The bath tub brooder..

A friend gave Damian 24 fertilised eggs a few weeks back, all the light sussex breed. So in to the incubator they went. They are all hatching at the moment, and so far we have got 18 hatched and another 1 on the way. One has died in it's shell, and the remaining 4 haven't shown any signs of doing anything yet, so we're not holding out for those to hatch. It is day 21 today, so we'll see. That's probably one of the best hatching rates we've had to date. The person who gave us the eggs said he spritzes the eggs with water in the last couple of days to keep the shells moist, so we tried this along with the higher humidity we normally do in the last 3 days, so not sure if this is the reason why we have ended up with a higher than normal hatch rate, but we'll certainly do that again.
I usually put the chicks in a large cage I have here with the brooder light, but the chicks flick the wood shavings all over the ground, and it makes a really big mess. The man who gave us the eggs says he uses an old bathtub as a brooder, which we thought was a great idea, and we have a few old baths around here, so Damian set about making a stand and putting a mesh lid on the bath, and......ta dah!

He has made it nice and high for easy access, and to keep the dogs out of it. He also cut a hole in the mesh at the top for the brooder light to be able to poke through so we can keep it high enough for them. They seem nice and happy in their temporary home.

These 2 have hatched in the last couple of hours, with another one on the way, which is the egg on the right with the pip marks in it....

We went to the markets this morning to get some fruit and veg, and I picked up the huge basket full of lettuce and herbs for  $8!!   I thought that was way too cheap, but apparently that is what she sells them for.

I just got back from a week in Brisbane with the big kids yesterday afternoon, and friends of ours on the Sunshine Coast did a big garden clean out while I was down there, and gave away all of their agaves, so I went and picked up some of what they had, and planted a few down in Brisbane and the rest will be planted up here...it's about the only type of plants that grow well here at the moment, hopefully as Damian now has the bore sprinklers working it will keep things a bit more lush and green and we will be able to have better luck with the gardens. I also did a big garden clean up while in Brisbane and pulled out a heap of wild iris, and bought just a fraction of them back up to plant here as well.

So, lots of planting to be done over the long weekend. Kasey had a fantastic week at her horse riding camp and is looking forward to going again, I said she may be able to go to one of the Xmas holiday camps. She was keen to show me how much she has learnt today, as she can also do a rising trot now, so she saddled up her horse and we went down to the yards for her to have a ride. Unfortunately, her horse had a flip out on her again, and bucked her off.....again...so Kasey promptly announced she is never riding Magic again, to which I said, "I don't blame you, I wouldn't ride her again either", ...so we are on the hunt now for an OLD plodder for her....she wasn't hurt, she has a grazed elbow, but that seems to be all, luckily. Poor kid....We also seemed to have solved the crow problem, we have closed the doors in to the house area of the chook pen, and there is a small access door that the chooks use to go inside. Since closing the doors, we are no longer losing any eggs, so the fridge is finally starting to fill up with eggs again. Next project here for me will be for Damian to build be a small corrugated vegie garden with a shade cloth roof so I can grow some vegies, it's too hot without the shadecloth, so I am hoping I have some success with growing some veg again sometime soon.

The year is flying by....

Things have been a little crazy here over the last month or so. The days are going so quickly, and it's been very busy. I can't believe we are nearly half way through the year already. I went to Ann's scrapbooking retreat in May at Kilcoy. Managed to get a few pages done, was a bit off my mojo though, so didn't get as many as usual done, I procrastinated a lot, but I had a nice break. I travelled down with a girl friend, and we went the scenic route on the way down, and stopped at a lovely cheese shop at Goomeri and bought some beautiful cheeses and pastes to indulge in over our weekend. These are the few pages I did:

Kasey feeding some poddy calves at a friend's place.

 These are a couple of my favourite photos. I hired a truck to pick up a lounge I bought off ebay, and Toni came with me to help me load it up. The first photo was when we were about to set off on our way...while we were loading the lounge, it bucketed down on us, drenching us both, the 2nd photo is the after shot...

 Then I thought I would do a few pages with lots of photos to get through some of my huge stash of pics, the first was of my chickens:

 This page is still of my chickens, but this was a class we did  on the Saturday morning, the photo's are on flaps which open out, revealing lots more photos underneath.

 Then this page was of a visit we did to the Flying High bird sanctuary, Kasey wasn't real keen on the bird on her shoulder

 This pic is of our gorgeous pups

 This page was based on the chicken page, and also has lift up flaps depicting lots of things from our farm

 I loved doing this page, very simple but elegant at the same time, depicting a morning scene here on the farm

The puppies are doing well. I have finally managed to get Stella putting on some weight, she has finally hit the 2kg mark and she is coming out of her shell more and more each week. Here they are curled up together on the lounge.

Sam has the biggest personality. He is so cheeky and loveable. He loves to play in the dirt, and even though he is white, he manages to clean himself up quite well...especially considering when he does this:

We also did a weekend holiday over to Fraser Island with 3 other families, even though it was only from Friday through to Sunday, we had a great time. I had a local animal carer come in and feed and look after the animals for me, which made things a lot easier.

I had a clutch of araucana's ready to hatch when I got back from Fraser, I had 2 hatch out and then Max knocked the incubator off the bench where it was, and the 2 that had hatched survived, but a number of others cracked and either weren't fertile, or were dead, and the rest did not end up hatching...so I only ended up with 2 out of the 9 eggs...seems to be the way it is for me, only a small number...I hope I can improve on that in spring. I have got a couple of big tubs now set up with some lettuce, silverbeet and shallots growing, and a few cabbage planted in the garden.

  I hope to plant up 1 or 2 more tubs of vegies, but I don't want to go overboard at this stage, just a little at a time. We have also purchased our first bull, a purebred registered Droughtmaster, he is due to arrive tomorrow. He is a lovely quiet boy, and he has been tested for fertility as well, so I hope he is easy for us to manage. The heifers we have here are all at the age where they are ready to breed, and I will put him over our Jersey as well, to get her started also. We chose the Droughtmasters for a number of reasons, and the small calf size was a big swing for us as well with the first time heifers. We hope to sell the calves once they are about 6 months old, and start to build up a purebred droughtmaster herd. I had a big de-clutter session here last Friday, as we just don't have the room here to hoard stuff, so I got rid of old magazines and general bits and pieces, and de-cluttered the bathroom as well and re-arranged things a little. I still have to finish off my decorating. I requested and received a Kreg drill jig for Mothers Day, so I will start to build myself a few bits and pieces to decorate with. Damian has also started doing up my craft studio, but I think that will take a few more weeks yet, as we have had a few weekends away. Anyway, I think that is all for a bit of a catchup for now...hopefully the bull arrives tomorrow and I can post a few pics then...

The menagerie...........

Damian and I are in the process of applying for our gun licences. We feel it is important on the farm here to be able to put down an injured animal if needed, or shoot a fox, wild dog or wild pig if they are being a menace to other animals on the property. We went and did our safety course on the weekend which is a pre-requisite for applying for a licence. I have never shot a gun before, but managed quite ok and managed to hit the target on most occasions. We later did some practicing with some friends air rifles and managed to hone in our targeting skills quite a bit. We are planning on eventually processing our own beef, lamb and pork on the property, so a gun licence will be essential. There is a lot of cost in applying for the licence, the safe to keep any guns in, permits etc and then the cost for the firearms themselves. Just to set ourselves up with 1 gun would be in the vicinity of a couple of thousand dollars, a lot of money. It also takes quite some time to obtain a licence, which is a great thing these days.
We are also gradually increasing our animals here on the farm. I have purchased a couple of purebred Bichon Frise puppies, I hope to do some breeding down the track as a source of income. I wanted to get a dog that is good for Kasey's hayfever and allergies and also for Toni's allergies to dogs, so these would be perfect as they don't shed hair as they have a woolen coat. Diversifying is how to make the farm profitable, so looking at different options and income sources is essential.

(This is Sam, he is now 3 months old. He is full of personality and is very cheeky and loveable)

 (This is Stella, she is 5 months old. She is very tiny, elegant and refined...a real girly girl)

Stella came to me from another owner, and she hadn't been wormed, hadn't had her update vaccinations and was eating human food and cat food. Even though she is older than Sam, she is smaller than him. I have managed (with persistance and bribery) to get her eating a really good quality dry dog food and she has put on a little over 100 grams since getting her 3 weeks ago. She was also very shy and timid, but is now starting to come out of her shell a little and is more trusting of us. It makes me really cranky that people don't do the right things by their animals. At least this person had the common sense to re-home her...
I am also working on getting my heritage chicken breeds more established. Kasey wants to breed Guinea fowl for some pocket money, so we are working on getting her some grown ones of her own that she can breed with. The guinea fowl that hatched 3 weeks ago are powering along, we lost the first one born on about day 3 unfortunately, so only 2 of that batch left now, but I learnt quite a bit about the incubation process in the meantime.

(Guinea fowl keets at 3 weeks old)

I am increasing my chicken varieties all the time, and I have quite a few roosters at the moment too, so I need to get the girls to match them, so that I can keep the purebred heritage lines. It is really important to keep the heritage breeds, so I only breed these instead of cross bred chickens.

(Ancona Hen, she is a really good egg layer, a bit flighty though)

 (Ancona Rooster and Plymouth rock Hen, this little girl has just started laying. The rooster is very flighty, all the plymouth rocks are pretty laid back though)

 (Light Sussex hen - this girl is huge, a good dual purpose breed, good layer and good meat, she would weigh at least 4-5 kgs, not real keen on being handled but not a flighty bird)

 (A little pekin bantam, I got her for her broody qualities, so she can hatch eggs for me instead of using the incubator, very docile and easily handled, great kids pet)

 (The little pekin rooster - to breed more little pekin mothers, also very quiet and easily handled. Quite protective though)

 (My favourite - my gorgeous silver spangled hamburgh rooster. He is a stunning bird, and I am just waiting to find a couple of girls to start increasing this flock, he is just lovely)

(White leghorn hen - she is pretty flighty, but a good egg layer, she just got out of a dirt bath, so is pretty dirty!)

I also have a couple of girls sitting on eggs at the moment. I have the little frizzle, she is sitting on about 6 or so guinea fowl eggs. I was keeping the guinea fowl eggs in the corner nest for the guinea to nest on, but the frizzle beat her to it! She is a very determined egg sitter, and nothing will take her mind off her task.

The little araucana quickly followed suit, and she is also sitting on a couple of guinea fowl eggs.I did have her sitting on a couple of frizzle eggs but while I was away last week she escaped from her nest and sat in her old one, so I had to toss those eggs and put guinea fowl eggs under her as well. I am also wanting to get an araucana rooster to breed these. I really like the araucana's, they are great little layers, she lays green eggs, and they have a lovely temperament and love to be handled.

I also have a lovely speckled sussex rooster, he is huge and he is just starting to crow and also 2 other huge plymouth rock boys. One of the plymouth rock roosters will have to go, I don't need 2, and because they are so big they eat a LOT! They would all weigh about 4-5 kgs as well, and they look so funny when they run along, a bit gumby looking because their legs are so long and they are so big.

(One of the plymouth rock roosters with the girl the same age behind him)

 (Speckled sussex rooster, very pretty with burgundy, brown, green, white and black plumage)

These 4 seem to hang out together, but they all hatched at the same time. Even though there were 4 roosters out of the 5 eggs that hatched, there is no major fighting amongst them at the moment, we'll have to wait and see if that remains

 

This is my purebreed Australorp, I did originally have 2 of these, but I think Reggie may have dispatched of one. You can tell a purebred Australorp by their black legs and pure black eyes (no brown in them at all) They don't seem to like to be handled, but are great egg layers and make great mothers, they go broody once or twice a year.

 And then there are my guinea fowl. I only have 3 remaining adult ones left out of the 12 or so purchased (again thanks to Michael's dog Reggie) I did have a gorgeous lavender girl as well. So I am hoping to seriously add to this brood with the recent hatch and the ones that are due to hatch soon. I only have 1 adult female and 2 adult males, one adult male is the 3rd wheel at present. They can be noisy, but not too much, mainly when they are letting you know something unusual is around. Both the little white dogs have been bailed up by them, so they don't go near those big birds now. The guinea fowl do harrass the chooks though as they are very territorial, but not so bad up here on the farm, it was much worse on the smaller acreage.

And then there is my big boy - Ziggy. He is a purebred Quarter Horse. He is pretty laid back, but is a bit more on edge with no other horse around up here. I am hoping to get hold of a horse that needs a home to be a companion for him and that Kasey can learn to ride on, she is itching to learn. He is keeping in good condition bordering on fat on just the grass here, I have just started to give him 2 cups of pellets morning and night to get him coming up for rugging now that the cooler weather is closing in.

And Max and Diesel, they are still causing mischief as usual. Max is a big sooky lala, full of personality red cattle dog...

And Diesel is a very lazy blue cattle dog. He has serious front leg issues, so he has every excuse to be lazy. He is very hard to get cross at when he is naughty.

There is also 18 cows around here somewhere. We have just had the crush installed and Damian is in the process of moving the cattle yards up to where the crush and ramp is. Then I can look at getting Buttercup the Jersey cow put in to calf and start on that journey. We are not sure whether we will get a bull and breed from the other 17 brahman cross girls we have here or sell them on and concentrate on breeding with a specific breed of cattle suited specifically for good quality beef...just not sure yet. On the still to get list is:
:A donkey or 2 - just love them
:Alpacas - just love them too
:Heritage breed pigs - sussex or berkshire probably - Damian's want list
:Maybe some sheep - would only be for meat
:Maybe some angora goats - not sure on this yet, will research their temperament
:Maran chickens - want to get some for their chocolate brown eggs
:Partner chickens for the ones I already have to match up and complete breeding groups

So I am being called Mrs MacDonald and Mrs Doolittle by our friends, but that's ok. What's a farm without animals!

Chook sagas...oh...and other stuff...

It's been an eventful few days around here as usual. Kasey was taking Max for a walk yesterday afternoon and came across a large carpet python on the driveway, about a metre and a half long. Damian went out to move it on with the broom, but it climbed up behind the grill of his car, over the engine bay and along the chassis rail, where we lost sight of it. We are hoping it came out overnight, otherwise it will be travelling around a bit. One of the plymouth rock chickens came down really sick late yesterday afternoon. She was all limp and had her eyes shut and was dribbling, we thought she was dead, but she wasn't. I put her in a box to see if she would start to recover but she showed no improvement overnight and seemed to be getting worse, so we had to give her the chop...first one we have done...not nice, but it had to be done, as she was suffering too much, at least it was quick. It was so sudden as she was totally fine yesterday morning, I would say she has been poisoned, either by a snake or spider, possibly even a toad?? Otherwise we have had some mushrooms pop up over the last few days, she may have eaten one and perhaps it was toxic...really don't know, it's all just guessing really. Such a shame as she was quite tame and would sit with me. That's 3 chooks we have lost over the last couple of weeks, Kasey's little pet chook was found dead one morning under their feeder, again a total mystery, we think her head may have got caught in the feeder? Then we lost Bertha the day before yesterday, but she died of old age, she was a good 10 years old!

(Bertha is the black Australorp chicken pictured here)

Damian spent today putting a couple of farm gates on the ends of the verandah in front of the shed to keep the horse and cattle out. Once the area in front of the shed is fenced off it will give us a house yard to keep animals out, and keep the dogs etc in when we need them to be.

He also installed the door at the top of the stairs a couple of days ago to keep the dogs out from upstairs, Max kept sneaking in while we weren't looking, and I found him curled up on our bed all wet and muddy, and that was the straw that broke the camels back, and the door went on. Still needs to be finished off, but it is keeping the dogs out which is the main thing for now.

I went and had my hair done today, I needed a change, and it was getting too long, so I went shorter and a little curly...I'm liking it a lot...

I'm off to a sewing retreat this weekend so I am leaving Daddy at home to look after Kasey and I will go and visit Michael and Toni while I am down there, it's Toni's 20th Birthday on Sunday, and I need to give her her present. So I will have 2 full days of sewing and socialising to do...yay...

Quarantine....the new regime for the chickens

The silver chinese silkie didn't make it through the night, she hasn't been very active since I got her, but I didn't associate it with anything being wrong with her as she was still eating and drinking and walking around, just sat alot,  but on reflection, I think perhaps she may have been the cause of the disease coming in as she has always been much smaller than the other silkie, and when I picked her up yesterday she weighed almost nothing. It's hard to see with the chinese silkies if they are drooping because they are so fluffy. The 2 remaining chicks are still with us this morning, so I am hoping that I have gotten to them in time.  So, what have I learnt from all of this, .....quarantine..... any new chooks coming in will need to be quarantined away from any other chooks while I treat them for coccidiosis as a preventative measure and boost them up with multivitamins, for a 4 week period. After this time they can be put in with the other girls. I also wasn't aware that all strains of the disease were not medicated for in the starter feed, so I will be sure to start all baby chicks on extra medication in their water to ensure they are strong and healthy. Got to learn something from all of this I suppose...

Still having chicken dramas...

2 more baby chickens were dead this morning, that just leaves 2 left, the little silver sussex, and 1 silver spangled hamburg. I have decided to treat them for coccidiosis, I'm not sure if this is the problem, but I don't know what else to do for them, and the treatment won't hurt them if they don't have it. I have put mum and bubs back in the small cage so I can treat them easier, I am treating mother hen as well. I am also treating the silver chinese silkie, as she isn't looking very well either, just wants to sit all of the time, so I have her in a box inside with some water and hopefully I've caught these in time. They  have all been started with the proper chicken starter mix, but apparently the medicine in this mix doesn't cover all the strains of the illness, so they can still get it. It's an incidious illness in poultry, the 2 plymouth rock chicks that were dead this morning were as healthy as they could be yesterday, running around, and I even checked on them about 11pm last night and they were all still completely fine, so whatever it is, it works very fast. I hope that I can save the ones that are left, but not much more I can do at this stage. I completely cleaned out the chicken tractor and moved it, I poured boiling water over the nesting area to try and kill off any of the oocyst bacteria that may have caused it, if that turns out to be the case.   I have spent some time outside the last couple of days, trying to clear my head from all the poultry dramas, I received my giant garlic on Friday, about 50 cloves, so they are all planted up, along with a few more lettuce and a big batch of climbing peas. I still have some beans to plant as well as cauliflower, brussel sprouts, green cauliflower, oregano, and coriander, and a few other things like snow peas and carrots. I dug some dynamic lifter and compost into the areas I planted, and then watered them over with a comfrey tea. I also harvested a nice big bucketful of worm juice today, so I will bottle that all up so I can use that as well. Hopefully this will add some much needed nutrients back in to the soil in the vegie garden. I also let the 3 new guinea fowl out today with the 2 bigger ones, they stuck with the 2 bigger ones and went away with them tonight, so that means they can now come out each day for some pick. The white chinese silkie came out for a little while as well, but put herself back in fairly quickly. It's good to see they all know where bed is for the night. Also caught up on some mowing, but still need to do the front, will try and get to that tomorrow.

What the hell is going on???

Another baby chicken found dead this morning, another of my silver spangled hamburgs.....what is going on? I can't work this out. I am doing everything right, and I am still losing them. I have no idea what is killing them, not sure if Mum is squashing them accidentally or it's something else.  I am so annoyed and getting really upset that I have had to bury another one this morning.  I'm running out of ideas.

Animal and Garden Happenings

I went to the markets on Sunday morning, to get some seedlings for the vegie garden, to do the autumn plantings. I bought lettuce, red chard, sugarloaf cabbage, mixed green lettuce, rocket and a couple of comfrey plants to put under a couple of fruit trees. Comfrey is very deep rooted, and draws up the nutrients from deep down in the soil, but don't compete with the fruit trees for nutrients, so they are perfect for under fruit trees as a type of nursery plant. So these are now all planted in the vegie garden. I have also finally planted up my mushroom patch, I bought the kit last year, and have been meaning and meaning and meaning to plant it...finally got around to it today. It will be interesting to see how well they go, when I grew the shiitake mushrooms last year, they went really well, so I am hoping these give similar results.

I also picked up a couple of chinese silkies while at the markets, they are so gorgeous.

 So these are now in the chicken tractor along with the 3 younger guinea fowl I have,

 and also with the mother hen and her 6 babies. The mother hen doesn't like it if the silkies or guinea fowl go anywhere near her babies, but they in no way have any intention of hurting the babies, she is just being very protective.

(When can we go out there Mum?)

 While we were at the market, Kasey spied a guinea pig, she has been asking for one for ages, so I relented, so we now have a little boy guinea pig named Toffee.

Kasey has been lugging him around everywhere, with her, not outside though, as the dogs would definitely think he is a rat...and that wouldn't be a good outcome. We have been having a few dog problems anyway, the dogs have been getting out during the night and visiting the neighbouring properties. Reggie has also unfortunately started killing chooks, I have lost 1 along with 5 guinea fowl, and the neighbour came to see me yesterday to tell me the dogs have been getting out during the night as she was up quite early and saw the dogs scooting just straight underneath everyone's fences, and she has lost 5 chickens over the last 2 weeks...I am not happy, it means that Reg has definitely got the taste for chook killing now, and I don't know how to get him out of it. I caught him attacking one of my chooks last week, which was lucky enough to survive, but about half an hour later he got another, who wasn't so lucky unfortunately.  I purchased an electric collar, but that is only useful if you are watching to correct the behaviour. I re ran the electric fence around the perimeter, but they still got through that, and Reggie is now jumping a 5 foot high brick fence at the front of the property. Michael is home this week, and as Reggie is his dog, I made him go down the front and do some training with him to stop him jumping the fence. I am now tying the dogs up overnight, and we are getting an electronic containment system installed on Thursday. That's money I really didn't want to spend right now, but I can't have them getting out. Max and Diesel are both fine with the chooks, and I don't want them learning from Reg to start killing them. At the moment the chooks are permanently in their pen, until I can sort out what to do. At the moment I am thinking that we are going to need to fence off the back area so the dogs can't go in so the chooks can free range up there, but it still leaves the problem with the guinea fowl, not sure if clipping their wings would work for the guinea fowl, I will need to do some research on that. That's really frustrating though, as I am holding off doing a lot of more permanent things here, as we will be relocating to the new property....but that is probably still 12 months away...but I would rather do more things like that at the new property, but I need to make sure the chooks are safe...very frustrating. The carpenter came this afternoon to install the new ironing centre in the laundry,

The electrician is coming tomorrow to wire it up, as well as install the new cooking appliances is the kitchen, as well as some extra lighting and power points needed around the place. Also been busy organising the packing for our holiday at Easter, Damian isn't home until really late Thursday night, and we are wanting to head up to the property on Friday morning, so I need to get as much done as I can before he gets home, so that is stressing me a bit, I was planning on starting last week, but I just haven't got to it. I have been spending at least my hour in the garden each day as the weather has been really nice,  that's the brilliant thing about autumn...warm days and cool nights. Anyway, early to bed tonight to catch up on some much needed rest.