  You would think since it was put together with screws and chicken wire it would be quick and easy to take apart. It was not.  It is not...I got sidetracked and helped by turkeys, it is not completely apart.

I went to get some ice water, today was kind of hot.  The UPS guy stopped and made a delivery.  I went and got the packages and opened them, new light bulbs for the heat lamps and shade cloth came today, I have to finish pens to separate more roosters...shade cloth is for over the last two pens.  I sold 14 chickens to get the money to do it...and help feed the poultry.  Anyway, while I was up at the house I saw something run across the street.  I thought it was deer and walked over to see if I could see them behind the shed...when all the sudden two pigs came out from behind the shed.

They were decent size pigs and I was thinking, we have not had any wild pig signs out here...they bee-lined it to my grapevines and I thought they would tear them up.  I yelled at them and they came towards me, but swerved when they saw the kiddie pool out by the tree...they jumped in the pool!  I know nothing about pigs, I ran and got my camera...I figured my husband wouldn't believe me unless I had proof.  Then I went out and took a few pictures, and called him.  Since we already had a cow loose on our property, he believed me when I told him about the pigs.  He had to go before I was able to ask him any questions...he was at work and a customer came in.

Anyway, I decided to try and get them into the backyard.  We have logging trucks that drive by at 60 miles an hour on our street and didn't want them to get hurt.  I also figured someone would probably come looking for them, they did when we had a cow loose on our land.  I got some dog food and poured some on the ground, they gobbled it up.  I went and got more and shook the container and called them and they came running.  I dumped it out in my back yard.  I am a member of a few groups on Social Media and asked what to do...I called the Sheriffs Office since we live out in an unincorporated area in the boonies.  They had a Deputy call me back.

I heard a commotion outside and went to investigate.  They had dumped out the dogs waterer, the bottle part was on the ground and wetting the porch...along with my feed barrel that was about a quarter full of scratch grains...the scratch grains were all over the porch and both pigs were munching it down.  I opened the security door and retrieved the big container and lid.  At this point I was unsure of how friendly they were or if they were feral hogs or domestic.  I thought they were domestic, I have seen wild hogs before and they didn't look like them.  But I consulted with the group and got some answers, I have never dealt with pigs before and it was kind of scary to me...I have heard they can eat people, I gave them more food...I am not ready to take care of pigs, not sure I should start off with any this big.  I am guessing the weight of the larger one at 120 pounds, the smaller one at around 80 pounds...female is larger, the male...well I saw pictures of males posted on the Facebook group, he has either been fixed, or is very young still.

I hosed them down and they enjoyed it, they never rushed me or anything so they are pretty friendly, they flopped down in the water as I was wetting them down.  The members of the group told me they can sunburn easy.  I even was able to scratch their ears.  They seem like they are people friendly.

Hair Cutting Time

I recently decided to give myself a haircut.  I have been cutting my own hair since I was about 13 years old so it is nothing really new, except the reasons are different to keep it relatively short now.

It has been hot and humid, my hair has a lot of natural curl to it and the older I get the more coarse it becomes and I guess you could say frizzy.  I have been working outside a lot and it is hard to wear a hat a lot of the time, they blow off or a turkey may grab one off my head.  I tried wearing a bandana over my hair to try and keep pine needles and cedar stuff out, but they come off too.  I found myself spending a lot of time in the shower picking things out of my hair, cedar fronds, pine shavings and needles and no telling what else.  I cut it pretty short, my husband doesn't like it...he didn't say that, but reserving judgement until I fix it...well that doesn't sound promising.

I didn't intend for it to be as short as it is, but sometimes when you cut your own hair it is difficult to get the back of your hair looking right and I had some issues with it being short in the middle and long on the sides, or shorter on one side than the other.  It grows pretty fast though, it will be OK, I don't mind it being this short.  I use to wear it short when I was on the swim team in High School or when I was working a ton of hours, I have pretty thick hair and cutting it short is a time saver...it would take 30 to 45 minutes to blow dry it and style it.  Lol, not that I do either very often any more.  I use to color it too, don't do that or wear makeup much any more either.  Very few people see me now and I don't inspect myself in the mirror very often either.  I guess I should pay a bit more attention to what I look like at times, since I am afraid I may scare customers off...but, as long as I am clean and my teeth are brushed I don't bother with makeup or hair gel and such.

I am thinking about cutting my husbands hair today.  He tried to get a haircut a few times in town before, there are a few places in Atlanta that are suppose to cut hair.  Finding one that is open when you want a haircut is the trick...we went in one shop, the lights were on but nobody was there.  We waited for awhile, we thought maybe they were using the restroom or something.  No one ever came out from the back or responded to our hello, anyone here?  We went to another place and they were closed.  In this place, it seems like people don't really have much competition like in Dallas...it seems like they don't care most of the time.  The sign may say what hours they are open for business, but I think a lot of places just don't care and come in for work when they have nothing better to do sometimes.  I don't think my husband has gotten a haircut out her from anyone but me...just trying to get it done before getting busy doing other things is tricky.  

I always have a lot to do...I got busy, he got busy...and it didn't happen today.  Oh, and I tried Walmarts salon before...that probably won't happen again.

Easter Egg Hunt Every Day

I believe I started raising chickens in July or August 2013?  In the beginning I only had two roosters and four hens...it was pretty easy to start.  I raised them in a chicken tractor we built.  It was really heavy, still is...but we use to move it around every few days.  It has been stationary for awhile now, it sunk into the ground in soft sand and I can't move it by myself, it will take a tractor and a couple of people to get it out the wheels on it have sunk into the ground about six inches at least.  My chicken tractor was fine for the six, but because we only got one or two eggs a day the first winter...we got four more chickens to add to our flock...it has kind of snowballed since then but I built an extension to the tractor that I could drag around to fresh ground that gave my chickens additional space.  There are four nest boxes in my chicken tractor...they stayed enclosed so no real hunting was involved for eggs, although they did lay eggs in the run sometimes.  My husband got the bright idea to use a golf ball retriever to get the ones in the run, great job honey!

Anyway, after my hens started going broody and we let them sit and hatch chicks, we decided to build a big coop to house them all.  In the mean time we got some baby ducks!  After brooding the ducks I needed a place to put the ducks while they were growing.  I built a grow out pen.  The grow out pen I made so that it could be moved fairly easily, four panels with rings that I could drop metal rods down into...it was a bit heavy to move each panel, but it was possible.  I actually had the ducks set up in the backyard, at the time it was the only area that was fenced.  This grow out pen was later used to make my "Rooster Condo"...it has all been a learning process.  I also found geese at a feed store and those soon were added.

Oh gosh, getting off track...but, my poultry yard and area has expanded a lot. In the beginning I just fenced around the chicken tractor.  I then fenced around my garden area next to that area, then after we built the big chicken coop, we fenced off an area for the ducks, then around the coop and another couple of garden areas and added a large gate to be able to mow the area.  I added dividers inside the area so that I could separate roosters or different ages of chickens too.  Then after hatching a lot of chicks this year, adding more ducks, more geese and turkeys...I fenced an even larger area and this is the area we have started having to hunt for eggs.

My older chickens still lay in nest boxes for the most part.  I had some issues when I had so many broody hens, but I added more nest boxes to fix that.  Now the chicks that hatched in February are starting to lay, they lay in the bushes, clumps of grass, next to the wood pile, in flower pots, under the nest boxes, in the turkey pen, in the chicken coops run, under the roosts, behind rain barrels, the ducks and geese lay in dewberry patches or sometimes under a tree that has some bushes around it and vines.  Some days I will be out filling pools and waterers and all the sudden I will turn around and there will be an egg practically laying at my feet.  I even found one on top of my patio table just laying there suddenly.  The ducks have laid in their pools before, and if I disturb an area they like to lay by putting straw or soft grass or something down over the dirt, they will move to another area sometimes...so, it is a constant hunt, my husband calls it an Easter Egg hunt, but the poultry are the ones hiding the eggs!

I am going to make a couple of large ground nest boxes big enough for the geese, ducks or turkeys to lay in...hopefully they will figure out what they are for.  I have one made that the frame is made from 1"x6" wood but I put cage wire as the bottom and raised it up off the ground a touch so the nest will stay dry.  Time will tell if they will use it.