I have never grown flowers for cutting before - but now I can see the attraction. I planted a dozen sweet pea seeds early in the spring and I am now being rewarded with beautiful fragrant flowers. Everyday there are more to pick when I forage for vegetables at dinner time. I will definitely plant more next year and I'll make a nice big frame for them too, the tee-pee they are on is much to small and crowded (too small for anything of use really - I think some up-cycling is on order). And as a bonus, I've been told you can cut down and dry the plants when they've finished and make pea straw for mulching your garden.
 |
| Sweet Pea Flowers |
I'm loving my garden, all the hard work in spring is paying off. There is a steady supply of gherkins growing over our old umbrella frame for pickling, sweet succulent cherry tomatoes, silver-beet, spring onions, coriander, carrots, lettuce, spinach, runner beans and juicy apple cucumbers. Every couple of weeks I bung a few more seeds in around the garden when a crop has finished, mostly carrots, spring onions and fennel. I think it's a bit too late now for fennel but I'm hoping I'll get some tender baby ones to roast with our back-yard raised chicken when they're ready for slaughter.
 |
| Sweet, tasty toms |
 |
| A quick forage in the rain this morning, yellow zucchini for dinner and gherkins for bottling |
I'm amazed how big the chicks are getting - in just the last 4 weeks they have tripled in size and have grown heaps of adult feathers - they are 9 weeks old. We are thinking they'll be ready for slaughter late February at around 14 weeks old. For this flock are trialing a 50/50 mix of a grain mix and formulated meat feed. The meat feed is not as cheap as grains but I'm sure the added protein is making a difference to their growth rate, which means they'll be ready for slaughter a lot faster and eat less in the long run. Time will tell.
A few weeks ago we moved them to their own run, which is also our compost area and they are doing a great job turning over the heap and it keeps them busy hunting for insects and scraps. I plan to create a 3 bin compost system after slaughter when the area is empty. Then we can have bins at different stages and leave one open for the the next flock to turn for me. I love having chickens, they are great at clearing weeds, turning compost and their poop is amazing for the garden - plus we get eggs and meat.
 |
| Our 'baby' chickens, a bit muddy with all this rain we've been getting but very happy and healthy. |
|
|
 |
| Baby chickens 6 weeks ago |
Hi Ruth, I bought some chickens before Xmas 1 mother hen and 13 chicks, I think their Wyandotte's. Have you been able to determine what sex your chicks are, I have found some information on the internet, that roosters combs grow before hens. Your chicken in the above photo looks like a Wyandotte. I have put a picture on Facebook of my chickens. Cheers Deb
ReplyDeleteHi Deb, yes, my hen above is a Wyandotte, I'm not sure what yours is, she's very pretty with penciled or barred feathers (not laced like a Wyandotte), she may be a mix - Campine or Barred Rock?
DeleteIt's nearly impossible to sex chicks before about 5-6 weeks. For me, at about 5 to 6 weeks the boys were quite easy to tell apart, they started changing to very red around the mouth which spread to their comb and wattles over about a week and the comb began to swell, the girls combs changed a little from yellow to a slight apricot but didn't really change in size. The boys vocals change too, from a chirp to a whine (like a teenagers voice starting to break), hard to explain but if you listen carefully you may hear the difference. They boys also start to fight at about 5-6 weeks, getting up in each others faces, it's quite funny - they don't hurt each other, just play fighting. The picture above of mine at 9 weeks shows all the boys, the girls combs are still small and apricot coloured (I'll try get a pic for you when the rain clears), they stay that way till a few weeks before they start to lay.