Tag: homestead

The Tough Days

~ Crystal Sands ~ 4 Comments

I have never buried a chicken before. Ron has always saved me that sadness. I have delivered to the woods a chicken who passed in order to feed the wildlife, but when we have a hen who passes in the summers when we have little chickens running around, to be safe, we bury her on the property. 

Last week, I dug my first hole and buried our sweet Silver. It was heartbreaking. 

On the same day Silver passed away, we found out our son has long COVID, and I am pretty sure Ron and I are having own own struggles with something along those lines. Ron has been so busy working in slow motion (at least slow motion for him, he’s still faster than I am) planting the garden that I realized it was going to be up to me to bury Silver. 

The last time I wrote, I mentioned that Silver was very sick. She had a terribly sour crop and a terrible water belly, and it had come on pretty fast. It had been a long time since we had water belly troubles, so I decided, if Silver made it through the first night, I would try to drain her water belly to buy her more time. 

This level of veterinary care is not my strong suit, which is why I had never done it before, but I felt I had to try to learn in order to get Silver more time. She was such a great hen. I spent the day watching video after video and asking for help from more experienced farmer friends. That afternoon, I went and bought the materials, and that evening, my son and I completed the procedure on Silver. 

It was a success, but I did not have much hope. Silver was in pretty bad shape. I think I waited too long. I think, if I had known what to do and done it earlier in that day, she might have had a chance. My anxiety and over-thinking delayed me, and I hate myself for that. 

It was hard day burying that poor baby. Ron had to come help me after I started hitting rocks and root, but I dug for a long time, so slowly because, right now, I am in a “down” time from COVID and do pretty much everything in slow motion. When I was putting the dirt back over her, I just broke down. 

I read a long time ago that the backyard chicken movement in the United States wasn’t exactly great for the welfare of chickens because a lot of people who don’t know what they’re doing keep chickens. I wondered about my own inability to help Silver, and my mind went back to that article I read. 

As I sat crying over Silver, I had the urge to just stop, to quit keeping chickens. Maybe I am too sensitive for this. Maybe I need more veterinary skill, as there are not many vets who will see a chicken, and vet bills are so outrageous now that corporations have bought up vet offices that most people can’t afford to take a chicken to the vet anyway. 

I remembered the last time I truly felt like giving up on chicken keeping. It was the day of our first hawk attack, and we lost Lucy’s twin to the hawk. Pumpkin had been raising babies at the time, and I could find neither Pumpkin or her babies. After searching for at least half an hour, I remember dropping to my knees and swearing I was done with keeping chickens, that my heart was too soft for this job, but then, by some miracle, we found Pumpkin’s babies frozen and hiding in a pile of leaves. It was an extra miracle that we had not stepped on them as we had been back and forth through the area many times. And then Pumpkin returned as well. 

I kept going. I decided to keep going after Silver too. I had new knowledge, another skill, and I would do better for the next one, I thought. 

After I finished burying her, I found a flat stone, wrote her name and dates with a paint pen, and drew little chicken feet on the stone, so, if we sell our property, the next people will know who Silver was. Silver is buried in the same area that Schubert is buried. Schubert was Silver’s mother. 

There have been many tough days of late for our family, it seems. I didn’t fully understand how serious long COVID is, but finding out that our son has it and reading more about what this means for him has been a blow. I have written about my son before. He’s a cellist, and he’s good. Right now, he can hardly play more than half an hour without being in pain and/or then collapsing in exhaustion afterwards. The Chronic Fatigue Syndrome is real, but that’s only part of it. His lungs are still struggling, and brain damage is almost always likely with long COVID. The COVID literally shrinks the brain. I can seem some cognitive struggles. I feel some of them in myself, and they are scary. What a mean, mean thing to do to such a young boy. 

It has been nearly three months since our son had COVID, and the struggle is still so serious. After he “went down,” as I call it, from exhaustion again this weekend, we made the difficult decision to pull him out of all his music activities for the whole summer.

I think we all feel a little bit lost in the world right now. We had been downsizing our farm in anticipation of travel to Boston for his music in the upcoming year. Now, we don’t know what to do but be shocked and worried. On top of this, our son was just getting to the point where he was a help to us on our homestead. He could mow and turn over soil, and he was the best wood chopper. Now, we’ve lost him for some time. What a devastating thing all the way around.

But, today, as I write this, it is a beautiful day. My son is resting, and Ron decided to rest today since it is Father’s Day. The sun is warm, but the breeze is cool. The shadows are long from the trees, and the chickens are enjoying a few more gorgeous days before the heat dome comes. I am going to close my eyes and hope the universe will tell me what to do, help me heal our son because wester medicine really doesn’t know a lot about this. I am going to try to rest too. 

And, tomorrow, I will go to the store and get watermelon for the chickens and ducks because some serious heat is coming. I hope Mary Jane and Rooster can make it. I don’t want any more tough days right now.

Good News and Bad News

~ Crystal Sands ~ 1 Comment

I am going to start with the good news because it’s really good news. On Saturday, Mary Jane celebrated her 7th birthday! Mary Jane is a giant Freedom Ranger meat chicken who was pardoned the day Tom Petty died in 2017. There were so many times I thought I was going to lose her, but mostly, I thought she was surely going to pass when the entire flock came down with a terrible respiratory illness in the fall of 2019, but she just keeps going and is doing quite well overall right now.

This is Mary Jane front and center with Kate next to her and then Hector on the left. That’s Eleanor on the right.

In fact, I just the other day saw her settle down a rowdy broody hen. The broody hen (it was Marshmallow) tried to attack her because broody hens attack anyone who accidentally comes near them, and Mary Jane just bonked her on the head and gobbled a bunch at her. When Mary Jane talks, she really does kind of “gobble” like a turkey. I wish so badly I could get it on video because it’s so cute. I am so glad to know that bird, and I am so glad she made it to 7. I am pretty sure that has to be some kind of record for a bird with her genetics.

Sadly, I have some really bad news too.

The morning of Mary Jane’s birthday this Saturday, when I went to the coop to open the little door to let the flock out into the big chicken yard, I thought people were acting a little strange. Rooster seemed upset, but I think he’s getting some senility in his old age, so I didn’t think too much about it. However, when I went around to open the big coop door, I walked in to find Poe Jr. Jr. had passed away fairly recently. I was heartbroken on this one.

Poe Jr. Jr. was Poe’s grand baby and was such a great girl. She didn’t fit in too well with the flock and had struggled with her lack of feathers because she didn’t molt for two years, which was really strange. I have never seen it happen to another hen. But, finally, last fall, she molted and grew the most beautiful feathers. She was mostly black, but there were brown and green feathers in there. I remember how proud she was when she final molted and grew her feathers. You could tell she knew. She let me take so many pictures of her even though she had always been so shy.

This was little Poe Jr. Jr. right after she grew her new feathers finally. She was so proud of them. She knew she was beautiful, and I was so happy for that little hen.

It feels like such a tragedy that she passed away. She just seemed to get things figured out, so I am devastated by her loss. I thought I wasn’t going to cry very much anymore about the loss of our girls, but I cried hard for Poe Jr. Jr.. I couldn’t even understand why I was so broken down over losing her. She was not sick and so did not suffer. I checked her over carefully when I picked up her little body. She was a good weight, looked healthy, had no sign of mites. She just passed. She was only 3. It happens sometimes. It just happens. Her father was Poe’s son Edgar, but I do not know her mother, as she came to me in a hatching egg from the farm where Edgar lived.

I think I cried extra because my younger brother is very sick. Very sick. I am very worried about him. Very worried. But I haven’t been able to cry. Maybe it came with some with the loss of Poe Jr. Jr. I am crying again as I write about her. Catharsis, right? The only good thing about it was that, I swear, she looked so peaceful, like unusually so.

There is more bad news though.

Last week, I noticed Silver was sleeping in the nest boxes instead of on the perches, but I thought she was maybe just going broody. She tends to go broody every summer. I just did a health and mite check last Wednesday, and she was on the perch then and seemed fine.

But, this morning when I was leaving for my cello lessons, I saw her standing in the sick chicken pose. When I got home, I found her, and I knew things were bad because she just let me catch her.

She is in very, very bad shape. Very bad. Her crop is bad, and her belly is swollen. I was barely able to give her a bath and get her cleaned up. I ran to the store to get her some medicine, though I wasn’t hopeful.

When I got home, I couldn’t get her to take it, and I thought I had better research and get more information about this, as I have never had a hen be this sick. It was as bad as I thought, and it seems she has ascites or some kind of tumor blockage. Either way, there is nothing to be done. Silver is going to pass, and because she is struggling so much, if she doesn’t pass by tomorrow morning, Ron will have to cull her. I hate for Ron to have to do this, but he knows how to do it quick, very quick and with no stress to the bird. This is the hardest part of keeping chickens, and I can’t believe we are dealing with this. But we do not want Silver to suffer more than she already is.

I have been pretty good in my breeding program here on the farm to make sure we don’t have to deal with ascites. I haven’t seen it in some years, though it was common in our first flock we got from a production bird line. Silver’s father is Rooster, who obviously has the best genes, and her mother was Schubert. I got Schubert from a very reputable breeder her in Maine, but she ended up passing last year when she was just 5 years old, which is not bad at all but not great. This is a hard day.

Silver has such unique coloring. She is Welsummer in the front, like her dad, and gray in the back like her mom. In the sunlight, she just always looked gold in the front and silver in the back. You just knew she might lay a golden egg. She didn’t, but it was a beautiful green.

Silver is like her father and so noble. She has never liked to be touched but has always been smart and curious. She has always been more serious, anxious for treats when I bring them–but never too anxious. She would never get into a fray over anything. She just kept her distance if necessary.

I am going to miss her terribly. When she was born, she was so shiny and silver. I wished so badly for her to be a girl, and she was. Now I wish for more time with her, but unless some kind of miracle happens tonight, this will be her last night.

I didn’t know what to do but drop everything and just sit with her this afternoon. I played Tom Petty’s Time to Move On for her. I couldn’t even hold her. She is too swollen for it. So I just held her little foot while we listened to the words. We love this song around here. My son, the musician, says it’s magnificent because the music sounds like it’s time to move on before you even hear the words. It’s a good one. It’s the best I could think of for a magnificent bird like Silver.

I hope she moves on to something great, something magnificent like she deserves.

Which way to love land?
Which way to something better?
Which way to forgiveness?
Which way do I go?

Yeah, it’s time to move on, time to get going
What lies ahead, I have no way of knowing
But under my feet, baby, grass is growing
It’s time to move on, time to get going

~Tom Petty

A First Egg, a Healed Hen, and a Cello Concerto

~ Crystal Sands ~ 1 Comment

I haven’t been able to write very much lately because we have been very busy with our son and his cello life. I’ll write more about that in a bit, but my cello mom duties have been extra of late. It’s a wonderful life in so many ways because my son is highly creative, and you just always hope that a creative can find an outlet early on. It keeps me hopping, though–as do chickens, ducks, dogs, and kitties.

But I have big stories to tell…

First, Petty’s babies have started laying! We have just two laying so far–the first one early in the week was definitely Wednesday. She sings a big egg song and lets you know she laid an egg. She was proud, and I thought it was beautiful. There is a story there because Wednesday is, in fact, a high-maintenance chicken like her mama–Juliet. So I think I am maybe extra thankful for her beautiful egg. She makes me earn her egg.

This is (from the left) Tuesday, Lenore, Jacqueline, and Wednesday–all Petty’s babies–having pancakes the other day. They fly over the fence and do whatever they want all day long. I definitely have some stories to tell about them.

Then, on Saturday, I got a first egg from either Lenore or Tuesday, but I think it might be Tuesday based on the color of it. Tuesday is Ruby’s baby, and the egg color is similar, though Ruby’s is darker. I hope to write about the egg colors tomorrow because the genetics involved are always interesting to me.

But I had to write tonight to talk about Mary Jane. I wrote a while ago about Mary Jane being hurt and having to go to the crate in the garage. I am so happy to report that chicken is better! That meat chicken will be 7 years old if she makes it to June, and I am starting to think she might. I have to try to find out if anyone keeps track of such things, but I think she has to be one of the oldest meat chickens in America. I have heard of them living to maybe 5, but Mary Jane is exceptional–in many ways really.

It was great to get to connect with her a little bit extra while she was in the garage. I brought her treats a couple of times a day since she was just in there alone and bored. She didn’t seem to mind it at first, but after a few days, I could see she was ready to get back to the flock. I made her stay a total of six days, just to give her leg time to heal, but heal it did. She is back out with the flock doing great. I try to remember to pet her every morning when I am getting their food and water ready and every evening when I collect eggs. I tell her how awesome she is, and I am pretty sure she gets that she’s awesome.

Finally, I wanted to share about the cello concerto my son has been working on. He made the finals of the Maine High School Concerto Competition, which is a big deal. He has been preparing so diligently and working so hard, and in the week before the contest, which was held this Saturday, he got pretty nervous. He was extra nervous the day of the contest but handled those nerves fairly well and still played so well. He got second place and was sad about that, but I just keep trying to emphasize how beautifully he played in such a tough situation. I am pretty sure he was the youngest finalist. And, of course, we try to emphasize the learning. It’s all learning, isn’t it? But, my goodness, isn’t it hard to see that when you are a teenager? Still, I think we’re making progress.

Anyway, here is the video. I think it will surely bring you some joy.

A Breakdown Over the Chicken Feed

~ Crystal Sands ~ 2 Comments

We started feeding our chickens organic feed in 2019 after reading more about issues with regular chicken feed. The organic was more expensive, of course, but based on what I was reading about the quality of ingredients in most chicken feed, it seemed worth the money. It was for the chickens but also for us. There is not a ton of research that I can find on how much a bio filter chickens are, but it seems pretty clear that, if you are eating chicken eggs, what goes in their little bodies goes into your body.

Over the years though, the quality of the organic feed we buy has declined significantly while the price has gone up. I get that this is just how things are. The food is still organic, so that’s important, but our bags of feed are full of food dust. Just dust. It makes the chickens sneeze, and I have to throw out pounds and pounds of it. When I do, I just think about how much money I am throwing away and how much of a waste of resources it is.

This morning, I did my usual thing of sifting through the bags of chicken feed and throwing out the dust. I had just enough actual food pellets left in an open bag to fill up both chicken bowls and the duck bowl.

As I was delivering the food bowls to the coop, I saw that our new rooster, Rostropovich, was on Mary Jane, our pardoned meat bird who will be 7 years old this June. Normally, she will let him have it for trying to mate with her, but she just let him and made a sad little noise. When I got back to deliver the fresh water, that little stinker was on her again. I shoved him off, and Mary Jane stumbled.

I realized something was not right with Mary Jane, so I had to scoop up that big chicken and bring her into the house. She had a bit of a poopy butt, but she seems great otherwise. Her comb looks good, and she has no mites. I think she has hurt her leg but, hopefully, not in a bad way. I did see her on the top roost yesterday, which is not a good idea for a nearly 7 year-old meat bird who must surely weigh 12 to 15 pounds. I’m hoping she just has a sprain.

I went out in the snow and dug out the dog crate, cleaned it up, put in fresh straw, trimmed Mary Jane’s back feathers to help her avoid poopy butt going forward, and I got her set up in the garage. She seemed pretty good about getting away from the flock–well, getting away from that young rooster.

Then, it was back inside to get Luna’s nest, food, and water ready for the day. I had to go open a new bag of the dusty feed to make Luna’s bowl, and I couldn’t get it open. I have always prided myself in being able to open the feed bags. It seems like a small thing, but there is a trick to it. There is a little tab on one side. If you pull that, the string comes all loose, and the bag opens. Well, the stupid company making the feed changed the bag, and there’s no more tab. So it’s just you and your cold fingers and the stupid string.

This morning that stupid string was just it, and I broke down and cried because they sell us dust and can’t even give us a tab to open it anymore. And it’s just all the things. The straw we have bought for years (and it’s not cheap) has repeatedly been full of plastic bits that we have pick out, so our chickens don’t eat it and it doesn’t end up in our compost. And the feed company sells dust. And grocery prices are so high that my family back home struggles to afford food, and I can’t mail them food from Maine because shipping is so expensive. Plus, I only know how to can sauce and pears and jam. I send them those things as gifts, but that’s not enough. And, though Ron and I are so tired sometimes, we have to keep going because our food industry is literally poisoning all of us and lowering our IQs and giving us cancer. I realize I am just making these claims without evidence, as an academic should never do, but we all know it’s true.

And I also realize all of this is “first world problems” considering the wars and the hungry people in the world and mess humans make of things everywhere for no good reason, as far as I can tell, but it all came down to that stupid feed bag this morning. I don’t know how farmers are going to keep making it. Feed is so expensive, and the straw is full of plastic, and there is drought, and there is flooding, and I have had three friends–two of them farmers–close their businesses in the last year because it’s all just hard.

This morning, I had a little breakdown–over the chicken feed.

But then, after I finished crying, I went in the house, got the scissors, opened the stupid bag, and got sweet Luna her food. She talks to me now. We are starting to understand each other.

And that helps.

And I am going to have to figure out how to get the organic ingredients to make our own feed. I read that it’s problematic, but it has to be better than dust.

photo credit: Prince Abid, Unsplash

Ode to the Rhode Island Red

~ Crystal Sands ~ Leave a comment
This is Lucy, who turned out to be my oldest original girl who passed away last year. This was taken when she was just 3 years old. Isn’t she just perfect?

This May, it will be 10 years since I became a chicken mama. I remember the morning those 17 Rhode Island Reds arrived at the post office. I had been researching and dreaming about getting chickens for years, and when I opened that cardboard box full of baby chicks in the early morning light, I fell madly in love. All 17 of our girls were Rhode Island Reds. After researching breeds, I landed on Rhode Island Reds because I read that they handle the cold of Maine well, are considered a high-intelligence breed, and are great layers.

These beautiful chickens had all three of these qualities and were so much more than I ever thought chickens could be. Of course, now I know all chickens are unique and interesting, but at first, I thought my chickens were special. I had always heard people say chickens were dumb, and I knew that was surely not true, but I had no idea just how smart chickens are, especially when it comes to social and emotional intelligence.

It could be the power of that first learning about how magnificent chickens truly are that made me fall so in love with the Rhode Island Red, but I think it’s more than that. Rhode Islands are a fantastic, often overlooked breed. I feel it’s fair to say they are taken for granted.

After all, they lay brown eggs, which, in the chicken world is not nearly as exciting as those blue or green or chocolate or olive eggs. I have certainly spent years chasing the green and blue and olive eggs, and I treasure all of the beautiful colors our girls lay. Still, even after all of the years and the bright colors, there is something so exquisitely beautiful to me about the simple, creamy brown egg of the Rhode Island Red.

Rhode Island Reds lay very, very well–actually too well. One of the first and hardest lessons I learned as a chicken mama is that breeds like the Rhode Island Red, who lay an egg almost every day, have been bred to be that way without consideration for the longevity of the bird. In fact, they are meant to be culled after just 18 to 24 months when they are used commercially (Rhode Island Reds along with ISA Browns are often the ones used commercially), so many of the Rhode Island Reds in our country do not have the greatest genetics in terms of living a long life. Out of the 17 Rhode Island Reds we started with, 7 or 8 were having terrible reproductive issues before they were even 2 years old. It was a blow, and after much research and years of experience, I came to deeply understand that “production breeds” are just not likely to live a long time. You can get lucky. Broody Hen was 8 years old, and Lucy lived to nearly 9. We also had a few girls make it 5 or 6 years, but we lost most of them way too young.

After all of that hard learning early on, I decided to seek out breeds that were not production birds. I didn’t want an egg every day from every hen. I love eggs, but I also wanted my girls to live long full lives. Life on our homestead is a good one. There is protected free ranging, green grass, warm sun, treats, garden time, and lots of love. I want my chickens to get to enjoy that as long as possible and not die early due to reproductive issues or ovarian cancer.* So I found breeds that lay fewer eggs. Most of our chickens are breeds that do not lay super frequently. Instead of 5 to 6 eggs eggs per week like my Rhode Island Reds laid, most of our girls lay just 3 or so times per week, maybe 4 or 5 during peak light, but that is short lived. We also do not light our coop in the winter anymore, so that helps because chickens will not lay eggs without light.

But after so many years of seeking out other breeds, mostly heritage breeds who lay less frequently, I miss the Rhode Island Reds. I have three children of our original girls left who came out looking just like Rhode Island Reds, even though we did not have a RIR rooster–Betty Jr., Joan, and Vivaldi–but that’s all we have. I miss all of those Rhode Island Red girls. I have decided to look into purchasing some heritage Rhode Island Reds.

Rhode Island Reds are an American breed, developed in Rhode Island and Massachusetts in the late 19th century. It was bred to be a dual-purpose bird–for both meat and eggs because Rhode Island Reds tend to be bigger birds. Of course, in recent decades, the commercial RIRs have been bred with a focus just on increased egg laying. The breed was developed by breeding different breeds of Asian chickens with the Brown Leghorn from Italy. According to The Livestock Conservancy, the traditional strains of this breed (heritage birds) are listed as a “watch” breed, which falls in between “threatened” and “recovering.” There are certainly not a lot of heritage RIR breeders out there. I have been searching for years and found just a handful of seemingly reputable breeders. With that in mind, heritage Rhode Island Reds are very expensive chickens.

Still, for my birthday this year, I plan to get myself some. I found a breeder that sells them for $28 per chicken, and I am going to pay it and have some of these beautiful birds again. I have this notion that, when my son is grown, I would like to start a line of heritage RIRs. I have thought about this for years, but I didn’t know if there would be enough interest in the breed. However, since reading they are the “watch” list from The Livestock Conservancy and finding myself missing this fantastic breed so much, I think it’s worth a shot. I need to research more before I invest in a heritage rooster, but I am definitely getting at least 3 or 4 baby girls this summer. I just have to wait for Petty to go broody. She is going to be my go-to mama every year until she stops going broody.

I find myself of late treasuring the things in my life that are simple, sturdy, and good. To me, there is nothing more simple, sturdy, and good than a Rhode Island Red.

***I thought I should mention that there are chicken farmers who argue that there is no connection between the number of eggs laid and ovarian cancer, but my own experience has told me otherwise. Additionally, chickens have been used to study ovarian cancer in humans for years because they ovulate so much, so there is a connection. And, finally, just last year, I read an article in a chicken magazine making the connection between ovulation and ovarian cancer. It just makes sense that that much ovulation is going to increase the chances of cancer in the cells.

A New Kind of Resolution: Making Small Homesteading Goals for the Year

~ Crystal Sands ~ 2 Comments

We are quite self-sufficient as homesteaders. We grow between 60 and 70 percent of the food we eat and have created a cycle of sustainability and regeneration on our property, but we didn’t get here over night. It has all been a process, and each year, I focus on adding a little more to what I can do. I used to have much bigger ambitions each year, but I learned pretty quickly that we needed to pace ourselves in order to keep from getting discouraged or overwhelmed. With this in mind, I like to think deeply about what we need and what a I love and make a few homesteading New Year’s resolutions each year.

As I have mentioned before, I am a bit of a planner. As such, I am a big New Year’s resolutions kind of person. Not everyone is, and I get that. Some people think they are ridiculous, and I get that too. Still, for me, someone who struggles to complete projects, especially when we can get so busy around here with outside work, homesteading, homeschooling, and more, New Year’s resolutions are helpful. They give me a focus and a deadline.

Last year, one of my biggest homesteading goals was to actually keep records of our eggs sales and consumption along with costs of feed and straw in order to see if there was in any way in world I might, someday, be able to expand our egg business and give it a go as a chicken farmer.

I didn’t get good news in my egg sales experiment and realized in April that, even in our best months, we could barely manage to break even selling eggs at $5.00 a dozen, so my farmer dream of selling eggs for a living was a myth busted in 2023. I can’t quit my day job, but I’m going to keep raising chickens. I am thankful they also use our food waste and supply our garden with fertilizer. Those chickens are our partners on this homestead, and I am thankful for each and every one of them.

On the positive side, in 2023, one of my resolutions was to finish a crochet blanket I started years ago, and I did it! I finished it on New Year’s Eve, just in time. We also had the goal to add more edible landscaping to our property. We added 4 peach trees, 3 grapevines, and 7 additional blueberry bushes. We have 3 raised beds of strawberries and had hoped to add another bed, but didn’t make it. I also learned how to can pears from our pear trees, and I think I may be most proud of that in terms of upping my homesteading game in 2023.

For 2024, I have a few homesteading goals that, I think, will keep us moving in a good direction while also being realistic given our schedules with work and being cello parents. It took me some time this year to think of what I wanted my goals to be and then talk about them with Ron, but I think I have a good list:

First, we need to add that additional strawberry bed if possible because out strawberries will be in their fourth season this year, and I know it won’t be long before we have to replant. We need a least one bed started now because I cannot go a summer without our delicious, organic strawberries.

Second, because our peach trees did marvelously in the chicken yard, we have decided to turn part of the chicken yard (they have about 3/4 of an acre fenced) into an orchard of sorts. We plan to add two more pear trees and then two more fruit trees of another kind, hopefully cherries. I plan to research this winter to see what kinds of cherries do well in Maine. We just decided this year that it doesn’t make sense not to have a yard full of fruit trees.

Our third goal for 2024 is to simplify the garden. Whether it’s a drought year or a flood year, the garden is epic in the summer. In 2023, I planted a small test plot using the Three Sisters Method, and it worked so well and just seems to take care of itself. Ron was greatly impressed and has been looking for a way to cut back on his work in the garden. With that in mind, we plan to plant a huge part of our garden plot using the Three Sisters Method in 2024.

Finally, my last resolution for the homestead is to research making our own organic chicken feed because, for the past year, our organic feed, no matter the brand we have tried, has been full of dust. It’s terribly wasteful and terribly expensive. I have no idea what we need to do, but that will definitely be another post–or series of posts.

Those New Year’s resolutions for the homestead make me hopeful. This coming year is not about growth very much but more about simplifying and finding ways to simply take more advantage of what we already have.

I also have a personal New Year’s resolution to finish some writing and get back to writing for Modern Farmer. I love that magazine. We’ll see how it goes.

In the meantime, what are you New Year’s resolutions for your farm or homestead?

photo credit: Skylar Zilka Unsplash

Summer Harvest

~ Crystal Sands ~ Leave a comment

We are in the thick of summer harvest, and it is both wonderful and terrible. Mostly wonderful. Still, it makes for some long days in the garden or kitchen or both.

Today, I processed 12 quarts of blueberries. Some were frozen. Some were for jam. Some were for pie filling. It’s been a bumper crop for our blueberries, but we have just 8 bushes old enough to product, so we also visit a farm north of us and pick from their high bushes. The blueberries are giant this year. It has been fun to pick them, though the heat has taken a toll for sure. They are so yummy it’s worth it. Plus, the heat broke yesterday, so I am hoping to go pick one more time.

The green beans are also ready, and the raspberries are still going a little bit. We have put up 14 quarts of green beans so far, and more will have to be processed tomorrow afternoon when I get home from taking my son to music camp on the coast. Summer harvest makes for some late nights.

But I learned a long time ago that that can’t sleep on that garden. When things are ready, they are ready. If you want to eat from the garden all year, you have to be ready to process a lot of food in a short amount of time in the summer and fall.

Of course, I am so thankful that we have so much to harvest right now. Food is so expensive at the store. It is wonderful to have all of this food to help feed us all year. This year started out more than a little worrisome, and we lost some things. Overall, however, things are looking really good right now. We didn’t get many beets, and most of the cabbage rotted; still, we had a couple of each. And the onions and garlic look great. We just started eating the onions in our dinners.

The carrots are coming and look beautiful. The potatoes are doing well, though Ron has had to treat them for blight. Mainly, the tomatoes are gorgeous. Oh, how I hope they keep going! It looks like it might be a good year for them. Oh, and my three Sisters garden is coming along so beautifully. I’m going to need a long summer for everything to make it though. Ron says that’s the only way the melons and watermelons are going to make it–a late frost will be key.

You never know what might happen these days. Last year, we got our first frost mid-September, and then it got hot again. That was a bummer. But the year before last, we didn’t get our first frost until after halloween. That was nice but scary at the same time. Maybe we’ll get something in between this year.

Oh, and Mary Jane is hanging in there. She had a great day yesterday and even slept on the roost. Tonight, she didn’t make it up on the roost though. I saw her get into a nest box for bed. Last night, I was in awe that she was sleeping on the top roost, and then I saw she was leaning on someone. It was a small, brown chicken who was just sitting there patiently, allowing the giant that is Mary Jane to lean on her. I went back into the house to get the flashlight because I had to see what chicken was allowing this.

It was Bianca! That hen is the sweetest hen in the history of ever.

Peaches

~ Crystal Sands ~ 1 Comment

Day 353 of 365

I can’t believe I have just like 12 or 13 posts to go, and then I will have done this every day for a year. I feel like I should write something profound for the last one, but the pressure of that makes me wonder if I will be able to write it. We’ll see what I can do.

It’s also such a busy time. Ron is planting all day most days, so I have to cover all of the household chores alone. He’ll be back soon, thankfully, as he will wait a bit before doing another round or two of planting in stages throughout the month of May. We also have blueberry bushes and peach trees coming, and it was my job to figure out where to put these treasures because Ron is busy babysitting seedlings every second he’s not planting.

Somehow, taking turns and counting on a kiddo who can now be given an assignment and work alone sometimes, Ron and I also manage to homeschool our son in the middle of all of this. I have the coolest story related to this: Ron started an online biology class for eight graders with our son, and our son already knows all of content because we have lived and breathed it on this farmstead! How cool is that? Our son reads the questions out loud while he takes the quizzes, and I am amazed at how much living on a farm covers the biology text. I mean, I knew it was an educational experience, but I forget sometimes how we cover everything from environmental issues to how life is created–just living this life. And, of course, Ron and I are always using the experiences as teachable moments.

Anyway, I have to spend some time tonight researching the kind of light and soil peach trees need. I’ll report on what we figure out with my new edible landscape plans. It will be a process, but this is a big step for me and my goals for this place. Won’t it be so cool to have peaches at the end of the summer? I hope we can do well by our trees. I really, really want to have fresh peaches to eat, cook with, and share. A good peach makes people so happy. It would be so great to get to share some with my friends.

photo credit: LuAnn Hunt, Unsplash

Raspberries: Delicious But Mean (or How to Prune Raspberry Canes)

~ Crystal Sands ~ Leave a comment

Day 337 of 365

Today, I pruned the raspberries! It feels so good to be finished with that task because it’s slow, tedious work for me. I am new to raspberry growing, and I have to study a bit to know which canes are dead and which are good. Today, I only cut two live canes, which is good for me, but I am beat up pretty badly. I wore gloves, of course, but I had on a 3/4 sleeve shirt and paid a dear price for not changing shirts. I guess I am also a bit allergic to the thorns, as I not only have a lot of cuts, I am covered in welts.

I was so grumpy at those bushes. I was thinking the whole time, “Crystal, you have to think about the delicious raspberries you will have this summer.” I had to find my raspberry happy place in order to struggle through this chore. I was imagining raspberry muffins and raspberry jam. Pruning the raspberries has not been a favorite chore of mine, but since my sickness, I get tired more easily. Still, I did it, and I am proud.

If you are about to prune raspberries for the first or second time, I have advice that may be helpful. This was my third year pruning, and I made far fewer mistake cuts this year.

First of all, put on the proper clothes. You will need gloves and a long-sleeved shirt at the least, but a jacket would be better. Raspberries bushes are mean. The thorns will shred you, so be wiser than I was and leave no skin exposed. If you have long hair like I do, put it up. The canes will grab your hair.

I recommend a very long handled pruner to help you keep your distance. I got smacked in the face with a cane one time today, and it was not fun. Not fun at all. I guess the bad side of using a longer handle is the way it limits precision, so maybe there are pros and cons to the long handles.

When pruning, look for the canes that are a little rougher to cut. It will look like they have bark. This seems to be a pretty good indication, if you can’t tell otherwise. Sometimes, you can just tell. It looks definitely dead. And the good canes will have some color to them. I learned how to prune from my neighbor who is a master gardener, and I can tell you that you might be surprised at how many canes you have to remove every year. It’s quite a lot, but they grow back with great enthusiasm every summer and end up being full, beautiful bushes.

Pruning is so important. I have seen raspberry patches where the people didn’t have time to prune much, if at all, and my neighbor’s was raspberry patch has always been so much more beautiful. So I copy her as much as I can. I am fortunate to have a neighbor who is a master gardener.

Much was accomplished today.

Busy Season

~ Crystal Sands ~ 2 Comments

Day 336 of 365

We are into a tough time here on the little farmstead. I love spring, but my goodness, it brings some work, and we have some added unusual situations this spring.

We are not sure what to do with Anna Maria. We even considered trying to make her a house duck, but I don’t know if she can do it. Plus, she will forever hear the call of her people from the window and will want to go out there with them. So, we have to keep thinking.

It’s also planting season for Ron, which is always kind of epic. I need to get the berry bushes pruned, and I have to finish pruning the pear trees before it’s too late. It may already be too late. On top of this, I ordered peach trees and more blueberry bushes because I am determined to make an edible landscape around our property, but I don’t even know where they can go. We have a lot of shade from a lot of trees. So I have to study our property and the sunshine and then dig. The soil is so rocky that Ron will have to dig the holes for the trees, but I can probably dig the holes for the blueberry bushes.

We also have rats in the chicken coop still, and they have done some fairly serious damage. Now that the weather is warmer, as soon as we are able to get to it, we have to take down the inner wall, maybe for good, and Ron will have to replace some of the boards on the outside.

Oh, and as I write this blog, I can hear Ron watching a video in the next room. He is learning how to treat trees for brown tail moths because we have those too. Thank you, climate change.

When I write this down, I feel a little panicky about being able to do all of this between work and homeschool, but I assume we will get it done–always later than we had hoped but always done.

In the meantime, I am doing a pretty good job of getting my essays graded for work while I sit in the bathroom floor with Anna Maria. We had a duck in the house before for several months. Her name is Anna Sophia, and she loved the cello. Today, I played Anna Maria some of Anna Sophia’s favorite music, and she really liked it. Ducks seem to like the low cello sounds a lot. In fact, I found a cello YouTube channel and used my laptop as a duck sitter while I was making dinner tonight. The music keeps Anna Maria from quacking and quacking, and female ducks quack very, very loudly.

The cutest thing was that I could see her through the reflection on the screen watching my computer over my shoulder, but when I would turn around, she would turn her head like, “you can’t look at me.”

*Also, I feel it is important to note that we had Anna Sophia for about a year and a half before Anna Maria came into our lives. And Anna Maria’s name was already Anna Maria. We didn’t rename her. I thought you might wonder why in the world we had an Anna Sophia and an Anna Maria.