Heavenly Homestead

8/1/2008
We were pleasantly surprised yesterday morning when we got a call from the post office telling us that our chicks had arrived - we weren't expecting them until today. The chicks are very happy in the brooder, where they have access to warmth from a heat lamp. Our new puppy, named Lady, spent some quality time (20 minutes) bonding with the chicks in the barn last night while Rick fed the chicks some live worms from our worm bin (what a treat for the chicks!). Lady is a Great Pyrinnes mix, which should make her a good livestock guardian dog. She is also the cutest and sweetest puppy anyone could ever want. Our other dog, Max, also loves her!

Rick has been investigating the possibility of leasing some additional pasture, where we can raise pork and grass-fed beef. If anyone has a lead on some acreage in the Monticello/Lloyd area that can meet this need, please let us know.

We are truly grateful for all of the supporters (customers) that God has blessed us with! Word of mouth is spreading quickly about the superior taste of our broilers - nearly everyone who has tasted our broilers insist that it is the BEST TASTING chicken they have EVER tasted! WOW, what a compliment! We are really blessed! Glory to God!
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5/28/2008 (from Amy)
Ahhh. Things are heating up around here. Our garden has been growing and growing, (thanks to the nourishment of LOTS of compost to the sandy soil) and some creature has been devouring and enjoying the pink-eyed purple hull pea plants, topping off all my sweet onions, and sampling most of the corn. We've been supposing the pest is a rabbit, so Rick put in some fence posts this weekend, but the more we talked about how we saw lack of rabbit evidence piled around, we thought perhaps it was the small gopher tortoise who burrowed in just a mere five feet from the garden not too long ago. Today, the kids caught the culprit enjoying a mid-afternoon snack. Did you guess the gopher? You're right. I think Rick was relieved as now he can just border the garden with large logs to deter the gopher instead of piecing together a patchwork fence of 'found materials'.

Chicken Break! Rick and Bailey just finished up the spring's first batch of broilers last Saturday. The previous two weekends we've enjoyed the company of a 12 year old homeschooled boy who is a born natural at processing, as well as a lovely family who came to help out. Fun on the farm!

Our little scale maxes out at 6 pounds and the birds last weekend were off the scales at just 7 1/2 weeks old! Time to invest in a new scale, and enjoy the break until end-of-June processing.

Does anyone have any fox-proofing tips? We're dealing with that four-legged issue currently...

Bonita the brown and black lop-eared bunny joined us last week. She's been quite aggresive to Amy, but we're convinced with a little love and good food, she'll adjust quickly and become a new friend. On that note, we're up to six rabbits now (all are 'fixed'). If you know of anyone who's looking for a little or a lot of bunny love, give us a call.

I'd like to close out tonight's post with a note of gratitude for all of our new customers. We are so grateful for all of you who are discovering us and buying from our farm. We can't wait to see how far we've come next spring!

Until next time,
Amy