HappyQuackFarms Journal:

[The_V's]

We are a small 10 acre farm in VERY Southern California by the Mexican Border and the Arizona Border. We are a married couple and our Uncle lives here on the property with us in his own trailer. Other family members have their own trailers out here but rarely if ever visit. We have bloodhounds, chimorkies, an australian cattle dog and one black cat that runs the whole place. We started out with pigs and chickens- about 80-100 chickens and 2 pigs. Quickly and I do mean lightning speed we decided chickens were NOT our thang. We got some ducks cause hubby and I love Duck and boom before we knew it we had a duck farm. We range anywhere between 80-500 adult ducks at a time now. Thats 7 breeds so far and working towards building my own breed of duck Named Polish Racers which eventually will be pekin sized ducks that lay like ancona ducks and we already have the racing stripe coloring established now just gotta work on egg production and size.. As well as 40-60 pigs at any given time NOT including piglets. I breed several types of pigs here pet breeds and meat breeds. We also have 5 types of quail now and three types of rabbits, two types of goats three breeds of geese and three types of peacocks as of yesterday. Hubby says I have a problem, but thanks to my "problem" he was able to quit his job a few months back and become full time here at the farm. We are broke but we are happy. When I say broke I mean everything here is built from craigslist free section or bartered for and even our wood is scrap wood hubby cuts down to build pretty things for me- everything here is made from recycled materials and it shows- I don't have time for pinterest our farm is functional not pretty. Again when I say broke I mean we buy feed for the animals and we don't have beer money left over even! Thanks to uncle we do get to enjoy a frosty mug by the fire once in while though. But we didn't figure wed be covering our costs here for the first 5 years and here we are covering(barely) but we are doing it.
Never worked so hard in our lives but we've never been so happy. To be honest even with the world collapsing around us we wouldn't have a clue if it weren't for the once a month we run into town or the internet.
When we moved to this family property there was three trailers and an outhouse. Now there's goat pens, duck pens, goose house, chicken coops , pig pens, pig arena, two patios about to be three a laundry patio we have outdoor plumbing( gonna build a bath house with a flushing toilet after the peacock enclosure gets finished this month)( oh yeah forgot to mention we also have to haul our water out here cause wells are illegal something about arsenic in the water?) So yes Hubby also makes 20 trips down the road every week to haul 2500 gallons of water every week, more in heatwaves less in wintertime)
Im not much of a gardener to begin with but add 120 degree heat in springtime and avg 130's in worst of summer out here and there's no point in gardening except for in winter out here. Oh and we have crazy winds out here too. all the trailers have to be chained to concrete posts underground so the wind doesn't flip them(yep its happened to our neighbors and even one of our trailers got picked up and separated from the septic tank last year!
So many people call us crazy for having a farm out here between hauling water, the heat, the wind and everything else. Then you add the constant insanity of having a farm in general with several breeding programs going year around for 15 different types of animals and yes we must be nuts. We're starting a company that's separate from our duck farm for the pigs and its going to be called StraightJacket Acres. Not kidding that's really the first name we picked before we came up with HappyQuack forever ago but it has been in back of my mind ever since and since our pig operation has grown so much we have decided to make it a separate entity and I love that name!
Both hubby and I can build anything we both had contractor dads so were both handy and we both also weld and work on cars too but that doesn't mean we ever have more than one running vehicle at a time lol.
Started a website recently (HappyQuackFarms.com & a youtube channel too same name) Added a classifieds section and a forum to our site to give back to the farming and homesteading community that has given us so much to be thankful for!
Been giving farm tours lately and even goat milking classes occasionally. Planning on doing a home butchering workshop for local homesteaders in the fall so everyone can learn how to process every animal on their farm instead of paying a butcher in case you're also as broke as we are.Just started making my own goat cheeses.I use to bake all the time when I was a plain ole stay at home wife- now I haven't even baked a birthday cake this year I've been so busy lol. Want to start canning have all the equipment just no time with all the farm work daily we get up around 4 everyday and usually pass out around midnight. We are still building pens and were always 3 pens behind what needs built because of what hubby calls "my problem". We also plan to add a fish farm out here if we can find a big water truck company that would be willing to deliver out here. I love tilapia and ooh I just learned I can raise them in old jacuzzi tubs! Yep I have a problem!
I guess I also forgot to mention we also breed parakeets, lovebirds and feeder mice.
yeah I have a problem- but when the pet breeds and animals aren't selling, my meat animals do and vice versa. So far every animal on the farm has supported the farm at least one month or more per year. I went into this farm thinking of it like a stock portfolio-DIVERSIFY don't have all eggs in one basket I told myself and its the saving grace of our farm! Yes I have a problem, but its keeping us fed and flourishing and growing faster than we can build the pens for everyone so i guess my problem isn't such a problem except as our running joke.
Guess that's it for today- that gives you a general idea of what life is like here at HAppyQuack Farms and StraightJacket Acres! Keep smiling folks and remember if you take care of your farm and your animals they'll take care of you!

 

[chickens really]

That's awesome. I really enjoyed reading your story.
Pictures of your place and animals would be appreciated if you could post some?

 

[The_V's]

 

[The_V's]

and some of our pigs, it only let me add 10 pics at a time

 

[The_V's]

 

[Senile_Texas_Aggie]

Now following along...

 

[The_V's]

beautiful day here today! The heatwave that has left us in the 120s for nearly a week has taken a break thanks to the wind coming in and blowing cool air from all the rain storms in san diego area today! Its been gorgeous only 100 something! Hubby woke up in a foul mood and didn't want to water runs or work on anything. Of course that meant my "NAG MOTOR" started running saying how beautiful it was outside and we better get as much done as we can cause a day or two from now it'll be too hot to do anything outside again, etc etc I had fifteen reasons to be outside each of his single reasons to stay inside. I finally screamed and walked outside by myself in a huff to tired to argue with him being a weinershnitzle. I went outside and puttered around doing the things I could do without him and by the time I was sitting alone with my peacocks hand feeding my 15 yr old peahen he finally came outside and loaded the water tank into the truck for water runs.
About that time I get a text from an ad I ran almost 2 months ago for some chicks they wanted to come out. I told them how far we were via text they said they were on their way. They drove an hour and a half and got all the way down three dirt roads and hubby even went and met them with his truck so they wouldn't get stuck in the sand with their little car and they get all the way to the corner of our closest cross road and turned around and said they weren't interested?!?! SO WEIRD right? I had a weird gut feeling about them via texting earlier but brushed it off as craigslist buyers are often strange at first anyway, but when that happened I knew they weren't really coming out for chicks. So glad our address doesn't get gps anywhere near our actual property!
Meanwhile throughout today once hubby attitude cheered up he decided to FINALLY move one of the trailers to other side of the property! yay! One down three more to go! Hubby said hes also planning on running cable tv out to the other rv tonight too! Happy Happy Joy! We haven't had tv in months in this rv its all been only connected at the other three trailers here on the property.
Still have one Bloodhound puppy left of Ruby & Cleatus's litter, can't understand why! Hes the sweetest and most like his daddy of the entire litter too but somehow he kept getting overlooked, who knows?
Our purebred pot belly sow Sweetheart is about to farrow in few days. Already have three piglets sold, so that's pretty cool.
Got three new peahens a few days ago to add to our Peafowl breeders. The lady gave them to us in trade for a future Kune piglet from next litter. She brought us a WHITE peahen, a PIED peahen and a Spalding Peahen. Im so happy I just hang out with my peacocks all day or at least every chance I get. This makes 9 total now, 6 ladies and 3 males! I could watch them all day. When we lived in the mountains I had an amazing koi pond that was the envy of everyone we knew, people would come and bring their kids or take pictures all the time. We had planned on doing same here but sadly my koi did not survive the move out here so all I have left are my original 9 feeder goldfish that I bought at one inch long that are now 10 inches long and Ive had them in a huge tank all this time feeling horrible that they didn't have a pond here. I used to sit and meditate at my pond, whenever the world had me upset all I had to do was walk by my pond and my heart would burst with joy and peace instantly. Thats what my peacocks do for me now. No matter how nuts Im feeling all I have to do is hear one of them or catch a glimpse of one of them and my heart soars and I forget all the whatever upset me to begin with. So now you have some backstory as to what Im about to tell you and why its such a HUGE DEAL! Hubby OBVIOUSLY changed his mood in a big way today because he brought up the new peacock enclosure that were building this month and then ...wait for it...he said...seriously are you sitting down... "How about we take that old pool liner and put your koi pond over here that way you can enjoy them together" OMGOMG OMG OMG OMG OMG I LOVE HIM SO MUCH! See THAT right there is why I have never once wanted to use my divorce shovel! Oh haha guess I gotta tell the divorce shovel story now lol
So years ago we lived in a place called Jamul California. It was a beautiful and almost mystical feeling place very rural but had a sparkle to the air you couldn't put your finger on. EXCEPT during the rainstorms where the trees would topple down and floods would wash away your car and horses and cows would get loose and fences and homes would get destroyed. So anyway hubby needed a new shovel to dig out a berm around the house to deflect waters from destroying everything. We went and got him one before the floods came and the floods never came that month. So one day Im napping on the couch in living room and I open my eyes hes sitting in his chair with the most peaceful dreamy loving look on his face. I yawned and stretched and asked him "Babe whatcha thinking about?" and he said and Im not kidding,"ya know, I haven't even gotten to use my shovel yet".I fell off the couch laughing and the divorce shovel was born. Its been a running joke for so many years now he eventually bought me my own shorter handled shovel and even painted it red for me so I wouldn't keep losing it or laying it and forgetting where I put it after using it. He wrapped it and said "here honey now you have you have your own divorce shovel". So anytime either one really pisses of the other or even when were just kidding around we threaten to get out our shovels out lol. And that's the story of our divorce shovels. Yes we are sickos and have sick humor.

 

[The_V's]

So a few things have happened: we have had two litters of piglets. One sow got mastitis so we put her on antibiotics and gave the piglets to a friend who could bottle feed them since I just don’t have the time right now.
I hadn’t been able to find a white male for my white peahens so I almost gave up and sold them to a friend who has a white male peacock. When she told me what shed pay for my white females I choked! I know she wasn’t trying to lowball me as that’s not who she is at all but I couldn’t ever sell them for that so I told her never mind. I woke up the next day from a dream that I had tons of different types of peacocks in every color so on a whim I thought I’d shop one last time for a white male again and I answered three white peacock ads within 400 miles of us and one answered. So we got to chatting and I bought the white male and next month I’m going back to buy a breeder age trio of purple peacocks and Bronze peacocks! I guess I’m going into the peacock business now! Then my Peahens that I already have, decided they were going to start laying again! So as of right now I have 9 pea eggs being sat on by my best broody hens. It gets better! I then found out what the plain India blue peacock chicks go for in my area much less the colored ones now hubby is WAY MORE on board with me buying all these new peacocks and he’s even excited about building the new peafowl enclosures! We are picking u the white male and the purple breeder trio in two weeks! I’m so excited, hubby just needs to finish building the new enclosures for the new colors!
Another super cool thing that happened was over a year ago we met someone with Sebastepol geese and I told him I wanted babies when he got some hatched, he gave my number to the lady he bought his from and she called the other day saying she has babies on the way! I do have three Sebastepol now and I told her I’d buy up to ten babies from her plus I have 5 friends who want sebbie babies too! So by this time next year I will have a full flock of breeding Sebastepol Geese!

Another update is that I’m over my quail, they’re cute and I like them and of course I bought 5 breeds of the prettiest ones and I love hearing their pretty calls and all but with all the other animals on the farm I keep having this feeling that my quail just aren’t something I want to pursue. So all five of my breeds and all the new cages etc everything is going to my aunties place so she can make money off of them. It’ll help her out money wise cause its alot of money in breeder age birds of unique breeds and everything that goes with them. That way if I do change my mind down the road I can always ask for a couple sets if I want to try again.

I bred my Flemish giant female to my California buck today, fall off complete she lifted for him and everything so I think Ill have bunnies soon too!

Bought a new laptop this week so I had to move all my pictures over to the new stuff and was looking over some old pictures from when we first started the farm and WOW we’ve gotten a ton done in two years! It doesn’t feel like we’ve accomplished that much when I look around but looking at these old pics today made my jaw drop at how much we have accomplished and achieved! I’m feeling pretty happy today!

Heres some pictures of our peacocks so far, Ill update with the new peafowl when we get them here in two weeks!

 

[The_V's]

 

[The_V's]

Havent checked in in a while. Lots happened. Lets see, we got our Berkshires finally and the Gloucester Old Spot pigs are on their way after the 16th of October. I ordered the Meishans a few weeks back so that's exciting too!Figure they'll drive sometime around christmas hopefully. Had a ton of litters for the early fall line up lol.

Thought we found a new hay connection turns our he was a fraud he bought from the same place we did and just changed the prices- we fell for it because he offered delivery. He ended up flaking on us one too many times and we went back to the old place and the owner told hubby all about the new fraudster in town yikes.

Got more breeds of ducks added to the farm.

Donated a ton of animals to the families who lost their flocks and herds in the fires out here. It helped lower our feed bill a lot too.
Today hubby and Uncle are picking up some registered kunes to add to our Kune herd, they're from a very respectable breeder so were pretty excited! The new boar is ginger so it will be so cool to add more ginger kunes to our litters!

Oh and hubby decided to keep a piglet from one of the many litters this time around. He doesn't do that very often so we made it his anniversary gift since simply not selling it sorta hurt our pocket book so we called it a gift and look at it as spending that same amount on if we had to go out and buy that same piglet elsewhere.

Oh yeah I bought more goats- that's becoming a problem- hubby needs to build more pens lol.

Lets see what else- oh Ruby our bloodhound is pregnant so we are super excited. This will be her second litter with our bloodhound Cleatus!

I THINK that's the highlight reel for now lol