Jason closes his journal... Thanks!! I love you!!

[Quail_Antwerp]

Nice bunch of eggs!

So your girls just started laying? Can you explain what you meant about checking their combs? I have read that you can tell if a hen is ready to lay by her comb but I don't really get it!

When they are getting close to laying, their combs get bright red. If you watch your chickens combs, the redder they get, the closer to laying they are.

I've hens running around with combs so bright red they'd nearly blind you!

Also, hens close to laying might also "squat" for you if you reach to pet/pick them up, like they would squat for a rooster...

 

[Dace]

Nice bunch of eggs!

So your girls just started laying? Can you explain what you meant about checking their combs? I have read that you can tell if a hen is ready to lay by her comb but I don't really get it!

When they are getting close to laying, their combs get bright red. If you watch your chickens combs, the redder they get, the closer to laying they are.

I've hens running around with combs so bright red they'd nearly blind you!

Also, hens close to laying might also "squat" for you if you reach to pet/pick them up, like they would squat for a rooster...

yeah I have a couple squatters! But their combs all just look the same red. I guess I just have not paid attention

 

[TanksHill]

Great looking eggs MP> Introducing the nest?? Have you not had a box in their coop? With both my coops I build the boxes in. The girls just start laying in them.

Keep up the canning, it's a good thing. I was working on beans yesterday.

Quail, I have never had a chicken squat for me until now. I picked up 12 sex links in March. They are all laying now but they are so funny. When you get close they just sit down. I have never seen this before. Most of my heritage breeds just take off running. Funny girls!!

 

[modern_pioneer]

Great looking eggs MP> Introducing the nest?? Have you not had a box in their coop? With both my coops I build the boxes in. The girls just start laying in them.

Keep up the canning, it's a good thing. I was working on beans yesterday.

Quail, I have never had a chicken squat for me until now. I picked up 12 sex links in March. They are all laying now but they are so funny. When you get close they just sit down. I have never seen this before. Most of my heritage breeds just take off running. Funny girls!!

When I built the coop, I was going to build the nesting boxes later, and planned to build them in August. They weren't supposed to be laying yet, well I didn't think so anyway. So I will get the lumber tomorrow and spend sometime building and installing them tomorrow. For now, I placed some hay in one corner of the coop where their laying eggs, that will get them through till tomorrow.

Dace- Aly is correct...

I gave Mark, not kidding, 30 pounds of green beans, I have put up enough for the next two years. See thats what happens when some one lets you borrow land to plant on. I took some to Johns today to sell, but he traded me a couple bails of hay instead. He said he'd try to sell them for 50 cents a pound, and there was at least 8-10 pounds.

With the cheap/free canning jars I got this year, as well as a larger garden, I have been a canning fool. I did well on my berries as the blackberries are now coming in and so one more round of jamming soon.

I am still fighting the deer, and that wise old ground hog is still alive. His day will come, and I decided I'd make some stew with him using a recipe my Aunt gave me.

Now is also the time to sure up my deer stand and put out some salt licks to melt into the ground. I filled for my extra doe tag as well as my black powder stamp. I can't wait to show you how to make summer sausage from deer meat. Thems some good eats..........

I am out to the garden and get some weeding done.

Take care folks, have a great evening.

 

[justusnak]

Jay, what a great feeling going out there and finding those first few eggs. Well, actually, for me...every day its a great feeling. lets me know I am taking great care of them. My girls reward me with a dozen a day! Today I let one broody Buff Orpington finally have a nest of her own. She has 16 eggs under her! No egg turning for me!

 

[modern_pioneer]

It is a good feeling to have our own eggs. They are very small right now as they are still young, I cracked the largest open last night to find a double yolker, two very small yolks as well as some small stuff in the egg white area.

Often when I do shows I have to struggle with making change, and sorting out my til and pulling out cash. Last show I got upset, so decided to buy a small cash register. Today I put a little solar system together to run the register without power available to use. It will also be used to run my forever dieing lap top that I use for designing when I am not working a sale.

1 5 watt solar powered trickle charger
1 deep cycle marine battery
1 12 volt power converter

I made a wooden box, screwed the power converter to the right, placed battery on the left (so I can flip the lid over and everything including the solar panel will fit snugged together without damaging each other. I made a clamp for the tents cross bar to mount the solar panel to and it does adjust for the best position through the day. So now I have portable power without purchasing a $1057.00 quiet Honda generator. I don't have to worry about hauling gas either. My cost including the cash register was under $325.00, for a savings of $732.00.

I also need to run lights at my up coming show, the hours are 0730-2300 hrs, so I might need to add another battery to the system and or another battery charger. If so, than my cost will still be less than 500.00. The batteries, if maintained correctly, should last no less 5 years, no more than 8 years. I am going to run the lights on this system to see how long they will last before the show.

Though I was happy to see the new search engine Bing get up and going without to many problems. I am even more happy how they use their spider programs to crawl websites that place websites in order. These "spiders" are programs used to crawl the web to search through websites and gather information. Googles spiders are much different than bings. My old business as always stays at the top free without advertising with google, where as my newest business was stuck on page two. Bings spiders have placed my newest business at the middle of its front page, and my old business at the bottom of the front page. So either way its been a good thing.

I worry about the shuffle that google does every few years, the last shuffle it took me almost a month to get back to the top of the page without paying for advertising. Last time I looked, it would cost me $1.04 per click. With over 300-700 hits a day, that would add up like nobodys business. Bing has the right investors and cash backing to give google a run for its search engine placement, let the search engine wars begin.

I did some adjustments on my deer stand, so its good to go. I located the ground hogs burrow as well.

 

[big brown horse]

My you are so handy!

 

[lorihadams]

Isn't it great to finally get eggs!!! I love getting double yolkers, the kids just think it is amazing!

 

[TanksHill]

Congrats on the cute little egg!!

If you have a chance can you post a pic of the solar set up.. I happen to have access to several deep cell batteries. I am wondering if it would be a good idea to put something together as an emergency solar charger. Just for fun and to see what it could power. Cell phones, comp etc...

have a great day.

 

[modern_pioneer]

Congrats on the cute little egg!!

If you have a chance can you post a pic of the solar set up.. I happen to have access to several deep cell batteries. I am wondering if it would be a good idea to put something together as an emergency solar charger. Just for fun and to see what it could power. Cell phones, comp etc...

have a great day.

I sure will, I am, my computer is still under battery power after being on for two days. I have continued to use my lap top, and the battery is at 60% right now. These are low wattage units, and my battery charger is only a 5 watt trickle. That means I am stilling using four times the power than the solar charger can put back.

I wouldn't run a register 24 hours a day, nor my laptop. So it will last 6 days on full charge, but I am pretty sure I can only run my light sets for 3 1/2 hours on a full charge. With the solar back up I might get 3 3/4 hours. I think I have defined this enough to say I need another battery. I might need to add 13 more solar panels in order to keep up with my electrical needs. That isn't cost effective, lets see what the converter will do.