ELeVan ~ Honaker Farm Journal

[BrownSheep]

I have a chicken that hunts down litters of kittens to lay her eggs with them. She even abandoned a nest at the 18 day mark to sit on some kittens who I guess looked cold.

 

[Squirrelgirl88]

Sounds like you should put a sign on the house that says "Maternity Ward".

 

[elevan]

Well the cat ended up moving her kitten to the barn a few days ago, which left the poor hen vulnerable.

Heard a bunch of loud squawking around 4:30 in the morning. Get outside to find the hen in a panic, feathers flying, several eggs on the ground in front of the dog house open and eaten by something. It took her a while to settle back onto the rest of her eggs and calm down. I suspect a possum, rat or skunk stole eggs from her. When DH got home from work he helped me move her (house and all) into the coop where she'll be secure.

We found 2 more broodies in the barn...another chicken and one of our East India Black ducks.

It being Mother's Day, I got my mom a 3 hole rabbit hutch with some accessories that I need to assemble and move the rabbits into before she gets home from work. I gave her a card yesterday evening with a note that said when she gets home from work on Sunday her gift can be found in the yard...that it'll be large enough and obvious enough that she'll be to find it. And that if she needs a clue to just ask the loud mouth (that would be B - he cannot keep a secret for the life of himself).

Wishing all the moms on the forum a lovely day!

 

[elevan]

Wow, it's been a long time since I posted in this journal. Where to start...

Life has been pretty chaotic and it seems that time and I are never on the same page. My specialty food business is going well enough that I've been putting plans in place to hopefully open an online store next year. We'll also begin commercially raising and harvesting guinea fowl in the Spring for the Harvest store. We plan to offer both meat and eggs. The store just entered it's third year of operation and has gained a large following of customers. We had an event on November 30th where we had over 400 customers come through our little local foods store in the 4 hours that we were open! We're building an addition to the house and it seems like it is taking forever but since we're doing all the work ourselves it's been slow going. We're also gearing up for a major "fight" against the school system to protect K's rights to be who she is. Life's crazy right now to put it mildly.

 

[bonbean01]

I've been absent a long time too Em...your food business sounds great and would love to hear more about that! Wish we had something like that available here. Sorry you are still having for K's rights....I think of K and B and you often

 

[bonbean01]

p.s....note my new avatar....yes...have my very own LGD pup...sometimes naughty and sometimes nice....LOL...will see if Santa sees her fit this Christmas

 

[elevan]

Your pup looks like a sweetie @bonbean01 , I'm sure Santa will find her on the nice list!

Our local foods store is all about Ohio foods and products - from milk to meats to candy to cheese to syrups to baked goods and everything in between. There is one guy who brings in the most beautiful cutting boards that you have ever seen and the local Heritage Museum weaves rugs and placemats. Now, when I say our store...I don't mean our store as in in belongs to DH and I....DH is the store manager and I volunteer a lot of time there but it is run by the Woodward Development Corporation which has the purpose of restoring the Woodward Opera House in Mt. Vernon, Ohio. Harvest @ The Woodward is just a leg of that project. The building which houses the Opera House is quite large and when it is fully restored to it's early 1800 glory will be a multi-functional facility with retail shops and deli and coffee shop downstairs, meeting rooms above and finally the Opera House on the upper floor. The retail level restoration is supposed to be complete by the end of 2015 and we're quite excited about that as it means a larger space for us.

 

[Southern by choice]

All sounds so exciting! You will have to get pics when it is all completed!

 

[elevan]

Been a long time...you all probably think I fell off the planet.

We've had some serious personal stuff going on with K this year that I can't really talk about that's kept me radio static. I've been reading but haven't felt like posting online much.

Then this Summer I had a breast cancer scare and had to have a lump removed. I was told the cells were abnormal and that given a couple of years that it would have likely turned malignant, so we caught it and removed it in a timely manner. Two days after that was removed I had a major gallbladder attack - my first ever. Tests on my gallbladder showed that it had completely stopped functioning so it had to come out. So, July 30th I went in for surgery. So two surgeries in one month's time...not fun at all.

One of our guinea hens hatched out 24 keets and then lost them one by one until she was down to four. One day they were out foraging and she came back with only three. A few nights later they were all roosted in the pine tree outside our bedroom window (where they usually roost) and two of the keets went super high in the tree to roost. We heard a ruckus in the middle of the night and the next morning she was down to one keet, we suspect an owl took the other two. She's managed to raise her single keet up to a "teenager" as of now. Hopefully s/he will make it to adulthood.

Kids started school yesterday. K was both excited and scared. B wasn't ready for another year to start. Both said it felt like Summer was never here as it "only rained twice this Summer - June and July!" It literally rained almost the entire Summer. We had a free week long pass to the public pool in town in June and it rained the entire week closing the pool. Multiple activities that we had planned were cancelled due to rain.

That's about as exciting as it's been, which is more than enough.

 

[samssimonsays]

I am so glad you are ok and healing! Also very sorry about your summer. It is never any fun having a crappy weathered one...