We have chicks!

It's alive!

From Jan 26th to Jan 28th, our first batch of chicks were born.

We did pretty well. Only 3 chicks never saw the light and one died 12 hours after being born from a broken yolk.

Our chicks are now in their maternity, a place where it's warm enough for them. They are growing well and their are already showing some feathers. Chicks grow to the speed of light.

It was an amazing experience. I will surely redo it and I loved to see them getting born. They are born fighters.

Now they think I am their mother, reacting to my every sound and move. It's funny.

Me, the chicken and Freud

I don't know how the chicken mind works. To be honest I would love to be able to decode chickens as I can decode cats.

Yesterday we transferred some laying hens in the laying hens sector ...

Fight! ... yeah fight! Between two hens.

The new one and the old one you'll say...

No ... between two that were already there?!

Of course Casanova, our police rooster rapidly intervened so now all is nice.

But why? I mean why the hell suddenly the fact of a new hen will bring too already coexisting hens to fight? And by the way a hen fight is not that nice to check!

I haven't written the end of the vacations simply because ... I ended it in the hospital. I had a relapse of my disease and spend a day and a night in the hospital.

Though, if we made a recap of all we did during the holiday season ... it's good. Three new cages for the rabbits, a water heater, a heating system, some food canned.

Next step will be to plan a cage for that Plymouth rock that is now alone ... :-( I really have to find a "hen for him" ... I don't know where I could go for that really at this time of the year ...

We will also build a cage for the Anconas.

Then, we plan on starting the demolition of the second floor at last. Recently we bought a second-handed bath for the bathroom that will be on the second floor. It's not a clawfoot bath like I wanted at first ... but I came to realize that it won't be that simple. Clawfoot baths are often very expensive or simply too small. I've also been told that they are not very good to keep water hot.

I just have to hold on and it will soon happen.
I have to admit I am a bit tired to live in a constant chaotic place.

That's for the news ...

Day 2-3 ...

Yesterday with had some "party" with the bears pack (aka my best friends) in Magog. We came back at like 2am home and I was totally but totally drained (can someone please tell me how 1 (yeah just one) bailey can do that much destruction?)

When we arrived the rabbits were short of water as well as the hens ... so we had to water (can I say that?) all the animals ... (probably not, but I am sick ... sooooo I won't check for a more appropriate verb)

Today, after we have been waken up by a choir of snowblower ... we got up and tried (key word here) to do something.

I was not well at all. Anyways, husband ... ohhh the hell with it ... Martin, ok my name is Julie, his name is Martin. No need to hide anymore everyone I know is like reading that thing. So Martin build some ... ok I have to find a name for that... he built well ... Some shit blocker (ew!) for the coops. Let say that the Ameraucanas for some reason are pretty good in that area of production.

Then. my friend Evelyne came by and gave me the nicest thing ever. She bought me a painting with poppies on it (Coquelicots being poppies for those of you who aren't fluent in French). I was pretty happy about it.

We also had a pleasant surprise. I was like checking my fridge telling myself that eggs is nice ... but not like 15 dozens of them when the phone rang. Madame Charron our neighbour asked us for some eggs. I was very pleased. Like 5 minutes after, someone knocked at the door. "You have eggs right" ... I was like good lord, I am very powerful when it is time to decide that I have to sell things! haha ... Well, our other neighbor recently sold us 12 hens, well now he is sending us all his clients!!!! I was super happy!!!

Right now, I am trying to clean up the living room (as you can see I am working really hard ... *rolling eyes*). We have to work on the heating soon, 'cause it's like 15 degrees right now. I am freezing!!! Some people I know would be totally nice about it. I am not. I am totally not!

Tomorrow, it's Xmas, so "day off" nothing but normal hen care.

The 15 days of Christmas - Day 1

We have 15 days of vacation starting today until Jan 7th. We plan to make the most of it. In order to feel better afterwards, I plan on writing all we did during those 15 days.
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Day 1.

Well, this morning husband went to pick up our brand new heating system. Can you guys believe that even if we are in Quebec, we have been heating the house with nothing more than 1 heater in the crawlspace and like 2 space heaters ... well let say that we had a rough time lately (strangely it was ok last year) so we went to buy some.

Since I've got a relapse of my disease two weeks ago (damn Pistacchios - but at least we got the culprit!) and that husband got sick ... Let say that the coop was not sparkling clean like it is normally. So we spent most of the day scrapping chicken shit, cleaning up everything and disinfecting the feeders.

We've also moved Coton (our rabbit) to a new space, leaving us more space to put some other small coops.

I did some laundry and some clean up in the house (that is also badly needed).

It's almost 4 o'clock now and I am exhausted. I am learning to check the signs that brings me to being too tired. When I exhaust myself, it's bad for my disease.

I've also have some pain in the back because of the fall I've made in the stairs yesterday and the stiff muscles from my lane departure on the highway 20 while going to my father's factory on Tuesday ... there was a snow storm and I missed the exit and I ended up in the field. I've got the scare of my life.

Tonight we are going to see my students making a lip-sync show in the village's school.

Joy and sore muscles ...

I am read!! J

I am always a bit afraid about that. Not in a bad way nor in a …  how to say that? It’s not that I am afraid, but I've been judged so much in my life that when someone says he or she reads the blog, I have mixed feelings. Joy that I am being read and knowing that I might be interesting enough to be read and the fact that I might say something that will make people think less of me or of us.

Well, people that are reading me and that are meeting me in real life. I am glad you read and are still happy with the fact you know us! J

Anyways, I am read!

Wow, what a weekend! All the stuff we have done  this weekend is amazing!

First on Friday night, we got prepared for the weekend, we took care of the animals and all.

Then on Saturday, we build a new cage for our Phoenixes and then we moved Oreo and Neige in a new cage (they seemed pretty happy of that... Neige was hopping around in her cage).

On Sunday, we went to meet a couple who did homesteading for 30 years. They are now selling their farm because they are "too old" (remark the brackets - I don't think they are) and now they move back to my former town ... poor them ...

Well anyways, so I went to see those people and we really connected with the couple. They gave us two Guinea Fowls and tons of stuff ... plus they sold us around $3000 worth of farming stuff ... for like $300. I was in heaven!!! That place of theirs was amazingly well done. Like my dream place really.

We will surely inspire ourselves from that place to build the houses here.

We also got two new cats, Strudel and Chausson. They are both pretty cute. Though they don't seem to keen of the barn so we rapidly build them a shelter on the porch last night as snow was coming.

With the new equipment we got from the couple, we will soon produce chicks!

Feathers, tons of feathers!

Wow, the last weeks have been pretty busy feathery wise. Even if I told myself I wouldn't buy any other chicken for the season, some bargains arrived (and some crookery too) that I couldn't resist.

First, our neighbour was getting rid of his 12 leghorns before the winter for the ridiculous price of 3$ each. Those hens were from last spring so that was according to me a bargain. So 12 more ...

Then, we spotted a girl who was supposedly selling orpingtons. Orpingtons are like my dream brand since I've started raising pure breed chickens. We went there and ... I got distracted, turns out I bought hens that probably aren't orpingtons... but then they are still cute. That makes it 16 ...

Then, my favorite breeder called me to invite me over for dinner, turns out he had 3 hybrid hens he wanted to get rid of ... Oops 19 now.

Then, the day we went to pick up the 3 hens he told my husband about a couple of Light Brown Leghorns to sell ... We couldn't resist ... that's now 21!

But as we were picking up the Leghorns ... we saw that Phoenix for sale ...

Ok fine, let's make it 23!

And all this ... in a week ...

I know ... some say passionate, some say nutcase! hahaha!

more deaths

I guess my bad feeling of yesterday wasn't in vain.
Two hens died of sudden deaths last night.

- sigh -

I have to become stronger

Let those birds roam free!

We finally had time to build that pen we badly needed for the hens.
It's 10X10 feet and it has been made (personal pride here) with reclaimed wood. The only new material part was the chicken wire.

We took pallet wood that are super easy to assemble (like it's already made for you) and it took us like around 5-6 hours to set perfectly. All you have to do is to join the pallets together, then attach the corner to the structure and voila. Also, taking used chicken wire is not an option in our case. We could have also completed the pallets with some boards we have from other pallets. We made the door from boards taken from extra pallets we have (to give you an idea, each time we go to the city, we go in some places where we know they are throwing it away and we fill the car)

The finish pen with our Cayenne

I wasn't able to help husband in every steps of the process. But I am glad we made it. We tried the pen with our Ameraucanas and they were pretty happy about it.

New hens ... and no I am not feeling blue!

Last Saturday we went  to our favorite breeder and got ourselves 15 baby Ameraucana. We are going to be breeders! Yeah that was a little shock for us too. It will be so funny to pick blue eggs!

So yeah, I am going to be a breeder of some variety of Standard chickens.

I plan in breeding Ameraucanas, Anconas, and if all goes to plan, Warrens, Orpingtons, Plymouth Rocks, Leghorns and of course some hybrid chickens. I am looking to breed breeds that have good dual purposes.

I want to offer people in my region who aren't massive breeders or hatcheries an alternative to hybrids brown and white chickens that are sold each year like just one day at the farmer's market. To me it's important to have more choice and better ones.

I am passionate by Standard Large Fowls Chickens.

So, that's for the news.

More pic soon! :)

Goodbye Little Hen

Well, when I said in a previous post that "the death of the jackrabbit was preparing me for many more to come" I couldn't be more right.
This morning, in like 10 minutes we lose a Warren.
I started to cry when I heard the news, good for me, I didn't see her, husband did.

I am very worried, how will I manage the first death I will have to manage myself?

I just can't deal right with death.

We put the hen in a bag and buried her in the cemetery along the rabbit.

I am very sad.

Goodbye little hen, thanks for the eggs and the laugh.
(Warrens are really funny).

The System

I knew it before, but I am sure of it.
Being a farmer, the way that I am, is fighting against a system, a system that even if it's fighting us and won't let go before major problems occur, is followed and even loved by most of the people.

We chose to produce things the way our ancestors did for tons of reasons.

Life as itself doesn't need human intervention to produce. Of course, you can prune, you can water, you can trim, but it doesn't need to be boosted by some kind of chemicals to produce. A tomato is a tomato and even if you let the plant grow by itself, you'll have a tomato at the end, maybe not as much as if you took good care of it, but still you'll have one.

Though, people nowadays are used to have a Pantone 186C tomatoes, same color, same form as the tomato they ate 2 days before. Grocers choose tomatoes for the clients like they would choose the logo for their next ad campaign. I remember a conversation I had with my neighbour about the day a grocer pointed him a tomato on a billboard saying "bringing me that and nothing else". My neighbour was producing 20000 tomatoes a year. He gave up.

Reason? Simple.
You can't produce a tomato like that without using chemicals and genetically modified stuff.

When I bought my apple trees in April, to the question asked by my provider, when not knowing much about apples, I answered Cortland, all she could tell me was:

"Are you sure?"

Cortland apples are popular. The market loves them. But to be able to have a nice and beautiful Cortland apple like the one you are eating everyday, your trees as to be chemically treated ... 15 times a year.

15 times!

Still want that piece of apple pie?

We don't know that. Well, or we know, or we pretend not to.

Recently when I discovered all the shit that was in my hens feeder I stopped feeding them with hormones. Of course, hormone fed hens produce more eggs and produced a lot of bigger eggs.

Do I want steroids in my eggs?
No

Today when someone told me with a point of disappointment :

"Well, can I take 2 dozen of your eggs 'cause they are really small!"

I understood that I too was now fighting the system.

Hens - what I learned - Part 1

There is one thing that I hate about our project is the lack of information that are reliable and Quebec friendly.
There are tons of books on Homestanding, sadly they are all written in an american aspect. We, in Quebec, have a very bipolar weather. We have very hot and very humid summers (from 20 C to 45 C - and this can happen in a day) and very cold winter (well we are supposed to have very cold winters but since 2010, I've rarely seen the -35 C, that used to make us tough cookies). American books never really deal with that perspective.

I am super novice when it comes to hens (and when it comes to a lot of things to be honest) but I grab some amazing info through the words of Bernard Desourdy. The guy is amazingly colorful, he calls himself big mouthed, but geez, what a wonderful man! First, he knows everything about hens, he breed champions tons of time (you should see that house that is full of trophies of any kinds). Second, he is willing to share his knowledge to all proven of having good intentions.

So I've learned several things about hens that I want to tell you.

1. Those are hens, not cats, not dogs, hens. You don't cuddle them like a cat, and you don't pet them like a dog. Of course, you can pet a hen but you have to do it with the back of your hand, not your palm.

2.  When socialized properly, hens - even roosters, can become amazing pets. You have to win their trusts ... each day!

3. You can feed a hen everything --- but EVERYTHING that is not eggs or meat. You should see them eating mac and cheese!

4. It's not true that a hen lays a egg a day. It's true if you "boost" them with hormones (mainly the "nourriture pour poules pondeuse - aka toxic poison that is on sale at all the COOP in Quebec). When you boost your end, you force them to lay eggs. Is this really what you want? When you force them to lay, you tired them. After a while, your hen will become tired, without feathers and full of hormones. After 2 years you can kiss her byebye.

5. A well treated and well fed hens can lay good eggs until the age of 5!

6. NEVER EVER give a hen eggshell (some say it gives them calcium) yeah it does. But would you agree to eat your own ovaries? Plus, if you give them shells, they are more inclined to eat their own eggs.

7. If a hen starts eating her own eggs, set her aside, and fed her all the shells you can find (hens one only) plus her regular food. Just like you would react after being fed all you can eat ice cream for three days, you might never want to eat ice cream again (or not for a long time).

8. Hens and rabbits, don't match. Never put a rabbit in the same park as a hen. The hen will kill it.

9. You can give oyster shell to your hen for calcium. (one that are on sale especially for that)

10. When you are a newbie like me, you go to the coop for your hens ... at the "journée poussin". Just like us you'll be offered "red hens" and "white hens". FYI the red ones are called "Warrens" and the white ones are called "Leghorns". If you are a beginner and have no choice to go there to buy you hens (they are somehow expensive) take the Warrens. For a beginner this is an easier birds. Leghorns are somehow nervous birds and they are way less sociable then Warrens. The coop also assure you than the hens are 20 weeks old ... sooooooooooo not true. I got a hen this year that started laying eggs a week ago (that would made her 12 weeks old or so!). If you can go to a specialist breeder go for it. We bought Anconas, Uccles and Sultan from Bernard and I really like the Anconas, that's a very good breed for Quebec.

11. Bloody stains on the eggs? Don't panic, it's just your hen first egg. (you should have see me freaking out)

12. 4 times a year you can vermifuge your hens using like the tip of your pinky size of a garlic. Do this for 5 days and prepare yourself for the day after shitting .... ewwww (btw this is just for hens, never try on another animals this is toxic)

13. Hens should be treated for fleas twice a year.

That's about what I learned.

Since a picture worths a thousand word

Here are some pics of the place and our furry friends.

Me fighting a door last March

Our inside cat, Cassis

Our rabbit, Fibonacci

Our cat, Muscade

In April (yeah temp varies a lot in Quebec) trying to clean up the mess that was outside (left by the former owner)

The mess before and after. At least now the mess is compost!

Part of the farm exterior ... the soon to be unbuild pool :(

The land, where we cultivate our veggies

Growing asparagus

The barn with a brand new Mulberry tree, the mess was still there ...

The land just before planting in June

Eole, our first barn cat and I

This is our cat, Camille

This is our now amazingly pregnant, Soleil

This is our Uccle rooster, called Mr Dujardin

His wife, Mrs Dujardin

This our dog, Cayenne (costs less than the car!) she is a Saint-Pyrenee or as I like to call her, a Pybernard.

This is our Sultan hen, Jasmine

And her husband, Aladin

This is part of our coop, Casanova, our Ancona rooster and his wife (well one of his wife) Bettina are missing.

One of our rabbit, Oreo

Our small Isis

Lil Moutarde

To whom who think I don't ...

I think I will say it once, maybe twice, probably all my life.

The hardest part of what we are doing is the fact that people think we are one or all of the following:

- Crazy

- Stupid

- Uncounscious

It's like they think we never think.

Crazy:

Since my last writing, a lot of things have been done. We cleaned most of the land of the garbage that was left there by the former owner, we planted trees, we built a chicken coop, we started a garden ... We got animals.

That's where the "bitching machine" went crazy.

To most people, the fact that we are working on the land while our house is upside down is like an act of terrorism ... or something worst. I just don't get why people care so much about how our house (focus on the "our") looks like a dump. Is it hurting someone? To my knowledge they don't live here and Martin and I are both adults, no kids being involved. It's like, they couldn't live in that mess so it's impossible that we can live in that one without being a bit nuts. It's impossible that we left a clean, brand new house for this. It's impossible that we found happiness here but not there. It's impossible to them that I find more pleasure petting my 10 barn cats or walking in my 4 acres then planting begonias in a single row around my tiny porch in town. I must then be crazy.

I am buying stuff from garage sell, I recycle things when I could buy new, I have enough money for that. I must then be crazy.

Stupid:

I bought a house that has to be repaired completely. I've spent money to buy land ... LAND! 100K for a shack and trees? Oh god, I am stupid. I plan on doing it myself, out of recycled good? Omg! I am soooooo stupid! What? Composting toilets instead of real ones? Hahahahahaha ! Geez I am sooooooooo stupid. Bringing cats to my farm! They will reproduce, you'll soon have too much? What? They reproduced? I've always thought they lived 3 months and then turned into plush toys! Good Lord have mercy! I am super stupid!

Uncounsious:

Taking care of so many barn cats. Cats that were meant to be euthanized! Giving them another chance to live? Good lord what an careless person I am. All cats must be in a house or in heaven, that's a given! What? they don't all live with me in my house? The 10 of them! What a bad person I am.

And those rabbits I have outside? What will happen in winter? What you don't eat them? Why the hell do I have rabbit then? For fun!?! Animals aren't meant to be fun, they are meant to be in the house or eaten!

Well, I won't go on with all the judgemental comments I collected so far.

All I will tell you though, is that the house is still upside down, we are planning on going on with it during late fall. 

Yes, we have now 12 hens, 3 roosters, 4 rabbits, 10 barn cats (and that a variable number - some come and go ---- what come and go? What a loosy person you are ... not organizing a massive search for each and every single cat not soundly sleeping in the barn after midnight) and a wonderful dog (what a dog with cats ! --- she loves them for Pete's sake!!!) and I am super happy. I am selling eggs and some veggies and I love my life.

And to those who think I am not thinking ... Here's what I am thinking : Go to hell ! 

Trees up ... trees down

The last two weekends were crazy.

We planted trees, fruit ones mainly. We also chopped down some. The two birches that were in front of the house were a bit dangerous. So cutting down and replanting ... We have around 15 fruit trees now but those won't be producing any this year as we have to take off the flowers to give them a chance.

We also get a chicken coop. It was in another village and it's nice 'cause it's a recycled one.

We have to take care of it and as soon as it will be ready we will bring chicken in it. Well, more hens than chicken, for the eggs.

And that's the latest ! :)