Chick Update: May 23, 2012 ~12 days old

The chicks are about 12 days old now.  I am not sure which one is the crooked-necked one, so I guess that is a good thing s/he is doing well.  I will have to go in this evening when they are tired and see if I can tell which one it is.

I took about 2 minutes of video and uploaded it to YouTube to share with my readers.

And here are some pics of our daughter and the chick she was holding. She is the only one of the kids that really wants anything to do with them. She wants to hold them and play with them every day (so far). LOL

The Main Garden: May 21, 2012

Some of the garden seeds I planted a week ago are coming up!

Royal Burgundy Bush Bean

Kale Mix

Burgundy Okra

Picklebush Cucumber

Jacob's Cattle Beans

There are moles that keep digging up and eating my onion sets. They don't particularly care for eating the red ones, but they dig them up anyway.  I put a live trap out there and haven't caught anything, which reinforces my thoughts that it's moles. I will have to figure out how to deal with them, as the vintage mole trap bit the dust last year...

I have seen a gigantic bunny outside on the property the last couple days. I am willing to bet that it's him or one of his buddies that have nipped off two of my banana pepper plants! I saw him this morning and ran out and scared him away, but I know that won't last for long!

Row-to-Row Carpeting in the Garden...aka Mulching

Since the garden was put in in the last week, today was dubbed Mulching Day.

Where we live, the soil around here is mainly clay. Not the best soil to grow things in, as it turns into a brick in the heat of the summer.  If the summer is particularly dry, the clay soil cracks. Picturesque, but not great for the plants.
 
Over the last 4(maybe 5) years, we have been mulching between our garden rows. This adds nutrients to the soil as it breaks down, makes pathways that we can walk on to get to our plants even if it's just rained heavily, helps keep the weeds down, and over time has made our garden less clay-like and more gardening friendly.

Our mulch of choice has often been grass clippings from mowing our acreage. It's work, but I'd rather be mulching than weeding, any day! 

Our second choice, and what I used today, is old straw. This year, we are using what was donated to us from the church's Live Nativity last December.  They didn't need it and were looking for someone to take it, so they brought it on over last winter. Win!

I do not recommend hay. Hay will have a lot of seed in it, and you don't want to be introducing that to your garden.  

Here's the straw I had to work with:

Here's the garden, with complete Row-to-Row Carpeting:

I think I ended up using 12 bales of straw. I need to water later tonite...those boards I think I will leave there so as to help the sprinkler head to sit level when I am watering.

Quite a change from 2 months ago, eh?

May 2012: Groceries

I went to the store today for a few things.

Ok, ok, there were more than a few things in my cart...but there were only a few things on my list! :)

You're doing your best to keep me accountable, aren't you?


At the end of my last grocery shop, I had $112.09 left of my $450/month budget.

Here's what I purchased today:

Food Store

Dozen Eggs

Coconut Flour

Almond Flour
Organic Tea
Multicolor Popcorn kernels

Total came to: $27.04

Local Grocery S=Sale

S=Head cabbage
Head iceberg lettuce
Romaine lettuce
clamshell container of Spring Mix lettuce on clearance
2# bag of carrots

S=2 blocks of cheddar cheese

2 pkg Hormel Naturals lunchmeat

Frozen orange juice concentrate

David Pumpkin Seeds
2 loaves 100% whole wheat, hfc-free bread
1 bag hamburger buns
(Ok, Ok, I admit it, I am caving on the no-wheat for the family thing!)

Total came to $30.76

Dollar General

2 pkg Flour tortillas
Trident Gum (can you believe they don't have Trident spearmint at the grocery store???)
Sunflower seeds...to grow...but we might eat 'em...eventually, lol


Total came to $7.50

So, $112.09-27.04-30.76-7.50= $46.79 left for the rest of the month

Chick Update: May 17, 2012

As of this morning, the chick count is down to 11 chicks.

The last one to hatch had something wrong with it, as I mentioned in my last chick update. It could not sit up at all, even when I set it up. I think it was paralyzed or something.  Its feathers did not fluff out nearly as much as the other chicks and it was missing feathers as well. I put that one down on Monday, rather than have it suffer any longer.

The second death was the weaker, less coordinated of the two that have what I believe to be Wry Neck. I gave this chick vitamins a couple times a day, and dipped his beak in the water multiple times a day. Still, he didn't make it.  I had read about elaborate means of trying to save chicks, involving blending lettuce and other foods up and force feeding them....and I considered it, but decided it to be unwise in our situation. If these chicks work out for us as dual-purpose birds, I don't want to be breeding birds that I know have this gene--and especially not ones that aren't able to pull out of it on their own.  At any rate, I think this particular chick was having difficulty in swallowing, and I am not sure he would have been able to eat the food, even if I did force it on him.

At the end of the day, this leaves us with 11 chicks. The remaining chicks all look to be healthy and strong. The one that has Wry Neck (or whatever it might be) is fully able to eat, drink, and run around with the rest of them. For now, I am just going to let nature run its course and see how it does and whether it corrects itself. If it's a roo, we will likely have him for dinner once he's grown enough...same if it's a hen and we don't want her eggs to be mingled in with our other hatching eggs.

Time will tell.