Thus we close our eyes to blink and our world changes…



 

In a mere fourteen hours…we will pass into a new year, leaving 2013 behind with all the memories we’ve made…and all that we have forgotten during our enjoyment of life as we know it. What will the New Year bring? What will we experience in the coming three hundred sixty five days? How will our lives change beyond being one year older and one year wiser? Only time will tell.

 

This past year has been impressive yet as normal as many before it. We remember things of significant importance to us and we forget happenings of less interest or things of less than pleasant encounter which in time, may again come to mind…possibly due to re-occurrence.

 

This year we changed the farm and our lives for the better we believe. We have stopped adding chickens to the barns by hatching eggs, thus eliminating the overabundance of roosters. After all, more than one rooster for every twenty hens is foolish due to the return on feed dollars spent. We are now adding a hybrid bird…the “Comet” or “Golden Red” as they are also known. They are good layers, begin before they are actually six months old…lay eggs well through the winter and their eggs are sterile. We will band each bird to trace their age and change them out every three years, replacing fifteen to thirty at a time. We will then be able to better manage egg production and remain productive.

 

We continue to learn and develop our Heritage Turkey flock of Royal Palm turkeys and will again allow the (now five) females we have to build one or more clutches of eggs this spring and hatch them out, increasing our flock of egg producing females yet further. Customers love the turkey eggs and they are a bargain when you consider that their size is larger than jumbo chicken eggs. Of course, we’ll sell off gobblers as table fare for the holidays.

 

We have given up on the hospice gift shop due to poor participation by the public and cost to our farm. We would have given more in a donation check if we would have wrote a check for the cost of operation of the gift shop each month. We therefore closed and dissolved the 501(c)(3) not-for-profit Nature’s Friend’s of Hospice and we’re using the building as our Farm and Fiber Shop, where we donate a flat 10% of the profit to a local charity-of-the-month.

 

I’ve purchased a used wood lathe and will begin making more and nicer fiber tools such as spinning wheels fashioned after wheels of the late 1700’s and early 1800’s. I will also make fiber swifts, combs and paddles used in processing yarns for spinners and knitters.

 

Vick continues to create more and more diverse artwork in watercolor, glass and clay.

 

So as you can see, we look forward to the coming year, its challenges here on the farm and our lives which we love. Come see us if you can.
 

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071627 Cluckin' "A" Critter Farm, LLC