INTO THE COOP THEY GO

Now that you have raised your baby chicks, how will you know they are ready for the coop?

The first sign that they are ready for the coop is that they no longer need to be heated? Chicks start to get their feathers at about five weeks and are ready for the coop soon afterwards, as long as the weather is good.

Ideal temperatures for chicks is above fifty degrees at night in a tight coop. And you should put about twenty birds in their at one time.

If you have ten or less birds, wait until they are ten weeks old and then put them out in the coop. They will be able to take any late spring weather that comes their way.

Chickens will need a few things in the coop;

1. They will need a feeder: Any feeder will work but even if you buy one of those fancy feeders at the feed store, put a trash can lid underneath it. You will be amazed at how much feed will be saved by the lid. Offer your chickens (free choice- that means there is always food in the feeder.) Use 16% layer feed (Pellet) you can also feed your chickens (Mash) this is a mix of feed and water or milk if you own a cow. Mash is good for the chickens but it does make a mess in the feeder.
2. They will need a source of water: I use a bucket for my chickens, it holds about two gallons of water, this makes it easy to clean out. I dump it into a five gallon bucket and then into the compost pile. I clean out the bucket every couple of days. The coop might get a  little dirty and the nest might need cleaning but don’t let your water source get dirty. On occasion put a bulb of crushed garlic in the bucket water. (After you use the garlic.) Its great for the chickens.
3. They will need nest boxes. One per four birds. Make the boxes about sixteen inches wide one foot tall and one foot deep. The measurements can very and you won’t have any problems. Keep your winter light source pointed away from the nest boxes. Hens like to lay their eggs in dark private places.
4. Supply your coop with a light source for the winter. Chickens lay best when they have sixteen hours of day light per day. I leave a 23 watt florescent light on twenty-four hours a day.
5.  They will need roost. You can use square boards but round ones are easier for the birds to grip onto. put the roost in the coop so they are off set. You don’t want the chickens to make a mess on one another. Also put the roost boards in with screws. This is so when you need to clean them you can take them out easily..
6. The chickens will need a coop that is wind tight and water proof. that doesn’t mean it has to be build to city codes. Chickens can do really well in frigid temperatures.but if they get wet and the wind blows on them problems can happen. I have had chickens in twenty below zero temperatures with the wind chill and they did just fine.

 

 

 

How To Apply Gods Plan To Your Garden

• Much of this is adopted from the Back to Eden Gardening with Paul Gautschi.

Applying God’s Plan To Your Garden

When layering a garden you will go against all conventional wisdom; we are just taught to plow the dirt turn the soil and work it.

Yet when applying God’s plan to your garden, you will need to look no further, than the gardens of this world that are not tended by man.

We live in high desert country. Yet for seven to eight months out of the year there is something sprouting up somewhere or blooming. Their are wild berry plants that give their fruit year after year and annuals that complete their lives every year.

And this is how it happens. The soil is rejuvenated every fall through winter. By God’s fertilizer. Dead trees, branches, wood debris, leaves and a little manure.

In the fall this matter begins to decompose and in the winter it breaks down even more so.

When the spring rains come, they carry all the minerals, nutrients and other components to a waiting system of roots. And that reaction can be seen for as far as the eye can see.

God’s Plan In Our Garden; Layering

For God’s fallen tree’s, branches and bark we will use shredded tree material from a chipper. You can get this material at *no cost many times. Just apply one inch to the soil each fall.

We will simply use leaves for our second covering. scatter leaves over the entire garden area. Do this right before it rains. The rain will weigh down the leaves and keep them in place. Do not scatter the leaves in the wind or before a windy day. (check your local weather.)

Put a little manure here and there. I scatter our chicken manure mixed with chips thinly over the garden in the late fall and early winter. Allowing a ninety day gap before planting or before our berry plants come out of dormancy.

My soil is already turning a rich dark brown from only one full year of using this pattern.

*I use the fishy emulsion 5% nitrogen to off set the effects of putting wood chips on the soil until I see no need to use it any longer.

*Call your local tree trimming company and many times they will give it to you. If not they will usually sell it to you for about 150.00 for ten yards.  Stop when you see the orange trucks on the side of the road trimming the trees off the road. The name of the company starts with an “A”. They will drop it off at your house. I have twenty yards sitting by my garden now from them.

Number two ingredient is leaves. The work horse of God’s fertilizer. Leaves cover much of the earth in the fall and winter. They make for one of the best fertilizers around.

Leaves can be gotten a hundred ways. And they are virtually free.

Ash

GOD’S WAY TO FERTILIZE

There are two ways to fertilize your garden and they are as far apart as east is to west.

Mans way to fertilize can be described in two words; quick results.

Man fertilizes in the spring and sees the results in the fall.

To get those results he spends lots of money and does lots of work, he will often compromise the integrity of the soil’s purity and he will do the same thing over and over getting the same results..

Man fertilizes by tilling the ground, by pouring compost tea on the soil and by many means that will give him the greatest results in the shortest of time. (Compost tea is not a bad idea.) He will pull weeds until the sun sets or he will purchase weed killer or blocker.

Gods way to fertilize is in layers.

It is said that an inch of top soil naturally made takes a hundred years.

Their was a time that nearly the whole earth was covered in top soil. And man had note carved his foot print everywhere.

We don’t have a hundred years to wait on such a thing to happen, so we will do it God’s way and see the results over five to ten years and fertilize less and less over the years.

God covers the soil in layers for many reasons; the first reason being that erosion does not take place. The second; top soil is an insulator for the root systems of many plants and trees. The third; Layering soil allows air pockets to be present in the soil. The forth; many organisms can live in the soil undisturbed and when it rains the rain will make “God’s compost tea.”

Look at a forest, how much was it fertilized? How much was it cared for and how many irrigation lines have to be installed within its boundaries?

Look at the fields in the spring, summer, and fall can their beauty be matched? Luke 12:27  Consider the lilies how they grow: they toil not, they spin not; and yet I say unto you, that Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.

God has a way of confounding the wise. 1 Corinthians 1:27 But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty;

We are but feeble beings when it comes to the might of God, I plowed the dirt many seasons, I worked soil over and over, I pulled weeds and pulled weeds and I got results.

Now I layer my garden, I pull some dandelions for their roots, I water and I get results better than I ever could have imagined.

*I do use fertilizer; 1/2 gallon of fish emulsion for the whole year on a 75X50 garden. I am going to make the garden 75X150 this spring. The new area will see the neighbors tractor tiller one time. I will at one time use no fertilizer. God’s compost tea will be sufficient.

The results of God’s plan can plainly be seen. In the following picture. Take note of the absence of weeds, My back did :).

 

My garden after applying wood chips, a little chicken manure and leaves.

The next post will be; How To Apply Gods Plan To Your Garden

MY GARDEN

My Garden; How My Garden Knits Us With God.

The Garden; that feeds the belly

I will speak of three gardens, the first being the garden that feeds the belly.

I will share what I know about gardening, about how to keep your plants healthy, how to keep insects from eats your plants; without destroying the soil and your health and about a few things that I have just picked up here and there over the years.

From ancient of days men have smelled the aroma of the soil under foot, Their families have helped them plant, water, weed and gather crops. And as long as the rains came, the sun shined and the soil was good. The bellies of the gatherers did not rumble.

Yet since those days, we have been brought into a new age. And with all its modern conveniences, it has only unnerved whole generations.

It is time everyone should have a garden, though it be ten acres or three pots in an apartment.

One of the greatest reasons for this is that we get to participate in seeing seeds come to life, taking a moment out of our lives for something that is living and giving life in so many ways and sharing it within our own homes, our neighbors and others.

For think upon this, how many people do you know who are avid gardeners and selfish? The gardener loves to share some of the crop with neighbors and friends and loves to eat his or her’s fresh food from the garden.

Yet there is more, I believe the farther man has removed himself from the garden the worse off his life has become. For in the beginning man was put in a garden by who created him. Genesis 2:8 And the Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden; and there he put the man whom he had formed.

And now we find more and more people are seeking that place within that is quite. And where is such a place?

My garden; Food for the heart, soul and mind.

Hannah with a tomato from our garden

When I wonder about in my garden, I often talk with God or sing to Him, and a great comfort overcomes my soul, time is of no essence and worrying about all the problems of this world leave me. Oh what a place, the garden of Eden right here on earth.

If I am in my garden alone, peace is my companion. Either in rain or sunshine I am at ease in my garden and you can be to. Let the dew on the leaves capture your eyes and the fresh taste of a leaf of arugula take away the taste of this world.

The smell of the soil, the spring rain or the fresh picked raspberry can not be counterfeited. For the hand of God has touched them.

If the children are with me, we are knit together in conversation and work. Seldom is there problems in the garden. Sharing about the fruits or vegetables in the comes easy to the children.

I have always let the children plant a few plants in the garden, this year I am going to give them a patch in the garden to do whatever they want to do with it.

I have found the family that grows bonds together in the garden grows bonds together in many things. We can’t count all the blessings that have come from the garden.

I will now leave with this, children are like small plants, they grow quickly then blossom. Then they are transplanted to their own pot of soil upon this earth.

I will write on the following subjects in more detail soon. So stay in touch and we both may learn a few things to pass on.

For birth and a healthy life to come to a garden only three things need to happen, *1 the soil must be alive to give long term life. *2 water must be present within the ground, and come in one form or another to the ground and there must be sun light.

1. I will not write about the practice of soil sterilization through massive fertilization practices.
2. There are ways to have little or no water given to plants and trees and I will share these ideas with you.

Take note; my friend, for a human being to live a peaceful life with God. He or she must have the same things as my garden has. They must have good soil (a good heart), water from above or from within. The living water is Jesus Christ. John 7:38 He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. (The soul) and he must have light. And Christ is that light  John 8:12 Then spake Jesus again unto them, saying, I am the light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.

Yes that is the second garden the garden that is within us.

My Garden; The tabernacle of God.

This garden is the place of peace, of liberty with God the Father, The Son Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit.

It is were man finds out who God is and who he is. Isaiah 6:5 Then said I, Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips: for mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts.

Yet we dwell upon this earth for the greater cause of our children, wives and other loved ones. Our homes should be as our gardens. Our souls as our God and our lives should be moved to do those things that give and not take. Acts 20:35 I have shewed you all things, how that so labouring ye ought to support the weak, and to remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he said, It is more blessed to give than to receive.

Men trod upon the earth for a time, then are put in the ground for a time. Oh Lord let us plant the fruit of the spirit within our souls, hearts and minds and let our works by faith be as a river to this thirsty world.

This garden is the Glory of God. Amen