Baby Ducks, 2 weeks old, Baby Chicks 1 day old

The temperature may still be playing games with us, but there is Spring in the air.   Baby Pekin ducks are entering their third week of being part of the farm family.  Not to be out done with chickens, which started to hatch Friday afternoon.  There is only a Welsummer rooster and all of the eggs are crossed with him or purebred with a Welly hen, we may be fortunate enough to hatch out some barnyard chicks and purebred Welsummer chicks.  Little ducks are swimming in their pond and loving the water.  When the weather warms these little ones will be meeting their mom and dad in our duck run.


Speaking of babies, the birthing pen has been finished in the barn, there is an outside area protected with a roof, this play day yard is really close to being complete.  I believe everything has been collected for the birthing.  I even found a canister for film which was suggested to have on hand.  This was in my seed box because I sometimes store seeds in the no longer needed film canister.  The closer April 12th is, the more prepared I feel we are.

Moles are loving all of the moisture in the ground,  There are tunnels everywhere.  I am so pleased I planted the tunnel garden in pots, when I go out to check I find a mole/vole hole beside the pot, check my plant, it is solid in the pot and growing.  Peas have been planted in the garden along with fennel and rhubarb.   This year I was able to have a few artichoke plants come up from seed and I will be adding these to the garden.  I want to protect the artichokes from the moles as I would love to establish a bed of these plants.   I will be using large pots for those plants.  Here is Swiss Chard with a mole/vole hole to the right side of the plant under the forward leaf.

When I checked the garden on Saturday, I found there had been visitors, all of the kale plants had been eaten.  These were planted in the row tunnels and I had removed the covers because it had been a nice spring rain on Friday night.  Being kale plants the thieves may have been deer.  I did see some damage to the turnips, also, the tops were pretty much consumed.

I have seen some big changes around the farm, Mr. Bootsie has taken to cleaning the duck brooder, Saturday morning there he was holding one of the ducks. I know this sounds like nothing but for him this was a biggie.  He always lets me move the little ones around to clean the brooders.   Leads are being put on the goats at feeding time and there is no sharing of food.  Mr. Bootsie put hooks in the barn so I can control them.  Every little thing seems to make my daily tasks much easier to complete.

Time for me to go and check, there may be a new chick just hatched.  I will let you know what I find next time!!!  Take care and Maybe, just maybe this coming week someone, somewhere may have some springtime weather.    Until the next time!!!