I know it’s been awhile, so before I jump into Thanksgiving let me give you a quick catch up on what’s been happening. After Oliver left we had lots of fun with several local things and I got serious about crafting! Now that I have space I have been picking up craft supplies at estate sales and have been trying my hand at making different things for the house. Some have turned out great, others not so much but its been nice to connect with my creative side. I really miss pottery.
My mother-in-law gave me some of Lee’s grandmas doiliesLook what I made!I bought a $10 bread machineAnd started baking breadMy big craft has been taking old cookie cuttersAnd with a variety of materials turning them into Christmas ornamentsI even signed up for a local craft event sponsored by the library and I met some people!!!
I also voted for the first time in person in 10 years and at the same community center went to a wonderful local craft fair.
This sign cracked me up
And we had some friends over and had our first bonfire!!
With Ted (Lee’s friend friend from high school, and the best man at our wedding) and his wife Megan.
Glad we got the bonfire in because not long after we got our first big snow. It was interesting because it was the first snow in their lives for the cat, chickens, and goats and none of them were particularly impressed. Jack has been in snow several times so he took it in stride but the rest of the animals were like WTF 🙂 Thankfully Lee already had installed electric water heating buckets for the goats and chickens so I didn’t have to worry about frozen water. We did have to pull the hoses in though and it’s NOT fun carrying a big bucket of water down to the barn
The goats have gotten so fuzzy!This bucket hooks to electric
Thankfully the snow didn’t last long and once it melted the goats and chickens got much bolder. They started to come into the backyard to eat the remaining leaves as they fell. Once Lee mentioned that the chickens would eat the bug larvae I was all for the exploration. If we end up losing one to a hawk at least they had a good life. Speaking of chickens I am still getting 4-5 eggs a day, but thankfully I found a young family I can donate my excess eggs to.
Finally Thanksgiving arrived and even though it had been years since I made a turkey it is like riding a bike. My secret is Reynolds wrap Turkey bags which keep the turkey super moist. I do put foil over the breast and wings though to stop burning and it turned out to be delicious. Maybe next year we will raise our own turkeys but for now this went great. It was a small group with only my in-laws, but I went ahead and made all the fixings. We had lots of leftovers which I am a huge fan of.
Denny going old school with the mashed potatoesso so goodFrom Left: Denny, Lee, and Dede
Best of all on Friday and Saturday I got to do something I have really missed. I have been collecting Christmas items at estate sales and between those and the items DeDe gave me and my daughter Kyrston (who converted to Judaism) returned to me I had a wonderful mix of old and new. I even got to watch the Ohio State game while I decorated which was awesome!
This was mine from when I was a little girl. I am so glad Kyrston saved it
We haven’t got the tree yet because I am committed to getting a new one at least this first year but things feel very cheery. Just in time because the weather is cold and colder for the next couple of weeks which has taken some adjusting to. Lovely having all this space though for decorations and I can’t wait until I get the tree up!
We very much appreciate your support of our blog.
You can purchase the ebook telling the story of how we became full-time RVers.
You can purchase our recipe book filled with 80 recipes we have cooked in our RV and taste tested by Lee himself. You can purchase the kindle or paperbackversion on Amazonor buy the Apple version on Itune
As much as I loved the 10 years we spent traveling the country I will say I really missed having a place that my kids and grandkids could come and see me. So it’s not surprising that as we were picking out a house and land the grandkids were a huge thought in our mind. We were then of course super excited when Kyrston flew in with Oliver for a few days on a school break and we got to share everything with them. It was also Oliver’s first plane flight and he got to meet the pilot and even got a cool pair of wings. Nice they still do that.
Oliver and Kyrston on the way!
I couldn’t wait to get back home with them and the tour went so great. I loved sharing all the little things we had done with my friend and daughter and Oliver really loved the land and the animals. The cat in particular took right to him and the two of them hung out non stop over the next few days. He did a really good job with all of the animals, even finally getting one of the chickens to let him pet her.
He loved loved jumping in the hayLook at my little farm boy!
I knew coming in that Oliver has a ton of 6 year old energy so I had planned some activities around the farm on purpose to keep him entertained and hopefully teach him some stuff. We picked the last of the corn, peas, and carrots from the garden, and he and Kyrston shucked the peas for me. Kyrston and I also made corn sheaves and added them to my front yard decoration…super fun.
We also fed the goats and chickens every day and gathered eggs along with taking the goats for walks around the property. I tried to take the animal chores in small doses and of course he had plenty of time to just run around the property. At first Kyrston was a little nervous not having him in eyesight, but soon she felt comfortable and he and the dog were wandering everywhere. Dede and Denny also came over one day to see him and another time we carved a pumpkin that we gave to the chickens to eat. Oliver loved that. Lastly we had so many wooly caterpillars all around the door to the house and his job was to pick them up and move them out near a tree. He loved that job !!
Old fashioned telephone tin can game I bought him
It wasn’t all about the farm though. We went to a local corn maze at Lohstroh Family Farms (highly recommend) and he had a blast running around their play area and corn maze. I really enjoyed the farm shop!
The big activity though was the Ohio Renaissance Festival. This freestanding village has been a renaissance festival for over 30 years, and Lee and I were there the very first year. I have been more times than I can count and my kids have fond memories of going there. So it was at the top of Kyrston and Lee’s list of places to go. I’ll be honest it’s not my favorite place, and I really don’t like dressing up for any occasion, but when Kyrston asked me to dress up with her and Oliver the love of my grandson won me over. Turned out the costume was actually OK and I loved how Oliver and I matched.
Oliver is definitely a screen kid so I didn’t know how he would do with low tech activities, but after some initial resistance on his part he did get sort of into it. He liked all the rides (which are human powered) and in particular liked our family favorite Shakespeare in the Mud. This trio has been doing their act since 1990 and it was really cool to see him enjoy it so much. Basically there’s lots of silliness and mud involved and what little kid doesn’t like that?
As the day wore on though it got more crowded and hot I was ready to go. My main complaint with the Ren Fest is that it is an alcohol heavy venue and I enjoy it less and less as it gets later in the day. Still glad he got to experience it and really we jammed a ton in to a pretty short visit. Personally my favorite parts were just hanging around the farm and showing him farm things, and I hope to get to do more of that in the future.
We very much appreciate your support of our blog.
You can purchase the ebook telling the story of how we became full-time RVers.
You can purchase our recipe book filled with 80 recipes we have cooked in our RV and taste tested by Lee himself. You can purchase the kindle or paperbackversion on Amazonor buy the Apple version on Itune
Fall has always been my favorite season and although New Hampshire falls were spectacular in their color and splendor they were also often very short. Ohio fall may lack a bit in the color explosion but the length of it can’t be beat. For the last few weeks, we have had summer like days with cool nights, and our windows have been open to a fresh breeze around the clock. The leaves have been slowly falling from the trees in stages is fun for us and the goats. Turns out goats love newly fallen leaves from trees, so I have started going on daily walks with them. We walk the whole outer yard together and they munch leaves along the way. Everyone wants to get in on the action and now even the cat follows along. I never imagined that this would be my life, but it is a really fantastic way to spend a lunch break.
Jack and the goats fighting over a stick…Jack wonGreat way to clean up weeds on a fence lineThey love the compost heapJack likes to pretend he’s a sheep dog…they tolerate it
Lee also built them a goat jungle gym and they love playing king of the mountain.
The little white ones really like it
The chickens are also doing amazing. We are consistently getting an egg per day per chicken and some of them are double yolkers. Those eggs are the size of a goose egg and seem to happen after I give the chickens a bunch of kitchen scraps. Almost every day they get whatever is left over from my cooking and that continues to make me feel great. At this point the goats turn up their noses at everything (picky little girls) so the chickens are reaping the bounty. We also tried something we saw on instagram and gave them a pumpkin with two small holes cut into it and they have cleaned that out.
Moxie hanging with the chickensChickens and goats!
With all these eggs I have started doing a ton of cooking and so far, most experiments have turned out OK. I bought a Sailnovo Pasta Maker Machine which was a little intimidating at first but works pretty good and I made homemade mushroom ravioli and my great-grandmother’s egg noodles. I also tried making bread (the chickens were happy that day because it was terrible) but we luckily found a used bread machine at an estate sale for $10 and that bread turned out great! And after some trial and error I learned a method to hard boil chicken eggs and made some yummy, deviled eggs with my mom’s recipe.
The deviled eggs were the best. The recipe for these is in my cookbook just saying 🙂
As a side note fresh chicken eggs are super hard to peel after boiling because age makes the insides shrink a bit for an air pocket next to the shell. I tried lots of ways but finally read in the Prairie Homestead cookbook (love her website too) to steam the eggs for 21 minutes. I thought this was a bit excessive, but it works beautifully, and the eggs are super easy to peel. That’s a big deal because we are swimming in eggs and I am trying all kinds of ways to preserve them. Pickled eggs anyone 🙂
Lee’s been busy too gathering supplies for various projects and organizing his workshop. He built a really cool workbench and a grill station and has kept costs to a minimum by looking for near free items on Facebook marketplace.
He also made me a goat hay holder which is awesome and he is teaching me how to do some things for myself. I hung my own pictures for the first time in years including some signs on the goat stall. It’s nice being handy myself and Lee’s been pretty patient with teaching me stuff.
It’s been fun and our new tradition of estate sale Saturdays have gotten us lots of bargains. I like them because I can get craft supplies which I used to make my own cloth pumpkins. Being crafty is awesome for my mental outlook and sometimes things turn out really great. If they don’t, I don’t worry about it because I am getting all the raw materials really cheap and it takes the pressure off. Lee’s parents are also cleaning out their basement, and we get first pick of what is going to the thrift store. The combination of sustainability, upcycling, and being thrifty makes me incredibly happy.
A cross stitch I made a long time ago in a frame made by Edward…Denny’s Dad. Made me happy
One last thing I should mention is we are really living in farm country and these folks are super busy. Harvesting trucks are everywhere and they are running round the clock. Anyone who doesn’t think our farmers work hard should hang out at my house for a minute. It’s constant activity on the road and fields around us.
These pictures were taken at 9pmGlad the locals took time out for a local car show and Mt Sterling Fall festival. Tons of locally made products.
It’s a nice life we are building here and although I would like to meet more people in the area and we are adjusting to living on a budget there are worse ways to slide into retirement. I feel like we are building something here and for me at least it’s nice for our money to go into something that gives me so much joy. I am keenly aware though that we haven’t spent a winter here yet and I think that will really show us if this was the right choice for us. So far though I have loved the fall.
We very much appreciate your support of our blog.
You can purchase the ebook telling the story of how we became full-time RVers.
You can purchase our recipe book filled with 80 recipes we have cooked in our RV and taste tested by Lee himself. You can purchase the kindle or paperbackversion on Amazonor buy the Apple version on Itune
One of the interesting things about traveling all of the time is some of the basic human entanglements in life slide right by you. At least they did for me. Less so for Lee because he was so engaged with people online, but for me I had created a little bubble for myself, and I largely ignored things that bothered me. Confused? Well let me lay out some examples.
The “where are you from” question. – We got used to always being from “away” wherever we were but the explanation we traveled fulltime largely explained that issue. Now we are in a town that is 20 minutes from where I grew up so I answer I am from Grove City except people look at license plates (they always have everywhere by the way) and form judgements about you based on that. Since the truck still has Florida plates and the little car has California plates the reactions to our plates are wildly different depending on which vehicle we drive. It is so ridiculous in some cases that I have asked Lee to speed up getting new plates so we can just move on from that judgement. Like I said when we were moving it didn’t matter much but now this judgement is coming from neighbors and local business owners who we are trying to build a relationship with for the long term. If you screw that up you’re living with it for a while. Speaking of which…
Permanent Neighbors – Now we have neighbors and although people largely stick to themselves out here in the country no one wants to be the person who pisses their neighbors off. At least we don’t. We intentionally bought property where we aren’t on top of anyone else, but we still have a few neighbors within eyesight and shouting (or barking) distance, and don’t want any problems with them. We can’t just pull up and roll out if there is an issue so making sure we don’t inadvertently piss someone off is a big deal. Lee in particular has been extra careful about making sure our lawn stays mowed and we have no eyesores. We never were ones for political signs either, but I think we would both think hard about that as well. Things are very polarized right now and the only sign I feel comfortable with right now is an Ohio State Buckeyes sign which is sort of a religion around here.
Politics – I, by choice, was largely isolated from the extremes of politics that are impacting our country, and we mitigated that even more over the last few years by staying in places that mirrored our political beliefs. Yes, I have lost Facebook friends over differences of opinion, but that is very different than being in one place and dealing with the fallout of these disagreements in person. I was prepared for the need with casual acquaintances to just stay away from the subject, but things have gone much farther than that. Since California plates = Liberal and Florida plates = Conservative in many people’s minds the difference in treatments can be a little startling. Lee in particular who is much more open on Facebook had a really difficult time buying things from Facebook Marketplace until he changed his profile picture and marked his account as private. You may think it’s crazy but trust me we did a before and after study on his experience and it was markedly different. The worst of it though is family schisms which I largely ignored in the past but cannot now that I am here.
Family – I was always an oddball in my family, so I didn’t expect anyone to roll out the red carpet or anything when I came back, but I am surprised by how fractured my family is. There always was lots of family issues for a variety of reasons, but now it seems political differences has overshadowed most of those grievances. Over the last several years brothers and sisters have fallen out over religion and/or politics and the one thing I hear over and over again is people with differing views no longer feel welcome. Unfortunately, both of my grandmothers (who never would have tolerated this behavior) have both passed away and the schisms continue and widen with each passing year. I don’t know why I am surprised given the state of the country but to be honest I was because I truly though family bonds would transcend those issues. On the one hand I find this very disappointing but on the other hand since I have always felt on the outside of things for me personally it doesn’t change much.
Friends – Actually more difficult than family has been negotiating friendships. It’s easy to be friendly on Facebook because it doesn’t cost anyone anything, but rekindling old friendships is not as easy as one might think. A huge part of that I have to own because Lee and I have been just us for a really long time now, but I was hoping that staying in one place would allow me to rebuild a friendship network. I find myself very hesitant though to open myself up to other people and it’s not like folks are banging down my door. People have lives and friendships they have maintained through the years, and I have not been a part of that. That’s fair and since I made the choice to live relatively remotely it’s not like I am running into people I know every day. The simplest thing would be to start fresh with new relationships but at the age of 59 that can be tough. I tend to be pretty introverted when it comes to personal relationships, and it takes a pretty special set of circumstances to push me out of that. The friends we made while RVing were based on shared experiences, and a lot of my current activities (work aside) tend to be pretty solo.
Overall, I think it’s odd that I feel lonelier in a house than I did when we were on the road. I feel less isolated for sure, but loneliness and isolation are not actually the same emotion, although they often go hand in hand. I gave up a community of like-minded people (our “tribe” as my friend Greg used to call it) and I have yet to find a new one. I remind myself that it is early days yet and I have plenty of time to find my people, but I am really going to have to force myself to get out there to make that happen. It was comfortable in my bubble, it really was, but it’s time to take steps back into the world and see what happens.
After Lee read this he said you deserve some cute pictures of the farm for getting through it so here you go 🙂
We very much appreciate your support of our blog.
You can purchase the ebook telling the story of how we became full-time RVers.
You can purchase our recipe book filled with 80 recipes we have cooked in our RV and taste tested by Lee himself. You can purchase the kindle or paperbackversion on Amazonor buy the Apple version on Itune
Well, we blinked our eyes and summer is coming to an end! This means cooler weather (finally) and the ability to catch up on all those chores we didn’t want to do when it was crazy hot. It also meant my garden was getting ready to harvest and I started putting some preserving techniques to good use. We started by freezing some corn and although we needed to buy a new Vacu-Seal (we got tons of use over 10 years out of our last one) it was pretty easy once I got the hang of it. One decision I did make early on after tons of research was I was going to try freezing without blanching. I know conventional wisdom says to blanch but I don’t like the end product so decided to try it without blanching. The key is to make sure your vegetables are bone dry before you freeze to avoid crystallization. I will let you know in the winter how it turned out.
I made sure to date the bags in case I did batches or forgot when I froze them. For me smaller portions is good because you can always pull out more bags and its best to cook right away when they thaw.
I also picked some green beans and froze as well. I was shocked by how many beans were hidden in the plants and got several bags worth. Moxie came out to help (she loves the garden) and scared me a couple of times when her head popped up. Yes, she can go outside now but only during the day, and Jack goes outside to babysit her. We did this over the course of a couple of weeks while supervised and now she will come back when I call her and can go out alone if she wants. Also, we know summer is coming to an end because Moxie caught her first mouse!! She didn’t know what to do with it other than play with it so ultimately I took care of it and heaped lots of praise on her. Yeah Moxie the Mouser!
The absolute best part of freezing veggies is I can give the bad pieces or ends to the chickens, and they love them. Actually, almost all of my vegetable waste is going to the chickens which makes me so incredibly happy. Not only does it reduce my purchased feed costs but it’s also good for the planet and seriously feeds my soul.
The ends of the green beans no longer wasted!I can mix anything together they can eat and they love it!
While training the cat to come, and the chickens to come, I also decided I wanted to train the goats. The man I bought them from suggested getting a bell (I am a lousy whistler) and within two days I had them trained to come in from the big field. They love corn mix so it’s a great motivator for them but even I was surprised at how easy it was. They are still pretty skittish, but will all feed from my hand now although they draw the line at me touching them much. I’ll keep working on it.
Goats running to the bell. So so cool!Everyone needs more cowbell!!
In the midst of all that I had a birthday, and Lee’s parents bought me the cutest things. Denny got me a bird fan which I absolutely love and Dede gave me a tiki man tissue box. I can’t get away from all things artistic have to have a purpose but that’s working fine for me!
What else? Lee finally worked on some cool outdoor projects. He built a roost and “litter box” area underneath for the chickens which has completely solved my poop in the nesting box issue and has made it much easier to clean the coop.
So great!! I showed him a picture and he figured out how to make it
Another big job we both worked on was getting the center stall ready for winter. It was full of broken pallets and was actually kind of dangerous, so we pulled everything out and stacked hay on one side and straw on the other and Lee hung up all my tools. This way when winter comes things will be close by. We still have the large tent for additional hay and straw but it has holes so we put a large tarp over it.
In between my asks, Lee also went to a barn my Dad is tearing down and pulled out a hundred or so oak panels and giant doors. He spent a whole week doing this but now we have enough wood for many, many projects. My Dad was also thrilled the wood wasn’t going to waste.
These doors were crazy heavyThe garage is getting there
I also tried freezing eggs which I heard was a good way to save summer eggs for the winter months when laying slows down. You use muffin pans and add 1/8 tsp salt for eggs you will use for savory recipes or 1/8 tsp sugar for eggs you will use in sweet recipes. General consensus seems to be that they work great when added to a recipe not as well for a standalone meal. I’ll let you know in the winter when I try it.
It hasn’t all been at home stuff though. We have been attending estate sales every Saturday which we really like and we took advantage of clearance sales to stock up on all the seeds we will need for next year. Even deeply discounted it was still $90, but good seeds are worth it because the two knock off seed packets I bought produced nothing. To get them organized I bought a super cool seed storage box and then Lee gave me his labeler to mark each box with the item and the plant dates. I feel so organized!!
It hasn’t all been work though because for the first time in forever I have been able to decorate for the fall. We didn’t have room in the RV for many decorations, and it has been a blast picking things up at estates sales and going all out. My whole life I wanted to live on a piece of property where I could have straw bale decorations for fall and now I have it!! Lee even bought me a pumpkin yard sign to add to the motif. It’s been busy and hard work but really fun and I have no regrets about moving back into a house.
Susan (our friend) made this as a housewarming present. LOVE IT!!!
We very much appreciate your support of our blog.
You can purchase the ebook telling the story of how we became full-time RVers.
You can purchase our recipe book filled with 80 recipes we have cooked in our RV and taste tested by Lee himself. You can purchase the kindle or paperbackversion on Amazonor buy the Apple version on Itune
WARNING THIS POST IS GRAPHIC. PLEASE DO NOT CONTINUE IF THIS WILL UPSET YOU.
I really should have named this post “First Time Killing a Chicken” because that is essentially what I did, but it truly was a process, so let me go back a bit and explaine how all this happened. In the process of looking for chickens and goats to buy I joined a few local Facebook farm animal groups and one of them had a workshop to process an entire chicken. The cost was $35 and you got to take home the chicken you processed which in my mind was more than a fair deal. I asked Lee if he would be interested and he said absolutely, and I prepaid and booked it.
Fast forward to the end of August and the workshop was upon us. I would be lying if I didn’t say I had serious concerns about the entire thing, but my driving factor was my desire to know if I could actually kill an animal I planned on eating. Believing intellectually you canld do it is far different than putting knife to neck and I thought it was important that I discover this about myself on way or the other. So we drove 1-1/2 hours to a small farm in Northeast, Ohio and with some trepidation walked around the small ranch house to the back yard. I was simulataneously intimidated and pleased by getting to look at someone else’s setup and since we were a little early I walked around a bit.
He had his Rhode Island Reds (which is the breed we have) in a very cool pasture setting but his meat chickens and layers in totally different spacing. His feeding and watering systems were really cool though and I took some pictures. There are always different ideas out there.
Cool homemade feederGreat watering systemThis setup for the Reds was awesomeNot so much for the meat birds
It was time to start though, and we all gathered around while the farmer talked to us. This guy is not a professional trainer, and he was a little hard to hear but once we started, he did a great job. It helped that it was a really small class (lots of last minute no shows) and it was a man and his 14-year-old daughter, two brothers from Toledo who drove 2-1/2 hours to get there, us, and a single man. We jumped right in and he killed the first chicken and processed it and then said it was our turn. Everyone turned to me and I was like “I’ll do it but I am NOT going first”, so Lee and a couple others jumped in. It helped to watch others do the steps first but I was really dreading my turn. Let me show you why. (To be clear this is where you may want to stop, and there are different ways of doing it, but I appreciated the efficiency of this particular system.
Step 1 – Select and grab a chicken, which felt kind of personal. BTW these chickens are specifically bred as meat birds and have complicated genetics so they’re difficult to raise from eggs on your own . Most people just buy then for $2-$5 a chick.
Step #2 – Put the chicken in a metal cone and zip tie the feet. This stops them from getting their feet down by their head and pushing themselves out backwards. It also hides some of the more violent aspects of their final moments.
Step #3 – Put on a metal glove and slice the chickens neck right below the chin. Then the chicken slowly bleeds to death which takes about 3 minutes. Some die quietly, others get very agitated during the process, but you can tell if they are actually dead by watching their “vent” (which is a polite word for where the poo comes out) to see when it stops pulsing. This was rough but I did it. Several of the guys did two but for me one was enough.I said a prayer thanking God for the food before making the slice but it was emotionally harder than I thought, although much easier physically. It didn’t take much of a cut and it helps that the knife is basically a scalpel. Chicken bleeding out. Hard for me to watch.Step#4 – Dunk the chicken into a hot water bath (with a big rubber glove on) swishing it until the longest feathers come out easily in your hand. Any longer or hotter than necessary and the chicken will start to cook.
Step #5 – Place the chicken in the plucker while the water is running and it is spinning. This machine costs $450 but it works incredibly fast (about 10-15 seconds) and gets 99% of the feathers out. Unfortunately, you have to look into the hole while doing it and the water sprays into your face getting in you noise and mouth if you are unfortunate enough to leave it open like Lee did. This can actually cause sickness so I would recommend safety glasses and maybe a mask over the nose and mouth.
He had this great setup with multiple stations for cleaning but that is only necessary because he was teaching a class
Step #6 – Clean the bird. This was actually the hardest part for me (and several others) because it is a ton of steps and pretty gross. The young woman only did half of hers and although I got through it was really gross. I have cooked more turkeys than I can count but when you buy them from the store this work is already done and I guess I didn’t get that.
You cut off the feet which this farmer saves and gives to his dogsYou cut the neck and remove the cull sack (which has stuff in it) and the esophagus. Both of which get discarded.Then you go in the other side and pull out the intestines, kidneys, heart, and liver. You can save some of this (kidneys and heart) and the gizzard can be saved if you cut it in half and scrape out all the feed and grass in it. The intestines get thrown away and lastly you use a special scraper to scrape out the lungs which are hard to get out and a pink mass. The lungs still make me queasy when I think about it but once it was done we threw our birds into a cooler with cold water.
He usually leaves them in for 24-48 hours in ice water to allow rigor mortis to set in and then dissipate, but we just waited a little while and then he broke one down. That was easy for me because it’s just like the chicken you get in the store, and I was pretty familiar with how to do this.
After that the class was about 1/2 way done and he offered to let people process more chickens. Lee did one more, but I was all set pretty much landing on I knew I could do it but wasn’t sure I wanted to. I spent the time having a great conversation with the two brothers from Toledo who have a 200-chicken farm. They gave us some great advice and made us feel tons better about the job we were doing. They also drove all this way because multiple times a week people stop and want to buy chicken meat. They don’t have processors near them either (most won’t bother with it unless its more than 100 birds at a time) so they wanted to see how hard it was to do themselves. The general consensus from the group was it would be better to self-serve although the entry cost for plucker and hot water tank was a little high. Yes you can pluck manually but everyone said its pretty time consuming and miserable.
My other questions were around what to do with the waste. The last thing I want is to attract predators and the answers I got didn’t really satisfy me. Still Lee is really interested in building a chicken tractor and possibly raising meat chickens next year, so I am willing to give it a go. We had the chicken for dinner the next night and it was tender but honestly, I had a hard time getting the images (and smells) from the previous day out of my head. Still it is nice knowing where your food comes from, so let me just say at this point I am on the fence about the whole thing. We will see how it goes.
If you made it this far good for you. It was tough to write it in such detail but I thought it was super important to include all the steps.
We very much appreciate your support of our blog.
You can purchase the ebook telling the story of how we became full-time RVers.
You can purchase our recipe book filled with 80 recipes we have cooked in our RV and taste tested by Lee himself. You can purchase the kindle or paperbackversion on Amazonor buy the Apple version on Itune
Small town living as I remember it involved neighbors bringing over apple pies when you moved in but honestly I am sure that is a fantasized version of how things went even 40 years ago. We were both a little surprised though that after two months of living in the house we had only met one neighbor. Turns out he was also our Fed Ex delivery guy and it was super sweet when he made a point to say hello while making a delivery. I felt vaguely guilty about how much work we had created for him in the last month with all our Amazon purchases, (yes I know its his job but still!) and didn’t enjoy the meeting as much as I could.
Part of the reason we moved so far out was we didn’t want close neighbors but still you want to know who is around you, just in case. I even mentioned it to my new hair dresser in Mt Sterling (side note seeing the same hair dresser two times in a row was a novel treat) and her response led me to believe that the country folk friendliness myth was just that. Anyway a couple of days later we were pleasantly surprised when we got an invitation to a neighbor’s annual back yard “block party” (country mile party?) in the mail. The neighbor not only put a real stamp on it but also added a note and said we hadn’t met but wanted to make sure we were included. That’s when I learned that the small crossroads right down the street (can’t even call it a town) was it’s own unincorporated community with about 100 people considered part of it and I was one of them! It even had its own Facebook group I learned later but I will get to that.
Everything was going right along and we had 4 blessed nights with no goats escapes, when we were on the phone with Lee’s aunt and he saw the goats across the street! Yes that’s right. What ensued was one of the most insane evenings of my life which is funny if you weren’t me in the scenario. The goats started going down the road, which gets a fair amount of traffic and we were chasing them. They can run pretty fast when they want to and there was no way like in a pasture to get in front of them. Finally I stopped cars in both directions and had 4 people trying to catch the goats. Two were neighbors and ultimately one (who was an electrician and had a work van) popped the mom into the back of the van and drove slowly back to our house while the baby followed.Yes it was funny, but honestly I was scared to death someone would get in an accident and country road or not people drive fast on it. The momma goat refuses to be on a lead and the baby wont let anyone touch her at all so it wasn’t great. We got them home and immediately went and bought twenty more 16′ long and 50″ high cattle panels. We managed to get them in our truck by hanging them over the top and Lee’s plan was to install them the next day. We know the gates we have are a weak point so we also planned on adding more snow fencing and lowering the gates a little.
The next day went fine and I checked on them routinely. At 3:30 I even went out and gave everyone a watermelon treat and things looked pretty chill. Finally at 5:30 I went out for the evening feed and the goats were gone. I don’t just mean out of the gate I mean gone. So I drove all the roads and ultimately hat in hand asked our neighbors if they had seen them. Our neighbor across the street was mowing for several hours and he was in his early 30’s and very nice but had not seen them. He remembered them from yesterday though! Then I drove down to the neighbor next door with the 35 acres and explained I thought it was possible they were on his property. He also had a young family and definitely could relate to animals getting out. We gave him our phone number and then went back home and watched Clarkson’s Farm (available on Prime Video) which is our new favorite show because it proves we aren’t the only idiots.
At 9pm we got a call from our neighbor and they said they saw on the small community Facebook group someone had found the goats. That’s how I learned we had a Facebook group. Lisa (who also works from home) only had a name so she got on the State auditor website and found and address it was .1 miles down the road and there we met another neighbor Ruth who had a huge farm with our goats in her barn. Ruth was also very nice and told us her neighbor found them on the road and had assumed that they were hers and put them in her barn. I could see why because she had goats, sheep, pigs, rabbits, a mini horse, and dogs all over her property. It was controlled chaos in the best way and she obviously knew what she was doing. As another side note while we were there we saw goats jumping over 4 foot fences with relative ease and when we asked why they didn’t wander off she stated because they knew that’s where the food was. Since we are feeding the Momma goat the best quality hay and corn we can find and have beautiful pasture I didn’t know what to say to that. Honestly I think she is just trying to get to a bigger herd, which I don’t have.
After receiving some more helpful advice we got the goats home (thankfully we had picked up a large dog cage at an estate sale and we got our truck back from the shop) so we had a way to transport them. We both knew though that something had to change so after a sleepless night I decided to call the man who originally sold the pair to me. I know he is under no obligation to help but my plan was to pick up two more babies for my birthday on Saturday so after explaining the situation I asked if I could bring the Mom back. I should have gone with three babies from the beginning but in a misguided attempt to have some protection for the goats I had insisted on a Mom and a baby. I like the Mom very much but we can’t keep doing this and in my mind at least she is obviously looking for something. She also has some very bad habits that I don’t have the time or energy to train out of her but with babies hopefully we can start fresh. This isn’t unlike getting a puppy versus a full grown dog and since I do work 50 hours a week I just don’t have the time to put into her.
With some reluctance the seller agreed but we had to go that evening because his remaining goats were going to auction Friday. That was no problem because my intent was to leave them locked in their stall all day anyway while Lee fixed the fencing. The dog cage (on our wagon to transport) is already down there so this would be relatively easy. I truly had a sleepless night over sending this goat to an auction, but practicality won out and we loaded The Momma (notice I stopped calling her by name. There is a reason people don’t name farm animals) into a large dog crate we got at an estate sale and placed it on our wagon and put her in the back of the truck. Her baby went crazy bleating so it was all pretty dramatic, and we loaded her into the back of the truck by the window, Lee strapped the crate down and off we went.
The seller is about 20 minutes away and a really nice guy Rob who invited us to tour his small farm. I wish I could show you picture of these setups but that’s not really cool so let me try and describe it. He has two different small pastures and a couple of mixed barn areas with goats, cows, two HUGE hogs, and chickens. His animals (except for the pigs) all grazed together, and Edith was thrilled when she was let loose into her home. He had isolated the three babies (with one Mom) in a side room and after some difficulty we caught the three and put them together in a cage.
One thing we have noticed is most people have a hodge podge of building structures. What they spend their money on is fencing and after our experience I understand why. The previous owners spent their money on the building, but the fencing is a mix. You know that saying “good fences make good neighbors”, I always thought that was kind of weird but now I totally get it. Animals on the loose can cause all kinds of destruction to crops, landscaping, and gardens and it’s our primary responsibility to keep these animals on our land as much as humanely possible.
We got home and saw our baby was out and in the chicken area. Thankfully she had stayed close and we put the other three in the stall with her. Immediately two of the new ones got out through a REALLY small hole in the fencing. When I say hole I mean it is part of the fence design and we were both amazed they could wriggle through it, so we piled up straw bales all around to get through the night and went into the house. We have a camera to monitor and the baby threw herself repeatedly against the bars trying to get out but was locked in thankfully. We went out to check them one more time and then went to bed.
The next morning Lee woke up and went to get snow fencing (not always easy to find this time of year but Menards a local hardware chain we love had it) and then he put that along all the new fence he had just put up the day before. I have to say Lee has put everything on hold to help me fix this problem which is the only thing that make it possible with me working full time. The snow fence stops them from getting through the small holes and has worked on both the chickens and the goats by the way. Also way cheaper and easier than chicken wire although we know it wont really be a predator deterrent. Anyways, Lee got all that up and we were finally able to get them out of the stall. That was of paramount importance because it was going to be another humid 90 degree day and we wanted them to be able to get out of the stall.
Finally the goats can run free and although they are testing their fence so far no escapes. In some places we have triple fencing and if that doesn’t get it done I don’t know what will. The babies are super cute and Lee named them Jane, Paula Georgie, and Ringa; The Bleatles. That goes really well with my Spice Girls chicken group. I’m really hoping they all settle in quickly so I can start working with them and I even ordered a cow bell to train them to. Let’s face it everyone needs more cow bell in their life!
Jack loves them. Light brown is Georgie (original baby), Dark brown is Jane, white with spot on her butt is Ringa, and white with no spot is Paula!
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You can purchase the ebook telling the story of how we became full-time RVers.
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I named the blog post with (Plural) because a very long time ago when we were a young couple with small kids we rented a small house on my dad’s hobby farm. My father is notoriously difficult to buy presents for and while living there I told him if he didn’t tell me what he wanted for Father’s Day I was buying him a goat. This was a spur of the moment joke but then it took legs and long story short ended up with Lee and I driving to an animal auction in Delaware and buying a male baby goat for $25 which was $15 dollars cheaper than the females. I have never seen my Dad laugh as hard as he did when we presented him with that goat but then the goat became my problem.
Knowing nothing about goats we ended up chaining it to a large dog house which we moved from weed patch to weed patch. The goat also ended up getting big enough that he could drag the dog house. Yes I know not great but I was pretty young. The goat ultimately thrived and developed enough affection for me that it started attacking Lee when he got near it. Thankfully Dad knew some people with horse farms and after 1-1/2 years the goat went to hang out with some horses. So my experience with Rambo (my 12 year old brother at the time named it) was a mixed bag and honestly I never thought about getting a goat after that.
When we bought the small farm though I wanted a purposeful animal that I could raise. I absolutely love goats milk lotion and the thought of making my own sounded fantastic. Plus, female goats are somewhat easier to manage, and the Norwegian Dwarfs are pretty small. So, with minimal information I started looking for goats, but they were often $400 for a pair. You can’t just get one because they are herd animals and the females are still almost double the cost of the males. Craiglist is absolutely a great place to search for goats but not only did I need two I didn’t have a clue how to transport them. I thought maybe when we got closer to the winter the prices might go down and as you can see from the previous post I have been very focused on the chickens. I did however clear out the stall the former owners used for alpacas, just in case.
I also got this idea that I wanted to try and make my own hay and after a ton of research we got a lawn sweeper from my dad and gather up some clippings. The deal is that as long as it is not chemically treated it can be used but since it wasn’t specifically planted for the goats with alfalfa it’s definitely not their favorite. Long story short gathering hay is a lot of work unless you have tons of expensive equipment, and the goats don’t like it much. For $8 a bale I will just buy it from a neighbor farmer so that’s what I am going to do in the future. Still glad I tried it and we have a pasture specifically for hay so in the future I know it’s a possibility.
You make rows of grassThe you have to wait overnight and turn it. It cant rain for two daysThe you use the mower to make multiple passes to fill this and then dump it in a pile
So I had an empty stall, 20 or so bales of leftover straw from the previous owners, tons of pastures and weeds but no goats. Finally, I saw an ad for a person who was downsizing his herd and was offering baby goats for $100. That was a bargain, but these goats were barely weaned and I was nervous about just having babies. Finally, I asked for a Mom and her female baby and he was willing to deliver them to me. Rob was a super nice guy and the price was right so on Sunday morning he drove over. The goats were really cute and after some discussion we loaded the crate on the wagon and took them back to the pasture.
I was excited and had a list of questions to ask Rob provided by my friend Deb. She raised Nigerian Dwarfs in California when her kids were in 4H and thankfully I finally had someone I could talk to I could trust. Turns out the internet is no more reliable than it was about chickens or RVing for that matter, but Deb can at least share her personal experience. Turns out the goats were due for worming, had never had shots, were never milked, weren’t trained to a halter, and worst of all had been corn fed. I figured for $100 this was what I was going to get and since they looked healthy and were friendly I figured I would just go for it. Unfortunately, while we were talking to Rob the goats escaped from the fencing which became the first of many goat chases we would experience over the next several days.
I really thought because I had so much land with good forage they wouldn’t be tempted to leave but nope the baby immediately found a hole and the mama followed. Because the fields are a mixture of different types of fence, we quickly learned that any weakness would be exploited. We also learned that the baby can leap over a four-foot fence and the Mom might be small but she is strong! We would fix a weakness, and they would find another and it was especially bad in the evenings. Finally, I called Rob and he said he had fed them corn every evening. Deb told me that COB (or corn, oat, barley mixture) is like crack to them and out of desperation I had Lee buy some which calmed them down some. He also went around the property and collected all the heavy-duty cattle fence panels we had and created a much smaller space for them to be in.
Don’t get me wrong I really like the goats, but once they got in the neighbor’s woods and another time, they went all the way to the road. I had to stop traffic to get them back that time and since we have liability if they cause an accident, we knew we had to do something. The corn in the evenings is helping and we will see if the new fencing holds. The biggest problem I have left to solve is the gates which the baby can get through prettily easily. Since I am getting two more baby girls for my birthday (yes, I am a glutton for punishment) we need to be baby goat proofed as well. They are really cool though and Jack really likes the baby which is nice after the chicken craziness. Lee named Mom Edith and the baby Gloria by the way and they are both really sweet when they are not escaping.
The females have horns and a beard when they are left naturalThe goats like to be in the chicken coop, but that fencing isn’t as strong so can’t really let them plus my garden is on the other side
Speaking of my garden it is doing great with beans, corn, peas, radishes, and carrots planted. I weed a little everyday and can’t wait for the crops to come in. I can feed any extras to either the chickens or the goats which is pretty cool. Next spring we will do much more but I am enjoying the cool weather crops.
The same day we got the goats Dede and Denny came down to visit and they really enjoyed all the improvements we have made. We had done a lot in the last couple of months but I think all we can see is what’s left to be done. Was nice to take a moment and just appreciate how far we have come.
A couple of other updates. I wanted Jack to see the goats but unfortunately he also slipped into the chicken pen again and now is in a major timeout. No more going to the animals unless he is on a leash and I have made my peace with the fact that he may never be able to be near the chickens. On the plus side I got my first egg! And I have gotten one egg a day for the last 5 days. The chickens are also foraging outside and have really settled in and I love going and seeing them every morning. Still haven’t finished the roost project but thats on the list.
Jack in timeoutMy first egg!! Seriously felt fantastic
Lastly despite trying different kinds of litter the dust in the litter was driving me crazy. Lee agreed to compromise and moved the litter box into the hall closet, and we have a small kitty door to provide access. Moxie is an absolute joy and is pretty adaptable which I appreciate. I am using a spray bottle to keep her off counters and tables. She has doubled in size and loves pouncing on the dog’s tail, but he is setting appropriate boundaries with her. We are all figuring it out, but I am so very happy, and Lee has worked so hard to make things work for me. I really love my little space we are creating here.
We very much appreciate your support of our blog.
You can purchase the ebook telling the story of how we became full-time RVers.
You can purchase our recipe book filled with 80 recipes we have cooked in our RV and taste tested by Lee himself. You can purchase the kindle or paperbackversion on Amazonor buy the Apple version on Itune
This is a long one ….Although I grew up in a small town and had a cousin my age who lived on a farm, personally I haven’t had much to do with chickens in my life. But every since we visited a sustainable farm in Wisconsin and ate some of their chickens and eggs I have been excited about the possibilities. I thought, “How hard can it be?” People in the poorest parts of the world raise chickens, and with all the resources at my fingertips it should be relatively easily.
Spoiler alert: it was NOT easy. Actually, it was one of the most humbling experiences I have had in a while. Honestly, I think I made almost every mistake I could have which goes to show you how adrenaline can really impact your judgment. As I tell the story I will share my mistakes in italics along the way. Many of these items (despite a fair amount of research) I didn’t know until after the fact but hopefully you can learn from my mistakes. If nothing else it will be entertaining although it certainly wasn’t for us at the time!
A lot of people online talk about the $3K egg, and there is a lot of truth to that. To get that first egg many people spend thousands on all the things they need. We spent more like $800 on everything we needed and I was really lucky because Lee built the coop, and we had existing fencing on the property that was already mostly what we needed, and the previous owners left behind a hefty supply of additional rolls of fencing and posts. The price of premade chicken coops is ridiculous and most of them are super small accommodating only a couple of birds. Thankfully I had an entire barn stall sitting empty and after researching extensively I saw a version where someone converted the stall into a coop. After some thought Lee agreed this was the best way to go and got to work. The pictures below were several days of HARD, sweaty work in above 90 temps and humidity over 85%. I think its beautiful, but of course Lee can only see the flaws, but no doubt it’s way better than any chicken coop I saw under $4K.
Empty stall I raked it out! Tool staging. Lee used the generator to power since we dont have electric in stalls yetLee removed the wood for use somewhere else because it wasn’t neededIt was HOT in that stallAfter much discussion we decided to use a door that was left on the propertyEssentially, he had to frame the entire interior to attach the chicken wire
Chicken wire is NOT cheap by the way and a total bear to put up, especially overhead. You need to enclose the chickens completely though because predators will climb up and over. Side note we had read that chicken wire doesn’t always stop predators. Some will rip right through it. So all the work you see below was with the knowledge it might not be enough. I felt so bad for him the half day it took to put the overhead wire in and he had tons of nasty scratches from the wire before he was done. That’s true love!
Look at his shirt. He was changing them 4 times a day during this process.
The area that he spent the most time thinking through before building was the coops. The dimensions can vary depending on the size of the chicken you are going to get (we went with the larger 16″ square) and it was very important to him that I wouldn’t have to bend over to get eggs, so he went to extra trouble to build them high and put ledges and doors on them so I could access the eggs from outside the coop. Since this coop (which I bought for pretty cheap) was what I had initially in mind what I ended up with was a chicken coop palace in comparison.
What I bought online for $40 on sale versus what Lee made (see below). After a lot of conflicting research I stuffed with strrawLee made two great ramps one to lower level and one to upperHe paid special attention to the hardwareAbsolutely gorgeous work
It’s worth mentioning here that there is a TON of conflicting information about nesting boxes. No one can decide on whether chickens like sharing and the size and material are also up for debate. One woman swears that cat litter boxes are her chickens favorite while others are adamant about size and individual nests. WE decided to play it safe and make extra nesting boxes figuring if they shared we would be no worse off and it would give us room to expand later. I don’t regret the number of boxes but you will see below the placement was less than optimal.
While Lee was working on the coop I decided to take a shot at creating a dustbath and a homemade roost. In both cases my work was much less competent than his but I was super proud of myself when I finished my contributions.
I laid long tree branches on the groundAnd used twine to connect the jointsLooks silly but I was proud of itAfter tons of conflicting research, I made a dust bath of dirt sprinkled with Diatomaceous earth. The powder helps the chickens get rid of pests. Some people swear by it others do not but when the lady at Tractor supply said she occasionally rubs it on her chickens I was sold. Speaking of Tractor Supply I absolutely love that store! They have a little of everything and the people are super helpful. Ultimately I removed the plastic pool ring and just kept the pile of dirt. Haven’t seen them really use it though.
So everything looks great right? Well, here’s what we learned later. Chickens will naturally sleep in the highest point of their pen and my roosting bar wasn’t even close. Actually, since Lee built the boxes so high they sleep in the boxes at night which is not great because then the boxes are full of poop every morning. In all the research I did on making roost I totally didn’t get that it had to be at the highest point. That meant that Lee had to go in after the fact and try to build a roost which would have worked much better if we had taken it into account from the beginning. He offered to rip out the top row of boxes but I said no way after he did all that work.
Another thing we didn’t really understand was how much poop the chickens would generate. Yes it all looks pretty but it’s also covered in poop which is why people are so careful about where they put their roosts. Several people we learned after the fact build a tray under the roost and fill it with kitty litter so the poop is easy to clean. There is a TON of contradictory information about how often the coops needs cleaned (from weekly to yearly yes, I am not kidding) and the poop bother Lee more than me. Probably because he spent so much time on it. Alot of the advice given is based on the size of the flock and type of chicken but the information is presented as generically applicable. Honestly getting chicken information is a lot like getting RV information with a lot of people thinking their way is the only way.
So we had the coop now we just needed chickens. Craigslist Farm And Garden section turned out to be the best place in our area to find livestock and after a lot of research I decided I wanted Golden Pullets. I found a guy who was selling 8 pullets (chickens that are 14 weeks old and just ready to start laying) for $100. Since I didn’t have a way to transport 8 chickens I said I would pay an additional $50 for him to bring them to me and we made arrangements for a Thursday.
I spent the next several days obsessively researching this particular kind of chicken in particular what the heck I was going to do with all the eggs. Initially I only wanted a few chickens, but these were a package deal and I went down the internet rathole of freezing, pickling, etc. I was so worried about excess eggs that after the guy blew me off on three separate delivery dates, I wasn’t that upset about walking away. Then on Saturday I found a couple with Rhode Island Reds which are very good foragers and common in Ohio. They were $25 each but it was worth the price, so Lee and I took an hour-long drive to go pick some out.
Turns out this was a good choice because the couple was extremely nice and the chickens were gorgeous. They had a huge flock and getting the chickens in hand was the hardest part which to be honest I was zero help. Lee stayed outside and took some pictures and video which are hysterical, but you stay calm when a chicken is flying at your face!
Victory!! Such a nice couple
We ended up with five chickens in three different cat carriers, a dozen eggs, and tons of great advice. Once we got them home we put them in the coop and let them acclimate a little bit. They seemed pretty friendly and pretty calm in the coop and I was happy things had gone so well.
I wish I could end the story here, I really do, but what happened next was sheer stupidity on our part, and probably chicken malpractice. Lee want to let them out in the yard to watch them forage and despite the advice of the lady we got them from we let them out. And they were fine scratching around in the yard until we decided that we wanted them to go back in. Turns out these chickens can really fly and they also run really fast. Not sure why I thought it would be different after my experience catching them initially, but we absolutely couldn’t get them to go back in. One got in a bush and absolutely wouldn’t come out so we got the bright idea to bring Jack out and see if he could flush him.
We think of Jack as a person most of the time, but when he saw the chicken he went absolutely crazy. Not only did he chase the chicken out of the bush but he also ripped its tail feathers out and chased another one all the way down the road. He only had a flea collar on when we let him out which ripped off in my hand when I tried to catch him. We were convinced he was going to kill one or all of the chickens and it was only dumb luck that stopped that from happening. At the end the dog was in the house and two of the chickens ran away. I was an absolute mess because it was totally our fault and I felt terrible about how stupid we had been. We also realized we were absolutely going to need a fence for them to roam in and free range was not as easy as it seemed.
Here’s the deal on free ranging. Most people buy chickens who are very young and so they grow up in the coop and then by the time you let them loose they know where the food is. These chickens were grown and we learned later it can take up to two weeks to acclimate to a new space. To be fair the woman told me that when I bought them but it was along with alot of other information and did not jive with my mental picture of how things would go.
The other thing about free range chicken is most people have large flocks and understand they will lose some to predators. Since we only had five, and expensive ones at that, I didn’t want to lose any unless I absolutely had to. I also live on the corner of two busy roads and chickens will run across them if allowed. No one knows why, people have been asking for hundreds of years. The woven livestock pasture fencing we have wasn’t enough to keep them out of the road and the last thing I wanted was to cause an accident.
So I had three chickens, a ton of guilt, and needed to get fencing up right away. I was on vacation that week but it was also super-hot so I went out on Monday (Lee was at work) and started using the fencing and snow fence we had laying around to put up some fence. I knew I wouldn’t get it completely done but thought I could start with existing fencing and had some success tying snow fence to it. I didn’t think it would keep predators out but it would keep chickens in and I felt pretty good about the progress I made. Honestly it helped me feel like I was taking control of the situation.
Unfortunately, I was so distracted as I was working through things that at some point I was in the garden and fell spraining my ankle and hitting the wood on a raised bed. I heard a loud crack and at first I thought I broke my ankle but ultimately it was a really bad sprain and nasty bruise. Lee came home to me with ice on my ankle, a partially finished fence and still three chickens.
Thankfully though he thought we could finish the fence and the next morning he woke up early to get started. He woke me up with the fantastic news that one of the chickens had “come back to the roost” and was standing outside the coop that morning talking to the other chickens. The chicken miracle got me motivated so I wrapped my ankle and hobbled out to help with the fence. We used a combination of plastic chicken fence (I bought from tractor supply) and various fencing and we finally got the fence done. It was alternately hot as heck or pouring down rain so we had to work around the elements. Also, we kept seeing the fifth chicken standing in our front yard but as soon as we got close to her she would run across the street into the huge soybean field. After one night of standing in the pouring rain, stopping traffic so she wouldn’t get run over, and this nice farm kid getting out of his truck in the pouring rain and trying to help me catch her I was like screw that chicken I am fine with four! Plus with the fence done we could at least open the door to the coop although the traumatized chickens wouldn’t come out very far unless pushed.
Right after the fence was done the fifth chicken finally came home. I can’t believe it lived for four whole days, but we found it under the raspberry bush in my garden. Of course, the fencing was up so it was much harder, but Lee and I held up towels and gently maneuvered it through the fences, around the barn and finally into the coop. Sucess and all my chickens had come home to roost! As a side note I now know where all these saying come from. Why did the chicken cross the road? To get away from the crazy lady who didn’t know what she was doing. Don’t count your chickens before they hatch…I get it! And many others.
At this point we just let the chickens chill for a week. The dog still goes nuts when he sees them, but Lee’s next project was to finish his fenced in back yard area which is now done. I also added a nylon net above part of their grounds to give them extra shade and predator bird protection, but they still don’t come out much. In all fairness it’s been super hot but I do see them being more active in the mornings and in the evenings. One note is that they can fly over the fence if they really want to but we have only seen that a couple of times and they are staying close now. Still no eggs but this breed doesn’t lay until 4 1/2 – 5 months and we are not quite there yet. Plus the heat and the stress will definitely delay egg laying. Also while they are growing back feathers (which Jack tore out) they often wont lay either. Honestly at this point I am just glad they are all alive and they are calming down. It’s not their fault I made their first days so stressful so I will take the eggs when and if they come!
To sum up I don’t regret getting them but the initial outlay is way more than we thought it would be. Still we have the infrastructure now and we can expand the flock as we desire. Or not..honestly five chickens at this point is more than a match for me 🙂 Oh and please be kind in your comments. I don’t think my fragile ego can take much more!!
Frozen corn chicken treats helps get them outOne, Two, Three. Four. Five Chickens. I count them every time I am out there
We very much appreciate your support of our blog.
You can purchase the ebook telling the story of how we became full-time RVers.
You can purchase our recipe book filled with 80 recipes we have cooked in our RV and taste tested by Lee himself. You can purchase the kindle or paperbackversion on Amazonor buy the Apple version on Itune
Ok so it’s really just one cat, (OK, really just one kitten) and a bat house that doesn’t have any bats in it YET, but I couldn’t pass up the chance for a rhyming blog post name 🙂
Getting a cat has been on my want list for several years now but Lee is super sensitive to ammonia and in such a small space I never could talk him into it. But when we moved into a house it was at the top of my list with the caveat that the litter box would be in my office. Finding a kitten turned out to be very easy though and ultimately, I chose a shelter that didn’t have a ton of weird adoption rules. I know it’s important that shelter animals go to good homes, but I wasn’t interested in signing my name in blood or having a home inspection to get one. Thankfully I found an old school shelter where with a minimum of hassle we could get a cat.
I initially wanted one about four months old because I thought that would be young enough to get along with Jack but also old enough to hold her own. Unfortunately, I also wanted a female (they make better mousers) and the only ones they had were 13 weeks old. I ended up with a really cute one though and she snuggled with me all the way home. To be safe Lee went in first and took Jack for a walk while I brought the kitten in. As soon as we got close to the door she went crazy. She started squirming and bit me hard in the flesh above the thumb…TWICE! Thankfully I dropped her inside and she immediately ran under the chair.
She was freaked out and I was surprised but I let her be while I set up her food and water and litter box. Then I fetched her from under the couch and held her while Jack came back in. It’s important to note two things. First Jack has been an only child for his entire life and it turns out he’s a bit spoiled. Second he has been smelling stray cats at various RV parks for years and is not a fan. But I held the cat and Lee held the dog and we managed our first introduction. It didn’t go great but nobody got bit so I took the cat into my office for some alone time.
Jack was super unhappy about being left out of the room but I stayed with her and then we left her in there for several hours. She made a home under the chair and pretty much stayed there. For the next couple of days we tried a variety of introductions and even put a hook on my office door so it could be open enough for the cat to go through but not the dog, and the cat and dog could look at each other and smell each other through the crack. That actually seemed to help but I was getting nervous because Monday was a workday and I wasn’t sure how this was all going to go. I couldn’t keep my office door shut all day especially if he was going to sit and whine at it so Lee said it was time for them to work it out on their own.
She really likes tassles of any kind
Thankfully if I was in the room everyone played nice, but I was still worried about when we went to bed. After a couple of somewhat restless nights, I heard a hiss and a yelp and assume that the cat nailed Jack on the nose. Things got better after that and within a week they were doing much better. Now they sleep together and snuggle and even drink out of the same bowl although they occasionally get on each other’s nerves. We made sure we kept Jack third in the pack by feeding him first but also let him know when he’s getting too rough.
Pouty puppyJack climbed on the window ledge as well but kind of got stuck there and couldn’t get downnever seen a dog and cat play together like thisSometimes he chews on his stuffed animal in frustration with her anticsSleepytime
Everyone has their own thoughts about how to work these introductions, but I will say it was ALOT more work than I expected. Part of that is overcoming Jack’s high predator instinct and the other was that the kitten was so small I was pretty worried. Now that’s she’s bigger its less of a concern but frankly I will be glad when she is full sized and on more of an equal footing. Oh, and we named her Moxie, which Jack understands and when are looking for her he will search the house with us and often finds her first and bark to let us know he found her. Another thing I have never seen a dog do 🙂
Oh, one last thing, we bought a robot litter box (an off brand, not the $900 one, we’re not Rockefellers) and although it works well the “fragrance” they add to the litter is a bit overwhelming in my office. We are trying unscented cat litter next, but we are also discussing moving the litter box into the hall linen closet. That’s a huge concession for Lee and I appreciate it.
Another thing I really wanted was a bat house. We saw firsthand in Oregon how bats can help with mosquitos and since we had an open field and we are near a water source we’re in a good location. Buying the bat house was pretty easy but the pole was super hard. The ones online are crazy expensive ($120 and up), but they also don’t have them in many local stores. We discussed other options but at 12-20 feet high choices are limited. You can mount them on a building but it’s really not recommended and after a month of looking Lee actually found a telescoping pole for a martin house on clearance for $69!! We picked it up the day we got the cat and a few days later he mounted it next to one of our fence posts in a spot I picked out. This was no small job, and needed a little modifying so they would work together and I really appreciated it.
The good news is it is very sturdy. The bad news is it is unlikely we will get any bats until next spring because we waited too long. Still, it’s up, and a big checkmark off the list and Lee got to do something he had never done before. There has been a lot of that for both of us and since we are no longer throwing money at problems (back to living on a budget!) we are learning how to do things ourselves. Next up is chickens, and if I thought the kitten was hard, wow was that crazy.
Quick Update: The unscented Tidy cat was much better, but my eyes still feel itchy. I am guessing it the dust because as long as I have a fan circulating it doesn’t bother me as much. Definitely want to move the litter box to the utility closet.
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