SPRING developments

Well hello...

Okay so I told myself I was going to be better at sitting and updating and well I didn't.  This is exactly why I don't make New Years resolutions either.

The month of March and part of April saw us teeter-tottering between bought of blizzards and ice and MUD.  Nothing brings down a person's mood or energy like acres of mud let me tell you.  I was prepared for mud when we made the move to rural living but seeing horses knee deep in mud; losing your rubber boot to sticky mud holes while moving horses and buckets and the constant mopping at the front door just depletes ones stamina.

Thankfully we had  a full week of sunshine last week and my internal energy is replenished!

I think it may be safe to say its spring, so here's a quick spring update.  There have been lots and lots of babies!

The first baby chicks hatched here at SchnickAcres... in the midst of ice storms that saw us losing hydro in the wee hours of the morning and running the gasoline powered generator (NOT quiet).

Baby ducklings... four for Krista's kindergarten classroom and nine for the neighbour down the road.  Though I am a self confessed "Crazy-Chicken-Lady" even I have to admit these guys are sweeties.
And once again, please let me tell you just how COOL small town people really are - I mean, DUCKLINGS in the KINDERGARTEN classroom!  What an amazing experience for the children.  :)   I love the names the kids gave them.. "DJ, Daisy, Fluffy and Fudgey".

And Smores brought four little fuzzy babies into the world at the end of March.  Two little grey tabbies (named Jasper and Edgar), one little Torti-shell that the girls named Stevie after her daddy and finally a little orange tabby that Krista named "Mr Orange".  For being a young mommy, Smores is an amazing mother.

And with the sunny weather it was time for us to get started on our outdoor to-do list before the mosquitoes make their appearance.  We began by trimming all the pine trees out front and trimming back some overgrowth at the roadside.  Our garden plot has been dug, and layered, and this past weekend, Derek began the big job of painting the barn roof.

The metal sheets were rusted but solid... after much research it was primed and painted...by Derek... I just held the ladder and held my breath.  Yikes...

Our 2016 goal list is ever growing.. the things that must be done and the things that can be done to move us towards a life of self sufficiency.  Even the mediocre jobs such as tree trimming and raking fill us with such a feeling of satisfaction and pride.  Life is good.

Happy Tuesday.

Jeanette

February Developments

Happy Leap Year!

It is hard to believe that today is the last day of February!  While we humans spent more days sick (colds and flu) than in any month I can remember, we had magic happening in our nursery.

Remember my craft room turned poultry brooder last summer?  It has once again been made into a baby bird nursery though on a smaller scale for now.

Last November, Derek met the father in law of a friend who aside from being just a real neat guy, happened to have an older style, large scale incubator he was willing to sell.  Though a little older, the  technology is the same and the wooden panelled unit was in phenomenal condition!

So, in the last days of January, Derek and Nicole moved the incubator into the craft room and Derek set to tinkering and  calibrating and on January 31 we set our first five duck eggs into the incubator.

What  a learning curve... learning to candle the eggs to ensure they were indeed fertilized and growing,  reading the humidity and temperature and adjusting as needed and finally, learning to recognize distress in hatching.

By day five we could see that we indeed had four growing embryos and one unfertilized egg.

Day five

And once those blood vessels stretched out, the embryo seemed to grow so fast!  For videos, be sure to check us out on instagram!

Day six

Day ten

Day sixteen

Day twenty-five

Newborn "Acadia" Day twenty-seven

Learning on a farm is not always easy and our girls are handling the ups and downs phenomenally.  Our first egg 'pipped' the outer shell almost 24 hours earlier than the others and knowing it can take a day for the duckling to emerge we did not panic.  Unfortunately, the little duckling passed while trying to hatch.  :(

Our little duckling Acadia emerged on her own moments after we sadly realized the passing of the first.

Worried about the progress on the final two ducklings and seeing similarities in the 'unzipping' progress we attempted to assist.  Knowing that the umbilical is attached until the very end we were very careful to assist only with some of the shell along the air pocket.  Sadly one little duckling perished shortly after getting its little body most of the way out of the egg and our final little duckling was quite weak from the hatching process.

We set this final little duckling into the brooder under the heat lamp to dry and keep warm and would you believe, little Acadia would not leave his side?  As we checked in throughout the night, Acadia had moved the little duckling away from the heat and helped him roll.  

By morning, the little duckling was up and exploring!

Nosy little duckling.  :)

The hatching process can be influenced by many factors - humidity being a big one.  As the incubator was reset, Derek spent the day reading up on the different situations that can arise and tweaking our original thermometer calibrations.  Our girls spent the day loving our new little family members.

 "Taylor (left)  and Acadia (right)"

Our next trays are in the incubator and include chicken eggs for me, the crazy chicken lady and ducklings for a neighbour down the road as well as some duck eggs for Krista's kindergarten class who would like to welcome them into the classroom for some learning adventures (can I say again how much I LOVE our small town? How cool are classroom ducklings??)  

New babies... all just in time for the Easter weekend.  :)

Jeanette