Consolidated Kansas

[Hawkeye95]

Wow, all those stories about trusting your gut feeling about people. Good stuff! I don't think I run into too many 'bad' people. But here recently, one of my girlfriends was dating a guy and after I first met him last year, I did not like him one bit. And that's not really like me. I told her she needed to dump him, something was off about him. But nope, only after about 9 months, she finally did and finally told us all the crap he'd done. She's just come out of a bad divorce, so I don't know WHY she'd want to do that again.

Karen-- CUTE chicks, your daughter does a great job with the camera! Oh and funny-- i have those SAME blue and white towels. But mine are so old now, they are in my 'old pile'-- that I use in my dog kennels or for wiping up the floor, etc..

I'm feeling bad for my DH, he went to the Easter Sun Run they have here and it's done nothing but pour down rain and thunder and lightening. I'm doubting they have their run... but I could be wrong. I expect he will come back home any time and be soaking wet. hehe! We had a movie night with our neighbors last night. Our neighborhood is a very tight community, we know everyone down here, and we all get together for one reason or another. Usually my other neighbors across from us can see me out working on a coop, or with the animals and I must provide him with a lot of entertainment, because I can hear him laughing at me. I imagine when I'm on the ground holding things up with my feet or shoulder it probably does look pretty funny. He has offered to help and he's walked over once when he took pity on me. My other neighbor on the other side-- he comes over a lot more to chat and i put him to work. Anyway, last night, we watched "War Horse" and had popcorn and margaritas. Great night with the neighbors.

As far as I know-- there's no pip on my egg that Yoda is sitting on. I haven't checked this morning, though. I'll entice her off with BOSS and eye ball the egg later.

 

[chicken danz]

Back in the good ole days when I was a police officer in OKC my intuition about people was probably my greatest asset. Unfortunately in that line of work you run into a lot more of those kind of people than the average person does. But in a touchy situation it saved my rear more than once. I just wish it had worked a little better in my personal life. He! He! I never was very good at distinguishing which men were good for me and which weren't. I am lucky I finally ended up with an awesome man who treats me well. He has his faults but as far as the way he treats me I can't complain at all.
My oldest daughter is in a relationship now with a guy who I told her was not someone she would want as a long term partner when they first started dating. I could see he was very self serving and evil. Sure enough it has been pretty disastrous but she is still with him. You have to let them make their own decisions though and support them. I just tell her I am here to listen and support, not judge.
I have Sabastopol geese that I got from Patricia. They are so awesome. I have a friend who has some and fell in love with them. And yes most of these weeds were dandelions they geese ate in the green house.
My yard actually looks really pretty. A sea of white! White dandelion heads to be exact. I sure won't be putting the babies out to eat to day. It is pouring down rain.

 

[chicken danz]

Oh I forgot to mention they had a bunch of African geese at Orshlen's yesterday. They looked big and healthy.

 

[Hawkeye95]

Danz, oh gosh, just like Tweety was saying earlier-- I also have NEVER seen the dandelions so bad before! Our yard is exactly like yours-- a sea of white! (Oh -- I went to the PO this morning. It's on it's way!)

I have mowed the dandelions all down twice and they pop right back up again over night. I've HAD it. I'll be going to Walmart or Lowes and getting the Dandelion killer! I don't care if it kills my whole lawn, I'm sick of them. We do have grass under there somwhere-- in places. We have seeded our lawn I don't know how many times. And then the weeds take over. I keep telling my DH it's becuase he won't let me buy the weed killer. We need to keep up on it! I mean... I know our "lawn" area is like 3 acres, but I'm only talking about doing just right around the house-- maybe only an acre is all. I wish I knew what kind of grass to plant that would take off and take over the yard and the weeds instead of the other way around. There should be a beautiful grass that grows like weeds.

Okay, I'm already tired of this rain, even though I know we really need it. And the up side is, I don't have to water my garden or all of my trees.

 

[Ivywoods]

I've been fighting weeds since we moved here. I've heard geese are good weed eaters, but I have so many open flower beds I don't know how I would keep them out of the flowers. I'm sure they would like the flowers every bit as well as the weeds. When I had geese before I also had a 5 acre pond that kept them interested, so I don't know where I would keep them now, and I certainly don't want to maintain an artificial pond for them.

As far as weed killer goes, I've been thinking about using some type of "weed and feed" on my lawn, but frankly I've been afraid to. I have so many free range birds, I'm really afraid my chickens would injest the crap. That wouldn't be good.

 

[chicken danz]

Back when I was a city dweller I kept my lawn perfect and so did my neighbors. Then I moved to Kansas in town, and did the exact same things to it. But I learned then it was not as much what you did but what was around you. If you spend a thousand dollars a year on your lawn you will still get weeds if your neighbors don't do the same. And being out in the burbs it's a lose lose battle for you there I think. Out here if it weren't for weeds we'd probably have no grass. The grass only grows really well in my flower beds!
I used to burn my lawn in the city. I would poor on nitrogen too heavy. Then it would rain or I would water. It would burn it and turn brown. But the next rain or watering the grass would come up beautiful lush and green and the weeds would stay burnt out. It worked so much better than weed killer and I had a to die for lawn, plus I wasn't poisoning the environment. I couldn't afford to do that here because I have too much. It would be nice to have a nice lawn again some day though.
The only thing I ever use as an herbacide is roundup. It is the only thing I know of that is safe because it neutralizes as soon as it hits the ground or water. It won't kill fish or birds. Problem with it of course is it kills about everything it hits. I use about 2 and a half gallons a year of the 40% stuff you use on farms. I spray the fence lines and big patches of horse weed etc. Then I spot kill all kinds of stuff. I am out right now and need to get some more for this year. I should have some to spray my future garden spot.

 

[HEChicken]

Dandelions are a GREAT source of greens for chickens to get those yolks lovely and orange. I haven't had any in my backyard since I've had the girls and in Spring routinely go around picking them out of my front yard and even my neighbor's yards if they haven't sprayed weedkiller, to feed to them. They go ape over them! This year I extended their forage by putting a temporary fence out into my front yard and leaving the gate open so they can come up and help themselves to some of those growing in front. For those of you with a dandelion issue, a tractor type of thing that you can put them in to move them daily to a new area thick with dandelions will take care of the weeds for you and also improve the nutritive quality of your eggs - win-win.

Oh - and they are actually also a great source of nutrition for people too. I stumbled across a website this week devoted to recipes using dandelions. I don't know where it is now, but a search for dandelion recipes will bring back tons of hits. I've used them in cooking in the past - you'd be amazed at their versatility. For those who like teas, you can make tea from them as well. They were actually imported here by the new settlers because they do contain so many good qualities.

 

[Trish44]

Well I got one more EE chick since last night, but this one isn't doing too well, it may not make it. The others are picking on it something terrible. I'm getting ready pretty soon to take the others out to the brooder so they can't kill the poor thing. I have two more eggs trying to pip, but that's it so far today. The first ones that hatched are doing great though, they're active & running around. I have to go out & get my brooder ready for them because I want to have everything in place before I take them out since it's rainy & cool today. It was pouring when I woke up first this morning, so I went back to bed & then worried about the chicks, so I ended up not getting any more sleep.

I did kind of like having geese for the weeds, but I don't have a place here to keep them. I don't want them in my fish pond & that's right where they would head first thing & then it would be more of a mess than it is.

 

[Hawkeye95]

Well I got one more EE chick since last night, but this one isn't doing too well, it may not make it. The others are picking on it something terrible. I'm getting ready pretty soon to take the others out to the brooder so they can't kill the poor thing. I have two more eggs trying to pip, but that's it so far today. The first ones that hatched are doing great though, they're active & running around. I have to go out & get my brooder ready for them because I want to have everything in place before I take them out since it's rainy & cool today. It was pouring when I woke up first this morning, so I went back to bed & then worried about the chicks, so I ended up not getting any more sleep.

I did kind of like having geese for the weeds, but I don't have a place here to keep them. I don't want them in my fish pond & that's right where they would head first thing & then it would be more of a mess than it is.

Ugh, I think I could do without them. I don't have any way to let my birds free range for dandelions, either. I can't imagine fencing this place in, and I have no time to build a tractor. Bleah. I DO remember when I was a kid we'd pluck the yellow flowers and make them "Pee" down someone else's arm! hehe But they stain so well- that even after a bath, you would still be yellow. I did pluck a bunch of them a couple of days ago and threw them in my girl's run and they looked at them and pecked at them and then turned up their noses at it. So I don't know what it would take for them to actually EAT the yellow dandelions. Ah well... weed killer is in my future!

 

[Trish44]

Hawkeye, just be careful what you spray on your yard if you plan to let your birds on it. I don't even feel that roundup is safe for them, it makes me nervous to use it now with my chickens free-ranging.