Washingtonians Come Together! Washington Peeps

[itsren]

Sitting here this morning with my SAD light hoping it'll help my mood a bit; just woke up feeling a bit upset for no reason. Took all my supplements and I'm letting the kids all color at the kitchen table while they eat their breakfast so I can get a minute alone.

On today's agenda: 4 loads of laundry, homeschool catch up, organize hall closet, waterproof nest boxes so Lucy stops getting damp.

I hope you feel better. I deal with that, too. Although, now that the light is getting better, I'm feeling better each day.

Today, if I can drag myself out there, I think I'm going to try to move the portable greenhouse to the grass, put the PVC chicken tractor inside, set up the brooder light inside and let the chicks explore the wonderful world of grass for a bit. I'm already imagining the squawking that might be involved as soon as the older 5 discover there are more chicks to have to learn to tolerate.

 

[flirty31]

I would think that if there were others in your boat, you'd have seen them already.


No?

Glad to see we have some jokesters in this thread

 

[itsren]

Hmmm you better get a good dose of vitamin D or hatchatitus will consume you before you know it.

It is our female way of dealing with rainy gloomy days.

So THAT explains why I have 13 birds on a lot that's only supposed to have 6.

 

[CarolynF]

Hi all:

I've been busy and out of the loop on everything lately, but I was just glancing through my new issue of Mother Earth News (Feb/March2013) and came across an article that needs sharing. It is about herbicides that pass through livestock and into compost making "Killer Compost". I can't link to the latest article, so I searched and found this one from a few years ago:

http://www.motherearthnews.com/organic-gardening/killer-compost-zmgz11zrog.aspx

I had never heard of "Killer Compost", but it sure explains why all my raspberry plants died within 2 years of sticking them in the ground, and why I can hardly grow any vegetables in my original garden beds, but the new beds are fine. Blackberries grow wild and plentiful in my yard, so I felt the raspberries should do equally well. To give them an advantage over the established blackberries, I gave them plenty of compost that I had purchased and delivered by the truckloads. My property is all glacial till with no topsoil, so all of my garden beds are built up using this compost: 24 fruit trees, 40 blueberry bushes 1 dozen raspberry plants and 6 large vegetable beds (each aout 16'X4') were filled with this stuff. The blueberries are not affected by it, but all my raspberry plants got curled leaves, most died within a year, the rest died year 2. 1/3 of my fruit got curl and trees died, within 2 years, all but 2 of the others still have stunted growth, and in the garden beds I could not grow beans, spinach, peas, lettuce, asparagus, peppers, carrots ... all stuff that grows well in the new beds. AFter 4 years of frustration with the old garden beds, DH and I built new ones. My new beds I filled with a mix of organic compost from the local nusery that I buy by the bag and compost made from kitchen scraps and chicken poo. The organic soil is quite a bit more expensive than the "North West Garden Best" that I had truck delivered, but in the long run it is saving me because plants will grow in the new stuff. These new (well, new 5 years ago) beds are still not very deep, but every year I add a dozen new bags and a lot more compost.

Hi Ogress, Thanks for the link, that was an interesting though upsetting article. Hearing that Whatcom county has been hard hit is disappointing. Sometimes I just want to run and hide from all the bad things we have to try to figure out without having the necessary details to make a good decision. We're starting a new garden area this spring and I've put in as much of our chicken manure as possible, but we were planning to add commercial compost, too. I'm hoping Oly Mountain is still ok!

 

[WhiskiRanch]

We luckily will get our compost from the neighbor. Its straight cow manuer but he piles it up thruout the year in one of his pastures and we go over and scoop a tractor bucket of it up and lay it out where our veggie garden will be and disk it up real good and then let it sit for a month or so before planting anything. i like it because I know everything thats in the soil

 

[Nikki99]

New to BYC today but had to post recently moved into our home in Graham WA and in the process of getting our 1st coop built. Wanting to start with five any recommendations for what breeds work best. 

Welcome!!   Are you only getting into chickens for the eggs? If so, I recommend getting a bunch of different breeds to see what you like. As for our fantastic backyard layers, we adore the hard work of our Black Australorp, Buff Orpingtons, Rhode Island Red, and we'll also be getting Barred Rocks in 2 weeks to add some more fantastic layers to the flock. That combo would give you a nice pretty backyard flock; I highly recommend at least one Easter Egger too; can't beat those gorgeous green and blue eggs!
[/quote]

Welcome!! I agree with Jess, get a variety!! I love the personality of our RIR, she's so sweet and curious, follows me everywhere!! Our BSL lays the biggest eggs out of all our chickens and the darkest one too. I can't wait until our EE starts laying, I love the blue and green eggs! Our BR lays an egg that always looks like it has white paint blown all over it, pretty cool.
Good luck and have fun!

 

[itsren]

Quote:
I think that's what killed Tilda. The more I thought and thought about what could have possibly done that to her, the closer I came to realizing she got sick right after the last time my neighbor had his yard sprayed. We share a chain link fence line and I watched the guy last time he came and gave him hell and told him to stay WELL on the other side of that fence or I'd sue him for killing my chicken. Yeah I was ******. Oops.

That could be. We have one neighbor who insists she buys "organic" pesticide from Washington Tree Company. It's one of those situations where I just have to zip my lips shut and walk away. I usually walk away very quickly when she talks about it, because my lip zipper doesn't work well sometimes.

 

[CarolynF]

New to BYC today but had to post recently moved into our home in Graham WA and in the process of getting our 1st coop built. Wanting to start with five any recommendations for what breeds work best.

Welcome, Welcome, and hello!

Glad to have you with us.
You should try to join Chicken Rustler, Mikeyb, and the others on Friday afternoon and get acquainted! There are several BYC folks in your neighborhood.
I've seen some good recommendations already, Black Australorp, Barred Rock, Rhode Island Red, etc. And definitely an EE for the "pretty" eggs. If you want choc. brown eggs go for a Wellsumer or Marans. If you haven't already heard this advice, try to get birds from local breeders rather than hatcheries. Many of the folks here will have chicks available soon. And there are 2 shows coming up where you can also get chicks and started birds. March 16 in Monroe, and April in Vancouver. Enjoy!

 

[CarolynF]

We luckily will get our compost from the neighbor. Its straight cow manuer but he piles it up thruout the year in one of his pastures and we go over and scoop a tractor bucket of it up and lay it out where our veggie garden will be and disk it up real good and then let it sit for a month or so before planting anything. i like it because I know everything thats in the soil

Well I think you should scoop some of that poop up for me and haul it along with your disc equip. over to my house!!

I *really* need to move to a farm!!!!

 

[WhiskiRanch]

I would die laughing if Isaw a tractor full of cow poo going down I-90...hahaha