Not too sure where time has gone, like the entire school year! WOW. Where to begin. I left off with some new pullets getting ready to lay so they are graduated to HEN status. All four (Sonny, Esther and Jean pictured) of them have started to lay on a daily basis, all light brown eggs. The hens come from a leghorn hen and pekin bantum cock. All are beautiful hens and very social and loving and on occasion naughty. School has become a fun teaching environment for me. Kindergarten has an egg section that they study and I have been invited into the classrooms this year to speak about being an urban farmer, specifically hens. Currently waiting on 38 eggs that are sitting in a kinder incubator--we'll see how brooding goes in my kitchen this time around. Should be interesting, to say the least.
The gardens are doing well. I have a raised bed in the back currently with red leaf, arugula, broccoli and a couple potato varieties. The new bed out front has tomato plants, pole beans, okra, cilantro and jalapeno's. Seems to be working well out there catching a good portion of the southern sun exposure and knock on wood, no javelina visits. For those of you who do not know what a javelina is...it is a peccary not a pig but looks like a black boar. On the edges of town that are opened to the desert they come in to forage on the flowers and plants that people try so hard to grow. Pretty aggressive and very protective of their young. I wouldn't want to be confronted by one!
Composting is very beneficial in our family. First of all, nothing is wasted in this house. What little food is not consumed goes straight to the hens with the exception of onions and potato skins. No protein goes into the compost heap but I have been experimenting with old socks, t-shirts and of course Sun Chip bags and I think I even threw in an old silk scarf. Pulled out the better part of a yard of black gold not too long ago and the trees and veg gardens loved every bit of that nice amendment. This is a fun adventure and some great learning for the boys. Being Sicilian, I grew up in a garden and have nothing but great memories!
I am really trying, not too hard obviously, to find the motivation and time to build a new chicken coop. Maybe it just isn't the right time as they, all ten of them, seem pretty cozy in their little log cabin BUT...a packrat has spread the wrath of destruction throughout their current residence. Just in case you were wondering, pack rats gnaw on pretty much everything. I found the finger of a glove inside the coop where a little pack rat was hulled up inside of an old "H" block. Needless to say I was happy to introduce him to his or her maker with no remorse.
