The Spell of the Feed Store

Every homestead needs a dog or two. Right?

I was particularly wanting a small dog to help clean up around the house. Even considered naming the dog Roomba. With six kids there ends up being a good quantity of food that hits the floor, making it necessary to sweep 3 times a day or more to keep the mice at bay.

So once we finished moving to the homestead the search began. We hoped to find a miniature dachshund in need of a new home, but our endeavors there came to naught. We looked all over craigslist and shelters for the right dog.

Finally we received a reply from one listing that featured two small dogs at an affordable price. So we jumped at the chance to add our first animals to our homestead.

Later that day we brought home Misters Huckleberry and Finn. They are terrier/chihuahua mixes.

They almost immediately started licking the floor, chair legs, and table feet. Now there is a little less food mess for this tired mama to clean up each night, and there are happy kiddos loving their dogs.

Having dogs means a need for dog food. So we made our very first trip to our local feed store, which happens to be right down the road from us.

They did not sell puppy food, but they did have quite the selection of fowl to choose from. We took down prices and went home to plan how many we would order. Little did we know that we had already fallen under the spell of the feed store.

Soon after the dogs came bunnies.

Now I didn’t intend to start out with fiber rabbits right away, but I found a beautiful Angora female with full set up for a great price.

So Helga joined the homestead, followed shortly by Herbert.

And so we ended up with fiber rabbits before food rabbits.

I must admit that I am a wee bit excited to try my hand at Angora yarn this summer. Perhaps bunny slippers are in order.

So we ended up with 4 animals in short order. These, of course, were followed by many more.

We returned to the feed store, and ordered 2 turkeys, 2 female ducks, 2 geese, and 31 chicks. However, we requested that they not arrive before mid to late april, due to late winter snowfalls.

In the mean time we had rabbits to care for. So I sent my second oldest child down to the feed store to buy pine shavings for the rabbits’ bedding. She came home with news that there were early chicks available at the feed store. She then returned to the feed store with our wagon to bring home the bags of shavings. While there she convinced the owner of the feed store to call me and let me know that there were early chicks available… again. And so the spell tightened.

I laughed, oblivious to the trap, and told her that she could send my daughter home with two chicks and the shavings.

It was only then, of course, that I realized my mistake and thr craftiness of the feed store spell. We didn’t have the feed or lights, or water and food containers for the chicks. That sly feed store had got me good.

So back to the feed store we went. This time I went myself, in order to make sure we got everything we needed for our new chicks.

Here is where my next mistake comes in. If Mama goes, everyone goes. Do not take 6 kids into a feed store where they are selling chicks. We left the feed store with a heating lamp, food and water dishes, chicken feed and 5 more adorable fluffy chicks…

Bringing our grand total of unplanned chicks to 7.

Thankfully we had kept an old dryer drum, so that became our brooder.

It was only then that I realized that I had made another mistake.

We had purchased exactly 1 Cornish Rock chick. These chicks must be separated from the others because they are butchering chickens that grow very quickly and cannot be free fed, due to their tendency to over eat and have heart attacks. (Lovingly nicknamed Heart-attackens around here.)

Well, how could we possibly separate one poor chick from the rest and put him in a brooder all by himself?

So when my husband got home guess what we did…

We went back to the feed store to purchase a second heat lamp, a second set of food and water dishes, and of course 6 more chicks…

Bringing our total of unplanned chicks to 13.

Now we were well and truly caught in the clutches of the feed store, because we had to return there regularly for feed…

Then we got a trampoline for the kids. However, out here on the prairie, if one wishes to keep a trampoline, one must use cinder blocks to keep it from blowing away into neighboring fields.

So, silly me, I sent my second eldest to the feed store again in search of cinder blocks.

She came home to tell me that there were ducklings and goslings at the feed store.

Thinking myself rather wise to the charms of the feed store, I told her no, our order was coming in the next 2 weeks.

Then the Grandparents arrived.

Grandma and Grandpa took the kids to the feed store and quickly fell victim to the spell. Soon our unplanned flock had 6 ducklings added to it. One for each kiddo. Learning later that they were all male.

Later that very week our order came in. Suddenly we were bombarded with our 37 planned fowl.

The older chicks needed to move out and make way for the new ones. So temporary coops were built, and chickens were moved.

Then to our chagrin we realized that since we moved the larger birds out and still needed the brooders for the smaller ones, we needed double the food and water dishes and two more heat lamps.