Category: Farm

The garden is now one huge pumpkin patch. Planting Seminole pumpkins in there was an error on my part. Somewhere beneath the vines are potatoes, sweet potatoes, and peppers. They have nearly taken over the blueberry bed and are creeping through the fence and forming pumpkins outside the garden as well. The deer are loving that, eating the leaves and flowers, and gnawing the still green pumpkins outside of the fence. The tomatillos are finally flowering so there may be some of them after all. The tomatoes are brown stalks standing in the midst of the pumpkins vines and the peppers are engulfed.

As the leaves fall from the apple trees, the fruit is more visible and a bucket was harvested yesterday and applesauce will be made today. The apple pears will be added to that sauce, it makes a delicious fruit sauce.

There are two hens in with the littles now. No aggression is shown, but favoritism is definitely shown for the ones Mama Hen raised, so the orphans are still orphaned. They are all looking like little hens now. Mornings are foggy as they set out on their daily forage. Later in the day, the two hens will go off and the 5 littles will rejoin nearer the coop.

The 4 hens in the Palace, still isolated are producing few eggs. I want to know which two are producing, so later this week, I will let one of the Marans out and to rejoin the coop and see if I get a dark colored egg in the coop. Mama Hen started laying again and has produced a green egg every day for a week. Little Red hen lays about 4 a week. If there are no dark eggs provided in the coop, that Marans will be returned to the Palace at night and the other one put in the coop as I know one of them is laying. Then the same process will occur with the Buff Orpingtons. It is the only way I can figure out who is laying and who is not.

Yesterday as the lawn was being mowed, I noticed that Ranger’s Memorial tree is sporting autumnal colors. Leaves are changing and falling, but the color in the mountains isn’t very vivid this year.

During our walk yesterday, I spotted this huge mushroom. It was on the other side of a chain link fence so now the best photo, but it must have been 15″ in diameter.

Daily foggy morning, obscuring the south ridge behind our farm.

Welcome to October.

Yesterday, the Hatchlings and the Orphans were playing nicely together so I let the most gentle Marans out of “Time Out” to join them. She was very kind to them and last night she perched on one end of the perch, the Hatchings and Orphans on the other end after hubby and I had to catch the Orphans and send them up the ramp.

Today has been extremely wet, but the hen and the pullets came out, mostly staying near or under the coop during most of the day. Late this afternoon, Mama Hen was let out of “Time Out” and she is no longer exhibiting the mama behaviors. She didn’t try to separate the hatchlings from the others, didn’t hover around clucking. Tonight, all 5 pullets cooped up and perched together on one end of the coop the two hens together on the other end of the coop.

Tomorrow, another hen will be released, and if things still seem calm, the remaining hens will be released one at a time, hoping for peace in the yard. The orphans seem less intimidated each day.

It looks like one of the hatchlings might be a little roo. Not a very pretty bird, but a rooster here as long as it is only one would be welcomed. They do help protect their hens from hawks and showing them treats.

After some frustration with this experiment, it looks like we may have added 5 more birds to the 6 adult hens. I hope egg production picks up.

Twelve years ago, we began talking about adding a dog or two to the farm. Hubby wanted an English Mastiff. I had no idea what they were, but he found a litter due in December in Pennsylvania. When they were 8 weeks old, we drove up and picked up our 22 pound puppy. Two weeks later, driving up again to purchase a beautiful German Shepherd pup. They were best buddies, but unfortunately, the German Shepherd, who we later found out had come from a disreputable puppy mill, developed Canine Wobblers and at 16 weeks, due to her paralysis and a heart murmur, she had to be euthanized. Later that summer, we purchased another German Shepherd pup but they never truly bonded like the first one did.

Today we had to say goodbye to the big guy, he far outlived the life expectancy of a giant breed and was the best gentle giant in the world.

It is such a tough decision to have to make, but this was the last gift we could give him.

Life on the farm continues with the saga of the hatchlings and the orphans. The orphans have been in a wire dog cage in the coop for a couple of weeks and in the cage in the yard during the day Yesterday, I left the hens penned in the run and let the orphans out into the yard. The hatchlings can still escape the run and the 5 of them played nicely all day, but if the orphans got near the run fence, a hen would lunge at them. Today I repeated the same procedure and decided that the best option for now is to put the hens in purgatory, AKA the chicken palace, AKA timeout. I left Mama Hen with them and she promptly separated her littles from the orphans, but didn’t attack the orphans. Tonight the 5 littles and Mama will have the coop and for a while, the run of the farm without interference. Eventually, I will release the hens one at a time to rejoin the littles in the coop. I hope it works. Egg production is minimal right now anyway.