Consolidated Kansas

[RoosterLew]

Hechicken , I can tell you what all of those are!
Weeds! Lol

 

[sunflowerparrot]

HOLY HECK Sunflower... 85 birds butchered?? I just read up, geez, that's a lot of birds!

Actually- more like 450 total... my friend sells her birds at the Farmer's market, restaurants, etc. the 85 was the last of her birds for spring! Now it is wheat season for them... then we'll both be getting some more come early fall for a late fall butcher. (Along with turkeys.. she is doing 20 of them and has most of them sold already too... ducks, geese too.)

 

[Polishpal]

The poor keet just died :'( its almost like she had a stroke? Her head would tip back and she would fall, and she couldn't stay focused. I am very confused on how she died because just yesterday she was a happy healthy keet. But my hearts broken because we tried so hard to help her.

 

[22qZoo]

POLISHPAL.. So sorry bout you're little keet, hope the others are doing well.
HECHICKEN.. I have all those weeds too. Last year so much of our grass just got burnt up and now this year the weeds are terrible!

 

[HEChicken]

Rooster, you disappoint me. I thought for sure you'd know them all

In good news, as a result of this discussion, I believe I now know what Johnsongrass is, and that we have a little of it - not enough to be a problem I don't think, just a few small patches of it. And, our sheep LOVE it! The last two nights I've been putting them in my chicken yard to graze at night and noticed last night that their first choice was a small patch of Johnsongrass. So I'm hoping they will help me control it so the county won't come in and be upset with us.

22qZoo - I never thought about the fact they might be worse this year because of the drought. We still have a lot of grass as well, but that makes sense. Hopefully Danz will come on soon and be able to recognize some of these - if anyone knows them, it will be her.

I can't believe this - I have two more broodies. This is just insane. And, how fast can a hen possibly go broody??? Saturday evening I was sitting in my lawn chair, reading my Kindle and specifically noticed my SSX hen. She had bumblefoot surgery a few months ago and I noticed she still has swelling in her foot and limps a little when running but is otherwise looking pretty good. An hour later when it was bedtime, she was in the nest with the broody duck. I figured she was sleeping there because with the foot, doesn't want to jump down from the roost in the morning, so I left her there. It wasn't until last evening I realized I hadn't seen her all day and she was still there! So sometime between around 8pm Saturday when she was out doing her usual grazing and scratching, and 9pm, she just suddenly went broody. Weird. The other broody is another I didn't expect. She is a production red hen who hatched from some eggs someone gave me for my very first broody hen a couple of summers ago. That silly hen spent all of August sitting and raised her chicks when the worst of the summer was over, but was a terrific mother. Now one of her daughters is broody. I think this may be the first broody raised hen I've had go broody on me. I wonder if her chicks will be any wilder than most broody raised chicks as a result?

At this point I feel like I'm just hanging on for the ride - I really can't keep up with them all. Every night I go and lift all those hens and try to gather eggs but I'm afraid to give or sell them to people in case they started to develop so my actual egg production is down to almost nil. My Sultan hatched 3 chicks so last night I took one of them and gave them to another broody, figuring I could use the situation to reduce the number of broodies I have. Instead two more went broody so now I have even more.

 

[lizzyGSR]

Here we go:


This one looks so familiar so I feel like I should know what it is. It looks a little like a dandelion except grows tall and doesn't produce the yellow flowers.

This is the only one I recognize. Growing up, we always called it a milk weed because when you cut the stalk, white milky stuff comes out. I have no idea if that is the correct name for it, though. I was talking to our neighbors just recently and they were telling me the names of some of the local plants. There is one that I always called fireweed, but they called it kosh or koshi - something like that. They also told me that fireweed was something different. Maybe it's a regional thing, I don't know.

BTW-- Lizzy, how are you feeling now?? Have you hit the phase where you're so tired you could sleep standing up??

I'm doing pretty good. I have been tired recently, but not nearly as bad as you describe. I think I've just been tired because I've been going to bed later than normal. Yesterday marked the halfway point for me, so I'm pretty excited about that. For about a week now, my DH has been able to feel the baby kicking, and I think he really enjoys it! I had a mini panic attack recently when I realized that we are already halfway through and there is still SO MUCH to do to get ready for Baby's arrival... One of the big things on my to-do list is sewing. I plan on making myself a good portion of the maternity clothes I will be wearing when I get big enough to need them. I also plan on making my own crib set (much cheaper and I get exactly what I want that way). The crib set will include a crib skirt, crib quilt, and a matching skirt and quilt for the twin sized bed that will be staying in the nursery. It will also include custom matching curtains for the windows, as well as a couple of wall hangings. Here are the fabrics I want to use for the nursery...

 

[maidenwolfx80]

HEChicken- the plant you are showing looks like the compass plant. It grows very tall and if left to grow will produce yellow flowers like small sunflowers. It is a member of the sunflower family and is called a compass plant because the flowers turn to face the sun no matter where it is in the sky.

I see everyone is having problems with snakes.. I am having problems with ticks and flies. All the moisture and rain is booming the nasty pest population.

 

[chicken danz]

Here we go:

This stuff is a ground cover and grows very thick, crowding out anything else.

Here is a close-up of the same plant:

I wish I knew what this is. My entire back yard is nothing but this. I hate it. The birds won't eat it and like you said it crowds out everything else. I will have to see if I can identify it some way.

This one grows in a tall stem, maybe 1-2' high?:

Flixweed or Tansy. I believe Flixweed. Tansy has little yellow flowers and flixweed has little white flowers. They look very much the same.
This is another of the same plants:

And here it is again, looking down on it. It has tiny little white flowers:

This one looks so familiar so I feel like I should know what it is. It looks a little like a dandelion except grows tall and doesn't produce the yellow flowers.
Prickly lettuce.

And then there is this one - no idea - anyone?


Here is a close-up of that same plant:
Pigweed. There are several types of pigweed as well.

And last, this one: common ragweed

If you figure out that first one I'd like to know as well. I guess I shouldn't complain it is about the only thing covering the ground out back. You'd think I'd know cause it was every where when I was a kid as well.

Good to see you both Hawkeye and Deerfield. I am far behind these days. The weekend was totally crazy and my birds suffered because of it. On top of that I hatched probably 100 chicks of various kinds over the weekend and am so over crowded it's rediculous. Ultimately I am going to accidentally sell something I don't mean to. I try to mark them if they are something I intend to keep but I am sure I miss one now and then.
Went to a long catholic wedding and reception on Saturday. I was so wiped out by the time I got home I didn't put my birds up. Thank goodness DH did it for me. I wasn't expecting a 12 hour long marathon for the wedding and we left the reception several hours early.
Thanks to all the stand up and sit down they did then I was awake most of the night with leg pains and my knees throbbing. I had to get up early on Sunday and do my cooking I thought I would get done on Saturday. Then we ran to town to have a cookout get together for father's day for my Dad. We all know it will be his last one so we wanted to make it special. I got home just in time to get some feed out for the birds before I had customers show up. Their visit took 2 hours but they bought several birds young and old and plan to come back for more. I gave them some really good deals just to make some room for all the chicks I hatched. And actually gave them a few birds just to keep going on my downsizing. I did sell the one lemon cuckoo Orp I planned to use for my new breeder roo but this girl shows and she really wanted that one. My stupidity for pointing out his awesome traits!!
Then last night we got torrential storms. We got over 3 inches of rain in an hour or two and it is still sprinkling some. The main road south of us is flooded shut. It's been a long time since that has happened. Actually though it came down so fast it will mostly run off and go south of here and cause flooding on south on the Neosho river. All my birds were drenched this AM and the ducks and geese are very very happy because we have some newly formed temporary ponds in the yard. That also means I need to get out and dump pan after pan of wet feed. (What a waste!) I moved most of the feeders outside with the heat to encourage the birds not to stay in the coops. I missed the weather last night cause I was out stumbling around in the dark putting birds up. I got distracted and wasn't out there at bedtime. So the ducks, geese and turkeys were spread all over. The turkeys normally put themselves to bed but they had roosted up on top of pens and stuff. They get lost in the dark and can't find their way back to the pen.
I swear I am going to find a way to get in the house before 10PM tonight. This is just crazy!! I've got a busy week ahead as well. I need to find some time somewhere to do some major house cleaning before a family get together next Saturday as well as several other things going on.
I don't know if I mentioned we got our automatic gate in finally. We still have too get the hard wire in and the key board control in, but we are using the remotes to open and close it. I love it. We also need to get some wire mounted on the gate as well but so far the birds and dogs aren't jumping through the openings without it.

 

[HEChicken]

This is the only one I recognize. Growing up, we always called it a milk weed because when you cut the stalk, white milky stuff comes out. I have no idea if that is the correct name for it, though. I was talking to our neighbors just recently and they were telling me the names of some of the local plants. There is one that I always called fireweed, but they called it kosh or koshi - something like that. They also told me that fireweed was something different. Maybe it's a regional thing, I don't know.

When I read that, my thought was "that makes total sense". Yes, that is the stuff with the sticky, milk like substance when you break a leaf or the stem. But interestingly, I google-imaged "milkweed" and all of the images show a very different plant - one I don't believe I've seen before.

HEChicken- the plant you are showing looks like the compass plant. It grows very tall and if left to grow will produce yellow flowers like small sunflowers. It is a member of the sunflower family and is called a compass plant because the flowers turn to face the sun no matter where it is in the sky.

I wasn't sure which image of the 9 you were referring to, so I google-imaged compass plant. It is, as you described, a tall plant with a yellow flower but after looking at multiple images I didn't see any that look like the plants I have here. I know mine aren't tall enough for flowers yet anyway, but none have the same leaves and stems, as far as I could tell.

If you figure out that first one I'd like to know as well. I guess I shouldn't complain it is about the only thing covering the ground out back. You'd think I'd know cause it was every where when I was a kid as well.
I swear I am going to find a way to get in the house before 10PM tonight. This is just crazy!! I've got a busy week ahead as well. I need to find some time somewhere to do some major house cleaning before a family get together next Saturday as well as several other things going on.
I don't know if I mentioned we got our automatic gate in finally. We still have too get the hard wire in and the key board control in, but we are using the remotes to open and close it. I love it. We also need to get some wire mounted on the gate as well but so far the birds and dogs aren't jumping through the openings without it.

I guess as a ground cover, it isn't bad - it is soft underfoot with no thorns or burs. I just worry about it crowding out all of the grasses that would be better, especially if it isn't edible by any of the animals. I know what you mean about the chores keeping you outside until well after dark. It is usually around that time every night when I get in too. The sheep drove me crazy last night! We had the brilliant idea to keep them in the chicken yard at night so they can graze, but last night a couple got out of their temporary pen so I just opened the gate to the chicken yard a little early and herded them in there. But they smelled the chicken food so all they wanted to do was go in the coop and help themselves. They will even go in the chicken door - DH was stunned when I told him as he didn't think they'd fit, but they just popped right through it. I had the people door open so the little ducklings would be able to get in, so was kept running trying to guard both doors. There are 6 sheep and only 1 of me and I'd shoo them out one door, only to find one of the others coming in the other. I'd try to herd them further down the yard, and then I'd go off to do another chore and turn around and find them all back in the coop again. No way am I letting them in the yard until both doors are closed for the night tonight. Of course, as soon as it opened this morning, they were right back in there. I went down around 6am and when they heard my voice, they all came filing out the chicken door. I can't really block off the feeder but when I refilled it today, I tried to only put in enough that the chickens will eat it all before morning tomorrow so the sheep won't have much to steal.

Congrats on getting the gate in - I'm glad to hear you like it as we are about to do the same thing. I was concerned since we get a lot of packages and the mailman or UPS/FedEx will no longer be able to drive down the driveway. How are you handling that situation now? I thought maybe we could set a big box outside the gate and ask them to drop stuff in there? Do you have a keypad with code to enter as well as the remote? Because the other option would be to assign the delivery drivers their own code to get in, but that seems like a hassle to me.

 

[chicken danz]

Hechicken I found it. The top weed is a Prostrate Knotweed. It is the first weed to germinate in the spring particularly on compacted soil. It emits a chemical which keeps more desirable grasses from coming up. It can be sprayed with a corn gluten based spray or if you aerate your soil that will help other grasses to grow in. We definitely have compacted soil here. Knotweed has super tiny roots so it can get in where other plant roots can't. Since we have the worst of worst clay here it is is understandable why this stuff took over.
I'm loving the gate. The people that came yesterday were super impressed even though we don't have all the finishing touches on it. I am going to buy a large storage box to set out there for packages I think. Haven't done that yet. I had been pricing them but hadn't decided I wanted to spend the money for some of them. And then I need to decide exactly where to set it. The gate mechanism cost about $500 and we did the installation. I also opted not to put in the intercom system because I don't want people pulling up and talking to me....It's not like I am in the house most of the time anyway. Anyone that needs to come here can call me or make an appointment the way I see it. I bought the key pad which isn't installed yet. It will hold several codes at once. I am thinking if I am expecting someone I could program in a one time code that they could use to enter, then remove it after they leave.
I do have a remote thing I bought over a year ago that will sound a bell if someone crosses the beam. I thought about setting that out there so at least if I was in the house and someone pulled in the driveway before the gate it would set off a warning. I wish it was all finished.
If someone wants in they will get in anyway but at least this will prevent them from driving in and slow them down. I think my dogs really like the fence line. Marshmallow can chase all the vehicles she wants and still play her games but on my side of the fence. She already has a path worn down along the fence line where she runs. And she doesn't get in trouble for it now. LOL
Maidenwolf I am familiar with the compass weed. Is it used in any medicinal ways? I see it growing along the roadways a lot.