‘ve been wanting to build a larger incubator for some time. When Lilian and I built our incubator last year, we put a post out on freecycle.com asking for a free ice chest or small fridge. We got the Omaha Steaks ice chest and a larger dorm fridge for free. We ended up using the smaller ice chest for our first incubator. The fridge has been sitting in our shop for the last year just collecting dust (something I’m learning on the farm is to not throw away everything, a lot of stuff will come in handy again).
About a month ago we were at the feed store buying quail food. There was a woman there that approached Julia. She runs a poultry coop of farmers from around the valley that raise all kinds of poultry. Chickens, geese, turkeys, ducks, etc. She had been looking to get in to quail, and asked us if we would like to join their coop and become their supplier for quail. We said we would. We will now be selling quail eggs and incubating quail and selling them through Oregon Cooperative Hatchery (I think that’s the name).
So, since we were going to be needing to incubate more than just one group of eggs at a time, we needed a larger incubator. I would like to buy one (here’s the one I want to buy if anybody is looking for a father’s day gift!!! Dickey’s Incubators, the 2X2 one would be nice!!) I decided to finally build one out of the fridge I’ve had in the shop. I’ve had the wafer thermometer and heating element for some time now, so all I needed to do was put everything together.
It took a couple of nights but it is now working and I’m trying to get it stabilized at 99.5. I had an old computer that didn’t work so I took one of the fans out and I am using the fan from there.
Here’s the fridge.
It’s not pretty but it’s solid. I took out all the workings but left the electrical hooked up.
I have the fan and heating element up where the freezer was
Since the fan doesn’t run on regular electricity, you can see the small black cord running from the top of the fan outside. On the outside of the refridgerator I put an electrical box. In this box I put a live plug, and a switch. The switch will turn on the heating element.
You can see the fan plugged in here.
The switch give power to the thermostat and that runs the heating element. Here’s a shot of the inside of the fridge:
As you can see I still haven’t cleaned up the wires (wanted to make sure it worked and all) but it is working (too well, it was up to 106°).
Now I couldn’t just put the eggs on the shelf, I needed something to put the eggs in, so I built a box last night that holds about 130 eggs.
This box will sit on the shelf, and I’ll tip the box left and right so the eggs will be moved easily. Looking forward to trying it out this weekend!
We have 3 areas in our barn but we only had 2 hay feeders for our alpacas. For the last year we’ve been using buckets or just putting the hay on the ground. I have wanted to build something similar to what we’ve had in the other areas, and this weekend I’ve finally been able to do it this weekend.
The hay feeders we have are about 8′ long and about 25″ wide. They are big enough that we can put 2 full 120 pound bales in, and the alpacas can slowly eat from them. We also just use them to put 4 or 5 flakes of hay in and then refill it daily or every other day. They are sturdy and somewhat heavy so the alpacas can’t move them around, but Julia and I can easily move them if needed (I can move one alone if I am just moving it within the same stall.
It was fairly easy to put together. It took about 1.5 sheets of plywood and about 2 2×4’s. Julia helped me cut everything and then I put it together. All in all it only took me about and hour and a half (it was hot so I took a lot of breaks!)
Here are some pictures of us working on it.
Here is the plywood getting ready to cut. You can see my nice straight line!! This was only possible because my father had brought me some of my grandpa’s tools. One of the was a plywood square. It was EXTREMELY helpful yesterday!!
Here I am cutting.
The final project.
The alpacas using their new feeder.
I even thought that I could make these and sell these. Anybody need a hay feeder?
Ok, it’s been a little while (a week) since I gave an update, and it’s been even longer since I gave an update on the chickens so I thought it was time to give an overall farm update!
I’ll start with the 2009 Farm Goals: = COMPLETED = Started but not completed =No work done yet.
Put in a Garden – The garden has been tilled. When Julia was in Orlando for a TSFL conference, I had a local farmer come over with his small tractor and till up the garden. It would have taken me ALL DAY to do it with a walk behind kind, it took him just a few minutes. No pictures at this time but I’m sure you know what dirt looks like!!!
Build Layer Chicken Coop - The layer coop is mostly done. It has walls, windows, doors, roosts, nest boxes, lights, and chickens. All that needs to be done to really finish it off is to put access doors on the back of the nest boxes so we won’t have to go in to the coop to collect eggs. Here are some pictures:
This first one is of the simple roosts that I built out of 2×4’s. I also had some leftover metal shelving that I hooked some large limbs to. The chickens really like the limbs.
Here are the nest boxes I built. Right now I have the 4 upper ones. On the middle shelf I am going to have a community nest box. There will be an opening at each end, and the chickens will be able to go in and lay eggs where they want.
Here are a couple of pictures of the chickens enjoying (except for me taking pictures of them) the limbs in the coop.
Build Chicken Tractors
Attend/Enter 3 Alpaca Shows – Just found out that the Alpaca show in Eugene is canceled this year. So we’ll have to find some more to go to!
Visit 3 Fiber Mills
Neonatal Class – We did attend the neonatal class at Northwest Alpacas. It was a good day and we did learn a lot. We now feel a little bit more prepared for our 4 cria this summer.
Get a Tractor – Yeah right! LOL
Build a Whizbang Garden Cart & Plucker – I’ve started collecting the wood I’ll need for this. Next thing I need to do is start getting the hardware.
Build Road to Back Pasture
Run Water To Barn
Make Compost Bins – We have a location and a lot of stuff to compost. Now we just need to put it all together.
Farm Days – We have dates!!! The first one is going to be June 27. This is just our Farm Day. The National Alpaca Farm day is going to be September 26th. We’re looking forward to these days!
Build a Fire Pit
Build a Skirting Table
Start a Monthly Movie Night- January & February Movie Nights went great. This has been harder than I thought it was going to be. We did have movie nights in March, April & May, but not all the kids were present at all nights, and we didn’t have friends at all nights but we did watch movies!!
CHICKEN UPDATE:
Well, at one point we had A LOT of chickens here on property. At one point we had 3 RIR, 3 Barred Rocks, 3 Welsummers, 3 Speckled Sussex, 3 Silver Laced Wyandottes, 1 Golden Laced Wyandotte, 6 Buff Orpingtons, 1 Cuckoo Maran, 1 Dominique, 1 Lemon Blue Game Bantam, 1 Barnyard Mutt. 26 chickens & 4 turkeys! I finally realized that we had too many. So I either gave away or sold a good number of chickens. At this point we have: 1 Barred Rock, 1 Speckled Sussex, 1 GLW, 1 SLW, 1 Welsummer, 1 Dominque & the Barnyard mutt. We also still have all the Buff Orps and the Cuckoo Maran & the 4 turkeys. Also in the incubator we have 15 eggs, so there is still a chance we’ll have TOO MANY chickens!!
We have named most of our chickens (except for the BO’s).
Goldie is our Golden Laced Wyandotte
Millie is our Dominique
Whitey is our barnyard mutt
Uncle Sam is the Barred Rock in back and Madge is the Speckled Sussex in front.
Wellie is our Welsummer
And Dott is our Silver Laced Wyandotte.
Like I said, we also have 6 Buff Orpingtons (no names yet) and one Cuckoo Maran. They are about 2 weeks old right now and are doing pretty good.
We also have 15 eggs in the incubator. 7 of them are Black Australorps. These will grow up to be beautiful irredescent black (large) chickens.
Image from Meyer Hatchery
The other 8 are Ameraucanas. I’m not sure what color they are going to be (there are multiple colors) but they will lay beautiful blue eggs. Here are some pictures from today!
We’re on day 18 with these, so no turning, and only a couple days left until they hatch!!
ALPACA UPDATE
All in all the alpacas have been doing great. No real issues with them. They are growing up wonderfully and getting along like they should. Like my last post said, we were getting ready for shearing day. It went great!!! We all had our jobs and we did them well, and we got them all sheared!
I was out getting ready for the day aroun 7:30. Kim (Brownie’s owner) showed up at 8:00 and started helping us get ready. We layed out plywood where we would be shearing and got the barn as clean as you can get a barn.
Eddie showed up right at 9:00 and started setting up his equipment (ropes & clippers). To shear the alpacas, we bring them in and lay them down on their side and then tie their feet and stretch them out so they can’t hurt themselves or us! All in all they are probably down for no more then 4-5 minutes. Most of them didn’t make much of a fuss.
Here is a picture of what it looked like just before we started. You can see the ropes stretched out ready to go. In the picture is Eddie the shearer, Kim, and Julia’s dad Terry filming.
So our jobs were as follows: Rebecca and I had the job of bringing in the alpacas, laying them down and tying them down. Georgia was in charge of sweeping between the alpacas and helping Bec and I separate the alpacas out and keep the others where they needed to go (she was a GREAT help!!!). Kim was in charge of helping Eddie with shearing and keeping the head where it needed to be during shearing. Robbin from Bailey Hill Alpacas was helping bag up the fiber. She was in charge of 2nds (fiber from the chest, belly, legs & neck). Julia was bagging up the blanket and clipping toenails while we had them down. Pattie was in charge of keeping all the bags and lables in order so we would know whos fiber was whos when we finished. Lilian was in charge of watching the kids in the house so we could all be out in the barn. She was also a great help! Without Georgia & Lilian, we could have never done this day so quickly!!
Here is a picture mid-shear! Over on the far side you can see them shearing Nola. Julia had just collected the blanket and Kim is holding the head while Eddie finishes up. Here close to the camera you can see Bec and I tying down Helena while Georgia brings us the ropes. (This was the only picture I got during shearing. I thought I had my camera to take one picture every 30 seconds, but it was really set to take one picture every 60 minutes. Next year I’ll get it set right!! Stupid camera!!)
This is the aftermath of shearing.
All in all it only took us about 75 minutes to shear all 16 alpacas. Pretty good for first timers! Julia and her mom had made a great lunch for all of us and we all went in and enjoyed a fun lunch, getting to know Eddie better and laughing about getting spit on or kicked (only Bec and I got kicked, so not too bad). I think we all had some sort of spit on us!
Here is what we are left with, 32 bags of beautiful fiber (only 30 bags are shown, Kim took Brownies fiber with her). I love all the different colors. One bag has their blanket and another bag with 2nds. We also collected a small sample to send off to get histograms (this will tell us the thickness of the fiber, the length, and all the fun stuff we want to know).
Terry was able to get some video. It didn’t upload that well, but here you can see I think Feline getting sheared.
We all had a great day. We’re looking forward to next year.
So, all in all we are having a great time on the farm! Keep watching for the update on the eggs that are getting ready to hatch!!
I’ve never been in to making New Years Resolutions, but this year we have decided to make some goals for the farm for this year. Julia and I went to the temple with our ward today so on our drive up, we wrote down some of our goals for this year. Will we get them all done? I hope so!! We’ll be working towards these, and in a year we’ll check back and see how we did.
Put in a Garden – We are looking forward to finally having a garden. Since we were first married we have wanted to have a garden. While I was going to school, this was not possible living in Married Student Housing. In Corvallis, we had about 3 sqft of ground to plant, didn’t happen. In Phoenix, well, it’s Phoenix, not much gardening for us going on there. Back in Eugene, the deer were not very helpful, but we did container garden on our deck. We have already started getting the garden area ready. We have been starting to compost the alpaca beans in the garden. We’ll start figuring out what we want to plant soon and get our seed from Territorial Seed here in Cottage Grove. We’ll then start planting in our green house, and we’ll be on our way.
Build Layer Chicken Coop – I’ve decided where I am going to build the chicken coop, in the old shed, in the back. That way the chickens will have a large protected run, and still have access to the pastures when I want them to. I have ordered the chickens and will be getting them as day old chicks in February. I’ll need to get the coop finished by the time they are around 5-6 weeks old so I have about 2 months to get this done. I have ordered 3 Buff Orpingtons , 3 Silver Laced Wyandottes , 3 Golden Laced Wyandottes & 3 Welsummers . I’ve ordered them (and borrowed the pictures) from Lazy 54 Farm in Hubbard, OR. Great hatchery, good people. Use them if you are wanting chickens!! We should start getting brown eggs (from light brown to very dark brown) around July. I’m looking forward to farm fresh free range pasture raised sustainable cage-free eggs!
Build Chicken Tractors – We are looking to have pasture raised chickens and turkeys this year. My goal is to have at least 50 broilers, and 10 turkeys. We’ll get the Turkeys in May to raise for Thanksgiving and Christmas. We’ll get the chickens in June or July and raise them for about 7 weeks on pasture in chickens tractors (so I have until about July to build them). I’ve thought about Salatin style tractors, but I think I like hoop houses better kind of like Robert Palmondon does at Norton Creek Farm near here in Blodgett, OR.
Attend/Enter 3 Alpaca Shows – We want to attend at least 3 alpaca shows this year. The ones we are thinking about are the EVAA Alpaca Marketplace & Fleece Show in Eugene, OR, Alpacalooza in Puyallup, WA, the CABA Classic Halter & Fleece Show in Portland, OR, or AlpacaMania in Medford, OR. We also want to enter our fleece in to at least three shows. We don’t know what shows yet, but with Spin Off’s, we can enter across the country. So we are now working on deciding what ones we are going to do.
Visit 3 Fiber Mills – Julia would like to visit at least three fiber mills to see where we would like to send our fiber this year, and to learn more about the process.
Neonatal Class – We want to attend one alpaca neonatal class this year before our babies are born. We have about 6 months to get this one done!
Get a Tractor – A real tractor, one with a bucket and a brush hog. We need to get a tractor. This will be one of the hardest this year because it is financial, and not just something we need to do. We at least need to get a riding lawn mower so we can mow quicker and use it to tow our wagon around the farm. We don’t need a big tractor, just one that will turn compost, clean out the barn, haul stuff, pull stuff, and load stuff. We’re not picky!
Build a Whizbang Garden Cart & Plucker – I have gotten plans to build a Whizbang Garden Cart and a Whizbang Chicken Plucker from Herrick Kimball of The Deliberate Agrarian. I should be getting the plans in the next little while. I’ll be blogging about building these, so watch for this.
Build Road to Back Pasture – I sort of talked about doing this in my blog post It’s Getting Cold. I want to build a road from the front of the property to the back of the property so we can drive down the side and get vehicles to the back of the property to pick-up and take animals back there, and whatever else is needed.
Run Water To Barn – I want to get water IN the barn. Currently, there is water in the backyard NEAR the barn, and we have to run a hose in to the barn to get water to the alpacas. I want to run water down the back of the barn and have a water spigot in each stall in the barn. This shouldn’t be too hard, just manual labor of digging the trench down the back of the barn and then running pipes down and putting in some no-freeze spigots or in the future automatic waterers.
Make Compost Bins – We have started our compost piles, but they are out in the open getting too much water and not composing. We have some bins we need to build and get using. We are going to put them by the greenhouse so the compost is more useful. Julia has some easy plans that I’ll get building soon!! (I hope!)
Farm Days – We want to hold 2 Farm Days this year. Last year we participated in the National Alpaca Farm Day and had a great time. We would like to do this again this year in September. We would also like to hold one early on in the summer maybe when we have new babies to show off. So be watching for our Early Summer Farm Day and come out and visit the farm. (Ok, you can come out whenever you like so just let us know when you want to come out!!!)
Build a Fire Pit – We want to have a fire pit this summer so we can sit out back in the evenings and have a fire to cook hot dogs and roast marshmallows. Nothing fancy, just some rocks, logs and a fire. This is something the girls have been asking for, and it is something we could use year round (not daily in the winter, but on dry days!)
Build a Skirting Table – This should be easy! We need a skirting table to skirt (clean and prepare) the fleece to be sent off to be processed at the fiber mills. I’ve thought about building my own, but I think I’ll just build this Skirting Table from Quality Llama Products in Lebanon, OR.
Start a Monthly Movie Night – Ok this one really isn’t farm related, but it will happen on the farm!! Last night Georgia had some friends over to watch movies, and we all had a great time. Julia and I were talking on our drive today how much fun it was, and that we would like to do it monthly. We’ll let each girls choose the movie they want on their month. The girls will be able to invite their friends over, and we’ll just have some snacks and enjoy a good movie! I’m looking forward to this!
There are our goals. We hope to get all of them done, and we’ll work towards all of them, but if we can get most of them done, we’ll be very happy!!
It’s starting to get cold. As I write this, it is 34.8° on our back patio. Tonight it is going to get down in to the high 20’s. They are saying that snow is possible over the next few days. This might hinder our trip to Aurora to see the Dexters. We were all looking forward to going up. Julia and I to see the cows (and Julia’s parents) and the girls to see Julia’s parents (they really don’t care much about the cows). We’ll have to see now what the weather is like in the morning. They say the snow won’t be around until Saturday night and Sunday morning. I hope it waits!! I do want snow, just not tomorrow morning!
Did some more reading today on cattle and Dexters. Lots to learn, but it is all interesting!! I’ve also been thinking about how to do the fencing to make it work the best with cows, a horse and alpacas. I think we are going to do a lane along the east edge of our property that will lead to the back pasture. That way we can drive the cows and horse along there, and not go in to the alpacas pastures! In the fututer, we’d like to get this lane graded and graveled so we could drive back there. That is going to be in the future!! Here is what I am talking about.
The yellow are the fences we have right now. The blue would be the new fence, and the grey is where I would like to have it graded and then add gravel to make a road.
I’ve also thought that we really are not a farm, but more of a ranch (ok, ranchette, but a ranch). So here is the next logo.
I finall had time today to build the manger in the horse barn. We really needed somewhere for Jackie to eat her hay so it wasn’t on the ground. It’s been 3 weeks or so since we finished the barn, so it has taken me too long to get back to it.
I went outside last night and measured, and then came back and cut the 2 cross boards. I build it with a 2×6 for the bottom support and and 2×4 for the top support. I built a floor for it and then a front. It turned out pretty good, and really strong. I don’t think Jackie will be able to knock this off the wall.
Here are some pictures.
My lovely helpers!!
If I can sit on it, it must be strong
I’m glad to get this done. Now Jackie has a nice place to eat.
Well, Howard, Judy, Julia & I finished the horse barn yesterday. It took quite a while, and we had to run to the store to pick up one more 14′ 2×4 & some screws, but we got it done. We had to put up the headers and the rafters, and then get the tin on. It was raining on and off throughout the day. The first pictures are from yesterday, and then some of the completed barn from today.
So now all we have to do is build a manger inside of it, and then paint it. Jackie already has been using it, and it is helping to keep her feed and hay dry.
Ok, it is more of a shelter, but it will be used like a barn! As you know, we have Jackie (the horse) with us, and she is in the back pasture where we don’t have any shelter. It will start to rain soon, so we thought it would be nice to have a place for her to go at night to stay dry. Our neighbor Howard found some wood for us that we could use. It is 3/4″ plywood that has 2×4 supports. Very sturdy!! They are 4′x8′ or 4′x4′ pieces.
You can see the wood in this picture behind the girls.
We were able to bolt together the pieces to make a 12′x12′ shelter in the back pasture. We got up the 4 walls yesterday. We are going to put a 2×12 header on the front and 2×4 header on the back to give us some slant to the roof, and then we’ll put corrugated metal on for the roof.
We were so busy, we once again forgot to take pictures. We’ll try to take some today of what we have done.
‘ve been wanting to build a larger incubator for some time. When Lilian and I built our incubator last year, we put a post out on freecycle.com asking for a free ice chest or small fridge. We got the Omaha Steaks ice chest and a larger dorm fridge for free. We ended up using the smaller ice chest for our first incubator. The fridge has been sitting in our shop for the last year just collecting dust (something I’m learning on the farm is to not throw away everything, a lot of stuff will come in handy again).
Anybody need a hay feeder?
= COMPLETED
= Started but not completed
=No work done yet.
Next year I’ll get it set right!! Stupid camera!!)
, 3 Silver Laced Wyandottes 
, 3 Golden Laced Wyandottes 
& 3 Welsummers 
. I’ve ordered them (and borrowed the pictures) from 
