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| Our oldest child, Joey, with middle sister Katie. |
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| Anna next to Dad's John deer lawn tractor. |
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| Jessie, oldest daughter, looking serious and too grown up. |
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| Jason's bee hive. The bees will arrive next week. He has promised that the hive will be in our tree line that runs parallel to the garden and not on our deck! |
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| The newest arrivals: 2 Peking ducks, 4 Mallard ducks, 6 laying hens and 5 broilers. |
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| Close up of Peking duck and laying hens in background. |
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| Dinner! Broilers will be ready for oven in 9 weeks or less. |
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| The chicken coop made of salvaged wood pallets and recycled wood from our previous goat shelter. |
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| The three Muscovy hens-the only animals allowed to free range besides the kids, dog and cats. They at least don't come up on my porch! |
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| This is Duck Maul, name comes from Darth Maul of Star Wars fame. He stands guard over the previous female ducks. His hiss sounds nasty, but none of the chickens are afraid. If they get lose they kick the ducks out of their duck pen...then again they have superior numbers, 24 chickens to 4 ducks... right now it is 5 roosters to one Duck Maul! |
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| This was last year's garden area, 50 ft by 50 ft. It is going to become our berry patch. |
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| This is our 100 ft by 180 ft family garden/market garden. Jason claims it's only four tenths of an acre, but it looks huge! So my original post of "an acre garden" now stands corrected. |
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| This is Snow Flake our mama cat. She just had kittens on April 11th. She won't let us get a good look at the kittens, so we don't know how many we have. |
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| This is poor love starved Holly. No one is scared of her as a watch dog. |
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| This is our heavy duty chicken tractor made from 2x6's. It was re-purposed lumber from some raised garden beds and other old projects, but my husband says he will NEVER build one like this again. You can see our Amish pole barn and attached chicken coop in background. |
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| Here's the girls!!! This is a side view into our chicken tractor. |
It's amazing how big a tract of land looks, when one is contemplating having to weed it! Your homesteading project looks like it's off to a great start. Let us know how the ducks work out. I'd like to get some to eat bugs, but worry about them eating other stuff, as well.
ReplyDeleteAwesome, Stephanie, thanks for sharing! It looks like a lot of fun (and a lot of work :) And the kids are getting so big - Anna has hair! Can't wait to see you all when we come in July.
ReplyDeleteKeep a close eye on the beehive. Like, don't ever take it to the store. ;)
ReplyDeletegreat pictures! fun to see your blog:)
ReplyDeleteSecond Try at responding to comments (I forgot to log in the first time!-AHHH!) I apologize on the delayed response-I have been fighting a bad sinus infection for the past five days.
ReplyDeleteRebecca B.: I am trying to "block out" the thought of weeding that huge area! I may luck out though-I will be pregnant until the middle of June and then nursing a newborn-I think I get exemption!
Christine: Can't wait to see you in July as well-how is it that your little guy is almost a year old already?!
Rebecca B.: I believe the bees are being delivered to the store on Wed, so hopefully they will stay contained and we won't make the local news for "Thousands of bees swarm local UPS Store"!:)
Molly: I love your blog as well...I'm still trying to figure out how to list the blogs I follow on the side bar....We will have some "computer savvy college students" over for Easter, so I plan on them doing some "work" for their dinner-show me how to do things on my computer:)!
May all of you have a blessed Holy Week and a Happy Easter!
God's blessings,
Stephanie