I'd like to talk about my ever growing family this week. I think that's a basic part of living on the land. You have space you want to benifit from this somehow. I eventually want the family to be pretty close to being self sufficent and maybe even dream of dreams start bringing in some income from my productivity. Ahhh I can dream.
Since the move date a young pup Izzy (border collie) yes I know I know, perhaps it would have been wise to listen when people warned me that they are a high energy dog need training and work to do. Ahhh 'working dog' well there you have it. Enough about her we are learning. The theory we are following is a combination of speaking with others that own Collies and a small addiction to ceaser millan (sp?) the dog whisperer.
Two Laying Bantams. This involved the building of a chicken house. Not really that cheap to buy the materials as we discovered after snorting in disguist at the price of readymade ones.
These Bantams were aquired from a great friend and neighbour in order to hatch some fertilised Eggs. Unfortunatley said Bantams became unbroddy on day 18 of the 21 day gestation period of chicks in Eggs resulting in the loss of all chicks : (
Hatching own chicks round two. Don't ask me why we started with the Eggs I know the question what came first the chicken or the egg, my husband is a man of science and researched the exact type of chickens he wanted for optimal egg production and eating. Myself I'm more a 'oh you don't want that chicken or oh that chickens $2 I'll have that variety' Enough about why we are trying to hatch Eggs rather than just buying some golly gosh chickens.
Anyway back to the story at hand, Incubator was borrowed for the hatching of chicks. Day 21 yes I believe that's the day that they hatch, power cut ! oh dear some one out there is telling us not to own chickens. Power cut lasted roughly 5hrs one chick was born during cut and was able to be revived by being placed in the steamer over a bowl of boiled water. (thankfully we have a gas cooker so water could still be boiled, water from the jug as none of our taps work during power cuts as you need an electric pump to pump water out of tanks). Power returned that night and chicks continued to hatch into the next day. Two did not hatch and were helped out of shell by worried husband ( this might be a no no but i don't think they were going to come out by themselves we could be wrong) one of these 'helped' chickens was fine. The other unfortunately couldn't move half of it's body so is no longer with us. As I type I have 17 happy little two day old chicks cheeping around in a box under a light next to me. Now lets hope they all survive and there aren't too many boys. The plan is to keep all the girls and one boy and eat the rest of the boys.
We have goats moving in on boxing day a girl and a boy. The girl shall be turned into a nanny goat and the boy might be dinner. Man it's tough to be a boy on a farm! I am currently in the process of trying to purchase a good shelter for these goats to use . I'm thinking a really big dog house or a really small shed ? What ever it is hopefully we won't be building it this time .
That's it that's us. The family so far one one mother, one father, two sons, 1 dog, 2 chickens, 17 chicks and soon to be 2 goats.
I haven't spoken about how the core family are doing so far. Mother me I'm good with all the Christmas merriment just jolly busy with all the added responsibility for my growing brood. The father, he's well, pretty tired with trying to build a lovely deck at the moment. The big boy Fin is great in love with his dog fairly interested in his chicks also. The little guy Charlie, in love with his dog, couldn't give a monkeys about the chicks. And mums looking forward to him having a deck to crawl around on , hopefully it will be a bit better for him than the current outdoor options of rocks or clay.
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