Hey Reader,

Remember last month when I said we were in a drought? Well that ended and we're now in mud season.

It's honestly a good thing but it also brings an explosion of mosquitoes (we use dunks buckets) and the aforementioned mud everywhere (the dogs are brown now).

Everything is on turbo drive to growth and greening up here now.

Homestead Updates

In the Coop

Like I mentioned last month, our egg production has dropped off a bit from 241 eggs in April to 217 in May, a ~10% decrease. Not sure I can entirely blame that on losing on hen (haven't done the math) but I'm not finding any hidden nests elsewhere. I do believe they were laying under the coop earlier in the month and Rex mentioned the heat might be causing issues too.

Thankfully it's still enough to handle our needs as we're not desirous of a larger flock.

Not technically in the coop, but I found the hidden guinea egg nest.

I've been told they're not great mothers so I'm not expecting anything to hatch. I do need to candle them but the hen likes to hiss at me when I get close. I gotta remember to look when she's away.

Funnily enough, one day last week Rex had asked me if a hen had been sitting on them. I told him no because the guineas have been putting themselves up before the chickens at night. And I mentioned their reputation as poor parents.

Well if she didn't make a liar out of me that very day. That night I was down a guinea in the coop and went straight to the eggs. There she was. I think she did it on purpose.

She has since randomly decided which nights she'd like to spend in the coop and on the eggs.

In the Garden

Things are growing! My transplant luffas are doing well and I'm seeing other plants come up.

Don't ask me what they are, I don't know. They all look the same at this age.

Ignore the grass.

I will say I am kinda concerned about weeding one side of the bed because I am honestly having trouble discerning between corn shoots and grass shoots. Soooo the grass may live another day until I can differentiate better.

My flower bed is absolutely killing the game over here. I can't wait to see what grows because I'm pretty sure these aren't weeds.

In the Pasture

*Knock on wood* I believe I've found a way to de-tick the goats.

Although of course one refuses to cooperate - lookin' at you, Peanut.

Anyone care for garlic and banana? Well Pender and Peaches love them but Peanut absolutely refuses to take his after the first few weeks. I did trick him with a strawberry though at least once so far.

I'm gonna have to figure something out with him long-term (not with my organic strawbs) because their tick burden has disappeared (from what I can see) since implementing this 3 times a week over the last few weeks. Success!

In the Kitchen

If you were here a few months ago, you received my minimalist, quick start guide to sourdough bread.

Rex looked through the 10+ pages and asked "this is minimalist?".

Valid point.

However, I do still consider it to be a minimalist approach because I condense all I've learned, messed up, kept, and discarded from over the years to make it as simple as possible. It's the bare minimum.

I am updating that guide with a must have process for fool-proof proofing, but it's not posted anywhere on our website or socials since that's not my main focus.

I originallly wrote it as a Christmas gift for family but decided to share it with y'all and others who ask about sourdough.

If you're interested in it when I'm done, shoot me an email.

In the Pasture

The skeeters are thriving in our new wet jungle environment. Thankfully dunks buckets come in clutch.

Rex upgraded our setup this year since the toddler loves to play in any sort of water possible. He got these tops from Lowe's when previously we just had wire covering the top.

You fill these with water, grass clippings or weeds, and a 1/4 of a dunk (for this size bucket) and let everything ferment. This attracts mosquitoes away from humans and the dunks kill the larvae before they can fly. We set them up close enough to where we hang out regularly but not so close that we're interacting with mosquitoes.

They worked really well last year and I'm excited for them again this year. It's the little things.

One Thing I'm Learning

So hear me out.

I know I said I'd have baked a sourdough whole wheat loaf with flour milled at home by May's recap email BUT

I believe I've discovered why I gave up on milling grain at home three years ago.

I was YouTubing tips and tricks to get fine flour and found out that my mill hopper is not setup properly - a manufacturing defect. The grinding stones don't align properly with the grind guide, if that makes sense. The video that helped me determine this didn't exist three years ago.

Thankfully this mill has a five year warranty and the seller is shipping me a new hopper that should arrive this week.

Now I don't feel like as much of an idiot for giving up all those years ago out of frustration.

So I should have that sourdough freshly milled whole grain flour bread loaf ready by June's update. Fingers crossed!

Reader Question

Why Svarthönas?

Our choice in Swedish Black Hens was driven by one chicken - Boudica.

She recently passed and is in my freezer until I can figure out a unique way to preserve her. Ideas?

We thought she was beautiful with her all black feathers and bluish-purplish sheen. So we went searching for her kind.

But we also needed a cold hardy, good winter layer that would forage and free-range well.

Enter the Svarthönas.

They're the cold-hardy cousins of the famed Ayam Cemani and lay really well throughout the winter for us. They forage well and run for cover when needed. The roosters are docile and don't attack humans.

They are smaller birds so they don't yield much meat, but the excess roos we process taste great.

Their feathers are gorgeous too so, of course, I have many of them stuffed around the house for some yet undiscovered project in the future.

Want to know more? Read here.​

What's Available Currently

Pepper and Pumpkin are still available for pickup in August. Pepper will be wethered in June (don't tell him). I have unfortunately seen Pepper do two full faints because I accidentally scared the heck out of him driving up in my car. Pumpkin has also shown us full faints when jumping and frolicking.

I do have hatching eggs available for pickup but I am debating continuing to ship eggs.

The eggs I shipped last month sat at the Memphis USPS hub for over a week. Ridiculous.

Memphis is the worst hub in the country and I'm honestly tired of dealing with them personally and with shipping eggs.

While purchasing shipping eggs is always a risk that the buyer takes on, I don't feel right when shipping is such a catastrophe.

I ended up refunding the buyer for her purchase less some shipping costs. The eggs eventually made it to her and she's going to incubate them but I'm not sure how much success she'll have.

My policy is to not refund for issues once the eggs leave our possession but I found this to be an egregious situation. Because I would be inclined to do so in a similar situation in the future, shipping eggs is not viable economically for us as a very small homestead.

So for now I'm moving to only shipping eggs if someone reaches out to me specifically for them, I can explain the situation more thoroughly, and see if it's truly a risk they want to take on. They won't be getting a refund when they've been fully informed of the fiasco in Memphis.

This also calls into question whether or not I want to continue with NPIP. While it's not a huge burden to test, it can be slightly cumbersome to test everyone twice a year along with the annual fee.

I also dislike how our home address is listed on the internet for anyone to find. If you remember the crazy woman I dealt with a year or so ago in regards (I ended up going to the sheriff for harassment and could've pressed charges), you'll understand my trepidation at having voluntarily doxed ourselves.

Decisions, decisions...we're due for testing again in July so I'm pondering giving this up.

One Small Beautiful Thing

I came across a bug I've never seen before. It's called an Eyed Click Beetle and I think it's pretty rad.

Ciao for now!

Jamie

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