Happy Easter

Lots of things going on here.

Our 3 week old Cornish cross broilers were moved out of their temporary brooder in our pole barn, out into their own shed/shelter and run. It was time, broilers are only cute and fluffy for about a week. Right now they are stinky and ugly. But before that could happen the muscovy ducks had to be evicted from the same shed/coop. So DH made a nice little nesting box for them. Then they were moved into the 10 x 10 fenced area that used to house the rabbits. We sold the rabbits and all the cages a couple of weeks ago after deciding to focus more on poultry. So there was a lot of shuffling going on here, but I think everyone will be staying put for awhile now. At least 5 more weeks anyway, then it's off to freezer camp for the broilers. We will do another batch later in the summer, around August.

I've been saving eggs to hatch for the last week. About half are a beautiful blue from our Ameracauna's. The rest are brown eggs from the brown and black sex-links. DH installed the fan upgrade for the borrowed Little Giant incubator. I'll get that running and calibrate the temperature this week, then the waiting will begin! It'll take 21 days for the eggs to hatch. The surprise will be seeing what we get from the brown eggs having our Ameracauna rooster over the sex-link hens. I'm hoping for some olive-eggers!! This will be our first time incubating and hatching ourselves.

You can see one of our first duck eggs in this picture. It's the middle one, a bit dirty looking even after cleaning it. The muscovies like to lay their eggs in a hole they dug in the ground. It isn't as big as I expected either, about the same as our larger brown eggs. The big difference is on the inside. The yolks are HUGE! Very little white either. They tasted just like a chicken egg to me when fried up for breakfast. Now that they are moved into their permanent pen, I'll let them keep any eggs and see if they'll hatch a clutch. Ducklings would be very welcomed!

I've also been busy starting seeds for this year's garden. Something new for me, but so far so good! DH set up some shelving and lights for me in the basement. Planting trays, starting medium and a heating mat have all been used to get a slew of tomatoes, peppers, broccoli and cauliflower going so far. I've got more to go so I better get it into gear this week or it won't pay to start them at all.

Our John Deere tractor's loader bucket got a make-over the last week or so. It's back from the shop with a brand new cutting edge and shiny black paint job. (our JD is yellow, their commercial color instead of JD green) It's time to put it to use and get the compost pile turned. Looks like the frost is nearly out of the ground here as well. If we're gonna plant the new garden area there's lots of work to be done getting that ready.

I'll update on that progress soon!