January Farm

January on the farm has been interesting. Early in the month we invited people to come on over to pick. We'd gotten what we could harvest and sell for the year, we wanted others to also be able to enjoy. Sold 200 lbs down in Las Cruces when we heard the prices were up on shelling. Got 80 lbs shelled resulting in about 48.9% return rate (meat only).I Will try a local source soon to shell the other 400 lbs. The trees continue to have some on and the Crows and Redwinged Black Birds are having a ball getting some off the trees with their hoping and picking. Our winter birds include several Sandhill Cranes who are coming every morning and enjoying the lower fields which seem to have some growth under leaves. These huge birds have been working their way to the fields closest to us and yesterday they were at the Cherry Trees just outside our door. As I was busy taking pictures, the chickens squaked and I looked up to see a coyote salivating at the nearby chickens. Molli ran the coyote off. He had a black tip on his tail, same as the last year's visitor, so I think this is one of the pair born a year ago last spring. We see a pile of feathers, but no carcass and the count of chickens holds at 20. The chickens have found a good balance of food out in the fields and the crushed pecans we have after sorting out the bird pecked ones from the pecans to be shelled. The yolks are that golden yellow and taste delicious.
They really aren't in much competition with the Turkeys who only seem to be making the run across the field to get to cover on the property just to the NE of the property. They seem to be in the creek alot more this year.
We've had some wind and some cold, but overall, the weather has been so nice, it is hard to suggest a better place I could be living. The Javalina even made an appearance during the afternoon yesterday. What a great drama every day.

We've got lettuce in the garden and in the greenhouse. Also, planted spinach and some buttercrunch in the greenhouse this week. Peas outside. The onions are already growing and I had to kick out some chickens who decided the greens looked good and tried them. Our Apricot and Olive trees arrived today. We will nursery them for a year around the vegetable garden before deciding which of last years trees took to great a hit from the deer and cows. Getting a handle on the seeds saved from last year to see what needs to be planted when. A few plants died because of bugs before we could get them in the ground, so will take extra precautions this year.

It's really nice to be watching the sun set at 6PM instead of the 4:45 or so that we had been seeing just a month ago. We just returned at 5 from the Montecello via the back road and the colors are beautiful as the sun set across the Black Range.