We lost one

Today was a little bit of a sad day for us on the homestead. Our Buff Orpington hen passed away. I always felt bad for her because of her life history. She was originally owned by Craig's grandma as part of a small backyard flock of 2 hens. The other hen passed and she was given to Craig's uncle, who already had 4 hens. She was lucky to have survived that transition. Then she was given to us with the other 4 hens and moved with us to our new house. I think she enjoyed having the room to roam and could easily escape from the other hens if need be.

Yesterday she seemed a bit off. She spent a lot of the day by our sliding glass door looking in. I just figured she wanted to be where it was warm. This morning we found her sitting by the front door. When the kids went to pet her, she didn't even try to move, which is highly unusual. She just laid there and eventually shifted to her side. I sprinkled some food by her, hoping she would eat something, but she just laid there. I found the other 4 hens eating her food and practically standing on her! Chickens are so mean to each other. She passed before it was time to pick up my daughter from school.

I think she must have gotten sick, although she didn't have a whole lot of symptoms. She was just lethargic and had some watery poop. It's really too bad, because she had recovered so well from Roxy, our large dog, gnawing on her leg. You couldn't even tell the dog had touched her. Fortunately, the other 4 hens are acting normal, so it seems to be an isolated incident.

My two boys and I had the task of burying her in the yard earlier today. It was sad, but the kids seem to be fine with it. I have tried to help them understand the circle of life and that things live and things die, and I think that's helped. It also doesn't hurt that we have 25 other hens in the garage.

RIP Shirley.

Where my eggs at?

Since we've moved to our new house, we've gotten around 4 eggs from our chickens. That's 4 eggs in the last six weeks. I wasn't too concerned because it is winter and hens tend to stop laying in the winter. I've been reluctantly buying normal eggs from the store to satisfy our egg needs.

Our 5 hens have been wandering aimlessly around our property, taking care of all the bugs and weeds. When we first started watering all the fruit trees, a bunch of grass started popping up around the trunks. Those chickens took care of it in no time. They gobbled up the grass, pooped all around the trees and then scratched all dirt around them and worked the "fertilizer" right into the soil. It's the greatest thing ever to let the chickens take care of weed control.

So yesterday, Craig was working out in the yard and discovered 2 eggs under some roof tins by the barn. I knew they were laying somewhere in the yard, that was not in their nesting boxes! We took them inside and I was silently praying they were not rotten. Who knows how long they had been sitting out there. Fortunately, it's been pretty cold, and the eggs have a nice, protective coating on them when the chickens lay them, to help them last longer. So I took those eggs inside, washed them off and stuck them in the fridge.

Sunday mornings are waffle mornings for us. We make a bunch of waffles and feast. As I was making the batter, I went to get 2 eggs and saw the ones we found yesterday. I thought it would be a good idea to use them. I'm not going to lie. My hands were shaking as I went to crack them. In my head I was thinking, "Please don't erupt in an explosion of rottenness!" To my delight and surprise, they were the best looking eggs I've seen in a while. The yolks were dark orange and thick and the whites were super thick too. When I beat them, they were so thick. I was in heaven and was thinking that these were going to be the best waffles ever! And they were.

It was a total bonus for us. Not only are the chickens acting as our pest and weed control, they are laying superior eggs because of it. Healthy chickens lay healthy eggs. They look way better than the ones they even laid at our old house. Needless to say, I am loving life here at the new homestead. I can't wait to set loose our new batch of chicks in the yard and let them have at it!

Baby Chicks

 Our baby chicks came about 2 1/2 weeks ago and I'm dying for them to turn into big egg-laying chickens. This is what they looked like at 2 weeks. Isn't it amazing how fast they grow? I've got so many different breeds that I can't even keep track of them all! They are a bit high maintenance though. I have to change their newspaper lining daily and I'm constantly having to refill their food and water. They eat and drink A LOT. It will all be worth it in the end when we have eggs coming out of our eyeballs.

We ordered from Murry MacMurry hatchery and got the rainbow egg layers. This means that we have a variety of breeds that produce several different egg colors, including brown, white, green, and blue. I'm excited to have a basketful of colorful eggs. The little day old chicks came in that tiny little box.
For reference, you can see my daughter holding the box. It's small. I got a call at 5:45 am on a Friday from the post office letting me know that my chicks had arrived. I woke the kids up and we headed out in our jammies and got to go in the back entrance of the post office and pick them up. We heard a lot of peeping coming out of that little box.

 We came home and immediately unloaded them into their cage we had set up for them. They were so cute and fuzzy.

Look at those cute little guys. There were 26 sent to us but one didn't make it, so now we have 25. We also still have the 5 we brought over from our old house. The plan is to "harvest" them. I'm not sure if I'll be able to do it. I'd like to do it at least once, just so I know how to do it and know how to cook them so they're palatable. These little chicks are growing so fast that I think the time to harvest will come quicker than I expect. Eeeeeeeeek!

Canned Turkey

I've been pretty busy this week with school and house stuff. I've finally gotten some motivation to do some deep cleaning. Aside from that, we canned one of the turkeys we bought. Craig and I make a good team - he de-bones and I can. If you decide to try this sometime, make sure you follow the directions exactly as they come in your canning booklet that comes with the canner. You definitely do not want to mess around with meat. We have a 16 quart pressure canner/cooker which is great for this kind of thing. After Craig de-boned the turkey, I cut it up into canning size portions and cooked in our small pressure cooker for about 5 minutes. It was just barely done with a little pink still in the meat. I then stuffed the meat into quart size jars and filled with boiling water and then processed for an hour and 15 minutes.

We love having the canned turkey. We use it in the place of canned chicken and every time it has been very tasty. I think I  might like the flavor better too. I was able to get 7 quarts out of this turkey and have one more turkey that still needs to be done.

I've also been canning the broth I make from the turkey carcasses. I've done broth for 2 so far by boiling all the insides and bones for several hours. Then I let it cool, skim off the fat, heat it to boiling and pour into hot quart jars. Then I pressure can them for about 25 minutes.

The turkey haul up to this point has been:

20 lbs ground turkey

7 quarts canned turkey

9 quarts turkey broth

I still have one more turkey to can and 2 carcasses left to make broth. I think that's quite a haul for 4 turkeys that we bought for around $40. This should last us until next Thanksgiving when we can do it all over again!

Ground Turkey

We went a little crazy on the turkey this year. Last year we bought a turkey and canned all the meat from it. We liked it so much that this year we bought 4 turkeys: 2 for canning and 2 for grinding. Ground turkey is expensive in stores so we thought this might be an option to stock up on some meat. We've used turkey in place of beef for several recipes and have been pleased with the results.

We started by de-boning the turkey. That is Craig's job. He likes to do it and I'm glad he likes to do it. It's good to have someone in the house that knows how to do this. If you do not currently have someone doing this I would advise you to go on YouTube and learn how. In the picture above you see the end result. I saved all the bones and innards for stock.  I also peeled the skin off and cut the meat into small chunks to fit in the grinder and then I ground away.

Once it was all ground up I packaged it in one pound portions in freezer bags and stuck it in the freezer for later use.

This will be an experimental year for us. We bought our turkeys frozen and thawed them to do this. I had always heard that once you thaw meat out it had to be used. I asked Craig about this before we did it, since he is the food safety expert. (His job involves running a kitchen for a hospital) He believed that as long as the turkey was ground before it was in the temperature danger zone for too long, it should be fine. We also figured that since we processed it and repackaged it, they would not get frostbite. I will have to give you an update later this year to let you know if we get sick from the meat or if it gets frostbite. I'm thinking it will be good. I am excited about all the ground turkey, regardless.

This also was a wise investment for us. We calculated the cost of the turkey and figured out that our ground turkey came out to around a dollar per pound. This is not even counting all the turkey stock we will get from the carcass. Plus, now we have 20 pounds of ground turkey in our freezer! Booyah!

The Property

 Before I get to my turkey posts, I thought I'd share with you our new property. As you can see above, there are a lot of fruit trees. A LOT. The pictures above and below are of the orchard in the front of our yard. This orchard has orange, lemon, grapefruit, kumquat, loquat, tangelo, pomegranate, apricot, peach, cherry, and avocado trees. In this area alone, I would estimate that there are about 30 trees. We also have olive trees next to the house.

We have plans to add some apple, walnut, and almond trees, as well as a bunch of grapevines and blueberry bushes.

 This is the area I hope to plant a gigantic garden. What a surprise! It's covered in rocks! I seriously think these rockscapes will be the death of me. I want to punch them all in the face!

Right smack dab in the middle of our property is a super old guest house. It's probably about 600 square feet. From what we hear, it was the old caretaker's house for the groves. Our whole neighborhood used to be grapefruit groves.

This is the barn. If you cannot tell from the picture, it is bigger than the house we live in. This thing is gargantuan. Rumor has it that it was built sometime in the 1800s. I've been making some calls to local historians to see if I can find out it's story.

This is what we have been using for our chicken coop. It's a little structure built right onto the side of the barn.

 It even comes with a little covered run! Our chickens have been enjoying the property quite a bit, but that's a post for another time.

Here's a look at the inside of the barn. Really, pictures do not do it justice. It's like those huge cathedrals with the super-high ceilings. It's one of those things you have to see in person. This is only one section. It is divided into three. As you can see, it needs a little cleaning up and the roof needs some work.

This is the middle section. It is huge! Craig has decided to set up his gym in here, which is awesome because now I might be able to park the car in the garage!

The third section of the barn. Not too much here, except the little door on the side goes to the chicken coop.

And last, but not least, the orchard in the back. These are giant grapefruit trees that I'm guessing were part of the original orchard. My kids were excited to pose in several of the pictures, can you tell?

The whole lot is supposed to be .68 acres, but it sure feels like a lot more.

This concludes our tour of the Pulsipher property. Thank you for coming and donations for the barn roof repair are always welcome. :) Have a nice day!

I'm baaaaa-aaaaaack!

And you thought you could be rid of my Amish posts! Ha! It's only just begun!

I have had a busy couple of months, you see. I suffered a miscarriage early in September and spent a lot of time dealing with that. Then, at the end of September, we FINALLY got an offer accepted on a house and moved in! It was an experience 3 years in the making. We had decided to settle for a normal tract house, a starter home, if you will, but as things turned out, we got everything we wanted and more! We now reside on a lot of .68 acres with about 40 fruit trees, a barn, AND a guest house! Our dreams have finally come true.

We are truly thankful we had the patience and the means to hold out for what we really wanted. And we are thankful the Lord answered our prayers and then some.

The adventures have already begun and we've only been here 2 weeks. Our chickens have been gnawed on, we got some new baby chicks, and we've got old pipes breaking all over the yard. Not to mention all the galvanized steel piping from when our property was all grapefruit groves (which we are afraid to touch since we heard it could crumble into dust if you mess with it).

Let the fun begin!

P.S. Expect a lot of turkey posts. It is Thanksgiving, you know...