the accidental smallholder :: diary

Yippee, a tray of mud!

Our French Copper Black Marans, successfully hatched from eBay eggs, are now nearly a month old. They've been living outside for a week now, and have settled in well.

We just wish they would learn to go to bed - they come down their ladder in the morning, and can often be found upstairs having a siesta in the afternoon, but when night falls they all huddle together downstairs shivering! They're very tame and queue up to be lifted into the top of their ark, but it's a pain in the backside.

Last weekend R gave them a dust bath - a seed tray full of earth - and this is how they reacted:

Chicks dust bathing from asmallholder on Vimeo.

They love it! It's amazing what an instinct they have for dust-bathing and scratching and how quickly they display it when even only a few weeks old.

Livestock Day

It's only 1pm and I feel like I've done a full shift, but it's been very rewarding.

We moved the pigs from pen no.1 to pen no. 2, where there is some grass. I put a bale of straw in the hut, since the remaining straw was a bit flat, thenw e seeded pen no. 1 with grass, phacelia and buckwheat - really anything we had spare in the garage. The pigs are very excited with their new pen and their improved bed, and have been galloping in excited spurts round and round, before stopping to munch grass.

We moved the 6 Maran chicks into a run in the garage. They still have a heat lamp, but they need to start hardening off, so to speak. Anyway, we'll need the puppy cage for the Cream Legbars, which will hopefully hatch soon.

We applied louse powder to the hens - that needs to be a weekly job at this time of year. The RIR are worst affected. The Brown Leghorn never showed a single louse, but her feathers were quite different. We also moved the hen ark out of the orchard , further up the field. Round the ark gets dirty so this will give the ground time to clean up before we bring them back down in the winter, when it's good to have them close to the house.

Finally, we trimmed the sheeps' feet and gave them all a dose of Heptavac-P Plus. They are none to happy with us now, but I'm sure they will forgive us by tea-time!

So, off for a cup of tea and a biccie, then out into the garden!

Cream Legbars

There was a time when the best present Dan could buy me was a chocolate bar but no more! (Actually, chocolate is also welcome anytime).

Today, 6 Cream Legbar eggs arrived in the post. They are the most lovely colour and if Dan hadn't taken the camera to London (again), I'd have taken a photograph of them. They have now been "resting" for about 12 hours so I'm just going to pop them in the incubator.

Fingers crossed!

Copper Black Marans

Of our six cheeps, I'm pretty sure we've got two cockerels and four hens. Two of the cheeps are bigger than the other four and have real coppertops. I've had alook at some photos of adult birds, and the hens are black, with the cockerels having the copper head and collar.

I think we'll keep two hens and one cockerel and sell a trio, once they get (much) bigger.

What's happening in the vegetable garden?

Well, quite a lot, really. The weather has been really dry - cold and sunny and very windy.

We've got all our potatoes in - Red Duke of York and Desiree, and Mayan Gold, because I'm a sucker for marketing. We've a few seed potatoes left, but we might find a home for them yet.

Garlic, shallots (Longor and Mikor) and onions (Hercules) are all in, along with a couple of rows of spring onions (White Lisbon) that Dan found lurking in the shed. Leeks (Bandit and Hannibal) are outside in a tray and will be planted out when they are pencil sized. It's a rotten tray (an old cat litter tray) that they are in with no drainage (but it's nice and deep) so we have to keep an eye out for both drought and waterlogging, which is what happened last year and we had no leeks at all.

We've sown beetroot - Forono, which is a cylindrical beet, in one sowing for pickling and two rows of Boltardy for eating fresh. We'll sow another two rows at the start of May, June and July too.

Peas (Greenshaft) are started in guttering in the greenhouse to spite the weevils! Three sowings of two lengths of guttering have been made at two weekly intervals and will be planted out shortly. We'll hoe the soil this week and hopefully, the hens will make short work of any overwintering bugs.

Also in the greenhouse is one gutter of green sprouting calabrese. My record with brassicas is shameful. I've never tried it like this before, so it's about ready to go out now. We'll have to get the fleece ready, or the hens and insects will have a field day. The other brassicas are due to be direct sown in a couple of weeks at the start of May. We prepared half the seedbed this weekend and sowed swedes (Marion) - best keep the sheep off them this year!! Actually, we've sown a few more than usual, for the sheep.

Dan's been busy in the greenhouse - there are four varieties of tomato (Sungella, Gardener's Delight, Sungold and Tamina) doing well. There are 12 of each variety, so we'll probably sell a few. Cucumber (La Diva F1) is up; courgettes (Costa Romanesque) and sweetcorn (Sweet Nugget) are in pots but not showing yet. I have one gutter of cauliflower (Igloo) that I'm growing as mini cauliflower, sown 12th April, but not showing yet. I'm going to do a gutter every couple of weeks - about 8 seeds to each gutter - to avoid a glut. Actually, 4 cauliflowers a week is quite a lot, isn't it?

We've prepared the seedbed for the carrots (Resistafly F1 and Flyaway F1) and should get them sown this week. I would have done them today but poultry plucking took precedence. Again, we're going to sow carrots successionally, under fleece and with coriander to fool the carrot fly!

Finally, there's salad ready in the greenhouse and some herbs (parsley, basil). The outside herbs are coming away fine on the patio, along with some strawberry plants I found discarded but hanging on to life, so they deserved a chance. Hope they show their appreciation appropriately!

The May weekend is a big one for planting and sowing, so hopefully the weather will be kind.

Mr Toad

We've sort of put in a pond - well, it's in but not filled or planted up yet (maybe this weekend!). That hasn't stopped Mr Toad moving in, though. We first saw him a couple of weeks ago - we thought he was dead but I think he was just cold. However, I caught him sunbathing the other day.

He's not handsome, but I rather like him. Just hope he manages to stay clear of the destructo-hens!

Another poultry update

We had our first egg from the new Black Rocks we bought last Saturday. There were two but one was squished. The eight new girls are now free-ranging, but don't really mix with the existing hens except at corn time. The new girls don't quite recognise the "call to corn" yet, but they are learning fast. One of the "old" BR may defect to the new flock, I think - birds of a feather and all that.

The six cheeps seem to be doing fine. I've now turned off the incubator and discarded the seventh egg. The six are very small and very, very cute - two have copper tops! They seem to be finding the water and food fine, so we'll see how they go on.

The trains are coming!

I bought the local rags today (as I do every week); both had double page articles about the re-opening of the Alloa-Stirling railway in May. This is a huge project for Clackmannanshire - the railway to Alloa closed about 40 years ago (I vaguely remember it) - and is seen a a major factor in the ongoing regeneration of this area.

The first trains will run, courtesy of the Scottish Railway Preservation Society, on the 15th May. There will be two trains that afternoon making the journey to Stirlinga nd back. The outward train will be pulled by a steam locomotive, "The Great Marquess" and the return journey will be hauled by a Deltic diesel "Royal Scots Grey".

There is to be a community fayre on Saturday 17th May in Greenfield Park and the first "proper" trains will run from Monday 19th May. It's all very exciting!

All we need now is for Alloa Athletic to secure promotion to the Scottish First Division! Come on, Wasps!

Hatching eggs update

Seven hours later, the first two chicks are in the brooder, a further three have hatched successfully and are drying off in the incubator and one is pipping. Only one is showing no activity yet.

I'd take some photos but Dan's taken the camera to London. Now what can there be in London that justifies a camera more than my cheeps?

Just off to move the three to the brooder!

Hatching eggs

Our French Copper Black Marans are due to hatch today. Two were pipping last night when I went to bed; by this morning at 6am niether had made much progress so I reluctantly decided to give them a hand.

Armed with warm water and some damp kitchen roll, I started to remove some of the shell. I would have stopped if there had been any bleeding from the membrane, but both were OK. There are now two little chicks drying off in the incubator. I'll move them to the brooder later.

I'm not sure if there are any more coming - two out of 10 would be a bit disappointing. I bought 12 off Ebay; the incubator only takes 10 (who designed an incubator for 10 eggs, I ask you); Dan candled them last week and discarded three as definitely being empty and he was not sure about the rest. So two is better than he expected! We'll be keeping any hens and one cockerel for the flock.

I'll update the diary if any more hatch today or tomorrow.