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rozannadanna

New to this forum

rozannadanna
15 years ago

Mostly hang out on Antique Rose Forum. Just curious how much land everyone is working with. See a lot of interest in chickens but what about food crops, etc. What and how much.

I have about an acre; 300 rose bushes; 10 Rhode Island Chickens; 9 ducks; 5 assorted banties and 9 little roosters that that were shipped with my last order of ducks to keep them warm - I see lots of chicken & dumplings in our future and last but not least 2 dogs. We grow lots of our own veggies and can and preserve.

Just trying to get to know some of you better and I suspect you all would like to know each other better also.

Comments (15)

  • beeliz
    15 years ago

    welcome Rozannadanna!
    we all enjoy this place and I can tell you this place is my favorite hangout! Love the people here and everyone has helped me out in so many ways!! You'll find it much the same I'm sure,,welcome!

  • rozannadanna
    Original Author
    15 years ago

    Thanks for the welcome

  • beegood_gw
    15 years ago

    Welcome to the site. Looks like with all those critters you'll be spending a lot of time here.I have nearly 6 acres mostly in pasture with nothing on it,4 wild turkeys of which are 2 hens on eggs and I also have 2 beehives. Now all we need is some warm weather. Chance of more snow this week! YUK

  • rozannadanna
    Original Author
    15 years ago

    We would like to get a bee hive but other things are comming first. I hadn't lived in the house for 2 years - ex was living there - when I moved back the place, inside and out was a disaster so we are slowly recovering, restoring, rebuilding.

  • marlingardener
    15 years ago

    Rozanna,
    Welcome to the Farm Life Forum--you will find it invaluable. We, too, have a small place, just 9 1/2 acres, but we love every inch! We wake up in the morning with a smile on our lips and go to bed at night with an ache in our bones, but every minute is worth it. Right now we are maintaining a small (21 tree) orchard of apples, pears, pecans and almonds; eight Australorp chickens that should lay golden eggs, considering how much we have invested in coop, feed, chicken tractor, etc; a HUGE vegetable garden (I got enthused and over planted, but don't tell my husband)along with an asparagus bed; and trying to upgrade the house and the barn. Like you, I adore roses, and brought 22 of them with me when we moved. David Austins are my absolute favorite, along with Maggie and Clytemnestra. We are so happy here--good neighbors, although they are a goodly distance away and quiet, quiet, quiet! Just the birds, an occasional cow moo, and the coyotes yodeling at night. Wonderful!
    We are getting hives next spring, and have found the Heart of Texas Beekeepers to be a great resource for information and advice. Enjoy your farm, and let us know of your progress.

  • velvet_sparrow
    15 years ago

    300 roses AND a bunch of chickens?! Can I have your house? :)

    Welcome! We have everyone from true farmers with huge crops, tractors, beef, etc.; to backyard hobbyists like me--I live in suburban Los Angeles and keep a flock of chickens in my back yard. I grew up on a small ranchette of 3/4 of an acre where we had horses, a fruit tree orchard, a huge vegetable garden and many other animals, including chickens for meat and eggs. My parents taught us to can & preserve, and how to process our own chickens (what great tasting chicken!).

    These days I get my chicken at the grocery store and my birds are kept for eggs & pets, but my white nectarine & blood orange trees yield enough fruit to make jelly & preserves with, and I whip up a batch of two of strawberry preserves every year. I plan on installing a raised-bed vegetable garden this year.

    I think this forum has begun to lean a bit more heavily towards chickens in the last few years because it's a 'gateway' animal for farming. :) They are relatively easy to raise and keep, and make for a great start to self-sustained living.

    Velvet ~:>

  • rozannadanna
    Original Author
    15 years ago

    Marlin and Velvet - at one time there were over 500 roses here - one of the largest collection of Noisette roses in the world but alas I left and the ex who was living here hated roses. Many are just gone but we will get it back to the way it was before. And my Man is a former Nursery Owner from Colorado who just loves to garden so every spare inch has something growing in it - grass is for golf. We plan to start a small nursery here in the next couple of years - roses and perennials and native Texas wildflowers. I can tell you more than you ever wanted to know about roses but chickens are new to me. The ex said "We have Labs (dogs) and the only thing that is big enough to withstand them is an Emu". He was wrong. My female lab just ignors the chickens and my Sheba Inu loves them. The other day the Sheba went in the chicken yard with me and sneaked up behind one of the Rhodies and kissed it's behind. She ment no harm but that hen jumped 2 ft in the air. I tell her "get them in their pen Jehanna" and she rounds them all up and into their house for the night.

  • sullicorbitt
    15 years ago

    Welcome Roxanne,
    We have a little over an acre with about 26 chickens of varying breeds from fluffy ornamentals to the basic RIR's. We recently hatched 15 chicks from our own eggs (we have one roo a blue orpington).

    My husband and I have just learned how to can over the past couple of years. This year we are building a hoop house to get an early start on the tomatoes and a few other veggies. We doubled the size of our veggie garden this year and hope to continue to increase our canning and freezing. I also have perennial gardens w/a focus on daylilies, cone flowers, peonies, foxgloves, phlox, cranesbill, lupine...gee I guess I have many favorites.

    I love the farm forum because the folks here have been so very supportive to me when I was just starting out w/my chickens. I live about 26 miles outside of Boston, there are no chicken people around here. This place has been an inspiration and huge resource to me over the years. I hope you will enjoy it too!

    Sheila

  • henhilton
    15 years ago

    Welcome rozannadanna

    Fairly new in these parts myself, I think this forum is heavy on the chicken and goat subject because they are good 'starter' livestock for us 'back to the country we never lived in before' folk! I have learned so much and seen so many subjects I was wondering about addressed here, it amazed me at first!

    So what do you do with 300 rose bushes? I know that losing 200 of the plants you love must be devastating! I'm glad you got the homeplace back in time to save the rest of them!

    We have 16 creek-front acres in the Texas Hill Country. Most of the property is managed for wildlife conservation, but we have a huge organic garden, a slowly expanding orchard, a small flock of RIR egg ladies ( + their macho husband), 4 dogs, 3 cats, and an ever-changing cast of supporting players.

    I, also, concentrate on preserving the bounty our land provides. Canning, freezing and drying fruits and veggies has become a major focus every year. We keep coming up with new and improved ideas as we experiment!

    Look at the 'Rollcall' postings if you really want to see what the denizens of this board are doing, rozannadanna. Personally, I love reading them!

    I see several folks on this strand have bee hives in Texas. I've asked about this subect before and never received any responses: I am VERY interested in keeping bees, but rather paranoid about the Africanized bee situation. Have any of you had any problems in central Texas with this? We seem to have plenty of harmless honeybees around our place, but can't locate a hive. Should we best leave it to the wild bees and keep hoping to find the honey?

    pam

  • pamghatten
    15 years ago

    Welcome Rozannadanna,

    I have 20 acres, 400+ varieties fo daylilies plus my seedlings, 3 miniature donkeys, 2 silly dogs, 5 house cats and 2 barn cats and their friends :>).

    I'm actually a NYS inspected daylily nursery, but work full time at a local bank.

    Have lived on my 20 acres of paradise for 11 years now, and can't imagine ever living in a suburb again.

    I have 5 acres cleared and the rest is wooded with trails. 3/4 acre pond right behind the house, I call it my "water feature". I love to watch all the critters the pond attracts, and then watch the donkeys chase the deer out of their pasture. It's really funny.

    Lots of good info on this forum ...

    Pam

  • rozannadanna
    Original Author
    15 years ago

    What do I do with all the roses? Love them; propogate them; enjoy them. When we finally get our nersery started, own root antique roses will be our major product.

  • beagler1776
    15 years ago

    Hi Rozannadanna,

    I love your name - both for the roses and Gilda! I'm sure I'll be learning lots from you about roses. Good luck to you on your nursery! I too am new posting here (tho a longtime lurker) and thought maybe I should introduce myself. Haven't updated "my page" in years...

    We bought an old (150+ years) 115 acre farm that previous owners had tried to develop but couldn't get zoning changed... They'd bought it from widow who'd farmed with her family here forever. Sadly, by the time we arrived roofs had rotted on most buildings, tho brick house was still standing and is an ongoing project where we live w/4 yo DD and nearly 2 yo DS, 2 dogs, 1 cat, and 2 large fish meant for eventual pond. The place looked ready for bulldozers (as they'd intended)! Only plant life here was wild; locusts, black walnuts, multiflora rose and silver maple... But at least there were also wild turkeys, deer, bald eagles, herons, ducks geese, bunnies, bats etc!

    We are slowly getting the place fixed up and trying to learn to grow our own food. Have small orchard and veggie garden but don't really know how to can/preserve(this years goal). Have a few meat rabbits (long story how we accidentally fell into that, but you can probably guess). Just got 12 pullets for eggs and 12 cornish/X for the freezer. Have guineas due next month too. I'm much more experienced in landscaping/perennials and horses (in my past life as breeder/trainer) than any of this real farming - LOTS to learn here! Soon I hope to get a few dairy goats and DH wants to look into bees... He's become enthralled with farming and makes hay for a "hobby." Thank God he's able to fix up our used equipment or we'd be bankrupt! We feel sooo blessed to live here in Maryland's farm country after growing up "inside the beltway" near DC. Now we're poor but happy wannabe farmers not too far from PA...

    Will enjoy reading here even more as I learn where folks are from. Thanks to all for making this such a welcoming forum (especially Velvet whose site I refer to often)!

  • claraserena
    15 years ago

    Welcome Rozanndanna!
    We're on 20 acres, small river, hilly, big vegetable garden, fruit trees that are due to start producing SOON and whatever flowers survive our 30-some VERY FREE ranging chickens (hens, roosters, inc a couple of bantams). The last two years we raised pigs but not this year. We also plan to raise some Cornish X this summer.
    Our rebate check is going into our barn fund--hope some day to get goats or sheep or cows or all of the above!
    Life is good!
    And this forum is awesome!

  • vancleaveterry
    15 years ago

    Welcome Rozanna.

    We have 32 acres. The front ten acres is bulldozed, and will be horse pasture with young live oaks spaced about 60 feet apart. Will be spectacular about when I die. And will then be too shady for horses.

    The next eight acres slope gently downward and is a mixed forest that I am slowly turning park like. Then a damp bottomland crosses the land with nice big mature trees. The last back few acres are high ground that I rarely visit.

    We want to raise peafowl, exotic pheasants, and Appaloosas. Hope to start a house in a few months.

    Someday bees, like my grandpa George.

  • critterkeeper
    15 years ago

    I have 68 acres, now mostly woods. on the side of a mountain. When my children were young we raised quarters horses and showed them. Only one horse left and I have used the farm to rescue farm animals and keep some chickens and other barnyard critters for the grandkids. There's lots and lots of wildlife and select cuts of the trees has provided a never-ending supply of wildflowers and birds. The small pond and creek is a watering hole for much of the wildlife that I cherish. My grandson has decided to become an ornithologist inspired, I think, by a great variety of birds these woods attract. I spend a fortune feeding them year-round along with my domestic animals.
    I finally invested in a pair of Great Pyrenees dogs that have, after many years of trying the most elaborate predator security features, have kept the predators at bay. With owls and possums and coyotes, foxes, raccoons, etc. they are a Godsend. None of my dog rescues had that livestock protecting instinct and I often had to protect my stock from my own dogs! Haven't lost a critter since I got the Pyrs. At one point I had a raccoon in my kitchen coming through the dog door! They even keep the plant-destroying deer out of my garden! I have cats and other dogs, the pigs and the goats,geese, ducks, too, that keep this Granny busy. I love them all and since I discovered this awesome website I am able to enjoy others' experiences, too. Welcome, Rozannadanna, I look forward to your tales of hobby farming!

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