Our Fermented Feed Setup

Fermenting Chicken Feed

If you've had chickens for any length of time I'm sure that at some point you've run into links about fermenting your chickens feed.
The why, how and benefits will make you really want to.
However the set up, time and dedication... not so much.

Photo is of my ladies enjoying their 3rd morning of fermented feed.
Let me tell you right now, its true they adore it.
(Also please ignore the ugly pan in the background I used their distraction with the food to clean it and fill it.)

I went ahead and started fermenting my feed when I was finally able to find some cheap containers - namely, sand buckets from Shopko on sale for .99 cents each!

I already had the plastic plates that fit perfectly on the top of the buckets, keeping MOST of the air in, bugs out but allowing gas to escape as needed - perfect for fermenting!
Notice the post-its?
They have a heart, flower, star & cross, also they are numbered 1-4.
I will need a 4 bucket system in the winter as it takes longer to ferment in the cold.
In the summer so far I am using a 3 bucket system and it works fine.

My mix for 11 hens is 2 Cups laying mash & 1 Cup scratch.

Add filtered water (we have reverse osmosis - a must for living in Magna)
to roughly an inch above the grain.
After two days of fermenting the feed, you can pour the left over water (normally a cup or so) into the new fermented feed to get it fermenting faster.
Stir it a few times a day.

I use a fine mesh spoon to draw the grain out so that it won't be a puddle and I can re-add the water into the new feed.

So far this mix seems to be working perfectly for my ladies - once all 11 are laying I will tweak it as needed.
I've seen some recipes only use whole grains, I've read where they only use mash.
I'm doing a mix because I happen to have both.

Top reasons for me to start this?
To many mice seem to be eating what my ladies were tossing onto the ground.
I'd much rather my ladies actually eat their food, than other animals - especially dirty animals.
They eat this food so QUICK!
Nothing is left on the ground!
In time I might only do two cups and give my ladies their scratch in the evenings, as that helps with egg production but again that will be once all my hens are laying.

Fermenting Chicken Feed links:

My favorite with Mash
What Containers

Chicken Chick

More on why & how

Bunny Birthday Surprise!

Our doe Stormy's 3rd kindling, born this morning.
All 9 seem happy and healthy.
Which has been a fantastic birthday gift for me!

Stormy's 1st kindling died when she gave birth unexpectedly and her babies froze without a proper nest.
Her second kindling all but one baby (peewee) died and that one lived only because we were able to get her sister to foster Peewee with her kits.
This is her third kindling, we've redone her baby area completely and made sure this time she's alone.
Praying this time she shines as the mama we think she is.
9 healthy babies! Now its up to her to keep them that way!

New Growth - Plum Health

My Stanley Plums new straight leaves!
You can see where something tried to take a few bites out of the newer leaves, so I've continued spraying the tree with water/soap every week or so at night.
Thankfully the new leaves show that an infestation hasn't taken hold a second time.
See Curled Plum Leaves and how I treated them

We bought 4 Concorde Seedless Grape vines to plant,
picked up the bare root cuttings April 25th and soaked them in wet paper for a few days before planting.
Two of the grape's took off almost over night and are over a foot each with lots of growth.
The above grape was my last hold out.
Earlier this week we FINALLY got a leaf to sprout!
Never stop watering grape vines, they are tough and resilient.

This was the other grape that was struggling to survive for a while
but is growing happily now.
Two years from now those vines will be massive and cover tons of fence line!

These grapes came with our house.
The vine had been neglected and looked horrible, we looked up advice and cut the entire plant back to root.
Three years later we are getting some fantastic looking grapes and I can't wait to find out what type they are!

Also my Thornless Blackberries are outpacing my coffee addiction!
They are growing so fast and so much that no matter how quickly I get the leaves to turn green, they flip back around and yellow again!
Next winter instead of putting our coffee grinds on the compost pile I'm freezing it to use on my blackberries next summer!
This is their second summer and I could not have predicted this many berries!

Homesteading, What, Why & How

Homesteading, Urban Homesteading & Smallholding

What is it exactly?

What started out a various land programs across the globe changed into a terminology of a group of people who share similar passions.

I couldn't find ONE photo that encompassed everything to me that Homesteading means.
My kitchen garden is as close as it gets!
The cinder blocks we got from a neighbor.
We bought in a load of composted dirt for the garden bed.
It shows companion planting - my dill and garlic.
Also shows that we are using what would have been wasted driveway space by creating a garden bed on top of it.
In the background is our new brick wall - the 570 free bricks we got last week.

Homestead blunt concrete def.

Homesteading/Urban Homesteading ect

Smallholding

How do you know that you are a Homesteader?

My journey into Homesteading isn't where you would think it might start,
mine started almost 13 years ago in the middle of a Walmart aisle.

My daughter was only a few months old and we were going camping with family and friends.
I'd gone to the store to get a few needed baby supplies along with bug repellent and sun screen.

Standing in the aisle starring at all the really strong sprays and chemicals that would "protect" my child. I couldn't get past watching my daughter rub her eyes, thinking how anything I put on her face or hands would end up in her eyes and mouth.

I couldn't do it.

Walking away empty handed was both freeing and terrifying!
I'd made a choice but now what?!
I still wanted something to keep mosquitoes from eating my baby!

Thankfully I found a simple mix of Clove Oil and water.
As my children grew I found more oils to add in.

Normal Homesteading mixes gardening & raising animals.
Each is area specific.
Many are like I am - chemical free.
No poisons, no pesticides, no antibiotics.
Homesteaders generally build rather than buy.
Free, Sale, Deal, Barter and Trade are happy key words.
Sewing, creating, crafting, cooking, preserving, wood working are fun things to do or learn.

Some Homesteaders focus on one area and everything revolves around it.
If they were pig farmers, they might raise crops, spaces and other animals that all go well with pigs.
Others (like me) branch out.
Homesteading you might start out simply trying to freeze and can a few things from your garden, next your making laundry soap and are looking into building a beehive, aquaponics, greenhouse or duck pond and you have no idea when that slippery slope started.
You dry herbs, milk goats and have fruit trees and look at every fence like a possibility of a new place to add grapes or berries of some sort.
Many Homesteaders go "green" or "off grid",
saving money and removing a dependency.
Saving seeds for the next year.

Homesteading no longer means you NEED to have a massive area of land.
Our small space has two small gardens on the driveway, three fruit trees, 5 grapes, 5 raspberries, 4 blackberries, 48 tomato plants, watermelons, zucchini, peas, beans, garlic, spinach, lettuce, carrots, onions, dill and mint.
Not to mention the rabbits & chickens and the large compost pile they help create.
We are also getting ready to add in a small duck pond, beehive and greenhouse.

The best part of joining the Homesteading movement toward self sufficiency is it doesn't matter if you're a young mom in grocery store taking her first step, or if you have 20 acres and all the farm animals, garden & eco friendly devices on the planet both are Homesteaders.
So far I've found the Homesteading world to be filled with amazing people!
Sharing people - knowledge, plants, & know how.

Did I cover everything?
Not even close!
Homesteading is so big and encompassing it can seem daunting but the best part is everyone starts the same way - one small step, one small choice and the rest is history!

Garden Spring Issues

Blackberries!

Love that I already have a load of blackberries starting to grow!

Note the pale color of the leaves with the dark veins
The pale color is most likely because our soil is too alkaline.
The dark streaks are from my grandmothers treatment
(proven 100% effective)
of pouring coffee & coffee grinds on them.

With in a day the bottom of the plants were back to the beautiful dark green,

while the top parts have the strange streaks occurring.
Thankfully (for my plants)
I'm a coffee addict!
Soon the whole plant will be back to its dark green lush self!

Also my lovely Stanley Plum that we just planted started to come in with curled leaves.
Which is a sure sign of aphid infection.
Sad to say this plant most likely came infected from the store I bought it.
So we bought and night released 1500 Ladybugs onto the Plum, surrounding trees, berry plants and my mint garden.
I want as many of the lovely darling to take up residence in my yard full time as possible.

This fall we will treat the leaves with an insecticide soap.
If new leaves continue to grow in curled we will need to move up the treatments - soaps, neem oil ect.

However, I'm really praying my ladybugs are hungry and solve the problem.

Note: all currently curled leaves will not magically uncurl.
Thankfully my tree is small and half its leaves are healthy and beautiful 

we just want to nip this in the bud (gardening pun)

as quickly as we can.

So the Ladybugs ate and ate and ate, then only two were left after 48 hours.
There were still bugs and larva on my Plum.
Phase two yesterday morning involved soaping my tree's.
Recipe link HERE

This really worked but will need to be reapplied OFTEN.
I also soaped my other two tree's to keep the aphid infection from spreading.
Will keep you posted on how new leaves form when they arrive on my plum.

Also due to this crazy wet springtime the mosquitoes are taking over the world!

Okay, maybe not the world, but definitely the Salt Lake Valley!
Its so bad that in the 20 minutes it took us to release the Ladybugs

I got 7 bites and my husband 5!
Its getting hard to garden in the morning or evening due to the mosquitoes!

We are even thinking of building and putting in a bat house!

Long live hungry bats!

Eat the mosquitoes!

Egg Shell Dispenser

This lovely Egg Shell Dispenser happened today. 

A few weeks ago I showed my hubby two fantastic dispensers I found off pinterest.
Fresh Eggs Daily's

Farmhouse 38's

My girls needed a full time dispenser and they looked easy enough for me to do without help.

So what happens when I ask my husband for a correct sized board?

He disappears for a while and when I check on him I find this!
My darling spoils me!

We nestled the feeder underneath one of the nesting boxes to keep rain off of it!

To attach it to the chicken wire of the night coop my husband bent two large nails downwards.

Making it easy to refill and clean!

(I'm not a wine person so mine was a washed out coconut rum bottle but any glass will do)

As long as its easy to fill and pour.

No matter how it looks, its important to offer your chickens either crushed egg shells or oyster shells! They need extra calcium, one of my girls egg shells has been getting really thin.

Hence the need for a full time dispenser!

Giving it to them every now and then isn't enough!

My ladies needed encouragement to investigate the new toy,
I sprinkled some crushed eggshells on the ground to get their attention to the new dispenser.
So far (day one)
I've had two ladies eat directly from the dish and two happily eat all the bits I dropped on the ground.
Will need to slowly work on the rest tomorrow!

Doctoring Tomato Plants vol.1

Ordering things online is always a risk,

this time I watched our postman 

(thankfully only the fill in) 

throw our package boldly marked FRAGILE on the ground.

If you look closely you can see the tiny slit.

Almost half of my new tomato plants were bent.

Using toothpicks and medical gauze I bandaged them up as well as I could.

Thankfully the seller promises to send more.

In the meantime my goal is to keep this bunch alive!

  

I'll post updates on their progress

Update: 6/11/16
We've lost two of the broken
but it seems four of the broken are doing well.

Cooling off!

Summer heat is very hard on rabbits!
Rabbits can easily die from several different types of heat related deaths, so for small rabbitry's like ours its very important to help them beat the heat.

We make sure they have shade, water and a few things to help cool them off.

I took several washed out glass bottles, added water (little over half way) 

kept the lid off (so it doesn't explode when the ice expands)

and then placed the bottles in the freezer.

Once frozen I waited a few days for it to heat up and then took these out and added them into the cages during the hottest part of the day.

Summer is just starting here and we are still in the low 90's.
As it get hotter and stay's hotter longer, I'll be taking bottles out twice a day.

Once in mid-morning, once in the afternoon.

Blackthorn, really seems to love her little cooler.

Limping Chicken

On Saturday (the 28th) I noticed my darling Annabeth had a limp!

Now, I've read the blogs. Heard the advice and took great care with my ladies.

No wet areas in their coop, or around their pen.
No splinters or rough dangerous areas for her to get something stuck into her foot.

On the flip-side

 I don't check the girls everyday.

It doesn't take much for your internal warning flag to see a signal. 

For me it was the fact that she stayed in the same spot for over a minute while I ran around taking photos.

She even allowed me to take few stunning photos!

Not moving much, even when I got closer....

but the real kicker was that she didn't squat when I was right next to her!

Instead she stayed mostly on one foot watching me with a wary eye.

When you get to know your girls (I've had mine almost a year in a half, since they were roughly two weeks old) you know them. My girls trust me, follow me, flock to me or when they don't want anything act like cats and simply ignore me. Her acting like that sent my red flags flaring. Now whatever is causing her to limp - isn't serious as I still had to chase her around the yard to grab her to inspect her.
What I found?

Nothing.

Nada.

No bumps.

No lumps.

No scratches.

No cuts.

No hot spots.

So my conclusion - after placing her in our mini chicken hospital (AKA the dog kennel - first time in use) where she ate and drank immediately - is that she has a mild sprain from jumping down from something. I'm going to keep her over night in the hospital so that she rests and doesn't get pecked on.

Checked her again - redness and heat in the tummy area. Even though she is fine, not lethargic - eating, drinking and pooping I'm going to give her a quick Epsom salt bath before bed tonight. In this case I'd rather be safe than sorry!
I REALLY didn't want to put a glove on and stick my fingers up her vent but hey - Chicken mama's gotta do the yucky stuff too!

Sunday Morning 

She laid an egg so she isn't bound, 

when I let her out into the yard she walked around just fine.

Whatever the problem she's feeling better now!

So our first injury resulted in one lovely overnight spa treatment and pampering for sweet Annabeth with a clean bill of health in the morning!
Whew!

Here are some good links to check if you have a limping chicken:

Chicken Foot Sores - for dummies

Bumble Foot

Limping Chicken - no sores

Tired & Limping Chicken - possible egg bound hen.