Nature Is One Bad Madre!!!

Sorry to all of you who have been checking the blog regularly only to find that as of late I haven't posted anything regularly.  It's been busy around here as usual and I just haven't had the time to write much.  I do have some exciting news....I found the camera!  Oh YES!!!  It was in my hunting bag right where I left it.  Who knew?  Moving on...as I write this I'm also watching the news because as all of you know we've got a pretty good snow storm plowing through here this morning.  It's not nearly as bad here at Red Rooster as last night's snow fall predictions had indicated, but we still ended up with about five inches and we've got wind gusts of up to forty-nine miles per hour.  The original forecast had predicted that we might see up to nine or ten inches, but as it turned out the heaviest bands of snow missed our place.  It sure is pretty though.

The view from the house looking out at the barns.  Soon I'll be voluntarily going out into that mess to feed the critters.

We all lucked out up north though because as I watch the news they are showing that the southern part of this storm ripped through Tennessee and Kentucky and tore it up.  In Tennessee sixty plus mile per hour winds and lots of rain and lightning caused trees to land on houses and messed up roofs and garage doors.  In Kentucky massive amounts of rain fell and are still falling at times as much as two and three inches per hour causing flash flooding.  Sadly, the flash flooding swept an Amish buggy off the road early this morning killing three young kids and one is still missing.  So sad.  Nature is one bad Madre!!

The backyard pine.

...And the cough goes on

As many of you know I've had a cough in some shape or form for about the last ten years.  That's annoying.  When it's not bad I often forget that I have it, but when it's bad.....it's real bad.  When I was in high school I had Bronchitis one year pretty bad and ever since then I've had this cough.  I saw my doctor and several specialists and in the end I think they couldn't pin point it on anything, but felt comfortable saying that it was asthma brought on by the Bronchitis.  I was prescribed some inhalers, which at first seemed to be doing the job, but as time went on they really didn't seem to help much and the cough became more of a seasonal thing.  It hadn't been bugging me too much in the last few years, but this cold I had brought it back full force.  I fought off the runny nose, the watery eyes, the sneezing, the headaches and the sinus pressure, but this stupid cough remains.  Pretty good acquaintances are we, this cough and I.  So, at the urging of my loving, but annoyed to death by my constant hacking and choking wife, I made a doctor's appointment.  It was a doctor I hadn't seen before, but I gave her the history and what not and told her about the cold but that this cough I just couldn't shake.  Her diagnosis:  "I think you have a cold...probably you can just treat the cough with Robitussin."  LOL!! There you have it folks.  I should have been a doctor.  Honestly, the cough is a lot better than it was a few days ago, but I should have taken the twenty dollars I used for that office visit and took Kennedy to lunch instead.  Oh well.

The snow is melting off here and we can see the grass more with each passing day with temps into the 40 degree range.  I can see the old garden beds poking through, and can't wait to get planting some things.  I did get some leek seeds planted in a flat in the house just the other day.  Historically I've not yet had a whole lot of luck growing my own transplants, but we'll see how this year treats me.  I've been seeing more and more birds around here lately which is a welcome sign that spring is on it's way sooner or later. 

In egg related news I was looking at my records last night and we've had over three hundred eggs laid so far in the month of February!  I was impressed.  We've sold just about all the eggs we can get so we may be increasing the flock size next year.

Things are Looking Up



A warm front is on its way.  Thank you God!  It's supposed to be 44 degrees today and I've heard reports of as high as 55 degrees on Friday.  It's going to be a mess around here with all of the melting snow and ice, but to be honest I need it to melt off some because we are running out of places to put it.  The warm weather will also do the animals around here some good.  So much snow and terribly cold temps for such a long stretch really takes its toll on them as you can imagine.  Heck, all of these cold temps were starting to take their toll on my psyche as well.  I'm suffering from a bad head cold right now.  Last night I thought it was going to kill me, but this morning I feel much better.  We'll see how the day progresses.

We've been getting about a dozen and half eggs a day here and thanks to my lovely wife I no longer have thirteen dozen eggs in my fridge.  She started talking to some people at school and sold all of the eggs I had here and then I was actually in the hole six dozen eggs.  I'm caught up now and have got orders scheduled through the end of this week.  And I've decided that whenever a customer is interested I will definitely put them on a standing order list.  Right now I've got four egg customers who have asked for the eggs to keep coming.  One wants two dozen a week, a couple want one dozen a week and one wants a dozen every other week.  It's nice knowing those are guaranteed sales and I don't have to worry about what to do with them once they are laid.  I am pretty sure that next year prices on the eggs will be going up.  It won't be more than three dollars a dozen, but we were in Wal-Mart last night, and I was checking egg prices there and Great Value brand Organic eggs were $3.38 a dozen.  Cage-Free brown eggs from Eggland's best were $3.22 a dozen.  So although, I'm still making a slight profit at $2.00 a dozen I think that the quality of egg we are offering demands a little higher price than two bucks.  A farm needs to be well rounded and not have all of its eggs in one basket.  My hope is that we'll be able to create an egg enterprise that generates a few thousand dollars revenue a year and that we'll be able to add several more pieces to balance the farm out including broilers and veggies.  The key to our success will be offering real food and not compromising our beliefs in growing food with integrity.  We need to build relationships with our customers and be transparent with them so that they can see where and how their food is grown.  That will be what makes this farm profitable and a success.  I'm feeling better and more encouraged even as I wrote this.  Have a great Sunday everyone!!

BRRRRRR........

It's freezing outside!!!! The thermometer on my truck was reading 9 degrees Farneheit when I took Kennedy to preschool.  They guy on the radio said that we could have as low as -15 degrees with the wind chill.  No thank you, Canada.  You can keep your air on your side of the border thank you very much!  Oh well, that's how it goes.  I think there is supposed to be some warm air coming back in though this weekend so I hope that happens.  The hens have been laying like champs right on through this bitter cold, and I've been getting between 14 and 23 eggs each day.  They are adding up fast and I currently have 13 dozen in my refrigerator, although 4 dozen just got sold and I'll be delivering them this evening.  I'm glad that the girls are laying so well, but I need to do a little work on getting some more consistent customers.  I'm toying with the thought of doing the eggs on a subscription basis.  You sign up for maybe a monthly or quarterly subscription and you decide if you want a dozen a week, one every two weeks or whatever your frequency and then I know as they are laid exactly where they are going and can get them to the customer faster.  The customer would pay monthly or quarterly, which I feel, would simplify things for both customer and myself.  The month would be paid in advance and then I'd just have to meet the ordered quantity.  I think it might also streamline things a little bit as far as getting them delivered.  If I know that three customers in Vermilion get so many dozen a month we can put those orders together and deliver them all at once.    I don't know.  Maybe that's a stupid idea.  Forgive me for rambling a little, but I'm just trying to figure out the best way to go about this so as things grow and we've got more customers to deal with and more hens to take care of we'll be able to most effectively and most efficiently.

This baby is CUTE!!!

January Egg Total

Our hens started laying for us about half way through January and the total at the end of the month was 125 eggs!!! Pretty good for our first month I'd say.  February ought to be double that I'd guess.  We've got eggs for sale now for $2 a dozen.  If anyone is interested in eggs that are loaded with nutrition and came from hens that were treated humanely call Matt at 440-935-4362 or Becky at 419-681-2653.

Yuck!!

     Have you looked outside??  It's nasty.  I have no idea how much snow and ice we actually got here, but the wind has to be blowing fifty miles per hour.  We've got white out conditions here.  I had to leave the house yesterday for just a bit to take my kids back to their mother's house and it was starting to spit ice and freezing rain then.  I came home and tucked all of the critters in for the night and made sure they all could get out of the ice and wind.  This morning I went out about eighty thirty to check on everyone and everybody seemed to have made it through the night with out any problems.  I got everyone fed and watered, collected a half-dozen eggs and hurried back inside.  Sometime this evening I'll go pick Tate and Kennedy up and bring them back here, but I am not looking forward to heading back out in this mess.  It's scary looking outside.  

     In other news, we've been getting between 15 and 18 eggs per day.  Not too bad.  We're not making a profit yet in the egg department, but once spring rolls around and we're getting more eggs per day and the feed consumption goes down because they'll be supplementing with grass and bugs, we should start making a little money.  There isn't not a lot of  money in eggs, but it's easy and will go nicely with the chickens and other things we hope to offer down the road. 

Snow Day

Well the snow made it in last night sometime between midnight and six a.m.  It looks like we got about four inches here or so.  This morning was pretty calm and peaceful and all the animals were well this morning.  This afternoon and tonight we are supposed to be getting ice and freezing rain.  I've heard reports that some areas could receive between 1/2- 1 inch of ice!!!! That's enough to pull down power lines and trees.  Hopefully everyone will make it through without too much trouble.