March

Time sure has a way of just flying by. It is now the first part of March. Soon it will be a whole year since Connie passed. And so much has changed. Sometime maybe I will grow philosophical and spill feelings, but not today.

A couple of stray dogs came thru on Sunday while no one was here and killed a half dozen of my chickens. Hens at that, not any of the extra roosters I seem to have. They also tore into my old Red Tom. Ripped all his tail feathers off and tore up his back some. I thought he would recover, but he didn’t. Monday I watched over him and thought he was doing ok. When I came to let the birds out Tuesday morning he was dead in the coop. Honestly I think there was some fighting going on in the coop during the night among the toms, and he lost. Literally. When everyone is healthy they all seemed to get along just fine. Even the new toms got along with the old one. But injure one of them and they all seem to want to eliminate the weakness. The Red tom came out of the coop the next day and they had him penned under the porch, so I put him in the garden away from everyone else. And there were issues when I put them away, but thought I’d separated them enough. Or hoped that out of sight would be out of mind once they each went to their own spots for the night. Well, I’ll know better next time. Just not sure where I could have put him and kept him secure from the coons too.

Had a big cold front blow thru the other day. It was 70 degrees during the day, then that night a cold front came ripping thru. Winds up to 70mph And large hail and the temp dropped to the mid 20's. There were reports of funnel clouds but no confirmed tornadoes on the ground. We didn’t get any damage luckily. The strange part was that the next morning it appeared to be raining mud. The NWS said it was dust from west Texas and New Mexico caused by a drought there and the winds aloft carried it here. Made the cars and windows nasty.

On 28 Feb put the 2 turkey eggs and the 2 goose eggs I had in the incubator along with about 25 chicken eggs. The geese eggs are a week or so old and the turkey eggs are probably older than that. Wasn’t sure what else to do with them, and if they develop they do, and if not, no real loss. Most of them I plan to sell. This year we are going to attend some poultry swap meets and try to sell chicks, mostly the turkeys. I’ll hatch as many as I can, and then sell as many of those as I can. Less money invested in chicks, less risk of injury or loss to predators and I think a higher return on my investment. More so because I’ll be hatching my own eggs. I sold some poults in December for $7.50 each. And only got $20 each for grown birds that I had fed all summer, so do the math and figure it out. At least that is the plan. We’ll see how it goes. And even if I get less for them, still coming out ahead. And I’ll keep enough to eat and sell a few this fall. Also plan to get a few Broad Breasted Bronze birds for canning. We really like the turkey and dumplings. And there are other uses for it. And we’ll share some with family, too.

I also put seeds to sprout. Have some in containers and others in wet paper towels to sprout, then I’ll plant them. Not sure exactly where the garden will be this year, but starting to get a jump on things early this year. Have a lot of marigolds started to plant around the garden, too. And herbs. Hoping to grow just a lot of herbs this year. Some of them I may try to sell fresh, see if there is a market for that. Other I’ll use fresh myself or dry to use later. I have cilantro, rosemary, thyme, sage and oregano, and 2 or 3 different types of Basil. And 2 or 3 types of tomatoes. Hoping to grow a lot of corn and more potatoes this year also. And with a little work should be able to get some strawberries, finally. Part of it is taking care of them, feeding and weeding them, the other part is keeping the birds and varmints out of them. Things like Raccoons and ground hogs. Had several ground hogs that moved in the last year or two. Got some of them, but haven’t been able to get all of them. Maybe this year. Had one pesky one last year ate all my tomatoes and pumkins and watermelons. In fact, he ate just about everything in the garden.

Drew and Frances have moved into their own place in Louisburg, and Jeanne and I are getting things moved in here and getting ready for us to move. And trying to go thru things in the process. We got the Washer and Dryer hooked up today and did the first loads of laundry here. Need to get a clothes line put up again, with more lines on it, for this summer. Help cut down on the dryer bill.

As we get moved out here and begin spending more time, I’ll be able to post on here more often.

February is here.

6 February. Super Bowl Sunday and I get to watch it for a change. Not that I’m this big NFL fan or anything, just get the chance, so…. But speaking of sports, how about them Spurs? 42-8 with the best record in the NBA? Beat the Lakers twice so far! Go Spurs!!

But definitely winter weather here. Guess the ground hog saw his shadow. We got about 12-15 inches on Tuesday and then just when we were getting that cleared, we got about 2 more on Thursday night. So there is snow piled up everywhere, in all the parking lots and on the corners and such. Reminds me of Anchorage when we went thru there a few times. At one point it was pretty cold, but it has gotten better. Up to about 37 yesterday and about that today. They are calling for more snow early this week. Could be a problem.

We are scheduled to leave Wednesday morning for Utah. We are renting a car and then we’ll drive to Colorado to see Erin. Then Thursday we’ll complete the drive into Salt Lake City. Saturday in my college graduation and stuff, the reason we are going. Then on Sunday we’ll head out and return to Missouri. Just hoping the weather gives enough of a break for us to travel safely there and back.

There are a few positions being posted for high school biology teachers. I’m getting my package together to apply to them. I should have everything I need to get my certification. Have all my transcripts and such. Just need to apply to North Carolina, then take that one and submit it to Missouri.

There is another job I found that I’ve submitted my application for. It isn’t a teaching job, but pays a lot more. It is also more in line with my military experience, so I’ll see what happens with that before I say much more.

Sold the last of my chick yesterday. Had three turkey poults and 4 chicks that I sold. So now the living room has no lights on in it at night and the room is a lot quieter. In some ways I’ll miss them, but not the smell and they dander and such. Hoping that when I get back the turkeys will start laying again. I’ll need to build 3 pens to house the breeders and keep them separated so I know who breeds who. Just part of the plan. And I’ll try to sell almost all of them. Plus we’ll probably get a few Broad Breasted Bronze turkeys to can this fall, and maybe a couple reds to replace the gene line in my flock. They say not to breed parent/child to each other, but skipping one is ok. Just have to decide which I’m replacing, toms or hens. Right now we have 9 turkeys, 3 red, four slates, a black hen and my new tom. This is how I’ll group them.

Group one will be the Bourbon Reds, 1 tom and 2 hens. 1 hen is new the other two are 2 years old. These I’ll sell mostly as breeding pairs.

Group two will be the Slates. I have a Chocolate Slate tom and hen that I’ll put together along with a regular slate hen. These will be mostly for eating.

Group three will be with my new tom, and he’ll get the other slate hen and the black hen. These will be primarily for eating, but if I get a good looking bird I may continue it in the breeding program.

Drew got his own hose and they have been in the process of trying to move out of here and over there. He is hoping by the end of the month to be out completely. That will give us the month of March to get things ready to move into and out of the apartment. Plan to give notice there we’ll be out by 1 April. We may be out sooner, but who knows or cares. Really looking forward to being back on the farm all the time, and hoping spring gets here soon so I can start growing things. The plants in the living room are doing pretty good. The banana got two new shoots on it so I separated one of them and now have two plants. The Rose Mary needs to be divided, the basil is still doing good. Don’t think you can kill the Ti plants. And the pineapple plant is doing good, too.

New Year!

28 January 2011

Hard to believe it is almost the end of January. Time sure has been flying by.

Completed all my degree requirements and got my BA degree in the mail last week. Now I am waiting for my transcripts to get here so I can send off for my teachers certification. That will be fun. Because I went thru WGU on-line and Missouri won’t accept it directly from them, I have to apply to North Carolina for certification. Then I can take my NC certification and submit it to Missouri and they will give me a Missouri certification. Guess if that’s what it takes. Just seems like extra money somewhere and a lot more work. Should have gotten used to that in the Navy though.

So we have 3 small turkeys and 4 baby chickens in boxes in the living room. Wasn’t going to do that this year. But when the turkeys started laying in December, I just had to try to hatch them. The first ones did pretty good, but the last ones had very few fertile ones. As a result, I threw out over a dozen turkey eggs and had one hatch each week, for three weeks. Then the next week I had the 4 chickens hatch. They were supposed to be with some more turkeys, but none of them were fertile and I had to toss them, too. So now I’m trying to figure out how to deal with 7 growing birds in late January. Another 6 weeks and they should have enough feathers to put out side, the question will just be where? Also thinking about plans for new pens and such for this year’s birds.

The second week of February we are driving to Utah for graduation. Leave here Wednesday, stop and see Erin that night, then drive to Utah Thursday. Spend time at Angela’s and go to graduation Saturday. Then Sunday leave and head home getting here Monday evening. That is the plan anyway.

December

Well, today is Saturday, the 18th of December. Hard to believe this month is almost gone and the year with it. Worked at Mcd today and have the next 2 days off.
We get mystery shops once a month or so and if you get a good enough score you get a bonus. Well, lucky me, I got shopped Thursday and we got the bonus!! Just what you need at Christmas.

So I got me a gas smoker off Craigs list yesterday. It is used, but they took really good care of it, doesn't look too old and they said they upgraded. So I'll be having smoked turkey for Christmas.
Got on here to look and see if I had written down when I put the turkey eggs in the incubator, but obviously didn't. So I'm expectignthem to hatch between now and Christmas. Think I have most of them sold when they hatch.
There are some pen things I want to get to use for turkey houses, but can't get around to them yet. I have 2 assignments left to complete for my degree, and then put it all together in a Teacher Work Sample (TWS) and I'll be done with my school. Plan to go to Utah in early February and graduate. From college. Imagine that!!

Sunday 5 December 2010

Last day of hunting season. Got up about 530am, got dressed and went out into the brisk 22 degree weather and the wind and went looking for deer. Lasted a few hours and saw nothing, so I came back in and got warm. Maybe next year. Yeah, maybe next year I’ll have better clothes to wear out there. And maybe next year I’ll have a better idea of where they are and when. And maybe next year I can put in some kind of ground feed to help attract them and keep them on the property. Or at least bring them here long enough to shoot one. Sad I know.

Monday 6 December 2010 Worked on school work, and had a managers meeting at McD. Not much has really changed there. Not sure if it is good to be back or not, and still way too much drama for me.

Jeanne and I decided we are going to get married in early February and then take a trip down to San Antonio for our honey moon. We will take the kids with us, guess that is only right. We were going to go to Corpus Christi and the beach, but the Spurs play the Dallas Mavericks then so we will go to that. And the Zoo and maybe some other stuff. We’ll take about 2 days there, then come back. We may take the next day and drive to the beach anyway. Non one here has ever been to the beach, so that will be great. But it could be cold, so we’ll see how it turns out. Jeanne said something about her van making noises. Maybe her alternator going out. Watched the movie “Pearl Harbor”

Tuesday 7 December 2010

Got up this morning and she said something about that was the noise her van was making. Oh and we got up late because I turned the alarm off yesterday. As in “Turned it off.” Not just disabled it for today. So she started about 15 minutes late. Then she called me and said the van died. Actually, the alternator belt broke and she was going to try to get to mom’s. So I went in and looked at it, and replaced the belt. Turned out to be the AC compressor froze. And that costs about $225 or so. But the have a by-pass pulley for $35 that you put on in place of the compressor to hold tension on the belt and then keep running. So she took the rest of the day off, and followed me home in my van. The water pump runs off the belts also, so the temp stayed rather high. Coasting down hills helped. And the power steering doesn’t work. Just outside of Springfield a Coyote came running across the highway and I couldn’t miss him. Got him with the passenger tire. She was following me and almost hit him, too.

So I’m off to work tonight (close) then off again tomorrow and she’ll bring the part home and I’ll try to replace it. I think my van is doing alright, and hers isn’t too bad. They just both need some TLC and maintenance and they should do alright for a while longer. We need to get something that gets better mileage and is more reliable for her to drive back and forth to Springfield. Who knows, next year we both might be driving someplace, or I could get a job here in Buffalo and she might look for something closer. So we’ll see that happens.

Wednesday 8 December 2010

Took the AC compressor off the van. Not the easiest thing to do. Then put the bypass pulley on, only to find out that the belt is just an inch too short to fit over all the pulleys. And not sure where I would have put the compressor anyway. So did some checking And it sure looks like the electric clutch froze up but the compressor is still good. The clutch costs $120. So she got that and brought it home.

Friday 10 December

Put the new clutch on clutch on, and it doesn’t seem to work right, like it is binding. And making it hot. Fear it will seize up also. But it got me out to the farm to check eggs and feed the birds. Got 4 more turkey eggs. Then went in to work from 1-9pm. When I got off we candled the eggs in the incubator. There are 6 that are definitely developing, 4 that haven’t been in long enough to tell and 4 that I just put in.

If I get all my paper work done in time to get my graduation notice by 7 January 2011, then in February we’ll drive to Utah and attend the graduation ceremonies. If not, the next ones are in July. Not sure why, but it would be nice to actually participate in a graduation ceremony.

Saturday

Went out and covered my cabbage plants with a plastic tent. Supposed to get really cold tonight and want to see how this helps them. They are starting to get small heads on them, but nowhere near enough to eat yet.

More Pictures of Birds

These are some of the pens we went and looked at last weekend. Well, we went to take the Black Tom and to look at the guys pens so I could get ideas for building new ones for myself.

He had a lot of birds, and a lot of different kinds of birds, too. Funny thing was, a few days later he had my Tom listed for sale. Not sure what the deal is. He only wants what he paid for it, claims his wife is getting him a tom for Christmas or some such thing. Who knows. Not my bird any more. And he was the one came looking specifically for a Black Tom, because we were going to eat it for Thanksgiving, but he wanted it. So why not sell it?

Back home.

The birds have taken to hanging out under a brush pile just beyond the back yard near the hay barn. Not sure what draws them out there. I can still see them from the back yard. Maybe it is that there is more grass and less mud and such like there is in the yard. I've been letting them run in the yard trying to save their run area for when it gets worse, but looks like they may have already trashed it. So they go out there and sit in the grass and soak up the sun. I think.

And so far nothing has bothered them. Not sure how much of an actual fight the geese or the tom would put up, but they surely wouldn't just roll over. And there would be lots of noise.

OK, the first pic is of some of my hens in the brush.

The second is actually one of my roosters. He has a small comb, but rooster still the same.

This is the brush pile and if you look close you can see them all back under the brush.

This is pretty much all the turkeys I have left. You can see the red tom and one red hen, the black and white tom, the 3 black hens and 2 of the slates. The little one right in front of the red tom is a chicken that has been adopted or something and hangs out with him all the time.

This is 4 of the 5 geese. They usually run with every one else. You can see a few chickens in the back ground. They are separate, but in the same area as the others. And they always go as a group. The fifth one was just to the right and didn't get in the picture.

Well it is the second of December already. Hardly seems like it so far. It was cold the other day and should get cold again, but today and tomorrow are supposed to be in the fifties. Nice out compared to other days. But then it is supposed to get colder, with highs in the low 30s and lows in the low 20s or teens.

Went out “hunting” a few times. That means dressing up and taking the gun out in the woods to freeze. There are tracks but I haven’t seen any deer. And this weekend is the end of the season. Last year I got my deer, my FIRST deer on the morning of the last day of the season. So who knows? I just want to make jerky out of it anyway. Sure made some good stuff.

Don’t have as many birds left. Which is nice because now my feed lasts a little longer. Took the camera out and took pictures of them. The first one here is the old red tom and the new red hen that I will pen up with the 2nd red hen. You can see the slate hen in the picture, too. In the second picture is the red tom with the other red hen, the one I had last year. In that picture you can also see the new black and white tom.

The next picture is the black and white tom by himself. I'll pen him up in another pen with 2 or 3 hens with him.

I have 2 slate hens and 2 black hens. And I wonder what the poults from the black hen and the tom would look like. The reds will be for breeders. I’ll try to raise several pairs to sell. They are pure breed, and they should do well on the market. The others are going to be for dinners. And so who really cares what they look like? But I’m going to try to see what kind I get and maybe something will come out of it. If nothing else a great looking bird. More than anything, the looks is what I’d be going for. I’d like to get big birds too, but that isn’t as easy as it sounds.