I found this: "Once an Emu chick absorbs the yolk sac at about 10 days after hatch, these birds are very hardy and only require normal livestock hygiene and maintenance.... "We feed our emu chicks a special feed that has been prepared specially for us by Lanark Leeds Distributor. It consists of 18-20% protein pellet mixed with crushed corn, wheat and soya bean." I would dip his beak in some water and give him fresh water every day. Go to your feed store and see if they have anything that resembles the above formula and mix in some chopped greens. Sit with the bird and simulate picking at the food and greens. Show him how it's done. Show him every day until he gets it. Don't wait for the yolk to be absorbed. "Newly hatched chicks cannot regulate their body heat and need a source of warmth until 3 months old if the outside temperature is cold. Maintain temperature at 90 to 95 degrees F for the first 3 days after hatch. Decrease temperature 5 degrees every 2 weeks. In warm weather, use supplemental heat only at night. The heat source should be of adequate size for all chicks to get around it, and the pen area should be large enough so the chicks can get away from the heat to avoid overheating. Brooder boxes for chicks 1 to 3 days old are typically about 1 foot high and 2 x 3 or 3 x 4 feet in area per 10 chicks. Chicks may pile and smother one another. Avoid overcrowding, extremes of heat or cold and sudden frightening of the chicks. Piling generally becomes less of a problem after the first few weeks. The floor of the brooding area must be easy to clean and have good traction. Chicks can be moved to an 8 x 8-foot nursery pen at approximately 70 to 85 degrees F on day four and then into progressively larger pens. Encourage outside exercise periods and sunbathing starting at 5 to 7 days of age, depending on the weather. Separate juvenile groups by age and/or size into large communal pens (50 x 100 feet) or pastures. Grass usually survives well in emu pens except along the fence, where the birds' tendency to fencewalk kills it. Many farmers feed newly hatched chicks a mixture of chopped greens, a commercial starter crumble and a vitamin/mineral supplement. The greens are thought to attract the birds to the feeder and stimulate feed consumption. Water may be offered before food by about 12 hours. Grit is offered with the food although it is not necessary if feeding a processed commercial diet. Chicks are usually fed twice a day for about an hour. Diets are usually in a small pellet or large crumble form for chicks. Fiber content varies between 7 and 15 percent. Some nutritionists recommend fiber content between 5 and 10 percent. Diets with more than 25 percent protein (such as dog food and catfish chow) have been associated with growth problems in young emu. Breeder diets contain additional calcium, or calcium can be offered "free choice" in the form of oyster shell. Breeders that are too fat do not appear to reproduce as well as those in normal condition. Some emu producers prefer free choice feeding systems, while others prefer one to three daily feedings. However, multiple daily feedings provide a time for interaction with the birds, making it easier to detect illness and control an individual bird's weight." Good luck

One of my joys of ws is having lots of sprouts to share with others. It's is sad that you had to give away those you would have planted. We humans also go through seasons, some where we are busy and active and others seasons where we need to re-coop our physical and mental health through less activity. Great that your family members are able to use your sprouts and seeds. That way you will be able to visit and see them grow. Sounds like you have enough planted in your gardens to allow you to putter and enjoy gardening at a more relaxed pace this year. Saturday evening I sat in my backyard satisfied with the results of a busy day transplanting and moving garden plants around and contemplating the work that needs to be done in the next week. The quiet and wafting lilac scent was relaxing.

Hi Michael, I grew several varieties of patty pan this year and it is my first year as a market farmer. I grew the yellow sunburst and then a mix from Rebecca's Garden or Sheppard's can't remember which, which had the dark green, yellow and lime colored patty pans. I also grew two types of zucchini, one was a dark green and the other a gray stripe and then a golden zucchini. I also grew white pattypans (an heirloom variety), a papaya shaped summer squash and Lebanese coosa squash. The patty pans were extremely prolific! At first, I had trouble selling them. I had seen the baby squash at the grocery store for $3.99 for a package of about 10 of them. I harvested at various sizes. I found I had to educate people about how to prepare them. Many people seemed intimidated by the color, shape, etc. Many asked me what to do with them. I made a sheet of recipes for the patty pans for sauteeing the baby and mid-sized (3-4 inch) squash and for stuffing and baking the large squash. I also gave out free samples of fresh squash because I had so much. No one else was selling squash so I didn't think I was stepping on any toes. After two weeks of doing that, people started coming around and asking after the squash. I sort of had a reputation of being the man with the squash. I agree with the others about checking with your restaurant customers first too. Another note, on my zucchinis, whenever they would hide from me and then I'd find the huge ones, I put together some recipes for muffins and bread and a quick how-to for grating and freezing zucchini for use at a later date. I never had to take home an oversized zucchini after that. I also made bread and muffins myself and froze some of those for later use. The papaya shaped squash became a big hit when I showed customers how to hollow them out and stuff and back them as colorful and individual accompaniments to a meal. I plan on growing a few more different varieties of squash next year. I only harvested a few Coosa as I planted them later in the season but I always sold them. I enjoy talking about my produce and people like to talk about food. They also loved the idea of free recipes to take home and would often come back to let me know how it worked out. I can't wait for next year and squash is so healthy and low-fat eating!

PA, this is weird. I don't have a block under my photos that says "HTML THUMB". The second one down says "DIRECT LINK" I use the "HTML code" for large pictures. I used to check the box under the picture, go to the bottom right and click on something (forgot what it said, but it is no longer there) and a thumbnail code was created. I tried the "IMG Thumb" and it doesn't work for GW. This is how the codes are lined up on my Photobuck Account: Email & IM Direct link HTML code IMG code IMG thumb Any ideas anyone?