A Much Needed Update

Yeah, I know...I've been slackin'.

So this is going to be a long one...just to warn you ahead of time! I thought I might just do a chronological update of the past month's going's on, but I think it might be easier to follow if I just go by topic. So...here goes.

Rednecks and Rememberance

Last weekend Mike and I made a trip out to my mom's last weekend to attend a BBQ held to honor my grandmother's last wishes. It was nice to get to see some of my family members, and to hear other's memories of gramma, and we all shared quite a few laughs and tears.

I think Gramma enjoyed watching over us all, and my mom made sure to give her the seat of honor, right up close to the bonfire :)

I hope Gram heard us ribbing my aunt, though...I really think she would have appreciated it! She always had a great sense of humor, and loved to tease.

So...take a look at this...Aunt Coleen and Jess are quite proud of their outhouse, since they have so many bonfires and bbqs and such.

But...check out the decorating on this puppy....talk about your nice digs! Jess said she wanted to make sure you knew you were using the restroom "under the stars" :)

Now...the funny part is....and I wish I'd gotten a picture of it...that the outhouse is finished, but their kitchen is still under construction!!!

Things around our 3 acres...

Well, we've been trucking along rather well, livestock wise, but the garden is struggling. The weather has been unseasonably cool this year, with an amazing amount of rain, and that has proved a bit much for our garden to overcome. Our cukes have given up the fight, and the rest of our squashes have just been shivering in the chill. Our green peppers have been handling it rather well, but we've pounds of tomatoes just hanging out on the vines, waiting to make the transition from green to red. We've been harvesting green beans rather steadily, and our canillini and hutterite beans are drying - we'll be pulling them probably in a couple of weeks. The corn's doing so-so...we've got ears developing on the Painted Mountain and Golden Bantam, and the Kandy Corn that we planted late in the season is puttering along fairly well.

All in all, it's definitely been a season of learning about our climate and soil, and I'm definitely hoping we fare better next year.

The rabbits and chickens, on the other hand, are doing phenomenally well. Our mama hen is doing a fine job of teaching her three chicks how to scratch for bugs and free range, and it looks like only one of those is going to turn out to be a cockerel, which is pretty awesome. We've got an order of chicks coming the second week of September - half will be meat birds, the other half will be a pullet run of Golden Buffs, which are a standard egg laying breed. We wanted to get more of our favorite Buckeyes, but they were sold out.

As for the rabbits, Lily was bred Wednesday, so about four weeks from now we'll see her second litter born. Her first litter is seven weeks old today. We'll weigh them in two weeks and see how they're doing...and will probably head to freezer camp that weekend.

Cocoa's second litter is three weeks old today, and there are some beautiful coats coming in on those babies! She had eight healthy kits, and we lost two - though we do think we know what happened there, and will endeavor to prevent that happening again! They're growing well, eyes fully open and I expect to see them start to venture from the nesting box sometime this week.

Last but not least, here are shots of Otter and Amber. They're the two does we decided to keep from Cocoa's first litter, and will be added to our foundation herd to bring us up to four breeding does and a buck. They're growing well, and we'll probably start breeding them come the end of October or beginning of November. The same weekend Cocoa had her litter we butchered the other three from her first litter, and found that to be MUCH different than processing chickens, and while it's not something I enjoy, I definitely won't approach it with anywhere near the dread I view butchering chickens with!

So....that's what's going on here. We've been working steadily on projects around the place, some small, some larger, and are looking forward to building the future of our 3 Lil' Acres. Our fruit trees are coming along nicely, and I can't wait to get the rest of what we have planned to round out the place.

I'll try to be a little more diligent in posting updates...depends on what's on our plate from week to week though!

Seeing results...

Well, we're really starting to see results now, around 3 Lil' Acres, from the garden to the barn and beyond.

We harvested some more honey today - a full bar - though it's still draining, and so on, so I don't know how much we have yet. As with the first bit we harvested, we'll store this back until spring, in case we find the bees need it. Our visit to the hive went smoothly, and for that I'm grateful. They've another bar in progress, and three empty ones besides, so I think this'll be all we're taking from the hive until spring when the nectar flow begins again. We're already looking forward to getting another hive built to add to this one, as we both anticipate needing to split the hive.

We weighed both Cocoa and Lily's litters this morning, and are very happy with the numbers. Cocoa's five are at 10 weeks as of today, and weighed as follows: Amber- 4#5.5oz, Hossenpfeffer - 4#5oz, Fricasse - 3# 13.5oz, Hershey - 4#8.25oz, and Otter - 4#8 oz. Not to shabby, considering they're a smaller breed than traditional meat rabbits who are expected to reach four pounds at eight weeks.
We weighed Lily's litter of six as a whole, just to get an idea of where they're at. At four weeks, the whole litter weighed 6#.5oz. Meat breeders aim for a litter weight of 10 pounds at four weeks of age for a littler of 8-10, so I think that means we're not doing too badly. We'll keep track of the numbers and see how we do. We didn't think to weigh Cocoa's litter, so we don't have a comparison there.

Mama hen is doing a fine job of taking care of her three chicks, and is teaching them to scratch and scrounge for bugs and other edibles. They're venturing farther and farther with her every day, and the rest of the flock seems to have accepted them without issue. It's really neat to sit and watch them though, and it's hysterical to go to check for eggs and find she has them up in the nesting box with her. Nothing like reaching under a hen for eggs and finding chicks!!

The garden is coming along, though struggling. Our poor cukes and zukes are fighting a wilt(not sure which one though), but the tomatoes and peppers are growing well, and we should be able to harvest our first tomatoes in a week or so, hopefully. Our Painted Mountain corn is in various stages tasseling/silking, and we've little ears starting to form. The spaghetti squash has set four so far, and hopefully alot more to come, and we've been steadily picking peas for about two weeks. Didn't plant enough to freeze or anything like that, but they've been delicious to snack on!!

Let's see...other news. We're working on reshingling the barn roof, and hope to have the whole of the front side done today. Here's a shot of our progress as of yesterday when it started raining - I must say, we've gotten a LOT of rain this year!!

We just finished the front of the barn, but my foot slipped, and I ended up spooked, so we stopped there for the evening.

Meet the Chiclets...

Our Mama hen finally brought the wee ones outside today, and Mike was able to get some pictures of them. They're quite energetic, and follow their mom diligently as she scratches up goodies for them.
The black one is a Dominique chick, and the other two are from what our friend calls her "mystery red hen" with a Dominique rooster. So, we'll have to see what they grow up to look like!








The rest of the critters are doing well, Lily's litter is growing and has taken over her age, and Cocoa's litter is putting on weight quite nicely. Next weekend we'll weigh the three that we aren't keeping for breeding stock, and see how they look.

We got to harvest some turnips from the garden today, as well as peas, and a cucumber. We've radishes and lettuce ready as well, and will go pick some of those when we get a little closer to dinner time.

Other than that, our week has been occupied with worrying about my grandmother, who passed peacefully last night. She will be greatly missed.

An update from the barnyard...

Well, this past weekend was a busy one. Our broody hen suceeded in hatching her eggs, though only three of them were viable eggs. So, we've two little fluffy yellow ones, and one black one. She's pretty protective of the little peepers, so no pictures of them as of yet.

The garden is truly beginning to come on strong now. Mike picked some peas today, and there are blossoms on nearly all of the plants - tomatoes, peppers, squashes, beans, peas. The first spaghetti squash has set on the vines, as well as the first cucumber. We pulled a handful of turnips and radishes out, and picked two heads of lettuce.

We got the growout cages completed yesterday and hung up in the barn. Poor Cocoa was cramped beyond belief, and everyone seems to be quiet happy with the new living arrangements. Fricasse, Hershey and Otter are in one of the new cages now, while Amber and Hassenpfeffer are staying with Cocoa for the time being, while they wait for me to pick up another feeder to outfit the other cage. Cocoa's due to kindle in a little under three weeks, so we'll make sure they're out in the next week or so, leaving her some time to chill.

Lily's doing really well, and her temperment seems to be improving a bit with motherhood. The babies have all abandoned the nesting box, and it's rather amusing to see Lily hanging out IN the box trying to avoid her kits.

A Box O' Bunnies

So, that's the goings on here-abouts. Working on the garden, taking care of the critters, and trying not to overheat as summer continues. Hope all's going well everywhere else, and I'll try to post more pics of everything sometime in the next couple of days.

The garden's growing...

Well, finally remembered to take the camera out to snap some shots of the garden. Now that we're finally warming up here and getting some sun it's starting to come on strong.
We're definitely experiencing a learning curve, though, and hopefully will find it much more successful next year.

We're growing: broccoli, brussel sprouts, cabbage, beets, turnips, mangels(which is a livestock beet), radishes, cucumbers, a few different lettuces, summer squash, zucchini, spaghetti squash, delicata, pumpkin, cannelini beans, hutterite beans(a soup bean), peas, pole beans, tomatoes(4 different varieties), and peppers(a bell pepper, a frying pepper, and jalepeno).

Here are some shots of the garden...

Barely handfuls and more than...

Well, Lily's litter is a week old today, and I can't help but find myself amazed once more at how quickly the kits are growing. Their fur is in now, and the final tally is four solid black kits, and two castors(I think...we won't know exactly what shade - castor/lynx - until their fur is in more). Lily's proving to be a very attentive and protective mom, though she's still showing quite the attitude, though more with me, than with Mike. I meant to weigh the litter today and forgot, so I'll try to do that tomorrow, and add it to our records. I would weigh them individually, but unfortunately there's really no way to tell them apart, aside from separating the black from the castors, and no way to mark them, (the way most meat breeders mark is to dab a color on the back of the head - but those rabbits are white) since food coloring or something like that wouldn't show up on those colors.

As for Cocoa's litter, we'll be weighing them tomorrow as well, to get their six week weights recorded. They seem to be growing quite well, and three of the five(Fricasse, Hassenpfeffer, and Hershey) will move out of Cocoa's cage and into a grow-out cage tomorrow, all things going the way we have them planned. Amber and Otter will stay with Cocoa until she's closer to kindling, then will move into another doe cage(Otter's fate being up in the air at the time being).

We bred Cocoa to Buck Wednesday evening, so we should see another litter from her around August 10th. We're hoping for a better litter size from her this time, though still hoping to see the nice range of colors that she gave us the first time around. Definitely looking forward to the outcome there!

Population Explosion!

In the course of two days, the population of our little farm has gone from 21 to 32!! Lily had her litter some time between 6 and 9pm last night - six baby bunnies!

So...for all of you who are wondering what makes up that number....

Mike & Jen

Willow & Idgy(the indoor cats)

Pollux and DJ(Our lab mix and tabby outdoor cat)

DJ's litter of 5 kittens-shortterm residents, there ;)

Seven laying hens(one of whom is sitting on a nest of 11 eggs...more residents are imminent!)

Cocoa, Lily, and Buck(our rabbit breeding trio)

Cocoa's litter of 5(one of whom will be staying on a permanent basis)

Lily's litter of 6