Wow! The past two weeks have flown by! We have been quite busy here on and off the farm.
Last
week we started our last planned hatch of the season. We had set 42
eggs, and 37 were viable, fertile eggs. Out of those 37 we hatched 17
little keets! Not a great hatch, but everyone of them are already spoken
for. We were thrilled to have two little buffs in this hatch.
Unfortunately, one of the little buffs didn't make it so we are down to
16. They are so cute, but crazy little birds!
I'm not
sure we are completely done with this years hatches, but I cleaned and
sanitized the incubators and turners and tucked them away...for now. If
I can collect enough guinea eggs we might, just might have one more
hatch. I have a new friend who is looking to add a few more Royal
Purple guineas to her flock....hmmm....might just have to do one more
hatch!
Just got word the hatch it on! Pulled out the
incubators and have eggs ready to set. Twenty eight days from now we
will be hatching once again!
The garden is doing
well....for the most part. We are harvesting yellow squash, zucchini
squash, spaghetti squash, Roma tomatoes, Kellogg's Breakfast tomatoes,
green beans, wax beans, a few carrots, peaches, and plums. Two little
Cinderella pumpkins were harvested due to the vines being damaged.
One
of the issues we are battling in the garden are bad insects. We have
been battling the squash bug and the vine borer. Both have taken their
toll on our pumpkin and squash plants. We have been hand picking them
and well...squashing them! Apparently, we didn't get them all and
didn't get them quick enough. We are still finding adults, nymphs and
eggs and will continue to be diligent in removing them, but they have
done some damage.
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| Squash Bug Eggs |
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| Adult Squash Bug |
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| Damage from Vine Borers |
On
The Old Five Notch Farm we use natural controls to manage pests. We
have two bee hives and do not use pesticides to protect our bees. Here
are two links to organic/natural means to help manage and control these
two pests.
Mother Earth News -Organic Vine Borer Controls
Mother Earth News - Organic Squash Bug Controls
We
will continue to battle these pesky bugs, but we are fortunate that our
plants are strong and can withstand the attacks so far. Despite the
attacks from the bad bugs we are harvesting quite a bit of produce!
Here are some of the veggies being preserved for later use.
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| Roma tomatoes |
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| More Roma tomatoes! |
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| I am so very happy with our new gas cook top! The caner is full of tomatoes and the other pot is full of tomatoes to help remove their skins....notice MORE tomatoes still on the counter! |
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| Tomatoes! That will make Four batches of Scott's famous spaghetti sauce. |
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| Summer Squash - Zucchini and Yellow Straight Neck - future casseroles. |
All
of the critters on the farm are tolerating the hot temperatures fairly
well. We continue to keep plenty of water available not only to drink,
but to stand their feet in and misters spraying in the air to help keep
everyone comfortable. We free range as much as possible as long as
someone is home to keep an eye out for predators. Everyone was out and
about all day yesterday and today.
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| My newest little buddy. A little Golden Laced Wyandotte Roo. He and his sixteen siblings will be five weeks old Tuesday.
He is a mess! He follows me all around and if I don't pay attention to
him, he flies up my leg trying to get to my arm for a perch. Such a
great, friendly breed! |
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| "Mama
Broodie" she is all done with raising the guinea keets and back with
the rest of the adults...much to the dismay of the keets. They still
follow her around and try to hid under her only to get pecked by mom! |
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| "Tommy"...My handsome, but hot turkey boy! It doesn't help any that he struts ALL the time. |
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| "Rudy"
He is the BEST rooster. He is great with all the babies both keets and
chicks. He does a great job of protecting his ladies and taking care of business with his girls too. He comes running anytime I go out to see about them and drops a wing and courts me...I'm one of his girls too apparently! |
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| Front: "Baby Girl" Middle: "Diva" and in the Back...the big man himself: "Tommy" <3 |
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| Our
little buff keet....aka "Buffy" She is starting to get some of her
color AND she is getting spots! I believe she is a Buff Dundotte! A
rare color! |
We were blessed yesterday
with a visit from my son and his sweet girlfriend. They came over to
have Scott help Matt make a corn hole game for a friend of Matt's
birthday. It does this moms heart good to see the two men I love
working side by side, chatting away.
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| Scott and Matt putting the corn hole boards together. |
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| Of course, they needed supervision! "Diva" was glad to help out. |
We
had some other visitors to the farm yesterday too. My nephew Gideon and
his girlfriend Amber came over to visit. They took a trip to Like Fork
Lake to check out the sites and then came back for supper. Nothing
like having family all around for a meal! We were so blessed to have
each one of them visit and then share a meal together. Time with family
is so precious.
All of the critters at The Old Five
Notch Farm are well taken care of and spoiled rotten. Our special needs
chicken is no exception. "Tater" is now three months old and has
adjusted well to her/his new house and pen. My sweet Farmer Man added a
table for Tater's house and pen to sit up on so she could see outside
and have better airflow.
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| I thought it was only fitting to include a picture of my sweetie sporting his Izzie's Pond T-shirt while working on a rescued chickens pen! Sorry it's a little blurry...I had to make him stop working for a minute just to snap the photo! |
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| Measure Twice...Cut Once! |
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| "Tater" enjoying her new high rise house! She had a ceiling fan on the porch for air circulation, and screens all around. |
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| "Tater" also has her very own redneck a/c......a fan and a frozen bottle of water! |
I'd
like to leave you with a few more of our rescued friends here at The
Old Five Notch Farm. I would encourage you to consider checking out
Izzie's Pond
or any other rescue for animals for your farm. We are so blessed to be
a release site for wild ducks and geese. This momma duck and her
twelve, yes 12! babies were released on our site awhile back. They have
made themselves at home and have become part of the wild duck family
that call our place home. We enjoy watching them and hearing them on
our pond and the small expense of their feed is worth all the beauty and
enjoyment we receive having them here.
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| Eleven of the twelve babies...making themselves right at home <3 |
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| Momma Duck and one more baby...getting really hard to tell Momma from the babies! |
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| Happy little duckies...yes, that is a trap, not for the ducks, but for predators. We do all we can do keep everyone safe! |
Thank
you for taking the time to check in with us at our little farm. I hope
you have enjoyed your visit and maybe even learned a little something.
God bless and keep looking for updates!
