Ms. MacDonald's Farm

Directions

Ms. MacDonald's Farm Growing food. Raising animals. Building a life rooted in the land. Small-scale homestead in Northern Michigan. Sharing the journey - from seed to harvest.

10/12/2026

šŸ“¢ The egg stand will be closed for the next week.

Preserving this yearā€™s catnip harvest. Fred gives it 2 paws up šŸ‘
10/12/2026

Preserving this yearā€™s catnip harvest.

Fred gives it 2 paws up šŸ‘

10/03/2026

The ladies have been molting so egg production has slowed, but weā€™ve got 1 dozen in the egg stand today!

Weā€™re getting our first freeze tonight, and Iā€™m reminded of this green tomato bruschetta.I cannot wait to make it with a...
10/03/2026

Weā€™re getting our first freeze tonight, and Iā€™m reminded of this green tomato bruschetta.

I cannot wait to make it with all of the green tomatoes I pulled šŸ’š

Iā€™ve moved on from pork broth to beef broth, and this time, I pressure canned it. Thereā€™s something ridiculously satisfy...
09/29/2026

Iā€™ve moved on from pork broth to beef broth, and this time, I pressure canned it.

Thereā€™s something ridiculously satisfying about seeing my homemade broth in jars on the shelf, knowing exactly what went into it and how much time went into making it.

Thereā€™s just one problemā€¦ Now I donā€™t want to use it. šŸ˜‚

The entire point of making and preserving food is to actually EAT IT, but those beautiful jars of beef broth suddenly feel way too precious to crack open.

Please tell me Iā€™m not the only person who preserves food and then has to convince themselves that theyā€™re actually allowed to use it.

Our yard has looked like a magical little fairyland of toadstools this year. šŸ„āœØEverywhere I turn, there seems to be anot...
09/18/2026

Our yard has looked like a magical little fairyland of toadstools this year. šŸ„āœØ

Everywhere I turn, there seems to be another mushroom popping up. Different shapes, different sizes, different colors. And it got me wonderingā€¦ why THIS year?

Turns out, thereā€™s actually a pretty cool explanation.

The mushrooms are only the fruiting bodies of a much larger fungus living beneath the soil. The main part, called mycelium, quietly lives underground for years, breaking down old roots, wood, leaves and other organic matter.

Then when the conditions line up just right, especially plenty of moisture (like weā€™ve seen this year), humidity and the right temperatures, and suddenlyā€¦ mushrooms everywhere.

So itā€™s likely that we donā€™t have more fungus in our yard this year. This might just be the year that conditions were perfect for us to finally see whatā€™s been living beneath our feet all along.

Iā€™m probably in my fifth year of owning chickens now, if I combine the years I had a small backyard flock in Arizona wit...
09/11/2026

Iā€™m probably in my fifth year of owning chickens now, if I combine the years I had a small backyard flock in Arizona with my time raising them here in Michigan.

And one thing Iā€™ve learned is that the longer you keep chickens, the more things you eventually encounter. šŸ˜‚

Iā€™ve had a chicken eat an egg here or there over the years, usually one that was already cracked. But now, Iā€™ve got at least one bonafide egg eater.

And sheā€™s gotten good at it.

Itā€™s gotten to the point that itā€™s noticeably impacting my daily egg collection, even though Iā€™ve always collected eggs at least twice a day.

There are quite a few ways people deal with egg eaters. Some use little ā€œblindersā€ that prevent the chicken from seeing directly in front of her. Some try to identify the culprit and cull her from the flock. Another method is filling the nesting boxes with fake eggs. The chicken keeps pecking at something that looks like an egg but gets no reward because she canā€™t break it.

Thatā€™s the route Iā€™m trying first.

Thankfully, I still had a couple of fake wooden eggs from when I moved back to Michigan and was teaching my first flock where I wanted them to lay. I put those back in the nesting boxes today.

Day one, and so far, Iā€™m already seeing some positive progress. šŸ¤ž

I have more wooden eggs coming, and I plan to distribute them throughout the nesting boxes and see how things go.

I also think I may have accidentally helped create this problem.

Whenever I have a cracked egg, Iā€™ve always tossed it to the chickens rather than wasting it. I never thought much of it because chickens eating eggs isnā€™t inherently a problem. But Iā€™m starting to wonder if repeatedly giving them recognizable cracked eggs helped teach somebody that an egg = a tasty snack.

So that practice is changing too. Iā€™ll still feed cracked eggs back to them, but from now on theyā€™ll be thoroughly smashed up so thereā€™s no recognizable egg left.

Five-ish years into keeping chickens and apparently theyā€™re still finding new ways to keep me on my toes. šŸ˜‚

Now weā€™ll see if I can convince my little egg thief that wooden eggs are a terrible snack.

After years of wanting a Roo Apron, I finally found a great deal on one on Mercari and couldnā€™t pass it up. And I have t...
09/11/2026

After years of wanting a Roo Apron, I finally found a great deal on one on Mercari and couldnā€™t pass it up.

And I have to sayā€¦ I get the hype.

Thereā€™s something incredibly satisfying about walking out to the garden empty-handed and coming back with your apron full of food.

Pretty sure this is going to become a garden-season staple around here.

Also, peep the sad onion harvest previously mentioned. šŸ˜‚

Address

Frederic, MI

Website

Alerts

Be the first to know and let us send you an email when Ms. MacDonald's Farm posts news and promotions. Your email address will not be used for any other purpose, and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Shortcuts

Share

Category