Fitty's Angling Ramble 7.0

[Hartski]

Both me and Kate have been sick since Christmas. Seems we just can't shake it until it warms up and we can open up the house

[Nainoa]

I'm just getting sick and tired of Winter.

This is a big "Deadlines" time of year for me so I've been super busy.

Dipped back into Ad sales to try to make some extra cash... I'm hoping to stock pile enough $$$$ that I can write my novel in earnest this summer...

Had a publisher offer me a contract to help me self publish for print.

He basically covers the printing cost and distribution through Amazon... Then we split the profits.

Right now all my writing goes into paying bills... So as much as I hate going back to ad sales, it might buying me the breathing room to make it happen!

This is a real make it or break it year for me.

[Nainoa]

Sadly it appears my old rosemary plant that has been living in a 5 gallon bucket since 2011, will not survive the winter.


My daughter and I bought a new plant, and potted it up with a little bit of old rosie's dirt.

[Procta]

I had two palms take a big hit last week. I hope they will come back. Temps dropped to 25 Thurs night for a hard freeze theny yesterday temp was 80 and I went to the beach.
Drastic temps will destroy the tropical plants easy

[Nainoa]

My chickens are going insane with being cooped up this much.

They refuse to go outside when the temps are under 32. Instead they just keep trying to figure out how to break out of the coop and get free access to the rest of the barn.

All 6 birds have started laying again and on warm days they are really going off... I've had a couple of days now when 6 birds have laid 7 eggs in 24 hours.

[|ceman]

My chickens are going insane with being cooped up this much.

They refuse to go outside when the temps are under 32. Instead they just keep trying to figure out how to break out of the coop and get free access to the rest of the barn.

All 6 birds have started laying again and on warm days they are really going off... I've had a couple of days now when 6 birds have laid 7 eggs in 24 hours.

That's very solid production. Crazy fast in fact!!

[Nainoa]

That's very solid production. Crazy fast in fact!!

Yeah their breeds are only supposed to average 3 to 4 eggs per week, per bird when the days are 12 to 14 hours long.

That's also if the birds are given 4 square feet each... Even in the coop mine have 16 square feet each, plus bars and platforms.

They get standard layer feed and then I give them vegetable scraps and day old bread etc...

The other day I had some leftover wheat flour and some peanut butter that was about to expire, so I baked them a loaf of heavy peanut bread...

They chowed that down and laid 7 eggs!

Some days there will just be 5 eggs, all in one nest box. (They seem to prefer #3) They all lay in the first couple of hours in the morning, so that nest box must just be like a porta-toilet at a rock concert.

Makes you wonder if the one bird that didn't lay an egg feels peer pressure that day!

[Nainoa]

There's a big gardening expo going on up here... Paper is having me cover it.


So I did a phone interview with the certified master gardener that is presenting it.

We started talking about everything I have going on, the things I'm teaching my daughter and such.

She even said "I envy your daughter getting to grow up with all of these first hand experiences, getting to know where her food comes from and what is best to eat."

[Nainoa]

Nice... I just had two different national magazines ask me to write audition articles for them.

One is a strictly gardening mag, that includes recipes for cooking organic grown vegetables.
The other is on country living, country skills and rustic cooking...

Time to dust off the old squirrel pot pie, with purple carrots recipe!


If they like the first round of articles they might offer me a long term contract to write for them in every edition.

[jason_bh]

Nice... I just had two different national magazines ask me to write audition articles for them.

One is a strictly gardening mag, that includes recipes for cooking organic grown vegetables.
The other is on country living, country skills and rustic cooking...

Time to dust off the old squirrel pot pie, with purple carrots recipe!


If they like the first round of articles they might offer me a long term contract to write for them in every edition.

Good luck bro.

In for squirrel pot pie recipe.

[Nainoa]

Stopped by Tractor Supply today with my Grandparents and daughter...

Turns out they just got the first of the baby ducks and chicks in... My daughter LOVES ducks.

Funny... I tell her "No you can't have that candy." Her attitude is "Meh... Whatever... No big deal."

Tell her "No you can't have ducklings." = TOTAL NUCLEAR MELTDOWN.

$50 for the stuff to make the brooder... $6 a month for feed... $5 per duck... Minimum of 2.

The only thing is I'd have to kill them in the fall because I don't want to pay for open water in the barn all winter long.

I wonder if my daughter would be traumatized by eating her pet duck this fall?

You know... Someday I'm going to actually ask a normal question of life.

[Procta]

just make sure the ducks are not named

[Nainoa]

just make sure the ducks are not named

Well technically you can start eating them at like 10-12 weeks old. I figure once the snow flies I can harvest them. My daughter only goes out to the barn once every two weeks, so stands to reason she might just forget about the ducks... Then when we eat them we'll just call them "Canard." (The French word for duck)

[envisu]

I've scrolled over this thread too many times to not stop in and say hi.

Hi!

[ConyPearl]

12345

[Nainoa]

I've scrolled over this thread too many times to not stop in and say hi.

Hi!

Yeah this thread used to move a lot faster, but RL has me super busy this time of year and some of the regulars are short on time as well.

Right now it's a death blizzard out my window... But I guess it's supposed to get up to the mid 30's by Friday and stay warm from there on.

With the small amount of snow pack we have I could in theory start planting snap peas and spinach in the next 10 days!


They also ran a contest for "Best Fish Fry in the State."

Turns out the winner is just 3 miles from me.

Ironically the only way to get there is by driving over a glacial drumlin which is passable only by 4-wheel drive truck this time of year.

I'm thinking about taking my daughter on Friday!

[envisu]

Yeah this thread used to move a lot faster, but RL has me super busy this time of year and some of the regulars are short on time as well.

Right now it's a death blizzard out my window... But I guess it's supposed to get up to the mid 30's by Friday and stay warm from there on.

Mid 30s is considered warm now? Pretty sure my city shuts down when it dips below 40 lol.

Been eating lots of Boarfish recently, catching quite a bit off the nearby jetty.

[Nainoa]

Say any of you gardening bros have a picture of potatoes growing in a container that I can use... or just a nice potato plant in general?

One of the Magazines I'm writing audition articles for wants a piece on growing potatoes and I just realized I have never photographed a single one!

In other news... My chickens have gone insane laying eggs... Eating eggs as much as possible... Still I have 36 surplus eggs in the fridge and all six birds appear ready to lay some more!

[Nainoa]

Mid 30s is considered warm now? Pretty sure my city shuts down when it dips below 40 lol.

Been eating lots of Boarfish recently, catching quite a bit off the nearby jetty.

You fish estuaries or just straight ocean shore fishing down there?

[envisu]

You fish estuaries or just straight ocean shore fishing down there?

Lots of estuary fishing up and down the coast but I've never done it. Just ocean floor... Been looking at spearfishing for awhile now but haven't pulled the trigger... little coves of abalone, eagle rays, leather jackets, sweeps, crayfish etc... ridiculously regulated though and quite crowded seeing as we only have I think 3 designated dive spots so it drives a lot of people to hunt illegally...

[Curl Master]

I am so tired of winter. Cannot wait for spring

[Nainoa]

I am so tired of winter. Cannot wait for spring

If my forecast holds true, this is the last day of "Winter" weather for me... After this the warm up begins and there isn't a single high temp below freezing on the extended forecast.

So of course I'm going to spend this last bitter cold day running around town interviewing people outdoors.

[Nainoa]

So the forecast is calling for a quick massive warm up and I have very little snow pack.

This means my 400 gallon mountain of frozen chicken poop should melt in a matter of a day or two.

Any predictions on how the chicken poop mudslide will go?

[Nainoa]

So compromise has been reached...

We will be adding 6 more chickens to the flock along with horseradish... Then we'll wait on the Elderberries and Paw Paw trees.

I also decided to splurge and treat myself after an ass busting month... So I ordered the complete Series of Battlestar Galactica!

Frack this is gonna be cool!

[Procta]

So when is the chicken with horseradish sauce recipes coming out?

[Nainoa]

So when is the chicken with horseradish sauce recipes coming out?

I'm going to have a hard time putting my laying hens in the stew pot. They've essentially become pets to me.

If I was just raising a bunch of meat birds for 10-12 weeks it would be no big deal. However I really take pride in my hens. When they finally stop laying my daughter and I are going to go on a day trip to the zoo and my wife and buddy are going to kill and clean them.

Earlier today my daughter and I went out to clear the run pen of snow. It's the first time I've been up close and handling the birds since early December. DAMN have they gotten FAT over the winter, cooped up eating high protein scratch and then getting gravid with eggs has really plumped them up!

[Nainoa]

Well it's all in motion now... By this time tomorrow 6 new chicks will be coming home.

My buddy is sponsoring 3 red leghorns... In the next year or so he's going to get his own place out in the country and wants to have a few mature chickens... Since somehow I am a frackin' natural at raising chickens he's tapped me to take care of him and he'll pay their costs etc...

I think I'm going to get 3 white leghorns, so that will bring my personal flock up to 5 white leghorns and 4 black sex links.

My daughter has been to Tractor Supply to see the chicks so many times the cashiers all know her by name... It's pretty cute, we walk through the door and she'll be singing her song "We're walkin' We're Walkin"

Then you get about 5 feet through the door and you can hear the peeping her face gets all bright and she runs back saying "Chicks! Chicks!"

[|ceman]

3 red leghorns and 3 white leghorns but no foghorn leghorns?

[Curl Master]

If my forecast holds true, this is the last day of "Winter" weather for me... After this the warm up begins and there isn't a single high temp below freezing on the extended forecast.

So of course I'm going to spend this last bitter cold day running around town interviewing people outdoors.

50's today just waiting for ice to melt. Would be nice to have early spring for fishing

[Nainoa]

3 red leghorns and 3 white leghorns but no foghorn leghorns?

With my first flock (The ones that are laying right now) we mis-identified the species, thinking we had Black Leghorns, when the chicks were little.

So I was giving the birds the names of Greek Goddesses, based on their personality. The alpha hen is Hera... The aggressive one is Artemis. Well there was one with no personality... So my wife named it Foghorn.

Turned out my black birds are Black sex link (A hybrid breed designed for egg production)

So there is a "Foghorn black sex link"


What we ended up getting were 3 white leghorns and 3 other unidentified chicks...

They were all two weeks old, so they are actually little fuzzballs with little feathered angel wings.
My daughter is completely enamored.

We think the unidentified breed is a British breed called Buff Orpington. I've got the chick manifest from the main hatchery and there are only a few options that were hatched that week... Buff Orpington looks the most likely.

So I've got 2 more white leghorns (They're dumber than a bag of hammers but they lay 6 to 7 extra large eggs per day) and one "Orp"

My buddy has 2 Orps and 1 White Leghorn.


These 6 are essentially our first run to decide if we want to upscale the operation to include meat birds.

One we shake out any bugs or glitches with our system with these 6 we're thinking we'll get 10 red ranger meat birds and free range them for 12 weeks through the peak of summer then slaughter and put them in the freezer.

If all goes well there, then we'll upgrade next year to 25 Black Jersey Giants (Which grow to 11 to 13 pounds).