Are we living our dreams?

[rhoda_bruce]

I have been out of grain a few days, except for some hen scratch, I picked up, real quick, with the dog feed to just hold me over, until I could make a trip to the river. So I have put 4 days rations to ferment. It has made a difference. I don't pick up as many eggs without fermenting.
So I have 90 eggs in the bator, the brooder is empty and waiting for the chicks and now I can start selling eggs a while. I have a customer coming in the next few minutes.
While I was running out of grain, I decreased expenses a bit, by killing extra drakes and now trying to determine if I will kill anything else. But with all my bins full, and fermenting, I should be good a while.
I tried using Daddy reciprocating saw to cut some tractor tires to use as raised beds, but the blade is bent. Sometimes its hard doing all this stuff alone.
Well, today DS and I unloaded the Suburban of the grain I bought Thursday and it was the easiest ever. Its been dry a while and I backed the Suburban all the way to the gate of the coop, got DD8 to stand at the gate, with a little net, looking scary for the birds and all I had to do was untie the sacks so DS could grab and pour in the bins. I think we figured the most ideal way to get the job done in the future.
I wonder if I can use the grass that grows in the orchard as hay. I mean.....if I'm going to have rabbits and I have grass, I can dry, rake and store.....maybe.

 

[Denim Deb]

I say, go for it.

 

[Mini Horses]

It's often that we have more time than money. No secret here...go for it! I hot wired a section of my "yard" and put the mini horses in there to graze. I was buying gas for the mower & hay for the horses --- now, they graze it.

 

[rhoda_bruce]

I posted a topic on my Facebook group and one of my rabbit buddies showed me how to make tiny little bales with a crate. They look cute. She even told me if I can get it going, she would buy from me.....well, she frequently posts that she needs to find hay, so I know its an ongoing thing for her. But I can tell you, when I am cutting grass in the orchard, sometimes its thick and if I can make 2 passes and have a row of grass that I can dry, then the next pass, in maybe 2 days would be much easier. Even better if I can actually get something on it....well, we will see.

 

[hqueen13]

How do you ferment the grains for the chickens? I've heard of doing this but I don't really know the process. Very interesting to note that it yields you more eggs. The BF and I are really toying with getting chickens. I'm still nervous because of the locking up issue. I"m afraid we won't be as religious as we need to be about closing the coop at the right time and we'll lose birds.

 

[rhoda_bruce]

I started one day, but putting 3 gallons of corn, which at the time was the only grain available, in a 5 gallon bucket. I did this with 4 buckets and covered with enough water so I had about 3 inches over the grain.
In the days that followed, I might have added more water and it is supposed to be rain or well water, but I only had tap, so that is what I used. I did have to begin using what I had the next day, but kept the buckets in line, in order and after feeding, I filled up the empty bucket with another 3 gallons of grain and water and put in line, so that by the 4th day, everything I would be giving had been soaking 4 days and was fermenting. It smells like a whiskey, actually.
After about 7 to 10 days, it seems you notice that they are unable to eat as much and you might have to adjust what you are soaking and you begin to see more eggs, less egg eating and a very calm flock. Yeah.....cuz they all drunk!!!
Well, I find it stretches out the feed and makes things more affordable for me. A lot of locals are complaining about egg production, but my strike is over, my bator is loaded and I am picking up 2 to 3 dozen eggs a day.
I did, however buy the supplies, I hope will allow me to use my water barrel. I plan on putting a faucet on the bottom for my animals and garden. Might buy another water tank or two. Less chlorine and might as well use the water God has seen fit to send to me.
Will help me with a few things actually....smaller bill and hopefully dryer yard. Need it for my soap making too.

 

[hqueen13]

Interesting! So you just let them sit? I wonder what the cold would do to things up here. Is that whole kernel corn, or like a feed mixture? The farm where I work has a feed mixture and doesn't feed whole kernel. I wonder how he could make it work? How many birds do you have? And how wet is it when you feed it? Like a slurry mixture, or does it absorb most of the moisture? Sorry for so many questions! Reducing feed intake is always a good thing, especially if it is a healthier product being fed! I can't see how fermenting wouldn't be a healthy product for the chickens as it is a live food rather than a dead food...

 

[rhoda_bruce]

When I read up on it, I was glad because a friend had told me she soaks for only 12 hours and I knew you can't get it to start breaking down in that time. The site I read from, didn't specify what to use, but said any grain was fine and you can even put in mash or pellets to ferment.
When its at day 4 and I'm feeding, I take along an ice-cream bucket and I start scooping out my grain in a can, holding it against the side of the bucket to strain off the water/whiskey, so that its mostly grain I'm giving them. I have had to learn what they will eat by trial and error, but its a good bit less than previously.
I try to put some of the water into an extra ice cream bucket when I'm getting near the end, so that I can use in my next batch to get it started. The instructions did say to stir each bucket twice a day, but I normally did it once and have even not stirred at all and still got it cooking good. I'm not sure what to say about people in colder climates. I suppose it won't ferment very much if its freezing cold.
The old man I buy grain with asked me how I did with just corn, which is all he had last time I went to him and when I told him how I made it stretch and how the girls were doing, he asked me if I knew the sheriff and what kind of terms am I on with him.....because of feeding my flock mash.....and having a little brewery thing going in the barn.

 

[baymule]

How do you ferment the grains for the chickens? I've heard of doing this but I don't really know the process. Very interesting to note that it yields you more eggs. The BF and I are really toying with getting chickens. I'm still nervous because of the locking up issue. I"m afraid we won't be as religious as we need to be about closing the coop at the right time and we'll lose birds.

Build your coop with attached covered run. Only let the chickens free range when you are at home. In the summer, if you get home a few hours before dark, they can free range a little while. I built a hoop run with 3 cow panels at our old house. At our new place, I built a hoop coop with 2 cow panels, as I have fewer chickens. I'll build a new larger coop later.

In this picture, the coop is 8'x7' and the run is 8' wide by 12' long. It was real easy to build.

 

[rhoda_bruce]

Neat baymule. I have mini versions of that coop, on a more simplistic model, for ease in moving around the garden. I imagine that would require more than one person to move, but it should be good wherever its located a while. This looks even easier to construct than the trampoline frame tractor I'm wanting to finish. I might try to convince DH to put something like that together for me, because he is wanting to rip his deck apart around the pool. I love not having to cut grass.
Well yesterday I broke down and went to the hardware store. DD 8 asked me for BB's for her gun and I needed connections to turn the bottom of my water tank into a faucet, a sack of concrete to support the base of one of the T-frames from my old clothes line to use as a trellis for the merlitons to grow up on and some wire to attempt to make my own rabbit cages. Today I put the faucet together for the water tank.....now all I have to do is figure a way to get the roof to drain water into the tank, the cement to dry, so I can put cattle panels in an archway across the top, stop my DD from shooting up everything, and deciding once and for all how to make my rabbit project become a reality.
A lady a few towns away wants to buy a pair of my geese, but her husband won't let her until she sells her ducks, which one of them would do good here and her rabbits, which I might just barter them against the geese.....depending on how many we talking about.
I tried to cut my tractor tires today with a bow saw, but was afraid to mess up the blades with the wire in the tires I was finding. DH is supposed to have used a reciprocating saw to form our older tractor tire planters, but Daddy's saw has a blade in the shape of an S, so really need to change that out. Just looks like its past time to get serious.
Gotta go to New Orleans in the morning with the girls for pointe shoes......hate cities.