A Peak At Our Week: Session 5 Week 1 - Beginning the Home Stretch

In My Life This Week

Spring HAS arrived at Our Side of the Mountain! Relaxing in the hammock under the budded maple trees, the Spring Peepers and wild birds sing loudly and the red squirrels scamper around the branches above. Green grass is growing and early flowers have sprouted in Sugar Maple's garden. The heat inside the house has been shut off and the windows are open days. And we're on our last session of Year #9!

Cluck and Quacks

The Saplings fashioned a make-shift pen for the lil' chicks out in the veggie garden for their first outside romp now that they have most of their big girl feathers. Although Nutmeg, Amber and Butterfly were on high alert, they scratched and pecked and fluffed while the older hens, outside the wired fence, ignored them.

On the Dinner Menu
☀ Ham, Cheese and Broccoli Strata with Pineapple Chunks ☀ Hot Dog Roast Outside with Baked Beans, Cole Slaw, Potato Salad, and S'mores ☀ Homemade Ham Fried Rice with Veggies ☀

Homeschool Happenings
SIMPLIFYING.

I've wanted to figure out a way to get some of this "delight directed" learning in despite my more "traditional" school views. But where to start? Gardening! Alaska! This week I decided to sit down WITH THE SAPLINGS and just learn about gardening and Alaska without any preplanned studies. We read. We wrote. We drew. We discussed. Whatever worked. And the sapling were confused. Not our usual approach to school.

We also read on in SOTW 2: Middle Ages, completing our mapwork and wall timeline along the way. And the younger saplings worked on their Saxon Math and Math-U-See. Sugar Maple is super excited that she should finish her ENTIRE math book this year.

In preparation for writing his first 10 page+ research paper, White Pine read How to Write a Term Paper (Elizabeth James and Carol Barkin) and then chose his topic: Comparing Union and Confederate Civil War Battles . He spent the rest of the week taking and citing notes from his research...and finished up his Computer Science 101 class from Coursera and continued on with Biology, World History, Geography and Cultures, US History Video Project, and Algebra. 

What We're Reading
☀ Darling Jim (Christian Moerk) (SP) ☀  Julie of the Wolves (Jean Craighead George) (SM) ☀ The Bear Scouts (Stan and Jan Berenstain) (BF) ☀ Prince Caspian (CS Lewis) (Read Aloud) ☀

Places We Went, People We Saw
☀ Scouts (All) ☀ Softball (SM) ☀ Library ☀ Co-op/Playground (All) ☀

Our Favorite Thing

Something to Share

As always, linking up to these WONDERFUL blog hops!

Cluck and Quack Happenings: Featured Feathered Friend

Tammy over at Our Neck of the Woods does a Feathered Friend Friday post each week that I've been reading. Am I the only one that enjoys reading about other people's chickens? Probably! ::grin:: But I'm OK with that! Anyway, I thought I would do some FEATURING of my own.

Meet Speckles!

Now, we don't know for sure what type of chicken Speckles is. (All our chickens are mixes.) We do know that her Dad was an Ameraucana and certainly gave her her feathery ear muffs and "beard". But we think her Mom was a White Laced Wyandotte or some other "laced" mix.

She is our Head Hen. Oftentimes she acts like a rooster, cawing whenever she senses danger to warn the others. She's always on high alert!

And she's also a little snippy at times. At least with me. I think she knows I'm REALLY the Head Hen and she doesn't always like that. But for the most part she does her peck and scratch thing and doesn't mind a little, um, holding time with the kids or I. 

Cluck and Quack Happenings: Why Chickens are Cool

I know what you're thinking...or at least some of you...chickens? cool? huh? But really, they are. And I'm not a crazy chicken lady! ::wink:: (Who said YET?! I didn't make any of those hooded fleece chicken ponchos I saw on Facebook, did I? Or the indoor diapers...)

My Top 5 Reasons Why Chickens Are Cool

5. Free ranging chickens forage, eating a diet of plants and BUGS. Now, I don't know about "your neck of the woods", but here in Maine we have a plethora of pesky insects: mosquitoes, black flies, Japanese Beetles, No-see-ums, and ticks. Chickens will eat them all! Devour! I know some of you love your bugs and they do serve a purpose, but I'm OK with a few less in the summer nipping me and the kids.

Our Coop and Run, Speckles, Balsam Fir with Chee (RIP), Egg Salad Sandwich, and White Pine with
Chee (RIP)

4. And those free ranging chickens don't stop at just bugs! No, they also chomp on grass, always leaving a couple inches close to the ground. Now, yes, LARGE flocks can decimate a beautiful, lush lawn, but my feathered 6 haven't. Well, OK, I do have a less-than-lush lawn...Anyway, less mowing. And the digging aerates the soil, and the, um, poo fertilizes it. 

3. Chickens help my family be more "green". Not only do chickens provide a natural source of, um, Miracle Grow for our garden compost, but they also eat veggie and fruit scraps, old bread, rice, spaghetti, and many other things from our kitchen. Obviously with the cost of groceries "going through the roof", we eat as much as our food as possible but now next-to-nothing goes to waste. We even dry and crush egg shells to feed back to the flock for a rich calcium source! 

Not Chickens, But They Were Foraging in the Woods. Tops of Celery From Making Sticks forSaplings'
Snack, Dandelions Pulled From the Lawn and Dropped Pumpkin Flowers from the Garden Make a
GREAT Duck Soup

2. I bet you thought eggs would be 1, but nope! ::grin:: Fresh chicken eggs are remarkably different than store eggs. Sure, they all LOOK like eggs out the outside, but the inside...Have you ever seen the BRIGHT orange-yellow of a farm egg? Store eggs PALE in comparison. Literally.

1. Our chickens help my kids live a healthier life. How so? Well, we free range under supervision. Our chickens are our pets and we do what we can to ensure their safety while letting them be, well, chickens. My kids are out almost every single day with our flock for at least a couple of hours...rain? yes! snow? yes! bone-numbing cold? some of the time. Fresh air and "foraging" is good for kids too! And no, they're not "foraging" for bugs, but they're building lean-tos in the forest, riding scooters, building snowmen and forts, searching for frogs, and gardening (depending on the time of year). They are more active because of our chickens.

Balsam Fir With "Twin" Rhodies, Chickens Digging and Foraging in Flower Garden, Chickens On The Search
for Bugs in the Fall Leaves, Balsam Fir with Chee (RIP)

So, what has your flock done for you lately?

Our Six Disheveled from Molting this Fall: Speckles, Onyx, Rhodie, Mustard, Little Rhodie, and Sassy

Linking up to these wonderful blogs:

Cluck and Quack Happenings: Snowbirds!

Any ideas on what made these prints on our driveway? Some ferocious 4-toed beast? OK, you got me! It's chickens! I kinda thought you would know. ::wink:: They do look a little dinosaur-ish though, right?

Last year our flock wouldn't venture far into the snow. It was new and strange and, well, cold, so they stuck close to the coop and run. Sometimes I don't blame them staying cooped up. Have you seen how high snow can get in our neck of the woods? Ugh! Anyway...This year they're older and wiser, having endured a long, snowy Maine winter last season. They're old "feathers" at this! 

But they're still not crazy about the snow. Look at Speckles on the wire fence. HER feet weren't touching snow if she could help it!

Some of the hens didn't mind it so much. They weren't clucking happily, but after a week of bitterly cold temperatures getting out was so worth the chilly feet to be in the bright sunshine. I think they were hoping for some juicy bugs or at least some green grass for their troubles though. April?

Meanwhile, the ducks had waddled off to swimming and explore in the icy brook water. Brrr! Watching them bathe is quite fun. They'll duck their head under, scooping water over and down their backs repeatedly, and then it's dunking for plants. Just like the chickens, they're not finding many nibbles right now.

But we're brainstorming a solution for the grub challenge...

Oh, and did you notice that one of our ducks is a soft, pale yellow? That's Olive! She's been dealing with a respiratory infection for a few months and has been on 2 rounds of antibiotics. With some on-line research we found out that antibiotics during molting can cause the new feathers to take on a yellow hue. Looks like we'll have a yellow Pekin until molt next early winter! At least I can finally tell them apart! ::grin::

And we're averaging just over one chicken egg per day! With the shorter daylight hours, I'm not surprised. Did you know that chickens need about 14 hours+ of daylight for optimal laying? Lots of people think it's the cold, but it's really the short days that slow egg production. I'm just happy to get anything considering they had stopped laying from early September to mid-December for molting! It's awesome to see those eggs in the frig again!

Cluck and Quack Happenings: Around the Coop

Feathers are flying everywhere! It's been a rough fall for our hens - both chicken and duck - as they're all going through their first molts. Still. ::sigh::

Each year, sometime in the fall, chickens and ducks lose some, most or all their feathers and replace that with new ones. It's a protein-zapping process that ends egg laying for months. The hens haven't laid a single egg since early September! And 2 weeks ago the ducks stopped.

I've had to buy STORE eggs! Can you imagine?! ::sigh::

Otherwise all the girls are doing their thing and settling in for the colder winter months.

The chickens forage for bits of something or another under the fallen leaves. What they find, I do not know! ::wink:: They've been finding cozy patches of warm sunlight near the trees to nap or dust bathe in pine needles. But you won't see them outside the covered fun if there's even a smidgen of snow on the ground.

And the ducks waddle out to the icy brook to swim and forage, preening afterwards. Poor Olive is still coughing occasionally and has a dry-sounding quack despite her round of antibiotics and now VetRx. But she is alert and active and definitely enjoys her dried mealworms.

With the colder weather here and the snow coming, White Pine and I wrapped up the run with plastic sheeting a month or so ago. Transparent plastic sheeting, which you can get get Lowe's or Home Depot, is wonderful for letting in sunlight but keeping out snow, freezing rain and chilly breezes. And we don't have to get into the run and shovel out mountains of snow through the season! 

To give them some added insulation and warmth, I've been adding dry, fallen leaves to the run. We have an abundance of leaves and they make great bedding! Not only do they provide some insulation against the cold ground, but the hens can scratch through it for exercise, searching for scratch grains or mealworms we randomly throw in. And they'll decompose with "flock fertilizer" easily through the winter months and can be raked out and added to the garden or simply left in the run.

We've begun "deep litter" inside the coop. Our coop does not have electricity as we believe its better to keep things as "au natural" as possible (while still protecting our flock) and so it's unheated. "Deep litter" is a method of allowing straw to compost inside the coop over the winter, releasing warmth in the process, and in the spring providing seasoned fertilizer for the garden. (Read more about "deep litter" on Fresh Eggs Daily.) Believe it or not, done right, "deep litter" isn't smelly at all.

Now, if only they would stay laying eggs again! ::sigh::

ETA: Guess what? I was surprised and excited to see our FIRST EGG since molting started this morning on the coop floor!

Have You Hugged a Chicken Today?

Have you been over to Tilly's Nest? Well, Melissa is holding her 2nd annual Hug a Chicken Day and we had to, well, hug our chickens (and ducks) and join right in! She also has a weekly blog hop, Down Home Blog Hop, for us poultry people or anyone homesteading or hobby farmin' or even just a great recipe and housekeeping tip. 

I know that it's hard to believe (for some) that chickens can be pretty cool pets, but they are. Each one has their own distinct personality and they can even be taught tricks. They're top-notch garden fertilizers and rototillers and debug better than any pesticide could ever accomplish. They'll even eat up veggie and fruit scraps so nothing goes to waste. And they give back with yummy farm-fresh eggs!

We wanted to share a little of our flock with you! We have 6 Ameraucana-Barred Rock hens - Rhodie, Little Rhodie, Mustard, Onyx, Sassy, and Speckles - and 2 Pekin ducks - Olive and Opal. Our hens arrived through incubation (as a homeschool Embryology and Biology study in June 2011) and our ducks from friends (in March 2012).

Our little red and white barn coop is attached to a run with an artificial pond at the other end. The chicken-wired run is covered with plastic weather sheeting and a blue tarp currently. This helps keep the run less muddy. (Soon, we'll be covering most of the run with plastic sheeting for our frigid, snowy winter months.) We've been filling the run with dry, fallen leaves as they make awesome natural "litter" for the chickens to scratch around in...and we've got an abundant supply until the snow comes. ::wink:: Our original tiny orange coop is also inside the run. The chickens like to sleep in it during the day or roost on top. And recently we added tree roosting bars for more chicken fun.

Thinking of getting some chickens? Here's some tips for you:

♥ Choose chickens that are tolerant of your weather and temperatures and are known to have friendly, docile personalities. Handle them gently and often as chicks.
♥ Build or buy a STURDY coop or repurpose a shed bigger than you anticipate needing for your flock with lots of ventilation, 1 nesting box for every 4 hens, roosting bar(s), and wide doors for easy cleaning. Chickens need MINIMALLY 4 square feet of space each and 9" of roosting space. Provide straw, hay, pine, or leaves as a bedding. No cedar or chemically treated bedding!
♥ Plan to build a large attached run to your coop that is covered in 1" or smaller wire. Chickens should have ample space to stretch those wings, scratch and exercise. Bury the wire in the ground 18" to help prevent predators digging in.
♥ Provide plenty of fresh water and quality feed every day along with a small dish of crush oyster shells (for extra calcium needed for eggs) and grit (for helping to grid food in the crop). Do not mix oysters shells and grit into feed!



Now, I would share some photos of eggs, but the chickens are on hiatus right now. The girls are going through their first molts this fall, losing all or most of their feathers and growing in new ones. All their energy is going into making new feathers and not into laying eggs. ::sigh:: We miss our fresh eggs! But the Os are still giving us their eggs!



So, when's Hug a DUCK Day?!

Welcome Home, Cluckers and Quackers!

Cluck! Quack! 

Welcome to your new homes and run, Cheeper, Sassy, Onyx, Rhodie, Lil' Rhodie, Mustard, Speckles, Olive, and Opal! 

When Olive and Opal, Pekin ducks, joined our family in March we knew we would need some new "digs" for the flock. But we're not builders. LOL

So, we asked a homeschool friend, who happens to be a carpenter, to build us a larger coop for the hens. Blue Spruce and I designed the coop on graph paper (to scale!) and passed it along to him. And he did a WONDERFUL job! Our fabulous "poultry palace" has 2 wired windows with clear plastic coverings that raise and lower, 2 large double-doors for ventilation and cleaning, 3 sturdy nesting boxes and 2 wider roosting bars, a fold down ramp-door, and a roof that opens up on one side.  It's DEFINITELY a "cluck castle". (Are you loving these alliterations? LOL)

And what more fitting then to paint it like a barn!

Cousin Noodle Helping

Balsam Fir Painting Above the Nesting Boxes

Red done! Time to Finish the White Xs and Trim

Sliding Clear Plastic Window (with Wire), Double Doors (with
Wire), and Front Ramp-door

Back Door (for Cleaning) - Balsam Fir Peeking Out

Blue Spruce and I laid peel n' stick tiles on the coop floor, like linoleum, for easier cleaning. And I added CHICKEN CURTAINS to the windows. Who laughed? LOL Chickens like a "homey touch" too! Seriously! There's chicken specialists who say that having curtains up over the nesting boxes helps promote more laying!

Roosting Bars, Floor and Window with Wire
and Plastic Covering

2 of the 3 Nesting Boxes and Another View
of the Floor

Chicken Curtains!

The older, smaller coop was repurposed for the ducks. We removed the nesting boxes, added a Plexi-glass window to one side and a wired window with a shutter on the other. We haven't repainted it yet, but the plan is to turn it into a barn too. Eventually.

We also needed a new run - a fenced in area for the hens and ducks to roam around outside their coops safe from predators - and set out to build one with the help of my Mom. We repurposed 1/2 of the old run to add to the end of the run for the duck's new "pond", a 4 1/2 foot x 2 foot x 20 inch plastic trough, but haven't repainted that white yet either. Eventually.

Mom Stapling Chicken Wire to the Top of the Run

Almost Finished Run

Olive and Opal Resting By the Partially Inground Pond

And then we put everything together in a new area of the yard. Not only are the coops and run near the brook so the ducks can explore it easily during supervised free-range, but we can see everything from the livingroom and diningroom. (Before the coop was not visible from inside the house.) And some mornings, when our bedroom window is open, I can hear them waking up for the day!

Roof Will be Black, but Set-up From the Diningroom Window