Even though there is no sun to help the build up of light, as the days lengthen the chickens have begun to lay again. Yesterday I collected TEN eggs.
Eggs are laid with a thin film of protein sealing the pores on the egg, a natural way to help them stay fresh for longer. So I never wash them. If you wash them they are then vulnerable to contamination and must be refrigerated. But with all this mud and with all our chickens being free range the pigs are getting a good number of eggs to eat. I just collect the eggs, boil them up, cool them and feed them to the pigs like candy.
Yesterday was warm so I cleaned out Tia and Txiki’s sleeping area. Usually I am throwing bricks of frozen solid manure with the rest just frozen to the ground and immoveable, so it good to get it really clean. I leave one part of the shelter as deep bedding this I just pick the cow pats out of and spread more straw on top of. The floor of the barn is concrete and cold. They like to sleep in the deep beds. 
I also attempted to clean out the piglets toilet corner but they are hopeless – always wanting to play with the fork. And throwing forkfulls of pig manure outside with little piggies trying to CATCH the fork AND any flying material means someone will lose an eye before bedtime.
It is wet. We did not get the forecast ice, or even much of the rain they were sending out red alerts about. This part of the plains had air full of thick wet fog and great droplets of water that did not rain down as much as hang around. It is 43F/6C already this morning and this looks to be our high for the day. From now the temperature will drift slowly back down below freezing.
Everything is sodden.
Today I will load the little chicks into a big dog crate (after putting Boo on the chain) and take them into the big chook house where they will meet the big chickens from the safety of their own house, in a few days and at night I will release them. It is time to get the turkey house cleaned out. When I come back from the UK and my mystery destination (any guesses yet?) we will receive a new set of layer chicks. They will be ready to lay between 4 and 5 months old so I like to start early.
Poppy the sow was observed being bred by Manu the other day so that is good news as I have a date for her. No-one saw him breed Molly so I have no idea about her, we will just follow the signs. I timed their meeting so that she would farrow six weeks before Poppy so if my plan works Molly will farrow in late March and Poppy in May. The gestation period for swine is three months, three weeks and three days. But you know what they say about plans and mice (or pigs).
I hope you all have a lovely day.
Love celi
The Kitchen's Garden 
91 responses to “Cook us some eggs”
Some supermarkets in Australia refrigerate or cool eggs variously. AndmImhave nevr seen a dirtynegg in supermarket somcan onky assume they are at least wiped. We buy local fre/pasture eggs from farmers, luckily the local co-op also stocks good local eggs because if there is only cheap, cage or so-called free range eggs to be had we go without. Ditto with chicken & meat.
I hope your sidetrip wil be somewhere in the southern hemisphere that will warm your bones 🌞
I am envious of you getting eggs. The bobcat killed almost our entire flock. We have two hens and one rooster left. And no eggs. Sob. We will start over again in the spring — and in the meantime we are covering every inch of the chicken run with chicken wire (over the hog panels already there). Now, if I could just get rid of the rats…
Those rats! When we had the worst of them I had the same – the rats were killing the chicks – horrible bastards. In the end I got a special box that you could put poison in but no chicken or cat or dog could get into it. We got rid of a lot that way. I hated to use poison and never had to again but needs must. I also killed a lot by having a half filled container of water with feed sprinkled on top, the rats jumped in after the feed and could not get out – drowned – that was my fathers trick.
I need to get one of those boxes. I was using rat zapper traps but they don’t last very long and they are very expensive. Where did you get the box? Feed store or online? I will also try the water trick. Bastard rats is right. We are getting more chicks in the spring and I don’t want to lose anymore to rats.
My knowledge of pigs grows by leaps and bounds here.
We’ll make an associate farm boy of you yet! c
Do you follow David, Fine Dining at Home? If you do, you should try to meet for a coffee in London, he is quite a lovely person.
Farm fresh eggs are such a treat. I bet the yolks are gorgeous and dark orange.
You know I may have come across him – but I actually Follow very very few blogs – I will look him up – thank you
I only have 2 hens and 1 rooster left now, and I hope the hens start laying again soon…really miss having eggs!
Good Morning Celi! Just had a quick thought I wanted to pass along. When working on your pig breeding program, is it possible to rub a bit of colored chalk on the rump of the females which would then transfer to the male when breeding commences? Of course you can’t sit and watch them all day, but perhaps this would provide a clue as to what happens “behind closed doors”? Also, if you are breeding several females, using a different color for each? Anyway, I’m sure you have it all under control, but it helps me to get random stuff like this out of my brain, to make room for more random stuff. 🙂 Have a great day!