Ram wrangling

I learnt a very valuable lesson in how to free a ram from a fence today.

1. Wear gloves or use a towel their horns really hurt your hands. 
2. Get on the other side of the fence to the ram, even though he is a placid boy, he's not happy stuck in a fence and will body slam you, and he weighs a LOT. 

Thankfully he ran away as soon as he was free. I got him some food to make it up to him. Now to try and get whatever is imbedded into my hand out.

 

Meat chickens

I killed our first Plymouth Rock rooster 16 June 2012. 

He hatched out 15 November 2011 and was so much smaller than the others that I expected him to die in the first few weeks.  He did not get feathers until very late in his life, weeks after the girls got feathers.  His brother is larger but it is raining hard so I plan to do him another day (or sell him as he is pure bred and a stunning looking bird). 

It is difficult killing something I hatched out, fed, watered, and looked after.  He was a beautiful looking animal with a calm temperament, had I entered him he could easily have won medals in poultry shows.  He lived a calm and happy life, and died an honourable quick death, not at all like the terrible and painful life and death of a commercial meat chicken.

At the age of 7 months he weighed 3.71kg live, when he was ready to go in the freezer he weighed 2.50kg.  That is a dressing percentage of just over 67%, not too bad for the first rooster I have processed in such a long long time.

Unfortunately I did not keep records on the food he ate to reach this size.  If I were to guestimate based on the feed that he has been consuming over the past few weeks I would say it cost about $19 to get this far (which works out to about $7.30 per kg of chicken).  The actual cost must be lower than that as he certainly did not eat this much when he was a week old.  Next time I plan to keep stats and keep the young chickens feed completely separate from all other poultry feed so I can work out accurately how much it costs to feed a chicken from hatching to eating size.

Plymouth rock egg stats over a year

I was meticulously recording egg statistics (among other things) for our hens every day.

On average our plymouth rocks laid 221 eggs per hen per year.  That works out to an average of just over 4 eggs per hen per week.

This average over the year includes each hen moulting twice (they do not lay through a moult), some hens going off the lay as they were injured, each hen going broody and not laying an average of 0.3 times each (they were not allowed to hatch so stopped being broody after 2 weeks or so). 

Average number of eggs per hen per month:

April            23

May             21

June             19

July              20

August         16

September   18

October       15

November   17

December   18

January       17

February     18

March         19

These hens were free ranged through the orchard and not provided any extra light or heat.  They foraged for between a third and two thirds of their diet depending on the season.  Feed costs should be very low on acreage as they can forage for most of their feed.

We had one hen who lays a different looking egg, she laid far more than the others, her eggs were not counted so that we have a more accurate average number of eggs for my old strain of plymouth rocks.  I also did not include eggs that were laid while we were away as they were collected by our neighbours and I did not want to impose that they also count eggs as well as feed and water them.

She's turning 1

My sweet beautiful little baby girl is about to turn. It has been an amazing year with her. She has grown up so fast. She is cheeky, oh so cheeky. She is clever, and gentle and beautiful in every way. She still loves her mummy cuddles and her mummy milk. We snuggle all day and all night. I am so blessed to have her.

Fun with Colour

The family photo shoot that rocked

Hugest thanks to Nikki at Virtual Memories Photography. Super happy with the photos and the service you get for your money is exceptional (definitely not a paid ad I really am super happy) Here are some of my favorite pics (you try picking from 155 or 310 if you include b/w photos)

Wordless Wednesday

Banana bread with Mr Thermie

I bought some almond milk as it sounded so delicious, in truth it's the nastiest stuff I've ever drunk. Who in their right mind drinks such a horrid concoction I'd rather starve.

Got me thinking on needing to use this horrible yuck and thought it might go alright in some Banana bread.

INGREDIENTS

• 1/2 cup Rolled Oats
• 150ml Milk
• 150ml Almond milk (or 300ml normal milk if you too think almond milk is nasty)
• 3 overripe bananas, mashed
• 240g Self Raising Flour (You Can Use Wholemeal)
• 1 teaspoon Baking Powder
• 1/3 cup Soft Brown Sugar
• 1 teaspoon Mixed spice
• 3 tablespoons Honey
• 1 Egg
• 100g of nuts I used almonds, cashews and macadamias

True Thermomix style (or is it Tracey Style?) chuck in all in the bowl in the order listed then mix on 6 for 30 sec. Use a lower speed if you want chunkier nuts but I have kids so wanted things well blended. Add the oats at the end and mix slowly if you want them whole.

If you don't have a Thermie well you miss out. No not really you may need to soak your oats, mash your banana by hand and chop your own nuts but then you should be right to mix in a bowl. Sweat and love makes a cake taste better right?

Pour into greased and lined loaf tin and bake for 45mins on low to moderate oven try around 180C

NB I forgot the weigh as I went so I will update the recipe with weights next time I make it.

I hate foxes

Last week we found the most beautiful cockatiel in our vegetable garden. After contacting the neighbours it become our new bird. Igloo named it K Air Puff. It was such a lovely friendly bird.

We had one day before we had to go away for a week, so I rushed around like mad and found a nice sized cage that we couldn't afford to keep her in. I spent far too long setting up a lovely home for her when I should have been packing.

We test the cage we get the kids to test the cage and it is steady and sturdy.

Fast forward to Saturday, the day before we get home from our trip. The day before K Air Puff would be in a safer position. And a bloody horrible nasty creature of a fox knocks his way into the cage. The poor terrified bird tried to escape and met its fate into foxes mouth.

So now we have a cage that we couldn't afford sitting empty without the money to fill this cage with a new bird.

I am so sick of these foxes. They come in the day time up to our back door. They walk up to Damien while he is outside. They get so close that he can kick them.

While it would be illegal to use fox poison without a license we did try and google a recipe. But apparently there is a cocktail called fox poison so we got no where. Thanks Mr Google :/

Eventful Day

Today started like any normal day, the sun was peeping through the clouds and fog. I figured the weather was done and the drama was over. Oh how wrong I was.

These two photos are from Saturday morning.

These photos are from this morning.

Our waist high letterbox is underwater roughly in the middle of this photo.

This is the tree that decided to fall down, just missing the house, swing set and cars parked out the front. One car which had just been unbogged from the driveway. Not our car. Needed a tractor to get this one out. We have a lot of holes to fill in once we dry out.

3hrs + 4 x 4WD + 8 people = 26 Sandbags

I had been wondering what I was going to write about for farming Friday. I had nothing prepared. Nature kicked in and helped with a story.

The carport.

The carport 1 hour later. It did get higher but I was far too busy by then

Where it flows after the carport.

The carport again after I wasn't so busy and the water had gone down a little bit

Our Road

Driveway

A few of the many trenches we had to dig to divert water from the house. This first trench is about 50cm deep. It took some digging to the water rushing over the pavers and into the laundry and sewing room.

The garage floor level is lower than the level of this water. There was about an inch of water in the garage.

4WD 1 to bring us sand bags

4WD 2 to save 4WD 1?

4WD 2 being saved by 4WD's 3 and 4

The mess 4WD 2 left

4WD's 2, 3 and 4 set up to rescue 4WD 1

4WD 1 half way out

The sandbags now doing not much as the rain stopped before they got there. Much more rain is predicted so I am sure they will be needed overnight.