Clover Wreath Farm’s Weblog

While I write, more of our chicks are hatching. It is an amazing process. And you can’t interfere with it or the chick will die. It is a mysterious event.

Our chicks are hatching under their warm loving momas. Not an incubator to a brooder, but a real, live, feathered, loving chicken moma.

After they dry off and recover from the trial of hatching, they will poke their head out from between their moma’s feathers. And if that is not the cutest thing I’ve ever seen, I don’t know what is.

A chick with a chicken moma will eat mostly bugs and worms for the first few weeks of its life. We still give our chicks a natural chick feed, but their moma’s stratching and digging for bugs sustains their rapid growth.

I think it helps their nutritional intake and I think it makes the chicken more healthy over its life span. And I think this means better nutrition in their eggs. I could be wrong about this and I have no proof to back it up. But I think nature is on my side. Chicken momas wouldn’t spend so much time feeding their kids bugs for nothing. Even when there are grains available, they will go for a bug everytime.

We have Madeline’s nest hatched, now almost two weeks. Leah’s nest has hatched and some may still be hatching. Naoimh’s nest is hatching and Rachael is not far behind. Siobhan’s nest is due next week. Brighid’s nest isn’t due until mid-May, but that will give us a bit of a break.

We are still going to have to buy chicks this year. We are buying forty female chicks. I’m hoping by next year, I will have enough sitting hens to sustain my needs without buying chicks. Chicks need their momas. Everybody needs a moma. So we will do our best to be attentive momas to these forty orphans and, hopefully, all of our chickens will be naturally raised from now on.

We plan on stratching large areas for the chicks to find bugs in and giving the chicks love. It is just a poor substitute for the moma nature provides.

Okay, most chickens these days don’t know how to incubate and nurture. So we use Bantam and “game” breeds to sit our larger breeds’ eggs. Our Salmon Faverolle (a larger breed), Madeline, has made a wonderful moma. This breed hasn’t been as scientifically “improved.”

I’m hoping to breed some of the desire to reproduce back into these larger breeds. If it doesn’t work, I’ve at least raised some healthier chicks with little or no cost to me.

Here’s something else to consider: the daily financial cost of running an incubator can be $10.00. Twenty-one days is what it takes to make a chick. $210.00 for one run. This isn’t even thinking about the terrific expense of an incubator. Then you have the cost of running a brooder lamp to keep the chicks warm, which really may burn your barn down. Happened this year to some folks north of here. Tragic for the farmer, tragic for the chickens.

Then there is the hatch rate. In an incubator it is 40%. With a moma hen, it can range from 50% to 100% depending on the experience of the mother. 65% is probably a good average. And it beats the heck out of 40%.

Then there is the time factor. Momas take care of their babies. No moma, so it’s all you. The chicks are more messy (who isn’t neater around their mother?), more prone to disease, don’t know when to get to bed at night, and fall to predators more easily.

No, I don’t think we can switch back to producing chickens the natural way overnight. But I do believe we can start the process.

Women have been “sitting” their hens for hundreds of years. We managed to lose this wisdom in a few decades. I hope we can gain it back before all chickens require a plug-in to live.

Peace,

Breann

www.cloverwreath.com

Lots of talk about the price of food lately. It’s nuts to see kale going for a dollar a leaf. But when large scale farms are getting money from the government and small farmers get none, you can expect to be eating lots of genetically modified corn and soybeans.

But there is another problem in the mix now. Agribusiness is opting to grow corn for ethanol because of government money. So instead of eating, we are driving our polluting cars.

I don’t think it takes a genius to see the problem upon us. The fall of the food industry and the auto-only transportation system is here. And meanwhile, our health crisis is growing by leaps and bounds every day. How we react will determine our fate.

I’m biased, but I think the best way to react is to turn to organic, biodynamic farming. Our health crisis is because of our food crisis. Our transportation problem is lessened by local, sustainable agriculture. We could slow Global warming considerably by turning away from modern, corrupt agribusiness right now.

But we need to do this right now.

I hope we do.

So, to combat this problem, I’m planting beets. It’s late, I know, but the ground is just now workable here. Strange spring, but we are thankful for it. We planted in hills, well a ridge actually, one long ridge about five to six inches tall down a row. Did a shallow row, 1/4 inch on top and planted the seeds.

I’m not following the demeter calendar as much as I had hoped. The weather and the demeter calendar has failed to coorespond this year.

I would love more resources on biodynamic and demeter. If anyone knows of some great ones, let me know!

Peace,

Breann

www.cloverwreath.com

Plants are thriving, chicks are hatching, and life is good. I’m so tired I’m praying for rain so I can sit down. My father is working hard with the tractor and plow, our son is lifting and moving a lot more than he thought he could, our daughter is finding all the danger she can, and my mother is keeping us all organized and sustained. My husband and I are just running around like chickens with our heads chopped off.

Madeline’s (our son’s favorite) chicks are here! She is doing great and the chicks are as well. We have Apple, Blackberry, Blueberry, Sunberry, and Muscadine as the newest additions to our flock.

Our hopeful produce list is posted on the Buy Our Products page on our website: http://www.cloverwreath.com/about.html

We are excited to now be selling our eggs at Greenlife Grocery on Chattanooga’s Northshore!

Peace,

Breann

Our society’s lifestyle is absolutely destructive to the life of our children. Fortunately, there is a wealth of information on Co-op America’s Heal Your Home’s page: http://www.coopamerica.org/pubs/caq/articles/Spring2008/HealYourHome.cfm

Great Information!

Can’t say enough good things about horse manure tea. It works. Tomato plants coming along well and have about 550 more seeds started now. Can’t wait to see what comes up first!

My pepper seeds are sprouting and that is very exciting. I had given up some for dead after our last cold blast. I will be so thankful for a heated greenhouse next year.

We are expected to have another cold spell this weekend, Dogwood Winter, really. Then there is Blackberry, but it is usually much milder. Then it is full steam ahead!

Leah, a Silver Phoenix, is now sitting a nest of my best laying hens’ eggs. She is one serious Moma and I have no worries about her commitment. Naoimh, a bantam, is also sitting a beautifully stocked nest. I will hopefully get some lovely layers out of these fine ladies. (Naoimh has been on a tear for a week now and I have the wounds to prove it. Because of her ill humor, I made some threats about her length of time here if she didn’t hatch a nest. With her attitude, I have no doubt she’ll be able to protect her chicks.)

Madeline is still progressing great! The eggs definitely have some chicks in them! Should hatch on Sunday!

Peace,

Breann