Anglesey Smallholder

When putting the chickens to bed just now, I looked into the coop and saw one flat on her back. RIP, chicken.

The old chicken coop was beginning to deteriorate – the roofing felt was torn off during a storm and didn’t get replaced.  Now they have a nice new coop to live in!  It’s a bit bigger (it could probably house twice as many chickens as I actually have – they like to sleep all squashed up together in the corner), and has two separate nesting areas.  They were not very keen on going in – chickens aren’t very adventurous at the best of times – so for the last two nights they have had to be carried over to it and put in.  Hopefully tonight they will manage by themselves.

Say hello to Kelsey, the newest resident at our small home.  She is here on loan from a friend, and is currently employed in keeping the grass in the field under control.  She arrived last Sunday in an enormous horse lorry.  She unloaded without any fuss and settled in immediately.  At the moment she and Victoria the sheep are in separate but neighbouring fields so they can get used to each other – I will open the gate soon so that they can have free reign over the fields.

She’s a three year old Irish cob, and very well behaved.  She’s been very quiet so far, just a little whinnying to the horses in the fields across the road when she arrived.

The only bother at the moment is horse flies.  They descended on her when she arrived, but they seem to have abated somewhat since then.  The rain has rolled in now, so hopefully that will keep them away.

In other news, I am now starting a second job.  This will help pay for repairs to the house, but it will mean that I’ll basically be working 12 hours a day, 7 days a week.  There will be no time for me to get outside and get things done.  It’s frustrating, and will be terribly difficult mentally, but it will only be for a month or so.

The polytunnel has arrived!  For the benefit of American readers, you would just call it a greenhouse.  It’s a series of metal arches covered with plastic. We have put the frame up, we now need to dig a ditch all the way around and bury the ends of the plastic sheet in it.  Digging the ditch is going to be very hard work, the soil seems to be quite heavy clay.  The good news is that the field has dried out a lot since the ditch was cleared with a digger.

It has been rather a stressful week.  First Victoria the sheep became ill – it turned out that she had a chill after being sheared, and is now fine.  Once again, I sheared her myself with a pair of hand shears.  This is not the 2-minute job you see on TV!  It took me a full 3 hours of cutting, without a break.  Victoria was very good, and didn’t struggle or try to escape while she was being cut.  I cut her closer and more evenly than last year (which was my first time ever), and again got the fleece off in one piece.  My biggest worry is cutting her because the shears are exceptionally sharp and in places where the skin is loose it would be very easy for it to get caught, however I went very carefully and didn’t cut her at all.

Second, one of the chickens died without warning.  On Saturday, I noticed that one of the other chickens was not looking well.  Looking at her closely revealed that not only did she have an egg stuck, but she was crawling with parasites.  The vet next door was away for the weekend so I went to see the Adrian, our next door neighbour on the other side and the chicken farmer that originally gave us the chickens.  He confirmed what I suspected, that the kindest thing to do was to put her down.  He kindly offered to come around and see to it himself, and thus her life was ended.  It wasn’t all bad news, however, as he brought with him three more chickens!  We really are fortunate to have such knowledgeable and generous neighbours here.  The new chickens are setting in well, and seem less shy than the previous ones for some reason.

One of the chickens was found dead yesterday, lying on her back in the coop. She had no signs of illness, she basically just dropped dead. I don’t know how old she was, but we had her for a year. At least she had a good life.

Egg shells make a good breakfast. Not for me, of course, but for the chickens themselves.

Chickens need grit in their diet so they can produce their egg shells. Without sufficient grit, they’ll produce soft shelled eggs – very strange and squidgy things. A useful source of grit for egg shells is – egg shells!

Whenever I use an egg, I place the broken shell into a bowl and save them until the bowl is full. (Don’t worry, they don’t smell bad.) Once I have enough shells, they are baked in the oven to sterilize them.  I just put them in a roasting tin in the bottom whenever I’m cooking something else in the oven – or I leave them in the Aga if it’s on.  When they have finished baking, I crush them by putting them in a carrier bag and beating them with whatever is to hand.

The crushed shells are mixed in with the chicken’s feed. They eat most of it, and it keeps their shells healthy and hard!