The Ditch

In this time off of work I thought it would be a good time to concentrate my efforts on the ditch.

To the east of the driveway is over 100feet of ditch. It is about 6 feet deep and has a row of aging spruce trees lining the property above it. Over the past two years, a tree has fallen across the road and the branches were left in this ditch, trimming of the spruce trees has happened with those branches being left in the ditch, I could not mow or trim last year due to all the debris therefore the long grasses are extreme, and since I have not had access to the ditch, there was 18 months worth of garbage in there as well.

It took me 4 weeks of working at least two hours most days, and I have finally finished. The added bonus was some hidden firewood I was able to pull out!

In addition to cleaning up the ditch, I also cleared about a 10 foot wide path past the spruce trees trying to isolate and encourage the next wave of border trees (as I mentioned the spruce are aging and don't have many years left in them).

Unfortunately we are in a burn ban now for at least the next 3 weeks and I accumulated a massive pile of brush doing this clean up. I have been researching the pros and cons of investing in a chipper thus reducing the amount of burning I do and perhaps being able to use the chips in the chicken coop.

Odds and Ends

This blog is just catching us up on a few odds and ends that have cropped up over the past few weeks.

Usually it is the family dog that digs holes throughout the yard. Here it is my sweet darling chickens! I am finding these little pits all over the place wherever my chickens think would be a good place for a dirt bath! Although they are less organized and a lot bigger, the pits do remind me of being in Africa and digging small depressions wherever we were to play Mancala with stones.

Dixie decided to have a little play time with two deer and took off for 15 minutes to romp through the forest. She returned scraped, scratched but not quite bleeding, totally happy and oblivious to the stress she had caused me!

A few weeks ago I hurt my back so I had to reduce my outdoor work hours for a while. So I increased my reading hours. I started on the top left of my bookshelf. I am now on the the fourth book and am pretty sure I have not read it before. The first three books, I realized around chapter 4 that the story seemed really familiar, but because I could not remember how they ended, I finished reading them for the second time. I was pretty confident that I had given away all the books I had read before we moved but.....?

I was able to do a maple sap boil. This years is absolutely delicious, no after taste of sycamore lol!! However, I barely ended up with any. For whatever reason, I do not know, I did not get much sap this year and ended up with only about 250 ml of syrup. But I will enjoy every last drop of it.

I was not going to start any seedlings inside this year. I did not find the transplanting went well last year. But....I was bored one day so I did plant broccoli, cauliflower, squash, peppers, cucumber, and tomatoes.

The garage has been a bone of contention with me. I have a very hard time returning tools to their proper place so it is always messy and I can never find what I need. I spent a few days cleaning and organizing and am very proud to say, two weeks later, tools are where they are supposed to be and I can still walk through the garage without tripping.

Taking advantage of this newly cleaned garage and being able to find my tools, I finally built myself a sawbuck. I have wanted one for a year, and since it only took about half an hour to put together, I am really frustrated with myself that I didn't do it sooner. However, I have now and I can cut firewood at a  comfortable height without straining my back!

I am loving walking around and seeing the sprouts and colours and growth that are starting as spring moves in.

Happy Easter

Happy Easter to all my friends here and there!

This holiday certainly was a different one. Did your isolation lead you to "skip" this holiday, or still celebrate but with a much smaller crowd around your table? I hope you all managed to find some happiness. Whether you found things to do outside on this beautiful day, or found the wine was pouring extra well, or if like me, you were able to connect with family members through technology.

My niece Laura, set up a Zoom account, so today I was able to connect with Laura in Stanley, New Brunswick, my parents, Bill and Sandy in Beamsville, Ontario, my children, Brandon and Zoe in Fort Erie, Ontario, my brother Bill and nephews Andrew and Brian in London, Ontario. We were all able to join a conversation, enjoy an hour of togetherness and catching up while seeing each other in Brady Bunch blocks on our phones and computers. I may complain at times about technology and how it is taking much of the face to face contact out of our society, but today I certainly appreciated the benefits of it. Thanks again Laura for setting that up for us.

I decided to enjoy an Easter dinner with ham, scalloped potatoes and squash (to which mom asked "wasn't that your Thanksgiving...and Christmas dinner menu??" and I said "Yes, but this time I also made a fruit crisp for dessert!"). Ok so I love ham and scalloped potatoes!! Pair it with a glass of red wine and a good book and I enjoyed my meal. And it's a good thing like it, I made enough for 6 people which means I have 5 frozen dinners for another time.

I did also enjoy some time outside doing more yard work and playing with the chickens. So overall...what could have been a sad and lonely day, was actually quite nice.

Even Dixie and Charlie took a moment out of the day and pretended to be friends.

Sam

Sam-note the girls backs

For those of you who may be more sensitive you may wish to skip this weeks post and I will see you again next week. I am going talk about culling a chicken.

To backtrack a bit. If you recall, last year I purchased some chickens who had been very sick and treated as producers not pets. After this  unfortunate experience, I was more careful with my next selection of laying hens. In August I met a wonderful gentleman who was patient enough with me to spend an hour answering my questions and helping me hand select 15 Easter Egger chickens. They were young and he did his best to help guide me to hens. As it turns out however, three of our girls were actually boys. One of these boys became very aggressive and killed one of my ladies. I wrote earlier about having a friend over to cull him and show me how so I could do it next time. 

Well that time had arrived. We still had two boys, Sam and Max. I noticed the girls had a lot of broken back feathers and were exhibiting some signs of stress, but unfortunately I was working so much I did not have enough time to spend observing which rooster was the cause of this stress. Cue COVID-19 and the temporary end of my work days. With all this free time, I had the chance to identify Sam as the aggressor. Max appeared to be protecting the girls from both predators and Sam.

Problem identified. Now to take action. I decided on the day, set up my "zone" with knives, hot water, cardboard and newspaper, and my chosen How To YouTube video on standby. No one can possibly tell me chickens are dumb. That darn rooster knew I was coming for him. After chasing him in circles, hiding behind doors, laying trails of treats, all to no avail (and looking very foolish to anyone who happened to see me) I gave up for the day.
As evening approached and everyone settled in for the night, I snuck back into the coop and easily lifted Sam from the roost and put him in a cage all set for the morning.

I had myself all talked up for this. I was confident, I was prepared, I was farmer, I was woman. I was scared shitless.

I have a building which is largely unused that I had prepared for the deed. So just after lunch (yes it took me to that long to get up the nerve) I carried the caged rooster to this building while trying to keep the rest of the chickens out, assuring them they wanted no part of what was about to happen. It must have taken me 10 minutes to get him out of the cage- I was afraid he would flap out of my grasp- he didn't. I quickly flipped him upside down and put him in a prepared construction cone. Phew. Step two done and successful. Unfortunately this is where I start to stress out. As I grab the knife and reach for his head he pulls away and starts jerking about. Now I am shaking, and crying, and overall not very happy. Skipping to the chase, it took me an entire hour of pacing and swearing until I finally got up the nerve. I pulled its head down and cut its jugular. I knew I was not strong enough to cut the whole head off so part of my panic was that I would not kill it straight out. I did, but there was still so much muscle movement after that I  had to walk away for half an hour until I knew for sure it would have stopped. 

So with the horrible part done, I proceeded to follow my YouTube video and de feathered,

gutted and prepared it for soup.

Moral of the story...I freeking hate this part of farming. But the long, slow simmering soup, was yummy. And that after all, is one of the reasons I came here. To grow and raise my own food.