Fall Photography

I have to admit we have been busy as usual. Anyone who raises their own food or has livestock big or small is kept hopping with all the chores.
Our trees are changing color and the nights are cool enough for a comforter. The poultry is busy in the harvested areas of the gardens getting bits and pieces and disturbed bugs. The young chickens are the best hunters and they have been mousing right along with the cat and her large kittens.
Yes life is good and I have taken photos of the start of the second year at Cub Run.

We got the first of our new fruit trees and they are now in the ground. 2 Santa Rosa Plum, 3 Elberta Pear and 3 Kiefer Pear. [ Somehow I missed the third peach and the third pear in this photo.

The grape vines to replace the ones they used to have, are here and waiting for the final choice of trellis system. We did find the roots of the original grapes when we dug in the second pear tree and we discovered the hole where a trellis post had been cemented in for the missing grapes. We feel like archaeologists!

The Australorpe hens that had the 17 chicks and mothered them together still have 17 but only one hen is still a full time Mother. One gave up all together but the second still helps at night and in the morning.

The "horde" has discovered the old bales and they love them for nap time, dust bathing and of course shelter. They blend in really well and despite the fact you cannot see all of them they are there....chirping and cheeping and scrapping!

We harvested the last corn from the big garden and when we get our grinder will turn the corn into meal. Ralph flail mowed down the stalks and it is just waiting for rain. Right now it is too hard to till  the trash in and get cover on it.

The stuff you see still growing is the row of peanuts and they will be harvested this weekend with any luck.

The Diakon Radish, Austrian Pea cover crop mix is doing quite well and even though the poultry are out there they do not seem to be doing  much damage. More bug hunting and chasing  mice than eating greens. This is an Australorpe X Buff Orpington rooster we are going to keep to replace "Attack". Yes "Attack" is getting more aggressive and not just to me but to the hens. So he is going to be "stew".

The Maple trees are turning color. We have 6 of them and each one turns at a different time and then turns a different color. The front west tree is the most beautiful and turns first!

All in all things continue to go fairly well. We got a large trailer load of loose hay cut, cured and hauled into the barn. It almost fills a box stall we do not use. We cut it with the drum mower and Ralph raked it with the Molon rake. It is fine quality hay, short stemmed and green. He should be proud of himself as he has not done a lot of haying and he has put up good feed.

Now we are heading out to clean the chicken nest boxes, the beautiful nest boxes Ralph made are not being used like we thought they would so we are experimenting with bedding inside them, Straw, hay or shavings. We will see which they prefer and see if it makes a difference in how much they use them.
We are also walking out to the  fields to decide if we are going to cut more hay on the south end of the hay field.

I hope you like the videos.....Happy Fall everyone!