Farm Chores with our Scaredy-Cat (aka Chicken Kitty)

Last night, after I got the kids to sleep, I headed out for my nightly chores… I remembered to bring my fancy camera!  I always start with watering… then I realize I should have harvested first… tomorrow, I say… every day!   Things are really growing (even the weeds! – again, tomorrow!).  Look how pretty the lettuce is!!

I think I’ve mentioned before that our kitty, Buster, is a city kitty, king of the neighborhood and quite the hunter when we lived in Seattle.  He’s become quite the scaredy cat since we moved to the country, and doesn’t venture far from the deck and his favorite pooping spots.  This spring, he started coming with me to water the garden. He acts all relaxed and cocky, and gets into his ol’ hunting stances with the bunnies and birds, but then doesn’t do anything about it.

Our tomatoes really struggled this year!  They hardly grew for the whole first month… and they looked really sad.  Our neighbor recommended that we get lime – she said that it totally turned her tomatoes around a few years ago.  I went to the Country Store in town and asked about lime and they only had a 25 lb bag – way too much for my 9 plants!  They recommended a few different fertilizers and the one I ended up buying didn’t even have lime in it, but it had a bunch of other things.  The company is called FoxFarms and the product is Grow Big!  I added it to my tomatoes every other day as recommended and within five days, there was a night and day difference!  And now, two weeks later, there are tomatoes on a few of the plants! WOOOOOOHOOOOO!

There’s kitty again!

I had to take a few shots of the alpaca fence on my way down to check on the chickens!  Isn’t it awesome?  Looks so farmy around here now!

Kitty followed me down to the lower part of the yard.  He’s a little hesitant but as long as I’m going, he’s going.  It’s been a fun part of the evening to see him branching out!

We’re (Carson is!) building the alpaca shelter off of this cool old building on our property and, in that process, we’re going to shore up the old building so that we can store hay and other things in it.  Another day, another project! 🙂

The chickies were running low on food, and Carson made a new setup for them so we don’t have to reach way into the coop part to grab the food bucket.  I like it… we’ll see how it is in the winter – we’re hoping the food stays dry.

This is Buffarina, the broody hen.  She rarely – if ever – leaves the nesting box.  And last night, she had a feather stuck to her beak… hmmm, I wonder if she was pecking one of her sisters?

Nolan the Rooster needed food and water, too, but he came over to pose for some pictures!  He’s such a nice boy.  We have heard about roosters not being so nice and we were worried that he would be a meany, but he’s such a love!  It took him awhile to feel safe around us, but now he comes right out to greet us and he’ll let us know if something’s wrong with the girls.  If they are out of food, he’s crowing a lot more and then he’ll run back and forth from the gate to the girls to alert us!  It’s been so fun to have him around.

Kitty has discovered the chickens and I hope he doesn’t figure out how to get over that fence.  The hens are all protected from above with chicken wire, but Nolan’s enclosure is open on top.  Buster was definitely scanning to see if he could get up there.  Then when I went back to the hen side, he laid right down and was flicking his tail.

Luckily, when I headed back to the house, he was very close behind me!  Chicken kitty! 🙂

Our apple trees have little baby apples on them!  TONS OF LITTLE BABY APPLES!  Summer is here!

I got back to the house, then remembered I forgot to get the eggs from the hens… back down I went.  I was a little nervous about my shoe choice – I usually boot up – both to avoid the poop on my feet, and so that they don’t peck me… exposed skin plus red toenails?  Not the smartest!  Luckily, it was easy and the hens didn’t seem to notice! Phew!