Internet at Home and Updates!

Last night we went and bought the things necessary to have Internet access at home through our PC. If this works out, I will be able to post regularly! Woohoo!!! So far, though, Wayne is unimpressed with the speed of the Internet service. It does take a while for pages to load, but I'm not surprised given our location. I'm just excited to be able to have Internet without having to buy a satellite! We have two weeks to decide if we are happy with the service and if so, continue on. If we are unhappy with it we will simply return the items we purchased for a refund and the contract will be cancelled. I really, really hope it doesn't come to that.

Homestead updates:

Garden:
I really wanted this to be the year I had a successful garden. However, life had other plans. The storms that ripped through our area in late March/early April caused a lot of unplanned work in the yard and interfered with out ability to get the ground prepared for planting in a timely manner. One thing I've learned is that I MUST get the garden in as early as possible in order to get a harvest before school starts in the fall. I absolutely do not have the time to deal with the garden once school starts. However, I can plant a bit in the evenings and weed on the weekends in the spring until we get out of school for the summer. All that is to say that I planted what I am calling a "micro-garden." It contains tomatoes, peppers, onions, lettuce, basil, and cilantro. I also have some tiny yellow day lilies, mints, and lemon balm that are supposed to be permanent residents in that bed. I have containers with rhubarb and hens and chicks as well.

Early in the spring I planted grapes, muscadines (one of my favorite things in the whole wide world!), and raspberries in the front yard, at the perimeter of the orchard. Most of them are doing well. A couple of the plants appear to have died back, but I am continuing to water in hopes of something springing forth from the roots.

We lost almost all of our orchard due to the hard winter of 2010/2011 and the drought of the summer of 2011. I have planted nine fruit trees since we moved here. Only three remain. Two are peaches and one is a pear.

Poultry:
Our chicken flock has grown dramatically. At the end of winter I had four Welsummer hens and one Welsummer rooster, one Delaware hen, and five bantam hens of unknown origin. A good friend decided that she didn't want to mess with chickens any more and gave me her hens, who are less than one year old. That added seven girls to the flock. One of them lays a lovely olive green egg! They are what she calls "barnyard mix." There appears to be two barred rock, one Welsummer mix, one Cochin, one Black Austrolorp, one Rhode Island Red, and one (?)blue grey beauty!

I found Silver Laced Cochin pullets at Atwoods about the first of April. I seized the chance and bought six of them. Cochins are my favorite breed. I hope they will turn out to be excellent layers as well!

I had ordered six Golden Laced Wyandottes through my feed store (Midwest Ag in Carthage) in very early spring. I got the call that they had arrived the first week of May. When I got to the feed store only four of my chicks was there. Someone had accidentally gotten my Wyandottes! I was pretty unhappy about that, since I had ordered so few to begin with, there is little margin for error. One of our big goals is to have enough eggs to sell, and I know that Wyandottes are the best layers I've ever had, bar none! The only other chicks the feed store had on hand that I would even consider adding to my flock were Easter Eggers. I ended up taking four of them.

This brings my chicken flock to a grand total of 32! Eeek! My goal was 25 hens. Oh well, that just means more eggs, right?

The week after I bought my latest eight chicks I was back at the feed store and they had ducklings for sale. Now, I've been wanting Khaki Campbells for a long time, but they were always too pricey, and I thought it would be years before I could get any. I offhandedly asked what kind of ducks they hand and when they said Khaki Campbells I embarrassed myself with the squeal that escaped my lips! I bought five. This has been an adventure and an education! What I read about them has proven to be untrue thus far. I really hope it wasn't all a lie! Khaki Campbells are supposed to be land ducks and not require water for swimming. Everything I read said that they enjoyed it, but it wasn't necessary. Those poor babies were FILTHY by the end of the first week!!! I ended up bringing them inside and filling the bathtub with warm water because they are still downy. I added the water a little bit at a time because I have heard of people accidentally drowning their ducklings. Apparently mine were ready, because as soon as there was enough water, they took off! It was so much fun to see them swimming and preening in the nice, warm water. When one decided to take a dive (like ducks do) it freaked all the others out. It was so funny! A couple of the others tried it and they had great fun. Every time I would think they were getting tired and it was time to let the water out they would get a new burst of energy and start all over again with dunking their heads and scratching them vigorously, standing on the water, splashing, etc. They are definitely very messy critters, but what a joy to watch! I love their call, too! It makes me smile every time. The benefit to the homestead (according to my reading) is that they are avid eaters of bugs, snails, and slugs. Supposedly, they won't bother the garden plants, but will eat broad leafed weeds with relish. I sure hope SOMETHING I read was true! The ducks will definitely be getting some sort of pond of their own!