Spring is springing

Frogs. Croaking and creaking and getting busy. We heard them the first time yesterday. We'd already found several huge tadpoles by bucket seining (if you can call it seining). I put them in a large vase in the kitchen and they're going through several large lettuce leaves a night. I can't wait until they start sprouting legs; it's just a crazy transformation to watch.

The ducks and turkeys have settled in well, though I have to say it's an odd experience to see ducks roosting up in the rafters of a building. Still, good it's a fox avoidance technique, don't you agree?

Duck finally worked up the nerve to nail one of the hens today. It took a surprisingly long time, but maybe I'm just used to the chickens. On! Off! ruffle and go! I hope that the hen will start laying in a place I can find; I'll maybe give those first ones to a friend who had a bad duck year. They got me started with Duck and his first two short-lived wives, so the least I can do is toss a few eggs at them. I won't be able to incubate them in the house until May since I'll be gone for 10 days this month.

I finally found someone who has built a hoop house the way I'm planning on doing it, so I have pictures and descriptions to go by to help me out. I won't be using quite the same materials, but it should work out the same. I'm also going to build the chickens a hoop tractor; I think we should be able to fit at least 50 birds in each tractor, and that would be a great way to start to revitalize a good part of the pasture.

Once I get back to town, we'll have our pigs delivered, and I'll start looking for a couple of market lambs. I'm going to take the small flock class at Shepherds Harvest, if I register in time. I wish I could have taken something like it last year, before the wheels fell off of my sheep keeping.

71 degrees today. Mostly sunny.