Mashing these two together since internet was slow yesterday night.
Saturday March 12th 2011
Points for the day are as follows: 28
Cheesy Biscuits (homemade x3): 9
Smoked Chicken (leg/thigh + 1/3 breast): 6
Cheesy Biscuits (homemade x3): 9
Broccoli and Cheese steamer 1/3: 2
Cherry Coke: 2
Sunday March 13th 2011
Points for the day are as follows: 29
Eggs (x2): 4
Hash Browns (1/2 package): 6
Ketchup: 0
Chocolate Chip Banana Bread: 4
WW smoked string cheese: 1
Smoked Chicken 1.5 breasts: 6
Ruffles Baked Sour Cream and Cheddar chips (damn you eric for leaving them here!): 8
In other news, found the first black copper marans egg in the coop, and the first (probably) seabright egg.
Sunday, March 13, 2011
Saturday, March 12, 2011
Friday March 11th 2011
Points for the day are as follows: 45 total
1 Gala Apple - 0 points
2 eggs - 4 points
Portion of hash browns - 4 points
16 Oz water w/ Crystal Light (x2) - 0 points
Chicken Enchilada Soup (cup) - probably 5 points
Cheese - 2 points
Tortilla strips - 3 points
Spaghetti (3 cups) - 15 points
Sauce (1 cup) - 4 points
Parmesan - 3 points
Garlic Bread - 5 points
Mint - zero points
3 cups water - 0 points
Ok, so here's where things are interesting. I have gone over my 29 points for the day (which I normally do on Fridays because every Friday I go out to a restaurant with the guys). This means I will be dipping into my 49 extra weekly points.
So with 45 total, I can subtract 29, leaving me with 16. So I've used 16 weekly points, leaving me with 33 for the rest of the week. These, I will probably not use on other days, as the rest of the week I tend to try to stay at just my daily points.
On the old program, we used to get... I want to say it was like 25 extra points... somewhere around there. And it was my general habit to cross off the first ten of them on my tracker. These ten I used as my error points, for the times when my measurement of food was off, or reasoned that they accounted for the partial points I ate when I nibbled things (like 1 mini chocolate egg.... it's not actually a point but if I eat one every day I've eaten a couple points worth).
I still like to consider those points as gone, so I will say there are 23 weekly points, and 39 to start with for other weeks... but it's my own personal habit and shouldn't be listened to if you get easily confused.
Points for the day are as follows: 45 total
1 Gala Apple - 0 points
2 eggs - 4 points
Portion of hash browns - 4 points
16 Oz water w/ Crystal Light (x2) - 0 points
Chicken Enchilada Soup (cup) - probably 5 points
Cheese - 2 points
Tortilla strips - 3 points
Spaghetti (3 cups) - 15 points
Sauce (1 cup) - 4 points
Parmesan - 3 points
Garlic Bread - 5 points
Mint - zero points
3 cups water - 0 points
Ok, so here's where things are interesting. I have gone over my 29 points for the day (which I normally do on Fridays because every Friday I go out to a restaurant with the guys). This means I will be dipping into my 49 extra weekly points.
So with 45 total, I can subtract 29, leaving me with 16. So I've used 16 weekly points, leaving me with 33 for the rest of the week. These, I will probably not use on other days, as the rest of the week I tend to try to stay at just my daily points.
On the old program, we used to get... I want to say it was like 25 extra points... somewhere around there. And it was my general habit to cross off the first ten of them on my tracker. These ten I used as my error points, for the times when my measurement of food was off, or reasoned that they accounted for the partial points I ate when I nibbled things (like 1 mini chocolate egg.... it's not actually a point but if I eat one every day I've eaten a couple points worth).
I still like to consider those points as gone, so I will say there are 23 weekly points, and 39 to start with for other weeks... but it's my own personal habit and shouldn't be listened to if you get easily confused.
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
Thursday March 10th 2011
This is my tracking post for Thursday March 10th 2011.
I expect my friend to post in the comments how he is spending his points for the day.
I will update my points when I get home from work.
EDIT: My points!
1 Cadburry Dark Chocolate Candy-shell egg (blue) - some fraction of a point
1 Gala Apple - 0 points
16 OZ water w/ Crystal Light packet (grape) - 0 points
Hamburger: 11 points total
(Patty (sirloin)w/ onion and garlic folded in - 8 points
Low Fat American Cheese slice - 1 point
Tomato - 0 points
Ketchup - 0 points
Dill pickle slices (Claussen!) - 0 points
Low fat Meijer hamburger bun - 2 points)
1 stick WW smoked string cheese - 1 point
16 Oz water w/ Crystal Light packet (strawberry) - 0 points
Small cube french bread w/ honey-whipped butter - the other fraction of a point
Hamburger: 11 points
Patty (sirloin) w/ onion and garlic folded in - 8 points
Low Fat American Cheese slice - 1 point
Ketchup - 0 points
Dill pickle slices (Claussen again) - 0 points
Low fat Meijer hamburger bun - 2 points
1 stick WW smoked string cheese - 1 point
Total for today (thus far at time of updating): 25
I expect my friend to post in the comments how he is spending his points for the day.
I will update my points when I get home from work.
EDIT: My points!
1 Cadburry Dark Chocolate Candy-shell egg (blue) - some fraction of a point
1 Gala Apple - 0 points
16 OZ water w/ Crystal Light packet (grape) - 0 points
Hamburger: 11 points total
(Patty (sirloin)w/ onion and garlic folded in - 8 points
Low Fat American Cheese slice - 1 point
Tomato - 0 points
Ketchup - 0 points
Dill pickle slices (Claussen!) - 0 points
Low fat Meijer hamburger bun - 2 points)
1 stick WW smoked string cheese - 1 point
16 Oz water w/ Crystal Light packet (strawberry) - 0 points
Small cube french bread w/ honey-whipped butter - the other fraction of a point
Hamburger: 11 points
Patty (sirloin) w/ onion and garlic folded in - 8 points
Low Fat American Cheese slice - 1 point
Ketchup - 0 points
Dill pickle slices (Claussen again) - 0 points
Low fat Meijer hamburger bun - 2 points
1 stick WW smoked string cheese - 1 point
Total for today (thus far at time of updating): 25
I'm going to attempt to be held accountable for my actions through this blog. I joined Weight Watchers for the first time when I was in my teens, and I lost something like 30lbs back then. It was great, and then I spent a few weeks in France, there was delicious food, and going back to the program seemed so... difficult. Plus, it was a lot of money and I didn't want my mom to pay for something my heart was not in.
Years later, after graduating college, moving around a few times and eventually ending up back home, I took a step back and looked at my life. When I'd started WW in high school, I'd weighed somewhere in the 180's. Here and now, I was looking at a me that was over 200lbs. As bad as this may sound, I looked at a friend of mine that I knew was somewhere in the 230's the last I'd heard her quote her weight, and I said oh the hell no. I was NOT going to let myself become that.
On my own, I changed some of my eating habits. I cut out fast food, and I started eating fruits and vegetables where I could. It was disorganized at best. I managed to fumble my way down by about 15lbs, and that was where progress stalled. I knew I wasn't going to be able to do it on my own. So I talked to my mother and together we joined up at WW. She'd kill me if I listed her starting weight, so I'll just say she weighed more than she wanted, and she was willing to change.
So we went. The program was still difficult at times. You get a set number of "points" per day, dependent upon factors like height and age and weight and gender. Every food has a points value. You also get a certain number of extra points for the week, which you can use in bits per day or all at once or however you want to spend them, so that things like birthdays or holidays or restaurants don't have to be totally killer. But the smallest number of points you could have in a day was 18... and let me tell you how that's not a lot of food. A Lean Cuisine runs you anywhere from 4 to 8 points, and those portions are tiny. A 100 calorie pack? 2 points. Forget any fast food except the occasional stop to Taco Bell. Big Mac used to be rated something like 25 points... maybe 35 I forget. Good luck, right?
When I got to 18 points a day, I despaired and pretty much surrendered. I still watched what I ate, but I was not driven like I had been. I'd lost nearly 50lbs total and was feeling pretty good. I had been wearing a womens size 18 and was down to a size 4 in normal clothes.
Then I heard WW changed their program, and that it was easier. I had recently changed jobs, changed boyfriends, changed focuses... I thought heck, why not change my habits again. I informed my friend Eric that I would be joining WW, as he had mentioned wanting to lose some weight as well, and he accompanied me to a meeting to see the new program.
It's.... awesome. Fruits and vegetables (well most of them) are free of points. The way they figure points now has changed, as they've learned much more about how a body processes nutrition. Now, the lowest # of points in a day is 29 instead of 18, and many of my favorite foods have stayed the same in value or even GONE DOWN! That's pretty exciting. I can eat things like bagels again without feeling guilty about the huge point load. Dinner out with the guys on Friday's no longer had to be a guilty pleasure either. In fact, I was able to order my Pad Thai AND have it be within just my daily points, no weekly points needed!
So there's the story that leads to my being responsible here. Every day I am supposed to track what I eat. Most days I'm terrible and I don't. I am within 8 lbs of my goal weight, and if I can make it in the next couple of weeks, I don't have to keep paying for meetings; I will become a lifetime member and can go for free. Having someone in real life to be accountable to is infinitely helpful in staying on goal, so I want to give it an honest shot. So I'm going to track here, and hopefully give and take some ideas if anyone stumbles across this that is doing the same, or wants to do the same.
My tracking week starts on Thursday mornings, so tomorrow when I get home from work will be my first report. Wish me luck!
~Ked
Years later, after graduating college, moving around a few times and eventually ending up back home, I took a step back and looked at my life. When I'd started WW in high school, I'd weighed somewhere in the 180's. Here and now, I was looking at a me that was over 200lbs. As bad as this may sound, I looked at a friend of mine that I knew was somewhere in the 230's the last I'd heard her quote her weight, and I said oh the hell no. I was NOT going to let myself become that.
On my own, I changed some of my eating habits. I cut out fast food, and I started eating fruits and vegetables where I could. It was disorganized at best. I managed to fumble my way down by about 15lbs, and that was where progress stalled. I knew I wasn't going to be able to do it on my own. So I talked to my mother and together we joined up at WW. She'd kill me if I listed her starting weight, so I'll just say she weighed more than she wanted, and she was willing to change.
So we went. The program was still difficult at times. You get a set number of "points" per day, dependent upon factors like height and age and weight and gender. Every food has a points value. You also get a certain number of extra points for the week, which you can use in bits per day or all at once or however you want to spend them, so that things like birthdays or holidays or restaurants don't have to be totally killer. But the smallest number of points you could have in a day was 18... and let me tell you how that's not a lot of food. A Lean Cuisine runs you anywhere from 4 to 8 points, and those portions are tiny. A 100 calorie pack? 2 points. Forget any fast food except the occasional stop to Taco Bell. Big Mac used to be rated something like 25 points... maybe 35 I forget. Good luck, right?
When I got to 18 points a day, I despaired and pretty much surrendered. I still watched what I ate, but I was not driven like I had been. I'd lost nearly 50lbs total and was feeling pretty good. I had been wearing a womens size 18 and was down to a size 4 in normal clothes.
Then I heard WW changed their program, and that it was easier. I had recently changed jobs, changed boyfriends, changed focuses... I thought heck, why not change my habits again. I informed my friend Eric that I would be joining WW, as he had mentioned wanting to lose some weight as well, and he accompanied me to a meeting to see the new program.
It's.... awesome. Fruits and vegetables (well most of them) are free of points. The way they figure points now has changed, as they've learned much more about how a body processes nutrition. Now, the lowest # of points in a day is 29 instead of 18, and many of my favorite foods have stayed the same in value or even GONE DOWN! That's pretty exciting. I can eat things like bagels again without feeling guilty about the huge point load. Dinner out with the guys on Friday's no longer had to be a guilty pleasure either. In fact, I was able to order my Pad Thai AND have it be within just my daily points, no weekly points needed!
So there's the story that leads to my being responsible here. Every day I am supposed to track what I eat. Most days I'm terrible and I don't. I am within 8 lbs of my goal weight, and if I can make it in the next couple of weeks, I don't have to keep paying for meetings; I will become a lifetime member and can go for free. Having someone in real life to be accountable to is infinitely helpful in staying on goal, so I want to give it an honest shot. So I'm going to track here, and hopefully give and take some ideas if anyone stumbles across this that is doing the same, or wants to do the same.
My tracking week starts on Thursday mornings, so tomorrow when I get home from work will be my first report. Wish me luck!
~Ked
Thursday, July 29, 2010
Ok, so it's been a while and I need to get into the habit of updating this thing.... For now I will just settle for recounting the past month and a half with shiny pictures.
First of all, after the first hatch of polish chickens (Megatron, Optimus Prime, and Fox), I put more eggs into the incubator. I put in 22 more polish eggs (in 3 batches, 9, 8, and 5, a week apart each batch), 2 dozen duck eggs (in 2 batches a week apart), and 8 peacock eggs (same breeder, 3 different pens/colors). My incubator was STUFFED and the peacock eggs were SO big that I had to double space them on the racks!
As it turns out, incubating chicken and duck eggs together presents a huge problem. The chickens want 30-50% humidity through the incubation and the ducks want 75-80% through the incubation. So I cheated them all and set the humidity at 60% (perfect for peacocks!) through the incubation.
The first batch of polish hatched just fine- two were clear and five hatched- one died in the egg and one died a couple days after hatching. As I knew these guys would probably go to homes beyond my control, I didn't name them. I just called them by the lay date written on their eggs.
Here is 30, next to a rubber ducky because he was the first born and had no other friends.
And here is 26, 28, and 30. 26's buff sibling is the one who died a few days after hatching :(
The best part of this second hatch was that all these babies imprinted. They still have not gone to homes beyond my reach, so when I visit the farm I go to the chick stall and call out Cheep cheep cheep! and all four of them come running over to say hello. Thirty was my favorite, liking to sleep on or near me when I took him out of the brooder.
The second batch of eggs had started incubation before they got to me, and died when I settled them overnight in a cool location. The last batch was waterlogged from hatching with the ducks. Very sad.
Of the first dozen duck eggs, only 4 were fertile. Two hatched (Spot and Stupid), one died, and one was a muscovy duckling which took a week longer to hatch.
Here is Spot and Stupid, enjoying their new rabbit cage when we first moved them outdoors!
They are a LOT bigger now! Spot is actually starting to get his big boy feathers in, sleek black and white. Spot is in the lower left and Stupid is upper right. Stupid got his name because for the first couple weeks, he held his head twisted/tilted around to one side.
Of the second batch, 9 were fertile. Five hatched, two died, one nearly hatched, and then died, and one was full of meat with no order and was totally disgusting (http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4099/4806423712_e75703a9d3.jpg).
Here's the first four, they all hatched together a few days before the fifth duck and the muscovy from the first hatch.
I gave the all yellow and the mostly black one to Liz, since I wanted to keep them close to home to baby. Plus, all her ducks are pekins, and they are plain white. I think it will be awesome to have some colored ducklings in there. The other two along with Spot, Stupid, and the muscovy are going to their new home tomorrow. I am SO HAPPY because they are making a HUGE mess/stink on my deck. They have nearly gone through a 50lb bag of food so far as well >.< Add in the Ton of bedding they get filthy and having to change their disgusting water at least three times a day.... yah, they are getting to be too much for me.
Of the five that hatched from the second batch, one of them was very tiny, and is still very tiny- we believe he may suffer from dwarfism, meaning he will need special care for his life and he will feather out a LOT slower than the others. We named him Ping and he is darn cute! Here is Ping with Yang, and they should be about the same size.
Of the peacocks, four were clear or scrambled by shipping and four of them should have hatched. However, two died in the egg perfectly formed and ready to hatch, which was REALLY disappointing. The other two, however, hatched just fine and they are THE SWEETEST creatures on the planet. I have not named them, but I will. I will be able to tell what gender they are in a couple weeks, and I will give them appropriately royal names then.
Here is the firstborn the night she was born, wrapped in my blanket.
And here she is at 2 weeks on my shoulder! This is her favorite hang out place :)
She is DEATHLY cute.
And for anyone who has never seen a peachick moving or making noise, we took a trip outside while I was watching the ducks have their free ranging time.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTQvn1FKARs
She is a TOTAL chatterbox, always talking to me. I have all my fingers and toes crossed that she survives to adulthood. Even so, I have not placed all my eggs in one basket so to speak.
With those hatches out of the way... I thoroughly cleaned and sanitized my incubator in preparation for another hatch. The eggs I'd hatched previously had for the most part been free eggs. I wanted to test the incubator, make sure it worked, see what a full cycle looked like, make sure I knew what to do in emergencies... Now that I am more confident in my incubator, I felt it was time to order some special eggs.
After about a week of searching and hemming and hawing, I finally settled on a plan and chose a selection of eggs that could be bought and arrive at the same time. I ordered one dozen French Black Copper Marans eggs, One Dozen show quality Silkie eggs, eight more peacock eggs (Silver pied and Emerald pied spalding), and then traded 6 polish hatching eggs for eight golden lakenvelder eggs. Now, mind you that my incubator holds 42 eggs. 12+12+8+8=40 eggs. Perfect. The peacock eggs would have to be double spaced, but the silkie eggs were small enough that they could go between the peacock eggs and the incubator would be perfectly full with just enough room to leave 2 spaces near the turner's motor clear (where it might get hot).
What ARRIVED is not what I ordered. What ARRIVED were 18 silkie eggs, 14 BCM eggs (GORGEOUS eggs, take a look! http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4096/4823215837_7b8ca7d559.jpg), 9 peacock eggs, and thank god I haven't received the lakenvelders on time. I thought to myself, looking at all these eggs... Don't panic. Shipped eggs have a high mortality rate, not all of them will start to develop and by the time the lakenvelders get here I will be able to remove the 'clear' eggs from the incubator. No worries!
I candled the silkie eggs- 17/18 show development! I candled the peacock eggs and unfortunately I think I only saw 2 with development, but it was REALLY early in their incubation period. I will be candling them again probably Monday to check again. In the BCM eggs... I'm pretty sure most if not all of them have development! So now I have no space in the incubator (still) and if the lakenvelder's arrive, I will probably have to create an incubator from scratch and turn by hand. I suppose this will not break my heart, to have a spare incubator in case of disaster with my main one.
So that's pretty much been my life for the past couple weeks... wake up early, go to work, home around 4 or 5, let the big ducks out, feed Ping and the peacocks (play with the peacocks!), clean the big duck cage, read a book outside with them for an hour, make dinner, round them up, and relax for an hour or two before crashing..... rinse and repeat! You can imagine I will be very happy when I no longer have the big ducks to worry about.
Will try to remember to update about the coming weekend!
First of all, after the first hatch of polish chickens (Megatron, Optimus Prime, and Fox), I put more eggs into the incubator. I put in 22 more polish eggs (in 3 batches, 9, 8, and 5, a week apart each batch), 2 dozen duck eggs (in 2 batches a week apart), and 8 peacock eggs (same breeder, 3 different pens/colors). My incubator was STUFFED and the peacock eggs were SO big that I had to double space them on the racks!
As it turns out, incubating chicken and duck eggs together presents a huge problem. The chickens want 30-50% humidity through the incubation and the ducks want 75-80% through the incubation. So I cheated them all and set the humidity at 60% (perfect for peacocks!) through the incubation.
The first batch of polish hatched just fine- two were clear and five hatched- one died in the egg and one died a couple days after hatching. As I knew these guys would probably go to homes beyond my control, I didn't name them. I just called them by the lay date written on their eggs.
Here is 30, next to a rubber ducky because he was the first born and had no other friends.
And here is 26, 28, and 30. 26's buff sibling is the one who died a few days after hatching :(
The best part of this second hatch was that all these babies imprinted. They still have not gone to homes beyond my reach, so when I visit the farm I go to the chick stall and call out Cheep cheep cheep! and all four of them come running over to say hello. Thirty was my favorite, liking to sleep on or near me when I took him out of the brooder.
The second batch of eggs had started incubation before they got to me, and died when I settled them overnight in a cool location. The last batch was waterlogged from hatching with the ducks. Very sad.
Of the first dozen duck eggs, only 4 were fertile. Two hatched (Spot and Stupid), one died, and one was a muscovy duckling which took a week longer to hatch.
Here is Spot and Stupid, enjoying their new rabbit cage when we first moved them outdoors!They are a LOT bigger now! Spot is actually starting to get his big boy feathers in, sleek black and white. Spot is in the lower left and Stupid is upper right. Stupid got his name because for the first couple weeks, he held his head twisted/tilted around to one side.
Of the second batch, 9 were fertile. Five hatched, two died, one nearly hatched, and then died, and one was full of meat with no order and was totally disgusting (http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4099/4806423712_e75703a9d3.jpg).
Here's the first four, they all hatched together a few days before the fifth duck and the muscovy from the first hatch.
I gave the all yellow and the mostly black one to Liz, since I wanted to keep them close to home to baby. Plus, all her ducks are pekins, and they are plain white. I think it will be awesome to have some colored ducklings in there. The other two along with Spot, Stupid, and the muscovy are going to their new home tomorrow. I am SO HAPPY because they are making a HUGE mess/stink on my deck. They have nearly gone through a 50lb bag of food so far as well >.< Add in the Ton of bedding they get filthy and having to change their disgusting water at least three times a day.... yah, they are getting to be too much for me.
Of the five that hatched from the second batch, one of them was very tiny, and is still very tiny- we believe he may suffer from dwarfism, meaning he will need special care for his life and he will feather out a LOT slower than the others. We named him Ping and he is darn cute! Here is Ping with Yang, and they should be about the same size.
Of the peacocks, four were clear or scrambled by shipping and four of them should have hatched. However, two died in the egg perfectly formed and ready to hatch, which was REALLY disappointing. The other two, however, hatched just fine and they are THE SWEETEST creatures on the planet. I have not named them, but I will. I will be able to tell what gender they are in a couple weeks, and I will give them appropriately royal names then.
Here is the firstborn the night she was born, wrapped in my blanket.
And here she is at 2 weeks on my shoulder! This is her favorite hang out place :)
She is DEATHLY cute.
And for anyone who has never seen a peachick moving or making noise, we took a trip outside while I was watching the ducks have their free ranging time.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTQvn1FKARs
She is a TOTAL chatterbox, always talking to me. I have all my fingers and toes crossed that she survives to adulthood. Even so, I have not placed all my eggs in one basket so to speak.
With those hatches out of the way... I thoroughly cleaned and sanitized my incubator in preparation for another hatch. The eggs I'd hatched previously had for the most part been free eggs. I wanted to test the incubator, make sure it worked, see what a full cycle looked like, make sure I knew what to do in emergencies... Now that I am more confident in my incubator, I felt it was time to order some special eggs.
After about a week of searching and hemming and hawing, I finally settled on a plan and chose a selection of eggs that could be bought and arrive at the same time. I ordered one dozen French Black Copper Marans eggs, One Dozen show quality Silkie eggs, eight more peacock eggs (Silver pied and Emerald pied spalding), and then traded 6 polish hatching eggs for eight golden lakenvelder eggs. Now, mind you that my incubator holds 42 eggs. 12+12+8+8=40 eggs. Perfect. The peacock eggs would have to be double spaced, but the silkie eggs were small enough that they could go between the peacock eggs and the incubator would be perfectly full with just enough room to leave 2 spaces near the turner's motor clear (where it might get hot).
What ARRIVED is not what I ordered. What ARRIVED were 18 silkie eggs, 14 BCM eggs (GORGEOUS eggs, take a look! http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4096/4823215837_7b8ca7d559.jpg), 9 peacock eggs, and thank god I haven't received the lakenvelders on time. I thought to myself, looking at all these eggs... Don't panic. Shipped eggs have a high mortality rate, not all of them will start to develop and by the time the lakenvelders get here I will be able to remove the 'clear' eggs from the incubator. No worries!
I candled the silkie eggs- 17/18 show development! I candled the peacock eggs and unfortunately I think I only saw 2 with development, but it was REALLY early in their incubation period. I will be candling them again probably Monday to check again. In the BCM eggs... I'm pretty sure most if not all of them have development! So now I have no space in the incubator (still) and if the lakenvelder's arrive, I will probably have to create an incubator from scratch and turn by hand. I suppose this will not break my heart, to have a spare incubator in case of disaster with my main one.
So that's pretty much been my life for the past couple weeks... wake up early, go to work, home around 4 or 5, let the big ducks out, feed Ping and the peacocks (play with the peacocks!), clean the big duck cage, read a book outside with them for an hour, make dinner, round them up, and relax for an hour or two before crashing..... rinse and repeat! You can imagine I will be very happy when I no longer have the big ducks to worry about.
Will try to remember to update about the coming weekend!
Monday, June 14, 2010
Bird Swap Weekend
It was a very eventful weekend, with a friend of mine driving down a four hour trip to attend a bird swap with me. She arrived with a bunny, a baby raccoon, and a dozen hatching duck eggs for me to put into my incubator. It was so full that I had to candle the eggs inside and remove a clear (an infertile egg) to fit all dozen of the new ones.
At about 3:30 in the morning, my alarm went off and we managed to somehow stumble out of our beds and put on real clothes and eat a cup of yogurt before Mils arrived. He came to the last swap with us, and he was somehow insane enough to come to this swap with us too. It was an hour and a half away, in Charlotte, Michigan. Sara followed us there, which turned out to be a very good thing as we didn't go straight home.
The swap was all right, but certainly not nearly as big as the swaps on the west side of the state. I would say maybe half the size and the vendors did not have very much good stock. There were a lot of quail at a nice price, which pleased Sara, but there was not a single female peacock for sale, and NO babies at all. Disappointing, as that was on my list.
What else was on my list was to find a companion for Sunshine, the goat we got at the first swap of the year. Here's a lovely pic of my dad feeding her a bottle.
And if you're wondering why she has black duct tape all over 1 ear, it is because she tore the tag out of her ear, ripping it clean in half lengthwise. Poor thing! But she doesn't seem to mind and in fact gets up to quite a lot of mischief at Liz's house. She climbs on everything and follows her new mommy around everywhere. She also likes to steal things....
After all the climbing and the stealing and the following, the line ended up being drawn at headbutting the dogs. It was time to get her a companion to play with so that she could learn to be a little more goat and a little less kid. So at the swap this weekend it was our mission to pick up a friend and we found the same breeder Sunshine had come from, with 2 goats left. Of course we picked another goat with some damage done; the dehorning had failed slightly and she will now have just 1 horn. But she's still darn cute!
They seem to be getting along so far!
So with the goat taken care of and put in her new home, we turned to catching the peacock we had bought at the first swap. His name is Malik and he's a very pretty boy but he flies very well and we don't want him to fly away from his new home. So he chased him down (through much wing buffeting and kicking) and clipped his wings. He was very offended.
I would feel bad for bringing such an indignity (*snirk*) on him, but he has been crying about going outside to the outer coop since we brought him home. When we finally had his wings clipped and set him down outside, he laid down on the ground and told us he was DYING from injured pride. So we booted him onto his feet and he wandered the coop exploring every nook and cranny. What a silly bird.
Of course the second goat was not the only thing we bought at the swap- I also managed to snag 13 araucana mix cheeps for $10 from a man with a whole lot of different sorts. They are super cute, but we were afraid to put them in with the helmet heads, since they were a week or two older and might peck at the little guys. Apparently I need not have worried- Megatron makes a wonderful mommy, sitting on the babies and keeping them herded together.
Speaking of the firstborn cheeps, here's Megatron and Fox now that they are growing in the feathers on their heads. A few more weeks and we'll be able to tell who is a boy and who is a girl!
I dug up the pictures of mom and dad for the cheeps, and this is what they all SHOULD look like when they are grown up:
So that's where we are at with previous adventures. Currently I have eggs in my incubator again, although this time they are a mix of polish chicken and pekin duck eggs. The duck eggs are actually a lot more work than the chicken eggs, to where I have to up the humidity and I have to spray the eggs with water 1 time per day to keep them at the right moisture level.
This weekend I candled about half the incubator and it was rather disappointing. I had previously handled the 1st batch of 9 polish eggs and had tossed 3 clears. This time I candled the 1st dozen duck eggs and only 4 were fertile and growing. I candled the second batch of 8 polish eggs.... and there was not ONE that was fertile. Bummer! Liz says that the barn was extraordinarily hot that week, though, so the chickens may have been too busy trying to stay cool or the eggs may have started incubation before she took them to store them for me. I will crack them open in the kitchen tonight and check for fertility, which will give us a better idea of what happened.
I still hold hopes for the remaining dozen duck eggs and the 5 newest chicken eggs. They will be old enough to candle in about a week.
But possibly the most exciting news of all is that I took a chance and I ordered a few hatching peacock eggs. I understand that shipped eggs are less likely to hatch because the mail people do not handle the packages as delicately as they should (and the auto sorter machine is rough on them as well :/ sigh) but I am hoping I can get at least 1 hen to hatch for me. That way I could give Malik a mate, and perhaps he could be allowed to wander the farm. It would also be nice to raise a little peahen at home, to be hand tame.
On an unrelated note, I took my guild to their first Naxx 10 and successful MC run this week and they actually did better than expected and everyone had a lot of fun. I am pleased with this, as it gives me hope for future raids. We shall see how it goes.
At about 3:30 in the morning, my alarm went off and we managed to somehow stumble out of our beds and put on real clothes and eat a cup of yogurt before Mils arrived. He came to the last swap with us, and he was somehow insane enough to come to this swap with us too. It was an hour and a half away, in Charlotte, Michigan. Sara followed us there, which turned out to be a very good thing as we didn't go straight home.
The swap was all right, but certainly not nearly as big as the swaps on the west side of the state. I would say maybe half the size and the vendors did not have very much good stock. There were a lot of quail at a nice price, which pleased Sara, but there was not a single female peacock for sale, and NO babies at all. Disappointing, as that was on my list.
What else was on my list was to find a companion for Sunshine, the goat we got at the first swap of the year. Here's a lovely pic of my dad feeding her a bottle.
And if you're wondering why she has black duct tape all over 1 ear, it is because she tore the tag out of her ear, ripping it clean in half lengthwise. Poor thing! But she doesn't seem to mind and in fact gets up to quite a lot of mischief at Liz's house. She climbs on everything and follows her new mommy around everywhere. She also likes to steal things....
After all the climbing and the stealing and the following, the line ended up being drawn at headbutting the dogs. It was time to get her a companion to play with so that she could learn to be a little more goat and a little less kid. So at the swap this weekend it was our mission to pick up a friend and we found the same breeder Sunshine had come from, with 2 goats left. Of course we picked another goat with some damage done; the dehorning had failed slightly and she will now have just 1 horn. But she's still darn cute!
They seem to be getting along so far!
So with the goat taken care of and put in her new home, we turned to catching the peacock we had bought at the first swap. His name is Malik and he's a very pretty boy but he flies very well and we don't want him to fly away from his new home. So he chased him down (through much wing buffeting and kicking) and clipped his wings. He was very offended.
I would feel bad for bringing such an indignity (*snirk*) on him, but he has been crying about going outside to the outer coop since we brought him home. When we finally had his wings clipped and set him down outside, he laid down on the ground and told us he was DYING from injured pride. So we booted him onto his feet and he wandered the coop exploring every nook and cranny. What a silly bird.
Of course the second goat was not the only thing we bought at the swap- I also managed to snag 13 araucana mix cheeps for $10 from a man with a whole lot of different sorts. They are super cute, but we were afraid to put them in with the helmet heads, since they were a week or two older and might peck at the little guys. Apparently I need not have worried- Megatron makes a wonderful mommy, sitting on the babies and keeping them herded together.
Speaking of the firstborn cheeps, here's Megatron and Fox now that they are growing in the feathers on their heads. A few more weeks and we'll be able to tell who is a boy and who is a girl!
I dug up the pictures of mom and dad for the cheeps, and this is what they all SHOULD look like when they are grown up:
So that's where we are at with previous adventures. Currently I have eggs in my incubator again, although this time they are a mix of polish chicken and pekin duck eggs. The duck eggs are actually a lot more work than the chicken eggs, to where I have to up the humidity and I have to spray the eggs with water 1 time per day to keep them at the right moisture level.
This weekend I candled about half the incubator and it was rather disappointing. I had previously handled the 1st batch of 9 polish eggs and had tossed 3 clears. This time I candled the 1st dozen duck eggs and only 4 were fertile and growing. I candled the second batch of 8 polish eggs.... and there was not ONE that was fertile. Bummer! Liz says that the barn was extraordinarily hot that week, though, so the chickens may have been too busy trying to stay cool or the eggs may have started incubation before she took them to store them for me. I will crack them open in the kitchen tonight and check for fertility, which will give us a better idea of what happened.
I still hold hopes for the remaining dozen duck eggs and the 5 newest chicken eggs. They will be old enough to candle in about a week.
But possibly the most exciting news of all is that I took a chance and I ordered a few hatching peacock eggs. I understand that shipped eggs are less likely to hatch because the mail people do not handle the packages as delicately as they should (and the auto sorter machine is rough on them as well :/ sigh) but I am hoping I can get at least 1 hen to hatch for me. That way I could give Malik a mate, and perhaps he could be allowed to wander the farm. It would also be nice to raise a little peahen at home, to be hand tame.
On an unrelated note, I took my guild to their first Naxx 10 and successful MC run this week and they actually did better than expected and everyone had a lot of fun. I am pleased with this, as it gives me hope for future raids. We shall see how it goes.
Thursday, June 3, 2010
So today is the day that my first born cheeps are going to their new home out at the farm. The buff polish chicks are a little more than a week old and the blue polish chick is about 2 weeks old.
Let's roll back and see where this started. This STARTED when my mom's friend, Liz, wanted to get some polish chickens for her new farm. She's already raising meat chickens and some straight run egg laying chickens, but she wanted something crazy to go in with them. So, when the bird swap rolled around, Moon and I set off on a mission to find some cheap birds for her. We ended up with 2 breeding pairs; two blues and two buffs. The females are really nice quality, and they have been egg-cellent layers so far. I think they are up to 1 egg each per day!
Which of course is a lot of eggs. So Liz decided, why not try to hatch some out into more chickens! Just for fun, to see what we'd get. So I happily obliged and set up an incubator and a brooder box in my room.
This is how it was originally set up in my room, with the incubator to the left (it's just a cheap Hovabator incubator) and my home-made brooder box on the right.
Above are the 5 eggs we determined to be fertile, after a candling session at 10 days. Next time I will try to make a video of what that looks like, as it will surely be awesome. Now, we started with 8 eggs total, but I expected the first 4 to be clears because the cocks and hens were separated. However, one lonely egg was actually fertile and would later hatch. You can see the one separated from the other four because the first 4 were given to me 4 days before the others, so the others were still being rotated by the automatic egg turner (the big yellow thing).
I will say, the automatic egg turner was a fantastic investment. I did spend a day hand turning the eggs when I thought I would have to take it out because of the difference in hatch dates... but it turns out that you can remove racks from the turner and leave enough space for chicks to hatch without disturbing the rotating eggs. Pretty darn cool and removes a large stress element for both me and the chicks. Since I didn't have to keep opening the top of the incubator, the temp was able to stay pretty stable. Well, until I later fucked it up by doing something stupid anyway.
Moving on! I knew I would need a brooder box for them, but I just don't have the space to hold anything that would be appropriately big. So I spied on all the boxes that we get coming into work every day that we just recycle in the hall, until I saw one that approximated a 10 gallon aquarium. I knew I had a 10 gallon aquarium lid, a snake heat lamp, and sawdust bedding from when I used to own mice. All I would need is a pair of feeding boxes like you'd hang in a bird cage, and I'd be set. So I picked those up from Meijer and trooped home to make myself a brooder box.
The first thing I did was tape up the edges so there were 1) no holes and 2) no 'sharp' edges. I don't know if you've ever had a cardboard cut before, but it's like a paper cut from 50 pieces of paper. So I duct taped the edges and then duct taped the bottom all the way around, and up on the sides a bit. Why the bottom and sides? Well, they're still chickens and last time I checked, cardboard is porous. So I figured, I want to re-use this box, better make the bottom able to be cleaned easily without stains or anything. So here is what I ended up with.
As it turns out, a reptile heat lamp is just not quite enough to keep the cheeps from shivering. Even with the last folding flap on the right side folded down (instead of cut off) to retain heat, the box was still too cold. When the cheeps hatched, I ended up scooting my sacred heating pad underneath half the box to keep the bottom warm enough. Unfortunately I was dumb enough to lay the other half of the heating pad against the incubator, which raised the temp by a few degrees- and the margin of error is not large here. The two dark colored chicks took the brunt of my mistake, paying with their lives. I think. That or the shift in genetics that was made by changing the parents' locations was a bad one.
At any rate, the first cheep hatched 22 days after I put it into the incubator and I was horrified to discover just how absurdly ugly chicks are when they are first born. Thankfully they dry out and become fluffy and cute, but man. That first day is monster movie material!
Somehow the above turned into a charming, shiny lump of silver:
To be honest, I'm not very good with things that are freshly alive. I feel the need to poke and prod and make myself annoying. So with no one to tell me otherwise, that is what I did. I poked and prodded and pecked at this newborn thing as soon as I was able to move it from the inside of the incubator. I pecked at the food dish and it scrambled over to eat. I dunked its head into the water dish and it really hated that but it learned to drink.
A few days later, I woke up at the ass crack of dawn like I normally do, and blearily flopped over to my incubator to press my nose to the glass windows on top. I held my breath and listened with all my listening power.... and heard peep peep cheep from inside the eggs that were supposed to be hatching. I bored holes in the eggs with my mind by staring at them very hard, trying to see if they were wobbling and alive. I then had to tear myself away from the incubator and go to work for the day.
Lo! When I arrived home there was a second soaking wet monster in my incubator, this one burnished yellow. It was looking exhausted, but it had been hatched long enough that it was partially dry. So completely disregarding what every source online told me to do, I snatched it out of the incubator and tossed it into the warm, dry brooder box with the silver chick.
There was a war. It was really more of a one sided war as the silver one immediately ran over to the golden one and started pecking at him, trying to figure out what it was. After all, the silver one had been alone in the brooder for days except for my pestering hand. So I had to separate them and I installed an impenetrable wall in the center of the brooder box- a folded piece of paper. With that installed, I poked at the still hatching third chick and went to get my dinner.
A few hours later, I returned to my bedroom for bed, and the last chick that would hatch was rolling around in the incubator. The silver one (which we named Megatron) was trying to find a way over the impossible wall to get to the golden one (which we named Optimus Prime), and Optimus was standing in the water dish screaming at the top of his little cheep lungs. Horrified, I pulled Optimus out of the water bowl and he immediately started making happy noises. So I set him back down, and he flailed himself into the water dish and started screaming. So I took the wall out of the brooder, and Megatron waddled over and began to peck at Optimus. Who shut up. Clearly this cheep just wanted a friend, so I shoved Megatron back to his side of the brooder, replaced the wall, and pulled the third cheep (which we named Fox) from the incubator. It lay on the floor soaking wet and Optimus cuddled up next to Fox and was quiet. Mission accomplished.
Here are all three, at about 2 weeks. Left to right: Optimus, Megatron, and Fox.
Here we are, two weeks later, and I've learned a lot and I'm happy with the cheeps. I am looking forward to seeing Megatron's adult colors, and I want to see if Fox's old-man beard grows into an actual beard or not. Polish chickens all have the poof of feathers on their heads (which are actually attached to a bone crest) but there are some varieties that also have a beard. So we shall see!
They are actually under my desk at work at this very moment, being smuggled to their final home at Liz's house.
And as if that wasn't an adventure enough, Liz dropped off 9 more eggs with me, and there is another bird swap on the 12th of June that we will all be attending. Whoo! Maybe I will get some hatching eggs for fun of some other sorts.
Let's roll back and see where this started. This STARTED when my mom's friend, Liz, wanted to get some polish chickens for her new farm. She's already raising meat chickens and some straight run egg laying chickens, but she wanted something crazy to go in with them. So, when the bird swap rolled around, Moon and I set off on a mission to find some cheap birds for her. We ended up with 2 breeding pairs; two blues and two buffs. The females are really nice quality, and they have been egg-cellent layers so far. I think they are up to 1 egg each per day!
Which of course is a lot of eggs. So Liz decided, why not try to hatch some out into more chickens! Just for fun, to see what we'd get. So I happily obliged and set up an incubator and a brooder box in my room.
This is how it was originally set up in my room, with the incubator to the left (it's just a cheap Hovabator incubator) and my home-made brooder box on the right.
Above are the 5 eggs we determined to be fertile, after a candling session at 10 days. Next time I will try to make a video of what that looks like, as it will surely be awesome. Now, we started with 8 eggs total, but I expected the first 4 to be clears because the cocks and hens were separated. However, one lonely egg was actually fertile and would later hatch. You can see the one separated from the other four because the first 4 were given to me 4 days before the others, so the others were still being rotated by the automatic egg turner (the big yellow thing).
I will say, the automatic egg turner was a fantastic investment. I did spend a day hand turning the eggs when I thought I would have to take it out because of the difference in hatch dates... but it turns out that you can remove racks from the turner and leave enough space for chicks to hatch without disturbing the rotating eggs. Pretty darn cool and removes a large stress element for both me and the chicks. Since I didn't have to keep opening the top of the incubator, the temp was able to stay pretty stable. Well, until I later fucked it up by doing something stupid anyway.
Moving on! I knew I would need a brooder box for them, but I just don't have the space to hold anything that would be appropriately big. So I spied on all the boxes that we get coming into work every day that we just recycle in the hall, until I saw one that approximated a 10 gallon aquarium. I knew I had a 10 gallon aquarium lid, a snake heat lamp, and sawdust bedding from when I used to own mice. All I would need is a pair of feeding boxes like you'd hang in a bird cage, and I'd be set. So I picked those up from Meijer and trooped home to make myself a brooder box.
The first thing I did was tape up the edges so there were 1) no holes and 2) no 'sharp' edges. I don't know if you've ever had a cardboard cut before, but it's like a paper cut from 50 pieces of paper. So I duct taped the edges and then duct taped the bottom all the way around, and up on the sides a bit. Why the bottom and sides? Well, they're still chickens and last time I checked, cardboard is porous. So I figured, I want to re-use this box, better make the bottom able to be cleaned easily without stains or anything. So here is what I ended up with.
As it turns out, a reptile heat lamp is just not quite enough to keep the cheeps from shivering. Even with the last folding flap on the right side folded down (instead of cut off) to retain heat, the box was still too cold. When the cheeps hatched, I ended up scooting my sacred heating pad underneath half the box to keep the bottom warm enough. Unfortunately I was dumb enough to lay the other half of the heating pad against the incubator, which raised the temp by a few degrees- and the margin of error is not large here. The two dark colored chicks took the brunt of my mistake, paying with their lives. I think. That or the shift in genetics that was made by changing the parents' locations was a bad one.
At any rate, the first cheep hatched 22 days after I put it into the incubator and I was horrified to discover just how absurdly ugly chicks are when they are first born. Thankfully they dry out and become fluffy and cute, but man. That first day is monster movie material!
Somehow the above turned into a charming, shiny lump of silver:
To be honest, I'm not very good with things that are freshly alive. I feel the need to poke and prod and make myself annoying. So with no one to tell me otherwise, that is what I did. I poked and prodded and pecked at this newborn thing as soon as I was able to move it from the inside of the incubator. I pecked at the food dish and it scrambled over to eat. I dunked its head into the water dish and it really hated that but it learned to drink.
A few days later, I woke up at the ass crack of dawn like I normally do, and blearily flopped over to my incubator to press my nose to the glass windows on top. I held my breath and listened with all my listening power.... and heard peep peep cheep from inside the eggs that were supposed to be hatching. I bored holes in the eggs with my mind by staring at them very hard, trying to see if they were wobbling and alive. I then had to tear myself away from the incubator and go to work for the day.
Lo! When I arrived home there was a second soaking wet monster in my incubator, this one burnished yellow. It was looking exhausted, but it had been hatched long enough that it was partially dry. So completely disregarding what every source online told me to do, I snatched it out of the incubator and tossed it into the warm, dry brooder box with the silver chick.
There was a war. It was really more of a one sided war as the silver one immediately ran over to the golden one and started pecking at him, trying to figure out what it was. After all, the silver one had been alone in the brooder for days except for my pestering hand. So I had to separate them and I installed an impenetrable wall in the center of the brooder box- a folded piece of paper. With that installed, I poked at the still hatching third chick and went to get my dinner.
A few hours later, I returned to my bedroom for bed, and the last chick that would hatch was rolling around in the incubator. The silver one (which we named Megatron) was trying to find a way over the impossible wall to get to the golden one (which we named Optimus Prime), and Optimus was standing in the water dish screaming at the top of his little cheep lungs. Horrified, I pulled Optimus out of the water bowl and he immediately started making happy noises. So I set him back down, and he flailed himself into the water dish and started screaming. So I took the wall out of the brooder, and Megatron waddled over and began to peck at Optimus. Who shut up. Clearly this cheep just wanted a friend, so I shoved Megatron back to his side of the brooder, replaced the wall, and pulled the third cheep (which we named Fox) from the incubator. It lay on the floor soaking wet and Optimus cuddled up next to Fox and was quiet. Mission accomplished.
Here are all three, at about 2 weeks. Left to right: Optimus, Megatron, and Fox.
Here we are, two weeks later, and I've learned a lot and I'm happy with the cheeps. I am looking forward to seeing Megatron's adult colors, and I want to see if Fox's old-man beard grows into an actual beard or not. Polish chickens all have the poof of feathers on their heads (which are actually attached to a bone crest) but there are some varieties that also have a beard. So we shall see!
They are actually under my desk at work at this very moment, being smuggled to their final home at Liz's house.
And as if that wasn't an adventure enough, Liz dropped off 9 more eggs with me, and there is another bird swap on the 12th of June that we will all be attending. Whoo! Maybe I will get some hatching eggs for fun of some other sorts.
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