Billy I guess mother nature figured you have enough issues without that storm. Glad to hear your feeling a little better. I was just thinking if my grandmother was alive and you where that sick you would get well just to stop eating chicken soup by now… she was a big believer in feeding you chicken soup until you got better.
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Funny Dan, we only had enough soup if my grandmother could see it in our eyeballs. My grandmother and mother ( both born in Czechoslovakia) were big on the cure for the common cold, chicken soup!
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I wish I had an appetite to eat anything. chicken soup or anything else…I’ve lost almost 20 lbs. the last few weeks. Nothing sounds good to eat.
Today is some better. I’ve been out of bed most of the day----doing taxes----not sure if the nausea is from the sickness or the taxes… 
I think I’ll go lie down now.
We had a fire around here yesterday too. The wind was real bad. My family did a training without me for a group from Tuskeegee university. Four hours after the training an ember from one of the stoves must have blown out and lit some leaves. Burnt a section of bleachers in the teaching shed…
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I can relate how something unknown can happen an the situation gets out of hand so fast. I hope it wasn’t to big of a loss. TomC
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The wolves were hungry last night. Not much waste left from this deer. This is near my closest neighbor’s house about a mile and a half from me on the road to my place.
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I’m not sure this video belongs under the topic " Life goes on "
I think it should have been " BTU experimentation " 
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Well at least you will get something out of your investment in the chickens… That is probably better then just digging a hole…
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Hello Mr Wayne,
Is that the famous “St Clair fried chicken”? 
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Hello JO .
I’m sure the chickens have past the fried stage and are very well over cooked .
Although the fuel was poultry and wood the truck purred like a kitten 
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Ha! Ha! Yes, let this winter topic line ride for a bit more. Three inches of snow last night. Mostly gone now 12 hours later. Probably another spell of it again to night.
Two days of clear blue sky 60F four days ago; with a five days no-rain so-so drying out so I was able to mud-in my 30 Oregon Ash, and 30 Red Alder tree whips.
The Pacific willow plantings did not come available again this year. I filled in with the Ash planting in my wet field spot, instead.
Oh well. Any that live will be one year not wasted, not trees growing on that spot…
Tree-farmer Steve unruh
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It’s hard for me to call it winter with all the buds, blossoms and leaves and pollen around here, but I’ll go along with it out of sympathy for you snow bound folks.
Pneumonia: I’m on my fourth course of antibiotics and still not totally out of the woods, but I am a lot better.
But I guess age does have some benefits because while I was sick the boys finished the first concrete dome, built a charcoal furnace, finished the septic/bio-gas project, planted the early garden, wired the teaching pavilion and the stove shed with lights, rebuilt the rear end in the Suburban, plumbed the irrigation system, rebuilt all the creekside pumps, taught 3 groups of university students, and did all the mechanic work that came along while I was down.
Makes a guy feel almost un-needed. haha
Problem is they will soon grow up and get married and then I’ll have to wait for grand children to grow up.
Some of us are heading to PA tomorrow for a missions conference. Some will stay here and get ready for the spring/summer program season…
Life goes on…
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At leaste the snakes wont get a. Apitite for chickens. Or did the fox get them.?I never raised chickens but eat mostly chicken eggs.what kind of animal kills all them chickens with out eating them, or was the animal going for the eggs.?
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Hello Kevin .
The cold weather got a few baby chicks . Not complaining as we have three dozen little ones doing good .
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Billy, I really commend you for bringing your kids up to be so capable. Most youngins today can barely wipe their own behinds.
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Weasels are the killers! At least that’s what slaughtered ALL my chickens! You need some BIG cats!
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Almost ready to set my swarm traps in trees next month. I built these traps, and frames from poplar off the band mill. These are called Layens horizontal hives, frames.
The viles in the last picture is where the lure goes.
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Thanks Wayne K i gess getting used too the heat aint good for Baby chickens wayyy dowwn south, Happy farming and SWEMS.
Well, even with new snow just above me higher up in the hills Wifie’s early Spring flowers saying it IS actually springtime. Flowering tree buds and leaf buds swollen ready to pop given just a few warmer sunny days.
Springtime is clean up the woodshed of junk woodfuels portions.
Piles of shed accumulated bark slabs off of the woodsplits.
All of the splitting areas now have an accumulated 4 inch layer of small bark chunks, split chips and debris.
And . . . still too many dense pitch-y chunks left over. They get gooey sticky if left to summer over.
Ha! real trial woodstove burning up these problems portions.
It’s all good. Less daily heating needed with some days just a morning break-chill heat burst needed. And with just maybe 4-6 hours of woodstove heating in the evenings before bedtime.
Pitch splits get used up rip-roaring over airing the now two daily starting up fires. No fine split kindling used at all.
Couple of good solid wood chunk-splits to make a char bed and the bark gets teepee’ed burnt up 2-3 broken crisscrossed slabs at a time. Otherwise it heat flares out too hot. Leaves too much ash choking off the gasses exchanges and shielding the charbed. Doug Fir bark IS natures wildfire jacket for the trees. Really does not want to readily burn.
And the woodshed floor mixed debris get wood stoved in accumulated paper grocer sacks. Yep. Onto an alrady established char bed. One sack at a time.
Good thing I am retired and like woodstove sitting these difficult portions.
I just do not like to see wood wasted.
And as the saying goes; “Somebody has to use up all of the dark meat on a chicken! Only Fancy’s insist to only eat pure white meat strips and nuggets.”
Regards - and spring will come to all
tree farmer Steve unruh
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It has been warm enough to thaw and dry accumulated bark in my all steel brown box trailer. Today before the rain I shoveled a bunch into the outdoor wood furnace. Each spring I heat my house for a few days with that season’s bark and bits from splitting and moving wood. At my property where I process the wood I will probably move a part trailer load of scraps home for a few fires.
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I don’t burn much bark here. I grind some to mix in potting soil. I also use it for mulch. Not only in the garden but also in a shady area by the edge of the woods where the soil stays moist. It’s great for accumulating bugs and worms for chicken food. Then on to the compost or directly to the garden beds. The small splinters and such are used as kindling or charcoal production .
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