24 October, 2017

pics of the chicks

Hainan and Honey Soy. (My sister named them!)

Chooks

I don't like the coop much, but working out something smaller and lighter in its place is going to be difficult. I definitely want a chook tractor, but the designs I've seen are very solid and therefore rather heavy. I want something that can be moved around the yard - but it's not a large yard, either!

Anyway, I'm still working out their personalities - and I think they're working out their pecking order. Honey tends to be the first into the feeder, and she hogs it something terrible when I hang it up, but Hainan seems to like prodding Honey - 'scaring' her, so Honey flaps away, or (when it comes to roosting time) climbing all over Honey until Honey gets off the perch and gets back up again. It's this big jostle-and-flutter on the perch, and somewhat amusing from a human perspective.

Chooks

I'm contemplating a 'fixed coop' with a moveable dome, but then, where should the fixed coop go? The backyard is about 6m x 8m - about large enough to swing a cat - and honestly, I want most of it for garden space!

At least the biggest danger to them will be the local cats. Not ours who are kept indoors, but the free-ranging, wandering cats who are about the neighbourhood - at least two, maybe three. There are dogs in the neighbourhood but they're all walked on leashes and it's our backyard. There may be urban foxes, but the chooks are mostly in the coop all day, except for when I let them out to free-range. Not sure about rats, but if we have free-ranging cats in the neighbourhood, then they'll probably deal with the rats. (Plus, our cats may be in the house, but their scent is probably on the underside of the house which is the most likely place for rats to try to make home. At some point, I'm going to need to make some fencing/gates so the chooks can't easily get out without going up. Their wings aren't clipped, but they're not instinctive flyers.

Chooks

Also, I need more fencing for seedlings! Luckily most of the summer seedlings I've got in the ground have pots around and over them. But the chooks have happily dug up the 'centre bed' which mostly housed the wintervege and coriander-gone-to-seed (coriander did AMAZINGLY in my garden this season, which resulted in my sister putting a chunk in the curry - and I do mean A CHUNK. As in, I forked up a bit of green...which turned out to be a lot of green, like an iceberg of coriander, with only the tip showing in the curry sauce...) I need to start collecting that seed, btw. So many things to do, so little time...

20 October, 2017

we have chooked-off!

The chooks have arrived!

They arrived on Thursday, bought from and delivered by the very helpful guys at Rentachook, and are set up in their fully-enclosed chook tractor. There are just two of them, one brown, one white and my sister has already named them (respectively) ‘Honey’ and ‘Hainan’. *facepalm*

The coop is perhaps a little larger than I anticipated, which means less chook stations. Also, there’s going to be rather more ‘dead edge’ in the space under the chook tractor since the chooks don’t really go all the way into the low corners, which is going to make those weedy edges just a touch tricksy… Ah well, I guess we’ll see how the first ‘rotation’ goes.

16 October, 2017

chooks in the garden

One step closer to chooks in the garden! They’re being delivered on Thursday morning, which means I need to work out where they’re going to go to start the rotation. (and, perhaps, to deal with the fruit flies and slugs!)

I have some planned-out chook stations, which I think will need to be better considered once the coop is actually in the garden and I have the size and scope of it all. In a circumstance that slightly complicates things, I planted out one of the beds on the weekends, and the growing period is nearly upon us (from Saturday for 10 days). It’s also the bed that has the most slugs in it, thanks to the leaf litter that I dumped on it a week ago.

The plus side of parentals moving: they’re not going to need all the mulch they’ve been making for the last couple of years. And I am going to be quite shameless about co-opting it for my garden, thank you!

(Which means woodchips for the paths, I guess. Luckily there’s no shortage of those around the place...)

The fruit trees are being...interesting this year:
all the Nectarines: fruiting really heavily but also fruit fly invasions
all the Peaches: doing pretty well thank you
Apricots: NOPED RIGHT OUTTA HERE
Plums: WHAT ARE EVEN FRUIT
Cherries: *waves a couple of fruit lazily*
Avocados: Three are 'fruit, what fruit?' and one is "I'm givin' her all I can, Gardener!"
Apples: One is "wait, I'm supposed to do WHAT?" Two are "...Oh wait, you want fruit? Come back to us in a month..."
Citrus: "yeah, yeah, we have flowers, talk to us in autumn"
Fig: "you put me in the ground three months ago and you want WHAT?:
Established Passionfruit: "HAHA I'M WILD, I DON'T ACTUALLY FRUIT IN SPITE OF PUTTING OUT REAMS OF FLOWERS"
Still in tubes Passionfruit: "PUT US IN THE GROUND AND LET US GROOW, LET US GROOOOW CAN'T HOLD US DOWN ANYMOOOOORRREEE!"
Sultana Grapes: "Hey, I got leaves, don't ask for more this year!"
Red Seedless Grapes: *dead*

I do wish I'd gotten the chickens a few months earlier, though.