A New Pack of Poultry, A New Drama of Ducks

Due to the Egg Laying Strike of Winter 2013-2014, Spouse has agreed we need to refresh our poultry flock, especially with breeds that will lay in cold weather. What we've ordered this year (all bulleted links go to McMurray Hatchery, who thankfully let us mix & match to meet their minimum):

• Red Star Sex Links: cold weather layers
• Pioneer/Dixie Rainbow: dual purpose poultry (meat & eggs), fast grower
• Ameraucana: because we like the pastel egg colors
• Welsummer: because we like the dark brown egg color
• Phoenix: small but mighty, good (medium size) egg layers, and excellent mothers

Cagney, our Phoenix hen with her chicks.

We're also updating the duck flock. The Khaki Campbells we currently have enjoy a reputation as good egg layers, but appear to have no mothering instinct whatsoever (with possible exception of Moe, but no definitive proof yet). We're adding Welsh Harlequins to the flock: they have Khaki Campbell in their bloodline, but also have nesting/motherhood instincts. Much easier to add to the flock when you can "let mama do the raising". The geese? They can live and lay eggs well into their 40's, and what goslings they do raise can be mean bast*rds from what I've been told, so we're just gonna stay happy with what we have.

Due to ordering minimums with the hatchery, this means our flock will (gulp) double at onset. Since the Welsh ducks, Pioneer chicks and Welsummer chicks are all straight-run only (you don't know what mix of males & females you'll get), I'm guessing we'll get at least half males, which means duck & chicken dinner by Summer. Some of our older hens may be freezer-bound as well. Killing and cleaning is not fun, nor should it be. On the other hand, if I'm going to be a meat eater, I should be responsible for my diet. I make sure to take excellent care of our flock, with healthy food and plenty of space to roam and socialize. For other meat needs, we do our best to purchase from locals who we know raise their animals with ethics and kindness. I realize it is a privilege to be able to do so. Anyhow...

Khaki Campbells from 2010, just a few weeks old. 

The night-time duck pen will be easy enough to expand, but the chicken coop will require some modifications. We'll probably take down the shelving to create space for more roosts. We currently have in place a 10-space nesting box, and have a three-space nesting box in reserve that we can add if necessary. We could also build a six-space box out of wood, there's plenty of online plans.

I went ahead and ordered duckling-specific starter feed. Some say you can feed ducklings chick starter, but from what I've read, ducklings have higher niacin needs. Since we want the females to be long-term layers, I'm thinking it's better to start them out on the best chow possible. I'll later transition them to the organic chicken chow with supplements once they mature.

I'm oddly nervous about raising a new flock from scratch. It's been a few years. We should receive both the ducklings and the chicks by the end of February. [Expect many pictures and much squeeing upon their arrival.] Timing it thusly, they should be feathered out and ready for protected outdoor pens (until they're large enough to be integrated with their respective flocks) by end of March at the latest, which is two weeks after the last average frost. Fingers crossed that there may be a rooster from the bunch that can get along with Lucky and be spared the ax. There will be no shortage of females for their harems!

Lucky the Roo. He's a right handsome bird, he'll have you know.

*splutter* Winter?

I mean, what the heck happened to Fall??? Texas has been hit with wave after wave of Arctic downdrafts. The cool concrete flooring I wax so joyously about in the Summer now feels like a block of ice, and this year (like last year, and the year before) I swear to get a couple of good sized area rugs to stave off frostbite. I mean, it's so bad that when Spouse surprised me with a pair of insulated muck boots for Christmas, I almost cried - I need them for inside almost as much as outside. Of course, I could just buy the d*mn rugs already...

The biggest event since last post has been The Flood. Our area received eleven inches of rain over a single night, ripping up the roads within AND leading out of the community. Spouse and Uncle brought in a few loads of roadbase right away to patch up our biggest ruts, but we ended up needing three more dump-truck loads to complete all the needed repairs. Our next-door neighbor was a tremendous help, loaning his time & tractor skills not only to repair our culverts and rutted road, but also assisting other neighbors, and doing what he could to temporarily shore up the community road until we all finish fundraising for a pro fix. If it weren't for him, we'd still be 4x4'ing to get anywhere. Thank you D. (and spouse T. for letting him!), more "spontaneous" smoked ribs coming your way!

pic: tangerines, satsumas & limes

In the category of "Hopes & Dreams", the first seed catalog to arrive this season was Good Seeds from Baker Creek Heirlooms, right before Christmas. Second in the mailbox was Bountiful Gardens, the gold standard for everything heirloom, untreated & open pollinated. I've put in a catalog order for Southern Exposure Seed Exchange in hopes of more varieties that will work well in our semi-arid region. Our "average" last frost is in mid-March, and if I want any Summer tomatoes at all, I'll need to start seedlings in early February.

While the garden may have been an epic FAIL in 2013, we had a nice Winter harvest of citrus. There are still some fruits ripening on the trees, but initial harvest of limes gave us enough for two ice-cube trays full of juice, which was promptly frozen & stored for future use. Other limes were used fresh for personal libations, on those few porch-sitting, warm weather days.  Spouse shored up & modified our old kit greenhouse to accommodate the taller citrus trees. The structure has done well by us: it's been a greenhouse in the Winter, and secondary duckpond structure in the Summer. We really need to get a bigger, sturdier greenhouse built in 2014, however, as this one is on its last legs. The plastic joiners can only be repaired so much, and the geese have chewed the edges of the plastic tarp cover to ribbons.

pic: yes, the geese did this

The chickens started their annual egg-laying slowdown around late August, and all but two hens went on outright strike until the other week. Our girls are getting older, but even the youngest (who are less than 2 years old) said "meh". Of course, when the light wanes the girls lay less by nature. We could put a 12-hour timed light in the henhouse, which would trick the girls into laying a few more eggs during Winter... but, nahh. Just two weeks after Solstice, however, the two youngest girls started adding to weekly egg tally, and I'm guessing by late February, we'll be back up to a decent production, enough to sell again. May get a handful of Welsummers to freshen up the flock this Spring. Had high hopes the Welsummer rooster would work out and give us a few pretty babies, as Lucky's progeny turn out too flighty for my preference, but Lucky the Leghorn rooster Did Not Want. The two roosters fought until bloody, with Lucky getting the worst of it. Lucky ultimately won the war by virtue of being a known good roo to the ladies. The Welsummer was shipped off to a new home. Perhaps I'll wait for another rooster & homegrown chicks after Lucky retires to the henhouse in the sky, so to speak.

pic: Nutmeg the Cubalaya, RIP

Speaking of chickens, we did lose one of the Pecking Order Enforcers from our first hand-raised flock, the small yet mighty Nutmeg. She'd been slowing down for a couple of months, and (what turned out to be) her last two weeks I'd bring her inside the house at night, where it was warmer. During her last week, she'd walk towards the house at dusk instead of the coop, and wait for me to bring her inside. She was the only hen that Bandit the dog would willingly share morning breakfast. She is survived by her sister Cinnamon, and two others of the original flock. We will miss her.

Now that Bandit's been mentioned, I must report that most of our savings for a garage has been spent on getting her knees repaired - yep, both back knees. One blew out late Summer, and the other right before Thanksgiving. It's a good three months of rehab (thankfully, we can do that for her ourselves), then three more months before the knee is solidly healed. Not that I know all that much about joint repair and rehab, mind you. I'm not bitter, I swear.

We still have the full flock of ducks: nine hens, and one drake. The ducks experienced a major egg slowdown like the chickens this season, then egg production rose these past few weeks as well. I'm on the lookout for paperboard duck-egg cartons, so if you happen to see any in your 'net wanderings, drop us a line in the comments? Gracias!

pic: Queen Moe,
in dressing room sans costume

Queen Moe had a moment of stardom this Fall when she won Second Place (in the "exotics" category) at a Pet Costume fundraiser for a local convalescent center. I whipped up a pumpkin cape for her back, and prayed no-one would judge for quality stitching. She beat out a horse painted like Nemo the clown-fish, but lost to two small children who painted up their hermit-crab aquarium so their crabs looked like they lived in an undersea world. [One friend mock-huffed "ageism!" Never compete against small children with pets*, or something like that.] Moe was a right trooper, letting herself be carried to, and petted by, all the seated patients in attendance. Her Majesty let me know she was ready to go home by tugging on my shirt towards the end of the event. Not sure where the video of her doing the shirt-tug is hiding, so the pic with ribbon award will have to do.

Last, but not least, we're now preparing for the arrival  of Extreme Goose Crabbiness, also known as Goose Egg-Laying Season. There have been signs, such as heightened annoyance (versus regular annoyance) when anything non-goose gets near, and some of the ladies have been seen checking out the undersides of bushes and other likely laying spots. No synchronized head-bobbing in the Pool o' Woo yet, nor any gander battles either, thank goodness. We wait with bated breath, chewed fingernails, and protective gear at ready.

*"Never work with animals or children." - W.C. Fields

State o' the Garden & Orchard, Wrapup Fall 2013: FAIL

Tomatoes: FAIL. Blight, blight, blightedy-blight blight. We may have trucked in the disease with the load of compost from a local garden center. Not one decent tomato this year. Nada. The plants could not keep ahead of the blight.

Chickens stalking Emma's food bowl. The garden is too
depressing to photograph right now.

White potatoes and Yellow onions: FAIL. The tops died back within a few weeks of planting this Spring, with only a little bit of root/tuber growth. Being lazy, I left the remainder in the garden bed over the Summer, continuing to water so as to keep the soil microbes alive. Oddly enough, now that the cooler weather has arrived the potatoes and onions both are sprouting anew. Not sure how far they'll get before being zapped by Winter, however.

Lettuce: FAIL. It got too hot, too fast. One lone little lettuce plant survived the Summer's heat & glare. I left it alone, and it is now going to seed. Why not?

Sweet Potatoes: FAIL. Rabbits were our nemesis here, as they'd sneak through the fence when we didn't close it carefully. Sweet potato greens are juicy and sweet, and the bunnies would chow down. The leaves keep coming back, however, so there may be some small tubers to harvest come early Winter, but I'm not counting on it.

Some not-so-failures: the sweet basil went nuts, two plants growing almost four foot tall. The sicilian oregano planted in the strawberry bed (didn't know where else to plunk it) almost took OVER the bed. It will be parted out and replanted come Spring. The strawberries took to the new bed as well, and will probably fruit nicely come next season.

Lettuce gone to seed

Must have left some partial sweet potato tubers in last year's old bed, as there's greens sprouting all over. Last year's crop was riddled with corking, however, so I'm not counting on these potatoes being edible.

[As a side note to my prepper-minded friends: this year's garden failure really hammers home the lessons from our grandparents & great-grandparents, to save/set aside as much as possible during the "fat" times, because the lean times are gonna happen no matter how well prepared we think we may be. I honestly thought this year's garden was gonna knock it out of the ballpark.]

As far as the orchard goes, once all the trees go dormant, we plan to cull a good many of them. The experimental almonds and cherries will go. So will the peaches. We'll probably pull all the fruit trees from the "front yard" as well, as they're not thriving. What DOES work on this property so far: apples, pears, plums, figs, and apricots. Not bad. We may try the cherries and almonds again once we get some soil berms and better rainwater catchment developed.

Spouse has rebuilt the "temporary" greenhouse, making it taller so we can fit the nine potted citrus trees (and other potted plants) under its eaves. Next year, we will really need to build a new greenhouse - the trees will not fit another year.

Onwards and upwards!

DIY Duck & Goose & Dog Pond Filter system

Spouse writes:

The eight geese and two dogs foul up the goose pond in about 4.5 days during the summer. The pond filter we have used for the last few years was a pressurized number that used an external pump. The old pond pump worked under horrible conditions. It had to pump goose poo "soup" continuously. It was stepped on when the dogs jumped in to cool off in said soup. The geese chewed on the power cord while making aforementioned soup... you get the idea. We have gone through a lot of pumps. The current incarnation is more of a pump in a cage. We have a regular 500 gallon per hour pump in this box (http://www.homedepot.com/p/Total-Pond-Mechanical-and-Biological-Filter-Kit-MF13010/202278958). It is connected to a 15 foot length of lead free 5/8 lawn hose connected with a ½ inch adapter. The old pond filter was just too small to take  - err – "soup" and make it spring fresh.

<insert boring design explanation of latest pond filter operation>
I wanted a large three stage filter. The first stage is mechanical filtration at the pump to make sure that the submerged pump runs without incident. The second stage is a a clarifier so that any particulate that makes it past the mechanical stage settles out before the third stage. The third stage is the biological stage. Bacteria - living in some sort of media - consume and filter out the remaining wastes still in the water. For the media, I am using three bags of lava rock.
<end boring design explanation of filter operation>

The resulting filter is part gigantic aquarium filter, part pond filter, and only slightly overbuilt (I hope). I used the filter described here (http://www.runnerduck.com/pf1.htm) as the basis for the new filter with just a few modifications. I switched to 55 gallon drums. I added an extra tank for a clarifier. And swapped out the filter pads for 3 bags of lava rock to host the aquarium bacteria that were going to convert the soup to clean water.

Here is a is the end result...

[the completed project]

Water is pumped from the pond through the light green hose into the clarifier.(the barrel farthest from the pond. The water enters the clarifier from the top which allows the particulate to fall to the bottom and the water flows out the side and into the media tank.. The water is piped to the bottom of the media tank under a plastic screen which is elevated 4 inches off the bottom. View from the top before the lava rock went in. The plastic screen rests on s stand made out of PVC as detailed on the runnerduck page link above.

[media tank BEFORE lava rock was added]

Here it is with the media barrel loaded with lava rock.

First thing I found out was use real bulkhead fittings like these: http://www.homedepot.com/p/1-1-4-in-EPDM-Washer-Bulkhead-MPT-x-FPT-Union-PL-1846-1-1-4-inch-Bulkhead-Union/203258816
Trying to make your own out of pipe pieces scavenged from the plumbing aisle only results in leaks, cursing, and a floor show for the geese who inevitably arrive to supervise.

Second: size the outlet bigger. But maybe not this big:

[the outlet. the filter screen below in the pond was temporary]

That is a ½ inch inlet being drained by a 3 inch outlet. Sort'a of like a grapefruit launcher loaded with raisins. I did have a one inch outlet but that barely kept up. I doubled the size of the bulkhead fitting to 2 inches but all I could find on short notice is the three inch pipe with an adapter.

Here is the inside of the media barrel with water running through it.

The pump has been running for 4 days and the water is just as clear as when we filled it up after cleaning it the last time. The water clouded up for a few hours after I added aquarium filter bacteria but otherwise it has been clear. The animals are certainly using it. The chickens play with the bubbles produced by the outlet stream. One of the dogs, Bandit, has been in it every day as have the geese so the filter appears to be working. We will still have to clean the foam filter on the pump box but that takes a fraction of the time compared to doing a full dump* and scrub. We still need to figure out a way to clean the bottom of accumulated leaves, feathers and whatever else the geese pull into swim with them. But so far the new filter system has been successful.

*d.a. writes: the aforementioned "dump" is actually pumped out to each of the fruit trees. It takes awhile to do so, but we don't waste water here in South Central Texas, y'all.

State o' the Garden & Orchard, 2013

Where to begin? It's another season of slow progress, due to shoulder issues that continued to haunt from last year. Second surgery completed in late March, and hopefully this is the last one needed.

Fresh compost & new bed for for fig. Geese say, "MINE".

One tremendous help for both my arm and our little farm: the new-to-us truck, affectionately nick-named "The Beast". It has a big bed, and with a couple of trips were able to haul in enough bulk compost to add several inches to all the orchard trees and the veggie beds.  Saved a goodly amount of money with the bulk purchase as well, and look, Ma: no plastic bags!

Although Spring was not kind to the orchard (a warm Winter and a cold Spring), the fruit trees that were able put out a crop have been doing so nicely. The apricots have come and gone, with 99.9% getting snagged (again!) by the local wildlife because I was too drugged out during recovery to remember to protect the bottom 2/3'rds of the trees. Ah well! The pears, figs and apples are fruiting, and so is one of the plums. The two oldest plums are not, however, so we're now suspecting a mixup at the nursery - these have to be accidental ornamentals. Was thinking of cutting them down & replacing, but a friend suggested pruning back and grafting with non-ornamental plum cuttings. Still thinking about that option.

Figs abundant.

Spouse put in two more raised beds, but instead of creating beds that are angled on the bottom to follow the line of the rocky hillside, he dug out & leveled spots for his 4'x4' forms. He says he won't be doing that again, ahem. We now have a dedicated strawberry bed, and the rest of the beds have combinations of tomatoes, herbs, peppers, onions, white- and (soon to be planted) sweet potatoes. We tried to grow a late crop of Spring lettuces and spinach, but the seedlings were fried in an early heat wave.

"Devil's Claw", a volunteer. Rumored to be a good tomato
hornworm trap. If so, then welcome, little buddy!

This year we're going to experiment with red shade cloth, 30%, for some of the veg beds during the hottest part of Summer. In theory, red shade cloth is supposed to allow more of the light spectrum while also protecting from harshest light of the day, and some folks swear that their tomato yields increase with red shade cloth and/or red mulch. For the shade structure itself, we looped a cattle panel over each of the three upper beds. The panels are a bit too long, look a little Dr. Seuss-y, but it'll work until we decide to do something more sophisticated. I'd like to cut them down a bit, then sew a fitted greenhouse cover for each Winter greens & other foods.

Tiny barrel cactus in full bloom. Beauty. 

Speaking of greenhouses, if we can get around to renting the equipment to level an area, we hope to construct a greenhouse using corrugated panels, like this one. Although the panels don't run the "correct" way, this particular design uses its materials efficiently with very little waste. May need to modify slightly for a solar-powered exhaust fan, as even in Winter the solar gain on our southwest facing hillside can be significant. Oh, and we need the bigger, taller greenhouse because I purchased an additional seven citrus (lemons, limes & satsumas) to go with our current few. They were on sale, and the ones we already had were lonely and needed buddies. That's what I told Spouse, anyways.