Seven babies and counting!

Here is Petunia with her triplets, two boys and a girl.

This morning three baby goats greeted us in the barn, all with long ears! Although I wished for three girls, at least one of the three was a girl! We named her Daffodil. So far two girls have been born, and we will keep those two for ourselves. We have only one goat left to kid. She is due April 28, 2025. Last time she kidded she had triplets, two girls and one boy, so we will see. We did the same breeding as we did that time, and her one daughter from that kidding was Poppy, who was our first one to kid this year. She had two sturdy boys and is milking very well, so we are happy with that.

I have seedlings started inside. I hope to start my greenhouse seedlings soon. It likely will have to be next week before temperatures are warm enough to start out in the greenhouse.

My incubators are full of chicken eggs and only have six days to go to hatch. The turkeys have started laying eggs and we are collecting them for hatching. I will start turkey eggs in one incubator after the chicks hatch.

I have visited my new location for my beehives. I hope to place them there within the next couple of weeks. There is a blueberry farm close, but pollinators are only in that for a month, rather than the majority of the beekeeping season like they are here at my farm. I may try to keep one hive here, I haven't decided. I will never know if conditions change if I don't. A neighbor is going to try to keep his hives in this area, so it will be interesting to see how his turn out. After a couple of pretty successful seasons he had all his hives robbed out this past year as well. He had Layens hives, which are double deep horizontal hives, which usually produce even better yields than traditional Langstroth hives, so it was a big disappointment.

The chickens are laying very well. We have plenty of eggs for whoever would like them. Milk production is picking up, but I would like to wait a few weeks before adding new milk customers.

I am itching to get more things planted, but I took the soil temp a few days ago, and it was only 40 degrees. You can't rush nature! Cold season crops can be started when it reaches around 50 degrees, but most everything does best at 60 degrees and warm season crops like beans and corn and squash really want 70 degrees. Patience pays off, it is just hard to wait!