Gardening Thread - Show me your gardens!

My brother lives on 10 acres (5 acres is cleared which is surrounded by woods) and has (at any given time) between 10-15 hens for laying. But he also keeps three roosters to protect the hens from raccoon, possum, skunks, etc...

I was there visiting one time and sure enough something came lurking on the edge of the woods to get the hens. Alpha rooster #1, without hesitation, goes berserk and starts attacking what ever it was (thinking it was a fox). Rooster #1 didn't bode well. As soon as rooster #1 was killed, rooster #2 in line went bat shit crazy and charged the predator. Pretty sure between rooster 1 and 2, there was a lot of damage done to the predator, but #2 died in battle as well. At which point rooster #3 steps up, gets all mindfucked and charges the predator one more time and does enough damage to complete the job of ridding it.

Rooster #3 came back to the hens, who were now huddled in the coop, and instantly became alpha rooster #1.

Was pretty cool to witness the natural synergy of roosters/hens.

 

Yeah, the Roosters attack with not so much a 'Battle Cry' as a 'Berzerker Death Scream'
It's crazy because they'll do it regardless of the size of the predator, too. We had a similar situation when I was still living at my parent's house, and the BDS from Rooster #1 gave me enough time to grab the .22 and get over to the henhouse in time to put a stop to the two raccoons who were trying to get at the hens before they were able to kill off rooster #2.

 

I used to always keep a rooster to help with the flock, but every year they die in battle. Havent had any for the past 5 yrs now and I haven't had any casualties. An old timer told me the reason I kept getting minks, raccoons, skunks ect. was because of the roosters. Loud noises they make, make wild animals curious to see what's over there, hence the killing of the roosters but only couple hens. Since I cull the young roosters now and haven't kept any, I haven't lost a single hen in the last 5 yrs. Is it just a coincidence?? I don't know but it works for me.

 

Might be. My biggest problem hasn't been wild animals, it's been my neighbor's dogs. I haven't lost any birds to wild animal attack, but I've lost 6 to my neighbor's Weimeraners. Since he doesn't have enough brain cells to power an LED keychain light he can't make a secure pen to keep them in. I was civil the first time, and then the 2nd & 3rd times I let Animal Control handle it. But after the last incident I snapped, went over and reamed him a new one in front of his wife and kids, threatened to shoot his dogs if I caught them on my property again, and tossed a printout of the Maine state laws regarding dogs running loose in his face.

Haven't seen his dogs since. He's got them chained up behind his house instead (which doesn't make me feel any better) and is trying to sell them.

 

Yea neighbors dogs are a pain for sure. Fortunately I don't have any close neighbors but once in a while one shows up from somewhere, I keep my flock in a 70x100 pen but on ococcasions I open the gate to let them out to roam a new place but only if I'm gonna be outside for awhile. Love watching them explore a new territory.

 

mom keeps a peacock in the same coop as the chickens. thirty chickens and about five roosters. ill tell you one thing, that peacock is the alpha "rooster". the roosters dont dare challenge that. any predator that shows up ends up getting a good peacock whoopin.

 

Lol, Maybe I should see about getting a peacock or two, then.

 

yeah dude. no kidding, a few roosters have challenged the peacock and all it takes is one hit from the peacock and boom... dead rooster.

 

Holy Christ!
Those buggers aren't cheap; $50 per, plus shipping

 

They're not.

You can get them at a farm supply place if they normally stock chicks. They are hard to raise as babies.

 

I stopped at my local Farmer's Union (where I usually order my birds) after work today to get some feed, and asked the guys at the counter about them. They said that the company doesn't carry them any more because the mortality rates were so high. Apparently they or their customers were losing so many chicks that they stopped offering them.
I'll have to ask around some more next spring at a couple of other feed stores in the area.

 

This year's garlic crop. Pic is about two weeks old. Harvest in a couple more weeks.

 

Nice. I usually have about the same amount of garlic, but the moles/voles got at mine over the winter and only about half of my crop actually came up. I've got more starting, but it's way behind and I'm afraid the summer heat will kill it before it matures. Fingers crossed.

 

Nice garlic crop, you're smart doing them in raised beds. We tried a couple of years ago with hardnecks and found that our winters are too wet and ground too clayey.

 

Every year we plant these at the end of Oct and harvest around the end of June. The more snow we get the better so hopefully this year's are alright since we had a very mild winter.

 

Against my better judgement, I let the GF talk me into 4 ducks and a goose at the feed store.

She felt bad because they were the last ones

We haven't named the ducks yet. They come unsexed, so we're not sure on genders.
The goose we're calling Bruce, and if he turns out to be female we'll just change it to Caitlyn.

 

Cute birds and about the name!!

 

Just finished up canning 14 quarts of dill pickles and another half gallon to ferment/pickle. Cuke and squash plants arent doing too well in this heat. It's been a high over 90 °F every day this past week and a half and no rain, it wont get any better this coming week either. We'll probably get enough from this crop to last us, though. We have a 300 gallon intermediate bulk container that collects rainwater from the roof, its only got about 100 gallons left with watering the garden every day. Tomatoes, green beans, peppers, beets, and potatoes are doing great!

 

@Noelie84 /bird farmer. Nice waterfowl!! What kind of ducks and geese are they?

 

all the texas rain is doing my cukes great! i have never pickled tho, would like to try it out.

potatoes did good, saved them from all the rain by harvesting in between storms..