chickens

Predators 30/ Farm 3

Steve HardinLeave a comment

It’s been a long week, I have been keeping the Ring camera open at night while we are watching TV so I can spot the predators killing our chickens, cats and eating our eggs. I had a few issues with this as always. I don’t particularly want to get sprayed by a skunk and our back door is right next to the cat feeding area so if I barge out there guns-a-blazing I am gonna get a face full of spray. This makes it imperative that I actually identify my victim prior to opening the door so I know what to expect. I spotted a raccoon right after it got dark on Tuesday night. I crept out to the back porch and silently as possible racked the action on my pistol to not scare the raccoon away. It really had nothing to fear. I dry fired the pistol as I had not cycled the hammer by gently racking the pistol. I cycled it again quickly but the raccoon was no fool and was beating feet as fast as possible and I never got off a good shot again. It was right there! I dropped the magazine and cleared the chamber when I went back inside the house.

Thirty minutes later I spot a smaller cat eating. As I keep looking at it the cat has a funny shape and color. Turns out it was a huge possum! I do the sneak approach and same thing happens. Luckily, they are a lot slower than a raccoon and I was able to dispatch it. It was headed to the berry patch. Thirty minutes later another huge possum shows up and this one tries to get under the old house. Again, damn pistol dry fired first round. At this point I realize I may need to actually clean the pistol. Honestly, I am unsure of the last time I did it.

But I decided that readiness was going to out trump safety and just kept one in the chamber and turned the safety on. It is hidden so it is not easily accessible. An hour later the raccoon came back and I was able to get off two good shots then had to chase it up the dry creek bed before finally putting it down. I had just counted my chickens before it got dark. The predators have killed over a dozen and they killed our two matching pairs of silkie chickens! Both the grey ones and the brown ones, rooster and hen. Those were the coolest of the new chickens. I think I have around 24 chickens now. This is a stupid problem! We know there is at least one skunk and two more raccoons around the place but I have not seen them on the Ring camera this week. So I will keep watching every night. The four new adult fixed cats we got are still hanging out around the back porch. I don’t know if they will be a deterrent to the predators or not.

Annmarie has been getting ready for her new loom. She took her old project off the inside loom so that we could send that loom home with Sarah. I am told that the rest of the industrial loom is coming up next week and then we can start working on getting it assembled. We are going to use the runner to cover our safes in the living room or else to cover the old wooden fridge in the hallway. It is made out of wool. She tells me she can see all of the mistakes but I cannot.

I was able to finally pickup carcasses to take them up onto the hillside for disposal this weekend. They do smell quite a bit after a few days but the important part is that I discovered one of our neighbors had upgraded and replaced about 50% of the fence that is along our adjoining property lines! This is way cool as it was one that was on our sooner than later upgrade but that was five years from now.

Catch up

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I lost another chicken this weekend, unfortunately this one was due to chicken IQ limitations. Do not go into the yard where the old dog is located because he has a tendency to off things, one chicken down. I am still unsure how many chickens there actually are out in the coop. I know there are at least five that sleep out in the back bushes and I am sure there are others camped out elsewhere. I have still not managed to get a lid on the chicken coop yet so I cannot lock them all up to count them yet.

I turned off the water to the front hillside, the yard and the lavender patch. We still have water going to the garden as I have beets sprouting and we are still picking green beans. Annmarie put up another 12 pints this weekend. Our trumpet vine is finally starting to fill in around our second living room window. If we get a mild winter it will give it time to get larger and start to create some wood so it can survive a freezing temperature. Mr GolfPro and myself have been cutting it away from the house several times this year in an attempt to get it to grow so we can train it to the location we need. I am hopeful that next year we can just kill everything that grows towards the house instead of trying to redirect it. It is way easier when you can just cut a clearing around the house.

The furniture juggle that occurred caused us to get a chair and old Murphy bed added to the master bedroom. We added another table to the breeze porch. I was given a Mayer lemon tree that is about three feet tall a month ago. It got down to 41F last night so I figured it was time to find a place inside for the tree. I had to rearrange the entire breeze porch. I cleaned it up, trimmed some plants back and found a spot for the lemon tree. I ended up planting another five starts from trimmings. I could have done 20 but I need more planting soil. I am pretty sure I am going to have more than 30 plants for Christmas gifts at work. I may have to expand my offerings. I still need to get a plastic sheet to cover the wooden table before I can use it. Even though I use the plastic trays a little water gets spilt in between them.

I did polish a lot of wood today, I managed to get about half of our wooden doors polished. They all need it. We got all of the baby stuff that our grandson has outgrown bagged and up into the attic. When there is another baby we will pull it all down again and reuse it.

I need to put more drawer magnetic locks in the kitchen but I need to remember where I put all of the extras. I am still not sure what “safe” location I stashed them in. My goal is to find them this week so I can get them installed. This will not make the munchkin happy.

We are feeding our bees again. One hive is looking fantastic and the new one this year only has one box full. They left the second box empty. We will be moving them soon to the sheltered area. I need to get the gutter up on it so that water does not get blown inside the hives.

I still need to cut hay one more time over at the Naked Gardener’s house. I should get around two tons. I am taking some vacation in October to get the hay done and the barn completed.

I have still not managed to find out what killed our kitten. I have gotten up twice in the middle of the night because I thought I heard a chicken death knell and both times it was a false alarm. We did see something moving around on the camera but couldn’t tell what it was and it was gone by the time I got out there. I had considered putting the camera feed up live but I am always running out at night with minimal to no clothes on so I figured I better not do that!

I got all of my marbles into one location. The next step is to sort them and get all of the modern ones into one large container so the grandkids can play with them. About half of those are not really worth anything other than entertainment value which cannot be overlooked.

Barn dig out initiated

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The big question of the day, will the new tractor fit into the barn? Before I could answer that question I had to go out and pick tomatoes from the back garden. The onions have been ready but with the party we just left them in the ground. I pulled them all out and hung them over the edges of a bin to dry out and form a skin. We had two bins worth of onions but one of the bins had some volunteer tomatoes come up so I am going to keep watering the tomato plant in the hopes of getting more fruit. I also planted beets in the old pea bin. I will probably plant some carrots this weekend in one of the other empty bins. I need to chop off some of the low growing branches on the back tree as it is starting to get in the way again. I will just add that to the list.

I need to work on the greenhouse again. Mr Rainman told me if I watched some YouTube videos I will need to caulk the panels in certain places to hold them in. I have had two panels pop out this last week. But the next thing after the barn dig out is moving rocks. I MUST get the rocks on the hillside below the gazebo put in place. The plan is super large rocks at the base of the mound and then at least 5-6” rocks all over the hillside to stabilize the gazebo base. After all of the effort to get the gazebo up and build the pad I do not need it washing out.

I was able to find my manure forks for the tractor bucket and install them. I was actually able to drive in and out of the barn without moving any fence but I had about three inches of clearance on each side and that is not realistic for hours of in and out travel. So I removed distal half of the fence on the left side of the entrance. I am going to move the entire fence over 12-18” when I rebuild it. That will be the last thing I do after cleaning out the barn. I put in a few hours today moving dirt and muck and have the barn over 50% done. I was able to hand dig out the entire sorting chute and did not have to remove it. This saved me about an hour of labor. I find that the labor gets a little harder every year. I was even able to turn the tractor around inside the barn. That is the real test of too big. The hydraulics are a little touchier than the John Deere so I am still getting used to them. My hope is to get the barn and gate all completed this weekend then I can switch gears and start hauling rocks.

I moved some water into the chicken yard and the chickens have started to lay in the coop again. I am getting at least four eggs/day now. The dog eats 2/day and the wife 1/day so they are at least out producing our daily consumption. I still have not gotten the roof on the yard but that project keeps getting pushed out to a later date.

I was thinking today in the shower about a seating area outside the gazebo. I may create a level gravel area outside and below the gazebo. There is a section of the hillside below the gazebo that has shallow soil and a rock bluff that not much grows there but cheat grass. I would need to build a retaining wall out of metal panels like I did for the horse area. This would make a nice gathering area. It’s a thought. If I do it I will need to put in some subterranean drain pipe to allow the gazebo roof to drain appropriately and keep the bank stabilized. I will keep musing on this idea to see if it is doable without too much work. Annmarie talked to me about putting in a water feature on the other side and I will want to do that before anything! I love a good water feature. My last one looked like a pair of breasts, it was accidental but everyone said the same thing when they saw it. It will be shallow so there will be no fish but I am hopeful that the birds will use it to bath in and the bees will be able to easily and safely get water.

Chicken coop hardening

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It was time to get some chicken eggs and to harden the chicken coop. the Quiet One came out this morning and we spent an hour getting all the tools and supplies over to the chicken coop so we could get it updated. There used to be a fenced off portion down by the window but the steers tore it up in the last couple of years by trying to go through it. They did not get through the fence but they tore it up beyond salvaging and it had some big holes. This time I anticipated the cows trying to go through it again. We put a triangle with alternating H braces and smooth wire fence tighteners to create an anchor that can take a charging animal and bounce it off. We put three 2×4 across the chicken wire so that the cows can see there is an actual fence present. We also slanted the fence so it forces them to turn all in the hope that it won’t get ripped apart again. This also creates a larger chicken yard. Normally, that does not matter as I do not lock them up normally but we are getting zero eggs/day with 30 chickens. I cannot figure out where they are laying eggs. Today we heard the little silkie hen lay an egg behind the sink and snagged it as soon as she left. It is the first egg I have collected in five day!

The plan is to get the fence around the greenhouse and then to put chicken wire over the roof of the chicken yard so they cannot fly out. I want to force them to stay in the chicken yard for 1-2 weeks until they get used to using the laying boxes. Drilling the holes was surprisingly easy! The auger just went right into the ground and I only hit one rock and it just went around it. It was amazing, I have never had it that easy and I only need to drill one more hole and I will be done. It is for the gate into the greenhouse area but I need to go pickup a gate first. I want to make it so that the gate has to be pulled outward and if it is pushed on it will just close it against the chicken enclosure. This way even if the gate is not latched the animals cannot push it open.

Digging out the barn is the next big chore. The new little tractor has a wider bucket than the John Deere so I am unsure how the gate setup is going to work. I may have to move 1-2 of the posts out 18” so the new tractor can make the corner. I have not been brave enough to try it yet! Mostly because I do not have time for another project yet. I need to get the greenhouse and chicken coop finished first. Once they are done then I can move onto the barn. I did take some time and move one of the barn lot piles, the one closest to the barn, so that I can make a new pile of barn poop and straw. Not having to drive to the far end of the barn lot will save me some time, a couple of hours probably overall.

I went to town to get some cow panels and a brand new gate for the greenhouse fence. I am all ready for tomorrow.

Greenhouse build

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I have plans to get Annmarie’s greenhouse in place and put together so she can use it. We would like to grow vegetables through the winter so we are going to give it a go. We will probably put a remote thermometer in the greenhouse so we can track the high and low temps throughout the year. This will not be possible if I do not assemble the thing. Rainman and I had already built the base earlier in the year we just needed to assemble the actual greenhouse, or so I thought. The Quiet One and I worked on changing out panels down by the spring first. I had purchased some old metal panels and we swapped out the newer horse exercise ring panels for some old ones that can stay forever. I of course found a deep spot with my rubber boots and ended up getting water inside my left boot first thing in the morning. My foot stayed wet for the rest of the day.

Before we could even assemble the first part of the base I had to bring over almost two yards of gravel to spread around the outside of the base. The chickens had spread out the gravel and were eroding the base. Once we got that corrected we assembled the base and the instructions said to bury the base. We brought in another three yards of gravel to fill the base but kept it away from the metal. I wanted to get the entire thing assembled then use some metal to wood screws to attach the greenhouse base to the wooden base we installed. We also bolted the wooden frame to three foot ground anchors screwed into the ground in the spring. I do not believe it will be able to fly away. It might fly apart due to the wind but the base frame will stay attached to the ground if it does! All the videos said it would take two days but we were making stellar progress despite reading the instruction booklet. That is until the instructions started to tell us to disassemble one piece for every two we attempted to add. We will have to change out some longer bolts for shorter ones as we used up all the long ones and we need them for the roof.

I ended up on my back after attempting to jump off of a ladder at what I thought was a foot or so. It was more than that and I did not stick the landing, my feet slid out from under me and my back stopped my fall when it pounded into the ground. Surprisingly, I did not knock the air out of my lungs. I did end up bruising the bottom of my left foot. It hurts to walk now and I have a slight limp until I get used to the pain. I also wore a short sleeve shirt, it was hot, and I don’t usually do that so I got an impressive sunburn on my arms and neck. At 58 years old I am not near as spry as I used to be.

We ended up almost getting the roof truss pieces in place before quitting. The Quiet One did bring over chickens! I now have an extra approximately 25 chickens. So there are about 40 chickens running around now. They need to figure out that they have to go to the front spring if they want water. I got a dozen eggs today, so the dog is back to getting an egg on her food twice daily.

Our Ring camera is getting a lot smarter. It can now tell you that the critters it sees are a flock of chickens! It is pretty amazing. They now need to work on the logic so the camera tells you when a dog enters the picture.