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Showing posts from January, 2015

Some good homesteading books to check out.

Old Wives Tales

I have never believed in Old Wives Tales.... except maybe one or two. But I have a funny story (I guess it's funny) about an old woman who had a strange old wive's tale. As you know I grew up in Brazil, in the heart of the Amazon jungle. And as you might also know if you've read this blog, I also am a horse crazy person! I've always loved horses from the day I can remember anything. This story takes place when I was around 18 or 19 years old. My third (I think) horse was a gaited Appaloosa stallion. He was really pretty and spotted. I saw him at the yearly fair and had always liked the colorful horses and of course immediately fell in love. Now let me explain before you get all upset that an 18 year old was in love with a stallion. I was already fairly well known in our small town as being the "horse woman" and in Brazil at the time, if you didn't own a stallion you were a nobody in the horse industry. So, back to the story, I had no idea if he was for

3 Ways to Help Chickens Keep Laying in Winter

I've been raising chickens for a while now, first in Brazil where I grew up, now here in Texas where the winters are much colder than where I grew up but certainly not as cold as the more northern states. The first few years I had to adjust to keeping my hens happy in the winter time. I learned a few tricks that I'm going to share with you that have worked for me in my chicken flock. 1. Extra bedding. Chickens won't lay as many eggs in the winter due to cold and less light. First problem we can help solve is the cold. With extra bedding in their coop it will help them stay warm. The manure will heat up and as long as you have plenty of bedding, hay or shavings, it will absorb the moisture caused by the chickens and will heat up and help keep the temperature warmer. If you give them hay or straw, sometimes they like to scratch in that and find seeds or bugs that they can enjoy as a special treat. 2. Extra light. Hens lay more eggs when the days are longer. I've foun