My Greenhouse is FLOODING | Quick Fix, for Now

What we're supposed to do this morning besides chores is catch some little old lady hens. It's snowy, there's rain on top of that, and we've got to do chores. But wait a minute, our animals are under shelter. Yes! Well, these are the only guys left outside. Oh wow, they are done tilling. It took just a few days for them to till a raised bed, but I'm not going to move them today because chickens do not like walking on snow. What you doing? Are they laying eggs?

Yeah, they've laid 2 eggs.

Oh nice. I am seeing this gap here. I could screw a 2x4 in. I want to prevent that because if other people want to do this And if I want to continue to do this, I don't want to screw in a 2x4 every year. Eventually it's going to wear out that bed. I'm thinking we could just put a— if this is 8 feet, we could just put a 2x6 in there and just— we could do it on the other side too because there's room. What happens when we're over here and we have this trellis? Well, then hopefully the chicken tractor will sit right there, and then we could put one board there, and then we could put some short ones here. That'd be easy enough to teach others how to do. Guys, everything I do here, it's not just for our homestead. It's with the idea of empowering you guys to do the same. You might not want to do the total Old MacDonald E-I-E-I-O farm that we have, but just this little chicken tractor, 4 or 5 chickens, and a raised bed might inspire you. So That's why I'm always trying to work and keep in mind that others might want to do this too, and how to make that possible in the most easiest way. I kind of wish my tractor was sitting on it a little bit better. In fact, back here, this is barely on it. Back here, it's on it maybe an inch. I mean, I guess it's working out. I'm trying to avoid having to totally redesign my chicken tractor. Yes! Mr. Brown is outside. He's kind of bumped his head sledding this morning. All right, we'll help him out. What we're supposed to do this morning besides chores is catch some little old lady hens. Remember what Joel said about 3 factors for winter laying success? Age, light, light we can do nothing about, and comfort. Our chickens are comfortable now in the greenhouse, but, uh, can't do anything about the light. They are old, some of them, so we're giving some away. Here you go, buddy. You feeling any better? Okay. Yeah, you're gonna have a little shiner. Of course, these people are fully aware that these are old ladies, little old ladies. But to somebody who has no chickens, little old ladies who give you some eggs— I mean, they're not in the height of their production, but a chicken will lay an egg the rest of her life. They just drop egg production, they tell me, like 50% as they get older. And our young chicks are now of age that we got last spring and are laying, so it's time. I mean, really, it's time 3, 4 months ago, but we're doing what we can. What's going on? Is this— are the snowballs good? I guess, I guess he tries on me. That didn't mean turn on me. Is it too wet or what?

It's a little wet, but it's good sledding.

Is it? We're getting serious about our fat hen program this year. That's the system where We get larger boned chickens to follow our cows on pasture. They got to be able to stay in a sheep net, and we, we tried it last year. We had some of our littler birds get out. Those are kind of the ones we're going to go after today. That's why I say little old ladies. We're also getting some— I'm going to call them rock stars. They're red stars, black stars, really a hybrid breed, really meant for egg production. So we're really going to get serious. Maybe we'll even sell some eggs. Your water's working out great, Lily. Did you feed them this morning too? Okay, there is one little old lady in here. That black hen, she's got a green band. Does the green band mean— you guys remember, does the green band mean— I think it means they got out of a net. Does them— does— oh, once. What happens the second time? Yeah, so green band Is that what that means, or did we mark a posse? Okay, can you guys come catch this little bird in here? Guys, guard the door. Lily, Lily, just grab that little one right there.

This one?

Yes, that one. Hi! Oh, is that Kai? Okay, well then grab that white little one.

This one.

This is the old lady.

Is it? All right, hand it to Jonah. That's— now that's a fat old lady, but All right, I try not to get too attached because we're trying to be serious homesteaders here, prioritizing to grow our food. That is kind of, you know, we got that one fat old lady when we got back from the Great American Farm Tour, so a little bit of sentiment there, but that's old. That's like 3 years now, and she was already old when we got her. She's probably like 5 or 6. Jonah, can you kind of help, like, reach in and grab the chicken? Good job.

I don't want to get rid of Kai.

No, don't get rid of Kai. Get rid of the little white one, and the black one's fine. So as we were catching those chickens and I was telling Lily which one to get, I told her to get the white one.

And I don't want to get rid of the little black white one either.

She didn't want to catch the white one, and at first I was like, ah, we gotta do it. I mean, come on, all these kids would keep all these animals, I think, if they could. And then we would have no eggs and we'd be feeding hundreds of pounds of grain a day. But then my heart melted. I guess she's my little girl, but I've got to stop it at 2, right? Okay, you want to keep the white one?

Yeah.

All right, call me softy. All right, take the black one. We're already keeping one, like Kai. Like, uh, we named it after a vlog fan's spouse. And, uh, long story there, but I thought one mascot was enough, but I guess two won't absolutely kill us. That is a little, little lady, so she is prone to get out. Forget putting her in the pasture, she'll have to be in the breakfast posse there in the front yard. We got this far with the 2 chickens. We're about to go catch the others. You hear the pigs? Yeah, we haven't fed them yet. And look, the posse is barging the door, so we need to get them occupied and fed, then we can catch the rest of these chickens. We only have about 25 minutes to do that till the man gets here, but I think that'll be just fine. We've got our feed. We still have a busted door handle. You got a trick, Josiah? I got a trick too. One of you boys go, go around and open it for us. You're gonna climb over, Josie?

Yeah.

Can you? Nice. No luck?

No.

Well, let's feed the pigs from the other side. And I'll climb through from the other side to see if I can't open it. Boy, we're kind of going from one problem to the next. Where is all that water coming from? Do we have a leak? This drips, but I don't think that much because look how much water is still left in there. There hasn't been enough to come out to Still a hole full of water. I just realized what that's from. We're catching all the water of the greenhouse that's going down in there. Easiest route under the ground, on top of the soil there, getting into the pigs. This is a problem because deep bedding is not going to work if it gets wet. Now thankfully it's not the entire area, she's got some dry spots. But for this to absorb her— absorb her poop and pee, it's got to be dry. There we go. Now we need to break this off, and we need to just start leaning something against the door until we can get it fixed. This is my temporary fix, a little twig holding that open. This lock has broken, and so when you pull this lever, it doesn't pull it back. So we're just gonna hold it back with that twig until we can get it fixed, and we'll have to shut this door. I'll put a bucket in front of it or something. Okay, okay. You started to put mulch on top of it. Uh, I might have— I might have gotten a bucket and thrown some of that water out first. Okay, let's just do like probably 2 or 3 wheelbarrow loads. The thing is, I— on a day like today, it's snowy. It's cold, it's Sunday, it's winter. I kind of want to just get the chores done and be done, not have any projects, but we got to keep things going. So instead of fixing that door latch today, I'll put the twig in there. This has to be fixed. I mean, long-term fix is probably— well, can you put a gutter on a greenhouse? A gutter, or at least a ditch out there to take that water away from the greenhouse, but that's obviously a long-term bigger project. All right, there's an icy right there. These old Icelandic chickens are, are, uh, definitely not gonna stay in a sheep net. They're so small. Lily, will you— you got one? You could take that to your chicken tractor. We're, uh, we've got enough. That's 7. We got our chickens up and ready to go. This is our other greenhouse. You can see, you can see exactly what's happening down there at the pigs. We've got a puddle here, it runs here. Look, you can see water coming down the greenhouse and it's super muddy. My foot is slipping as I'm talking. So water's coming down in. That's Eventually this water, it's sloped that way, will go that way. But if this were a deep bedding for a pig, this might seep up through. So I'll have to see if they have a gutter option. Hey, look who decided to come! Nice, Ginger! It's been a while. Yeah, let's don't tell anybody it's really me, okay? Okay, I gave it away. They want to see you anyway. They're all in their pajamas watching anyway. That's true.

That's true.

All right, all right, good. My late dad's wife and Ethan, her son Ian. Ian, so what are you gonna do with these, Ian?

Hopefully get some eggs out of them.

Yeah, they're, they're old, they're not in their prime, but you'll get something.

Yeah, that'll be fine. All right, that'd be better than nothing at this point. Okay, we got a few little ones over there already.

All right, good. Are they going to be yours, little man? You gonna help? Yeah, I bet that'll be fun for you.

Are you excited? We're gonna go put the chickens up.

Yeah.

Okay, Ian's gonna give it a try. He asked if there's an art to it. I would say yes, it's more than science. So you, you kind of pinch off the top and then squeeze. You pinch off the top to prevent it from running back up. Okay, there you go. That right hand nailed it. My left hand is kind of numb. That's— that's— and she's got a small teat too, so we actually end up milking her with just a couple of fingers. What do you like, cows or sheep? You like them both? How was it, Ian?

It was awesome. That's fantastic.

Yeah, your first few times milking, you might want to bring an audiobook down, podcast. It's gonna take a while.

Look, yeah, the professional.

You squeeze easy, and you don't squeeze too hard, and no milk will come out.

She's learned. But they're fast.

The reason they're fast is because they want to get it done.

I forgot to put cream on Phyllis. She's got a bit of a— it's a different issue this time. Her teat is dry. This is why she's nearing retirement. Her teat is dry. Uh, we're gonna let— keep the calf off her for another hour. I'm gonna put this cream on her. Here, let's do this while Flossy isn't in there. Between her getting mastitis and getting clogged up and Pete's getting sore and then getting picked on by the older— the other animals, just confirming her retirement soon. I don't know if retirement is the right word for it. Harvest or graduation. She's been a good cow, but she is getting up there in age. And I'd like to do that before, you know, she goes too far downhill and she becomes miserable, uh, and/or a lot more trouble. Meanwhile, beautiful one, my baby's mama, prepping for the baby. So what you cooking?

I think I'm just gonna cook the chicken and then I'm gonna make a, um, it's called chicken pot pie soup. So I'm gonna— I just would shred the chicken and use it in the soup. And then I still need to make my tomato soup, and then I was gonna make a broccoli soup.

You feel like you're ready? You feel like you're ready to push this baby out? Oh yeah. Are you still nervous about it?

No, I'm, I'm Doing a lot of preparation, mind preparation, to get ready for it. But I am, I'm ready, ready for him to grow a little bit bigger so that we can go into labor and have him out and hold him. Then I can eat all my soup that I made.

You're always holding the baby.

I am.

Someone noticed that. It's just so cute how you're always holding the baby.

Well, he needs to know that I love him.

So, you know, he's rubbing on him, talking to him. This is a handy trick she's gonna do. We've got these— are these Super Cubes? Yeah, we've frozen— she's made some potato soup. Now that it's frozen, we're gonna get them out and we can put them in a, in a bag, and then we can put her chicken soup in this. The end.

Yep. Freeze it.

Well, almost. We'll stick it in the freezer. Yep, and then put it in Ziploc bags and you've got a meal. That's fast food, babe.

This is like, this is 8. I'll have 8 meals from each soup and I have 4 soups, so I have 32 meals.

In one day you can make 3 different kinds of soups, 36 different meals. 32. 32 meals because you're making a bunch of meals in one soup.

Yeah, well, I want to eat a lot of soup after the baby comes because I've been reading in the book First 40 Days, just talks about warming foods are really good for healing, and soup is a warming food.

So good, and it'll be nice and cool still.

So it will be cool, that's good, still be cool, and it'll be Well, the broth is so good. It'll be just good for healing, the collagen, gelatin in it, so.