Robins and Soup

I know I can eat some strange things, but contrary to the post title the robins and the soup are not connected.

Robins - I saw the first robins of the spring today. Even though it snowed all day yesterday (a wet sloppy snow) the birds appeared today.

Soup - I have been really busy with work over the past few months and I knew that I would be home late today, so I prepared a soup in the crockpot this morning. I have never used it for a soup before and it worked pretty good. I didn't find the recipe all that wonderful but it was filling. Some extra spices and tweeking and it could taste far better

Hamburger Lentil Soup

1 lb ground beef
1 chopped onion
6 carrots, sliced
3 potatoes diced
1 clove minced garlic
4 c tomato juice
2 c dry lentils
4 c water
1 T brown sugar
1 tsp tyme
1 tsp sage
1 T salt
1/2 tsp pepper

Brown ground beef and onions.
Combine all ingredients in crock pot
Cook on low for 8-10 hours

I'm gonna kill that fox....

I am so frustrated that I couldn't sleep last night and ended up crying this morning.... maybe it's hormones, but most likely it's that damn fox!

He's been around a lot over the past month sneaking off with the odd hen.  Well I thought it was only one or two hens until I actually took count down by the hen house and we appear to be missing a lot of hens.  Then a few weeks ago our favourite rooster, Cockzilla, went missing one evening.  We searched and searched, but I knew when he wasn't on his roost by 6:30pm that he was a gonner.

Last night Donald, our drake Khaki Campbell duck, went missing.  The three remaining duck hens were wandering around aimlessly without him leading them.  Donald NEVER leaves his girls so I know that fox got him as well.

I like fox, but this has to stop, as I can't continue losing my livestock.  Son and Husband are prepared to shoot him if they see him on the property.  Until then I have to keep all the poultry locked up (no free ranging) which I hate to do.

More stuff...

Sometimes I feel lonely as I don't have any friends with the same sorts of interests as me.  I can talk to my family and of course my blogging friends about livestock and gardening, but I miss having any face-to-face meetings.  Throught the Alberta Chickens Etc site, I have been emailing with a lady who lives in our community and I'll be visiting her farm this Wednesday.  I'm so excited as she has chickens, ducks, geese and goats.  I love goats, but Husband is totally set against ever having one on our acreage.  I'm hoping to establish a friendship with her... so far so good via email!

She is in the process of hatching out some African Goose eggs and I will be purchasing three goslings from her should the hatch work out.  I may be coming home with some new friends on Wednesday afternoon!



We've had two chicks hatch this afternoon/evening!  They are so adorable.  Daughter actually managed to catch the first chick hatching on film and I hope to post it soon once she has a chance to download it.

The neighbourhood fox was around yesterday and I managed to sit about 1.5 meters away from him and take some photos.  Hopefully once our geese are grown they will be keeping him away from our property.

This is the last post of the April blog challenge - 30 posts in 30 days!  Yeah!  I have to say I'm actually surprised that I was able to accomplish it.   As you can see I have four posts today as I was so busy with work I didn't have time the last few days - but it doesn't matter- I did it!

I Was Going To Go for a Walk....

I was going to go for a walk this evening and get some good stress relieving exercise, but have since changed my mind.  Earlier today I walked over the the neighbours house a few doors down for a quick visit.  As I was walking I heard 3 big bangs... like gunshots.

Upon returning home both Husband and Daughter asked "How was your walk home?"

While I was out another neighbour phoned to tell us a cougar was spotted one road over.   I don't know if that was what the big bangs were about, but the timing was about right.

I think I'll stay in this evening.

Fox

Daughter took this video of the fox who happened to visit about an hour or so after we put the chicken and ducks away. We are pretty sure that the fox have a den across the road, but we haven't seen one all winter.

Birds

Yesterday I saw four very large shining white birds flying against the sunny blue sky. It took me a minute to realize that I was seeing Trumpeter Swans. Swans over-winter a bit north of here, and I have seen them on the rivers, but never flying. It was quite a sight.

A short time later, I witnessed a beautiful mature bald eagle circling overhead.

Today Husband and I broke down and purchased an egg incubator... the Hova Bator 2362n. At $219 it wasn't cheap (cheep - ha ha - pun very much intended)

Isn't she a beauty?

We have been thinking about this for some time and will try to hatch some of the Amercauna (chicken) and Khaki Campbell (duck) eggs.

Simple Things

Up early on a Saturday morning. Having a coffee, sitting by the fireplace and looking out the window. Watched a moose standing across the road eating his breakfast of willows. It was wonderful watching him. Life doesn't get better than that! Its the simple things that make us happy.

The Sly Fox

I love to watch the wildlife in our area and since we have been living here we have often observed a fox coming to visit our property. We know that she/he has a den across the road from us and it usually comes to check out the compost, but we haven't seen it for a about year or so.

The other day as we were working on the pole barn, Son came with a wheelbarrow full of gravel to pour into the holes. As he dumped it, the hens and one of the roosters came running towards us. We thought that they must have figured to was food that we were dumping - that is until Daughter yelled "A FOX!" We looked up to see the fox standing 20 meters away from us with one of our ducks in its mouth. We ran at the fox brandishing our shovels and screaming like a mob of angry villagers.

Luckily it dropped the duck and ran. She appears to be okay other than walking with a limp. We put the birds immediately back into the henhouse enclosure. That night I realized that I didn't remember seeing one of our hens (she stands out as she is a very silvery colour). The next morning I checked and sure enough she is missing. The night before we also had a hen die which had seemed fine all day - perhaps the fox had tried to get her and she managed to get away. I had looked her over and she seemed fine, but perhaps had internal injuries or died of shock?

Now the fox just keeps hanging around. The other day it walked up the driveway, sat down and scratched at its fur. It then walked over to our kitchen window and looked in at us. The dog was barking and going crazy, but the fox seemed completely unperturbed. He continued on along the side of the house and at this point Husband ran outside to scare it away. He was yelling, a shoe was thrown, and the fox just trotted away not frightened at all.

Later that same evening as Daughter went to feed the birds, she saw him hanging around the hen house. She grabbed the water hose and sprayed him full force!

The day before yesterday he was back. So cheeky! He came up to the front walkway only 10 feet away from our front door, sat down and again scratched at his fur and began grooming himself. Daughter ran out and scared him away.

I'm beginning to get a little frightened as this is a wild animal with obviously no fear of humans. I don't know too much about fox or if they can become aggressive towards people, but I think we may have to do 'something' about him.

Acreage All Sorts

Weather: Last weekend the temperatures began to cool off and we finally received more than just a short drizzle of rain. I can't believe how quickly it has changed from a super hot summer to cool and fall like in just a couple of days. The leaves have begun changing colour and even the mice seem to know autumn is on its way. The great white hunter (aka Son) has been trapping the mice families that are trying to move into our garage and crawlspace. Daughter seems disgusted and wants us to just catch the mice and turn them loose in the 'wild'.

This morning we received our first frost.

With the rain the forest fires have be brought under control and the choking smoke that was plaguing our city (as well as others) has finally dissipated.

Garden: Most things are growing well and I have been picking beans, peas, tomatoes and peppers like crazy. We will have to assess our produce at the end of the harvest to see what seeds did well so we can re-order in the spring. Some things we did not have luck with this year namely radish, spinach and beets. I think it is perhaps because we ordered short season varieties and then the hot summer pushed them into seed right way.

Some of our produce picked one evening after work

Preserving: Needless to say with the garden producing like crazy I in turn have been preserving like crazy - pickling, freezing and canning. I have also made salsa and relish.

Pickled green tomatoes and peppers

Perfect pearls of pea perfection (just a little alliteration for you)

Dog:

Who's that conehead?

Kaiser was once again at the veterinarian. He got into a fight with the neighbour's Bull Mastiff and he was on the losing end. Kaiser is not a vicious dog, he just wants to play with everyone but doesn't understand that not everyone wants to play with him. His front right leg was bitten quite severely and became infected after a few days. He now has a drain tube and is on heavy antibiotics. We are seriously investigating and researching electric dog fencing.

Wildlife:

Moose: The moose have been out again at night. We noticed their tracks going on the path between the garden and berry garden. They stopped to have a look at our produce but continued on their way - I guess the fence around the garden helped after all. The next night one was back and walked over the berry garden fence and through the berry bushes and out again. Luckily it didn't squash any of our strawberry plants or berry bushes.

Grouse: We have been seeing quite a few grouse around lately. Usually they are in a flock of 4-7. This one was on the road - she stopped and stood still thinking I couldn't see her while her friends took off into the bush.

Bear: The bears are out in full force. Since April there have been over 700 reported sighting within the city. The expect that in fall there will be quite a problem because the hot dry summer has dried up their food source of berries. Now they will be coming into town to look for other goodies to eat - garbage, fruit, and whatever else takes their fancy.

I spoke with a lady that lives in our area and she said to watch out as there is a grizzley in the area. I hadn't heard about it, but now I wonder if that was the bear my neighbour across the road saw the other day. She telephoned us to say a HUGE bear was in her yard and was heading across the street to our property. We never did see it, but I waited for 30 minutes befdore heading out for my daily walk.

Pioneer Week Challenge: Well it wasn't a huge success this year, but I did okay. Obviously we cooked at home other than one day when we had Indian takeout. I didn't purchase anything other than a few groceries that I needed, and a pair of Birkenstock shoes to wear in the house as my feet were killing my from standing in the kitchen at length. I combined all my trips into town to cut on my fuel consumption.

Boxing Day Visitors

Yesterday morning we had three visitors to the acreage... a cow moose and her twins. They were all very large.






Luckily Daughter received a camcorder for Christmas so she was able to film the twins.

We were pretty surpised that they did a good checking out of our compost pile.

This Week's Wildlife & Plant News

A few days ago we saw a moose had walked right under our bedroom window. We didn't see it... again. We consistantly see moose and deer tracks on the property, but very rarely see them.

Today we saw a grizzly bear in one of the neighbour's fields. It's a little disconcerting as we are used to having black bears around here, but to see a grizzly is unusual. We have told the children to be very careful and keep on the look out when they are outside.

The chicks are doing well and have lots of feathers already. The are beginning to do little low flights in the brooder box and they are beginning to scuffle for dominance. Obviously we have a few roosters in the crowd (Americana chicken that could not be sexed).

The weather continues to be hot; up to 28c. We have now had 3 weeks of glorious weather and no rain. It has rained a few evenings in town, be we didn't get any here, other than the occasion drop. The plants are doing well though - the mountain ash tree is full of flowers and the snowball bush which Kaiser chewed up in the fall has sprung back and is about to flower. The gladiola are up about 15cm (6inches). The North Star Cherries have dried up - we have given the tree lots of water during this hot spell, but I think the stress of moving the tree is the main culprit.

I just realized... this is our 100th post!

Spring, Have you forsaken us?

It was a beautiful long weekend. Warm and sunny. The family did lots of work in the front yard. We purchased and planted Peonies, Hostas, Golden Rod and Coral Bells. We planted bulbs of Iris, Lilies, Anemones, and Gladiola. We transplanted cucumbers and into the greenhouse. We put up the hummingbird feeder on the front deck and watched many Rufous hummingbirds flitting about between the tulips and the feeder.

This morning we awoke to snow. But not just a little snow - oh no! By the time I left for work at 8:30am there was 10cm (4 inches) on my car. One of our trees had fallen from the weight of the wet snow and several other were leaning; their roots being pulled from the ground. It snowed all day. By one in the afternoon there was 20cm (8 inches) on the ground. Luckily Husband had the day off and could brush the snow off the plants. The hummingbirds continue to visit the feeder - obviously the only place that they will find any nourishment within the blanket of white.

I haven't gone into the greenhouse to check on the cukes.... I'm scared. We have already lost almost all of the tomatoes we started. I managed to bring some of the better looking ones into the kitchen window - hopefully we can nurse them back to health.

Busy, busy, busy

You can tell when I am busy with work because the blogging stops. My business is either slow or super busy, and lately I have been run off my feet. Needless to say not only has the blog been neglected, but so has my home.

We did manage to hold a party for husband's co-workers as everyone worked hard over the winter. He barbequed baron of beef roasts while I made salads. We had a ton of food, drinks, and really good company! Luckily the weather was warm and sunny and everyone sat outside on the bit of lawn we have in the front of the house. We even got to see some wildlife in the form of a little mouse who has been living under our driveway over the winter. He came out and begged food off our guests - totally unafraid of the 30 or so people milling around.

Our plants are still growing in the garage and the cucumbers and pumpkins are beginning to blossom. Husband has built a large greenhouse frame 12x30 ft and we need to move it to the back of the yard. Unfortunately, the snow has just disappeared last week, so the ground is very muddy. I imagine we will try to move it this weekend, and then I can start to harden off the plants.

I made homemade pasta for the first time a few weeks ago. I have wanted to do this for quite some time and saw pasta machines everywhere. Of course when it came to actually wanting to purchase one, I couldn't find a single machine! I finally found one at the last store I tried - I really should have gone to that hardware store first as they are known to "have everything".
It surprised me how easy it is to make noodles! Just some flour and eggs made into a dough and then slipped through the pasta machine several times. The kids loved them! Of course being homemade the taste is far superior to prepackaged. I want to make some more, but just have not found the time yet.

Out with the Old

Wow, last day of 2008 already! Where does the time go?

We had a very quiet and enjoyable Christmas; just the four of us. We watched some Christmas movies and played lots of Scrabble over the holidays. It was very cold - down to the -30's (-22f) so we didn't get out much.

Christmas morning (I decided not to include the unflattering photos of me in pajamas)

On Boxing Day it snowed. And snowed and snowed and snowed some more. We did not go out to shovel - we played Scrabble instead and watched it float to earth. The next day Husband took out the tractor and blowed the snow off the driveway and I shovelled the walkways. That is when we realized we had gotten another 30cm (12 inches). I am very thankful that husband convinced me we needed to purchased the snowblower attachment for the tractor. He can get the driveway and way to the compost cleared in about half an hour! It certainly saves a lot of back breaking shovelling.

Once it warmed up a little we got the dog outside to run and play. Being a boxer he is not an outside/cold weather dog.

Kaiser and Husband walking in the woods where the snow is not deep.

Kaiser running(?) in the deep snow. It was over my knees in depth.

Nice photo of husband in his usual winter ensemble - toque, vest, and boots.

In yesterday's newspaper there was a story of a cougar attacking a dog very close to where we live. The cougar was destroyed the next day, luckily the dog survivied. Over the past few years the incident of cougar sighting has grown quite a bit around our city. I can't ever remember cougars being in this area before - they must be slowly moving in after the deer. With the kids and dog, we need to be more vigilant.

We accomplished a lot in 2008...

• Finished the new house (still some siding, soffits and eavestroughing to put up)
• Moved in
• Began fencing
• Renovated old house
• Rented old house
• Landscaping/levelling of yard around the house
• Brought in sandy loam for the yard
• Laid some sod in front of house
• Cleared garden area for spring 2009
• Set up green house
• Did some container gardening
• Did some canning
• Son made honour roll first year of high school
• Daughter has made a large amount of babysitting contacts/job
• Made cheese for the first time
• Tried to cook most things from scratch
• Recycled most of our waste - I only take one small bag of garbage to the land fill a week
• Poured the garage floor and have begun setting up shelving/storage areas in December (yeah! I have some closet space again)

Have a Happy New Year and all the best for 2009!

Thanksgiving Weekend

The weekend was spent with Husband, Son and a family friend cutting up logs that were temporarily moved out of the way so we could build the house.

The original plan was to sell the wood to the mill, but then the prices dropped so much there was no use. Our friends heat their home with an outdoor wood burning furnace so they can use the wood and I feel better that it won't go to waste. There is enough wood to keep them warm all winter.

We need to get the logs out as they were placed in the spot were we want to make our garden next year. Since we have so much clay in our area, we would like to start some preparation before the snow flys (and stays!) which will be soon.















Here I am picking up all the left over sticks and putting them on the burn pile. Not fun work, but I kept thinking "every stick picked up leads to a better garden". Daughter was not too impressed with the work and I kept telling her that we will have a great garden next year and we will be able to feed our family from it. Her response was "Yah, I know and we're already in a global food crisis." It was kind of scary hearing that from a 12 year old... What have I been teaching her? Hopefully not to be frightened, but to be prepared.

I did cook a wonderful turkey dinner for Sunday evening. During kitchen duty, I realized that I had run out of laundry detergent so I whipped up some homemade detergent while the turkey was in the oven.

I have been making my own for a couple of months now, and I am really happy with the results. Clean clothes, no perfumey smell, and it works great in my front loading washer.

Grate 3 bars of Ivory soap in the food processor.

Remove soap and put on the chopping blade, put soap back in and chop until it becomes coarse granules.

Add 3 cups of Washing Soda and 3 cups of Borax and continue to chop.

When it looks like regular dry detergent it is ready.

Use 1/4 cup per load for a front loading washing machine.

It has been so long since I've blogged and we have been busy working around the property. Husband build a proper compost bin for me... though the fox is still visits occasionally for a meal.

He also built a bridge over the ditch/swail complete with solar lights. This allows us access to the compost, lagoon and eventual garden.

We have also added to our family a few weeks ago.... His name is Kaiser!

It is so wonderful having a boxer in the house again. Though I forgot how busy puppies are! Can't wait until the housebreaking kicks in.

It's warm and muggy feeling today at 25c (77f), which for our northern climate is fairly warm. Daughter and friend wanted to sleep in the tent in the back yard tonight, but I think we have to nix that since it looks like there is a storm on its way.


Plants are coming along wonderfully. As you can see from the photo below, I will have to add soil to my container potatoes, and the lettuce is growing like crazy.

Potatoes

Lettuce

Our compost has had to have some adjustments to it. I noticed that the crows are picking out the yummy items. I saw one scratching underneath the wire mesh, so I dug a small pit and sunk the compost into it and packed the clay around the outside. The crows continued to dig, so I had Daughter ring the outside with some bricks. The next day the bricks were flung a meter (3 ft) away from the compost and the clay was dug out from underneath. Obviously that was not a crow! After packing everything back into its place, I sprinkled a mixture of crushed red pepper flakes and black pepper around the outside of the compost and on top of the bricks. So far so good.Bricks around the base of the compost

I surprised a mother mallard and her ducklings in our lagoon. They surprised me too, because I was expecting only to see the tadpoles in there. It is a good thing that I decided not to sprinkle the mosquito pellets in the lagoon. We decided it was more important to have the tadpoles than to battle the mosquitoes (which were very bad for a few weeks, but seem to be getting less now).

Yuck, the lagoon is not really a wonderful place to be raising ducklings. I know that a lot of people have no idea what a lagoon is - due to my line of work I am often asked this question. So, here is the (my) explanation: a lagoon is part of a sewage waste treatment system that is used where the is predominately clay soil and underground disbursement of water is not possible. The waste runs into two underground tanks where the solids are separated to be broken down by bacterial action and the grey water is drained into an above ground lagoon (pond) where is evaporates.

Don't try this at home....

In my wisdom decided to try to get my bread machine to knead a double batch of bread dough, because I wanted to bring my new neighbour (with two babies) a homemade bread. Obviously it didn't work; I was left with a goopy lumpy mess. I thought it might be like drycleaning.... you know, when the label says 'dryclean only' but if you're careful you can hand wash it anyway. When the bread machine instruction say one batch only - take heed!

I did manage to knead by hand and get the two loaves of bread I wanted. And, my new neighbour was very happy.

It turned out that this weekend's weather was much better than we expected. This was good as it afforded us more time to work in the yard and do more gardening. Husband managed to spend time hauling away building material scraps and garbage as well as burning some of trees that BC Hydro cut down in front of the property. The kids thought that was great and had a weiner roast.

I finally put together a compost made of wire mesh and clipped together at the ends. I pounded a stake in the middle to hopefully keep the waste material together as it piles up.




Here it is with my first compost offering.





I also baked bread from a recipe that appeared in the first issue of Down to the Roots magazine (I had to extend the baking time). I never have much luck with bread, but this one turned out well. I did use the bread maker to knead the dough which possibly accounts to the success of the baked product.


2 cups warm water
4 cups whole wheat flour
2 1/2 Tbsp sugar
2 tsp salt
1 handful rolled oats
2 1/2 tsp yeast

Put in bread machine at whole wheat setting to knead. Remove when finished and knead by hand on a floured board. Bake at 375 for approx 30 minutes.

I also managed to get in a batch of yogurt. I think I will try straining it this time to see what a yogurt cheese is like. I have been interested in cheese making for some time, but it seems like a scary undertaking. The latest issue of Mother Earth News has a great article about it - and now it doesn't seem (quite) so difficult.

I love living here and seeing the wildlife that lives with us on the acreage. This little guy has been hanging around and appears quite comfortable cozied up underneath our vehicles. He and another rabbit have done this numerous times over the past week.



Husband has also seen tracks of a deer and her fawn near the lagoon, but we have not actually seen them. It makes me happy knowing that they are here... until they begin nibbling on my garden produce that is.



Here is a photo of the inside of the green house with the tomatoes on either side.









In the back I purchased some cucumbers as I have a feeling the cukes I started (late) may be too late to mature. I also bought some basil and dill pictured here and other herbs as well.

Can you guess that it has been busy? No posts for over a month! Work wise spring is a busy time for me so I just haven't been able to spend the time to blog.... though I have thought about it.

A lot has happened including my Mother's Day gift of a new green house!





As you can see I won't be putting in a traditional garden as our property is currently hard packed clay. The load restrictions are still on so we are unable to bring in any good top soil yet.





I have moved the tomato plants in and am starting some heirloom Armenien Cucumber plants and some just regular green pepper plants


My mother-in-law gave us some purple starter potatoes which we planted in some large garbage containers. As the plants begin to grow we will continue to heap them to encourage the growth of lots of potatoes. We have never done this before so it should prove interesting.

I didn't know what to do with the lids of the garbage containers, but figured that I could turn them upside down and drill drainage holes, fill them with dirt and plant my lettuce. And that is exactly what I did.

The strawberry pot has also been filled and planted with strawberry plants that I purchased from the local gardening shop.

Husband and I were away for two weeks - he was on business and I was on holiday ;)

We spent a few days in Penticton as the Penticton Lakeside Resort, Convention Centre & Casino. We had stayed there a few years ago and it was very nice. This year they are touting how 'green' they are... and in a lot of ways they are trying really hard.

From Penticton we headed to Harrison Hot Springs for the long weekend in May. It was nice but VERY touristy (we didn't know). We had fun looking at the sand castle competition entries. The sand sculptures are built in May and taken down in October. How do the last? They spray the sculpture with a water and glue mixture. My favourite sculpture is shown below "Queen of the Pirates" and the Husband's is the chess match to win the princess.



Can you believe they really are made all of sand?!

The Beach at Harrison Hot Springs

From Harrison we drove south across the border and to the southern part of Washington State. We headed for a conference being held in Kennewick. How ironic - it was a 'snowfighters' conference, at which Husband was a speaker, being held in 38c weather!



Husband has decided to become a 'gentleman farmer' in his own words - he even said he would be willing to have other animals in the future (besides chicken) like raising weiner pigs or sheep. Let me tell you this is a BIG step for him. Yesterday he purchased a tractor...


a Kubota BX 1850 with post hole auger, bucket, snow blade, mower and tiller. All the things we will need to get this property into shape and maintained. We will be selling the Bobcat that we currently own as it is much to big and heavy for this clay.

On the way back from the farm equipment store we came across a grizzly sow and her cub. At least one of the photos I took turned out!

His name is Larry and he followed me home - hitchhiked actually.

I did some shopping and decided to purchase some indoor plants for the house. Our old place was so dark, I wasn't able to keep any plants alive. This home was build with very large windows for passive solar energy, plus is south facing - very bright and sunny indeed.

I found a large Mass Cane at the store that I picked up. Daughter squealed in delight when she saw it. There was Larry attached to the side of the plant!

Considering I have about a meter of snow (3 ft) in my yard, and snails are not indigenous to our area - I am not able to send him out. I guess I got two for one - a new plant and a new pet.

For Christmas our son received a bird feeder and bird house kit, a suet feeder and bird field guide. He quickly placed the suet feeder outside his bedroom window (we can all see the feeder from our windows) and there it hung.

Yesterday, the Red Breasted Nuthatches finally found it! I have always loved these birds, so I was really happy to see them.

Today, there were fresh tracks in the snow which travelled directly under the feeder. We think it may have been a fox.