The Ice Storm

.

The ice storm today shut the city down. It's an inside chore day. I'll have to wait till the weather clears to keep going on the garden:

The chickens are laying very well now that the 15% sprouted lentil ration has kicked in. It usually takes about a week before we see the results of a dietary change. Our 11 starter hens were laying an average of 3 to 3.5 eggs a day over the past month. The last 4 days they've laid 26 eggs! That's 6.5 per day. We got 8 today, a record for the new flock:

But they have eaten 2 voles over the last week, and that may be causing the spike. They've also been getting a little fish oil as well, as we're trying eating high-DHA fish twice a week, like herring, salmon, and mackerel, following the research of Weston Price on worldwide indigenous and traditional whole foods diets.

The bucket-sprouting we resorted to to pull the chickens off fodder till we're back on track has done surprisingly well. 2 pounds of grain are filling out into 7 pounds of sprouts quite rapidly, with good root growth. If we can get some green shoots going with a day in the light it may be something to continue with the birds, as we've got limited shelf space, and once the does go into milk they'll eat far more fodder.
.