Hatching!

I have 5 Khaki Campbell duck hens. I regularly get 4 eggs a day 7 days a week and they are always
sold out! So I traded one of my Muskovy hens for a KC drake a couple months ago.
The girls really wanted nothing to do with him at first but he hung in there and breeding commenced!
I put 12 eggs in the bator about 2 weeks after we brought him home. On day 7 I candeled and only kept 7
as the others appeared infertile. Well today we hatched 5 KC ducklings! Yeah! I am hoping for hens to
increase my egg production next spring. I think I will pull off 12 more next week! 

New ram lamb!

I just purchased a new ram lamb from The Lavender Fleece. With this purchase I hope to

bring some top quality Icelandic VAI genetics to my flock.
My new lamb is a Black Grey Horned lamb. A Visir grandson
out of a Rector grand daughter. I hope to improve the meat and milkyness qualities in my flock. We will call him Vision.

Now offering: pastured poultry

We are now taking orders for pastured duck, chicken and turkey. Our birds are all raised on pasture in our moveable chicken tractors. This allows us to move them to fresh grass daily or twice a day as needed. They get to eat grass and bugs much as they were designed to do. They are much healthier and healthier for you and your family. Moving them daily also helps us to rejuvenate our pastures. We keep our stocking rate low at about 15 chickens or ducks per tractor.

See what I mean? LOL

How we raise our sheep

We raise Icelandic sheep in Portland, Or and Estacada, Or. Our sheep spend the summer in  Estacada where they grow and thrive on plenty of fresh grass and black berries. In the fall we bring them home to set up our breeding groups. After breeding the rams go back to Estacada and the girls stay in Portland to lamb. The Portland place actually belongs to a friend just down the road from my house. It's only about 3 minutes away so we can spend alot of time there with the sheep. The Estacada place also belongs to a friend. It's a lot farther from home but in the summer grazing period we don't need to be around as often. We do go out once or twice a week just to visit with them and check on their condition. My friends who live there also help keep an eye on them. I couldn't do it without either friend. We are looking for our own property to move to but in the mean time this set up works well for all concerned. I get free grass and they get help with keeping down the grass and blackberries. Seems to be a win win situation.

Lambs 2010

I just couldn't resist another picture of my favorite. This is "the bandit" He's huge and built like a brick ---house. Wonderful soft profuse fleece. His only draw backs are he seems to be scurred and he is part of my unregistered flock. Darn. I may use him for breeding this fall with the unregistered girls and see what he throws. To be fair to my other lambs he is a single but there is no denying his great attributes. He looks even better from the rear! LOL

Lambs 2010

These two are Beaulah's boys. The morrit is both better built and calmer.

Lambs 2010

These are Olga's boys. The one in back takes after his mom! See the mouth set? Very nice well built lambs with beautiful fleeces.

Olga the Big

This is Olga. Doesn't she look tough? This is a big beautiful ewe with a great udder! She has a great depth of chest and shoulder. She's long and deep throughout. We called her Bossy for a long time before I caught this look on her face. Olga is big and she knows it! She also loves a good scratch!

And this is Olga's Morrit Mouflan Badgerface lamb.

This is Beaulah's Morrit mouflan lamb.

Onions and such.

These onions are about 12 to 18 inches tall. I put them in the ground in Feb. The peas are planted along the fence right behind the onions. I have very limited space in my yard so I have to take advantage of every little area.

Update on broiler chickens & Muscovies

Just wanted to fill you in on the end results of the broiler chickens. We butchered 10 cornish-x
chickens. They all butchered out between 4.5 and 6.5 lbs. The majority were in the 5-5.5lb range.
We butchered at 9 weeks. Next time I will butcher one or two weeks earlier because I think plucking will be easier and we lost 4 in the last two weeks due to leg and heart problems. We still have 4 dark
cornish and 3 naked necks in the chicken tractor. These we will let grow for about 4 weeks longer
as they seriously do not grow as fast as the broilers. The ducks should start hatching about the time
we butcher the rest of the chickens. Then they will take up residence in the chicken tractor. Muskovy duck is the all around best eating duck there is! And so easy to raise. I can't wait to get some in the freezer. Until next time.
Tamera

Aspragus and others.

My asparagus is finally up! So are my potatoes. I am trying a new technique with my
potatoes this year. I am planting them in a 4'x4' raised bed and adding 2x6's as they grow
to raise the bed and hopefully get more production. I have planted German butterball,
Russian bananna fingerlings and a Finn. We also butchered our 10 cornish-x chickens today.
I was glad to see them go. We still have 7 chickens in the chicken tractor that won't be ready
for another 3 or 4 weeks. They are Naked necks and Dark Cornish. What a huge difference in
growth rate. Till later.
Tamera

This is one of Olga's lambs. I may just keep him for next years breeding season.

More ram lambs!

Wheezie and Thistle both lambed singles. Once again ram lambs. OMG!

I can't believe not one ewe lamb. This is Wheezies 10.25 lb lamb.

More ram lambs!

Well Maude, Edith, Olga and Beaulah have all lambed nice, large, beautiful RAM lambs!
Yes, all eight lambs are rams! With last years 4 Archie is now 12 for 12 throwing rams.
We also butchered a ram yesterday from last years lambs. He had become quite destructive and
aggressive. We will have him made into spicy sausage. The Sportsmans butcher shop
in Carver did a great job with our venison last fall so we will take him there to see how
they do with a ram. The muskovy ducks are now setting so we should have some
ducklings in about 35 days. We plan to move them to the farm and raise them in our
chicken tractor. They will all go in the freezer. I'm considering selling my unregistered
Icelandics this fall as I will need to make a little more room for the ever hoped for
ewe lambs from the 5 ewes that have yet to lamb. I will keep my fingers crossed!
Till later, Tamera.

Lambs! Finally....

Maude was first as predicted. She had two ram lambs unassisted mar23. I expected more
spotting as last years lambs from my ram Archie and Maude both exibited spotting.
Black moufflan was 9.25 lbs and the morrit solid with white flashes on his head was
8.75 lbs.

 The sheep all look as if they are ready to burst. I can't tell who will go first. Maude is sooo... wide and her udder is getting huge! Edith looks rediculously funny with her round body and skinny legs! They all are developing udders. Even the wild two. I find myself walking up behind them and doing the
"backend" check. Tuesday is I believe "D" day as per all my calculations. We will see!
Tamera

Makin Bacon.

Wednesday the 10th we started curing our own bacon.
We bought a fresh pork belly from the "Original Steer Market"
off 122nd and Division Portland Or. After cutting into bacon slab
sizes (4 pcs) I made a dry cure of :
one cup course Kosher salt.
one cup brown sugar.
one cup pure maple suryp.
This I worked generously into 3 of the bacon slabs. It seemed a little wetter
than I expected/wanted but slather I did!
The last slab I used a prepared cure I bought at Fred Meyer.
It's called "Mortons Smoke Flavored Sugar Cure".
This had sodium nitrite in the mix. I turn them every day. They will
stay in their cure for 7-9 days.

Spring Fever!

I finally put in my long awaited Aspargus bed. I put in Purple Passion and UC72. 10 of each.
Been meaning to do this for two years now.
Moved the blueberries up front in their new beds, dug up and moved my pathetic
strawberry "roots" that the chickens decimated this winter. They were showing some signs of life now that the chickens are properly confined. Planted turnip, kohlrabi,bokchoi and romaine
letuce seed. We'll see what takes. Next weekend potatoes!