Buddy and Joe show up for Goose Cam but they just don’t have any mean really left in them so it is more look at the camera then attack it. We take a stroll over to the other side of the property and see the damage the Two Assclowns (Charlie and Max) did to the baby duck enclosure last night in a full on run. No ducks or dog were harmed, just one more thing to fix as always.
The baby girls are doing great and likely only three weeks away from full flock integration. The quail are at least half way grown now, doing well and loving the extras after micro green harvest. Going to have to find a way to allow Dorothy to move the quail tractor when I am gone though.
Lastly we check in on Broody Mama Muscovy (AKA Sweet Girl) who is now no longer sweet and defending her babies with the care only a mom can. After a bumpy start with her first brood she has it down now. It appears all the eggs she hatched and kept babies from are from “Little Browns” clutch we found hidden in the bushes. So we have three new baby mallards.
The end got cut off here due to too much video on the phone and needing to delete some. What got left off is basically that we are doing our work on a very difficult property to show what can be done and we are doing it at a large scale.
One Note – the actual cubic yards to cover 3 acres in 4 inches is about 1500, don’t know what I was thinking when I said that crazy large number. Still 1500 yards at 10 dollars a yard is 15,000 dollars. Think about that.
Many of the “all you need to do” suggestions are given with good intention but don’t address the reality of where we are, the scale we operate at and the time and money constraints everyone has.
I actually feel there is a big danger in Permaculture with what I call “over simplified all you need to do is thinking”.
I will have a video out soon (not part of the chronicles) to address that. Because I think this does a lot of harm to permaculture’s credibility. This is from well-intentioned individuals, who simply do not know, what they do not know.
Sometimes in the micro and often even in the macro view of the complex design considerations of permaculture, specifically at broader scales then the quarter acre suburban gardens most permies are working in.
Today on Season Two – Duck Chronicles Episode Seven – Freedom is Heaven we see that in the last week the young girls have gotten big enough to begin training them to free range and return to a holding area and they are out and about.
We also cover our new microgreens set up and show you the quail.
Sadly in the episode the broody muscovy has hatched two babies but one didn’t make it. This is one of the true realities of keeping animals.
Today in Season Two – Duck Chronicles Episode Five – Fall is Finally About to Arrive we start out with the “Brothers Green” who are just beginning to really get all their colors back after the summer molt. Buddy and Joe are trying to timber sorghum during morning bath time.
Little Brown and the Mini Brothers Green make an appearance as we take a look at some of the growth in the food forest. The “dwarf” mulberry is now about 8 feet tall, really.
We discuss the harsh summer we just came out of, 4 rain events in if you can even call them that in over 4 months. By rain event I mean, say 1/10th of an inch if that per event. Basically less than an inch total in the last 90 days, this after 27 straight days of rain in May!
I cover the new container/wicking gardens that we are putting in for the fall workshops. We also take a look at the baby quail and ducks who are doing quite well with my new philosophy of SDB (short duration brooding). I also discuss the discovery that Goji Berries seem to just go dormant in the heat of summer, look like they are dead, then come back and do a second crop.
They are eating about 50% LESS feed then they did last winter in the brooder. Today I also discuss more about SDB (short duration brooding) and why it works but why it isn’t for everyone or for every season.
I finish up discussing our plans for a large quail aviary made with cattle panels and how it will let us basically produce pastured quail and quail eggs and leak bit more about the quail product I am working on for suburban environments.
Early this year we decided to increase our duck flock with 50 dedicated layers to our flock. We ordered them form our favorite supplier Metzer Farms. Metzer then took them on hatch day, packed them in a box and yes mailed them to our via the post office.
We hear from a lot of people who are afraid to order birds by mail, but it is done every day. So that morning I took out my phone and recorded picking htem out, just to show that it was okay, then I recorded gettting them home, into the brooder and out of this was born a YouTube series called, “The Duck Chronicles“.
This is a 48 episode series all shot on an iPhone that shows the journey of 50 little ducks along with the rest of our flock though the snow and ice of 2015s harsh winter and ends in early summer with the birth of more babies and seeing the new girls just about all grown up.
And guess what! We are about to do it all again, on Sept. 9th season two will begin, right where we started last time, the Lake Worth Post Office where this time 60 new little girls will start their journey at Nine Mile Farm. This is actual reality TV folks, the real way we love and care for our animals, there little victories and their struggle and occasionally their losses.
It is a good thing too that we ordered more, right now our waiting list on eggs is a mile long. More girls are starting to lay every day, we are doing the best we can. Next week the new wave of Duck Chronicles begins, until then catch up on all of season one. The entire playlist is below or can be viewed at DuckChronicles.com
In Season Two – Duck Chronicles Episode Eight – Three New Baby Mallards Doing Great we start out with morning bath time with the main flock in the three quarter acre food forest. We see that both the Brothers Green and the Mini Brothers Green are coming into full on fall beauty.
Today in Season Two – 
Today on 