The Old Folks Home

[ronott1]

(shhhh, btw, got my latest test results, still in treatment free remission. I'm still my Onc's favorite! Aka, miracle patient Thank you Lord )

Morning everyone.

It's a toasty 28 degrees here this morning. It was 24 when I got up. I didn't think it was going to get that cold so I didn't dump out the water containers for the birds last night. My bad. Will have to wait for them to thaw now or hopefully they will have just a skin of ice on them.

@Wickedchicken6 your ducklettes are such pretty birds. It must be tough to watch them fly off wild and free and not know if you are going to see them again next spring. I hope you do.

Not much going on here today. My broken toe is starting to work on me. Still cannot get a proper shoe on that foot. I managed to wear a loose sneaker for DH's doctor appointment on Monday and paid for it on Tuesday. DH keeps telling me to be patient. I'm only at week one and it isn't going to start feeling better till I reach the month anniversary. I'm just getting tired of wearing my muck boots whenever I go outside. Patience is not one of my virtues, LOL.

I need to get up to the local C&R for my free turkey. I am the only one who likes it so I'll let it thaw, quarter it and refreeze it for future use. I also need to get to HyVee for a prime rib. Even though we are invited out for Thanksgiving dinner I told DH I would still cook a nice meal along with pumpkin pie for us to enjoy at home at our leisure depending on when our neighbor is planning the meal. I may even just fix it on Wednesday then we can do left overs for a while.

Good news on the Toe! One of mine is better too--I think I had a bit of a gout attack. I hope I do not get a big one!

Yep, me too! Cooked one in the pressure cooker for supper last night, now we'll have sandwiches today while I start roasting pumpkin for pies and baking my famous deercamp recipe cookies for the crew arriving tomorrow. DH is making a supply run to town this morning and is going to pick up a large one which will make four in the freezer. (BTW-one tip. We always grab at least one big bird and have our grocery store butcher cut it in half. That way we get the bargain of huge bird w/o having to cook it all at once.).

I need to check into pressure cooking a turkey!

 

[superchemicalgirl]

Yeah I have guineas, turkeys and chickens together but I will not add the ducks to it. The ducks muck around in the water too much, get it all nasty and then splash water everywhere. The regular fowl can't take things being that wet. Especially as cold as it is up here. They just can't be together.
My ducks are in a small enclosure (I think it was a dog pen at one point that I found on craigslist) but I do let them free range whenever I am home (used to be all the time until the fox discovered them).

The ducks do pretty well in the cold and wet - they have a really crappy outdoor "coop" which I snug up a little bit when it gets significantly cold. My wedding quilt (I'm divorced) and some tarps and excess building supplies work great.

 

[Wickedchicken6]

Yeah I have guineas, turkeys and chickens together but I will not add the ducks to it. The ducks muck around in the water too much, get it all nasty and then splash water everywhere. The regular fowl can't take things being that wet. Especially as cold as it is up here. They just can't be together.
My ducks are in a small enclosure (I think it was a dog pen at one point that I found on craigslist) but I do let them free range whenever I am home (used to be all the time until the fox discovered them).

The ducks do pretty well in the cold and wet - they have a really crappy outdoor "coop" which I snug up a little bit when it gets significantly cold. My wedding quilt (I'm divorced) and some tarps and excess building supplies work great.
View attachment 1188188

So that's how you do it.

 

[Beer can]

While I don't personally buy/eat commercial meat, our store had a sale this week for 39 cent per lb turkeys, and I got some for the food bank.

I'd rather not. Especially after hearing what they feed beef in those feed lots. Our condensed whey goes to a place that sends them 'feed'. Everything you see in a store, everything out of date goes to this place and they mix it with our whey, dry it out bust it up and then send it out west to feed beef. Driver that picks our whey up said one time there was a tractor trailer load of Skittles there, they feed beef Skittles..and Mac and cheese, onion soup mix, donuts and Twinkies..

 

[Wickedchicken6]

I'd rather not. Especially after hearing what they feed beef in those feed lots. Our condensed whey goes to a place that sends them 'feed'. Everything you see in a store, everything out of date goes to this place and they mix it with our whey, dry it out bust it up and then send it out west to feed beef. Driver that picks our whey up said one time there was a tractor trailer load of Skittles there, they feed beef Skittles..and Mac and cheese, onion soup mix, donuts and Twinkies..

I just read this to Dh. Oh my, he's ranting as I'm writing this. He thinks people have lost their minds. That's a terrible thing to think of what they do. I sure hope our cattle stay up here and aren't subjected to that. I'm not sure what our protocols are exactly...but I believe they're pretty strict about what can be fed to cattle here. However, don't quote me on that.

I was out checking out our cattle and taking pics the other day.

These calves were following me around...lol. Looks like a nice replacement heifer with the white underside and the black will be one of our replacement bulls.

In the background are two of the bulls pushing heads. The guy on the right will be four. The guy on left was old in 2010. I think he'll be 11 or 12 now. Still going strong. I like that longevity!. His heifers should be great! And the bull we kept from him.

 

[ronott1]

I just read this to Dh. Oh my, he's ranting as I'm writing this. He thinks people have lost their minds. That's a terrible thing to think of what they do. I sure hope our cattle stay up here and aren't subjected to that. I'm not sure what our protocols are exactly...but I believe they're pretty strict about what can be fed to cattle here. However, don't quote me on that.

I was out checking out our cattle and taking pics the other day.

View attachment 1188225

These calves were following me around...lol. Looks like a nice replacement heifer with the white underside and the black will be one of our replacement bulls.
View attachment 1188232


In the background are two of the bulls pushing heads. The guy on the right will be four. The guy on left was old in 2010. I think he'll be 11 or 12 now. Still going strong. I like that longevity!. His heifers should be great! And the bull we kept from him.

View attachment 1188240

Nice Cattle you have!

Feed is better now. They do not feed them cow brains and manure anymore.

Back when I was in 4-H, 1974, we visited Cal Poly. The graduate student that gave us a tour proudly showed us their experiment withe different percentages of cow manure in the feed. Fast forward to mad cow disease....Not a good idea!

 

[Beer can]

Nice Cattle you have!

Feed is better now. They do not feed them cow brains and manure anymore.

Back when I was in 4-H, 1974, we visited Cal Poly. The graduate student that gave us a tour proudly showed us their experiment withe different percentages of cow manure in the feed. Fast forward to mad cow disease....Not a good idea!

 

[Alaskan]

Furnace works. No dripping.

So good to know! As well as ABOUT TIME! Those workers were frustrating! Please tell me they are not charging you too much?

I still have a turkey from last winter. We buy a bunch when they go on sale also, I love turkey.
For the price some of them I just de-bone, grind, mix in chopped onions and peppers, Italian sausage seasoning and stuff in casings.
Well, I'm done, try to get some sleep. Hear a darn rooster crowing though...
need earplugs

Sounds tasty.

I may hoard turkey. I think I've got four in the freezer right now. I love a good roast turkey. If I was in jail and could ask for a final meal...I'd ask for a roast turkey meal with the gravy and stuffing and potatoes. Maybe a tiny bit of peas...but if dying right away...I think I could break away from healthy for one meal.

me, I would want cornbread dressing and giblets gravy.

Good morning!!!

I was just thinking about the ducks. I can't remember if I updated about them. It got a little hairy around harvest time...lol.

I hatched the four.
View attachment 1187968


They did really well with the chicks they were in with. Ducks are SO messy...lol!!

View attachment 1187963

They stayed with the chickens in the electric fence where I had a shallow pan for them to rummage in the water. They got along with the chickens really well! Then one night as I was following them in to shut them in the coop, Steve the cat was sitting outside the fence. Two of the ducks took flight into the pasture. I felt really bad because it was at night and I was worried some predator would get them. I got this pics of the last two remaining ducks the next day.

View attachment 1187981


Dh saw two ducks flying over the barn the next day. These two left the day after. But then we saw them living across in the pond across the road! I took the pic below from the combine. They stayed at the pond until everything late fall. One day they were gone, presumably they flew south.

View attachment 1187966

fun story. I can't get over how blue their bills are..and that tiny wing patch.

(shhhh, btw, got my latest test results, still in treatment free remission. I'm still my Onc's favorite! Aka, miracle patient Thank you Lord )

Excellent news!!!

 

[Wickedchicken6]

Nice Cattle you have!

Feed is better now. They do not feed them cow brains and manure anymore.

Back when I was in 4-H, 1974, we visited Cal Poly. The graduate student that gave us a tour proudly showed us their experiment withe different percentages of cow manure in the feed. Fast forward to mad cow disease....Not a good idea!

Thanks Ron. Yes, they don't feed the brains/spines/offal etc.

The feeding of manure! That's just disgusting! No respectable cow person could imagine doing that. If I told someone here that...they'd think I lost my damn mind. We spread the cattle manure on the summerfallowed fields. That's what manure is for. That's scary and gives me little faith in those who are supposed to be guiding with knowledge. Those poor cattle.

 

[Wickedchicken6]

fun story. I can't get over how blue their bills are..and that tiny wing patch.

They ended up being Blue Winged Teal ducks and not Mallards. I thought that was pretty cool.