Susan came over on April 1st bearing a box – and not just any box.

I think in fact her words were “Happy April Fools! I brought you ducks!”

Six of these little cuties are residing in a makeshift brooder in one of our chicken coops.  We don’t know the breed(s) or gender(s), but they’re ducks, so does it really matter?

They have a nice heat lamp to keep them warm since it hasn’t exactly warmed up yet the way it did last year at this point.  We’re excited for them to feather out so we can let them swim!

Meanwhile the chickens are giving us sure signs of spring: they’re laying eggs again.  Lots of eggs.  I am about to be overloaded again.  I am not complaining about that, though.  I’d rather be overloaded than otherwise; I actually had to buy eggs this winter.  Free – range organic eggs are not cheap, let me tell you, and I won’t have extra money to buy expensive eggs for awhile because of this:

We got a tractor.

There was just no getting around it anymore – we need a tractor.  Our road out to the pasture is usually too muddy for hay delivery, and there’s no way to move an 800 pound bale of hay without a good sized tractor.

Not to mention that we need to FINISH the pasture.

This weekend we are going to focus on penning in a portion for the animals to stay in while we remove the rest of the tree stumps from the field (again, tractor required) and get some grass growing.

I also need to focus on getting the new squash bed tilled and ready for planting in a few weeks.  I’m actually thinking I may borrow Susan’s pigs for a few weeks to dig it up and fertilize it for me.

Things are getting exciting around here!