Greenhouse plastic and a chicken coop planter

greenhouse plastic goes on

We've had a pretty strong, constant wind for about four days, which makes our greenhouse project more interesting, but with the colder temps, it has to be done, sooner rather than later. Richard and I began putting the recently ordered and quickly received real greenhouse plastic on our tiny greenhouse yesterday. In spite of our efforts to cover the few plants inside the structure, last night the freezing temperatures proved too much for our drop cloth and blanket freeze protector, and I'm afraid we lost most of the pepper plants that were hanging on. The leeks may be okay.

Inadequate plant protection

Also working on placing the little chicken coop in some spot in the yard where we can create a guinea and eventual chicken run. The idea here is to build a base for the little house that will become a raised planter in a season or so. We cover the floor of the house (which is really bare earth) with wood shavings and the birds cover it with poop. We continue to refill litter as needed, building a deep litter bed that will compost in place and become next year's garden plot. How about that? And then we move the chicken coop and run to another prepared "bed" and do it again, rotating our birds through the garden, one vegetable bed at a time.

Planter bed chicken coop. The boards at bottom of house form vegetable planter, and the foundation of the coop, which keeps the wooden house out of the snow and rain, prolonging the life of the wood that much longer.

We bought our "chicken barn" from an online retailer and had it shipped. It was pretty pricey. I don't see why a guy, or a gal, couldn't build a simpler model to do the same thing. This way the wastes from the birds become fertilizer for the garden in a few less steps, saving the farmer time and money. I love it. Eco-farming at work.

Unfortunately the first place we built a bed turned out to be constantly in shade, which for the winter and live critters, is a downright bad idea. I was hoping to protect the coop and the yard from the horrid wind we get in the fall, which, nestled in among the junipers, it is indeed hidden from the noxious wind, but without solar gain, I'm afraid my little birds will freeze to death. Tomorrow we are going to get some more boards to build another planter for the coop---in the sun.

Injured guinea is doing well. He has a healthy appetite and is still healing. His buddy is still in the room with him, and his constant chirping and singing to his sick friend makes me smile. Also in the bird infirmary is egg bound hen (who is no longer egg bound), who never transitioned back to the flock well, so I brought her back in. She's not eating enough for me to notice, or be confident with, but I did open my office this afternoon to find she'd dislodged her grill covering and hopped out of her "bed" and was standing under my desk, looking like a chicken who belonged there. What a site. The Red Star chicks are unruly and try to fly out of their playpen every time I change the food and water. Also healthy guinea made a break for it yesterday and ran across the room, looking so proud of himself, but when I herded him back to his kennel, he reluctantly entered, as there was no other place to go. Injured guinea, who is still hanging in the air, just watches in silence at the antics of his roommates and caregiver. Silent Bob.

Life on the farm.

We are still trying to come up with a farm name that fits and will stick; a name that isn't being used in some way by someone else. One Little Farm is being used, although not in Colorado. Thinking of other names, so don't be surprised if the title of this blog changes again. We'd like to happily rest upon a great name and start building our business around it, including a web site.

Healing

It was terribly cold last night (low 20's), and yesterday was blustery and chilly, and I swear I even saw a few snowflakes fall around dinner time. Was our fall so short that now we've progressed directly into winter. I won't have it.

Injured guinea is doing remarkably well. I can't help but wonder if there is another lesson in this. We thought for sure he was going to die...with a huge hole in his side showing his entrails, how could he not? But not having the heart to kill him, we did the only thing we could, we bandaged him up and tried to make him as comfortable as possible, making sure his food and water needs are met several times a day. Every now and then we bring in his guinea buddy to keep him company because I read that the best thing for recovery is a friend. The healthy guinea sings or purrs to the injured guinea when I put his kennel next to his sick buddy. The injured guinea seems to perk right up, eating and drinking a little more when his partner is near him. Guineas mate for life. I know these two are males, but their relationship seems to be built around a very strong bond. Maybe they are heterosexual life partners (like Jay and Silent Bob---would those be good names for the guineas?), or bff's, or whatever. The reality is that the company seems to make a positive impact, along with the body's natural ability to heal itself. The injured guinea's wound is visibly shrinking. And that's a miracle in process.

When did we, as a people (and not all people have---many indigenous cultures continue to practice centuries old tribal, and natural, healing practices) give up our power to heal ourselves? When did we start to believe that the best advice for our bodies came from the doctors who didn't even know us and certainly could hardly know our bodies in their ten minute examinations. When did we stop listening to our own bodies?

As I watch the animals on my farm, who live only in the present moment, I learn. The guineas don't expect someone else to heal them, nor do any of the other animals. They either heal themselves, or they don't, giving up the ghost and moving on to greener pastures.

If we humans could forget for a minute how helpless and dependent on others we are, for everything, it seems, maybe we could take some initiative and responsibility for our own little selves. What do we need to do to heal ourselves? And certainly we have moved beyond the primitive thinking of a pea brained guinea, but maybe that's the problem, we over think and allow our decisions to be influenced by so called "experts." How can anyone know me like I know me? I live in this body twenty four seven, so I better listen to what it has to say to me. Right now it's telling me to get healthy, to lose the accumulated weight from pregnancies and inactivity, to eat right and stop poisoning myself with processed and hormone injected foods.

I hear the whispers of a voice telling me that my lifestyle and what I choose to put in my body has a direct correlation with how healthy and maybe even how happy I am. Can we know for sure if the myriad of chemicals we have been injecting and ingesting are not related to mental disorders and malfunctions? What about autism and ADD, which have been on a steady increase along with the increase in poisons in our air and foods. Are they related? I bet they are. I bet almost all of our diseases and ailments can be traced back to something in our environment. Even if it's a genetic mutation, I bet even that is a dysfunction due to some weird chemical imbalance somewhere.

Isn't it time we took back our health along with our food choices? Take back our health. Take back our food. Take back ourselves. Take responsibility for the choices you make. I choose to eat the Twinkie that has a shelf life of forever. Why would I do that? Have I been brainwashed by a commercial laden culture that tells me to eat this and wear that....it is sooooo good. What about the fine print that tells me that this product may cause chronic, irreversible damage to my life system. Where is the disclaimer? Oh, it's not there, except on some so called "medicines" that have so many negative side effects, you have to wonder, who in their right mind would take such "medicines."

It is time to wake up. Our culture doesn't care. As a whole, "they" are not interested in the health and well-being of the people. "They" are interested in the bottom line. It doesn't matter that the people are dying, that the earth is dying, "they" will tell you it isn't so and to keep on spending. Look around.

We need to wake up, stand up, man up and save ourselves and our planet. Every little thing you can do will help. It does matter. Recycle. Re-use. Buy local. Buy organic. Support and be active in your community.

Those little guineas don't care. They live in the NOW, eating, drinking, yelling, and healing. They live local and they certainly eat local, given the choice. It is what they do. They are in balance with nature and with themselves. They can go a long way toward healing themselves. No one ever told them they couldn't.

Giving up guineas...hard lessons learned

Today I sold my four lavender guineas to a lady who answered an ad I posted on craigslist yesterday.

The last few days have been crazy with the birds.

For a couple of days, we tried putting injured guinea in the chicken run with his uninjured guinea buddy. We would kennel the hurt one at night, but the other one would fly out of the chicken netted run and perch on the roof. Okay. We were keeping them separate from the chickens and other guineas, but then, somehow the chickens ended up in with the two guineas, but everything appeared to be okay. Until it wasn't.

I went down to catch injured guinea and put him in his kennel for the night, and noticed he had blood on his back. I took him into the house and yelled for Richard, who happened to be on his work break from his telecommuter job. With his help, we examined the bird and were horrified to discover he had been pecked so extremely that he had a bloody hole in his back. Richard immediately thought we should kill the bird, put it out of its misery. But there was no time...he had to go back to work and I had no idea where my camp hatchet was, and we didn't own an ax. Plus I still had two little kids to take care of and get ready for bed.

We bandaged up the bird with makeshift items, took off his splint (the poor thing was probably going to die anyway, one way or another) and stuck him in his kennel in my office. I gave him food and water as usual.

In addition to injured guinea, I had another hen who was acting "funny." We had brought her in the house earlier in the day and cleaned her dirty rump to find she had an egg stuck. Great. What do you do with that? Well, give the chicken a warm water bath, which Richard did, holding her hind end under the bathtub faucet. After she dried a bit, we put her back in the coop with the other hens. I noticed she had some plucked feathers too.

I suspected the lavender guineas, especially the two males, who ruthlessly attacked our poor rooster Charlie, on more than one occasion. I had seen the mean birds attacking some of the hens and even one of their own females. But the injury to the already hurt guinea was more than I could take.

That night, I grabbed my broom when I went to put the chickens to bed. When I closed up the coop for the night, I chased every one of those guineas out,  leaving them to fend for themselves until I could figure out what to do the next day. I knew they'd find a roost in one of the trees and be back in the morning. They were.

The next day, we bathed the egg stuck hen and I added her to the bird infirmary that was formally my office. And, that morning, the injured guinea looked at me with perky eyes, seemingly oblivious to his horrible injury.

This was when we decided to get rid of the guineas, for the safety of our chickens, who also had signs of being  plucked and pecked. Now that the game birds had the taste for blood, would they continue to terrorize the hens and rooster until they killed them? Not a chance we wanted to take. With a heavy heart, I put an ad on craigslist, knowing my dream of having wandering guineas to amuse me was all but over.

I found an old tank top I could turn into a bird sling and stitched the bottom closed and we went to find bandages. We talked to the guy at the feed store who said to put ointment on the wound and the bird would probably be alright. I was more interested in buying first aid than in buying an ax, and decided to give the poor bird a chance.

We bandaged the guinea (this guy needs a name), cut holes for his legs in my "chicken sling" and stuck him in, hanging the sling from a two by four balanced across the old baby corral. The idea is to keep him off of his injured foot, which I think is a broken foot and leg, by the swelling, and keep him from pecking at his wound.I put some food and water on a box in front of him, and he started to drink the electrolyte boosted water like crazy. Then he knocked it over.

 

When I went to put the chickens to bed, the other guinea was hiding in a corner. One of the hens went over and started  pecking at his back, where the feathers look like they have been worked on for a while. Crazy. I caught that guinea and took him inside too. The two female lavender guineas managed to work their way back into the chicken run by flying onto the bird netting until they fell through. I let them stay. The males were wandering back and forth outside the fence.

Later when I was reading the kids stories before bed, I heard the unmistakable sounds of unhappy guineas, and it sounded like it was coming from right outside the living room windows. I flipped on the porch light, and sure enough, one male guinea was standing there, looking so forlorn, squawking at me. "Mama, let me go in the house, " he said. The other guinea was "roosting" on the front step. They were so cute. Maybe I made a mistake. Maybe I should keep them. Someone was coming to get the four of them in the morning.

After I got the kids settled into bed, it was back to the hen with the hang up. I took the chicken into the bathroom, filled the tub with warm water and held her, making sure the water was covering her abdomen and egg vent. This was some advice I had found online. Keep her there for an hour, they said. Really? Who has that kind of time? I tried, massaging her vent and splashing water on her rear. She'd push so hard, letting out wails...just like a woman in birth, and I knew Richard and maybe his clients on the phone could her her in the room next door. It turns out she had a broken egg stuck in her and I had to help her get it out. After that, she went right to sleep back in the bird infirmary.

The next morning, we redressed the injured guinea, cleaned his bed and moved the healthy guinea into his own outdoor bird run, until we can figure out what to do with him. After much hullabaloo, we caught the four lavenders and put them in a kennel, where they waited until their new mama came to pick them up. I hope they can find happiness in their new home. There aren't any chickens on that farm, but they do have goats. I will miss the idea of them more than I will miss them.

I learned that you can't keep guineas with llamas (uncastrated males) or chickens, and that injured creatures must always be separated from the rest of the flock or herd or whatever.

These have been hard lessons this week and I'm not happy with any of the outcomes of this mess. I hope injured guinea gets better (he's eating seed today), but I'm not sure what his life will be like if he's crippled. Will his buddy pick on him too because he's the weak one? Do I now have a guinea as a house pet? I wonder if he'd get along with Luna, my Amazon parrot. They could live in the same room--in separate cages-- and yell at each other. Guineas kind of sound like parrots screaming.

I have to address my fear of killing the animals if they are suffering. If I'm going to be a real farmer with livestock, I'm going to have to face these situations, and be prepared for them. I have to find my ax. A responsible farmer would take care of the matter in the best way to ease the suffering. But I can't really tell if the guinea is suffering. You'd think he would be. But he's perky, alert, eating and just hanging out. Is it possible that his little pea brain has somehow disengaged from the pain? I know animals live purely in the present moment, regardless of what has occurred before. I can only hope the little guy is not in too much pain and that in a short time he will be back out raising trouble with his buddy.

Taco Salad

Taco salad

taco salad with sauce

Who says that organic, vegetarian food has to be boring? Tonight we had a taco salad for dinner. The onions and tomatoes came from our garden. The leaf lettuce, scarlet mustard greens, kale, icicle and globe radishes, and the sweet red pepper came from a friend's organic farm. The tortilla chips were made in the store at the Latino market. I made the enchilada/taco sauce from peppers from our garden. Pretty local food.

Taco Salad

Put 1/2 cup TVP (Textured Vegetable Protein) in bowl and add 1 cup water. Let it hydrate. Put olive oil in a skillet, add hydrated TVP and taco seasoning powder. You may need more water to make a sauce like consistency. OR you can use a ground meat of your choice for your taco meat. Brown meat, add taco seasoning, according to directions. Simmer 10 minutes or so.

Fill two large meal size bowls with lettuce, and or greens (leaf lettuce, iceberg lettuce, romaine lettuce, kale, spinach, mustard greens).

Sprinkle taco "meat" onto salads.
Add a handful of beans (black beans, pinto beans) to each bowl.
Slice radishes and add to bowls.
Chop onions and add some to each bowl.
Line edge of bowls with tortilla chips.
Add grated cheddar or pepper jack cheese to salads.
Slice and add tomatoes and olives to salads.
Top with a salsa.
Enjoy your healthy meal (minus the red meat of course).

I use a variety of vegetables that I have on hand to fill my salads. Carrots, corn...whatever.

Pumpkin Bread

 Pumpkin Bread

Oven 350 degrees

Combine wet ingredients in very large bowl.

3 cups pumpkin (heirloom, organic varieties are the best, but one large can of pumpkin is 3 cups)

3 and 3/4 cups sugar (cane sugar is less pesticide laden than beet sugar)

5 eggs (organic, free range)

1 and 1/8 cups oil (extra virgin, cold pressed olive oil is the best for you) without nuts, 1 and 1/3 cups oil with nuts

Mix dry ingredients in separate large bowl

 3and 3/4 cups flour (unbleached wheat flour makes batter thicker)

1 and 1/4 teaspoons nutmeg

3/4 teaspoon baking powder

2 and 1/4 teaspoons baking soda

1 and 1/2 teaspoons salt

1 and 1/4 teaspoons powdered cloves

1 and 1/2 teaspoons powdered cinnamon

Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients. Add 2 cups of nuts now if desired. Mix well.

Makes 3 loaves, 10 mini loaves or 3 and 1/2 dozen muffins

Grease and flour bread pans.

Bake breads for 1 hour in 350 degree oven.

Bake muffins 20 minutes.

Bake mini loaves 20 or so minutes

Adjusted High Altitude (above 5000 feet) recipe

Oven 370 degrees

Mix wet ingredients

3 cups pumpkin

3 and 1/4 cups sugar

6 eggs

1 cup oil

Mix dry ingredients

3 and 3/4 cups flour

1 and 1/4 teaspoons nutmeg

1 and 1/2 teaspoons salt

1 and 1/4 teaspoons cloves

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

2 and 1/4 teaspoons baking soda

1 and 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon

Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients. Mix in nuts (2 cups) now, if desired.

Mix well.

Makes 3 loaves, 10 mini loaves, 3 and 1/2 dozen muffins or one bundt cake

Grease and flour pans.

370 degree oven

Bake standard breads 50-60 minutes 

Bake cake 40 minutes

Muffins: check doneness at 15 minutes

 Check doneness with toothpick, which should come out clean when inserted into middle of bread.