It was snacking on the necks of 8 ducklings and two chickens. It looked at her and stayed perfectly still. She ran to the house to alert me.

I accompanied her to the chicken coop where it still was happily munching the birds. “Hand me that board” I told her as I crept closer to whacking range. First I snapped a photo:

For a long while there was a stare down between me and the mink, then I went at it with the 4×4 board and failed. It still didn’t run off so I grabbed a kitty litter bin that was nearby and set it to catch the bugger. I managed to get it to walk in my bin and as I tried to close it in it jumped over my hand and took off. If I only had a hand gun…

Guess it’s time to bait some traps & clean up some dead birds before we take the girls to the town easter egg hunt. Then maybe we can buy a few more ducks while we are out and about…

Poor ducklings

The post Wildlife Encounters on the Homestead: The American Mink appeared first on Updates from Ryder Family Farm.

I got some fancy Wyandotte chickens in the fall. Specifically Blue Laced Red and Golden Laced Wyandottes that I’m now breeding. I also got some Wellsummers for an experimental breeding project. Then I discovered our local farm supply store is doing “chick days” and they ran a special for free chicks. Of course we got some!

I’ve now added some Silver Laced Wyandottes, more Wellsummers, some Light Brahamas, more Easter Eggers and a handful of mixed mystery chicks that the kids picked out. These are in addition to the 4 bantam chicks we hatched out last month. Plus, I’ve now put 7 of our farm fresh eggs in the incubator.

The really girls love having chicks to look after. Everly has taken over feeding and watering the chicks in the mornings and as needed in the evenings. She’s quite responsible, already knows the ropes and can be trusted to take care of their needs without supervision. 

Adalyn is helping Everly and knows the ropes too…

The girls are well on their way to proving that they are ready for their own poultry project. Did I mention that Everly is adamant about her request for peacock to call her own? It’s true, not sure how reasonable of a request it is yet…

And what crazy chicken lady post isn’t complete without oblatory cute chick photos?! So, here is a close look at the new chicks:

The post Crazy chicken lady in the making? appeared first on Updates from Ryder Family Farm.

So far, our 15 mail order chicks have arrived and are thriving. Today our incubated eggs are cheeping & beginning to hatch!

Plus, our homemade incubator isn’t the most air-tight temperature regulated thing right now. When I heard this faint “cheep, cheep!” coming from the dining area I was kind of amazed and pleasantly surprised. We weren’t in very high sprits this morning after someone dropped by to see us but the surprise cheeping turned moods around.

8/11 Nothing exciting happen overnight, little chick just rested. The resting continued most of the morning, with small cheeping bursts in between.

Noon Update: The chick is pressing it’s self on the ends of the shell from the inside… It’s emerging from the shell now (and we got it on video!)

I’m waiting for the videos to upload so I can share them. Stay tuned

The post We have hatching… appeared first on Updates from Ryder Family Farm.

Me and the girls are really getting practice with recognizing when it’s time to take a break and to decompress. Being cooped up in a house full of boxes with moving day anxiety looming is getting the best of ALL of us. They are being allowed to watch the portable DVD player in their bed/ nest at will these last few days because, amazingly, it unwinds them enough to takes naps (which they never normally do). I’m eating lots of chocolate & sweets to decompress : /

I sat down to pay the bills this week and realized, we have no income to pay those bills with yet… Nathan’s last pay check comes this week and is basically spent already on the bills from the last two weeks. Grayson had his last insured doctors appointment this week too. My kids will soon be uninsured!  We didn’t sell our house, so we are still having to pay the mortgage and the utilities on the house until it sells. Things are getting real in terms of lack of security but I know the anxiety and minor panic will subside and that things will work themselves out soon. Just a few more days till all the fantastic parts begin.

The girls have next to nothing left out for playing with and they’ve already gotten bored of climbing and jumping off the stacks of boxes. Now they want constant attention and to be entertained which isn’t so easy when you are bouncing a teething baby on your hip (a 6 mo 19lb baby!) while packing up the house plus policing backyard turkeys and chickens. We are just doing chores, packing and kind of taking in the day-to-day happenings with the animals & with nature till moving day is here. Everly noticed something kind of cool while doing her plant watering chore today:

Our injured turkey is healing up nicely, we just discovered signs of a few more “first time” eggs from our new hens and our compost pile clutch of chicken eggs are still warm and possibly growing babies.

Can you believe I found a whopping 15 eggs in the compost bin yesterday? After candling them I came up with 5 that might be developing (they had resemblance of a shadow inside that moved when the egg was spun). In another few days we might be able to candle and check for forming blood vessels. The girls are kind of excited about the prospects of chicks hatching from our compost bin, though, I have no idea how we’ll move a clutch of eggs and a broody hen that are inside the compost bin without disruption. Ideas?

The post We’re leaving the suburbs for farm life next week! appeared first on Updates from Ryder Family Farm.

Also, my new chicks are integrating to the main flock right now and we are preparing to move in just a few days so our chicken coop situation is in transition. I also figured the stress of the transition was possibly impacting the egg output from the hens.

Today there was quite a squawk fest out of the chicken coop and my girls anxiously ran out to collect the eggs. However, there were no eggs to be found. So we went about our garden and backyard chores. I opened the compost bin to get some fresh compost for one of the plants and I left it open for the chickens to scratch around in since were getting ready to move and we have no intention of taking cooking compost with us. I had the compost bin open earlier in the week for the same reason but husbands who work outside the homestead (he has just 3 work days left!) miss lots of strategic decision making and close the compost bin back up thinking they are being helpful.

Anyway, after a while we went back inside had some cold water ate breakfast and we heard the chickens squawking again. We went out to try to collect eggs and once again there were none to be found.

They always say if you’re missing eggs, go on an egg hunt.

All week we’ve been hunting around the yard in strange corners, under bushes and behind various things to see if we could find any hidden eggs, we found nothing. After the recent squawk fest we noticed the Rhode Island Red hanging out at the base of the open composter. Just out of curiosity I bent down and peeked my head in the composter…

I found two Rhode Island Reds and one of my Americauna hens sitting on what seems to be a pretty large clutch of eggs inside the composter, on top of the compost.

Now, assuming the eggs have been there for a while….

1. Are they cooked?

Compost bins are HOT, deathly hot. The hens laying in there were panting up a storm. I put a bowl of water in there for them because they didn’t seem interested in budging. The temperature read shows the air inside the compost bin at 85 degrees and the soil temperature is the same since it’s pretty dried out.

2. Are the hens broody and sensing they should be hatching these eggs?

Remember my 4 new roosters? They have been seen this week jumping then hens (as in sexing them up). Now I think their immediate success in mating is probably unlikely but on the off chance that they are successful and these hens are broody… should we let nature take its course and see if we get baby chicks?

Based upon the heat of the composter these eggs probably aren’t going to be edible, so if they are fertile I guess it’s less waste right? But we are moving in just a few days… Wont the move disrupt a broody hen’s hatching process, especially for a first time brooder?

What do you think?

The post Tales from the backyard flock: Are they cooked or do they have chicks in them? appeared first on Updates from Ryder Family Farm.