Hogs?  Certain breeds of chickens - you bet!

Let me tell you something about poultry... chickens will eat a lot more grain than ducks and ducks will eat more than geese when they have access to pasture.  Some chickens can be pigs. 

But recently, I noticed a serious uptick in grain consumption.  Mind you, I'm raising a few turkeys for our Thanksgiving meal, several guinea fowl, and I have about twice as many juvenile chickens out there right now as "on staff" layer hens so I, naturally, thought that those babies (and those dang turkeys) were seriously gobbling up the chicken chow.  I would fill all the bowls each morning and when I returned in the late afternoon the bowls were licked clean.  The most surprising thing was that when I came into the henyard with the feed bucket I was mobbed by starving birds.

I thought... wow! that's over 25lbs of feed just in the morning, but I put out an extra tray of kibble for them. 

Hi there, peeps.

Now that we're seeing some warmer days, the farm animals are having babies and eggs are fertile and most breeders are hatching like crazy.  Spring is here! Our spring swap meet has been scheduled for Saturday, June 8th 2013 
http://mdpoultryswap.blogspot.com/. 

Along with the Huge sales area filled anything farm related, homemade, handcrafted, used, recycled, vintage, we will also have fun stuff for the whole family.  Kids will enjoy pony rides, a poultry show, the moon bounce, ice cream and aisles of bunnies, sheep, goats, peafowl, chickens, baby chicks, turkeys and more.  We will also have a pig roast, concession stand and a live bluegrass band playing from 10-2.  

Anyone is welcome to participate as a vendor.  It's a $15 flat fee to sell.  There is no registration necessary but, there are a few regulations regarding the sale of livestock. Please check with our website for more info!  Show up before 7:30 with your tables/chairs/canopy or just tail gate with you items.  Folks selling poultry with 5 birds or less can sell for free.

Vendors: Please contact me with what you are planning on selling so I can compile THE LIST in which I use for advertising purposes.

New this year:  We are now charging $2 per person for admission.  Kids 17 and under are free.  Due to us getting bigger, we are now in need of traffic control as well as parking attendants and this helps to cover those costs along with logistics, entertainment, advertising and kid's activities.  I hope you understand.  Camping is always free for swap goers (shoppers and vendors) 

Also new this year:  On Father's Day weekend, we will be hosting "Homesteading Days."  This weekend will be filled with seminars featuring many aspects of sustainable living.  Learn about goat soap making, canning, bread making, dutch oven cooking, harvesting rabbits, poultry processing, wine making, gardening and composting and we will have a seminar on "prepping." Experts in their field will be traveling to Green Hill Farm to share their knowledge and send us home with some goodies.  

Please see our website for pricing and how to attend.  Prices vary due to equipment needed and cost of googie bags.  There will be free camping during that weekend for seminar goers.. so feel free to help in the garden, help feed the animals in the morning or just relax.  You can build a fire and cook outdoors and just enjoy the day.  http://mdhomestead.blogspot.com/

If you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask,

Erin Moshier
Green Hill Farm
5329 Mondell Rd. 
Sharpsburg, MD. 21782

Sharpsburg, Maryland is a picturesque landscape of rolling hills and farmland with a very charming and nostalgic downtown that looks like it was lifted directly from a snapshot of the 1800's.  The town is near the West Virginia and Pennsylvania borders, tucked in beside the Antietam Battlefield and Historic Harper’s Ferry; it's a rather beautiful and bucolic 2 1/2 hour drive from my tiny farm in Southern Maryland.

Speaking of charming, this swap is hosted at Green Hill Farm by Erin Moshier, a delightfully sunny gal with an infectious smile.  Twice each year (summer and fall) she hosts a fun poultry swap at her family farm just minutes from the center of downtown Sharpsburg.  But once you turn down that gravel road leading to the poultry barn and the horse stables where curious pony's whinny hello's over the fence, you feel miles and miles from anything but the countryside.

My MooseHerders and I arrived early in the morning with a modest selection of ducks, chickens and geese and quickly put up our canopy, table and portable poultry pen.  The feathered flock was soon nibbling on Erin's pasture and getting rehydrated after a long car ride.  Folks were milling about prior to the 8am "selling start time" and were very curious about what poultry or farm related product each vendor was preparing to sell out of that day.

I had 2 extra Holderread Penciled Indian Runner boys from my spring order I was preparing to sell.  Those birds were as nervous as ever and abjectly refused to stand at ease; they chose instead to peer nervously at their growing audience and sort of dance from foot to foot like a 5 year old who needs to use the potty.  The young Sebstapol goose was taking everything in stride (I could have sold him 10 times over!), and my affable juvenile Welsh Harlequin was attempting to charm the chickens into being his pals for the day (since he was raised by a chicken mama and didn't know he was a duck) and those Marans cockerels were not having any of it.  All in all it was shaping up to be an interesting day at my booth.

Browsers stopped by to ask over and over again what the heck kind of birds those Penciled Indian Runners were ("are those some kind of goose?")  and before too long a somber and truly gentlemanly young man hailing from West-By-God-Virginia quietly asked me if I'd be willing to sell him those lovely Runner ducks (he said it just like that).  I was more than happy to negotiate a price for that gracious, young aspiring farmer and help him carry his new waterfowl to his car.  Such a peach, I wish him well.

Tons of folks stopped by to chat with me at length, get advice about waterfowl, and tell me about their own flock. I gave out many business cards and collected a few as well.  What a great place to network!  There was so much to see and hear at the swap:  Craftsman selling poultry housing and nesting equipment, crafty-crafter ladies peddling so many wonderful handhewn wares, local feed stores, chicken farmers, duck farmers, guinea keets, peacocks, muscovy, turkeys, pheasants, chukar, bunnies, goats, and pigs (ADORABLE)... I even saw guinea pigs! 

And - holy moly - Someone had the nerve to bring some gorgeous German Shorthair puppies... O My GOODNESS!  Those hounds were absolutely snugglicious!  I barely contained myself at that booth.  I reminded my hard farmrgirl heart that hunting dogs and ducks were not the best bedfellows. *sigh*

We had such a good time at the swap!  There was live music and great giveaways.  I bought a few things, sold a few things and met a bunch of interesting and fun folks.  You just never know who you might make a good friend out of until you go to one of these events!  For the upcoming spring/summer swap I'll be loaded up with hatching eggs, eating eggs, baby ducks, geese and chickens to sell in the early summer at Erin's next poultry swap... this event is too good to pass up!  I hope you'll join us all next year - especially at the early market when all those spring hatches will be ready. 

For more information or to be added to her mailing list, Erin's blog can be found here: http://mdpoultryswap.blogspot.com/. 

Don't forget: When you're in the area be sure to have lunch in one of the local establishments.  We did (twice - once in Boonsboro) and were NOT disappointed mmmmm... good!

So I'm out locking up the birds for the night and start, as usual, with the duplex broody coop but find Mama Cochin and her 20 rowdy chicks (who've just started free-ranging this week) missing - uh oh!

Mama Cochin is sharing the duplex coop with my broody duck (due to hatch this week) so I peek in on the adjacent apartment occupied by Miss Blush, my Welsh Harlequin duck and her 10 eggs, where I find 5 fat baby chickens snuggled in there safe with her - LOL!  These two apartments share a single attached yard so those chicks must've figured cranky Miss Blush was better than cold, plain straw next door.

As I lock all the doors on all the various houses I search with my flashlight for Mama Cochin inside each - she has to find a suitable nighttime house for her babies. Just as I start to think I'll be covering a couple acres this evening hunting under prickery holly bushes for my Mama Cochin, the last house to be closed up is where I find her... she's taken over the doghouse my fat goslings are living in!  The small goosy-gooses are outside in their pen instead of in bed where they usually are after dark, so I herd them inside where I see my Mama Cochin tucked into a corner... many tiny heads poking out, curious as kittens, from her fluffy feathers.  Everyone safe and warm this windy, chill night.

Wonky but satisfying social dynamics you don't typically consider: Baby chickens shacking up with my broody duck (poor Miss Blush!); Mama chicken and her hooligan brood bedding down with baby gooses... and one adult Khaki Campbell duck (Miss Faith) who somehow ended up sleeping in the barn with my newly broody Muscovy girl, Lumi, this strange, mixed-up night.  Everyone completely tolerant, if not downright companionable, with the other.  Only at Moose Manor, eh?

Well, everyone is locked up tight and all babies are accounted for and pleasantly cooing while warming with a fluffy mama of some stripe.  It could certainly be worse!       

Today my American Blue Goose hatching eggs arrived from my friend Kim Kelly!  She even tossed in a couple of bonus Sebastopol eggs...

This will be my first time attempting to artificially incubate goose eggs.  I have a Muscovy girl who looks like she's giving a great deal of consideration to going broody but hasn't really committed herself to it full time yet.  That's a bummer because I was hoping to remove the wooden eggs from her nest and slide these wonderful works of goose art right in under that warm, feathered bum of hers.  Wouldn't she have been pleased to sit 5 days less than her own would've confined her?  Oh well... I can certainly put that fluffy bottom to work on other duties once she gets herself settled.

These eggs are HUGE!  I had to take some pictures just for posterity. I knew they were big but until you actually hold one...

And, of course, there will be a meeeellion photos of the babies once they hatch out.  Who doesn't love baby goose breath?