We just came in from spending a couple hours out in the yard, playing with the pups, mucking out pens and freshening them up.
The quail were quite interested since they love pecking about in the new straw.
The little house sparrows also took notice since they, too, love to dig around and find goodies in the straw..
There were absolutely no clouds in the sky to be seen, unless you count a dissipating contrail as a cloud. 😄
Juno was happy to have a break from her puppies and took a nap in the sunshine while we relieved her of mommy duties for an hour or so…
We’ve rehomed half of the puppies now so her job is nearly finished anyway. She’ll be getting spayed soon so she’ll have years ahead to enjoy a childfree life, which I’m sure she’ll enjoy.
We did a bit of garden planning while the puppies played.
We’re trying to decide where we’ll plant everything this year. We have plenty of beds and space to add more but we want to rotate our crops and expand on a few things. We definitely want to grow more corn and potatoes and I need room for all the pumpkins I have planned.
Lucky we have plenty of time to work out all the details since we won’t be planting for several more weeks.
Of course between now and then we will have loads of work to do to get the gardens ready for seeding (as soon as the snow melts for good), and I can hardly wait!!
Empty Nest Homesteading 
Doesn’t Juno look great – queen of all she surveys. I hope she doesn’t miss her puppies too much, she’s bound to wonder where they’ve wandered off to! Mari
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She actually does miss them and we have to console her each time one goes away. She is such a sweetheart.
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I imagined so. I could never do your job, rearing lovely puppies like that and then sending them away, even to good homes. I’d worry too much about the mother and my own feelings for them would get in the way too! You must feel very sad at times, losing them like that, even though you know it has to be. No way could you ever keep them all.
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It is hard! I get very attached to each one of these pups, but we’re careful about adopting them out and we stay in touch with a lot of the families that take them. That helps a lot!
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I tried to raise quail once, but the chicks were so delicate they didn’t make it. Same with the pheasants. But the chukar did well.
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They really are delicate! We incubate the eggs and lose a few each time after they hatch. They are definitely not hearty (but they are tasty lol).
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lovely
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