Happenings Around the Farm

Hello :) I apologize, for I have not been writing nearly enough. That however, is about to change...

Ta Da!! Screw you steady paycheck, nobody needs you.

 That's right, I put in my 2 weeks notice at work. I'm super excited, and a little (maybe a lot) nervous. I have a good feeling about this though, and I am looking forward to the many changes that are coming! So, what am I going to do with all my new found free-time? I have a ton of plans, for starters taking care of the farm. John and I are busy every single weekend with random stuff that comes up, for example the turkey disappearing or the pig escaping, and we got to thinking about how when we're both at work, nobody is home to take care of the important things that pop up. That thought makes us both very anxious. This place just needs a lot more care than we can give it with our current schedules. So we've done a lot of talking and planning, and I decided to go for it and quit my job. I'm going back to school in August, so until then I'm going to focus full-time on the farm. I'm taking most of my classes online, so it should work out perfect. I'm really excited about the future right now :)

Meantime, on the farm, we have new babies! Our chickens have been going broody left and right, and we finally have some new chickies :)  They're so adorable!

Hatching

Mama Hen and a Chick

Also, We found this puppy...

My brother told me that there was a dog running around by his friends house with a litter of puppies. All the puppies had been killed except one. One got hit by a car, I don't know about the rest. He convinced me to go look for the remaining puppy, who we found sitting on the sidewalk near a drainage ditch just inches from the busy street, and now here she is! John, my husband, has dubbed her Potato. Often times she wakes up crying and whimpering loudly, like she is having bad dreams. :( She has nothing to worry about anymore though, the poor little pup will have a nice place to live here on our farm.

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I have to admit, I'm a little addicted to Instagram. My username is aGirlandaFarm. Follow me, I'll follow you too. :)

That Troublesome Turkey

Dino the turkey is up to her usual antics. The other day when we went to close the coop for the night, she was nowhere to be found. We didn’t panic right away, knowing from last time she disappeared that she was probably brooding somewhere, so we started searching. After a while the sun had gone down and all the usual places had been checked, but no turkey had been found. Panic started to set in at this point. More than likely she was fine, but she would not be fine for long if we didn’t find her before the predators did. We’ve lost too many of our birds, sometimes right under our noses during the day, to feel secure with her out of the coop for even a few hours after dark. It really doesn't help that at night time, turkeys (and chickens) seem to lose all thinking ability and just sit there, no matter what's happening. Predators have no trouble walking right up and making a meal out of them, they don’t try to get away or anything. I guess it's the darkness or something, I really don't know. By now it was now plenty dark and my turkey was still not in the coop. I started running back to the house to get a flashlight, feeling my heart sinking. Suddenly, I felt the earth squish under my foot as something let out an indignant squawk. I flew towards the ground, catching myself on my hands and knees. Dino stared down at me, feathers ruffled but otherwise ok. 

She had apparently decided that the middle of nowhere with no cover or protection, other than being slightly hidden in foot tall weeds, was a great place to make a nest. Oh turkey..

She's a looker.

The Mystery of the Disappearing Turkey

Dino, our pet turkey

Yesterday, we learned what it feels like when a parent loses there kid in a crowded area. Our child was a turkey, lost amongst acres of four foot tall weeds, but I'm sure it's a similar feeling. I got home from work, and as soon as I saw John I could tell something was wrong. "I can't find turkey" he told me sorrowfully. The next 30 minutes were a paniced blur, we combed the property, looking everywhere. "Maybe she's hiding with some eggs", John tried to cheer me up. I rejected the idea, she had never even layed an egg before. If she didn't come for the afternoon scratch treat, the worst had to have happened. We called her and searched the best we could within the rain forest of weeds that is currently our property, there was no sign of her. Every bunch of weeds I searched, I expected to find her body, half eaten by a predator like we've found chickens who have gone missing. It would be hard, if not impossible to find any remainder of her amongst the weeds, so we headed back to the coop, giving up.

Well guess who was waiting for us at the coop when we got there? I don't know where she had disappeared  to, but at least she was safe.

Natural World: Farm for the Future; A video intro into permaculture

While wasting time at work one day I stumbled across this video on a website, http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/, that has given me a new perspective on farming. It explains how huge monoculture style farms, tilling, and pesticides are not sustainable methods of agriculture, and that if we are going to feed our ever growing population things are going to have to change. The video teaches how diverse, permaculture farming methods are the the future of farming. My favorite part, the documentary advocates no-till farming, which I am a huge fan of. Watch the video, I promise you'll learn a lot :) 

Natural World: Farm for the Future

Something to make you say "awwww!" - Video of a chick hatching

Here is a video of the chick we hatched out in the incubator after the mom gave up on it. After she dried she went back outside and now we can't tell her apart from the other chicks. Oh, and don't worry, the blood is normal. ;)

Guineas, Weeds, and Hero

The four guineas we've been raising are finally ready to go from the brooder to the chicken coop. We moved them a couple days ago. After a few weeks they'll be ready to be let out of the coop to free range with the rest of the poultry. They've already made a friend; a black sex link has found her way into their part of the coop and is now roosting with them.

Sadly, weeds are taking over as our little lawn mower broke over the weekend. But on an up side we got a new feed bin, we'll no longer have to keep the scratch in the truck. Hopefully this cuts down on the chickens attacking the cars when we drive in.

Hero, our ram, is still getting used to being tied. He still tries to run from us every time we approach him, even though he's eaten many treats out of our hands and let us pet him a bunch of times. But each time we go to catch him to tie him out to eat he runs.  During the chases around the yard we've discovered French Fry, the dog we found and put in with him mainly because there was nowhere else for her and they both needed company, is a pretty good herd dog. She actually helps us by cutting him off when he runs and keeps him in place by licking his face. The other night he came untied, but all we had to do to catch him was let French Fry out and Hero followed her right back into the yard. They've bonded well, but we definitely need to get Hero some sheep friends asap.

This weekend we're gonna do more work on the garden and post some more photos to the blog, check back soon!