Holidays

Well, things are finally settling down a little bit here after the Christmas break. We had a very quiet and relaxing Christmas here at the palace. On Christmas Eve, we decided to follow the Germanic tradition of having dinner and opening gifts.  We spent the evening with Sandra's mother and ordered Indian Take Away for dinner.

The food was delicious! We had a selection of spring rolls and Samosas for entree, and for main course, we ordered Mumbai Fish (mild), Navaratan Vegetable Korma (Medium) and a Traditional Goat Curry (Hot) accompanied by Naan Bread and Brown rice. Everything was very flavoursome and not too hard on the tastebuds for spice. We added some Ginger and Mango Chutney and drank Blood Orange Soda to wash it down with. All in all, it was a very nice dinner, topped off with ice cream to cool the palate for dessert.

Christmas day, Sandra and I spent at home together and ate lightly, just made ourselves some Vietnamese style rice paper rolls and had them with sweet chilli dipping sauce. Christmas Night we had fresh bread rolls with Seafood mix on them and Sandra tried her hand at making a Thousand Island dressing which worked out very well!

The Hensington Palace Hens were not forgotten on Christmas and enjoyed a special treat for their dinner. We thawed some Kangaroo Meat ( a favourite with the girls!) and doled it out to everyone, from the youngest chicks right up to the guest hens we have staying with us over the Christmas holidays. It was a hit with one and all, and gave them all plenty to cluck about as they retired to their roosts for the night.

The kangaroo meat was particularly enjoyed by the hen we had in Hensington Hospital. Her reaction made me wish I had brought the video camera with me. It's hard to describe the sound she made on tasting her first mouthful of Kangaroo, but if a hen was capable of squealing in delight, that is what that sound would be. She did it after the second mouthful too, and I swear it is the nearest approximation to "OOOH! Yummy!" A chicken could possibly make!

As thanks, the girls all delivered an egg each on Boxing Day, which was lovely of them, but meant I needed to find a means to deal with the eggs we already had! In keeping with the holiday, though, I didn't do anything about it that day. Instead, I took myself to the movies to see War Horse, whilst Sandra settled happily in front of the TV to watch the beginning of the Boxing Day Cricket Test.

War Horse is a beautiful film. There are some sad/painful moments in it, but you'd expect that with a film that is dealing with war. World War I is a particular interest for me, so I was keen to see this film. I thought the cinematography was amazing as one would expect from Stephen Spielberg and the storyline was moving. There is a goose in the early parts of the film, too who steals the show and adds some wonderful comedic relief. I recommend this film, but be sure to take a few tissues with you. There was not a dry eye in the house at the end of the film! Well, except for mine...I was moved by it, but I think I used up all my tears on Christmas night, Watching Judy Dench and Maggie Smith in Ladies in Lavender.

The day after Boxing Day, and I still had the dilemma of what to do with excess eggs. I had been thinking of trying my hand at pickling some for a while now, so decided this would be as good a time as any! I found a recipe online and decided I'd give it a go since I had all of the ingredients, particularly the 12 eggs the recipe called for. So I set out to make "Garlic-Curry Pickled Eggs"

The pickling juice I made for this smelled delicious and I had fun with it. Peeling a dozen hard boiled eggs is not easy! Some of my hens lay eggs with particularly hard shells and strong membranes! I got it done, though, and here is the end result.

It looks, and smells wonderful, but we won't know how it tastes until two weeks from now as they need to mature before eating. I will keep you posted!

Well, that about sums up the Christmas break here at Hensington Palace! I hope all of my readers have had a happy, healthy and safe holiday and I wish you all the best for 2012.

Still waiting....

Today marks the 11th day of Bertha's long incubation of her eggs. It seems so much longer since we set the eggs under her, but I have checked and double checked the date we set her, and it is definitely day 11. I am tempted to candle the eggs, but as I wouldn't even know what I am looking at, I have refrained from doing so. What will be, will be. I just hope they're progressing and we will end up with chicks out of all this.

I went up to the coops today with some kangaroo mince which I fed to the other three girls, and when Bertha smelled it and heard the special "Ohhhh we have goodies!" call of the other hens, she decided to get off her nest. I gave her some of the mince, which she gobbled down happily, along with some grains and then she proceeded to have a drink, and a leisurely dustbath. She is looking quite scruffy because she has pulled out a lot of her feathers to line her nest. I was going to snap a photo to show everyone, but by the time I went back up there with the camera she was just settling back on her eggs and I didn't want to disturb her again. She looks well and happy otherwise, so I think she is going to see this through.

In the meantime, we have been busy in our garden again and spent yesterday planting seeds and seedlings. We finally got our seed potatoes into the ground, along with planting out the pumpkin seedlings I have been nurturing. We also planted rockmelons, watermelon, beans, zucchini and button squash.

Seed Potatoes.

Yes, there really are little pumpkin plants here!

The chooks were busy, too! (A couple of these were from the day before)

They really enjoy their summer coop!

A well deserved lunch after the hard work.

And this is what Solly, my cat, thinks of hard work!

 It was good to get the planting done, and relax in front of the telly with our special "Grand Finals" cheese and vege platters for lunch!

Bokashi, Books and Broody hens

 It was time to bury another bucket full of Bokashi today so I took it up to where I buried the last lot on August 29, almost a month ago! My how time flies! I was curious to know how well the last lot I buried had broken down and I remembered saying on my blog that I would let you all know how it went. If you recall I said in THIS POST That I gathered up windfall citrus to bury with the bucket full of citrus peels, vege scraps, eggshells, and other waste from the kitchen mixed with Effective Microoganisms to help it break down. 

I started to dig where I had buried the last lot and was very surprised at how soft the ground here was. I turned over a spadeful of the most delicious smelling compost! It's kind of fruity and sweet smelling and very moist.

 For the most part, the scraps and peels had broken down completely, although there were still some little bits of citrus mixed through.

Citrus in the compost

I think that the bits of citrus that had not broken down yet might actually be from the whole ones I put in that I picked up around the yard. Anything that had been cut into small pieces and processed in the bucket prior to burying was gone!

I am really very pleased with this.

The vege patch continues to thrive, despite the potting mix we planted it in being quite hydrophobic and not holding moisture very well.

We have Roma Tomatoes coming on nicely!

 We actually put some soil on some of the veges, from the bokashi compost pit, to see if it helps at all with moisture retention. We won't be doing the 'no dig' gardening method again, though. It hasn't really saved us any work because of the time involved in trying to keep the roots moist.

I am reading a good book at the moment called Frugavore: How to grow your own, buy local, waste nothing, and eat well by Arabella Forge. I'm really enjoying it and will post a review once I have finished it. Sandra is reading Changing Habits, Changing Lives by Cindy O'Meara and I want to read that after she is done with it.

Broody Update: Bertha sat all day again, today. I think she may have been up for some food and water early in the morning, but hadn't stirred again all day. It was a very warm day and I was concerned about her, so I went and tried to put some water on her beak to tempt her to drink from a little bowl I had with me, she told me where to get off! I left her alone after that, but when I took a wet mash up for the other girls this afternoon, I offered some to her in her own little bowl and she ate about 1/4 cupful. That is food and water mixed together with some egg added so I am content that she won't starve or dehydrate. I've left a small bowl of water and a little bit of mash next to her nest for her as well. She must think this is the life. No egg laying, a comfy secure box all to herself and room service laid on!

Omnivorous Chooks

Green Jungle Fowl

When I posted on my blog recently about my chickens going nuts over canned sardines, my friend DivaJyoti commented that she hadn't known chickens would eat fish.

Chickens actually prefer to follow an omnivorous diet. The chickens we know today, that scratch around in barnyards or (sadly) rot away in battery farms, for shame! tend to be fed on a grain based diet, more because it is convenient for us. The domestic hen, gallus domesticus is actually descended from the Jungle Fowl:

• Gallus gallus
• Gallus lafayetii
• Gallus sonneratii
• Gallus varius (pictured)

Jungle Fowl originate from India, Sri Lanka, South East Asia, and Indonesia. In their wild state, jungle fowl eat a varying diet consisting of fruits, grains, vegetation, small rodents, lizards, bugs, slugs and insects. When allowed to 'free range' our domestic chickens will do much the same. I've heard of domestic fowl eating mice, lizards, beetles, worms, caterpillars snails and slugs. In fact, a flock of chickens let loose in a matured vegetable garden will nibble little bits of the veges, but will also keep the garden almost completely pest free. They particularly favour the larvae of coddling moth! Yesterday, I gave my chooks 100g of kangaroo mince.

Someone mentioned on a poultry forum I frequent, that feeding kangaroo meat to chooks is an extreme sport. After trying this myself, I'd have to concur. There was none of that hesitant peering at it before taking a small peck to taste it that you normally see when offering a new type of food. Rosie tried to rip the meat out of my hand before I even got the wrapper off it! 

Velociraptor

Then it was on for young and old as my gentle, 'boking', scratching hens turned into miniature velociraptors, jumping up, flapping at me, trying to snatch beakfuls of meat out of my fingers (they rarely eat from my hand) and chasing each other all over the chook pen trying to snitch pieces out of each other's mouths. All the while, they were making that special high pitched muuuur-uurrrrrr! sound that chooks reserve for only the best and tastiest morsels.

I think they like it!
Images via wikepedia

Let the Composting Begin!

Today I finally made a trip to Bunnings in order to spend the gift voucher I received from Hannah for my birthday. I also had some cash that was given to me by my partner's mum so I had a fairly generous budget to spend.

I've been wanting to get into composting for a while now, and made a half-hearted beginning on a compost 'heap' in the backyard, which has really become more of a supplemental feeding station for the chooks, who delight to rip through it every day and pick out bits of it to eat. I don't mind them doing that, so much because they're turning it over at the same time, but the problem is that I don't then, have much other than straw and chicken poop for my compost and it's just not working!

So today with money and gift voucher in hand, I cruised the aisles at Bunnings and looked for a solution.

I'm actually quite surprised at what the budget stretched to!

I purchased an indoor (Bokashi) composter and two 60ltr plastic garbage cans which I will convert to use as outdoor compost bins, thus keeping the compost in and the chooks out. I also got a lovely new garden fork and a 15m hose which will be used to extend the current hose which is too short to reach up to the chicken coops and the potato beds that we have dug behind the chicken coops.

I'm very pleased with all this, and can't wait to get started on creating compost. In fact, the bokashi compost bucket has already been started as I type!

Below is some information about Bokashi composting for those who might not have heard of it before.

Wikipedia:

Bokashi composting

Bokashi is a method of intensive composting. It can use an aerobic or anaerobic inoculation to produce the compost. Once a starter culture is made, it can be used to extend the culture indefinitely, like yoghurt culture. Since the popular introduction of effective microorganisms (EM), Bokashi is commonly made with only molasses, water, EM, and wheat bran.

In home composting applications, kitchen waste is placed into a container which can be sealed with an air tight lid. These scraps are then inoculated with a Bokashi EM mix. This usually takes the form of a carrier, such as rice hulls, wheat bran or saw dust, that has been inoculated with composting micro-organisms. The EM are natural lactic acid bacteria, yeast, and phototrophic bacteria that act as a microbe community within the kitchen scraps, fermenting and accelerating breakdown of the organic matter. The user would place alternating layers of food scraps and Bokashi mix until the container is full. Liquid "compost tea" is drained once or twice a week and can be diluted 1:100 and added to plants as fertilizer, or poured directly down drains to help clean them.^[17] Once the container is full, it is left to ferment for an additional 2 weeks in the container, and then buried under 6-8 inches of soil, in ground or in a non-reactive container. After another two weeks buried under soil, the food scraps should be broken down into rich compost.

Inside a recently started Bokashi bin. The aerated base is just visible through the food scraps and Bokashi bran.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bokashi_composting#Bokashi_composting

Chocolate for Chooks

Today I made a special treat for my chooks which I call "chocolate for chooks" it is something that they go nuts over, even though it might not seem that appetizing to you and me.



This is about half a dozen egg shells which I baked in the oven at 120C for 30 minutes and then smashed up in a mortar and pestle. It is good for the chooks as it supplements calcium back into their diet. The small, sharp bits which would play merry hell with a human's digestive tract are actually useful in the chicken's gizzard for helping to cut up and digest food. Grit is an essential part of the diet for birds and especially for laying hens.

Here is a video of the reaction when I arrived at the coop with a dish of crushed eggshell. It is guaranteed to get them into the coop without too much trouble. Well, except for big, beautiful Bertha.



Betha's pretty but she's not too bright. She never can seem to understand why walls get between her and her food, poor darling, but with a little guidance, she finds her way. Sorry for some of the unsteady camera angles in this clip, but it is a bit complicated handling the camera, watching where the chickens are, and avoiding standing on them all at the one time. Hopefully I will improve at this lol!

How I spent my birthday

I had a lovely birthday yesterday. Here is how I spent the day.

It started, as most days do, with the chickens.

Then, some native parrots came to visit. These are called Pink and Grey Galahs.

They wanted to eat the seeds of those yellow flowers you see in the second photo which are called Catsear, or False Dandelion.

The bees also like those weeds.

The afternoon was spent baking a cake to have for dessert after dinner.

All in all it was a wonderful day. Relaxed, low key and peaceful. Just the way I like it!