Michigan Thread - all are welcome!

[Hillbilly Hen]

Hubby is going to put a flat top on it with a perch. He also has some old rubber conveyor belt material that he's going to put under the roost. Easy to do the daily poo clean up. We have the same rubber belting under the other roost and it's working out great.

 

[Chickin Fairy]

Well, unlike @Hillbilly Hen, we are going big with the garden this year! I hardened off all my seedlings last week in the gray stormy weather and planted them in our new raised beds yesterday. We put up fence poles and secured the fence, but we have to keep working to get it working as a permanent fence.

I planted cukes, pole beans, marigolds, spinach, romaine, and lettuce from seed. I have some more seeds to go today. I'm loving the look so far. I'm still waiting for my winter savory to get to a point where I can transplant it, the seedlings have just stopped developing

The chickens have all integrated nicely, but the roosting bars need to be adjusted so they stop cramming onto one roost. Always something with chickens. And yeah, they roost on top of the nesting boxes and poop up there *sigh*

 

[Hillbilly Hen]

@Chickin Fairy , your set up looks beautiful!
We had a huge garden the past two years after a dozen years or so of not having a garden. It's just hubby and myself but I share with all the family. However they didn't take very much and we had more than we could eat. I canned and froze a lot. I canned about 800 jars of stuff. I was exhausted and decided to take a year off from gardening and canning. We have enough stocked up we can eat for a couple of years or maybe more lol. I told hubby that we'll revisit the idea of a big garden when he retires.

 

[Chickin Fairy]

@Chickin Fairy , your set up looks beautiful!
We had a huge garden the past two years after a dozen years or so of not having a garden. It's just hubby and myself but I share with all the family. However they didn't take very much and we had more than we could eat. I canned and froze a lot. I canned about 800 jars of stuff. I was exhausted and decided to take a year off from gardening and canning. We have enough stocked up we can eat for a couple of years or maybe more lol. I told hubby that we'll revisit the idea of a big garden when he retires.

I totally get it! I canned some things last year, but canning tomatoes around me are $8 for 25 lbs, so the only tomatoes I'm doing are ones I grew from store bought cherries my daughter loves (cherubs). It's a grand experiment to see if they produce, but I have about 10 plants right now, so we'll see!

I do want to can a lot more this year, and dehydrate others, hubby has a ton of hot peppers he's growing, he wants to make chipotle spices and sauces. We'll see how that goes... If I hadn't been watering his seedlings, nothing would be coming up right now. But they're just seedlings at this point, I'm sure he won't harden them off and he might be harvesting in October at this point

 

[Hillbilly Hen]

Two years ago I canned 100 quarts of tomatoes Last year it was around 50 quarts plus another 50 quarts of spaghetti sauce. We only use about 50 in a year.

 

[Folly's place]

Double WOW!!!
Mary

 

[Sally PB]

hubby has a ton of hot peppers he's growing, he wants to make chipotle spices and sauces. We'll see how that goes... If I hadn't been watering his seedlings, nothing would be coming up right now. But they're just seedlings at this point, I'm sure he won't harden them off and he might be harvesting in October at this point

Last year, our habaneros didn't bear until very late, and we had to BUY (!!) peppers to make hubby's salsa.

This year, we started the habaneros and jalapenos on a heat mat inside. WHAT A DIFFERENCE!!! The seeds were up in 5 days and the plants are a bushy 7" tall right now. Much better than the spindly 2" things I planted last year.

 

[Chickin Fairy]

Last year, our habaneros didn't bear until very late, and we had to BUY (!!) peppers to make hubby's salsa.

This year, we started the habaneros and jalapenos on a heat mat inside. WHAT A DIFFERENCE!!! The seeds were up in 5 days and the plants are a bushy 7" tall right now. Much better than the spindly 2" things I planted last year.

Peppers are so fickle! I tried to grow some hots this year, but none of them germinated. I have sweet red peppers I grow every year, I got the seeds from some peppers we bought from the Amish a couple years ago. I do that, too. I always use a heat mat and lights and I start them in early March. Just the red peppers did well! Last year, I experimented with overwintering. The one full plant I brought in is doing fantastic and has flowers on it already! I am thinking that overwintering the whole plant is the way to go. I have others that I cut back into the V shape and they aren't coming back like they should.

 

[Chickin Fairy]

Hey, y'all. My neighbors have a chick that appears to have wry neck. I told them to separate the chick from the rest, and to not feed the medicated chick feed (to any of them anymore), and mix 1/4 ml liquid or 1/4 tablet of b complex, 400 IU of vitamin E and some egg yolk given orally each day for selenium. Treat for at least 2 weeks. Mix a little water in a bit of chick feed to make it mushy, and feed it fresh throughout the day.

I believe that advice came from Wyrop here in the threads. Anything else I should tell them?

 

[Folly's place]

They need to check the mill date on their chick starter, if it's old, not good.
Some chicks just won't live, for whatever reason, sometime it's just their genetics. Worth a try, making sure it can actually eat. And it's easy to drown a chick giving liquids by mouth, sadly.
Mary