Snipe Hill Farm

GLUTEN FREE MENU! This weeks home catering menu is here!

Let us cook you dinner this week.

Oooooooo

Learn how to grow herbs with the LSU AgCenter's Herb Gardening in Louisiana publication: https://tinyurl.com/HerbGardeningLouisiana

Welcome 🍁 Maple

Maple is a retired “classroom” pet for children at barksdale Air Force base, who lived her time with a sweet older lady till she couldn’t care for her anymore. So Maple has come to retire with us. She’s 5+ yrs old and I believe she is a Rex although a tad overweight 🤫

She’s been an inside pet and we are hoping to find a small but decent inside cage system for her. Since my set up is very temporary.

❤️❤️ Snipe Hill Farm

Ideally, food should get dehydrated at a temperature that helps maintain nutrients and prevents the food from degrading or rotting during the drying process. You don't want to dry food so slowly it starts molding, nor do you want to dry it at temps that cook it. So what temperature should you set your electric dehydrator to? Here ya go:

Herbs: 95 degrees F.
Seeds and Nuts: 105 degrees F.
Fruits: 135 degrees F.
Fruit leather: 140 degrees F.
Vegetables: 135 degrees F.
Jerky: 160 degrees F.

Update on coop!

Hubby surprised me by moving it into place! Still needs adjusting !

I can’t wait to see the rose bushes take off climbing the frame!
Now if I can get Oreo to quit eating them! 😂😂

❤️ repurposing and restoring ❤️

Our first bass caught in the pond 🎣

The lord is faithful

Well she outlived all expectations for a one legged duck. 🦆 sadly she passed away. Peg leg was such a sweet baby ❤️

I know it looks like a hot mess now! But when it’s done ✅ omg! It’s gonna be a great fun coop!! I am super excited to transform this into our new coop! The run is getting so updates and fresh wire. Hoping to build a forage frame and re set the dust bath station !

Inside will hopefully 🤞🏻 have a small chick brooder box, storage up high, sand p**p tray below purple line nesting rods. Also storage for feed etc and then one small coop space for separating mating pairs!

I believe we have mating pairs for : French copper marans, red laced wydandotte, salmon favorelles, and lavender Orpingtons.

Can’t wait to share pics and posts along the way!

Beautiful Louisiana summer day

My garden this year was a dismal one..

But I got the blessing today of getting to pretend and enjoy this beautiful garden today with Mr. Rick Breen. His love of gardening shows. He was so kind to let me pretend it was mine for a minute and pick the pretty flowers 💐 and comb through the tomatoes 🍅 and peppers. I was reminded of my childhood with my mother and the beautiful gardens she kept as a child in Washington State. Not that I was gifted with the same green thumb 😂 I was excited to see I can try my zinnias again for fall, especially after being able to cut and play with all these pretties!

❤️❤️

Oreo is still looking for a home with friends!! She’s an intact female in Ruston!

If you must go to the ER, please be cautious, friends!

They will ask you to sign a blanket digital consent form. This form essentially gives them permission to treat you any way they see fit. It will often include the word "biologics," which means they can give you certain pharmaceutical products without asking you if you actually want them. Many people have been given one or more while out for a minor surgical procedure.

I think this is wrong. Outside of immediate, life-saving care, you should be able to consent to interventions (or not) on a case-by-case basis.

To protect your rights:
1. Ask for a paper version to sign. They can print one out for you, although some will not want to do this.

2. Carefully read through it, and cross out sections you don't agree to
initial and date next to the cross-outs.

3. Ask for a photocopy. Sadly, some hospitals have been caught swapping out papers for clean copies or using white-out to make it look like people consented when they didn't. Having a copy of what you actually signed will protect you in case of a discrepancy.

4. Know your rights. The ER is required to treat people on an emergency basis. But some will try to ask you to leave if you do this because they don't want to be questioned. Stand up for yourself.

5. Avoid the ER if possible! Learn to treat common symptoms at home so that you don't need to go in. Mild to moderate fevers, sore throats, and most run-of-the-mill symptoms don't need mainstream care. (And if you need help learning, just ask!)

Best way to test cow for pregnancy prefer not to carry to vet just yet till we get a positive test.

Picture is for reference .

Anyone buy something like this on Amazon or from a vet to do on the farm?

One of the most common questions that I get is why we keep different kinds of chickens - especially layers vs broilers.

I think a picture is worth a thousand words, but let’s chat about it 🙌🏼.

🐓 There are 3 general groups of chickens:

🥚𝗟𝗮𝘆𝗲𝗿𝘀: these are your efficient egg layers! They put most of their energy into producing eggs, so they tend to be lean birds and are generally not prized for eating. We do utilize the extra roosters from hatching (see bird on the right of the photo), but they are best used for soup because of how little they are. They are also a lot more active, which leads to tougher meat, so a slow-cooking soup is a great option!

🍗𝗕𝗿𝗼𝗶𝗹𝗲𝗿𝘀: these are your meat chickens! They put ALL of their energy into growth and some do it super fast. The most popular breed is the Cornish cross, which can reach full size in just 6-8 weeks 😱. This breed freaks me out a little… so we raise red rangers (see bird on the left), which finishes in 13-16 weeks. This may seem slow, but in comparison… the little rooster on the right was actually quite a bit older! Broilers will continue to grow until their body basically gives out (can’t stand, heart attack, etc.) so really their only future is on a plate. It’s rare that they can live a full life, even if given the chance 😕.

🥚🍗𝗗𝘂𝗮𝗹-𝗣𝘂𝗿𝗽𝗼𝘀𝗲: these chickens are decent at both! They are a meatier chicken that can still live a full normal life while also producing a fair amount of eggs. This is what folks used back in the day - they would raise the hens for eggs (and retire them as “stewing hens”) and utilize the roosters for 🍗. However, dual purpose breeds take quite a bit longer than the broilers to reach their finish weight (22 weeks) and are less economical to raise (at least 2x as expensive).

I think we’ve found a happy medium using the red rangers. They are fairly economical to raise, but don’t grow quite as scary fast as the Cornish cross. Longer time on pasture = higher amounts of antioxidants, vitamin D and omega 3’s!

If you’d like to learn more about raising meat chickens, I'd love to teach you everything that I know! Enroll in my course for 10% off with my code "HOMEGROWN10" -> https://learn.thehomesteadingrd.com/meat-chickens-landing-page/