Arizona Chickens

[cactusrota]

Our light brings in the bats too, which is really fun to watch. I've gone out to watch them and had them wizz by my head by inches as they make their passes at the light.

 

[bunsnpupsnchick]

That's an idea. Thanks. Have to see if it's feasible. It'd be the only source of light I'm sure. I have them in the yard without light, but I think they're after water as I've found them in the dishpans & water dishes both. Now, I empty those nightly.

 

[BlueBaby]

That's an idea. Thanks. Have to see if it's feasible. It'd be the only source of light I'm sure. I have them in the yard without light, but I think they're after water as I've found them in the dishpans & water dishes both. Now, I empty those nightly.

Maybe you could put some water pans for them by the hanging light that was mentioned to keep them in a certain area only?

 

[twinsmom6]

Sonoran toads - I love the idea of attracting their bug food with lights I am going to try that too. I have one dog (over 75 lbs) that likes to lick the toads and he acts like he has been to an opium den for about 6 hours.. it is pretty scary.. But I think he is addicted. They can make the little dogs pretty sick so keeping them out of our acreage has been a challenge. thanks for the suggestions..

 

[bunsnpupsnchick]

Hmmmm....would mean setting up on the other side of the fence nightly. I don't want to encourage them in my front yard as my plan is to enclose the front too & let the chicks out there.

My concern for a dishpan of water is that it'd attract any strays & coyotes to the wall which could lead them to checking out the yard...though my pups have done a pretty decent job of teaching most stray cats to stay out. Closest coyote that I've heard of was across the street on the neighbor's back fence. Exception to the strays was the momma kitty who had babies behind my shed few months ago! lol...my goofy dane just helped me block her off from the chicks, etc. & kept checking on the babies. I think he wanted to keep one. He tries so hard to 'play' with the chicks, but I can't let him as he gets too excited. He does watch over them which is nice.

 

[bunsnpupsnchick]

Sonoran toads - I love the idea of attracting their bug food with lights I am going to try that too. I have one dog (over 75 lbs) that likes to lick the toads and he acts like he has been to an opium den for about 6 hours.. it is pretty scary.. But I think he is addicted. They can make the little dogs pretty sick so keeping them out of our acreage has been a challenge. thanks for the suggestions..

Wow. I bet it is scary. Very lucky he's not experiencing worse. I could imagine it could be a bit addicting given that's how I've read the description of its effect on us. I think the worse effect comes when the dogs apply pressure/bite on the toads, if I'm remembering what I read right.

 

[twinsmom6]

pretty tough guys.. rattle snakes out here too.. but they have survived them.. I am sure we all have our predators. One of my boys sits outside the coop and watches the chickens.. My kids think he is protecting them.. I think the way he is drooling and stalking them that he is just waiting for them to trust him so he can have a bite... the chickens stare right back.. I will get a pic of it..

 

[DesertChic]

pretty tough guys.. rattle snakes out here too.. but they have survived them.. I am sure we all have our predators. One of my boys sits outside the coop and watches the chickens.. My kids think he is protecting them.. I think the way he is drooling and stalking them that he is just waiting for them to trust him so he can have a bite... the chickens stare right back.. I will get a pic of it..

Right now the #1 predator we're dealing with is....mosquitoes. They're crazy this year! My cologne? Deep Woods Off.

 

[Sill]

Please write that gardening book! I'm one of those people who was born with a black thumb. My mom's thumb was green, and my son's thumb is green, but mine most definitely started out black and is finally changing to a sappy-brown sort of green, but it's been a constant battle. I bought the book "Extreme Gardening" which helped a lot, but not quite enough. If you're unlocked the mystery of gardening in this desert climate then please, please share! I'll be your first customer!

It's always a challenge to garden here is summer! Wood chips and other types of mulch are the way to go. Got to cover that soil.

No kiddin? I figured you for a "green thumb" kinda lady. Ok now you got me seriously thinking about doing it. I've never written a book to be published before so I don't know how long it takes but if others can do it I certainly can too. In the meantime if you're having any particular troubles just shoot me a pm or email which I'll pm to you now. I never consider myself an expert on anything; I'm a lifelong student, but I'll be more than happy to pass on anything I learned over the years.

Here's one of our our garlic harvests a little while ago:

My farmer wife:




Me:




I love growing garlic here and of course we eat it about every day. We only grow the hard-neck varieties because they really have superior flavors and there's a wide variety of types to grow. Most of these were Georgian Crystal which according to the data on them are only supposed to grow well in cool climates - wrong! They do exceptionally well here and are one of my favorites. I sold a good bit of them for $1.00 a head and they were all gone in about a week. That's just through word of mouth too; no advertising or farmers markets. They sell themselves once people try 'em. Next year I'm tripling the amount we're growing since they're so popular. I'm also adding a bunch of new varieties I think will do well (a couple creole, asiatic, and mediterranean types I haven't grown yet). They'll cover my feed costs for a year easy.

That's just one crop but almost everything does really well here. Okra, eggplant, beans, onions, sweet potatoes, snow peas, and corn among other things do exceptionally well here. While a lot of people cuss at having to irrigate, the nice thing about it is you have complete control of the timing of water to the plants, so you can often grow a better crop here than in rainier parts of the country. To be successful you just have to feed the soil and not the plant. We only use organic methods because they do just that; synthetics are only short term and often too much at once. But yeah, correct your soil over time with compost, chicken manure compost especially, sheet composting, green manures/cover crops, etc., and over time your pH will come down and the often clay soil will gravitate to a loam and you'll be in serious business. All these methods work even for very small scale plots but some make more sense like only using compost vs. planting green manures on a 2'X5' bed. But all plots benefit from cover crops which are simply growing something in a plot that's fallow so it's not exposed to the drying, sun-baked conditions we have here until your next planting. I love cover crops and green manures. For this area certain covers work a lot better than others such as medic instead of white clover, Ameristad Alfalfa instead of dormant varieties, etc. These covers are very drought resistant. Anyway I'm rambling and taking up space on the website, but it's a great subject.

Like I said, I'm always learning and I'm sure there are others who have this stuff down pat a lot better than me, but I'll be glad to tell you what I know. Learning and seeing results first hand is a big part of the fun.

Gene

Wow, that's a lot of garlic! How do you store until you need it?

Yes, agreed.. but not inside for us.. we love our duck's just as much..

They lay egg's the same as our chicken's. they are way healthier. We also use their water for the garden.

Ducks are great! Their eggs are fantastic!

Ya know what I would do for your toads is put out light, either a bug zapper or just a regular light bulb, about 6 feet above the ground somewhere a few feet outside the fence or somewhere the dogs can't go. The toads will learn quickly that bugs fall to the ground under the light and they'll all congregate there. At least they do under our bug light. We've got three different ones here, the woodhouse toads, the colorado river toads, and I can't remember what the third one is at the moment. My dogs never bothered with them so I never worried about it.

We have geckos that hang out by our porch light. Free food!

 

[Sill]

Right now the #1 predator we're dealing with is....mosquitoes. They're crazy this year! My cologne? Deep Woods Off.

Oh no! I try to never use the commercial bug repellants. I make my own, 2 oz witch hazel with 40 drops lemon eucalyptus EO. If the bugs are super bad I'll resort to the heavy duty stuff. Mosquitoes are bad, I even find them in the nest boxes when I collect eggs.

I was using lemon grass clippings in the boxes and that helped keep them out but I had to kill my lemon grass when I put in other plants. Need to plant some more!

Our light brings in the bats too, which is really fun to watch. I've gone out to watch them and had them wizz by my head by inches as they make their passes at the light.

We got buzzed by a bat on the fourth of July after we set off our fireworks. Like in your face close! I hope it was eating those mosquitoes!!!