The Old Folks Home

[superchemicalgirl]

That is wonderful that you have taken up this new adventure. I admire that you are doing this and there is nothing like giving or getting a gift someone has made for you. Post pics if you can, I love to look at every ones crafts and things they make for their families and pets.

Well I don't have another quilt to post pictures on, yet, but I do have this picture to post (and he has absolutely no idea I took it and would quite possibly kill me if he found out that I took it and posted it online). It's 42 degrees here in central Maine. I just went out to buy shavings for the coop. Had the window down and the air flow turned to the coldest of the cool (and was still sweating). BF went and got my wheelbarrow for me upon my return:



Yup. 42 degrees is tank top and shorts weather.

 

[CanuckBock]

It's snowing, the dogs are playing, the teenager is sleeping, the chickens are strutting and digging holes in their run, the fishes are nibbling, the parrots are singing, the cats are plotting, I am drinking coffee, the hubby is getting ready for work. It's Saturday and I LOVE IT... The only better day of the week is Sunday when the whole family is home together.

What are you all up to this Saturday? I see so many with new baby chicks coming, I sure wish I could have more too. We have lived in this house for almost ten years now but if we had to move we would definitely move out of the town limits so we could have more birds and a bigger garden and more than 2 beehives. I hope we never have to leave but I am a bloom where I'm planted person so I would make the best of it.

I agree, Sundays are the bestest! Usually work a bit harder on the Friday so Sat and Sun have less chores to do. Not so much in the winter but you can count on the summer for my spouse and I to sneak out the gates and go for a slo mo drive knowing all the creatures are happily enjoying the weather too. My man plays on vintage vehicles (I think classic is 20 and vintage is 25+ years) so we can go for a day trip. Love the drive, never care about the destination, it is all about the ride. Singing along to the oldy mouldy tunes, smell the sweet air, enjoy the sunshine...no moss under our rolly rockin' wheelers. Never more than a day trip tho, home BEFORE dark to tuck all in is fine by me. Never have to sleep away (maybe 2x in 15 years & hated it--truly home bodies where home is where the heart thrives)...besides, got old dogs and they would miss the routine! LOL

Trade kids off for dogs that get old like us and have more critter dependents to keep you grounded, confused, poor, and forgetful...where was I? Oh yeh...title says random ramblings but must keep on some sorta set out course.

Project Bantam Chanteclers in F1's and F2's - June 2013 ​

Hatched up some F3's on my bantam eight year invested into it Chantecler chicken project--some Brahmas too. In winter we natural hatch mostly under F1/F2 project bantam Chant hens. Really tests a line when it's -20C (-4F) in the Duece Coop and the babes are thriving.

Even got a bantam Brahma warming its toes perched on brood Momma! - Dec 2013
​

Not lost a single chick in the mixed bunch of different ages...working on true Oka foundation blooded varieties in Partridge, Self-Buff, and Self-White. Bantam White Chanteclers were first created by Donald Dearing outta Ontario but he never used any real Chant blood--just recreated the large fowl standards by using the recipe substituting bantam breeds for standards--he missed out on the final addition of White Rhodes and Leghorn that we now know was used as per the creator's obituary, but this was all done after APA officially recognized the breed, so not sure how valid later additions after 1921 would be?


Large Fowl recipe: White variety of the Chantecler chicken: Female (Dark Cornish Male X White Leghorn Female) x Male (Rhode Island Red Male X White Wyandotte Female) resulting Female pullets x White Plymouth Rock Male. Crossed with White Rhode Island Male and then crossed with White Leghorn Male.

F3's so far - hatched winter 2013.​

Whites here are gettin' better and even got a Silver Columbian male like Wilfrid did in his beginnings with the White variety (1908 in his second crossing of Rhode male x Wy female = male he kept for breeding in 1909 was Columbian patterned). Nice to know this was normal and expected and tells me Columbian was hidden in the Whites right from the beginnings of the breed creation, as would be the tell tale "greyish" colouration meaning he also had blue dilution in there working its magic on any eumelanin pigment leakage.


Quote: - Brochure; Souvenir of the World's Poultry Congress held in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada in 1927. Supplied by The Canadian Chantecler Breeders' Association.


I am seeing in my strain the dom and rec white with white enhancers like the blue dilution, barred/cuckoo, Silver, and even the Columbian (to push out pigment to the extremities) genetics but need more generations to have any decent expression of the Partis (the chick in the foreground probably has only a single dose of Pg but the ground colour looks deeper than just a diluted expression of phaeomelanin now!) or Buffers (laugh as some of the Buffs look like Red Pyles from the dom white in a single dose!). Got time to keep playing, eh?

Shape is great in a miniaturized form (love the long wide backs), as is temperament, vigour, fertility (a given in a hybrid working towards ALBC "heritage" purity), and even production (pullets = small eggs and hens = medium grade). Longevity...well with F3's on the go, I don't count a chicken being of any age (old?) till its at least five years of age. Then you know you got natural disease resistance and longevity on the go in the strain simply because they chose to LIVE! The Columbian cockerel is already crowing (singing brightly, eh?), so can do F4's if I wanna, don't usually breed off cockerels and pullets but might this coming spring, depends how busy I get with the rest of the flocks, bevies, gaggles, and broods. I get excited and well, sometimes I just can't behave myself...who says just the youthful ones are the only ones allowed to be simply silly...hee ha harrumph.


Quote:
- William Shakespeare, The Tempest


Well this weekend decided to be kinder to ourselves than we were last weekend...

​

I don't think we ever quite quit...we forget how much we hurt when we work, but we never quite give up hopes that we'll dig deep and find something to draw on. Light the candle on both ends and hope we don't drip hot wax on our fingees...know better but still won't be tamed...tempered but never not wild, eh?

​

Found a warmer break in the weather round about Jan 24th/25th and had two weeks prior, ordered up four pallets of species rations (2 waterfowl, 1 turk a lurk and 1 chook--they only stock 17% layer rations now...you gotta pre-ORDER the proper rations made up for the turkeys and ducks/geese/swans/Shels) from the feed mill for hauling home on the 24th. Just lucky it all fell into place, especially in January! So got the bagged rations picked up, hauled on home, and temporarily stored and we were still feeling out oats so to speak. I guess the Friday never caught up on us till the Sunday and by then, well we all know it's too late to stop the fat lady from singing! Hee hee hee

​

The Saturday was a whirlwind. This is my knight in shining armour (my fav colour is chrome...) waiting patiently on me to "hurry up & dump that last load in the feed pans and mover her on out!" Day trip to our grain supplier and brought home four totes; half whole hard red wheat, half whole heavy oats. Then we got hit with proper winter weather...can we say "all full stop?"

I guess at my age I really don't prefer off loading loads when it's -20C (-4F) and lower...so I simply had to wait. I move but not well, my fav temp is -10C (14F) as you can throw on a very light sweater and there's no bugs to bug you! HA Last weekend it was warmly decent, right around 0C (hovering at freeze/melt, so like 32F--so battled the snow on the roof raining down to drip on my back...not perfection but do able and kept the grains all dry and keepable).

l know I am getting older because just five years back, I would have offloaded two tons (eighty 25kg/55# bags) into our feed room per day with daily chores, no issue. Now I only want to do a ton a day (2,200 pounds/~997 kg or jest a 1000kg) plus chores. Have I wimped out...I'd say I have learned to behave as I don't recall paying so heavily if I felt like givin' 'er! I can do two tons a day, but not much good for nothing dragging my sorry self around snivelling I shoulda done one.

​

Here's the two totes lined up with my bucket brigade begun. Did you know there are like 50+ five gallon pails of grain in one of these tote and a halfs? Dunna ask why I know...as I used rocks to keep track of the cart loads (5 pails per cart moved) and thought it rather silly. Stoop to find a rock and line it up on a ledge...really, has it gotten to that...incentives to line up rocks to see how much I done did? Wondering about now if the rocks I found were ones I lost ... or are those suppose to be lost marbles?

​

Here's one of my furred helpers...team player Styra Foam...she's asking, "You done yet? Done like time to toss toys? You DID save up enough energy to play dog dogs, yes? You look a bit peaked...maybe you need to sit a while longer...don't get up, stay put. I worry about you..."


Sometimes I wonder why us "old folks" are so hard on ourselves as we get older and can't do what we use tah....my son popped by about five years back, was July running about 39C (100F) and I was resting in the shade, havin' a cold cola (cola fired machine--sugar and caffeine...yeh healthy living at its finest!) and he just laughed. Said to me, "Mom, I can't do what yer doing!" Nice, nice there laddy...it is never a question of "can't" round here...when you can't no more, they ship you off to some old age retirement home telling you you gotta relearn how to play bridge ... Simply put, I won't go if I can't sneak a few chooks and a dougal or five in there with me (might allow dogs...lap dogs tho aren't normally 50 pound Cattle Dogs...little too feisty and might chew on other residents...end up with me in jail, three squares and maybe even a padded cell if deemed more unstable than most...ha ha ha!). I told mah boy (over 30...some boy!) to go visit with Dad till I finished up. You come to the farm, you don't interfere with the work bees...on a limited expiry date here...only so much GO juice.

Buzz buzz

So this weekend, playing it safe...day trip to the city to pick up some reserves to add to the stocks--outta saran wrap and old dog kibbles (learning how to feed "no grains" cause one of the old girls has allergies...see...living a longer time just adds to the complications...wiser because we gotta learn new ways to do what we use to do just fine...sigh!). Fly in, fly out, get back home to the sanctuary. Come back home to see everyone survived the high of minus 20C for today and toss more oat straw abouts for the -35C they threaten we are getting tomorrow night. Right proper winter...it's them spring like breaks that get us not acting our rightful ages and being foolish. Leave that for them younger folks to do...

Yeh, so I guess I can say after the trip out today, just chillin' with my peeps.

Doggone & Chicken UP!

Tara Lee Higgins
Higgins Rat Ranch Conservation Farm, Alberta, Canada

 

[blythspirit]

I agree, Sundays are the bestest! Usually work a bit harder on the Friday so Sat and Sun have less chores to do. Not so much in the winter but you can count on the summer for my spouse and I to sneak out the gates and go for a slo mo drive knowing all the creatures are happily enjoying the weather too. My man plays on vintage vehicles (I think classic is 20 and vintage is 25+ years) so we can go for a day trip. Love the drive, never care about the destination, it is all about the ride. Singing along to the oldy mouldy tunes, smell the sweet air, enjoy the sunshine...no moss under our rolly rockin' wheelers. Never more than a day trip tho, home BEFORE dark to tuck all in is fine by me. Never have to sleep away (maybe 2x in 15 years & hated it--truly home bodies where home is where the heart thrives)...besides, got old dogs and they would miss the routine! LOL

Trade kids off for dogs that get old like us and have more critter dependents to keep you grounded, confused, poor, and forgetful...where was I? Oh yeh...title says random ramblings but must keep on some sorta set out course.

Project Bantam Chanteclers in F1's and F2's - June 2013 ​

Hatched up some F3's on my bantam eight year invested into it Chantecler chicken project--some Brahmas too. In winter we natural hatch mostly under F1/F2 project bantam Chant hens. Really tests a line when it's -20C (-4F) in the Duece Coop and the babes are thriving.

Even got a bantam Brahma warming its toes perched on brood Momma! - Dec 2013
​

Not lost a single chick in the mixed bunch of different ages...working on true Oka foundation blooded varieties in Partridge, Self-Buff, and Self-White. Bantam White Chanteclers were first created by Donald Dearing outta Ontario but he never used any real Chant blood--just recreated the large fowl standards by using the recipe substituting bantam breeds for standards--he missed out on the final addition of White Rhodes and Leghorn that we now know was used as per the creator's obituary, but this was all done after APA officially recognized the breed, so not sure how valid later additions after 1921 would be?


Large Fowl recipe: White variety of the Chantecler chicken: Female (Dark Cornish Male X White Leghorn Female) x Male (Rhode Island Red Male X White Wyandotte Female) resulting Female pullets x White Plymouth Rock Male. Crossed with White Rhode Island Male and then crossed with White Leghorn Male.

F3's so far - hatched winter 2013.​

Whites here are gettin' better and even got a Silver Columbian male like Wilfrid did in his beginnings with the White variety (1908 in his second crossing of Rhode male x Wy female = male he kept for breeding in 1909 was Columbian patterned). Nice to know this was normal and expected and tells me Columbian was hidden in the Whites right from the beginnings of the breed creation, as would be the tell tale "greyish" colouration meaning he also had blue dilution in there working its magic on any eumelanin pigment leakage.


- Brochure; Souvenir of the World's Poultry Congress held in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada in 1927. Supplied by The Canadian Chantecler Breeders' Association.


I am seeing in my strain the dom and rec white with white enhancers like the blue dilution, barred/cuckoo, Silver, and even the Columbian (to push out pigment to the extremities) genetics but need more generations to have any decent expression of the Partis (the chick in the foreground probably has only a single dose of Pg but the ground colour looks deeper than just a diluted expression of phaeomelanin now!) or Buffers (laugh as some of the Buffs look like Red Pyles from the dom white in a single dose!). Got time to keep playing, eh?

Shape is great in a miniaturized form (love the long wide backs), as is temperament, vigour, fertility (a given in a hybrid working towards ALBC "heritage" purity), and even production (pullets = small eggs and hens = medium grade). Longevity...well with F3's on the go, I don't count a chicken being of any age (old?) till its at least five years of age. Then you know you got natural disease resistance and longevity on the go in the strain simply because they chose to LIVE! The Columbian cockerel is already crowing (singing brightly, eh?), so can do F4's if I wanna, don't usually breed off cockerels and pullets but might this coming spring, depends how busy I get with the rest of the flocks, bevies, gaggles, and broods. I get excited and well, sometimes I just can't behave myself...who says just the youthful ones are the only ones allowed to be simply silly...hee ha harrumph.



- William Shakespeare, The Tempest


Well this weekend decided to be kinder to ourselves than we were last weekend...

​

I don't think we ever quite quit...we forget how much we hurt when we work, but we never quite give up hopes that we'll dig deep and find something to draw on. Light the candle on both ends and hope we don't drip hot wax on our fingees...know better but still won't be tamed...tempered but never not wild, eh?

​

Found a warmer break in the weather round about Jan 24th/25th and had two weeks prior, ordered up four pallets of species rations (2 waterfowl, 1 turk a lurk and 1 chook--they only stock 17% layer rations now...you gotta pre-ORDER the proper rations made up for the turkeys and ducks/geese/swans/Shels) from the feed mill for hauling home on the 24th. Just lucky it all fell into place, especially in January! So got the bagged rations picked up, hauled on home, and temporarily stored and we were still feeling out oats so to speak. I guess the Friday never caught up on us till the Sunday and by then, well we all know it's too late to stop the fat lady from singing! Hee hee hee

​

The Saturday was a whirlwind. This is my knight in shining armour (my fav colour is chrome...) waiting patiently on me to "hurry up & dump that last load in the feed pans and mover her on out!" Day trip to our grain supplier and brought home four totes; half whole hard red wheat, half whole heavy oats. Then we got hit with proper winter weather...can we say "all full stop?"

I guess at my age I really don't prefer off loading loads when it's -20C (-4F) and lower...so I simply had to wait. I move but not well, my fav temp is -10C (14F) as you can throw on a very light sweater and there's no bugs to bug you! HA Last weekend it was warmly decent, right around 0C (hovering at freeze/melt, so like 32F--so battled the snow on the roof raining down to drip on my back...not perfection but do able and kept the grains all dry and keepable).

l know I am getting older because just five years back, I would have offloaded two tons (eighty 25kg/55# bags) into our feed room per day with daily chores, no issue. Now I only want to do a ton a day (2,200 pounds/~997 kg or jest a 1000kg) plus chores. Have I wimped out...I'd say I have learned to behave as I don't recall paying so heavily if I felt like givin' 'er! I can do two tons a day, but not much good for nothing dragging my sorry self around snivelling I shoulda done one.

​

Here's the two totes lined up with my bucket brigade begun. Did you know there are like 50+ five gallon pails of grain in one of these tote and a halfs? Dunna ask why I know...as I used rocks to keep track of the cart loads (5 pails per cart moved) and thought it rather silly. Stoop to find a rock and line it up on a ledge...really, has it gotten to that...incentives to line up rocks to see how much I done did? Wondering about now if the rocks I found were ones I lost ... or are those suppose to be lost marbles?

​

Here's one of my furred helpers...team player Styra Foam...she's asking, "You done yet? Done like time to toss toys? You DID save up enough energy to play dog dogs, yes? You look a bit peaked...maybe you need to sit a while longer...don't get up, stay put. I worry about you..."


Sometimes I wonder why us "old folks" are so hard on ourselves as we get older and can't do what we use tah....my son popped by about five years back, was July running about 39C (100F) and I was resting in the shade, havin' a cold cola (cola fired machine--sugar and caffeine...yeh healthy living at its finest!) and he just laughed. Said to me, "Mom, I can't do what yer doing!" Nice, nice there laddy...it is never a question of "can't" round here...when you can't no more, they ship you off to some old age retirement home telling you you gotta relearn how to play bridge ... Simply put, I won't go if I can't sneak a few chooks and a dougal or five in there with me (might allow dogs...lap dogs tho aren't normally 50 pound Cattle Dogs...little too feisty and might chew on other residents...end up with me in jail, three squares and maybe even a padded cell if deemed more unstable than most...ha ha ha!). I told mah boy (over 30...some boy!) to go visit with Dad till I finished up. You come to the farm, you don't interfere with the work bees...on a limited expiry date here...only so much GO juice.

Buzz buzz

So this weekend, playing it safe...day trip to the city to pick up some reserves to add to the stocks--outta saran wrap and old dog kibbles (learning how to feed "no grains" cause one of the old girls has allergies...see...living a longer time just adds to the complications...wiser because we gotta learn new ways to do what we use to do just fine...sigh!). Fly in, fly out, get back home to the sanctuary. Come back home to see everyone survived the high of minus 20C for today and toss more oat straw abouts for the -35C they threaten we are getting tomorrow night. Right proper winter...it's them spring like breaks that get us not acting our rightful ages and being foolish. Leave that for them younger folks to do...

Yeh, so I guess I can say after the trip out today, just chillin' with my peeps.

Doggone & Chicken UP!

Tara Lee Higgins
Higgins Rat Ranch Conservation Farm, Alberta, Canada

Oh my gosh...and I was whining about cleaning off the porch..hangs head in shame.. I am in awe of you and yours! I don't like to be gone from home either. I don't do sleepaways and we are always home by dark to put away our hens and button up the property. Our youngest is going off to college this fall so we will have to do something for this next winter to get the girls put up because we aren't home from work before dark in the winter.

 

[ChooksChick]

Canuck, you win the prize for entertainment today!!

 

[CanuckBock]

Oh my gosh...and I was whining about cleaning off the porch..hangs head in shame.. I am in awe of you and yours! I don't like to be gone from home either. I don't do sleepaways and we are always home by dark to put away our hens and button up the property. Our youngest is going off to college this fall so we will have to do something for this next winter to get the girls put up because we aren't home from work before dark in the winter.

No worries, clearing off the porch is good too...

You know us and slip sliding...old bones...don't bounce, mostly jest fall down and end up broke.

This December we saw three times the amount of snow we normally see all winter...it was ... interesting ...

​

After the snow was taken off some of our temporary canopies (working on a parking building...six units...dreamy...dreamin' when all twelve have a spot too--yuk yuk yuk!) I had to begin pulling it back off the piled up heaps on the ground ...early December I did that four times in eight days and we got some 200 feet of canopies with 7.5 feet of roof times two. Yes, I still love snow, lots...but maybe in lesser amounts over more time. I felt old...125 years old...ha ha ha...now, not so bad...I feel good...young for a tree, right?

​

I think the issue I had this winter...it played us. Fall was gorgeous...had a "summer" (all it did was rain every 2 days!) in the fall...nice and warm. I had the ducks out one day, weatherman said next day snow...I sorta believed it, way way over due and....

​

And he never said SNOW for the whole month...and it would snow like it rained...every two days, just in time for you to wake up outta the daze to...more snow...

I lost count at four feet and how many times the bird yard got cleared out. I know when spring hits I'll need to be on stilts because some of my pathways are three feet up in the air....got my head bumping low branches and I don't want to trim them no more...be this canopy 10 feet up. But if I keep bonking my head...can't say I won't have a old timer fit and cut a few boughs...sigh...self inflicted pruner's purge...sure to be regrets come summer...AGH!

​

I like home...worked a lifetime making home where I wanna be. Would not make much sense to make a place you hated. Where we live, I consider it like camping but with all the comforts of home...tired of outside, go in and use the amenities. Long weekends are holidays and work we do. Invest in ourselves and reap the rewards, I figure at least. I never wanna go away because everything I like, right here and when do we ever have everything done up completely like we wanna...ha ha ha...not dead yet, still making changes...IMPROVEMENTS!

Can you hear the rant...???

Yeh, you'll get thru the empty nester syndrome...we all do...fight like the dickens not to be responsible and then after 20 or so years of beat about the head to be responsible and solid on our feets...(mine stayed till he was 18 and high school educated and off to tech school he went, degree in engineering now--made me chicken soup last week...that's good as I know he can take care of himself)...takes two or so years to unleash the choke collar. My son phoned my hero's cel one day...quite emotional "Where ARE you guys?" "Well Dad and I are at A&W drivethru with the dogs...Oooopps, there's the fries...Gotta go Boy....!" Never had money to run about with the kid, but once he was gone...we got a bit crazy and wandered about, lost but still home before dark. Then we got it figured back out and quite fine with our second freedom stretched out in front of us. Kinda *sic* though because we should behave and we know we should but we don't and then whine like babies when we push it. Ha ha ha...fortune of having old brains...limited memory retention..."Did that hurt the last time? I forget..." Oh yeh...

Can't teach an old dog new tricks. Heh heh heh...

Still got it going on...trouble is, too many parts worn almost out to fully accomplish what we use too...thank heavens we worked at getting things in order so we could coast a bit. Get by on our former good looks...

Doggone & Chicken UP!

Tara Lee Higgins
Higgins Rat Ranch Conservation Farm, Alberta, Canada

 

[blythspirit]

Well I don't have another quilt to post pictures on, yet, but I do have this picture to post (and he has absolutely no idea I took it and would quite possibly kill me if he found out that I took it and posted it online). It's 42 degrees here in central Maine. I just went out to buy shavings for the coop. Had the window down and the air flow turned to the coldest of the cool (and was still sweating). BF went and got my wheelbarrow for me upon my return:



Yup. 42 degrees is tank top and shorts weather.

oh my gosh, that looks just like my husband...he wears shorts and t-shirts year round..I am frozen if someone opens the refrigerator too long..lol..

 

[CanuckBock]

Canuck, you win the prize for entertainment today!!

Just so long as it is not the "booby" prize and I have to throw them over my shoulder to get the chores done up.

We laugh...Rick wanted to talk about his vintage rides on a vintage truck forum and needed a handle...I asked him for one and instantly...too old to part out was born.

​

Yup, that sums us up.

Happy and active but not kidding ourselves none.

​

Felt sorry for this young girl...out in the city in our Red Chev for a ride (this unit's named after our red Australian Cattle Dog "HyBlade" and Rick's work as a grader men--in the red Chev, he sure ain't rolling no rocks or pushing snow, now is he?) and she pulls up. I am thinking she thought some stud muffins out doing loser laps...Nope...the look on her face was PRICELESS...one of shock, disappointment and utter disgust--her whole expectations dashed when she sees what's driving and riding shot gun! Bwa ha ha...booga booga!

What made me laugh the most was the truck I bought my husband is the same year he had when I first met him...me and the kid wore it right out. New family having a life, so I bought him one to replace it in red, with air and 4x4 for his 49th. Been enjoying the rework he did on her ever since...repainted, pimped it out with some LED lights and a bit of shiny trim and such but left everything else pretty much stock. No hot rod stuff...we don't need to go fast to get noticed...LMBO New engine...but again, stock, no super duper over the top but a heavy duty fan to keep the engine cool in summer. I did up some of my etching on the glass on the canopy. RH for his initials...it is his fer sure! Even the whitewalls...we had those on his blue truck. Wait long enough and everything's new again...sheesh!

​

Sweet ride but we ain't no more...

Reliving our youth but now we can really enjoy it, maybe keep the better parts going along that we enjoy.

Doggone & Chicken UP!

Tara Lee Higgins
Higgins Rat Ranch Conservation Farm, Alberta, Canada

 

[Wisher1000]

I was going to tell yall about my morning selling hens and hatching chicks, but after reading Canuck's posts, I'm too tired.

 

[blythspirit]

I was going to tell yall about my morning selling hens and hatching chicks, but after reading Canuck's posts, I'm too tired.

 

[ozexpat]

I read the first one and had to have a nap. I woke up screaming for Bernie in some bad nightmare.

After the second one I took 800mg Ibuprofen