The Accidental (happening by chance or accident ; not planned; unexpected) Chicken Farmer

The pig and the chicken were on their way to breakfast, trying to decide what to have. When chicken said, ''Let's have ham and eggs.'' The pig then replied, ''That's fine for you, it's a small donation on your part, but it's a total sacrifice for me.''

 

When we started out last May, we just wanted four hens. I had my brother, David, build a homemade coop to hold four hens.  The magic number here is four.  By June, I'm talking about one month later June, we had close to thirty hens and three roosters. That is not four. I keep asking myself, "How did this happen?" Well, the short answer is, you can't have just a few chickens.  It's like an addiction or an affliction, depending on how you look at it. 

Our first chicken coop, with veggie garden on top.

The lovely thing about chickens is nothing goes to waste.

Our blue heeler, Gypsy, loves the chickens too. (June, 2012)

 

This year Becky wanted some Easter Eggers who lay pink, blue and green eggs and I wanted Silver Laced Wyandotte.  So...........

Yeah, we know. They are roosters but we also have five hens.

The original home of this hen suffered from overcrowding.
Now she shares a yard with three other laced hens and a young rooster only.

And then there are the "no telling what" that we got when brother Dave incubated  eggs from our hens.  So...........

 

As if that were not enough, I wanted Pygmy goats.  So..........

Meet baby Lily, Blossom and Sweet Pea.

 

Most of our chickens free range during the day now and we lock them  in the barn at night with the goats.  The goats seem puzzled by all the cackling in the barn when the hens are laying and the chickens really enjoy "goat watching" as does Gypsy and her 2- two year old pups. 

I would like to say there is always peace and love here at Harmony Acres Farm in beautiful Oklahoma, but the truth is "sometimes stuff happens".  

 

The older roosters don't have a proper appreciation for the younger roosters, the stray or untrained dogs running loose in the neighborhood make me crazy (I scream like a banshee at them) and chicken hawks flying overhead give me heart palpitations (I can almost see their amused looks as I flap my arms and yell shoo).  That is just the stuff outside. 

 

We have also taken in five house dogs and four inside cats over the years and least I forget, an outside cat that hangs out in my chair on the porch (sharing his fleas with me) waiting for me to bring him dry cat food (yes, he could hunt for his food but why bother when he has room service).  His name is Harvey Gene after a dear family friend.  They are both a pain in the rear but very special to us.

 

Living on a farm, even a small one, is lots of hard work.  It is not for everyone but for me it is heaven.  One can learn a lot by observing the animals.  Things about the seasons, the weather, the unseen danger (snakes, I hate snakes) and living together in harmony. 

 

 Thank you for stopping by.  Hope to see you again soon.  The adventure continues.......

 

Good for the body is the work of the body, good for the soul the work of the soul, and good for either the work of the other.

~Henry David Thoreau

 

 

 

  

 

Learning to Love the Oklahoma Heat...........Solar Power

"Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can.” Theodore Roosevelt

Hi. I'm Linda and my daughter is Becky. We are striving to become a self sustaining homestead here at Harmony Acres.  The quote above has recently become my mantra. Like many women, I assign myself more tasks than even Wonder Woman could achieve on a daily basis. Becky does the same thing so "the apple didn't fall far from the tree". Country Living is very satisfying but it is also a lot of hard work, especially for two "beginners" like Beck and I who are learning as we go. Sissies need not apply for country life but a hottub would be nice.

This is what we have to work with: 

 two ladies who have never lived on a farm,

 five acres of land (probably another acre if all the brush were cleared) 

 the totally unpredictable Oklahoma weather. 

Our goal is to reach a happy medium somewhere between helpless females and doomsday preppers.  Every day is an adventure around here.

We started our quest with a DIY solar panel array. Why wouldn't we want to utilize an unlimited free source of God given energy? We're smart people, right?   It's going to shine anyway, so why not use it? My long suffering big (and only) brother David has come to the rescue (again).  He is like "Tim, the tool man" (sitcom Home Improvement) on steroids.  He really can build it bigger and better!



 He custom built the metal frame to perfectly fit the solar panels. Pretty impressive, huh?





I knew what I was doing until you started "helping" sis.  Now I'm a little confused!  Where did I say the red wire went? Becky is amused by our good-natured bickering.



These four panels will produce 920 watts per solar hour.  It takes a 1000 watts to make one kilowatt. Doesn't sound like much until you go to pay the electric bill and see that it really adds up.  A penny saved is a penny earned.......... Can I get an "amen", ya'll?

The electric line then runs into the house and connects to the invertor (green lights are good. means it's putting power back into the grid) and the invertor then plugs into a wall outlet.  Ours has a 1000 watt capacity with a lot of safety features.  If the electric goes off, it will shut down automaticlly (this is a good thing as Martha Stewart would say). Pretty cool, huh?

 This is my solar clothes dryer.  Nothing like having your granny panties waving in the breeze to amuse those passing on the road on the back side of the house.

 Just when I thought we were ahead of the game, our antique (circa 1976) central heat and air unit gave up the ghost and we had to replace it on January 25 of this year.  We bought a heat pump because we have natural gas as well as electric that we can use to supplement the heat this winter. Geothermal would have been nice but it is a little in the "you've got to be kidding me" price range.

Since we replaced the unit and put up the solar panels the first of February, this is the breakdown of our usage:

                                                   2011                     2012

February                                   1537 kw                 788 kw

March                                         950 kw                 741 kw

April                                           950 kw                  525 kw

May                                          1318 kw                 711 kw

Total                                          4755                  2765          so far we have saved 1990 kw 

             

That's about $140 in actual usage plus the power cost adjustment is about another $45 (don't even get me started on PCA).

The total cost of adding solar was around $2200 which included extra pvc pipe to run the electrical wire through and really long pipe to elevate the outside line to make it safer to mow and clean around and the metal (which ain't cheap) to build the frame.  We plan to add more solar panels as we can (this will call for another invertor) and a wind mill as well. 

The heat pump cost around $5000 (we'll be making payments on that puppy for a while). Bottom line:  I don't have to feel guilty about staying cool this summer (another string of over 100 degree temperature going on here) and the power of the sun is a free resource we have an ample supply of without harming any part of the environment.

It is every man's obligation to put back into the world at least the equivalent of what he takes out of it. 

 ~Albert Einstein