Churchbankfarm's Blog

Sudo creme update

churchbankfarm — Sat, 26 Feb 2011 12:00:39 +0000

It worked a treat on the turkeys snoods, all nicely healed now, only had to apply it for a couple of days, worth a mention I thought.

At last

churchbankfarm — Sat, 26 Feb 2011 11:54:46 +0000

Hurray, first 3 goose eggs all clean and ready for the incubator, just need another 7 now!!! Hurry up girls

First duck eggs

churchbankfarm — Fri, 18 Feb 2011 12:05:04 +0000

At last, the runners have started to lay, an egg yesterday and one today, the chickens have been fighting over the best nests and they’ve settled into laying nicely now, I can finely put my eggs for sale sign back up, the neighbours have all being patiently waiting for it!

Just waiting for the geese now, they’ve been mating on the pools for a few weeks now but no ones laid an egg yet, wish the weather would warm up a bit, oh and the turkey stags had a major set to a couple of days ago, they do this now and again, but both have some wounds on their snoods and the bottom of the snood is a bit swollen so I’ve tried sudo cream on them as its a bit of an awkward thing to treat so we’ll see how successful that is.

Hive dried out

churchbankfarm — Sun, 16 Jan 2011 20:44:37 +0000

15 Jan

Quick update to say the hive has dried out nicely already, should have made sure I’d cleared all the dead bees out in December, hopefully the damp hasn’t done too much harm, hindsight is a great thing!!

Finally getting around to updating things!

churchbankfarm — Wed, 12 Jan 2011 08:49:18 +0000

I’d sort of promised myself to set to and work on the site over the winter months and when we get there the weathers been that bad that most of my time has been spent outside sorting things out because of the snow and when I’ve been inside I cant use the laptop because Ian’s been PHing (Piston heads to the uninformed) as he can’t do any of his outside jobs!(Well that’s my excuse and it’s a good one).

But getting back to normal this week, weather milder (dogs spent 3 hours in the field in the sun while I cleared ditches yesterday…..bliss!) but I’ve put aside half an hour in the dark each morning to do some work on this site…..hurray!!

So keep checking for updates, I promise I’ll get there!!

Not so good news

churchbankfarm — Wed, 28 Apr 2010 07:02:31 +0000

The first batch of Toulouse eggs have finished (nearly), only 2 out of 10 hatched as yet, 6 had started developing but then stopped for some reason and I have 2 still in the hatcher but I don’t hold much hope for them. My second batch is due to hatch in just over another week so I hope I have more success with them.

The Buff Oprington eggs were even less successful, all 10 were infertile, the hen has been broody and was sitting on at least 9 eggs, when I checked her a couple of days ago she only has 2 eggs left, I’m presuming she (or the cockerel) who sleeps in with her must have eaten them as there is no sign of shell or anything? I’ve put another batch of 6 in the incubator and if these are infertile I’ll have to review our cockerel situation!!

We acquired last Sunday 3 new ducks, 1 pair of black indian runners and 1 white runner drake to bring some nice new blood into our ducks.

The good news is the 2 goslings are growing like made and are just discovering thinks like grass which is great fun, I’ll get some photos on soon, I’m just keeping my fingers crossed that I didn’t mistakenly pick up 2 Brecon Buff goose eggs when setting up the incubator!!

Incubators on the go

churchbankfarm — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 15:38:52 +0000

I’ve got two incubators on the go now with Buff Orpington and Toulouse eggs so watch this space, hopefully have some news in about 3 weeks!

Bee check

churchbankfarm — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 07:12:18 +0000

I checked the bees on Thursday and was pleasantly suprised, they’ve still got good stores, spotted the queen, and some brood though she didn’t seem to have much room for laying so I’ve put a super on as I want to feed them some 1:1 syrup as I need to give them a vitagold feed treatment. The bees have been coming in with pollen so that’s a good sign. Hopefully I’ve done the right things as it’s a lot of guess work for a newbie.

The other hives are all oiled now and nicely weathered, I’ve just got to start putting some frames together for the nationals and get the lift built for the Warre………………………any offers????

Billy

churchbankfarm — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 07:00:05 +0000

Billy’s leg is finally back to normal, it just took time but she’s running around with all the others (though she thinks she’s a goose as she keeps trying to get the gander to tread her)!

Billy’s leg

churchbankfarm — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 07:24:07 +0000

Still trying to get Billys leg to heal, after cutting it somehow its been very swollen and she’s very lame. She’s been on antibiotics and I’ve been cleaning it daily and twice its scabbed over and the swellings gone down and I’ve let her out with the others (they spend all day on our pools) and both times it’s swollen back up again with 3 days.

She’s now been on her second coarse of antibiotics and isolated for a week with regular applications of a poltice on her leg, the poltice hasn’t drawn anything out as yet and it’s still very swollen but not as bad as it was. Any help or suggestions would be gratefully received!!