Gardening for the Dinner Table

We are getting potatoes, squash, zuccini, eggplant, tomatoes, and GREEN tomatoes from the garden. The corn has put on tassles and the sugar snap peas are putting on thickness. We have been oven roasting squash and tomatoes with olive oil, salt, and pepper; the squash also gets fresh oregano and lemon juice. We are eating veggie dinners many nights a week. It is exciting to pick, cook, and eat dinner without going to the store!

Then there are all the eggs we've been eating for breakfast!

NEXT: Wil and Tim are planning a chicken butchering day this summer. Thanks to Backyard Poultry magazine, they think they can now tackle this tedious feather-pickin' task. I'll be glad, once again, to profit from this farm other than just eggs and the great humorous entertainment.

To market!

Wil and Tim took Adam and Lars to market. Wil came home with a nice check and new ideas about what direction we will take with goatherding! I am pleased to see some money come in for this endeavor. We have made back part of what we paid for Pepper. Next we want a female from a "meat" breed to mate with Ethan and sell for more than we got for the males.

Tucker is still around for the time being. He will be farmed out for a while to Tim for grass trimming. Tuck has excellent La Mancha traits, but we are more interested in other breeds.

So much for duck mothering...

After the eggs hatched, Mary kinda lost her mind. She trampled a couple of babies, then kept walking off without the chicklings. She would just ramble around the farm griping. Wil took the chicklings and put them in the brooder with other chicks. They are all fine. Mary is now in the duck pen with the mallards, six of whom are males. Wish us luck that Mary will know a normal duck life now.

Mary's First Chickling Hatches

Proud Mama Mary with her first chickling (chick + duckling), possibly a buff Orpington.

Spring 2007

Pepper's latest twins: Ivey (left, female, mostly white) and Lars (right, male, mostly caramel).

Father is Ethan, a Nigerian Dwarf. Both these twins exhibit the Nigerian ears--and they are SO CUTE! They are not as friendly as last summer's boys, though.

Summer 2006 Twins

Our first babies, Adam and Tucker, born to Pepper last July. Pepper was expecting when we bought her (father unknown). Notice the size and color difference.

Pepper is LaMancha and her boys both exhibited LaMancha ears, to different degrees. Tucker has no ears, and Adam has "elf ears," little flaps.

Brooder Moves from Kitchen to Shed

We have been housing small chicks in the kitchen in a plastic tub (seen below brooder) covered with mesh and a lamp. Now Wil and Tim built a brooder that is 3-4 feet off the ground and can go in the tractor shed. That's good, because those chicks can get NOISY!

It Can't Get Any Fresher!

From the garden to the table: ya gotta love summer! Potatoes and yellow zucchini.

(potatoes on the ground were culled for the chickens, along with the potato plants pulled up.)

Wet Dog Loves Sprinkler

No pool? No worries--we have a sprinkler to cool off in. Maggie, too! As expected, she tries to "bite" the water, but she also runs back and forth through it with Katie.

Duck Sits on Mixed Lot

...and here's Mary on the nest. Chickens, banties, ...what will the duck-mama think when they hatch?!

Duck and Hen Share Nest

We have a duck that thinks she is a chicken (Mary) and a silkie hen that likes to be roommates. The two of them are sharing a nest of mixed eggs in the woodpile. Here is Ellen maintaining the nest while Mary is out and about. Actually, Mary is being chased by the puppy while I am snapping this shot.

Mary the duck is crazy about Fabio the blonde rooster. We hope there is at least one male in the batch of mallards so Mary can live a more normal lifestyle!

My Favorite Rooster

Sundance and his wife: Sundance has to stay in a pen of his own because he roughs up all the other roosters.

The New Puppy

Went shopping today for puppy supplies: flea shampoo, collar and leash, ear mite meds, brush, engraved nametag...

Now the puppy and Katie are playing in the sprinkler! I guess the new shampoo and brush will get a workout right away.

I love it that Katie is a "fashion girl" but she will also randomly show up with a toad in hand! She also loves the chickens and is a fearless "herder." Today she watched Wil kill a chicken for the first time. When she came in the house, she was ready to recount the event to me, but as she told it she grew pale and had to run to her bed. It only took a brief "life on the farm" discussion to get her right again, though. Much better than last summer when she watched Pepper give birth to the boys, and Katie turned GREEN and almost passed out! We are still holding out for her going to Vet school at Auburn!

Welcome to our new Blog!

We have been meaning for a long time to keep a diary of our adventures in farming. I finally was at the computer when the idea hit me to look for a blog site.

We are constantly amazed by our life on a farm. We used to live in Memphis, living the Yuppie life, driving a sports car, working the DINK lifestyle (dual income, no kids). Then we moved back to Alabama, and God finally blessed us with a child. When she was three, we took our daughter to a festival. In the petting zoo, she wanted no animal BUT the black banty rooster. She was fearless with the chickens, and it was difficult to get her to put the little rooster down and leave.

So began our lives with chickens, and over the last few years, a whole menagerie of animals.

Now we don't want to be anywhere but home with our animals. Well, Katie and I love our office/art studio. And now that we have Maggie May, our new pup, Katie has a playmate.

LIFE IS GOOD ON THE FARM!