The chicks find freedom-ish!

The chicks are still a bit too small to scare off the hawk but we've sorted out a run for them where they can enjoy the fresh air, peck about and stretch their wings.

Here they are checking it out for the first time...

A cure for broodiness?

One of my colleagues, who keeps a thousand hens and supplies local shops with eggs, told me that the way to cure broodiness in a bird is to put her in a draughty pen for a few days until she gets bored.

Regular readers will know that we've been struggling with a broody hen recently but the hen in question ran away.

Before she ran away, I confined her to the makeshift coop. I was quite pleased with the design - puppy pen, beer crates, tree stakes - but the hen was not impressed and managed to knock the stakes to one side and escape, even when I put a layer over the top. After two escape attempts and being locked out of the hutch for a day, she high-tailed it off somewhere.



So if anyone wants to try the same, I suggest that you attempt a more robust design than the one you see above.

The good news though is that the hen did eventually return when her little bird brain forgot that she was mad at us. But she's still sitting in the coop on the plastic eggs!

Mosaics

One day, when we stay still for long enough, we're going to take some mosaic classes.

For now, I'm busy gathering ideas and seem to have found most of them in toilets like the Hundertwasser toilets at Kawakawa and this one at the Funky Fish Cafe at Baylys Beach near Dargaville.

I think we'll keep our attempts outside though, at least until we produce a masterpiece...

Swan plant - chapter 3

We planted our first swan plant back in October. Since then, it's gone from strength to strength, providing a nursery and food source for Monarch butterfly caterpillars.


Now it's developed some lantern like seed pods so I'm hoping that we'll have dozens of swan plants next year and dozens more butterflies... It looks as though that might take some human intervention though so I'm waiting for the pods to dry out and then I can collect and sow the seeds.

Guilt-free gardening 2

I don't need to feel bad about the strimming either as the bees are having a lovely time buzzing about the mint bergamot at the edge of the lawn.

Guilt-free gardening 1

I've been meaning to do something about the gorse that appears in patches around our block for some time now. But I haven't quite got round to it. Luckily I've now found out that it isn't necessary...

Flax Pods

Woodpile

We might not have a woodburner yet but we have started work on our woodpile with a generous contribution from Allan's unwanted China doll trees.

Shades of Green

Before Christmas, a drought was declared in Northland and Waikato, the two regions on either side of Auckland. Since then, bucketfuls of rain have fallen.

Luckily the North Island has escaped the kind of floods that Queensland is experiencing on the other side of the Tasman but everything is looking much lusher and greener than it did this time last year.

Unidentified Flowering Object

I found this tall, fat flower in one of the beds this morning, amongst all the fading day lilies, and I didn't have a clue what it was.

Here's a close-up...



Any ideas? Just say what you see...



I took a good hard look at the photos and decided that it might just be called a pineapple lily and - lo and behold! - it is exactly that. Also known as eucomis, it's a South African native.

Kiva - make a loan, change a life

As well as developing our own little farm, I've decided that I'd like to help other people to develop their own agricultural enterprises. One of the best ways to do this seems to be through a micro-loan to a Kiva partner.

The system of micro-loans strikes me as even better than a donation to charity - if all goes well, I'll get my money back, the borrower makes a profit and I can lend the capital to another project.

You can select projects by gender, country or sector. I decided to lend to a woman after reading about Plan's "Because I am a girl" campaign. Unfortunately the Pacific region is under-presented at the moment but the agricultural sector seems to have a large number of projects.

Rather randomly, I opted to make my first loan to Gulmira Kachibaeva and partners in Kyrgyzstan. Gulmira and friends are raising money to purchase cattle so that they can breed, fatten up and sell on for a profit.



The loan had only been listed for one day and was 14% funded already. It should be repaid at the end of next year and I hope I'll get an update about the success of the project then too.

Chicken House Irrigation System

Dedicated readers will remember that we slaved away to build a dining-room for the chickens which would keep their food and water out of the coop, making more space and less mess. The next job was to create an automatic watering solution to keep the chickens well-hydrated during the long hot summer.

There are many simple gravity-fed water troughs available at the farm shops but the problem we found was that without a flat surface to place one on, the water just drained away within minutes. Even without that problem, it would still need re-filling on a daily basis because of its limited capacity.

So I took an idea from a member of our gardening club and we recreated a more sophisticated gravity-fed trough.

This is what we used:

• A small water trough with ball cock
• A camping tank with a hose attachment at the base
  
• A length of hose attached to the tank and the trough
• Two cement blocks to give the tank enough height for the water to flow
• An old litter tray filled with sand to keep the water trough roughly level

If you want to do this yourself, you'll also need a hosepipe from your nearest tap or a gutter draining from the roof of the coop. When we replace the metal roof on our house, we'll create a primary water supply from the roofs over the coop and the run to save us dragging the hose down from the house water tanks every time.


You can also see the chooketeria in the photo above - the hen just needs to stand on the step and the lid opens up. This keeps sparrows and mice out of the food. But not peacocks.

Chicks Galore (but one less hen)

Our chicks continue to grow in their new outside abode and the mother hen returned to the flock apparently without any feathers being ruffled but it didn't last.

She seemed to be broody again one morning but I threw her out of the nestbox and she trotted off. It's almost a shame when you think of lovely clutches of chicks like this one in the Kerikeri car park but her eggs weren't fertilised once we'd moved on our roosters.


She started sitting again (or maybe it was the other hen - I'm not entirely sure) so we locked them out of the nest box. Sadly when we went back to open it up at night and let the hens back in to roost, there were only two out of the three chickens waiting.

We've walked the boundaries and poked about the bush but there's no sign of her. At least there's no pile of feathers and no possum licking its lips. Maybe she'll reappear when she's good and ready or maybe she's put all her belongings in a little spotted handkerchief and gone looking for somewhere with streets paved of golden corn.

Going Green in Kohukohu

Counting my blessings

Every time I feel depressed at the state of our house and the distance we'll have to go with the renovations, I just have to think about the way the pioneers lived 150 years ago. This is a gumdigger's nikau hut from the Kauri Museum in Matakohe - not quite all the comforts of home.

Bathtub

I found this amazing bathtub (a forerunner of the log flume?) at the Kauri Museum in Matakohe. It's not quite the right era for our house which is lucky as we'd have to get the floors reinforced and the prize of kauri has increased significantly since this log was hewn out.

Sixties Sofa

A little inspiration for our 1960s themed home from the Eutopia Cafe in Kaiwaka... (sparrow not included)

The Natural Look

There were lots of natural objects at the sculpture gardens too - all sorts of interesting things I could do with a woodpile...

Sculpture School

Those of you who recall our trip to the Trash Palace in Porirua earlier this year will know that I'm keen to create some sculptures from "found objects" to display around our block. James, on the other hand, is very keen that I don't turn our beautifully manicured land into a junk yard.

My recent trip to the Kaipara Coast Sculpture Gardens gave me a few new ideas...



I've now got the perfect excuse to hoard bits of piping and plumbing from our renovations, plastic bags and bits of tat.

Winter Warmer

I've asked James to crochet me a hat to keep me warm on our forthcoming trip to the UK - and next winter, just in case our renovations haven't progressed far enough by then. We picked up some interesting yarns at Spotlight this morning - my new favourite shop.



But whilst you're waiting for a picture of the hat, here are some knitting art from the Kaipara Coast Sculpture Gardens, especially for Helen.







Knitting is cropping up in all sorts of odd places across New Zealand - just look at the yarn-bombers in Christchurch. Will crochet take off soon too?

Feathered invader

This little female yellowhammer flew straight through our front door and attempted to leave the house by the window over the stairs. When I tried to pick her up, she played dead but soon perked up again and flew off when I released her again outside.

Hot Chicks - Update!

Our three chicks are in rude health. The mother hen started squawking at dawn and pacing up and down at the front of the nursery cage so we threw her out to re-join the flock. Her offspring don't seem to mind and have even bonded better with us now - hopping out of the cage to sit on our hands.



We suspect that the father was our frizzle/Plymouth barred rock rooster who was dominant within the flock but the chicks have definitely picked up traits from their silkie mother as well.

This rooster-to-be is displaying a proud single comb and barred frizzle feathers. Apparently it's best to breed frizzle chickens from a frizzle male and a smooth female - that was lucky then!



But this wannabe cockerel has a rose comb and an obscene number of feathered toes - both features of a silkie - but not the proper feathers.



And this little hen (we hope!) has a vaulted skull, another feature of silkies.

The vaulted skull is a result in a hole in the bone structure of the skull causing the brain to protrude beneath a layer of tissue and (thankfully in our case but not always) feathers. A big problem for human babies (who suffer from spina bifida) but not too much of an issue for chickens. Nevertheless, maybe we should dose our hens up on folic acid. Biologically and genetically interesting as it is, it does make me feel a bit uncomfortable about human interference in breeding.

Peace at last

We sold our eight-month old roosters at the weekend. It was a little sad parting with them but we have two new rooster chicks growing up in the garage now so it was time for them to move on. They have a new home with a family setting up a 9 acre block on the other side of Auckland. Hopefully they'll produce lots of lovely chicks for their new family.

Rosebud...

Uncle Geoff's inspired Christmas present to James was a rosebud teapot to add to his collection of pottery that looks like fruit or vegetables. Obviously we'll be using it to serve rosehip tea.



The teapot teams up well with Geoff's earlier op-shop-find - a teapot with matching cups and saucers, all made up of bunches of grapes.



Other acquisitions for the collection in 2010 included this red apple cruet set from the op shop in Kohukohu which would tempt Sleeping Beauty...



...and this sweet little pineapple sugar bowl, found in the Foxton op shop...

Instant 1950s/60s House Kit

One of the essential tools that we'll be using during our renovations will be the Instant 1950s/60s House Kit, my Christmas present from Uncle Geoff.

Here's the instructions - click on the picture to get a legible version. (Yes - that's Allan playing the piano in their sitting room in Invercargill.)



The kit contains "everything we'll need to create an atmosphere of cool modernity". From a bottle of life-preserving Pimms (to be served with home-grown cucumbers, of course) to a handy carry-set of glasses. The pictures are gracing our bedroom walls already (no - we don't know the bride but isn't she splendid?) and we'll be hunting down a gramophone to give voice to our new LPs.

New Year's Revolution

If 2010 was all about getting started outside, then 2011 is going to be about getting started - and finished - inside. This blog finally will cover both ruralism and renovations.

We'll be shaking off the asbestos cladding and the rusty roof, sorting out the hot water supply, warming up and drying out the house, raising the shower heads, ditching the carpet, smartening up the period features, rationalising the seven bedrooms and creating a family containment facility - or granny flat, as they're more commonly known.



And once we've settled up with the builders, we'll be obliged to become totally self-sufficient. Wish us luck, cross your fingers and hold your thumbs!