Spring Blooms

G brought home some color for our planters. I love it! 

The best part is, once they're done flowering, we can plant them elsewhere to bloom next year. 

Many things are sprouting on the homestead...

Rhubarb. Has it been here for three years? I might be able to harvest some this year. 

Chives in the orchard. 

In Bekhor's area bulbs I planted in the past are coming up! I also planted some daffodils that were finished flowering. Should be nice and springy next year.

Oregano coming up in the garden from last year. Also lovage, which looks kind of like celery.

I had a ton of lettuce to plant, but instead of doing each kind separately, I mixed all the seeds together and scattered them around three different garden plots. Hopefully that was not a mistake. 😅

Past Photo Dump

Jaron checking out the redneck baby gate I set up on the deck. He's not walking yet, but he's super close! 

The incubated ducklings have been out of the garage for a while now, but back when they were in the garage, they were driving us nuts splashing all the water out of their waterer. 🙄

And the mature ducks nibbling up the last bit of snow. 

Dixie the chicken hustled over to make sure she wasn't missing out on anything good. 😂

Tool Cleaning Bucket

I didn't use all the sand in the chicken dust baths. In between making them, I made a tool cleaning bucket. 

Pretty simple - Fill a bucket halfway with sand. Add a cup of mineral oil. Wait an hour then stir. Repeat. 

To use, brush dirt off your tool then plunge the blade in the bucket. The sand is abrasive and polished the metal, the mineral oil coats the metal and keeps it from rusting. 

I tested it on a shovel. 

Looks nice and shiny, although I think I could add more mineral oil in the bucket. Seems a little patchy.

Chicken Dust Baths

Gotta deal with those chicken mites...

The chickens have a routine of dust bathing among the lilacs in the early afternoon, but there are a few additions that work well to get rid of mites and other crawling insects. 

Diatomaceous earth is the main thing; it's pulverized diatoms (microscopic organisms made of silica) which shred the insects that walk over them. Wood ash can also help. Sulfur dust is good at repelling parasites. 

This website has percentages for mixing the different ingredients. 

I picked up a few buckets of sand for free from someone on Facebook marketplace. We already had diatomaceous earth and sulfur from past gardening years. I collected a bucket of ash from our fire pit. Then I mixed everything in a tote. 

A tire holds an awful lot of sand, etc.

Finally ready!

And look, one of the infected mamas used it right away! 

She rolled all over, flipping sand everywhere. Those mites don't stand a chance! 

One tire doesn't allow for much chicken bathing. We didn't have many options to add another. Then, on our way to church Sunday we noticed someone had dumped a couple tires in a center median. I half jokingly said we should take them home with us. A few days later, one tire was gone, but the thick one was still there...

G swung by after work and picked it up for me as a surprise. 😊

Nice and deep for chickens to dig. 

I used up the last of the sand and the collected ash. It didn't come quite up to the top, but I think it'll be okay. They won't be able to scratch so much out this way. 

Someone else enjoys getting dust baths...

He's been mesmerized by the gravel in the driveway. He spun in an entire circle checking out all the gravel. And surprisingly only one rock ended up in his mouth! 

Wanderers

Our neighbors don't want our birds on their side of the fence. I happened to look out the window as I often do and saw a flash of buff feathers through a gap in the fence. 

So Jaron and I went out to take a look. Sure enough, both chicken mamas were scratching with their chicks on the wrong side. 

We walked around the fence to our neighbors' property and I herded the chickens as best I could so they would go back through the gap under the fence. The chicks went first and their mamas followed.

Whew! Big relief. 

The other chickens and ducks have been wandering and foraging in the beautiful weather we've had. It's impacting their egg shell colors in a good way. 

The ducks haven't had dark eggs in weeks! Some of them never, but take a look at the most recent egg haul:

The chickens too have had many more shades in their eggs. 

Jaron loves looking at eggs. I found this out one afternoon while I threw a load of laundry in. Jaron had been playing with his toys when all of a sudden it was too quiet... He had found a basket of eggs we brought back from the farm and was picking them up and putting them down again. 

He was very gentle and didn't crack any, but I will admit I didn't last very long letting him explore the basket. 😅

Potatoes in Hay

Somewhere in my Internet perusals I came across a YouTube video of guys who did a potato planting experiment. They tested how many eyes a chunk should have for best harvest and they tested a number of popular growing methods for best results. 

The winners of the experiments were using a whole potato and the Ruth Stout method. Container plantings didn't result in a great yield, but the convenience of being able to move them to our garage and harvest in December was too good to skip, so I plan to plant some that way too.

The whole potato method is self explanatory. I'd never heard of the Ruth Stout method, but after a little research I discovered it's super easy. Also, we have a bunch of spent hay, so we have everything we need!

Start by putting potatoes on the ground, 12" apart. 

I started with a ruler and ended up using my foot as a measurement. 

Some of the seed potatoes had gigantic sprouts already. I chose to leave them attached and arranged them so the sprouts ran along the ground. 

Next, I spaced the onions. 

I also spread out some garlic bulbs I discovered drying out in the fruit room. Oops, forgot about those we harvested last fall... 

No way we're eating them so I might as well see if they grow. I had a few dried out potatoes left from our fall harvest and a few hard carrots, so I planted those as well. 

The last step is to cover them with about 8" of mulch/straw. 

It keeps the weeds down and retains moisture. According to my research, we won't even need to water them. 

Next year we can reuse the bed and simply add more hay over top. Perfect. 

Carbon Steel Initiation

We got a new pan, a wok to replace our electric wok which had the nonstick coating flaking off. 

It's carbon steel, which is cared for similarly to cast iron. It gets seasoned with use, and the more you use it, the more nonstick it gets. 

It came with a coat of wax over the entire thing to protect the carbon steel from rusting and the seasoning from getting scratched. There were special instructions for first use. 

The person who sold it to us recommended putting it in the oven on warm on top of some old towels to catch the wax. 

It took a couple of times in the oven, mostly because I kept getting interrupted during the process. I did use paper towels to wipe off the melted wax that didn't drip onto the sacrificial shirt. 

We inaugurated the dewaxed and freshly seasoned pan with stir fry veggies of course! 

Now I'm curious... What else do you use a wok for???