Wednesday, January 6

Wednesday, January 06, 2010... All's Well That End's Well On The Farm......

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This morning after returning home, we turned all the animals loose before feeding and watering everyone. It was pretty warm in the bunny brothel, which I attribute to the dark green metal roofing which gathers the sun's warmth, allowing it to warm the brothel inside, giving the bunnies a toasty afternoon in an otherwise cold winter afternoon. The ducks congregate at the little duck pond where I constantly break a hole in the ice every day I leave them out. Freezing water does not deter the little quacks because the immediately plop into that bone chilling water, diving underwater to wash their backs and wings as if it were the middle of summer.
The guinea fowl are much more discriminate and really don't even care to walk in snow if there is a bare spot large enough to step on. They mill around and feed, then congregate in a leeward corner with the sun shining on them. This is where they spend the day...as long as nothing scares them. If something does scare them, they head for the trees and will stay until the next day...if they feel like it.

Lately, we suffered along with an egg collection of three to five...sometimes six eggs, when it initially got this cold. Prior to the major drop in outside temperature, we were gathering about four dozen or more eggs per day, with an occasional guinea hen egg or two. It was nothing like this past summer, when we collected six dozen chickens, a dozen ducks and at least six guinea eggs and a turkey egg per day, but still a decent amount, until it got so cold. Stanley our artist friend has an old Coast Guard shipmate friend on the west coast, who is a consultant for a large group and a chicken specialist. Stan talked to him by phone as asked if he would consider helping us out with his expertise. He told Stan that he would be delighted to help and immediately told him to have me call him the next day. I did and was given some top notch information about caring for a winter laying flock. It worked! We are gradually improving our egg count daily by implementing what he told us to do. Vick and I are so grateful to both he and Stan both. John gets $100.00 per hour as a consultant and he helped us as a friend of Stan's. He is looking forward to visiting the farm later this coming summer when he is in here from California to visit Stan again.

We are also going to be featured in the New York Alpaca & Llama Associations newsletter soon. We sent them a couple pictures of us with the alpacas and the lady did an article on us about the farm and the Hospice Gift Shop... How Cool is that????? Things should get real exciting around here this spring!

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