Good Saturday morning all!
Nice warm-ish morning here, and we started the morning off with a fresh loaf of my sourdough cooked in my new cast iron dutch oven. However, I think this new “toy” has a slight problem, I believe the lid handle is painted.... I hope the paint will safely burn off. As the handle itself seems to be metal and probably is cast too.
I have taken up to making a very multi grain sourdough for now on, our discount grocer has a “7 grain” mix, it also has flaked barley, then I add oatmeal, hulled (non salted) sunflower seeds, and flax seed. It makes for a wonderful tasting bread.
Our first two “dinner guests” actually did not come to dinner, we gave them to Queen Sized Tink and now are deciding what to do with our two polish roosters. Now I said deciding as well, even though we keep a good amount of “water bowls” out for them and our couple cats that prefer to be outside; they prefer to drink out of our septic. I don't think I want to eat them now.... I'm sure a few people will agree with that.
So I have to spend part of today seeing how many of my seed potatoes they ate, and how many more of the onion sets they dug up. If you didn't know, chickens (at least mine) don't eat onion. Also as a friend on another website has asked me some info about my chickens after I posted the Record Keeping post I'll post what I wrote there in case anyone wants to know this information:
I buy feed from our local feed store as the organic feed is about 4x's the price here. I feed my 16 birds (1 rooster) 3, 50 pound bags a month @ about $8 per bag. That is the lest expensive feed here and it's mixed at the local major feed company on site. They get kitchen scraps and in summer the odd "weed" that I found they like. (chickens will eat almost anything).
We haven't used extra light, but our coop has that big screened opening at the east side that gives them tons of light. They have their "yard" that they if they chose to be in at any hour. They get cicadas (in season), and tomato horn-worms (in season). They are also almost a year old and haven't had their molt yet.
we also don't have extra heat, this winter was mild, we are going to upgrade our coop this year (crosses fingers) with a power box in it for if it is necessary. I do not feed them back their egg shells, I buy oyster shell only, I don't want to risk them eating their eggs in any way.
... also I would occasionally add milk to their water or some molasses (heated water and added it). We have also made our own suet when we had tallow for deep frying and it would get a tad "old". I'd mix in some grains I have for my bread making, some milk powder, dried berries, and pour in the hot tallow then let it harden overnight in a cool spot (in winter outside works well) Then I'd put it into the chicken yard in a suet feeder for them to inhale (which they did, the one time I had walked back to the house to get them some water and by the time I came back it was gone).
So they are pampered a tad...
I thought this info might be helpful and if it is good.
We have as of today shrunk our “indoor” wood piles down to just one as if we need heat it might be a first thing in the morning to rid us of the chill. So where we had the one wood pile under my girls' ladder, we are putting in some shelves. ...I like shelves... shelves are nice... I don't have many shelves, now I'll have two more.
Out during my normal garden walk this morning I noticed one cabbage sprout from the seeds I planted. Now from the cabbage plants I transplanted only one seems to be “holding on”, the others have changed to an odd color, and I can't figure out what is causing it. According to what I know I transplanted them at the right time, the broccoli I planted near them are actually doing about 100x's better, and has some noticeable new (and better) growth. The Hyacinth that I saw coming up (which I planted 2 years ago and this is the first year it has come up) has bloomed with pink flowers. The elderberry trees(?) are coming along in their leaf growth. I am worried about the fig however as the buds don't seem to be getting larger, but we'll see what happens with it. The rosemary plant that I transplanted into the ground last fall has new growth on it, Silver thinks we might wind up with a bush of it this year. The prickly pear that I planted last summer also has new growth, as does my yucca plants. I planted some chives in one of my trunk “pots” and they have sprouted, and about ½ of my tomato and peppers have as well.
So far this year is promising to be pretty good on our food production side, I am hoping it will only get better. I am waiting, and waiting for our dogwoods to finally bloom, they've had their flower buds on them for months. I do hope they bloom soon they are always a good show in the spring. With all the nice weather and not seeing much green yet outside I've been looking at ornamental plants with lots of color, just to see some color. Anyone else feel that way right now?
Hope you have a good weekend!
Be Well Be Safe and Blessed Be...
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