Day 7 - Countdown to Baby Chicks - Candling Night!

(Photo taken from Univ. Illinois @Champaign-Urbana site "Chickscope"
To give you an idea of how many eggs we found NOT to be fertile and growing chicks, Farmer Jeff asked me in a very plaintive voice: "Can we PLEASE not have all of these chicks in the bathroom"?

We started with 41 eggs in an incubator which holds 42. I guess I thought I would be a little manic if I filled all 42 spots. I guess that is like an alcoholic not thinking they are an alcoholic because they don't drink before 5.

Well, we have 40 eggs that are growing and only one that is not. I guess one of the hens stayed in the hen house that day and was able to evade the 6 roosters. SHE should be the one we breed!

Now it is just a waiting game. OH, a friend and Chicken Mama in her own right advised me to keep the humidity in the incubator at 50-55% until the last 3 days at which time I need to raise it to 65%. WHAT!!! How in the world am I going to do that!!! Heavens...new things to worry about! Where is my Chicken World catalog when I need it!

PS: Farmer Jeff is going to build a brood box that will be set up in the greenhouse! He is excited he gets to build something! Whew!

Back in Business!

Sometime around the winter holidays we lost or misplaced our camera battery and charger. For a blogger, that makes life a little harder and more challenging. I am happy to run around taking pictures of what is happening today, starting with Farmer Jeff and his seed starts!

He has started 1,000 plants and 25 varieties, or at least that is what it was yesterday! Who knows what he will do in the next few weeks. Well, actually, I KNOW what he is up to. He is building the greenhouse! For those of you that lean more towards the hibernation end of life, I know you feel sorry for me right about now. Yes, if you didn't realize it before, I AM married to a hybrid of the energizer bunny and Tigger.

Farmer Jeff loves to re-use things. In the new lingo, this is called "up-cycling". In the old days this was using your noggin by using stuff you already had! The redwood is from the old fence from behind the restaurant and the windows are from the "buy it here" area of the local dump. Yes, the most feared words to be uttered by Farmer Jeff, "Honey, guess what I bought at the dump today?!!!". He actually started gathering for the greenhouse a couple years ago and that is when he first found the windows. We went back to buy the windows and I was left at the dump as collateral so he could go and get cash 'cause they didn't take checks, but that is another story for another time!

He is really close to being done. He has just attached the first set of roof windows. The next challenge will be installing the sliding glass doors that are going up for the larger part of the roof. He has



engineered this whole thing himself. I don't have a clue how to put it together!

While Farmer Jeff has busied himself with the greenhouse and tomatoes, I have been tending to the baby chicks! They are just so damn cute! I was once told that the word "cute" only applies to things younger than 6 months...and this works! I went to Western Farm Center to buy baby chicks and ended up with 4 four month old Ameraucana pullets (female hens pre-egg laying age) and then 6 day-old chicks. I also picked up 3 black Astrolorp babies (Australian Orpingtons)and we are looking after them while they are away. Take a look at the video I took last night!

Gentle Days

Today was a beautiful day. We can't believe it is late winter! How crazy is that with weather like this?

After feeding the masses for 2 long weekends in a row, Farmer Jeff and I are doing something a lot quieter. We are transplanting the 1,000 tomato babies! He has been very organized and written out planting maps for seedling trays. I have assisted by printing up labels for the transplant trays.



Once they have been moved to the trays, the trays are labeled, the labels are taped down to slow the water damage to the label, then they are numbered and moved to the truck. Why the truck? Once the tomatoes have been transplanted, they are moved over to the greenhouse at the other property we are farming.




I have never seen my honey so happy. He loves what he is doing. We are both grateful for the life we are leading. What more could we ask for?



(I just had to include a picture of our beautiful blooming camellia!)