Tag: orchard

We have an Orchard (sort of)

~ wattlesandcombsfarm ~ Leave a comment

Sometimes the way a child looks at the world is exactly what you need. One of my big wants when I dreamed about moving onto property was an orchard. However, this first year we spent most of our efforts and budget on getting the animals set up and fencing done, therefore the orchard was put on hold for the season. The other day when I walked outside I noticed we had a ton of berries on a few plants around the property. I assumed they were not edible, but I Google lensed them anyway. To my surprise they were chokecherries. Turns out we have probably twenty chokecherry trees around the property. Right next to the original plant, we have a different tree that this spring I was told was a wild plum tree, but it turns out it’s a crabapple. I brought my daughter out to show her and she had the best reaction, “Mom, you have an orchard!” I could have cried at her words. Her sweet simple reaction reminded me to look around and be grateful for all I have. Yes, I want a large orchard someday, but how lucky are we to find these blessings already here and thriving?

We have already picked a five-gallon bucket of berries and I am working on preserving them in a few different ways as we speak. Chokecherries are described as having an astringent taste and not really for fresh eating, so I have cooked some down and made a syrup which I can turn into jelly or use as a base for anything that needs a good fruit juice. I have added syrup to hot tea and it’s delicious. I plan on making jelly in the future and I have a whole freeze dryer loaded up with the berries and a few bags in ziplocs in the freezer.

There will definitely be an orchard planted in the future, but for now I am thankful for my daughters perspective and my “mini orchard”.

Hatching is done

~ wattlesandcombsfarm ~ Leave a comment

This round of hatching is done. It was not what I would call a successful hatch, but we do have three adorable little chicks from it. I will need to go back and have a look at my incubator to find out why the egg turner wasn’t working as it should. Other than that, this was our first time hatching chicken eggs so I will call it a learning curve. I am not sure if we will try again with more Swedish Flower eggs, since we have access to them, or just stick with what we have for now.

In total, we ended up with nine chicks. We purchased six from the store and three we hatched on our own. That will be plenty of chickens to keep our family of four in eggs. However, we do have friends who would like eggs in the future so, maybe we will stick with the chicks we have for now and if needed add a few adults later.

For now, I am thrilled with what we have and can’t wait to watch them grow. I do have one Welsummer chick that I am very curious to see if it may be a rooster. They are all supposed to be female but sometimes even the hatcheries make a mistake and honestly, I really want a Welsummer rooster so fingers crossed!

Moving day will be here soon

Moving day is next Friday! We don’t have to be out of our current house quickly so we plan to take our time, but we get the keys to our new place in 5 days. I can almost not even wrap my brain around all the possibilities we have. I have been looking forward to putting roots down for so long now and having a place to really settle into. There are silly things that I haven’t been able to do until now. Things like berry patches, an orchard, things that take years to really get going. I think the hardest part will be having patience and not trying to make it all happen at once. When you’ve been dreaming about something for so long it’s hard to rein it back in and take it slow. Friday is the beginning and I feel so very lucky to be making this move.