Review: Raising Poultry the Modern Way

The modern series released by Storey has a good reputation. I grew up with several of the series in our house as well as our neighbour's house and many seem to be classic tomes of agricultural knowledge. With that in mind I ordered a few on thriftbooks.

(Photo from Thriftbooks.)

Sadly this publication from 1983 does not hold up to the reputation of the series. It is a product of its time with the focus on 'bigger is better' through the imitation and replication of industrial agricultural's methods, motivations, and practices. 

The following are some bits of advice that I would never follow: 

Broody behaviour in poultry is uniformly viewed as negative and should be 'broken'.  

To avoid feather picking and cannibalism, chicken combs are cut off with manicure scissors. 

Washing eggs before incubation is advised as a blanket procedure.   

All poultry houses are to have indoor lighting. 

Some of the scientific information on capons, egg hatching, and butchering was acceptable and basic enough to withstand the change in agricultural management. 

The chapter on water fowl was a tiny bit interesting to me as this was the first time I have done any research on water fowl - but I suspect that after a few more resources I will feel the same way about the water fowl chapter as I did the rest of the book. 

Resources: Homesteading Facebook Groups

Grow Your Own Cut Flowers: While this group is set up by a business, it is full of beautiful pictures of cut flowers and is overall a pleasant and helpful group. While advice posts occur, this group is primarily a place to share photos and to get arrangement ideas from others through photos posted.

Red Worm Composting and Vermicomposting - Worm Farming: Both of these groups are open, inviting, and willing to answer both basic and advanced worm composting questions in a friendly and accepting manner. Excellent resources for worm composting.

Market Gardening Success Group: While this group frequently discusses their mandate of being a place for 'professional' market gardening there is some good advice and conversation within this group. If you are new to market gardening or just growing a large garden for personal use I would suggest that you utilise the search function rather than posting for advice.

CSA Farmer Discussion: This group is a decently friendly group for folks running CSAs unfortunately you have to fill out a google form before admins let you join. There are some good discussions and advice regarding running a CSA in this group.

Winter Sowing (Vegetable Gardening with Sheryl Mann) : While my first experiments with winter sowing were not successful, I find this group to be a welcoming introduction to winter sowing.

Tanning, Leather & Fur Crafting: I've been lurking in this group for a while but do not participate very often. It seems to be a fairly welcoming group and there is a plethora of information contained here. I'm a bit overwhelmed at the thought of tanning but it is something I want to get into.

I'm still searching for a good Angora rabbit group that focuses on wool production and a friendly chicken group.

Seed Swapping Basics

After last week's seed saving post, you might come to the realisation that saving seeds often results in a plethora of seeds of the same varietal. This is where the joys of seed swapping enter the equation!

I attended a local seed swap and while packaging seeds for the exchange, discovered that I was having trouble actually selecting seeds to swap. First off, I need back-ups! And then I need back-ups for my back-ups! But more than that I enjoy knowing where my little plant babies are going! I did manage to send a few seeds out into the world (and got a few back!)

#packed #seeds for #seedswap tomorrow #yellowknife #communitygardenAGM Anyone else have a hard time getting rid of seeds? I need a back-up and back-ups for my back-ups. I worked hard to save them! I want to know whose gunna grow my babies!

A post shared by Sarah (@sarahehoffman) on Apr 4, 2017 at 5:04pm PDT

One of the biggest things to know when attending a local seed swap is... Don't be afraid to take seeds! The folks that offered them up for swap want them to go to good gardens - where they will be used!

While I have been attending local seed swaps for many years, this is the first year that I have experimented with online seed swapping. It is fun to negotiate for the specific types of seeds you want but the postage is an added expense. Free Seed Swap is the facebook group I most frequently use.

Seed Saving Basics

Seed saving is the process of reserving and/or collecting plant seeds from the current year's crop to plant as next season's crops. Before the advent of corporate control and the widespread practice of purchasing seeds, seed saving was a vital and necessary part of the agricultural process.

#january is the month of #seed #saving #cleaning #flower #nasturtium

A post shared by Sarah (@sarahehoffman) on Jan 10, 2017 at 12:30pm PST

There are many reasons why seed saving remains an important practice. Seed saving reduces dependency on large corporations and creates agricultural systems which are low input. This is important for cultural independence and to create sustainable agricultural practices. The concept of saving seeds is firmly entrenched in the ideas surrounding food sovereignty, which is the right of people to define their own food systems. Seed saving promotes agricultural biodiversity because seed saving eventually creates strains of plants that are well-suited to your land's individual climate. Seed saving practices can help farmers find varieties of crops that grow better in different regions which becomes especially important when combating the effects of climate change. Seed saving is also an easy, fun, educational and experimental way of being personally connected to the larger seasonal growing cycles.

I managed to save seeds from Nasturtium flowers as well as plenty of bean seeds. These plants are easy as all you have to do is wait! When plants are dried and dead pick off the viable seeds and save in a cool dry place for the next season.

#beans #garden2016 #dried #seed #seedsaving

A post shared by Sarah (@sarahehoffman) on Sep 22, 2016 at 12:58pm PDT

Garbage Garden

I have become obsessed with planting literal garbage.

Sprouting garlic? Planted.
Sprouting onions? Planted!
Carrot tops? Hand me the soil!

While the seeds planted for the garden, get the benefit of grow lights this 'garbage garden' has to make due with the little natural sunlight that Yellowknife in March affords but, all things considered, they are doing pretty well.

I've taken to planting #garbage #onion #garlic #carrottops #spring #waiting

A post shared by Sarah (@sarahehoffman) on Mar 14, 2017 at 9:40am PDT

The end of my coffee table - the closest flat surface to the window - quickly became full of recycled milk containers and DIY newspaper pots filled with plants. I decided to double down on the 'garbage' in the 'garbage garden' and made a quick drip tray of reclaimed pallet wood lined with dog food bags!

My #garbage #garden got a #facelift by way of a #diy #recycled #dog #food #bag #drip #tray. #recycled #upcycle #stillgarbage #lolz

A post shared by Sarah (@sarahehoffman) on Mar 22, 2017 at 11:21am PDT

While not the most beautiful thing I've ever constructed, looking at my 'garbage garden' makes me very happy!

Why plant garbage?
I planted the garlic to eat garlic scapes.
I dream of collecting seeds from the onion bulbs.
The carrot tops make for a beautiful natural dye.

Almanac 84 Mini Zine

It's been about a year since we closed on our 84 acres of land in Manitoba. I have spent a lot of time over the last year developing skill-sets and researching with specific land projects in mind. I managed to put together a mini zine round-up of those skills along with a few short essays.

This small zine is available as freebie if you order Plot 13. 

Or contact me (wingedsnail99@hotmail.ca) if you would like to trade! 

DIY Flower Press

I have been kind of obsessed with flowers lately (Exhibit A) so I decided to spend the afternoon making a flower press. I had one as a kid and always loved the idea behind them - preserving a bit of summer's beauty into the white winter.

Flower presses are nothing more than a bit of wood, a few bolts, and few pieces of cardboard so it did not take me long to finish this project. I enjoy every second of using my manual hand drill so a small project that required me to use boring drill bits was a bit of extra pleasure. I did use my electric sander to do the bulk of the sanding but found the noise distracting so I finished the project by hand sanding it. A project this small would not take very long to sand entirely by hand anyways so in the future I will forgo the use of the electric sander for small projects.  

#manualdrill #handdrill #woodworking #making #diy #fun #afternoonproject #thingstodo #done

A post shared by Sarah (@sarahehoffman) on Mar 7, 2017 at 4:39pm PST

The completion of this project reminds me how quickly farm related skills develop. Just a few months ago the construction of a bench was arduous and overwhelming but now I can complete a simple project in a few short hours and be relatively stress free while doing it!

And now to we wait until flowers bloom.