Snow Maze for Chickens

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by Lisa

The past few days was the first big snow storm out chickens have seen. They didn’t like walking in the snow so much. Anya made a snow maze for the chickens. The funny thing I’ve noticed about chickens — and remember, these are birds that can fly (well, for short distances) — is that they get stymied by two foot walls. The whole flock will be standing on the other side of our courtyard wall, chattering and cocking their heads at the wall trying to figure it out. Well, 18″ of snow works the same way — one chicken “cheated” at the maze and just flew into a different section, but they generally hit a head end and meandered around until someone accidentally worked their way back into the main part of the maze.

And she added a prize at the end of the maze

Winter Wonderland

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by Lisa

It was warm over the weekend, rained Monday — and, as the temperature dropped, it changed over to ice and snow. The tree branches are all covered in a bit of ice with a lot of snow sticking to the ice. With saplings drooping over and tree boughs pulled down, we have a winter wonderland.

Autumn Wrap-up and Winter Projects

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by Lisa

Autumn is coming to a close. We had an great growing season this year — I covered the lettuce beds with fabric tents three or four nights in November because temps would be near freezing. We had a few nights where our small pond froze on the surface, but tomorrow night will be the first sustained sub-freezing temperature. I got a bit of a late start to outdoor gardening because we rebuilt the garden beds in a sunnier location, but I still managed a 200 day growing season. Adding another six weeks for the seeds started indoors, I had plants growing for 244 days — about 2/3 of the year! Moving the beds to a sunnier location greatly increased productivity, and the compost in the garden area has turned into a large pile of dirt. We’ve been adding new stuff to the north side of the pile, and I’ve been moving everything south as I turn the pile. It is impressive how much the pile of grass and leaves shrinks down as it decomposes. In early autumn, I put about 16 cubic feet of compost into the garden beds to make a lettuce and kale bed. Yesterday, I amended another fifteen cubic feet of the lettuce bed. Anya and I used two cucumber A-frame trellises and a few of the tomato trellises to create a structure and covered the lettuce bed with greenhouse plastic. Hopefully we’ll be able to continue growing lettuce throughout the winter. I also plan on planting the broccoli, brussle sprouts, and cabbage under the cover next April.

I was worried the chicks we got in August would be too small when the temps dropped, but they are fifteen weeks old today. They love being outside and fluff up really big when it gets cold. Both the coop and chicken tractor have a wide roost so they can keep their toes under their warm feathers.

In the next few weeks, we’ll build some nesting boxes and get the coop finalized. I also want to finish making packets for the seeds we harvested this year and file them into my seed storage boxes. In the next week or two, I will be making a lot of candied almonds — vanilla cinnamon candied almonds, maple roasted salted almonds, and some plain candied almonds — for us and to give away to neighbors.

This winter, I want to finish the crochet blanket I am making for our family room. It should be a thick, warm blanket that we can all snuggle under. I want to finish Anya’s new Peppermint Swirl dress. I also want to make her micro-corduroy dress/tunic/shirt to replace the one she outgrew this past year. Both will be worn in the spring/summer, but sewing is a cold/snowy day activity for me.

Chicken Fodder

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by Lisa

I wanted to grow a little treat for our chickens to eat as winter sets in and green leafy things become scarce. I took about half a cup of wheat, a quarter cup of barley, and a quarter cup of oats and mixed the seeds together. I covered the seeds with water and soaked them for about 20 hours. I then spread the seeds in a 8″x8″ aluminium tray that has holes poked into the bottom. This sits into its plastic lid to keep from dripping water everywhere. Twice a day, I run water into the tray and let it drip out. No soil used — the roots and seeds form a fairly solid mass as the seeds sprout. One week later, I have lots of bright green shoots. Hopefully they think it’s a tasty treat!

Chicken Tractor

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by Lisa

We put together a chicken tractor to give our chicks to keep them where they’re supposed to be. We’ll put a tarp over one half of the tractor so they’ll have somewhere to hide when the eagle come about (and a place to hide from the rain). And it’s got a low-motion swing!

We used a 1×4 for the swing and mounted the rope to both the top and bottom of the tractor. This approach leaves the swing move a few inches each way, but it doesn’t swing when they hop on and off. They seem to like it — I’ve seen each chicken hanging out on the swing today.

High Density Apple Pie

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by Lisa

I have been following the “roast apple slices before putting into pie crust” approach from Bon Appétit when making apple pies. The Thanksgiving pie this year was about five pounds of sliced apples, mixed with about a cup of maple syrup, and roasted at 350 F for 25 minutes. They should be tender but not dehydrated (a big *no* on the convection oven). The roasted apples are mixed with 2-3 tablespoons of flour and drizzled with more maple syrup. They are then added to a walnut pie crust and baked for another 20-30 minutes.

Maple Cranberry Sauce

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by Lisa

I made a maple cranberry sauce tonight — add about a cup of water and a cup of maple syrup to a saucepan and stir. Rinse a bag (12 oz) of cranberries and add them to the pot. Bring to a boil, then lower the temp and simmer for twenty minutes or so until the cranberries break up. It’s really good warm and cold.