Lone berry

I was up early feeding the chickens, and as I passed by the mulberry sapling I saw this single berry hanging in there... It is getting cold so I am not sure why this one decided to come out.

It looks pretty pathetic, not juicy at all...

Should I be worried?

The lilac sapling isn't looking super energetic... since it was planted recently the poor thing has gone through a typhoon, torrent rains and god know what else. But maybe it is just resting. Hope hope.

The feijoa saplings in the back were planted at the same time as the lilac  

Here is a close up view. Still a few tiny green leaves on top. Ganbatte lilac!

The cover broccoli sprouts are thriving at least

Run reforms

As usual the weekend weather was against me. We had almost constant rain, varying from drizzle to buckets of water thrown down (Yes, really that intense. Got me soaked down to my underpants through jacket and layers of clothing in under a minute, and my boots were full too).
As always I ignored it and went out in the garden to fix the run. I had planned to fix it this weekend and I didn't care if the rain gods agreed or not.
Rain wasn't that bad when I started cutting down the trees. I didn't climb them though but instead used a short two step ladder, which was dangerous enough as it was both slippery and kept tilting because of the slope. I was going to used my chainsaw but actually got away using only a handsaw.
There were 3 tops to be cut, and I started from the smallest and moved up in size. My method was to secure the branch with ropes to the fence post, and used another rope higher up to pull the branch outwards as I cut it, thereby forcing it to lean outward and as soon as it got severed it would fall outside of the fence and hang there from the securing ropes. I could then pull it in and put it away. The first two branches worked perfectly, but the third was just too heavy for unbalanced me to pull in (it was still raining and I was barely holding myself on top of the ladder while trying to reach over and pull the branch in) so I left it outside. Figured its dense and sharp twigs would serve better as a cat obstacle on the other side of the fence.
Then, I went further down along the fence, to its shortest point (only 1,5 meters tall) and jumped over a gate to get to the other side. Positioned the branches and other obstacles properly outside of the run, and installed metal netting on the lower part of the outside as well. Now there is netting on both sides so even if a cat would try pushing its way in, it would get stuck on the second layer. After making sure the fence is completely cat-safe, I made my way back to the run, and dug in the post for roof net support.
By this time the rain had gotten much worse and everything was a muddy mess. I took a break, and a few hours later when the rain was normal I started with the roof netting. While I was doing this the rain keep getting worse plus the chickens somehow found it extremely interesting to come out despite the rain and play with me and the net while I tried to focus so I decided to give it a rest after the first two sections were done. At least I covered the trees and the coop, and did almost all parts of my plan.

Stupid rain

The trees are shorter now (still pretty tall) and manageable. At the same time they still provide cover for the birds. The chickens don't seem to be interested in the bush (on the right side) leaves, so maybe I will replace it with something else. I will also try planting quick growing vegetables/weeds all over the run so the chickens can have some green to eat. Still have not found a good tree to put in the run.

Of course, on Monday when it was time to go to work, the weather cleared up and sun came out. Nice, I bet this weekend will be rainy again.

Can Tora has birds?

Lucky for the birds I keep Tora on leash when he is out. He is extremely interested in the chickens.

White power

With the white baby chick gone, I am still determined to have at least a white chicken. So I got a few more... here is the entire population on the first night, Friday night:

I don't think they like the light shining on them while they try to sleep

The three original chicks (3-4 months old) are on the roost, the new 6 months old chicken is kind of half white, sleeping alone under them, and the two new 2 months old chicks sleep together on the poop board.
The night after that, big momma had also moved up to the roost to sleep. But I guess the two youngest ones are still not comfortable up there, as they keep sleeping next to each other on the poop board.

The poop board works very well, so it gets almost covered after 2-3 days. I take it out and give it a rinse as often as I can, optimally every morning.

On Sunday morning, I found an egg in the coop. Not in the nest though but almost next to the nest entrance.

Hello!

My chickens being araucana, the eggs are supposed to be blue/green. Big momma just started laying eggs and I just got her so I am not sure what kind of diet she has been on. So I was not expecting any super eggs. It was nice enough on toast. Here is a color and size comparison to eggs we bought at the supermarket:

We always buy LL size, so big momma's first egg looks real tiny.

Tall order

Line up!

We got lots of evergreen trees protecting the view on the south side. Almost all of them are either still young or just well behaved, so yet I am not in desperate need of trimming them.

However, this one guy is just too big for its own good. I have postponed dealing with it many times, but now I have to do it.

It's a giant. The fences around it are 2 meter high.

This morning I saw one of the chickens had climbed up inside it to the same height as the fence, and if it had the brains or the will, it would have easily jumped out of the run. Plus I am going to cover the whole run with net roof so that the chickies can fly without getting out. I am not going to cut the whole tree down, because it provides good shade and protection for the chickens, and they like gathering under it. Plus it keeps the ground together I guess. But at least I need to shorten it to 2-2,5 meters. That way it can go under the net roof.
Also!!!! As I approached the run, the chickens seemed a bit alarmed (nowadays they get excited when I get close to the run because they know they are getting treats) instead of happy, and ran away in different directions, and among the things running I saw glimpse of a white thing running along the south fence. First I though it was a chicken but then I remembered the white one was R.I.P. A second later I knew it was the neighbor cat who was outside of the run, and saw me and ran away into the bushes.
So, my weekend work is cut out for me.
1- Put net roof over half the run (The half including the coop) so that the chickens have somewhere to cuddle/hide/panic while I am doing the other steps.
2- Tie the upper half of the big tree, and cut it down (Hopefully it will land outside of the fence)
3- Put cat protection just outside of the southern fence (Actually not only along the run but all the way on the south side of the property)
4- Put net roof over the rest of the run (I probably will need to put a post in to support the net)

Step 2 is gonna be difficult. I could climb up the tree and cut it down in steps, or I could just cut it in one go and split it up later on the ground. Either way, I am going to need a helmet.
For step 3, either a sharp nail strip pointing upward, or plastic bottles full of water, or just bricks. Let's see what I have.
And for step 4, I have actually been thinking of planting a fruit tree right in the middle of the empty space in the run, but not yet decided what. So in the meantime, a post should do.

Learning to fly

I guess it was just a matter of time... the chicks have started to use their wings and I think they like it. So I probably need to put a net roof over the whole run to keep them from accidentally flying over the fences. Will do it this weekend.

The poop board seems to work:

Feast your eyes on the perfect aim

Once a week I take it out, give it a rinse and voila!, we're back in business. I rinse it with rain water from my tank, and do so near the vegetable garden. Maybe I should put it in compost instead...

After the typhoon most of the vegetables seemed dead but now a couple of days later it seems, maybe thanks to half of them dying, the rest are coming back with even more vigor. Bigger leaves and look real healthy. Maybe it is just a coincidence and now is just the timing for their extra growth, maybe the typhoon thinned out the crowded patch allowing the remaining plants the opportunity to expand...

Farming bugs

I have now started keeping meal worms. The chickens love them and I think they are the insect correspondents of weed so they should be easy to maintain.

Here is a picture of the chicks right before I closed their coop door for the day. Sleep tight.

The brown stains in the back wall are paint, not water leak.

Blown but not disturbed

Stupid typhoon again all night.
After it was over, in the morning, went out to check the damages. Sun was shining and there was a nice strong wind.
The tunnel over strawberries had blown off and hanging by a thread. Fixed it again. Next time I set a tunnel I will do it properly.
Actually I will be setting up tunnels over most of my veggies until they have established from now on. Tiny worms have eaten the leaves of lots of vegetables that were under the open. I guess my garden is not as balanced as I thought when it comes to bug predators.
A big plastic barrel I use to keep manure in was empty at the time, and stood upside down in the backyard. After the typhoon it had somehow managed to blow up to the garden, over the 1,5 meter wall, hmm.
The chicken coop door had blown open but the chickens had the good sense to not go out. Also the run's gate had opened up a bit but not wide open. Fixed the gate and the door. The rain had revealed some tiny openings that had let in water, opened up the doors and window of the coop wide open so that the sun and the wind would dry up the insides. Then used sealant to close up the tiny openings... let's see if it got better next time it rains. Oh, and one of the two nest boxes was soaking wet so water had leaked in from somewhere... and I saw beginning of mold on the wood, which I sand papered right away, and let the sun take care of it. Next weekend I will spray paint over that nest box...
Used sealant to close where I thought the water was leaking in, but not sure. Added a bit of extra protection against rain with a blue sheet. Ugly but functional.
The chickens were eager to be out and play in the sun anyway so we all spent a nice day out, me catching bugs and giving to them, at the same time as I cleaned up the garden.

After cleanup. It's like my garden took a shower.

I think all the saplings made it although they took a beating. Time will tell. Luckily my beans had not grown leaves yet, probably the leaves will come this week.

The front of the house with the 2 saplings and all the tiny sprouts now growing.

Spooky

Remember The Ring, where you knew who would die next because their faces would be distorted in pictures?

B4... Before?

Well, take a look at this then

Next day the white chick was dead

I'm just sayin'....

Post Ugly

Saved a couple of years waiting for lilacs to pop up

I started cutting all the bush and crap that had grown out in the front of the house. While digging out the roots and rhizomes which had gone pretty deep I unearthed lots of grubs which I gave to the chicks who happily devoured them. Also at the beginning while digging around the woody roots of the big big bush with the shovel I accidentally cut a couple of lizards into half, so those also went to the chicks. Pulling out the roots revealed 7-8 more lizards which I let go to find new homes. After all they do eat the insect larva hidden deep in the ground.
Little by little rain started and got more and more intense and by the time I was almost done, it was pouring down, and I was standing in slippery mud. But it was all clean at least.
In the back part I planted two pineapple guavas (fruits are supposed to look like small kiwis and delicious, and the flowers are also beautiful), and in the middle part I put a lilac sapling, as it sends out runners I think and should fill out that part eventually.
The tiny small part I left as it was with a bush... also I think I need to leave a path clear for the gas/water/electric company guy for checking the meters, so that is the track on the left in the picture, still a bit muddy.
The plot looks pretty bare so I distributed some sprouts seeds which should germinate within a week, to cover and make it difficult for weeds and rhizomes to take over again. Let's see if it works as planned.

And then there were three

Rest in peace white chick, we hardly knew ye

Sad sad news, the white chick disappeared during the night. Late at night we checked on them and she was in, and first thing in the morning she was not.
It was raining constantly so I could not tell what had happened, but I guess one of the neighbor cats managed to sneak in through the fence bottom part and caught and ran away with her.  Either that or she found a small hole and escaped in which case I assume it is just a matter of time before she gets either eaten by a predator or hit by train. So very unfortunate...
Any blood trace was washed away by the rain, but I saw quite a few white feathers outside the back of the coop and also a few on the other side of the JR fence. The track of feathers led into the thick grass and bushes. I didn't find evidence of struggle inside the coop so if there was any predator it must have caught the white chick while she was outside...
I bought some wire fencing for the bottom part of the run fence and attached it. Now it is really tough to get in or out. (In the remote chance of the white chick still being alive and somehow coming back, there are still openings outside of the run leading to the garden)
Also I had left the coop door open all night but from now on I will close the coop door during the night time when they are sleeping anyway.
The remaining 3 seemed a bit scared at first but now after I fed them lots of treats and bugs they are out and have really gotten used to me. They come close to me even when I have no treats for them.
I feel very sad for the white one though, I should have been more careful. Sorry girl...

Patient I am not

I got tired of the lilac seeds not germinating. I tried all suggested variations (in freezer, in zip bag, in the fridge, just outside, in room temperature, in moist paper, in dirt) but they all seem dead.. Of course I will keep trying but even if they do germinate I have to wait a couple more years for them to start blooming. So I just ordered a seedling today.
I plan to put it near the new gate, of course for that I have to get rid of the ugly bush. I also went ahead and ordered pineapple guava trees. 2 variations to replace the ugly.

I have a pineapple, I have a guava.... Uh! Feijoa.

R.I.P. melons

I guess it was just a question of time as it was not season for them to grow big. But now the rogue melon seeds from the compost have officially died.

At least I know when to start next year

Mourning for them was a spider sitting across the garden in his net.

Can you spot him?

I got to meet the lady who has the next door field/orchard. She was there to harvest some fruits and I said hello and had a small chat. I told her a little about what I am doing etc. Did NOT ask if she wants to sell the land... thought it would be more tactful to get to know them first...

Finished!

Here I listed the things that are finished.
The gate is ready

gate

I shall plant something sensible on both sides and probably also arrange with fencing... The ugly can be seen on the left side. All the logs and our bicycles now live in the carport.

The coop is ready

coop

It took its sweet time, but finally I made it. Everyone who sees it says the heart is the best part. Not sure if I should take that as an insult or a praise.

The run is ready

chicken run

It only took a day and a half. I burrowed the poles a meter into the ground. Hopefully they will hold...

The chickens are ready

chooks

The four girls arrived on Monday. 2-3 months old and still too shy to come out of the coop. I gave them some grasshoppers which they took immediately. I will try to spend some time with them to get them accustomed to being near people...
The waterer I bought as short term solution, and the feeder is also put together as a short time thing, just a bucket on tray. I will monitor and decide what works well for them.
They are not interested in the roost or the nests it seems... oh well, I will give them time.
I haven't given them names yet.

The eggs are NOT ready

no eggs

Either they are too young or they are still stressed from moving so of course no eggs.

Run run run ngngng

After a bit of thinking I decided to expand my run plans. Here is a map of the big run (HAhahah)

Traditionally extracted from THE MAP!

The coop is that brown thing on top right side, and the run limits shall be along the dotted blue line. South is already fenced by JR. The round brown thing north of coop is the tree trunk, and the green round thing is the bush...
The arrows show where I took a couple of pictures to make it easier to understand.
First, the white arrow:

panorama

Turning a bit to the left and right gives us the following two pictures:

On the left side, is my old discarded fence from the previous apartment we lived in. I guess I could move it to the back, to the big drop.
On the right side, is the discarded wooden fence from the ugly part near front of the house where I am now cleaning up. Behind the fence has gathered a lot of branches and stuff which I shall remove too.
Maybe I can reuse the wooden fence as door to the run...

Back to the map, the picture corresponding with the orange arrow is below:

Messy messy

The tree trunk is right behind the bush. Once chickens move in I think things will become tidier as insects and small animals will no longer be living there.

And finally the pictures corresponding to the pink arrow:

That hairy thing by the way is not a spider leg, it is my arm

 Yep, the green net is where the drop happens. Behind it, "protecting" things from falling/rolling over to my neighbor are a couple of bamboos I stuck in there. And lots of branches on both sides...
The ground is solid enough on my side but it is small and may erode easily.

How to get rid of bamboo

I hate you

The American Bamboo Society recommends a simple and repetitive approach to getting rid of bamboo: cutting. Since their specialty is bamboo, I would lend the most credence to their advice, which, in sum, runs as follows:

1- Cut the bamboo shoots down
2- Apply water to the area
3- Cut down the new crop of bamboo resulting from #2
4- Repeat the process until shoots stop coming up.

The idea behind doing all of this is to deplete the reserves of energy in the plants' rhizomes, after which they will not be capable of sending up new shoots. Those reserves are no longer being replaced because you are removing the plants' mechanism to do so (photosynthesis) by depriving them of vegetation. They can only hold out so long without being replenished.
As a concluding observation about using this method, the American Bamboo Society writes that, once you are done, "The rhizomes will be left behind, but will rot away." The reason that these old rhizomes will rot away is that they have been depleted of their energy reserves.

Although this can be done any time of year, I guess ideal time to do it is in spring. I could already now go and start cutting away whenever I have time though...

Coop finished

Finally

Yesterday I had just enough daylight to finish the coop. I installed the rubber parts which hinder water form leaking inside. I put a strip on top of the roof where the wiggly boards meet in the middle, and a small strip above the nest lid.
I also finished the second layer of paint about 5 hours before rain started. Whew!
I also "waterproofed" the screws on the roof by dotting paint on each of them.
Now that the coop is finished, I can concentrate on the run, and to find chickens. I did read the details of the Chiba prefecture home page regarding keeping animals, and although they require yearly reports on sanitation and health laws being followed, it seems if you keep less than a 100 chickens (!) you only need to report the number of birds every year. The form contains absolutely nothing else, like say for example at least a statement saying I do promise to keep clean or to report disease or anything. Just how many birds you have, and your name and address. Pretty much waste of everyone's time. But it is simple enough so what do I care.
I will also have more time to tend to the garden, and maybe even to start with the forest plots. I now have a better clue how to start there by the way. I need to get rid of the bamboo, and then make a huge compost pile out of it. When it is kind of ready I shall cover the wood surface with cardboard and put the compost on top, and start by growing beans and crap. Then I can think about what kind of trees would like it there and plant them. But this is all for spring and onward when the bamboo shoots come out. For now I can finish the garden.
The run.... the front part is simple enough I guess, there is a slope but I can create a pretty tall fence with painted solid metal posts, and a small door for me to get through. It is the backside and the right side of the coop that will give me a headache. Backside we have the famous drop where I would really want to have a retaining wall and a fence on top of it. The right  side doesn't really need to be included in the run, as I have fenced the underside of the coop facing that direction already. But I do have a pretty big area with straws and branches which would be ideal for chickens to work at. The problem is that I need to fence it and although its drop depth is not near the backside one, it is still maybe 50-100 cm and unlike the backside where I do own a small strip of the land beyond the drop allowing me some freedom and space when it comes to barrier, the right side drop happens just on the border line...
Gotta think a bit more...
Anyway, in worst case, I can still go with the original plan of minimum area, still allowing up to 5-6 chickens plenty of room to play, without the right side, and with only half of the back area. 

Terminator

My neighbor (well actually no one lives there as it is just a big orchard) grows fruit in his land, among others chestnuts, which have started to fall on my land. I gathered them all and cooked them, it was real yummy.

This much and big ones too. Afterwards neither of us had space for dinner.

While walking past my salad patch I saw a praying mantis guarding it against bugs who come to eat the leaves. It does a good job I guess, but they are too many so I still find my lettuces and other greens are half eaten by bugs. Anyway, I took a picture of it and then noticed it was actually preying on a little grasshopper, so I took a couple more pictures while it finished the job. Good mantis! Terminator of the field.

waiting for the right moment

gotcha!

nom nom nom

Got a bit lazy

Although I had planned to finish the coop last weekend, somehow I got a bit lazy and still a bit remains....
Maybe I enjoy it so much that I don't want it to end.

What the coop looks like right now

I actually did a lot. Patching is all done, second layer of paint on the roof, and then the wiggly sheet on top for rain. The door and window and the storm door are all done. I did forget the rope which secures the whole thing to the ground, which was supposed to go under the roof wiggly sheet. Whoops. Maybe I can thread it in somehow.
What remains is not much really. Second layer of paint overall, and then detail painting just to make it look nice, putting rubber strip on top part of the roof and also above the nest lid, and door handle. Oh, yeah, and poop board and extra flooring.
All can be done within the week as it is not much. Actually it is gonna be raining tomorrow, so I need to finish the painting and the rubber and rope today...
I grew a bit indecisive about the exterior net and fence... I was just showing the coop to my gal and after I was done she asked where the boundaries of the chicken run would be. When I showed her she immediately reacted "isn't that too small?" so I am thinking to modify my plans a bit, maybe.
Anyway, I have still not found chickens, haha
Also I found some regulations on Chiba government hompage for those who want to keep livestock of any sort or quantity. So I need to go through it and be sure I am OK.
By the way, I did a bit of cleaning up, moved all the logs to the sunny bit in the carport which I don't use for anything else.

The ugly bush is still there...

This way I will get the logs all dried up and nice. In the picture you can also see that the entrance posts have been installed. The gate will arrive next weekend.