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I'm a little late to the party but here we go. We had been noticing that we just were not getting the eggs like we had been. Now there are reasons for this:
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- Lazy. We just were not checking the boxes everyday and in the winter they freeze and burst and the girls, well, they get hungry and everybody likes chicken.
- The decrease in daylight. Production just goes down as the days get shorter.
- Water. During the summer they had watering cups in the run and your normal galvanized waterer out in the bigger open run. When freezing started we took our rain barrel and added a fish tank heater and circulation pump which runs to a pvc pipe with nipples. This prevents the water from freezing, keeps the water moving which keeps stagnation at bay and also keeps warm water constantly moving through the entire system. The nipples might make them feel like they just are not able to get as much water as easily and eggs are mostly water.
- Stress. In the winter things get boring we all feel the blues. Plus a few months ago a guinea hen wandered up here from parts unknown. We put her in the flock to keep her safe and waited to see if anyone came to claim her, they did not. I think it stressed the flock out.
Author: Marisa
Categories: Homestead
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We would like to put up a greenhouse, but for the time being, we do not have one. We've been researching crops you can plant early, and found that the brassicas are very frost and cold tolerant. In fact, they do not like heat.
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We started a flat of brassicas at the end of January, and have had to pot them up already. They are to the point where they need to get in the ground. With the warm winter we've had, we decided that rather than just potting them up again, we'd plant them in the raised bed across the driveway. We toyed with just putting some kind of cold frame over it, but saw something similar to the one we built.
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Author: Bill
Categories: Gardening, Homestead
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