Chook Coop Mark 2

Yes I know its been awhile but I have now nearly finished the chook coop!

Some very hot weather had delayed things along with having visitors, this week I had a extra long weekend and was able to finish the frame, concrete a gate post, erect 3 cross beams and do about 90% of the wire. A couple more hours on the weekend and I should have everything finished, except for the gate! As I still am unsure on what I am doing with this!

Here's some photos.



There is a market in town on Sunday and I hope to get 3 birds there, though we are having some hot weather forecast so I might delay getting the birds if it looks like it will be very hot all next week.

Vegie patch

Anyone for zucchinis ?(or courgette if you prefer) I have quite a few! I bought a punnet each  of zucchini  and button squash seedlings, not expecting all the plants to survive. Well they did!

I planted 2 of each in an outside bed, and 3 of each within the netted area. The outside ones are going great and I am picking 2 a day, the ones in the netted area are a little behind - partly to do with the poorer soil, but that's another story, and are now starting to produce.

Even with giving some away and trading some we are still eating zucchini or squash with every meal!

I will be picking the last 2 cabbage at the weekend and digging the last of the spuds, some of which will be going in the local show the following weekend. We are still picking kale though the sprouting broccoli has now finished. I picked the first tomato the other day too!

 

 

I've also been making some jams, jellies and chutneys to varying degrees of success. First attempt was a wild plum jelly, tasted very nice but didn't set too well,  next came plum jam - a great success, also zucchini chutney which is beautiful.

 

 

 







 Today I have also made some lemon butter and lemon cordial

 



As mentioned above we have been trading vegies, well mainly zucchinis and squash, and getting goats cheese and some smoked ham in return. The boys are loving the goats cheese, and Quinn liked the ham even though he knew where it came from - the next door neighbour's pig that he was feeding up until a few weeks ago.

Local Agricutlural Show

Saturday week is the local agricultural show, yesterday Lisa and I spent the day going through what we were going to enter. We ended up planning to enter 25 different classes, including some of the following

Potatoes
Rhubarb
Zucchinis
Novelty Veg
Plum Jam
Lemon Butter(Curd)
Chutney
Scones
Date Scones
Baked Slices
Apple Pie  - the big one! $100 prize money for the best pie
Chocolate Cake
The boys are also doing a few including
Lego
Edible necklaces
Chocolate Crackles
Decorated Eggs

I'll post an update with some photos after the show, hopefully with some prizes!

Chook coop and run

This weekend has been spent trying to build a run for the chook coop to go in, after several changes to my original idea its now half way built.

So far all the building materials have been found around the garden or in the shed, except for some wire I got from the neighbour. Star pickets and fence posts from the shed, roofing iron and some timber from under the house, wire mesh from an old sheep enclosure in the front garden.

Here is what it looks like at the moment, yes defiantly a work in progress!

Tomorrow I want to get the cross pieces up and work out what I am doing for an entry gate , then its off to the shop to buy wire. I was hoping to have it finished by next weekend so I could get the birds in, but not too sure at the moment

Things are growing... and not just the weeds!

Things are picking up in the vegie patch, today I have harvested the last of the peas, the first of the spuds, radishes, broccoli, and spring onions.

 

Tomorrow I will be making a sausage casserole, everything in it bar the sausages and a can of tomatoes will be home grown.

Spring onion, garlic, parsley, peas, broad beans, radish, potato, kale, broccoli and asparagus from the neighbour in exchange for broad beans.

The first of my red currants are coming along nicely and it looks like we will be eating lots of cabbage soon, I'm growing a variety called January King a large green cabbage. And much to my surprise it looks like I will get 6 or 7 decent size cabbage! At the old place I really struggled with brassicas as the caterpillars ate them all, but here they are growing brilliantly!

The next stage, chooks.

Well we are ready to take the net step and will be getting chooks soon!!!

I have ordered a coop, which should arrive early next week and hope to have that built and ready to house the chooks in a week or two, it depends on work as to when I can pick up the chooks.

I've been spending a lot of time recently reading about keeping chooks so am looking forward to getting them. I have decided to start small with 3 or 4 birds in a coop with small outside area, I plan to build a large coop and run but have not had the time to do it yet, I seem to be spending all my weekends cutting grass! When  I get the bigger run constructed I will use the first coop either for quail or something else.

Pictures to follow soon!!!

It's been awhile!!

Yes I know it's been awhile between posts.....

I could give several reasons for this but not sure if you really want to hear them! Main reason for not posting is we went overseas, back to the UK to visit family,

Anyway here are some of the things I've been upto  since the last post, in no particular order.

While we were away there was a big storm, 4 trees came down and a couple more lost branches, the largest was a gum that came over the back fence by the train line. The train guys cut the main trunk to clear the track but left the rest of the tree balancing on my fence and the slope down to the train line. Seven  hours of chain sawing later I managed to clear it from the fence and remove abit from the slope, to be left with a large pile of wood to be cut and stacked for firewood and an even bigger pile of small branches and foliage to be burnt. Two weekends later in between rain showers I managed to cut and store the firewood and burn off the smaller stuff,

 

The wood shed is now 3/4 quarters full, not enough for next winter but certainly a big help.

 

 







That still leaves the 2 willows that came over the front fence, a neighbour cut these as the were blocking the road and I have made several calls to the council to move the trunks from the roadside culvert but the are still there waiting to flood the road when I rains next! I need to get out there to remove the branches from the fence line but again they are on a slope and the ground is very wet around there so it might have to wait awhile.

I only discovered the fourth tree yesterday, a neighbour had told me about a tree he had down,  taking out a section of his fence, and while taking a walk with Quinn we found it over our fence! We also found a tiger snake.....  so I really need to cut that long grass.