1. After several weeks of switching, the girls look very healthy on their new diet of no soy layer pellets and No GMO Tofu. They LOVE the tofu so much and when I put the treats in the suet feeder they look for the white chunks. The extra protein is helping their feathers and a few of them are showing signs of molt, so it’s helping this too. I find Market Basket has a great organic section and their prices are better for the tofu.

The weather has been very wet, but my drainage ditch is holding strong. The coop gets a 1/2 of muddy on top, but no puddles. Few more adjustments in redirecting the water and this should work.

All the girls are back to laying, and the eggs are getting larger now.

The babies are in the kiddie pool now, and growing fast. They are getting back and neck feathers now, sort of looking homely.

Life is good 🙂

4 egg am-After two solid days of rain the sun is peeking out from the clouds, warming the air quickly. Treats of Chicory Endive and tofu make for a great breakfast. Maple trees and dropping seeds, hummingbirds have returned and new baby chicks are doing great.

3 egg am-On this wet memorial weekend, I decided to try my experiment in using the non-soy laying pellets by adding Organic Black Bean Tofu, with no GMO’s. I cut a slice off, cubed it and added it to the chicory endive greens, and gave it to them in the feeder. They LOVED it! They were all trying to get the most pushing each other out of the way! They tofu wasn’t that expensive ($2.19) and I think I can use that instead of the fruits. Win Win. I got it in the organic section of Market Basket if anyone is wondering.

Meanwhile the new kids on the block are doing great. made it through a night, and up and eating and drinking this morning. Unlike my other babies, these don’t seem to like the gro-gel, but I’ll offer it just so I know they are getting enough. Still haven’t named them yet. I got a Ameraucana, a California White, and a Wellsumer. Wellsumers were picked as the bird to survive the apocalypse, they are also the Kellog’s rooster. From this I will get blue, white and chocolate eggs.

1. 1 egg am- I think I am getting to the chickens before they’ve had time to lay. Treats of cantaloupe , bread crusts, and leftover broccoli on the menu. Flock looks good very “chatty” this morning. Dew glistens on the grass with sparkles. Lilacs in full bloom now, the air smells wonderful. White Azalea about to bloom, usually signaling the start of hummingbird season. Yellow Swallowtails are fluttering around.

1 BIG egg am- to most Friday is a big deal. They look forward to the weekend either traveling or home mowing the grass and gardening. Me, I’m lucky  if I can remember what day it is. They are all a blur sometimes. Appointments help, and today started at 8:00am with getting Mr. Frodo’s nails cut at the vet. He’s a Hemingway cat, and has 8 toes on both front and 6 on the back. In between all those toes are extra claws. Probably has about 12 claws on each foot in front. So it’s much easier to bring him in to have them clipped about every 3 months. This time he didn’t fight me at all, and went right into the box. Afterwards went and hid somewhere, but he’ll be fine.

Hemingway cats were a favorite of Ernest Hemingway  and even to this day at his Key west estate, cats roam freely on the grounds and they have a little cat cemetery in the back too. All the cats have 6 toes or more. Polydacts is the technical term for a cat with 6 toes or more.

Oh, back to chickens! Treats were a cantaloupe and bread crusts this am. I need some greens but haven’t gotten out to the store to find any. They really enjoyed the mustard greens last week. Today’s egg was larger and a bit misshapen. I wonder if this was from the chicken that wasn’t laying. As I was leaving May was up in the nesting box clucking. Her feathers are growing back nicely on her back and she almost has a real tail!

I need to clean out the PVC tube and use that for oyster shell. With the new soy-free/GMO free  food I also need to figure out how to up their proteins. Fish meal is super stinky from what I read and not sure I want to do that.

These are the pellets I got yesterday, interesting development in the chicken feed world.

http://www.greenmountainfeeds.com/products/poultry/organic-soy-free-layer-pellets/

ingredients:Organic Corn, Organic Field Peas, Organic Wheat Middlings, Organic Flaxseed Meal, Organic Canola Meal, Calcium Carbonate, Organic Alfalfa Meal, Organic
Whole Grain Wheat, Organic Whole Grain Barley, DiCalcium Phosphate, Oystershell, Kelpmeal, Hydrated Sodium Calcium Aluminosilicate, Brewers Dried Yeast, Choline Chloride, Niacin, Vitamin E Supplement, Manganous Oxide, Zinc Oxide, Sodium Selenite, Riboflavin, Calcium D-Pantothenate, Menadione Sodium Bisulfate Complex, Ferrous Sulfate, Copper Sulfate, Vitamin B12 Supplement, Calcium Iodate, Pyridoxine HCL, Thiamine Mononitrate, Vitamin D3 Supplement, Folic Acid, Vitamin A Acetate, Salt, Sodium Bicarbonate, Methionine – 99%, Allzyme SSF (Organic Enzyme Supplement).

This Product does not contain soy, soy products, or soy by-products. Due to this, other sources of protein are used to meet the amino-acid requirements of your chickens. The sources used in this formulation are Organic Flaxseed meal, Organic Canola Meal, and Organic Field Peas. Using these alternative forms of protein will cause slightly lower production levels than a soy based feed.

This product is new. Please contact us with any feedback that you think would be important to us! The more feedback that we get, the better. We are going to continue our research with soy free feeds, and start introducing more soy-free options to our product line!

• Minimum Lysine0.5%
• Minimum Methionine0.3%
• Minimum Crude Protein15%
• Minimum Crude Fat2.75%
• Maximum Crude Fiber8%
• Minimum Calcium3.5%
• Maximum Calcium4.25%
• Minimum Phosphorus0.6%
• Minimum Salt0.2%
• Maximum Salt 0.3%

2 egg am-The beautiful aroma’s in the air, sun high in the sky. Treats of Cantaloupe and bread crusts make for happy hens.

So they were out of my usual organic feed at The Mane Place, so I bought organic feed with no soy! Who knew? I guess they did. No GMO’s! Can’t be a bad thing, when you are what you eat! I believe I will start feeding this on a regular basis, and maybe add fish meal to make up the protein from the soy.

Getting 3 new chicks next Friday! Excited. Trying to come up with names. I am getting a chocolate egg layer, a white egg layer and a blue egg layer. Supply and demand.

I am easily selling out every week on my eggs and have 3-4 clients a week. It helps pay for feed and that’s all good. I’d like to start keeping track of these things how many each person gets a year etc. but then I give dozens away too, so not sure it’s worth the effort.

2 egg am- Started drizzly and wet in the am and now the sun has broken through and everything is popping up and blooming. Buds on the lilacs and the lily of the valley are off and running. Treats were cantaloupe and bread this  morning, ran out of greens. Cleaned coop this afternoon and everything looks great.

Finally we got a solid rain, and today the drops are still clinging to the newly budded tress, grass and flowers. Slightly muggy. Flock has treats of Mustard Greens and Cantaloupe with 2 crusts of bread. I finally figured out who is laying the smaller eggs! Clara! There was a red feather on one, and I was able to pin that down. Hope she recovers, and starts laying full size eggs. Because Betsy died I wonder whether these RIR’s are just a weak strain. Still want to put the finishing touches on the coop, but time hasn’t been my friend of late. Hopefully summer will slow down with work, and everything else so I can focus on the coop before it floods again.

0 eggs am- The flock is laying little bits at a time during the day. They all seem to be laying just not in the early morning anymore. Carrots and Pears on the treat list. Everything is going so well with them.

Kale, Spinach and Chard sprouted.