Ducklings!

After raising Chickens, Turkeys, and Guineas we decided last spring it was time to get some ducks. Once we did a little research we came across the Khaki Campbell breed and next thing you know we have six ducklings! We learned quickly that they didn't like us all that much but over time through food they warmed up enough to where they would take food out of our hand.

Unfortunately our duck population dwindled due to the predators we have living in the middle of the woods and we were left with two hens. Of course it was then that we realized it was time to get more. This time we decided to get a Male or in duck terms a drake. The drake we got was grown and about the same age as our hens so they got along great. Unfortunately later in the weeks we lost another hen and were left with just our drake and hen. Since then they have been the perfect pair and this spring they hatched their first ducklings!

Once our hen started laying we started collecting the eggs to put in our incubator and whatever she laid afterwards we watched her put in her nest. So we set our eggs and waited and waited and waited some more. Finally after coming to the realization that our eggs in the incubator weren't going to hatch we moved on and started keeping a close eye on our Hen or as I like to call her Momma Duck. Since she didn't start sitting on her eggs until after we set ours in the incubator we figured we still had a good chance she would hatch some and sure enough about a week later we had 12 baby ducklings!

We decided to leave the ducklings with Momma Duck until she started not showing interest in them and leaving them out in the open. At one point I even looked out my back window to see her quacking across the back yard with a line of ducklings behind her and our 90lb chocolate labs nose right in the last ducklings rear! Thankfully our Lab is a big baby and loves all her farm friends but after that we weren't too confident Momma Duck would keep them as safe as we'd like so for now we have taken them from her. With that said they will be reunited later but for now we are loving every second of playing with our new ducklings!

Homemade Yogurt

Have you ever wanted to know how to make homemade yogurt? If so you've come to the right place and just as an added bonus it's actually really easy to make! 

Since we have small children (14 mos. and 3 yrs) that love yogurt we tend to buy lots of it, but one thing that has been an issue is finding plain whole milk yogurt. You can sometimes find it at store with more selection like Farm Fresh, but it's not typically found at your local Food Lion. Also we have found making it ourselves has allowed us to make our own flavors using fresh fruit we have around here.

How exactly do I do this....

A large pot with lid, Candy Thermometer, 1/2 gallon of milk, and 1/2 cup of yogurt, Digital thermometer with probe (if you have one)

For the milk you can use any kind you like, but of course whole milk or 2% are going to produce a thicker, creamier yogurt, but you can use skim if you'd like. That's the wonderful thing about making it yourself! It's YOUR choice!

When it comes to the 1/2 cup of yogurt you can either use Greek or regular yogurt but make sure it is plain, no added flavors. Also make sure to check the ingredients for "Live Active Yogurt Cultures". This is what turns the milk into yogurt, so of course this is a must! The higher number of cultures the better because each strain of bacteria has its own health benefits, but as long as there is at least one, you can make yogurt. Note once you make your first batch of yogurt you can actually take out a 1/2 cup since it now has the active culture in it and save it for your next batch so you no longer have to buy any yogurt!

The first thing your going to do is pour all your milk into your large pot and start heating your milk up. 

Make sure you stir as it heats up to prevent it from sticking to the bottom. As you can see LM wanted to help with this part!

Once your milk reaches the correct temperature (200 degrees Fahrenheit) It's then time to let it cool stirring occasionally to keep from forming a skin on the top. If you notice it forming the skin on the top just stir it into your milk, it's not going to hurt anything.

Then once your milk is cooled to (110-115 Degrees Fahrenheit) scoop about a cup of the milk into a bowl with your 1/2 cup of yogurt and whisk until all the yogurt is dissolved. Add your yogurt and milk mix to the remaining milk in your large pot and mix well.

Now its time to put your lid on your large pot and place your pot into an off oven while monitoring the temperature (110-115 degrees Fahrenheit) for at least 4 hours or as long as over night. Really until you get your yogurt to the consistency you want. 

This is where I used the digital thermometer with the probe to monitor the temperature, but if you don't have one you can just use whatever thermometer you have to check the temperature periodically.

Give it one last jiggle to make sure it's the thickness you want and if so you can go ahead and stir it. 

Then place it in your container and refrigerate it.

Once cooled, then enjoy!

Ingredients:

1/2 gallon Milk (whole or 2% or Skim can be used)

1/2 cup of Commercial Yogurt containing active cultures

Equipment:

Large pot with lid

Whisk

Spatula

Small measuring cup

Candy thermometer (or one that clips to your pot)

Instructions:

1. Pour all your milk into your large pot and heat over medium-high heat, stirring to prevent from sticking until it reaches 200 degrees Fahrenheit. 

2. Let the milk cool at about 110-115 degrees Fahrenheit, stirring occasionally to prevent a skin from forming over the top.

3. Scoop out about a cup of your warm milk and stir it into your 1/2 cup of yogurt until all the yogurt is dissolved. 

4. Add all of your yogurt and milk mix to your large pot with the rest of your milk. Mix well.

5. Place your lid on your large pot and transfer it to an off oven keep it at 110-115 degrees Fahrenheit for at least 4 hrs or more till yogurt sets to the consistency you want.

6. Once yogurt has cool some transfer it to a container and store in the refrigerator until your ready to enjoy.

  

A Busy But Wonderful Life...

Though it has been quite sometime since our last post on here (over two years) we are still homesteading and doing our thing. We do have a Facebook page  now so you can always keep up with us on there, but we're going to try to keep the blog updated for now on as well. 

So I am sure your dying to know what in the world have we been up to in the past two years?! Well here's what's been going on and of course an update on all the animals!

First and foremost we welcomed our second child, a sweet baby boy (LS) into the world on January 2014 so that's been one big reason for our absence on here.

Also while we are on the topic of kids here is an update photo of our two precious little ones! LS is now 14 months and LM is almost 3 years old!

Now moving on to whats been going on with our homestead....

Well one of our last post was about the garden so here is an up to date picture of that, which may surprise you, but I will explain.

Like most this time of year we are preparing our garden for new crops to be planted, but particularly this year we are redoing some of our raised beds and adding more height. Last year our garden did fine in some parts but because of a very large tree near by sucking up all the water around one side of our garden did not thrive as well as the other. Recently we removed the tree so we are hoping to have more success this year. Also this is just one side of the garden shown above but the other side looks quite the same. 

Here are some more pictures of what's going on inside the garden so far this year and also what has not yet made it into the garden.

Above is a picture of our strawberries doing well as always. We are now just looking for a way for them to grow somewhat off the ground to prevent from rotting by sitting on the ground.

Here is a picture of our favorite veggie, asparagus doing equally as well!

Recently we built a little green house to keep our plants in until we move them to garden. So far we have Kale, Broccoli, Squash (two different types), Zucchini, Cantaloupe, Sweet pepper and Cucumber started.

Now on to what you've all be waiting for the animals....

Here are some of our Guineas. They are all this color (pearl) except one that is white.

These are our chickens and here are the different kinds we currently have.

This is our one special breed we received in an order that came from Mcmurray Hatchery

which is typically where we order our chickens from. If you haven't used them and are looking for a reliable company to order your chicks from this is the place to use.

Back to the Rooster above....He is a Buff Cochin and his name is fluffy. FYI we didn't know he was a rooster before we named him. He is feather footed, as you can see and a beautiful breed.

These here are Ol Fluffs offspring which are two roosters of course that were breed with our last Red Star before she passed. So they are Red Stars and Buff Cochins.

The hens breeds we have now are some Speckled Sussex and Buff Orpingtons. Both are beautiful breeds but I tend to favor the Red Stars which we will hopefully have some of soon once we place our spring order to the hatchery.

 This is our one and only Bourbon Red Turkey hen sitting on chicken eggs. She isn't one of our smartest birds. She has yet to have any eggs hatch.

We also have a pair of breeding Khaki Campbells which are very entertaining, especially when playing in their pool. We are hoping to have ducklings from them hatch later this week so be looking for a post on those.


Talking about hatching babies these recently hatched last week and though we are not 100% sure what breed they are yet we are pretty confident the all yellow one is Buff Cochin breed with Buff Orpington and the other two, Red Star/Buff Cochin breed with Buff Orpington. So we shall see what we get when their feathers start to come in. So far we have 2 feather footed and one without.

Now moving on to the goats we currently have..... 

The top picture is the oldest goat on the farm, Pebbles. If you've read our previous post she is one of the first goats we purchased and when we got her we were told she may be pregnant and sure enough a couple months later she birthed these two baby girls. Wilma is on the left and is identical to her Momma. Then of course the bottom right is her other baby, Betty.

The other goats we have here are...

Jack and Jill which are brother and sister. Like all our goat here they are Nigerian Dwarfs.

Our newest additions are strictly for food purposes but they sure are cute to look at, for now anyways!

 These are our two female American Guinea Hogs that will be with us until about November and after that they will be remembered every time we sit down to have some of our delicious home raised pork.

On a not so happy note we recently lost our oldest animal family member, Drake. Our sweet 13 year old black lab passed away due to heart failure two weeks ago. 

Not only was this hard on all of us, (my husband especially since he had Drake the entire 13 yrs) I can only imagine it has been the hardest for our other chocolate lab, Bristol that has been with him her entire life. She has never known life as a only dog, but thankfully she has handled it like a champ and of course we have been spending lots of extra time with her to help her cope. We have considered getting her another companion but that is a whole other issue. So we will see what happens.

Well I think that about covers all that been going on here at Lees Reach. 

Oh, except one more thing.....

We are overjoyed to announce we will be welcoming our third child into the world in September of this year!!!!

Garden Plan 2013

Well last years plan was a big Bust! I had high hopes to run 2 gardens the first year at Lee's Reach and it just didn't happen. I did have good success with the "Food Plot" garden but not one thing cam up in my raised be garden. So this year I am abandoning the Food Plot Garden and focusing on the Raised Bed Garden. Sounds backwards I know. The reasoning is I can water the raised bed garden and I cant the other. Also it's mush closer to the house and therefor I can give it more attention. It took a four wheeler ride to get to the other garden. I purchased some composted soil the other day and loaded up the beds this weekend . I have also been composting all winter so I should be able to add more as the season progresses. Last year the only thing I did was till the soil and I never added and fill dirt or compost to the beds. Also I never planted anything until late June and it was super dry and hot. Here is the plan for this year.

(Click on the picture for a larger view)

I am hoping that less is more. Fewer plants but more produce. When the garden was so far away last year the critters were able to get to everything before I was. With this new set up I should be able to "Defend" it from the house and keep a closer eye on it. 

Now it's time to start some seeds.

New Chicks are Here

We got our order of spring chicks in yesterday. We ordered from McMurray Hatchery again. This time we got 10 Speckled Sussex Females and 2 Males, 10 Barred Rock Females and 2 Males and 5 Red Stars. Of course they included the free exotic chick which ended up being this feather footed Buff Cochin.

Here are the Speckled Sussex

The Barred Rocks

 And the Red Stars.

Unfortunately we did have one that was DOA and we lost one last night but I'm confident that the rest will be fine. We will be selling a few of these just to cover the cost of shipping. The minimum order is 30 and we just don't need that many right now. I guess I better get working on a larger coop.