Journal Entry #1

 Rancher Ashkan: "I am afraid one of the voles escaped and ate our previous reports... We will try and make sure that does not happen again." 

 Rancher Steve: "So far the only successful ranch we have been able to establish is with the Pacu. They are providing us with fillet regularly, but with the sudden and late increase in population it is not enough to  keep us well fed most of the time. We need to add another sweeper in the Evolution chamber so they produce more."

Rancher Askhan: "We had a regular provision of meat coming from our Hatch ranch while it was inside the base but we had to move them out to make space for more beds. By that point there was only a few atmo suits available and we had to fight over them with the diggers and builders... All Hatches  have now been safely moved outside the core base but the building is far from finished and we need the automation installed soon. We asked for a rush order but an imminently erupting natural gas geyser that was not ready took priority."

Rancher Steve: "The Dreckos and Glossy Dreckos ranch need to be moved too. They do not have enough space and a lot of the hydrogen escaped so we need to build it bigger and use a liquid lock to avoid the gas escaping again. We are debating using Mealwood again, which would require some oxygen in the room, or Pincha Pepperplant and Bristle Blossoms if we can arrange some irrigation."

Rancher Ashkan: "We are still at a loss with the Shine Bugs. They were wiped out when the automation had a bug and removed all eggs. We could not correct it in time. Since then we made improvements to our system and the eggs are now carried away as they should."

Rancher Steve: "Our only problem is currently with the eggs we hatch for the solar panel. The door keeps them in place but then they get overcrowded and do not emit light. We have tried using water to keep them in place and so far, even with up to 800kg of water they are just flying around the room as soon as they hatch. We are going to try adding Brine maybe, see if it will keep them in place."

Rancher Ashkan: "We have a few pips that we move from time to time to nice areas with plants. We have yet to find a single tree on this asteroid so they are wild but they look happy enough."

Rancher Steve: "We also got voles from the printing pod. They laid eggs but since then we do not see any sign of life coming from their isolated room. Now that we have access to some metal production we should be better prepared to contain them next time."

Added notes to the report:

1 - The Pacu ranch is from here except with limited automation as we only just installed a Metal Refinery. It was only removing eggs from the pool, we are currently adding a new container to retrieve fillets, egg shells and polluted dirt. Let's just pray the contents will not mix...

2 - The Hatch ranch is from this automated ranch. Originally they had a smaller space with the floor made of automatic doors linked to a timer so that once a day the eggs would fall. It did work for a while but removing the eggs right away is better for the reproduction. Still, the copper was primarily used for the construction of atmo docks and suits.