Chickens and more chickens...

I love chickens! Chickens as pets and egg producers are the best use of your time and space when it comes to caring for animals. I love looking at their different colors and watching them interact with each other. They all have their own personalities, attitudes and preferences.

We have 25 hens and three roosters although I think one rooster is going to get his way with the chopping block soon. He is becoming pretty aggressive and is attacking people! He is a pretty good size so that is worrisome, we have the twins and other children always going in and out of the coop to collect eggs and heaven forbid he attack a kid. Just a note I like chickens for their eggs and personalities NOT for their meat, it makes me sad when one has to go to the 'soup pot', my husband is in charge of that task. If it were up to me the aggressive rooster would get a separate coop...but then my husband would say 'he is not doing his job- he has to go'. My husband grew up on a ranch in Mexico where the animals were their livelihood, not pets. I on the other hand grew up in the city and only had animals for pets (even rabbits). So we bump heads about this all the time, that's why it is my husband’s job to figure out who is 'soup' and who is not. When he kills the chicken he is also in charge of dressing it and finding a pot at someone else’s house for it. Don't get me wrong I like chicken but I cannot eat an animal that I have cared for and watched hatch from an egg. My husband tells me all the time that if things continue to get worse with the economy and the worlds food I will have to learn to eat those chickens... We will see...



That's him in the middle, see the attitude



 

We started out with four chickens (1 rooster and three hens) in our backyard. I loved it because I could go to the backyard and watch them and feed them the scraps from the kitchen. After a while we had to move them because the raccoons and opossoms figured out that they were there. Poor chickens were terrified everynight. Raccoons are very smart and can figure out most primitive locks, you need to put a padalock with a key or a combonation lock on the chicken coop door. Don't leave the key close I wouldn't put it past them to figure it out... LOL

No, in all seriousness they are very smart animals and have 'hands' similar to ours.

Opossoms' well they are just opportunists they didn't try so hard to open the coop, they just would steal the eggs and try to catch a chicken and pull them through the fence.

It all worked out fine in the end becasue now I have so many more chickens- more eggs for me. I do miss the clucking and the rooster crowing, my neighbors even miss those noises if you can believe it.

New Baby!

We have a New Baby!

New baby colt that is… You didn’t think that I was having another baby did you? Ha! Twins are enough J

Our beautiful 5 year old Paint ‘Chona’ had her baby colt on April 22, 2013 at 6pm. First time Mom dropped the foal all by herself, she didn’t need help from my husband or the vet. Way to go Chona! I wouldn’t expect anything else from her, she is the most intelligent and gentle horse around. We got her when she was 8 months old and she thought she was a dog. She followed us around and let my then almost 2 year old twins run underneath her, around her and swing from her tail. I was terrified I am a city girl and rarely saw horses and was always told that you never go behind them. Yes, that is still the rule of thumb, Chona being the exception. Hopefully she will pass these traits onto her son.

It's hard to be a baby

Ok back to baby… His name is Hercules, yes Hercules it was better than ‘Botticelli’ the twins wanted. Botticelli- I know where did they get that you say? - A movie of course. It is a C rate cartoon that the damsel in distress has a white horse named Botticelli. So we settled for another movie character name Hercules. I think it suits him, he looks strong and beautiful. I know I am a proud Grandma.

Mama and baby

Hercules is black with a star and a white patch on one back foot. He looks nothing like his Mom who is brown with black patches on her legs and a blaze on her forehead. It is so funny how things don’t turn out like you think they will, Chona was mated with an all white Stallion. Where the heck did black come from- maybe the milkman? Hercules does however look just like a Stallion that died on our ranch about two years ago named ‘Cuervo’ a beautiful retired racehorse -reincarnation, maybe. We will have to wait and see if Hercules color changes, in the sunlight he has red highlights or if he continues to look like Cuervo. He is very gentle and not scared of all of the kids that come to the barn to see him. He nurses all of the time and will even try to nurse you fingers LOL.



Pita with Hercules



He is a dream come true for my daughter ‘Pita’, she is a very petite little girl and of course the biggest horse at the ranch was ‘hers’ Cuervo. When he passed away (old age) she was devastated. Since Cuervo was gone she had been trying to convince us to buy another horse. My husband took her and her twin to his friends Ranch a retired veterinarian from Mexico; the man now breeds and shows horses for a living. So Pita falls in love with a beautiful 2 year old Roan Stallion. She tells her Papi “I want this one, buy me this one”. Oh boy… So her Dad tells her to go and ask Don Ramon how much for the horse. Knowing full well that she is painfully shy and lets her twin sister talk for her, Pita grabs her twin ‘Mina’ by the hand and off they go. My husband just stood there grinning thinking when she got to the owner she wouldn’t speak. She surprised him, when she got to where Don Ramon was she stood really tall and said ‘How much for the horse?’ Humoring her he said ‘which one?’ She described the horse and Don Ramon told her “$10,000.00” she looked and him and said ‘that is too much for a horse I will give all the money in my bank, $10.00’ and back and forth they went. Both Don Ramon and my husband had to hatch a plan quick to discourage her because Don Ramon was losing fast. Needless to say she left that Ranch in tears and fits but she won. Don Ramon told her that she could come anytime and visit ‘Caramelo’ and she could be part owner but the horse was going to stay at his ranch. That placated her for a while, she still goes and visits and brushes him. She hasn’t ridden him yet because everyone is scared because he is a Stallion and Pita is a little thing… but if anyone can ride that horse it will be Pita. Caramelo loves her and knows who is boss.

So when Chona was in foal she told her Papi that the baby was hers with the same determination that she had negotiated joint ownership of ‘Caramelo’.  He of course wanted the baby for himself that is the reason that he wanted Chona pregnant. This time Pita won! Chona belongs to Mina and Hercules belongs to Pita. My husband and I are horseless… I’m ok with that I have enough mouths to feed and clean up after. J Besides I have my chickens.

8 pounds of Plums... Now what?

I was blessed with the gift of 8 pounds of plums, from a neighbor. Now what? I was trying to figure out how the girls and I were going to eat so many plums. I was actually doing the math, ok so we eat 5 per day and in no time we will be done. Then I thought better of that idea...

I guess I channeled my Grandma at that moment because I decided that I was going to make plum jam. Mind you I have never canned anything in my life. My Grandma did the canning for the family, not even my Mother cans. So I said ok this can’t be that hard I’m smart I can figure this out. I looked up a couple of recipes online and found one that I half way liked. Most of them used way too much sugar, so I cut the sugar in half. My research showed that sugar does not make the jam the Pectin does so it really doesn’t matter how much sugar you use or don’t use. Bearing in mind the fruit you are using, so plums can be tart so I figured that if it turned out too tart to use on toast then it would become a meat/chicken plum sauce marinade.

Here is the recipe that I used:

4 Pounds of plums
½ cup water
1 packet of Fruit Pectin
½ tsp butter
5 cups of sugar* (original recipe called for 8 cups)

*add as much sugar as you like. You have the opportunity to add more with no problem before you are done.

You will also need:

Ball jars with seals and lids

Stock pots (two at least 6 qts. each) Not aluminum or non-stick, Stainless Steel is best

Tongs

Kitchen towels

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Remove seeds and skin from plums (removing skin is optional) Cut plums into small pieces add to your stock pot, add the water.  While you are cooking your fruit use the other pot to boil water to sterilize your jars. Bring fruit slowly on low heat to a rolling boil stirring constantly. Cook the fruit down into the consistency that you like. I had small pieces of fruit still in mine; I like the flavor better like that and it looks more homemade to me.

 

Cut plums, getting ready to start jam, yum!



In the meantime clean your jars, lids and seals with hot soapy water. Place into the hot water and sterilize them. Place one of the jars upright and make sure that the water covers that jar by 2 inches. If the water does not cover the jars by 2 inches add more water to cover, better to do this now then wait until you have jam in your jars and discover that you need more water and then have to wait for the water to boil…

Remove sterilized jars, lids and seals and place on a clean kitchen towel.

When fruit is boiling (and is the consistency you like) turn heat down to a simmer, add Fruit Pectin, and stir vigorously until dissolved. Add ½ tsp. butter to dissipate the foam. Bring mixture back to a rolling boil and add all of the sugar, stir vigorously until all is dissolved. Cook at a rolling boil at a rolling boil stirring constantly for 1 minute.

Simmering plums in their own jiuce and 1/2 cup water

Test the mixture for gelling. The mixture should form a gel (like hair gel) on a cold spoon. It should not fall or slide off easily. If the mixture passes the test you can now put it into the sterilized jars. Fill the jars and leave about a ¼ of an inch open to the top. Wipe the jars on the sides and top, place the seal and ring (lid) on the jars. When you have filled all of the jars, place them into the pot of boiling water and making sure that there is 2 inches of water above the lid of the jars.

Boil jars of jam for 20 minutes. Turn off the water and let jars sit in water for another 5 minutes. Then remove and set on a clean kitchen towel for 24 hours to set.

Enjoy! I will be spreading mine on toast. I was also thinking of making a sauce for chicken or meat, by adding onion seasoning mix and fresh herbs to the plum sauce marinating the meat and then cooking.

 

Plum Jam,Done!