Japanese Bantams on Friday!

I'm really looking forward to the Japanese Bantams (aka Japs or Chabos) coming on Friday.
They're going to be tiny. I'm going to trial the Belgiums under the house during the night. I expect a few peeps, it'll be their first night out of the brooder box, but under the house is protected from breezes and winds, so I think they'll be fine. I'm sure Bluey will enjoy crowing to a wider audience. The neighbours are having a party tonight. I'm sure they'll welcome the 5am wake-up call! *lol*
 This is what an adult Belgian Bantam d'Uccle looks like:

Anyway, the Japs are coming from Simon Drew, a young breeder from Kureelpa on the Sunshine Coast. If you dont know what a Japanese Bantam looks like, they're very Japanese! Proud and fierce looking birds, but really quite friendly and docile... Huge red combs (males) and both male and females have tails that tower over them, almost right over their backs.

Here are a couple of pics of Simon and his champion Rooster, and also a pair of Japs.
Our chicks will likely be a black & white like these, and a blue mottled. You can view more Japs on Simon's site: http://mistwoodpoultry.webs.com/

Whilst it's a shame only two hatched, if they are both girls then our brood will be complete. :0)

We have Chicks!

Cute little 4-6 week old Belgian d'Uccle chicks. Yep, that's older than we thought they'd be too, but really, that's quite a manageable age. Also, the breeder said he thought they could possibly be all girls... well, it was early to tell for a couple of them, and it seems like at most we will have two boys in the lot.
As for the Japanese bantams, out of 8, only 2 hatched - there was a power outage whilst the breeder was out & unfortunately it did the rest in! Oh no! But it seems we only have two chickens to replace, and there's a 25% chance they're both female, so we'll take it. We'll pick them up on Friday. Wish us luck!

Without further ado- here's the chicks in their first week here with us!

 Colours from left to right : Dark millefleur, lighter millfleur, silver porcellain, silver millefleur, white.

 

 Colours clockwise from top: Silver porcellain, silver millefleur, white, millefleur (paler), millefleur (darker), blue.  So names, clockwise from the top are: Ellain (but has now grown a comb, and so might really be Porky), Silver, Snowy/Daisy, Millie, Fleur, Bluebelle (but has since grown a comb & begun to crow, so is now Blue-steele or Bluey for short!).

 Bluey - curious! And no comb yet! *lol*

 Elaine has a small comb, silver takes a rest.

 Miss M meets the chicks.

 Elaine is the bravest & also the trouble maker of the group. :0)

 Millie has a snooze.

 Just milling about.

 Silver gets a cuddle.

 Bluey is the calmest.

Luckily she knows how to be gentle!!!

Helping Weed... AKA Mud Bath!

Miss M helped me weed... and then got bored, and decided to wallow in a muddy spot in the yet to be cultivated part of the vege patch... I figured, what the heck. It's a one time only type thing, because soon it will be built up and well draining, and planted full of fruit & veg.
Then Little Miss C came down and joined in on the act. :0) Cutie patooties!

 The cultivated side... This side is bed #5, and it has been planted out with beans, peas, nasturtiums, a marigold, and broccoli.

Bean update & climbing sugar snap peas...

 Beans are the heart shaped leaves in the punnets in the photo above.

 Germinating after just two days.

These are the beans a little larger, and ready to put in, along with some climbing sugar snap peas. I didnt wait for the sugar snap peas to fully germinate before I planted them in, as you can sow those directly. I figure, it's just as easy to water them in place, and it will enrich the soil as I do so, anyway.

Lettuce Bolting...

We've come to the final stage in the lettuce lifecycle... the bolt. You can see why it's called that. The lettuce gained height in a very very short amount of time. It bolted to gain the height it needed, and has started to grow flowers, which I have read, are going to be like "santa clauses" those puffy white flyaway type seeds. I will post photos soon as the flowers open or seeds erupt. :0) I'm letting these lettuces bolt because I want to grow the same type mixed with a mesculin mix next time. If I didnt want to do this, I would have just ripped them out and tipped the whole lot into the worm farm.
Happy Gardening!

Beans Progress

This stupid photo won't rotate... so feel free to turn your head to the left... If you click on the photos they will enlarge so you can see the beans uncurling. Amazing when you consider the homogenous nature of the bean when you eat it... something so delicately intricate, and yet robust, can come from such a small bean. Seeds never cease to amaze me!

These photos were taken when the beans were only about 5 days old... unfortunately one type of bean rotted in both of the pots due to the excessive rain we had, but I'm pleased to note that the other two varieties really went to town, and so we will have beans! 

Chiara put a few extras in, so I fished those out, and potted them elsewhere to much the same results as the ones in punnets. They are now planted out into the garden, but first, this is what they looked like when they were just coming up - and boy do they come up and grow quickly - no wonder the fairytale was "Jack and the beanstalk" not "Jack and the passionfruit vine".

That one type of bean failed is precisely why it pays to plant a variety of crops... if one fails, you will probably hit a winner somewhere... As for my six varieties of strawberries, they are all behaving quite differently, and so one, which I had all but given up on, is only just starting to flower, when the others are either chugging along, or finished cropping. :0)

Happy Gardening!!!

Kids' Gardening Seminar, with Annette McFarlane

On the 29th of September the girls and I went to a gardening seminar for children. They had a ball. They learned how to pot-on seedlings (Tommytoe Tomato seedlings and marigolds) and plant seeds from scratch (three large bean varieties - easy to handle for little fingers). Annette also introduced the children to worm farming, letting them pick up and play with the worms. Here are some photos from the day - enjoy!

All the supplies - ready and waiting for the kids to arrive!

The worms are spread out for inspection.

Chosen a worm...

 Showing Mama

And Miss C - Oooh it wriggled!

 We potted up some Marigolds...

 

Anne showed us some Tomato seedlings....

 You just pop them in like this...

And then she gave us six magic beans each - three of each type!

So we planted them in our punnets. :0)

Filthy hands, lots of fun!!!

Lots of soap and a good old scrub 

to get them clean again. All done!

Dramatic Difference Depicted

If you were wondering why I hadn't made a garden earlier, it is for one reason. There was a giant Chinese Elm creating too much shade! Great for kids playing in the back yard, although there was so much shade that the grass had stopped growing.
Don't believe me? Here are two different satelite pictures of our backyard. The first shows our garden in June before the massive Chinese Elm went.
The second shows our yard in July, AFTER the elm went. These were taken at the same time of day. I know this because the shade on the pool two doors down is the same shape and size.