Life on the Farm
Summer brings an abundance of strawberries, then blueberries, to our Tennessee farm. One of the many ways we enjoy berries is in berry butter. It’s delicious on toast or biscuits and is incredibly easy to make. Making Berry Butter We...
Understanding whether or not vinegar in your chickens’ water promotes flock health requires first understanding pH. In case you missed, or forgot, this part of chemistry class, let’s start with a quick review. The pH Scale The acidity or alkalinity...
Yukon Gold potatoes are ideal all-around spuds. They are not as mealy as white potatoes and not as waxy as red potatoes, making them perfect for any method you might use to cook a potato. They are smallish in size,...
Chickens are just big birds. And bigger birds than chickens fly really well. So let’s find out why chickens don’t fly. Or at least why they don’t fly as well as, say, a hawk. Wing Loading The short answer is...
That’s a trick statement, because celeriac is a type of celery. However, all the attempts I’ve ever made to grow regular celery ended poorly. So I was left with buying celery at the store. Since celery is sprayed with 29...
Dual-purpose chickens are the classic backyard breeds. Farmers, like my grandparents, kept them to produce both eggs and meat for sale, until the introduction of commercial hybrids developed solely as layers or solely as broilers. In commercial production both hens...
Marek’s disease is so common you can assume your chickens have it, even if they don’t show any signs. But while some chickens resist Marek’s disease, others succumb. The question is: Why? What is Marek’s Disease? Marek’s disease is the...
Frost flowers are delicate white ice formations that develop at ground level around the dry stems of plants. They go by many other names, including ice flowers and ice ribbons. An amazing sight The first time I saw frost flowers,...
What do you do with a bountiful harvest of ginger and turmeric from your garden? Well, you could make energy shots. They offer a great non-caffeine pick-me-up when you’re feeling the winter blahs, and might just keep you healthy during...
A matter of much debate among chicken keepers is whether or not to use electric lights in winter to encourage hens to keep laying. Let’s look at some facts and bust some myths about lighting your chicken coop in winter....
