How the chicks have grown!

Remember a couple of weeks before I went to Scotland, Elizabeth hatched 6 wee chicks? Well under Lloyd and Elizabeth's care and attention they have grown huge! Poor Lloyd really had his work cut out for him as they kept having mammoth dust baths which made holes big enough for them to escape under the sides of their little chick house. He had to round them up numerous times. They're now big enough to be let out with all the other chickens ( I am a big wimp with wee chicks and make them stay in their own run with their mum until they are about 5 weeks old) Out of the 6 there are three girls and three boys - one of each type - Light Sussex, Golden Wyandotte and Silver Wyandotte so I am well pleased.

A wee boy GLW and a wee girl SLW

A boy LS and Elizabeth ( she's a Silver Campine)

The boy LS

They're difficult to photograph as they zoom around really fast.

Here's 4 of the big chooks. They're pretty much all coming to an end of their moult, so they look lovely and shiny. Hopefully they will start laying again in the not too distant future... We're getting 2 eggs a day just now, which is actually a lot better than most folk who aren't getting any right now, shorter daylight hours and the time of year for moulting puts paid to an egg glut. But they deserve a rest, for sure.

One of my three araucanas from the last lot of chicks. I used to think I had 2 girls and a boy, now they all look like boys and frankly until one either lays an egg or starts crowing I will remain clueless!

Garden

Last year we planted lots of wild flower seeds ( at great expense!) But it was worth it and the little wild flower garden was a gigantic success. This autumn we religiously collected seeds from spent plants, then after a bit of clearing and feeding, we sprinkled them all over the wild flower garden again. They're doing beautifully.  I planted a couple of planters for the veggie garden, just to entice bees and to look pretty. They're also growing nicely.

sunny one!

shady one!

There was a lot of dew this morning.

go and have a look at the other Farm friends fridays!

Farm Friends Fridays

I thought I'd be a bit random round the farm today!

First, to show how totally farmy I am I thought I'd let you see our mail box. We had this painted for us, in it are, "Billy the Tractor", Gladys the rooster and Boris the bull.

and on the front are Lloyd and I with Bob the Dog!

Moving on to a couple of my favourite areas round the farm. This is looking up from the stream. I love the gum trees.

This one is near the back of the farm, there's a small area of native bush with a stream running through it and a wee waterfall, further up stream from here's a little swimming hole, however there are eels in it so I tend to give it a miss!

Pretty much my favourite thing on the farm are the chickens and my next fave is the eggs we get from the lovely girls.

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for more fun around farms.

I managed to video a chrysalis transformation!

Amazing eh?

Not  totally farmy but if you check out 

at Verde Farm there will be lots more to read!

On my Mind

It's that time of year again, the veggies are ready and there's much bottling and saucing to be done. This is pretty much all we've got left of last years stuff, but soon there will be more chilli sauces and more tomatoey things ( however we mostly make passata for the freezer with them)

It'll be time for the citrus before we know it and there will be marmalade and lemon curd.

And this year we're going to dry and dry some figs. We have 2 fig trees in the garden, one is a purply fig and the other is a huge green one that when cut open is pinky white! This is the first year that we've had fruit from this one as it's only been in the ground for 2 years and yesterday, I was pretty excited when I saw how big they'd got.

On My Mind over at Rhonda's have a peek at the other posts.

and as ever on a Friday... 

at Verde Farm

Fred - the next installment.

I have three chrysalis - whoo hoo! Very happy about it. They all look brilliant and healthy. So here's hoping they make it this time. I've also been rescuing the odd caterpillar from the outside swan plants - I just do one at a time so that these small plants don't run out of food and this has been working well.

Good luck Freds!

this was the one that formed first

Second

Third - he decided the roof of the greenhouse was a suitable place.

and this is the rescued caterpillar.

I'm rather excited!

Have a peek over at Verde Farm!

Seed Saving

For us in the southern hemisphere it's getting to be that time of year again.

I tend to use just heritage/heirloom seeds for the veggie garden. I, personally, think they taste good and also if you buy ones that did well in your area in 'ye olden days' then they are likely to still do really well! It's nice to save and share.

Year after year I save the seeds from things that have become favourites over summer. It's mainly tomatoes and chillis. But beans and peas are super easy.

With tomatoes I go for the plumpest ripest fruit then scoop out the seeds. Wash them thoroughly in a sieve then put them out on kitchen roll to dry. Remember to write what they are. Be patient and leave them until they are completely dry ~ you don't want them going mouldy. Also don't worry if they stick to the kitchen roll - you can just tear the seed off and plant it with the wee bit of paper.

Once they're dry I put mine in small brown envelopes ( wages envelopes because they definitely earn their keep!) Then just store. I have to put all my seeds in to water/rat/mice proof containers as 2 years ago my potting shed made a lovely winter home for all sorts of wee critters, and almost all my seeds were eaten.

For chillis just remove the seeds and let dry out - I don't wash these.

If super nippy ones put gloves on.

Peas and beans -  I just take some nice plump pods into the house and let them dry out. It can take a wee while so again, just be patient. You can also let them dry out on the plant.

Alderman peas and yard long beans.

Herbs are incredibly easy! Just let some of them go to flower, then seed, just where they are in the garden. I then shake the plant over where I want new ones to grow, and save the rest. I can't remember the last time I had to buy rocket, coriander or parsley seeds.

Happy seed saving!

this is On My Mind over at Rhonda's and also at the lovely 

Farm Friends Fridays.

Click on the links.

Around the Farm today

There's a definite change in the weather, it feels slightly less like summer and slightly more like autumn. It's hard to say exactly what the change is as it's still really warm during the day. 

I've been up since 5.15am, gone for a swim then came home and started on the daily stuff of feeding chickens, ducks, checking veggies, wandering around...

So first off veggies, or more specifically chillis. Lloyd is a chilli fiend. He loves them and would eat them with every meal given the choice. It gives me great pleasure to grow them for him, less so to eat them! His all time favourite is the habanero. Super hot and very pretty. He makes the most amazing chilli sauce, so I'm told. I come out in a sweat just looking at the bottle. 

Oh and he did this brilliant thing at the weekend ~ one of the Thai chillis got trashed in the cyclone and the chillis went red and dried on the plant which promptly died. Lloyd took the dried chillis and blended them really finely with some salt and made chilli salt! Amazing.

Chillis need a long season so they are beginning to turn now. I planted a good selection for him. Habanero, of course, a small Thai chilli, Tabasco, Rainbow, and a sort of purple cherry one that is new this year. I got it at the farmers market from a lady who has the most amazing seedlings,  a couple of Sudra which I had never heard of before but are a long, thin, hot, Indonesian chilli and some special ones I was given by a friend ~ you know who you are! And last but not least some scotch bonnets - another friend gave me some seeds from her plant. So all in all quite a good selection.

 Habanero

 Sudra, which I think will look amazing when they go red.

Scotch bonnet

After the veggies I went back to play with the chickens. The baby ones have merged in beautifully with the big ones. In fact one of the light sussex already goes to sleep with the big ones up the tree! The others go to bed in their house. Far more sensible. 

And I have yet another broody! That makes 4 this year. I put her in the wee house and she settled down beautifully on a little plastic egg and unless a wee plastic chicken miraculously hatches, I thought I really should get her some fertile, non plastic, eggs. Charlotte's roosters are having some time off just now so she had no eggs but I did manage to get some online. I got 6 ( as Elizabeth is a silver campine so very small) 2 light sussex, 2 silver laced wyandotte and 2 gold laced wyandotte, so fingers crossed my ratio of boys to girls is slightly better this time round.

But my favourite thing of the day is this...

You just can't beat lovely fresh washing dried out on the line. Love it!

Come and join in!

Donkeys!

The best thing we ever did was get Sheba as a companion for Rachel after Jojo passed away.

Even though we felt she was fine, and getting lots of attention, she was very vocal. Now the only time she, and Sheba, bray is if they think we're going to walk past them without giving them an apple.

It was always the plan to get her a new companion, but we had no idea how long it might take. We were so lucky that Sheba needed a new home because it really couldn't have worked out more perfectly.

They are inseparable already, never much more than a few feet apart. It's just lovely. 

Their winter coats are all brushed out now ( with only a month of summer left. It does look very autumny in the photos - I think it's because the poplar leaves are falling off because they are so dry.) Anyway,  they're looking very neat and tidy. Pretty girls.

Farm friend Fridays @ Verde farm

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Make Do and Mend

Make do and mend was the title of a booklet produced by the British wartime government department, the Ministry of Information. Wool was in very short supply, and the booklet encouraged women to unpick old unwearable woollen items in order to re-use the wool.

I have a print of one of the posters up in The Pip , where I do all my sewing. I really like the idea!

Now who doesn't have a pair of favourite, old, faded jeans? I do and they have been patched SO many times I've lost count. I could say I only wear them for gardening now, but actually that would be a total lie. I still wear them even if we go out for dinner. When these jeans die it will be a black day.

( inside) What a mess!!

See! Years left!

I've just spent the last hour patching them yet again. While I was at it I patched up an old top I made ~ I actually really do wear this for gardening ~ honest.

 This has been worn and washed so many times the fabric is quite literally falling apart, but I love it.

This is On my Mind, over at Rhonda's.
and also

Farm Friend Friday over at Verde Farm. Now the reason I think I can get away with this post for 'farm friend' is because the only reason my clothes are in this state is cos I live on a farm - do you think I can get away with that?? 

☺

Check everyone else out ~ click on the links!

out and about

Still very hot for Northland. Our sort of usual summer temperatures are around the 23-27 degrees C mark but this summer has been much hotter, up around 30C for days, add to this intense humidity and it feels incredibly hot. A bit too hot for gardening, but with the heavy rain of Cyclone Wilma everything is growing so fast that I have to get out there and weed otherwise I'll have a garden full of triffids! 

I am so pleased with the tomatoes this year. I reckon that weight for weight we'll have around the same as last year, only this year because of the size of them and the types I've grown it's taking about quarter of the time to pick them.

And you can't have tomatoes without basil. I grew all our basil from seed this year and they were slow to start, but wow they are gigantic plants now with lovely huge leaves and a gorgeous taste. Will definitely do this again next year.

The broad beans have grown really quickly - in their neat regimented rows! These do well over late summer into autumn, I actually grew them over winter last year and got a great crop. We love broad beans!

My one and only cucumber! Not a success at all. I've tried for the last 4 years to grow cucumbers, different varieties and everything and each year they've been absolutely rubbish. This was their last chance. Next year I'll give them a miss.

Now for a different area of the garden ~ The Freds. There are new ones! Finally. These are teeny tiny and if you look at the left bottom corner of the photo you can see an egg. I know why there haven't been many appearing, even though I've watched the butterflies lay eggs  - the paper wasps are using them to feed their young, supposedly once the feeding time is over they'll stop and the caterpillars should thrive. 

I'm still concerned for Fred the Original, though. The chrysalis is nice and solid but is  really dark and he hasn't hatched yet. I'm still thinking it's diseased and won't hatch, but the red wings are visible through it so I'm keeping fingers and toes crossed.

Oh and the ducks are so amusing right now! We have a lot of windfall apples and plums after the storm last weekend and they love them! It smells rather alcoholy in the orchard so it wouldn't surprise me if they were a wee bit drunk! Plums are their favourite, they chase eachother around if one of them has a nice bit of plum! It's hysterical as they eat the whole thing, seed and all then spit the seed out! There are plum seeds all over the place just now.

...and finally!

Baby chicks.

They were having their first ever dust bath today - well first one I've noticed them having and they were absolutely filthy! This is the wee boy one who is now gigantic! Shame they're not all this big because I would let them out into the big run if they were, but the others are still awfully little. You can really tell he's a light sussex now - see the black feathers coming in round his neck. I think/hope the other LS is a girl.

This is one of the wee araucanas. Totally looking like a dinosaur. Supposedly they're very difficult to tell what sex they are so I really haven't got much of a clue. But I think one of them might be a boy as well, not sure about the rest of them.

 Looking rather ostrich like here, I reckon.

I'm linking up with Amy at Farm Friend Friday at Verde farm. Go and check out the other's.