Cooling Weather and Animal Shenanigans

It's been a while since I wrote about the smallholding, because I didn't feel like I'd actually accomplished anything, but it turns out there's been more happening than I realised, once I actually started writing about it. This got a bit longer than I expected!

What's up in the Garden

After an unseasonably hot early start to summer, back in spring, we have now been having an unusually cold few weeks for this time of year. I'm rather hoping that because summer came early, it's also going to finish early. While we haven't had many, the odd days of rain have certainly helped relieve me a bit of the watering chores, which has been good because the garden has been on the back burner a bit of late.

In winter any cardboard or waste paper goes on the wood burner, but now its summer I'm using it as weed matting in an area that got out of hand with couch grass taking over. I've been emptying the rabbits’ bedding on top, with all those lovely toilet additions. Hopefully this will give the soil a break and rot down so that when I finally get around to doing something with this area the soil will be more nutrient rich. Usually I try to grow annual crops in this area, but I'm starting to think that a little food forest approach might be better. _{Or maybe even a little spa area with an aquaponics or reed bed filtration system...a girl can dream, right?!}

^{I want to lay some pavers along the fence to try and slow the progress of the grass coming in.}

The area where I'm planting the chilli pepper plants is still ongoing with preparations, but a fourth plant has been added. I'm not sure exactly what it will be, chilli or standard pepper/capsicum, because I just threw a mixture of old seeds I'd saved in an area that needs some love to see what would sprout. I lost a few seedlings in the heatwaves and the first one I transplanted died, but this one has taken and seems to be loving the nutrient rich soil, because instead of the usual transplant sulk, it started growing again straight away. A great relief because its growth had paused in the low grade soil it came from.

^{Yes, it is surrounded by rabbit poops}

I'm getting lots of flowers on the other plants, with the jalapeno bearing fruit. It's been good to have fresh chilli peppers again.

^{I don't remember the exact name of this chilli, but I'm loving the colour and I think the chilli peppers will be purple too.}

^{Hopefully that little white flower will soon be a habanero}

The sultana grapes have ripened. I didn't bother trying to net them this year, because of time constraints, so anything outside of the fence has already gone to the local bird population. It's been a tough summer, so I can hardly begrudge them that. I have some bunches growing inside the chicken run, however, so we'll have them. There are only so many we can eat, anyway.

The tomatoes have been going gangbusters on the fruit production. They're all very small, however, so I probably should have pruned better. I'm not to worried, though. They still taste good and it's nice to have fresh tomatoes. For some reason I don't like to buy them in. Maybe because they don't always get eaten, then end up going to the chickens when the humans consider them past their best. It feels like a waste of money then, but when you harvest them fresh as you want them, it doesn't feel like such a big issue.

Then today we noticed that the paper almonds were splitting open. Another harvest ready!

^{No nutcracker needed for these beauties, they prise right open}

Rabbit Issues

My timing turned out to be appalling with regards to the birth of the bunnies. They reached rehoming age a couple of weeks after Christmas and I've had very few responses on the Gumtree advert. Summer isn't the best time to sell anyway, because that's when everyone's been breeding and there is a lot of competition. This is why I usually stick to winter breeding. So soon after Christmas when all gifts have been bought and money spent has probably only compounded things. Pets and Christmas are a bad idea anyway, so I'm rather annoyed I didn't think it through. I need to stick to my own rules better and not give in to a broody rabbit and my daughter's friend, eager for a bunny that mum agreed to initially, but had to change her mind on, for a good reason.

We have said goodbye to the two chocolate/black bunnies who each left with people totally smitten with them. Currently two are left and one is the unusual coloured one we're rather smitten with anyway. It's not by accident, however, because I marked her as sold. If we're going to end up with some not selling and keeping any, then that was the one I wanted to stay.

^{This girl gets more patterned as she gets older}

On the Poultry Front

A few weeks ago I hatched some more quail. They tend to be short lived, so as I'd had a few older quail die, it seemed like a good time for a replacement hatch. I've recently gotten a customer for their eggs, who will take whatever we can give, so I don't need to worry about over supply. Quail mature very quickly and can start laying between 6-8 weeks old.

Because I was incubating through the heatwave, the incubator kept overheating when closed, so I had to crack the lid open to keep the temperature stable. This meant that the humidity would have been lower in there, so I was steeling myself for a bad hatch. Quails need high humidity particularly at hatch and thankfully I was finally able to close it again at that point, but I wasn't sure if it was too little to late. Unstable temperatures during incubation can also lead to development issues, so even if they hatched, I still might have some deformities.

As it happened, they surprised me. Most of them hatched and most were healthy. I did have a couple with hip detachments that had to be culled and one with some intestine on the outside. A couple more died later. One had no outwardly apparent issues, but it's usually something internal that hasn't developed properly. A couple had curled feet. I find with curled feet they either open up after a day or two, the chick dies, presumably because there is something else wrong inside, or it needs a little help straightening them. So I like give it a couple of days to see what happens first. Of the two with curled feet, one died and the other had one foot straighten up by itself, so it got quite mobile by walking on the ankle of the other over the two days. I taped the curled foot up with a bit of masking tape to straighten the toes out and bring the foot into a forward pointing position. Initially the foot pointed straight out from the leg, not bending at the ankle joint to stand on, but the chick rectified that over the next two days as its instinct to try and walk made it put its weight through it. You wouldn't know it even had a problem, now.

^{Not the actual chick, but this is how I used to do the curled foot. I've since found the piece of card isn't necessary and just use masking tape alone now.}

Because the weather's been warm and the quail chicks were fully feathered on their bodies, I decided to put them out into the run with the big ones at two weeks old (three weeks is the usual recommendation to come out of the brooder). I had 22 and they were soiling their wood shavings after only a couple of days, so it would save costs and time to just have them out. There were enough of them to snuggle together at night and share their body warmth if it got a bit chilly.

Usually I put them out when they'd older, because the days are getting cooler, and the big quail get a bit bossy with them. This time they didn't bother them. I'm not sure if it's because they were younger or because they were overwhelmed by the sheer number of them. I found the chicks mingling, chilling and dust bathing with the adults the next day. I also found all the water bowls empty when I'd only filled them the previous afternoon, so I added another.

Over in the run with the apple tree, the big chicken chicks had decided to start climbing into the tree and stripping it! To save the tree I made the executive decision to move them in with the bigger flock in the night. Usually a large group being introduced at once doesn't pose to much of a problem. As always, the resident flock was not happy with them and they were getting harassed the next morning, but as long as no blood is being drawn, that isn't an issue. Chicks are faster than the adults and can easily get away from them. Unfortunately, one of the bigger cockerels wasn't following the flight instinct. He wasn't even following the fight instinct! He would just lower his head in submission and sit there while the big girls took it in turn having a good peck. His tail was a mess and bleeding, nice and red to entice in more pecking.

I didn't want to isolate him on his own, that would just cause more problems reintroducing him later, likely with the same results. So I just moved the lot of them into the neighbouring run which I was supposed to be preparing for planting. I guess I won't be growing in there for another few months now. Not that I've had the time prepare it anyway. They don't have a proper coop to go in, because the big flock is using the attached one from the other side. However, they do have shelter and a tree stump to practice roosting on.

The next job will be selling the pullets.

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