Happy Birthday, America! A little belated... sorry. I realized how ironic it is that the primary method of celebration of our independence is done promoting the Chinese economy (fireworks)... on whom we are very much dependent to continue funding our need to spend and never have a balanced budget. Interesting... Randy also started a tradition... that we read the Declaration of Independence each year to remember what we have to celebrate. Its amazing the things that our forefathers died for... the rights that we are signing off and ignorantly allowing to be taken from us again. Why die for independence to relinquish our rights to the United Nations? Why die for independence to have international trade limited and forced by subsidies and genetic engineering? Why die for independence to be taxed mercilessly for programs promoting social dependence and "health care" that will NOT make us any healthier? In all the world, America really is the best nation... and worth fighting for. Praise God our present day fighting is calling senators and representatives, educating ourselves and voting and not tossing our 10 year old boys onto a field with a musket and a prayer. I think its an easy thing to do to protect our freedoms.
Now onto other thoughts: though we spent some time lounging by a pool and took in a nice display of Chinese pirotechnics, we also did a LOT of work. That extra day off for Randy was really nice for me!
Friday we shaved udders and trimmed hooves. I haven't trimmed hooves in months, but they weren't bad at all! I think those scrub piles they've been climbing on is doing some of the job for me. But at any rate, all but Chuck and the little ones are nicely pedicured. Then we tackled more work in the garden expansion and realized my 250 pounds of compost I had snagged off craig's list wasn't going to go far at all. We then finally bit the bullet and hauled our trailer off to get a new tire... where it took less than $50 and maybe 15 minutes. Now we're ready to see our horse-loving friends and load up with another full load of rich compost.
I've also been increasingly frustrated with the fertilizer options availble here. First of all, its a 15 min. drive (make that an hour long trip when you include loading kids, unloading, making the purchase while kid-wrangling, re-loading the kids and again unloading) to the nearest nursery, a bottle of liquid fertilizer is over $10 and lasts maybe 4 weeks. Does NOT seem like a sustainable option for me. BUT we have this GREAT little fisherman's co-op nearby. We swung by there Friday afternoon, bought some yummy fresh, locally caught fish and took home all the fish guts they had on hand and also arranged for a weekly pick-up of their wasted treasures. We found a few recipes for fish emulsion fertilizer and have our first attempt stewing in the shed right now. Aaaahhhh, local, sustainable... and I can leave the kids in the car, run in dirty and stinky and make it back home before nap time. The smile on my face is BIG. Now to find a local, sustainable source for potash (what fish guts lack)
We also have collected 3 more duck eggs... so borrowed an incubator. I'm, right now, between sentences, trying to get the temperature adjusted to the 99.5 its supposed to be. The thermometer has been a problem... we only had a candy thermometer that would fit in the established hole, but it was so low on the range it wasn't giving us an accurate reading. So last night I went hunting for a good old fashioned mercury thermometer. A neighbor found one... but geeze, neither Randy nor I can read the thing. So now I'm using our standard digital thermometer and sticking the whole thing inside, waiting for the beeps, checking the temp, adjusting the thermostat, letting the thermometer cool down and repeating the process. But the goats are calling and I may just have to finish this process later this afternoon. Muscovy eggs take 35 days to hatch (I think) so it will be a while before we even know the futility of this, but we'll also throw some chicken eggs in while we're at it... just to see. In our straight run of replacement layers we have only 5 hens so we'll need a few more going before the barred rocks start molting anyway.
We also rearranged Gloria's room to bring down the bunk bed and make room for our big boy... who has now spent 2 nights in a big boy bed. Its going rather well. After a few more nights, I think they'll both be well adjusted to the new sleeping arrangement. Gloria is thrilled to have her brother in her room with her... except when he wakes up in the middle of the night confused and crying. Then she opens the door, ushers him out and closes it behind him. Kinda funny if it weren't 3 am when nothing is too funny.
And just as I was signing off, the thermometer beeped... at a lovely 99.6. Close enough. In go our precious 3 eggs with hopes I shall find another in just a couple minutes. Gloria is running and screaming with glee about baby chicks. Just another glorious, God-given day at the Pinedale Palace.
Showing posts with label Goats. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Goats. Show all posts
Monday, July 6, 2009
Friday, May 22, 2009
Who built the Ark?
I have measured just shy of 11" of rain (not including what fell last night as I haven't ventured out to the gage yet) and the first time I dumped it, it was totally overflowing. The kids' pool is overflowing and that's 18" deep, but it started with a few inches (less than 5) of water in it. One internet site says 9". A neighbor says he recorded 16". More rain coming today and for the next 10 days. So, who's got the ark???
The good news is that we're draining well. There's some ponding in the front ditches, but nothing has even coming close to our first fruit tree. The goats don't care for all being crammed into the shed all day and night, but they're still fairing well. I sowed grass seed at the beginning of all this so hopefully that will be getting established well and we'll have greenery for them to eat soon. I added a rubbermade tote (on its side with no lid) to the chicks' pen to give them a bit more shelter. It took them 2 days to figure out what to do with it (chickens aren't known for their intelligence), but now they've learned to huddle in it when the wind and rain really get going. The big chickens hunker down in nest boxes. They're a bit wet, but doing fine.
The bad news is that this is wreaking havoc on my spring garden. That little touch of a foliar disease on my tomatoes is now extensive. I've gone out during respites from the rain to pull off diseased leaves, but its still spreading like wildfire. I can't spray and prevent further spread until its dry. I picked 4 yellow squash, 3 with pickleworms in them. I think they were already there when I bagged them, but the blossoms look like they're back to taking the hit. Again, there's nothing to be done while everything is wet. It also looks as though some anthracnose is getting in there too now. All my young bean plants in the summer garden are leaning due to the wind. I know they will correct themselves, but until then, they look awful. Sections of my lawn are almost knee high. I was planning to mow on Monday when this started. The goats would have a hay day if only they could leave their shelter enough to graze in the front yard.
The kids are going berzerk. Gloria is, right now, crying and screaming, "I wanna go outside!" But its pouring buckets. She hates it in the rain. If she went outside she would stand in the garage and cry some more. Aaron on the other hand, has been sneaking out every chance he gets. He'll slip out while I'm switching goats and get drenched, laughing gleefully the whole time. I'm right there with them on going nuts though. I hate cleaning and that's all I've had to do. The house looks good (except that evidence of cooped up kids is everywhere), but I'm seriously starting to twitch. I think its a vitamin D deficiency.
More looking on the up side, if you're flooding in your neighborhood, call your city managers and tell them to hire Randy's company (McKim and Creed) to fix/redesign the area's storm water system. Seriously, now wouldn't that be stimulus money well spent? The north end of the county is showing homes with 4' of water in them. Hmmm... build an abortion clinic or redirect some storm water... such a tough choice. (Do you detect the sarcasm?)
In other news, after only 2 days of adding extra protein to the chickens' feed, we got 14 eggs from 15 hens yesterday without a single blemish or peck mark. I'm quite pleased to see such a quick turn around and am hoping it sticks.
Until next time (which if it keeps raining, may not be long from now), stay high, stay dry and if you see animals walking down the road, 2 by 2, follow them.
The good news is that we're draining well. There's some ponding in the front ditches, but nothing has even coming close to our first fruit tree. The goats don't care for all being crammed into the shed all day and night, but they're still fairing well. I sowed grass seed at the beginning of all this so hopefully that will be getting established well and we'll have greenery for them to eat soon. I added a rubbermade tote (on its side with no lid) to the chicks' pen to give them a bit more shelter. It took them 2 days to figure out what to do with it (chickens aren't known for their intelligence), but now they've learned to huddle in it when the wind and rain really get going. The big chickens hunker down in nest boxes. They're a bit wet, but doing fine.
The bad news is that this is wreaking havoc on my spring garden. That little touch of a foliar disease on my tomatoes is now extensive. I've gone out during respites from the rain to pull off diseased leaves, but its still spreading like wildfire. I can't spray and prevent further spread until its dry. I picked 4 yellow squash, 3 with pickleworms in them. I think they were already there when I bagged them, but the blossoms look like they're back to taking the hit. Again, there's nothing to be done while everything is wet. It also looks as though some anthracnose is getting in there too now. All my young bean plants in the summer garden are leaning due to the wind. I know they will correct themselves, but until then, they look awful. Sections of my lawn are almost knee high. I was planning to mow on Monday when this started. The goats would have a hay day if only they could leave their shelter enough to graze in the front yard.
The kids are going berzerk. Gloria is, right now, crying and screaming, "I wanna go outside!" But its pouring buckets. She hates it in the rain. If she went outside she would stand in the garage and cry some more. Aaron on the other hand, has been sneaking out every chance he gets. He'll slip out while I'm switching goats and get drenched, laughing gleefully the whole time. I'm right there with them on going nuts though. I hate cleaning and that's all I've had to do. The house looks good (except that evidence of cooped up kids is everywhere), but I'm seriously starting to twitch. I think its a vitamin D deficiency.
More looking on the up side, if you're flooding in your neighborhood, call your city managers and tell them to hire Randy's company (McKim and Creed) to fix/redesign the area's storm water system. Seriously, now wouldn't that be stimulus money well spent? The north end of the county is showing homes with 4' of water in them. Hmmm... build an abortion clinic or redirect some storm water... such a tough choice. (Do you detect the sarcasm?)
In other news, after only 2 days of adding extra protein to the chickens' feed, we got 14 eggs from 15 hens yesterday without a single blemish or peck mark. I'm quite pleased to see such a quick turn around and am hoping it sticks.
Until next time (which if it keeps raining, may not be long from now), stay high, stay dry and if you see animals walking down the road, 2 by 2, follow them.
Monday, April 27, 2009
Spring in the Air
Ahhhh. Spring. New life.... Everywhere.
Saturday morning Randy found 2 newts (I think they were newts or salamanders or skinks or some other lizard like thing) romantically involved on our wood pile. That was rather entertaining. Then yesterday I found one of them happily swimming in a rain barrel. I think it was laying the eggs. So, here's the question... will they eat my comets (fish) that I now have in there or will the fish eat the eggs? Or can they all live happily ever after and share the same rain barrel?
The bunnies from the woods have returned to feed in our yard. We see a couple every morning to a little girl's (and my) delight.
We found 2 duck eggs Thursday morning. Both laid in very high traffic areas in the pasture. I put them both up on the pump house until I could find a suitable box to act as a nest. When I returned, one had been completely eaten, probably by a crow. I put the second in the box and tucked the box in a little nook and did my best to show the females where it was. When I went back out in the afternoon, the box was overturned and the egg was smashed. I haven't found any since.
All but two of the Easter kittens have new homes now. Apparently all the no kill facilities in the area weren't accepting anything and one even hung up on my neighbor. They're nice to animals, but not to people. Go figure.
The chicks are doing well, however, we lost the 2 that were looking weak. The first one again looked to have recovered so I put her back in the next day and watched her closely. I was celebrating when I couldn't tell her apart from the others. The following morning I found her dead. At least I assume it was her. The second, despite all my efforts gradually got weaker and weaker. I did all I could, but it wasn't enough.
We have lots of flowers and a good amount of fruit on our squash vines. Beans are starting to blossom. Corn is getting quite tall. Our two little strawberry plants are doing well despite being moved. Well, earlier today some chickens got out due to lots of wind and dug them up. I've caught all but one chicken and the rooster and replanted the berries. I'll have to wait for Randy for the rest.
I've set up a new "sprouting station". I piled wood palates high enough so little hands can't reach them, lined my trays up, have 2 4x4s on each side and a large piece of glass from a picture frame stretched across them. This keeps pelting rain off, loads of oak leaves and pollen from cluttering them, and keeps a moderate amount of moisture in. I have the glass mounted high enough for air flow so I still have to water frequently. I also tried this round of seeds in half sawdust and half compost. I'm still working on germinating fruit seeds such as dragonfruit, passionfruit, prickly pear, kiwi as well as a host of herbs. The seeds are far more finicky than veggie seeds so I've learned I've had to treat them with extra TLC.
Annabelle is letting Carob nurse some now. I'm still bottle feeding her but only 3 times a day instead of 4.
Aaron went most of the morning leaving his shoes on today. That's an incredible feat (no pun intended) for those of you who know him.
All for now. This weekend awaits with MANY projects on the list, but thankfully this week doesn't look to be as hectic as last week. Its funny when normal life feels like a vacation.
Saturday morning Randy found 2 newts (I think they were newts or salamanders or skinks or some other lizard like thing) romantically involved on our wood pile. That was rather entertaining. Then yesterday I found one of them happily swimming in a rain barrel. I think it was laying the eggs. So, here's the question... will they eat my comets (fish) that I now have in there or will the fish eat the eggs? Or can they all live happily ever after and share the same rain barrel?
The bunnies from the woods have returned to feed in our yard. We see a couple every morning to a little girl's (and my) delight.
We found 2 duck eggs Thursday morning. Both laid in very high traffic areas in the pasture. I put them both up on the pump house until I could find a suitable box to act as a nest. When I returned, one had been completely eaten, probably by a crow. I put the second in the box and tucked the box in a little nook and did my best to show the females where it was. When I went back out in the afternoon, the box was overturned and the egg was smashed. I haven't found any since.
All but two of the Easter kittens have new homes now. Apparently all the no kill facilities in the area weren't accepting anything and one even hung up on my neighbor. They're nice to animals, but not to people. Go figure.
The chicks are doing well, however, we lost the 2 that were looking weak. The first one again looked to have recovered so I put her back in the next day and watched her closely. I was celebrating when I couldn't tell her apart from the others. The following morning I found her dead. At least I assume it was her. The second, despite all my efforts gradually got weaker and weaker. I did all I could, but it wasn't enough.
We have lots of flowers and a good amount of fruit on our squash vines. Beans are starting to blossom. Corn is getting quite tall. Our two little strawberry plants are doing well despite being moved. Well, earlier today some chickens got out due to lots of wind and dug them up. I've caught all but one chicken and the rooster and replanted the berries. I'll have to wait for Randy for the rest.
I've set up a new "sprouting station". I piled wood palates high enough so little hands can't reach them, lined my trays up, have 2 4x4s on each side and a large piece of glass from a picture frame stretched across them. This keeps pelting rain off, loads of oak leaves and pollen from cluttering them, and keeps a moderate amount of moisture in. I have the glass mounted high enough for air flow so I still have to water frequently. I also tried this round of seeds in half sawdust and half compost. I'm still working on germinating fruit seeds such as dragonfruit, passionfruit, prickly pear, kiwi as well as a host of herbs. The seeds are far more finicky than veggie seeds so I've learned I've had to treat them with extra TLC.
Annabelle is letting Carob nurse some now. I'm still bottle feeding her but only 3 times a day instead of 4.
Aaron went most of the morning leaving his shoes on today. That's an incredible feat (no pun intended) for those of you who know him.
All for now. This weekend awaits with MANY projects on the list, but thankfully this week doesn't look to be as hectic as last week. Its funny when normal life feels like a vacation.
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Busy!
Wow. Its been a BUSY week! I'm skipping church tonight on account of still having WAY too much to do and being so tired (and the kids also being exhausted) to warrant going just to fall asleep during the meeting. Yet here I am, in dire need of sitting, if only for a moment.
I noticed when the twins were 2 days old that Annabelle was only allowing Cocoa to nurse. Carob is the runt in the pair and for some reason Annabelle left her to die. So I've been bottle feeding her, first trying with a normal baby bottle, which didn't work at all, then getting a proper nipple and some milk replacer. She's now screaming on the porch as she does this time of night. I get her before it gets dark and leave her on the porch until her just-before-bed-feeding. She's back to growing and is quite the little cuddler now. She even lets Gloria carry her anywhere.
And Fudge kidded on Saturday morning. Gloria was able to witness it. When asked what happened to Fudge, she says, "Fudgie had baby. She said AAAAAHHHHHHHHH." Its really cute. This one looks like Sundae from the chest up. The rest is white. And its a boy. Gloria is now insisting that Chuck will have a baby, "probably next week." I've tried to explain that boy goats don't have babies, but she's unwavering. Chuck will have a baby next week.
Meanwhile, Wednesday (the kid we want to keep) has been getting wilder and faster. I've started catching her each morning and bringing her in the porch while I feed Carob. This takes a few minutes of chasing and then some time as I try to cuddle her and tame her down... lest we sell her and keep Carob who probably will never be quite as strong given a less than optimum start in the world.
So, I'm milking 3 goats, bottle-feeding one kid, and wrangling another. Then our chicks arrived today. They're gorgeous and look great. I got them set up this morning and still managed to make it to Storytime (Gloria's favorite event all week) only to find out it had been canceled. We went to the playground instead, but by the time we got home I found one chick had been knocked into the waterer and pushed out of the warmest part of the light. She was shivering and near dead. I brought her in, wrapped her in the heating pad and brought her back with some rather time-consuming attention. She was standing and eating by afternoon so I put her back with the others. A few hours later she was back to looking weak and being pushed around. She's back inside with the heating pad and an additional light. I figure I'll keep her there for the night. Found another one that looked a mite on the weak side and thought it wouldn't hurt her to not have to compete for warmth and could keep the other one company so I have them both chirping... in my dining room.
To add to that, I had to get my mom's lawn mowed today lest it be another week with grass up to her windowsills, and our nut trees arrived yesterday. Bare root again. I should have been able to guess. Anyway, I learned my lesson on postponing planting bare root stuff from the "blackberry sticks" that are still in the yard. It said to soak in water immediately and plant within 24 hours. That means I had 4 trees to plant today as well.
You can imagine why I'm tired. And I just realized I burned my bread. (Sigh)
Tomorrow I have a host of kids and moms coming over for a playdate with baby goats and chicks.
And my floor has muddy footprints all through it.
And I have piano students tomorrow afternoon.
On that note, break's over. Time to tackle dishes.
I noticed when the twins were 2 days old that Annabelle was only allowing Cocoa to nurse. Carob is the runt in the pair and for some reason Annabelle left her to die. So I've been bottle feeding her, first trying with a normal baby bottle, which didn't work at all, then getting a proper nipple and some milk replacer. She's now screaming on the porch as she does this time of night. I get her before it gets dark and leave her on the porch until her just-before-bed-feeding. She's back to growing and is quite the little cuddler now. She even lets Gloria carry her anywhere.
And Fudge kidded on Saturday morning. Gloria was able to witness it. When asked what happened to Fudge, she says, "Fudgie had baby. She said AAAAAHHHHHHHHH." Its really cute. This one looks like Sundae from the chest up. The rest is white. And its a boy. Gloria is now insisting that Chuck will have a baby, "probably next week." I've tried to explain that boy goats don't have babies, but she's unwavering. Chuck will have a baby next week.
Meanwhile, Wednesday (the kid we want to keep) has been getting wilder and faster. I've started catching her each morning and bringing her in the porch while I feed Carob. This takes a few minutes of chasing and then some time as I try to cuddle her and tame her down... lest we sell her and keep Carob who probably will never be quite as strong given a less than optimum start in the world.
So, I'm milking 3 goats, bottle-feeding one kid, and wrangling another. Then our chicks arrived today. They're gorgeous and look great. I got them set up this morning and still managed to make it to Storytime (Gloria's favorite event all week) only to find out it had been canceled. We went to the playground instead, but by the time we got home I found one chick had been knocked into the waterer and pushed out of the warmest part of the light. She was shivering and near dead. I brought her in, wrapped her in the heating pad and brought her back with some rather time-consuming attention. She was standing and eating by afternoon so I put her back with the others. A few hours later she was back to looking weak and being pushed around. She's back inside with the heating pad and an additional light. I figure I'll keep her there for the night. Found another one that looked a mite on the weak side and thought it wouldn't hurt her to not have to compete for warmth and could keep the other one company so I have them both chirping... in my dining room.
To add to that, I had to get my mom's lawn mowed today lest it be another week with grass up to her windowsills, and our nut trees arrived yesterday. Bare root again. I should have been able to guess. Anyway, I learned my lesson on postponing planting bare root stuff from the "blackberry sticks" that are still in the yard. It said to soak in water immediately and plant within 24 hours. That means I had 4 trees to plant today as well.
You can imagine why I'm tired. And I just realized I burned my bread. (Sigh)
Tomorrow I have a host of kids and moms coming over for a playdate with baby goats and chicks.
And my floor has muddy footprints all through it.
And I have piano students tomorrow afternoon.
On that note, break's over. Time to tackle dishes.
Monday, April 13, 2009
Three girls, a boy and a litter of seven
He has RISEN! A blessed week to all those celebrating the GREATEST EVENT IN ALL TIME- the resurrection of Jesus of Nazarath. We had lots of new life to celebrate yesterday!
Sunday morning, at 3:30am, Annabelle went into labor. Actually, what's so funny is that Noel was the one screaming and waking me up. I knew she had merely "lost" her baby. Wednesday has been liking to hide in little crevices and fall asleep. I was NOT happy about getting out of bed to go hunt around in the dark, in the midst of piles of scrub and wood, for a black baby goat who could fit in any of the millions of nooks and crannies out there just to quiet down her nervous mother! But shortly later I heard a small grunt from Annabelle and knew she must be delivering. I went straight out and found one kid already born and her working on the second. I went to finding Wednesday, which thankfully didn't take long, got Noel to settle down and got back to Annie just in time to see the second born, again with only a couple little blats. She's such a birthing pro. I guess when you've had 12 kids, you know how to do it.
What's REALLY odd... all three goat kids are does (girls), all three are black with a small white spot on top of their heads, all three look identical to Sundae. Noel and Annabelle must have gotten pregnant in mid November and we put Sundae down in early December... could it be that missing her affected the coloring of each goat??? It sounds like a Jacob, the subplanter, thing... placing spotted objects in front of the sheep so that they would birth spotted sheep and become his and not his father-in-laws (see Genesis 30).
So, now we have Wednesday (who is most likely the one we'll keep), Cocoa and Carob. Wednesday has blue eyes and Cocoa has a tiny white spot on one side- this is the only way we can tell them apart! We debated naming the twins Thursday and Friday, but decided against it. Even Cocoa and Carob are merely place-holder names until they are adopted and named by their new family. I'll post a picture of all three when I can... I can't exactly hold all three and a camera!
Sunday afternoon we also discovered a litter of stray cats in the woods between our's and our neighbor's house. These are LITTLE kittens... maybe a couple days old? Randy found one at first and brought it over to show our neighbor's grandkids (who were having an egg hunt in the front yard). She promptly took responsibility for the little guy, though that's not what Randy was intending to happen. Later we found the rest of the litter with no mama cat in sight. We hardly need 7 more stray cats added to the neighborhood so we were going to keep them for the night and take them to the humane society in the morning, but again, our neighbor took them over instead. Sounds like they will get distributed among her family members.
So... I redirect you to the post title... and announce that we had a sonogram done last Friday. Yes, baby Superfly is a boy! We can now decide on a name other than Superfly! I'm also a bit relieved to announce that there's only one baby. We had some thoughts that there may be a double blessing in there... but nope... he just has ALL the space he wants!!! So if you see me, please refrain from comments like, "Wow, you're so big already!" Yeah, I know. Thanks. All in all, we were very excited to catch a glimpse of our newest little blessing. He's a wiggly little fellow with beautiful hands and cute little feet. We got a new ETA- Sept 22, however we're shooting for Sept 19th as that would put all our children at 594 days apart. Cool, huh? We'll get to have another sonogram also, on account of this one being a bit earlier than we had thought, so I'll post pictures in a couple months when he looks more like a baby and less like an alien. God is a such a good God. Children are a treasured gift from the Giver of ALL good things!
Sunday morning, at 3:30am, Annabelle went into labor. Actually, what's so funny is that Noel was the one screaming and waking me up. I knew she had merely "lost" her baby. Wednesday has been liking to hide in little crevices and fall asleep. I was NOT happy about getting out of bed to go hunt around in the dark, in the midst of piles of scrub and wood, for a black baby goat who could fit in any of the millions of nooks and crannies out there just to quiet down her nervous mother! But shortly later I heard a small grunt from Annabelle and knew she must be delivering. I went straight out and found one kid already born and her working on the second. I went to finding Wednesday, which thankfully didn't take long, got Noel to settle down and got back to Annie just in time to see the second born, again with only a couple little blats. She's such a birthing pro. I guess when you've had 12 kids, you know how to do it.
What's REALLY odd... all three goat kids are does (girls), all three are black with a small white spot on top of their heads, all three look identical to Sundae. Noel and Annabelle must have gotten pregnant in mid November and we put Sundae down in early December... could it be that missing her affected the coloring of each goat??? It sounds like a Jacob, the subplanter, thing... placing spotted objects in front of the sheep so that they would birth spotted sheep and become his and not his father-in-laws (see Genesis 30).
So, now we have Wednesday (who is most likely the one we'll keep), Cocoa and Carob. Wednesday has blue eyes and Cocoa has a tiny white spot on one side- this is the only way we can tell them apart! We debated naming the twins Thursday and Friday, but decided against it. Even Cocoa and Carob are merely place-holder names until they are adopted and named by their new family. I'll post a picture of all three when I can... I can't exactly hold all three and a camera!
Sunday afternoon we also discovered a litter of stray cats in the woods between our's and our neighbor's house. These are LITTLE kittens... maybe a couple days old? Randy found one at first and brought it over to show our neighbor's grandkids (who were having an egg hunt in the front yard). She promptly took responsibility for the little guy, though that's not what Randy was intending to happen. Later we found the rest of the litter with no mama cat in sight. We hardly need 7 more stray cats added to the neighborhood so we were going to keep them for the night and take them to the humane society in the morning, but again, our neighbor took them over instead. Sounds like they will get distributed among her family members.
So... I redirect you to the post title... and announce that we had a sonogram done last Friday. Yes, baby Superfly is a boy! We can now decide on a name other than Superfly! I'm also a bit relieved to announce that there's only one baby. We had some thoughts that there may be a double blessing in there... but nope... he just has ALL the space he wants!!! So if you see me, please refrain from comments like, "Wow, you're so big already!" Yeah, I know. Thanks. All in all, we were very excited to catch a glimpse of our newest little blessing. He's a wiggly little fellow with beautiful hands and cute little feet. We got a new ETA- Sept 22, however we're shooting for Sept 19th as that would put all our children at 594 days apart. Cool, huh? We'll get to have another sonogram also, on account of this one being a bit earlier than we had thought, so I'll post pictures in a couple months when he looks more like a baby and less like an alien. God is a such a good God. Children are a treasured gift from the Giver of ALL good things!
Friday, April 10, 2009
Wednesday
Sorry to keep you all waiting... but frankly, we had to. After thinking Noel was going to kid "any minute now" for almost 2 weeks, checking on her after every outing, toting a flashlight for late night checks, etc, the waiting is finally over. Wednesday night about 2:30am, Noel woke me up with a loud blat. A second blat bolted me from bed and sent me running out with the basket of supplies that had been sitting ready this whole time... except the memory card had been removed from the camera. I found her with two front hooves and a nose just barely poking through. Now all you women who think birth is difficult with just a head, imagine a head and both arms coming out all at once. Yeah, Noel wasn't liking that too much. I let her push a few more times before I pushed the nose back in and gave one foot a tug. The whole kid flew out then. I was 
thankful these are tiny goats and not cows as I remembered my days on the farm when helping out with a birth entailed both arms being in sometimes up to the shoulder. Good times. Noel has been a great mother. She immediately cleaned off her beautiful little doeling, who has inherited her blue eyes and gentle disposition. I stayed up with them a little bit longer just to make sure she was done (that there weren't twins) and to make sure the little one could nurse ok. What's really neat is that this goat looks exactly like Sundae, Noel's half-sister and half-aunt, whom we had to put down last December. So, in Sundae's honor, we decided to name her Wednesday. We debated spelling her name "Wednesdae" instead, but since it would basically just be for blogging purposes, we decided to just be normal for a change. Even Gloria, without any prompting noticed she looks like Sundae. She calls her "Sunny" or Sundae though with a little hesitation.
We're only going to keep one more doe and Fudge and Annabelle have yet to kid. We'll choose the doe with the best disposition to add to the herd and s
ell the rest. I think it will be Wednesday. Besides, Noel is looking to be a great milker. Thursday I put her on the stand to shave her, check her over, check her feet, etc. and decided to milk out whatever was left just to have on hand in case we needed it to bottle feed Sundae at some point. I got about 10 oz of colostrum. That's a lot!
ell the rest. I think it will be Wednesday. Besides, Noel is looking to be a great milker. Thursday I put her on the stand to shave her, check her over, check her feet, etc. and decided to milk out whatever was left just to have on hand in case we needed it to bottle feed Sundae at some point. I got about 10 oz of colostrum. That's a lot! Its not entirely clear as to whether or not she's passed the placenta. A retained placenta is somewhat common though very bad. I've had a hole dug for a peach tree waiting for this juicy piece of nourishment to fertilize it its whole first year, but its never been found. Websites say it usually comes 6-12 hours after birth. Its also common, even healthy, for them to eat it, but our other goats never have. After numerous phone calls and a lot of belly massages (for Noel, not for me), I think she's passed it and ate it without leaving any sign of it behind. I keep sniffing her back end (the joys of goat farming) to smell for infection and rubbing her belly and sides to check for tenderness, but she just seems to enjoy it. I'll keep a close eye on her a while longer, but I'm increasingly certain she just ate my peach tree fertilizer. We're not going to wait for Superfly's placenta before planting that tree though! (Aaron's placenta has our avocado tree doing very well!)
I think Anabelle is next. She's acting a bit strange today. She's a bit goopy and bagged up, but her bag is so big already, it could really get quite a bit bigger. She normally lets me rub her all I want. Today she wouldn't let me near her. There are tendons on each side of the tail which will slowly disappear as birth approaches. Unfortunately, feeling her tail-region is going to have to wait until she's not evading me... probably post-birth!
Saturday, March 21, 2009
A De-bucked Chuck and more
While I've done very little today, I'm feeling the need for "butt jobs" and so here I am, giving a... maybe-not-so-quick update.
1) Yes, Chuck has been de-bucked. We had a friend come over to help us do the deed. I was thinking I'd like someone else just to hold him as I wasn't going to get myself and our baby around his trashing horns and feet, but I also didn't want to go cutting on him without him being held totally still. Randy and I are both very glad we had, not only an extra set of hands, but this particular extra set of hands. A good southern cowboy who's done it all, Joe. He had better ideas for tieing him, did the slicing himself without and ounce of the timidity I would have had and even took the "jewels" home to fry up for dinner. It was over quickly and Chuck's healing well, but is still moving slowly and warily.
2) Still no kids, but I keep looking at Noel thinking its going to be anytime. She looks a little dilated, but then again, humans can be dilated to 3cm weeks before birth.
3) A month or so ago Randy and I found a pile of chain link fencing and poles on the side of the road. We actually were driving home from buying Chuck and already had the trailer hooked up so we gathered it up and brought it home figuring we'd find a better use for it than land fill. Randy's outside now putting it up inside the pasture. There was enough there to almost make a complete pass across and we had enough leftover from the outer pasture fence to make up the difference. This will give us a temporary partition so we can allow one side to grow up before its getting eaten and trampled then vice versa. It won't be a permanent fence as we still have the ENORMOUS piles of scrub to get rid of before we can put in fencing exactly where we want it, but that day is coming and this will work for now.
4) We ventured to Rockledge Gardens yesterday, quite the haul for us, for a particular variety of black raspberry- Mysore. I've looked for months for this plant. They called a couple days ago saying they got some in so we went and grabbed it. We only got one on account of it being bigger and pricier than we would have liked, but if the rumors are true, this is going to be a great producer for us.
5) We ordered a set of meat birds and some replacement layers from a different hatchery- S and G Poultry. We're really excited about these birds as they aren't the commercial get-em-big-fast-and-off-em-before-they-keel-over-dead breeds, but ones that are bred for taste, good health and good foraging ability.
6) We also ordered a pair of pecan trees and a pair of hazelnut trees from Burgess. I'm really surprised by their prices- worth it for even an experiment.
7) Most of my seeds are up now: corn, okra, lots of various squash, pumpkins, tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, cowpeas, and beans. I also have several different fruit seeds planted, but those take months to germinate so I'm not expecting anything yet. I was hoping to at least get a couple beds ripped out and overhauled with a fresh load of compost today, but that will wait until Monday when I'm hoping my back end will feel a bit lighter.
8) We're still battling an early rising rooster. We noticed he was crowing at the moon as it came up over the house the other morning at 5am. We've tried wrapping the pen in black weed cloth with moderate success. I'm concerned about doing that in the heat of summer (when sunrise really is 5am) because I think it will make the pen too hot with too little air flow. Its not so much for us that we want to hush him up, but more for a dear, sweet neighbor who would never complain about anything, but has happened to mention that he wakes her up. We need a system that works because continually buying chicks, particularly if NAIS really goes through, just isn't feasible for long term. If anyone has any tips on hushing up a rooster, please share them!
9) We're also considering getting into mixing our own grain rations. A hardware store in town (who's owners happen to be good friend's of our's) is going to be ordering from a company that also carries feed supplies. We'd have access to corn, minerals, soybean meal, oats and a host of other raw materials. We haven't calculated any cost savings nor are we sure we could store the unmixed portions of various ingredients critter free, but its kinda attractive to be able to mix whatever level of protien we need with whatever minerals we want in whatever quantities we want. If anyone knows of a good resource for grain recipes, please pass them on.
10) We lost our honeybell tangelo this winter. The last frost that wasn't supposed to be a frost at all. The root stock has new growth, but nothing from the graft up. So we're thinking about grafting our own... probably something a bit hardier than a honeybell. We tried to find an affordable grapefruit tree to no avail, but we then read that they will grow well from seed. So, that's exactly what we're going to do! God's design is great, isn't it!
11) As for family stuff, we went camping last weekend and had a great time with gorgeous weather. Randy took this week off for a "staycation" and its been so nice having him around. Baby Superfly (our placeholder name for #3) is now 15 weeks old and I'm officially in all maternity clothes. Gloria still insists that Superfly is in her tummy instead, but I think she'll get the concept soon. Aaron is completely bipedal now. Its nice to let him outside and know he can stay upright... though he still won't keep his shoes on.
Blessings to all. Butt job is now complete.
1) Yes, Chuck has been de-bucked. We had a friend come over to help us do the deed. I was thinking I'd like someone else just to hold him as I wasn't going to get myself and our baby around his trashing horns and feet, but I also didn't want to go cutting on him without him being held totally still. Randy and I are both very glad we had, not only an extra set of hands, but this particular extra set of hands. A good southern cowboy who's done it all, Joe. He had better ideas for tieing him, did the slicing himself without and ounce of the timidity I would have had and even took the "jewels" home to fry up for dinner. It was over quickly and Chuck's healing well, but is still moving slowly and warily.
2) Still no kids, but I keep looking at Noel thinking its going to be anytime. She looks a little dilated, but then again, humans can be dilated to 3cm weeks before birth.
3) A month or so ago Randy and I found a pile of chain link fencing and poles on the side of the road. We actually were driving home from buying Chuck and already had the trailer hooked up so we gathered it up and brought it home figuring we'd find a better use for it than land fill. Randy's outside now putting it up inside the pasture. There was enough there to almost make a complete pass across and we had enough leftover from the outer pasture fence to make up the difference. This will give us a temporary partition so we can allow one side to grow up before its getting eaten and trampled then vice versa. It won't be a permanent fence as we still have the ENORMOUS piles of scrub to get rid of before we can put in fencing exactly where we want it, but that day is coming and this will work for now.
4) We ventured to Rockledge Gardens yesterday, quite the haul for us, for a particular variety of black raspberry- Mysore. I've looked for months for this plant. They called a couple days ago saying they got some in so we went and grabbed it. We only got one on account of it being bigger and pricier than we would have liked, but if the rumors are true, this is going to be a great producer for us.
5) We ordered a set of meat birds and some replacement layers from a different hatchery- S and G Poultry. We're really excited about these birds as they aren't the commercial get-em-big-fast-and-off-em-before-they-keel-over-dead breeds, but ones that are bred for taste, good health and good foraging ability.
6) We also ordered a pair of pecan trees and a pair of hazelnut trees from Burgess. I'm really surprised by their prices- worth it for even an experiment.
7) Most of my seeds are up now: corn, okra, lots of various squash, pumpkins, tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, cowpeas, and beans. I also have several different fruit seeds planted, but those take months to germinate so I'm not expecting anything yet. I was hoping to at least get a couple beds ripped out and overhauled with a fresh load of compost today, but that will wait until Monday when I'm hoping my back end will feel a bit lighter.
8) We're still battling an early rising rooster. We noticed he was crowing at the moon as it came up over the house the other morning at 5am. We've tried wrapping the pen in black weed cloth with moderate success. I'm concerned about doing that in the heat of summer (when sunrise really is 5am) because I think it will make the pen too hot with too little air flow. Its not so much for us that we want to hush him up, but more for a dear, sweet neighbor who would never complain about anything, but has happened to mention that he wakes her up. We need a system that works because continually buying chicks, particularly if NAIS really goes through, just isn't feasible for long term. If anyone has any tips on hushing up a rooster, please share them!
9) We're also considering getting into mixing our own grain rations. A hardware store in town (who's owners happen to be good friend's of our's) is going to be ordering from a company that also carries feed supplies. We'd have access to corn, minerals, soybean meal, oats and a host of other raw materials. We haven't calculated any cost savings nor are we sure we could store the unmixed portions of various ingredients critter free, but its kinda attractive to be able to mix whatever level of protien we need with whatever minerals we want in whatever quantities we want. If anyone knows of a good resource for grain recipes, please pass them on.
10) We lost our honeybell tangelo this winter. The last frost that wasn't supposed to be a frost at all. The root stock has new growth, but nothing from the graft up. So we're thinking about grafting our own... probably something a bit hardier than a honeybell. We tried to find an affordable grapefruit tree to no avail, but we then read that they will grow well from seed. So, that's exactly what we're going to do! God's design is great, isn't it!
11) As for family stuff, we went camping last weekend and had a great time with gorgeous weather. Randy took this week off for a "staycation" and its been so nice having him around. Baby Superfly (our placeholder name for #3) is now 15 weeks old and I'm officially in all maternity clothes. Gloria still insists that Superfly is in her tummy instead, but I think she'll get the concept soon. Aaron is completely bipedal now. Its nice to let him outside and know he can stay upright... though he still won't keep his shoes on.
Blessings to all. Butt job is now complete.
Monday, March 2, 2009
Weekend Adventures
Every Saturday morning, Randy asks what's on the to-do list. Its usually rather extensive, but its always fun- working together as a family outside all day. This Saturday was no different... except what we were trying to do:
Castration- yup, we tried. Chuck has his "buckhood" for another week. We tried catching him in the morning only to get him riled up and avoiding us. We waited for the afternoon feeding then managed to catch him while his head was stuck in the bucket. And when we finally got him tied around a tree, Randy holding him steady with all his might and me, literally, bringing up the rear, we discovered he's already much too, shall we say well developed for our handy castrating device to work. This device stretches a small, tight rubber band open to fit over the testicles. Then you release the band from the device. It cuts off circulation and they eventually just drop off with very little discomfort to the animal. I was NOT happy about the prospect of trying to do the job with another method so believe me when I say I tried to make those suckers fit. It wasn't going to happen.
Catching a rooster- we traded "Baldy" with some friends for another rooster. Baldy was a hen that got pecked bald in the re-shuffling of the pecking order. We pulled her out and there was no putting her back in. Our rooster had been killed in the reshuffling and our friends said they had one that nothing was going to be able to kill. We put him in a separate pen to get him used to pen life first as he had been free-ranged previously. We had him a week and were working on ways to get him to not be so noisy in the mornings when he managed to escape from him pen while the lid was opened briefly to change waterers. A wild goose chase ensued. We finally gave up. In the evening we were able to capture him relatively easily and so threw him in with the hens. By Sunday morning his head was bloody and he was cowering in the corners, bloodying the corner posts. I pulled him out before leaving for church, but we forgot about him until after dark. We tried and couldn't find him. I didn't know if he could survive the night. Come 6:30am we hadn't heard him and I thought for sure he was gone, but a few minutes later he let out a mighty crow. He's still strutting his stuff all over the front yard. He managed to ward off the coons, foxes and bobcats, but can't stand up to a few fiesty hens. ???
Eggs- We got our first obviously pullet eggs. Pullets are young hens and the first eggs they lay are going to be quite small. But our other layers aren't too old themselves yet so for them to throw out a smaller than average egg isn't unheard of. But Saturday we got 2 that had to have been from the newer batch of birds. Can you pick them out?
Blackberries- I know it doesn't look like much, but this is a blackberry bush. I had ordered 6 bareroot plants from a friend, 3 different varieties. All are thornless. I would have rather had thorns as they will double as pasture fence reinforcement, but the thornless are more disease resistant, particularly to anthracnose which is all over here. We also had 2 blueberry bushes to plant so the majority of the morning was spent in digging holes. Aaron was a big help in spreading the mulch. He had a great time!
Pruning- I finally pruned all the dead branches off of everything... just in time for close to freezing temps to come again! But all is fine. I learned the hard way that nightblooming jasmine is cold sensitive. That sucker is DEAD. Oh well. It won't feed us so we might as well put in something that will. One orange tree was having some nice new growth. I fertilized it (as with all the others) and now the older foliage that survived the winter has dried up and dropped off and even the tiny new growth is wilting. I've treated this tree the same as all the others and the others are looking great... any thoughts???
Noel and Annabelle are looking close to kidding. I'm hoping they'll hold off a couple weeks, but I don't know how likely that is. At least not for Noel... she's huge. Annabelle looked enormous for ages last year. We've started reluctantly giving them a daily dose of grain though. The research shows that it drastically increases the milk production and the health of the kid for grain to begin in the 3rd trimester and carried throughout the lactation. And the only thing it does to the milk is dilutes the CLA (conjugated linoleic acid), but doesn't add anything negative nor decrease the amount of CLA in each milking. There's so little information out on grass-fed goats that a lot is up to us to figure out. We got rather low milk levels last lactation going strictly grass-fed. It looks like we can double our yield with just a little bit of grain added to their diet each day. Its worth it.
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Meet (or meat) Chuck
This morning we headed out to our first experience with an animal swap. We loaded up "Daisy", our supposed mature female muscovy duck which really is a male, into a chicken pen in the trailer. Our first 5 minutes of being there, we had her... or him... sold for our purchase price. We were in the market for a boer goat kid and a truly mature female muscovy. We found a 7 month old beautiful boer buck who just so happens to be great breeding stock. The man, who knew our intents, had to tell his wife we were going to breed him or she wouldn't sell him to us. :-> "Chuck" is already a big, strong fella. It was work to get him back to the pasture, but I think he's settling in alright now. Noel, our little sweetie, wanted to welcome him warmly. Annabelle is still leery, her hair standing straight up, not letting him eat despite the fact that he towers over her. We'll be castrating him soon, but since all of our little ladies are already expecting, we have some time for him to get over the first trauma before encountering another. We can't wait too long though as crossing a large boer with a little Nigerian inside the little Nigerian would cause for a really difficult, if not disasterous, birth.
No muscovies to be seen... but if you're in the market for a bunny, that's definitely the place to go.
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
Goat slippers stage 1
Randy has been working for weeks on tanning Sundae's hide. A taxidermist lives just a few houses down, but his professionalism is a bit cost prohibitive for us. So, the internet to the rescue (praise God for the information age!). After some searching and reading on different methods, he decided to go with soaking it in a battery acid solution for a couple weeks, pulling off the inner layer, soaking it again, rinsing it, drying it, "breaking" it, drying it again, resoaking it to "break" it some more, and then finally rubbing in the mink oil. It was such a long process, made longer by responsibilities of daily living. One evening we put the kids to bed then Randy went to work on the pelt in the garage, his wet hands freezing. I bundled up and knitted my Christmas stockings with him in the dark December cold. Then finally this past Saturday, he was rubbing in the mink oil while we were sitting in warm sunshine in our reclaimed front yard. It came out quite nice. Its not too big, of course, as Sundae wasn't big, but its big enough for kids booties. However, I'm a bit daunted. Sewing is my job... but this isn't scrap fabric that I have drawers full of. I have one go at this- no mistakes allowed.
I'm thinking of buying some standard skinned leather for the main part and using the fur to trim it around the ankle. That would give me a bit more wiggle room. I'd appreciate any thoughts on the subject though. Randy's ready to do another one. He's been reading about brain tanning and the perfection of the Creator in making an animals brain the perfect size, containing just the right amount of oils for that animals pelt. I'm wondering if that's the case for a brontosaurus though. I'll put that on my list of questions for God. Anyway, he's found a new interest in learning to hunt and is wanting to tackle and entire buck. I have dreams of a leather patchwork quilt dressing our bed!
And please excuse my shaggy-headed daughter... she's getting a haircut today!
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
A Long Overdue Update
Call me a slacker, but we've been celebrating. And what a reason to celebrate... the lion will lie down with the lamb- or in today's vernacular, the racoon will lie down with the chicken!
As for gardening, the greens are still going strong. Peas are getting nice and plump. I've gotten
several handfuls a week of beautiful pearly pink cherry tomatoes. My cilantro is waist high. I planted more garlic and some more seeds this weekend. We're giving spinach one more shot. Not a single plant has survived transplanting... such a shame- I love spinach! The beets too remain very small. I've got a few more seeds in cups hoping they're take off where the others have stunted. I think I'll have some carrots for harvesting in a couple more weeks and planted some more seeds to take their place. Also trying to get more sage going. Seasoning our 37 Thanksgiving bird still has me wiped out.
The goats MUST all be pregnant. They are all looking rather wide though the earliest kidding date would be March. They are enjoying their wide open spaces... though haven't ventured to the rear of the pasture much yet.
As for our other kids, Gloria had a fabulous Christmas. She was so cute to watch. Her favorite part was making "Baby
Jesus Cookies" though few made it onto the gift plates unsampled. She also loved all the "horsie" ornaments on the tree. I never realized how many "horsie" ornaments I had until she pointed them all out. My mom gave her a little tape recorder with a microphone- she's been singing jingle bells ever since. She's quite the little diva. Aaron has enjoyed the season as well though not because of cookies or presents, but rather just having lots of people around to hold him. He's such a cuddlebug. I've gone through a little bit of withdrawal. I had so many projects I was working on for Christmas: handknit stockings for Aaron and my mom's fiance, a quilt for my nephew, scrapbooked calendars for all the grandparents, etc. Now its just cooking and cleaning and organizing and making up for all I let slide while I was making gifts. I don't mind the daily grind, I just really like being creative. Now all I have to create is some diapers for "little" Aaron's ever-growing behind.
Many blessings in the new year for all of you. The pictures are of our family celebrations: Gloria modeling her new "click clack shoes"... The kids must have been mighty good this year (yes, small children CAN fit in those stockings!)... Aaron and "GG" (Great Grandpa)... Gloria singing with Grandpa Mac... And its not Christmas if Randy isn't stealing some playtime with the kids' new toys!
I come bearing tidings of great joy which will be to all people of N. Pinedale Rd.- the goats are out of the front yard!!! Randy and our friend, Steven, put up woven wire fencing around the pasture this past weekend and it has proven goat proof! And the ducks are even tucked away meaning they're no longer eating my chives and pooping all over the driveway! Now lest you think our necks have totally ceased to be red, we still have a pallet wood fence, the most decorative area of landscaping is a smattering of herbs and our jasmine climbing our "Narnia light" has yet to recover from frequently being snacked on.
We moved the ducks night time enclosure into the pasture to encourage them to... ahem... fertilize the pasture sand. They evidently no longer recognized it as home and refused to go in. Previously we merely had to go outside after dark and shut the door. No amount of chasing and 
herding would get them in now though. So today I tricked them. I put their water in the pen only and lured them with some chicken grain. Once inside I trapped them in. I'll let them out again in a few days after re-establishing it as home. I've had some rather nervous nights with them running loose where any coon or bobcat could get them, especially since they are further from the house and I may not hear an attack in time to save them. Thankfully, they were unseen by all mischievious nighttime wildlife and lived to see another day.
herding would get them in now though. So today I tricked them. I put their water in the pen only and lured them with some chicken grain. Once inside I trapped them in. I'll let them out again in a few days after re-establishing it as home. I've had some rather nervous nights with them running loose where any coon or bobcat could get them, especially since they are further from the house and I may not hear an attack in time to save them. Thankfully, they were unseen by all mischievious nighttime wildlife and lived to see another day.As for gardening, the greens are still going strong. Peas are getting nice and plump. I've gotten
several handfuls a week of beautiful pearly pink cherry tomatoes. My cilantro is waist high. I planted more garlic and some more seeds this weekend. We're giving spinach one more shot. Not a single plant has survived transplanting... such a shame- I love spinach! The beets too remain very small. I've got a few more seeds in cups hoping they're take off where the others have stunted. I think I'll have some carrots for harvesting in a couple more weeks and planted some more seeds to take their place. Also trying to get more sage going. Seasoning our 37 Thanksgiving bird still has me wiped out. The goats MUST all be pregnant. They are all looking rather wide though the earliest kidding date would be March. They are enjoying their wide open spaces... though haven't ventured to the rear of the pasture much yet.
As for our other kids, Gloria had a fabulous Christmas. She was so cute to watch. Her favorite part was making "Baby
Jesus Cookies" though few made it onto the gift plates unsampled. She also loved all the "horsie" ornaments on the tree. I never realized how many "horsie" ornaments I had until she pointed them all out. My mom gave her a little tape recorder with a microphone- she's been singing jingle bells ever since. She's quite the little diva. Aaron has enjoyed the season as well though not because of cookies or presents, but rather just having lots of people around to hold him. He's such a cuddlebug. I've gone through a little bit of withdrawal. I had so many projects I was working on for Christmas: handknit stockings for Aaron and my mom's fiance, a quilt for my nephew, scrapbooked calendars for all the grandparents, etc. Now its just cooking and cleaning and organizing and making up for all I let slide while I was making gifts. I don't mind the daily grind, I just really like being creative. Now all I have to create is some diapers for "little" Aaron's ever-growing behind. 
Many blessings in the new year for all of you. The pictures are of our family celebrations: Gloria modeling her new "click clack shoes"... The kids must have been mighty good this year (yes, small children CAN fit in those stockings!)... Aaron and "GG" (Great Grandpa)... Gloria singing with Grandpa Mac... And its not Christmas if Randy isn't stealing some playtime with the kids' new toys! Monday, December 8, 2008
Remembering Sundae
This weekend held a mixture of emotions- Friday night, Randy surprised me with my Christmas present early. He placed a piece of barbed wire in a jewelry box and wrapped it up. Upon opening, I knew it had something to do with the unfinished pasture fence, but supplies were not the issue, it was the time and labor. He quickly explained that he and a very good friend would be finishing it together. I cried. I couldn't have asked for a better gift.
So Saturday morning, Steven came over and they began working. Gloria LOVED having "Uncle Steewie" around. She would have hung on his leg all day if we would have let her. But the day went as planned- I had a meeting and random chores to do, the guys slaved away and made far better time than Randy and I ever did. Shortly after putting the kids down for a nap, Randy had fetched Sundae, our wild, little escape artist, to test the fence. She has had to be tethered inside the enclosure because of her escaping abilities and her insane speed which made catching her after each FREQUENT escape next to impossible. My hope for her was that after kidding and being milked, she would simmer down to a nice sweetie as our other goats are. At any rate, she slipped through all the barbed wire with minimal difficulty. After that, I was scratching her head and back, loving on her as I occasionally did to again aid in the "simmer down" process. That's when I noticed what I had never noticed in any other scratching session- her collar had rubbed the back of her neck raw and had started growing into the flesh. We immediately went through all our options. To remove it would be excruciating, not to mention the pain she has already endured. Should we have removed it, we would still have had the containment issue and stone fruit trees which are deadly poisonous to goats. So, regretfully, we ended her life. It was painless and quick, and oddly enough, right beside the all-purpose pen that sheltered her when she was first born. It was hard on both of us. I feel horribly guilty for never noticing the wound before. She was a shaggy, longer haired goat which hid it well. Randy kept thinking back to when she was little, scamping and playing. Playful jumps and twists, lightening fast from just a couple days old. She was merely 10 and a half months old.
I know everyone is wondering what happened from there. We see things very different from most people- all meat has a face whether you see it or not. We chose to process her as we would venison or beef. I pulled her from the oven just a little while ago. Her fur, thick and soft, I've saved to be tanned and I'll make it into kids slippers or booties. If you disagree with our actions, please don't post negative comments. You never knew our goat. We are saddened by her loss enough already and don't need PETA activists ignorantly telling us we're heartless. Those comments will not be posted anyway.
We're both very glad Steven was there for all of this. I was a bit too emotional to help. Randy was steeling himself for all of it as well... including his first time ever firing a gun. I also left before the processing was complete to take in the New Smyrna Christmas parade (which the kids loved!), a cherished tradition especially for my grandfather. Its amazing how much help moral support is!
Thank you for remembering our little spunky goat. If there were a goat heaven, I'm sure she would have run circles around it multiple times by now. Thank you, Sundae, for spending your life with us and for us.
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
Bits and Pieces
Wow- I don't think it broke 85 degrees all day today. Brrrr. (For you Northerners, I'm only slightly kidding). Fall is in the air and I'm glad. We have a lot going on right now:
1)Our pasture fence is still incomplete. We've decided to do the whole thing in barbed wire instead of trying to electrify parts. We're going to grow thorny vines along the fence as well to reinforce it- and of course, that vine has to feed us as well. Thanks to the Central Florida Gardener, we found a great match for our needs- the mysore black raspberry. Now to find a source. Any suggestions?
2) In the process of looking for the mysore black raspberries, I found another site that made my mouth water- www.tradewindsfruit.com. They have TONS of fruit and nut trees for all types of climates though mostly southern. We ordered some guava, passion fruit, dragon fruit, prickly pear, macadamia nut, and kiwi. I had planted some passion fruit and kiwi seeds previously, but gave them up for lost after a month. I have since learned that it can take up to 4 months for such seeds to germinate. So we try again. At least seeds are cheep!
3) We have temporarily acquired another goat. A "boy" goat. And a little boy he is, but he's supposedly up to the challenge of siring many other goats, even with our rather matriarchal Annabelle. He's only 12 weeks old but had already been mounting his sisters- and his daddy was completing the job at his age too. We've kinda named him Sugar Daddy. Right now he's not getting much action. He joined our herd Friday evening. So our evening entertainment was sitting in front of Gloria's window hoping to watch something exciting. Maybe we should get the turkeys to set the mood. At any rate, right now he's just trying to make a place for himself. Our sweetie, Noel, seemed to welcome him to the herd... until Mama Fudge caught wind of it and gave him a rough butt. No one else has been nice to him at all. Only today has he been able to get a few nibbles from the hay basket before someone chases him off though I don't think it will be too much longer before he's accepted.
4) In speaking of being accepted, the new chickens are all properly sorted into their pecking order. All is well and we've even gotten a few pullet eggs from them already.
5) After 2 and a half weeks, the fire finally stopped smoking. Any ideas what to do with the rest of the piles?
6) We are still fighting grass in the garden. The second garden is a double layer of plastic and that is working well so far. All I have in the ground are long beans and tomatoes. The beans have been covered in aphids. Neem oil has worked the best though not miraculously. We have little frogs everywhere- why aren't they eating them? I'm going to try companion planting some mint with them as beans don't do well with anything from the onion family. Sunflowers, cucumbers, and brocolli are up. I'm having a really hard time getting my pole beans to sprout though. I'll wait another week or two before putting everything in the ground.
7) We built a potato bin, again out of wood pallets. We sprouted some yukon golds from the store, filled the bin a few inches deep with compost and burried the sprouts. As they grow, we'll add more compost. By the time comes to harvest, we should have a barrel full of potatoes- or so the articles say. We laid a double layer of plastic and weed cloth under the compost to prevent nematodes.
8) We also planted some ginger that we sprouted from the store. And the bulb ends of some green onions (once again, thanks, central florida gardener). To think I was throwing them away all this time!
9) 20 barred plymoth rocks and 10 cornish rocks were hatched and shipped today. We expect to receive them Friday morning. Hopefully they will be a stronger batch than the last ones (you may remember we lost 50% of the cornish rocks).
10) And the best news of all- Gloria, at 2.25 years old is officially potty-trained! On a whim I left her in her big girl panties one night figuring she'd either handle it or I'd do a load of laundry. She did great! And she's done great every night since... as long as I don't give her a gallon to drink when she's too exhausted to even know she has to go. I'm really proud of her. She's my big, big girl. Just makes me wonder how long she's been capable of this... Hmmmm, I wonder what Aaron can do???
11) And speaking of Aaron, he's on the move. He can scoot to any room of the house- fast! He loves his walker and can manipulate it to get anywhere as well. I bought shelf anchors this week as we now have 2 large book shelves and he will be pulling himself up very soon!
And a note for Randy who's away on business: I miss you already. The Palace isn't the same without its King.
1)Our pasture fence is still incomplete. We've decided to do the whole thing in barbed wire instead of trying to electrify parts. We're going to grow thorny vines along the fence as well to reinforce it- and of course, that vine has to feed us as well. Thanks to the Central Florida Gardener, we found a great match for our needs- the mysore black raspberry. Now to find a source. Any suggestions?
2) In the process of looking for the mysore black raspberries, I found another site that made my mouth water- www.tradewindsfruit.com. They have TONS of fruit and nut trees for all types of climates though mostly southern. We ordered some guava, passion fruit, dragon fruit, prickly pear, macadamia nut, and kiwi. I had planted some passion fruit and kiwi seeds previously, but gave them up for lost after a month. I have since learned that it can take up to 4 months for such seeds to germinate. So we try again. At least seeds are cheep!
3) We have temporarily acquired another goat. A "boy" goat. And a little boy he is, but he's supposedly up to the challenge of siring many other goats, even with our rather matriarchal Annabelle. He's only 12 weeks old but had already been mounting his sisters- and his daddy was completing the job at his age too. We've kinda named him Sugar Daddy. Right now he's not getting much action. He joined our herd Friday evening. So our evening entertainment was sitting in front of Gloria's window hoping to watch something exciting. Maybe we should get the turkeys to set the mood. At any rate, right now he's just trying to make a place for himself. Our sweetie, Noel, seemed to welcome him to the herd... until Mama Fudge caught wind of it and gave him a rough butt. No one else has been nice to him at all. Only today has he been able to get a few nibbles from the hay basket before someone chases him off though I don't think it will be too much longer before he's accepted.
4) In speaking of being accepted, the new chickens are all properly sorted into their pecking order. All is well and we've even gotten a few pullet eggs from them already.
5) After 2 and a half weeks, the fire finally stopped smoking. Any ideas what to do with the rest of the piles?
6) We are still fighting grass in the garden. The second garden is a double layer of plastic and that is working well so far. All I have in the ground are long beans and tomatoes. The beans have been covered in aphids. Neem oil has worked the best though not miraculously. We have little frogs everywhere- why aren't they eating them? I'm going to try companion planting some mint with them as beans don't do well with anything from the onion family. Sunflowers, cucumbers, and brocolli are up. I'm having a really hard time getting my pole beans to sprout though. I'll wait another week or two before putting everything in the ground.
7) We built a potato bin, again out of wood pallets. We sprouted some yukon golds from the store, filled the bin a few inches deep with compost and burried the sprouts. As they grow, we'll add more compost. By the time comes to harvest, we should have a barrel full of potatoes- or so the articles say. We laid a double layer of plastic and weed cloth under the compost to prevent nematodes.
8) We also planted some ginger that we sprouted from the store. And the bulb ends of some green onions (once again, thanks, central florida gardener). To think I was throwing them away all this time!
9) 20 barred plymoth rocks and 10 cornish rocks were hatched and shipped today. We expect to receive them Friday morning. Hopefully they will be a stronger batch than the last ones (you may remember we lost 50% of the cornish rocks).
10) And the best news of all- Gloria, at 2.25 years old is officially potty-trained! On a whim I left her in her big girl panties one night figuring she'd either handle it or I'd do a load of laundry. She did great! And she's done great every night since... as long as I don't give her a gallon to drink when she's too exhausted to even know she has to go. I'm really proud of her. She's my big, big girl. Just makes me wonder how long she's been capable of this... Hmmmm, I wonder what Aaron can do???
11) And speaking of Aaron, he's on the move. He can scoot to any room of the house- fast! He loves his walker and can manipulate it to get anywhere as well. I bought shelf anchors this week as we now have 2 large book shelves and he will be pulling himself up very soon!
And a note for Randy who's away on business: I miss you already. The Palace isn't the same without its King.
Monday, September 8, 2008
Mind if I smoke?
You may remember that we were working on clearing our back 0.6 acre pasture way back in January. It was completed sometime in April with about 8 huge burn piles. To have the excess brush hauled away was putting it way out of the budget (the trees were taken to the clearing company's mill). We were waiting for the brush to thuroughly dry and some good wet weather to come our way before burning. Well, we got it. Fay, Gustav and Hanna provided some moisture for safe burning. Saturday the wind forecast was nice and gentle so at first light, Randy was out lighting a fire. By 8:30 we had 2 fire trucks, a police chief and a couple volunteers in our yard. We had discussed the situation with my brother-in-law (one of the firemen on duty) about it before hand. He assured us that someone would definitely call it in, but that they would come out, look at it and tell us to continue as planned. Well, apparently SOOOO many people called reporting a house fire that they had also dispatched 2 units from Port Orange, the tower truck and paramedics. My brother-in-law saw it was "just us" and canceled all units. The problem was not risk of fire. Randy did a great job preparing and tending. The trouble was that the smoke wasn't rising. It hung low and smoked out the entire northern section of Florida Shores. As I was leaving for a meeting, I was still smelling smoke on US1. For those of you not local- that's almost 2 miles of smoke. We were instructed to call the division of forestry who agreed that this was a great time to burn and told us to continue. Thankfully, the smoke did start rising. This pile burned until 5:45 when Randy tried to put it out so we could safely leave for the evening. He couldn't get it out even after an hour and a half of shoveling and hosing. He stayed home while I left with Aaron. At midnight we were shutting off the lights and I noticed our back yard glowing. We both went out to again try to extinguish it. Got it, again, down to embers in the center of the pile. At 1am I woke up and checked. Again flames were going. I went out and hosed it down to a smolder. I checked it again at 3- the pile was glowing but I didn't see flames so I went back to sleep. At 4, the flames were back so I again hosed it down. At 6:30, Randy went out and did some shoveling and hosing again. Since then there has been a continuous stream of smoke, but no flames. 2 days later, still smoking and still a LOT left to burn. We really don't know what to do with the rest of the piles. We were not expecting to find this many HUGE logs beneath all the scrub. These piles could take 5 days to burn and they are a bit close to homes to risk that. So... we're back to the idea of finishing the fence and letting the goats go wild in there until we can save enough to have it all hauled away.
In other news, grass is still trying to get up through the plastic and weed cloth in the garden. I patched places and added more mulch this morning. I killed my seedlings thinking it would rain. I had sunflowers, cucumbers, brocolli, amaranth, sage and thyme coming up... all dead by my own laziness in not wanting to do something I thought mother nature would do for me. Alas, live and learn. Thankfully we still have plenty more seeds of each variety.
We also placed a chicken order today. 10 cornish rocks and 20 plymoth rocks. The cornish rocks are for eating (all but one lucky rooster). The male plymoths, however many there are, will mostly all be for eating. We'll save 1 or 2 for breeding. The hens are for laying and breeding. We're going to try hatching our own at some point. Maybe crossing the cornish rocks with the plymoth rock to try to get some of their original size back. They used to be an enormous bird back when dual purpose meant something. Now they are bred to be small so that the feed ratio is better for laying purposes.
While on the topic of breeding, I started drying Fudge off today. She's been giving only 4 oz of milk lately. We want her dried off and bred as soon as possible. Hopefully the next post will be one of expectancy!
In other news, grass is still trying to get up through the plastic and weed cloth in the garden. I patched places and added more mulch this morning. I killed my seedlings thinking it would rain. I had sunflowers, cucumbers, brocolli, amaranth, sage and thyme coming up... all dead by my own laziness in not wanting to do something I thought mother nature would do for me. Alas, live and learn. Thankfully we still have plenty more seeds of each variety.
We also placed a chicken order today. 10 cornish rocks and 20 plymoth rocks. The cornish rocks are for eating (all but one lucky rooster). The male plymoths, however many there are, will mostly all be for eating. We'll save 1 or 2 for breeding. The hens are for laying and breeding. We're going to try hatching our own at some point. Maybe crossing the cornish rocks with the plymoth rock to try to get some of their original size back. They used to be an enormous bird back when dual purpose meant something. Now they are bred to be small so that the feed ratio is better for laying purposes.
While on the topic of breeding, I started drying Fudge off today. She's been giving only 4 oz of milk lately. We want her dried off and bred as soon as possible. Hopefully the next post will be one of expectancy!
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
Good Morning, Fay
Tropical Storm Fay is due for arrival any minute now. Its really not a serious storm, but even the not-that-bad of a storm brings a whole new dimension when dealing with animals. Thankfully we didn't have to pull out all the stops, but this is what the Palace looks like right now:
1) My bike and enormous bike trailer is in the hallway to make room in the garage.
2) The chickens are in a child gate enclosure with a plywood top in the porch. Newpaper is saving the concrete floor from poop stains (I hope) and rubbermaid containers and rubber floor matting is blocking the wind and rain that will blow in.
3) The amorous turkeys are right outside Gloria's window. We had to move them from the back yard to the front yard to spare them the eastern winds.
4) Its a Mother and Child Reunion with the goats- all together in the front yard with the shed opening north.
5) The electric fencing around the goats is completely disconnected. I even left a little gap in the opening should they need to get out. I don't expect them to venture out of the shed at all though. Goats HATE rain.
6) Potted plants and seedlings decorate every flat surface of the garage. Grain bags are mounted high enough so if worse comes to worse, the goats can be housed in the garage without thinking its a candy shop. We intend Randy's car to be in there instead though.
7) The chicken pen (which can't handle wind at all) is upside down against the house.
8) All Gloria's yard toys, slides, climbing things, etc. are crammed into an empty shed in the pasture.
Should a worse storm come, the goats go in the garage, the turkeys into the porch, the chickens turned loose to fend for themselves with the hope that they will return unharmed after the storm is over. Chickens are a whole lot smarter than turkeys which is why they would get the boot and the turkeys would get the cozy porch. The goat shed would need to be turned onto its side and against the safest side of the house. I'm glad we have a plan, but I hope we never have to use it. And if we ever do, I hope we won't have meat birds to throw into the mix as well. It was enough work to prepare for this.
Good luck to all. Stay dry.
1) My bike and enormous bike trailer is in the hallway to make room in the garage.
2) The chickens are in a child gate enclosure with a plywood top in the porch. Newpaper is saving the concrete floor from poop stains (I hope) and rubbermaid containers and rubber floor matting is blocking the wind and rain that will blow in.
3) The amorous turkeys are right outside Gloria's window. We had to move them from the back yard to the front yard to spare them the eastern winds.
4) Its a Mother and Child Reunion with the goats- all together in the front yard with the shed opening north.
5) The electric fencing around the goats is completely disconnected. I even left a little gap in the opening should they need to get out. I don't expect them to venture out of the shed at all though. Goats HATE rain.
6) Potted plants and seedlings decorate every flat surface of the garage. Grain bags are mounted high enough so if worse comes to worse, the goats can be housed in the garage without thinking its a candy shop. We intend Randy's car to be in there instead though.
7) The chicken pen (which can't handle wind at all) is upside down against the house.
8) All Gloria's yard toys, slides, climbing things, etc. are crammed into an empty shed in the pasture.
Should a worse storm come, the goats go in the garage, the turkeys into the porch, the chickens turned loose to fend for themselves with the hope that they will return unharmed after the storm is over. Chickens are a whole lot smarter than turkeys which is why they would get the boot and the turkeys would get the cozy porch. The goat shed would need to be turned onto its side and against the safest side of the house. I'm glad we have a plan, but I hope we never have to use it. And if we ever do, I hope we won't have meat birds to throw into the mix as well. It was enough work to prepare for this.
Good luck to all. Stay dry.
Tuesday, July 8, 2008
While the farmers are away...
While the farmers are away, the goats will play. And so our's did. We had rigged up our fence to where it held the goats inside for a single day and prayed it would do so while we were gone to Tennessee for a family reunion for 4 days. They quickly figured out that the fence was nothing more than a back scratcher and roamed the property and our neighbor's as they pleased. No damage was done. They were sweet, harmless goats, but it tired our neighbor plenty trying repeatedly to get them back in. 
Before we left, we harvested a few watermelons. To get really sweet melons its best if the weather is dry the last couple weeks before harvesting. That's exactly when our rains started. The first was ok. Not a lot of flavor, but at least moderately enjoyable. Like a typical store bought melon. The next had even less flavor. The third wasn't ripe at all. When we returned, Randy found 2 more little ones where the vine had died. I'm thinking the anthracnose is showing its ugly side and taking our little melons with it as it slowly kills the vines. Its a lesson in knowing what can hit and preventing it long before you even see a symptom. We at least have gotten a good number of viable seeds from the first watermelon we ate.
As for our trip, it was great. I got our fall garden mostly planned on the 12 hour drive up and back. I also cut out diaper pieces for Aaron, finished knitting Randy's winter hat (little late) and started Aaron Christmas stocking (hmmm... will I have it done in 6 months???) Gloria had a wonderful time with various other kids, mostly 3rd and 4th cousins. Aaron loved being held by all the great aunts who are waiting for grandkids and more cousins who are waiting for kids. He was just as mellow as usual, even when I made him sport the festive do rag.
Before we left, we harvested a few watermelons. To get really sweet melons its best if the weather is dry the last couple weeks before harvesting. That's exactly when our rains started. The first was ok. Not a lot of flavor, but at least moderately enjoyable. Like a typical store bought melon. The next had even less flavor. The third wasn't ripe at all. When we returned, Randy found 2 more little ones where the vine had died. I'm thinking the anthracnose is showing its ugly side and taking our little melons with it as it slowly kills the vines. Its a lesson in knowing what can hit and preventing it long before you even see a symptom. We at least have gotten a good number of viable seeds from the first watermelon we ate.On a good note, we harvested a sunflower and it is drying in our porch. The sorghum heads really look good. Our amaranth is starting to head with beautiful red fuzz balls. Our various different beans are flowering. We have about 10 little pumpkins growing bigger. I have our pineapple protected with a heavy dusting of cayenne pepper. We slaughtered most of our meat birds last Saturday and will be doing the remaining 5 hens this saturday. Our okra continues to give a few bits a day, amounting to about a side dish a week (which is about all you want of okra) from only 2 plants. Our new plants are looking good to start producing in a few more weeks.
As for our trip, it was great. I got our fall garden mostly planned on the 12 hour drive up and back. I also cut out diaper pieces for Aaron, finished knitting Randy's winter hat (little late) and started Aaron Christmas stocking (hmmm... will I have it done in 6 months???) Gloria had a wonderful time with various other kids, mostly 3rd and 4th cousins. Aaron loved being held by all the great aunts who are waiting for grandkids and more cousins who are waiting for kids. He was just as mellow as usual, even when I made him sport the festive do rag.Now its back to normal, continuing the potty-training process, fixing the fence, fighting off the fungi, chasing Sundae, etc. The break was nice, but normal life is really nice too.
Friday, June 27, 2008
Not-so-hot fence
I'm once again waiting for my children to sleep peacefully so I can escape outside and continue my duties. This time to continue troubleshooting as to why our hot fence wires are not so hot. We finished the fence Sunday (I'm sorry, we worked on the Sabbath). I tried to juice it up on Monday. Nothing. Randy got a slight tingle Monday night if he sat on the damp ground and held the ground rod in one hand and the wire in the other. I cleared the fence row of everything that could possibly be draining the voltage on Tuesday. Still nothing. Tuesday afternoon I bought a new charger. Wednesday I installed the charger to no avail.I called the extension agent. She suggested a new ground rod and if that didn't work to buy a voltmeter that would measure each point along the fence. I bought an 8' copper ground rod and drove home with it hanging out of the trunk in a lightning storm. Fun. Thursday I installed the new ground rod. Still no dice, with either one of our chargers. I got one zap in about 5 seconds of completely grabbing on to the fence. So Thursday evening I bought a tester. While at the feed store, one man said to not loop it around in a continuous circuit. Another said not to try to test it in the rain as the moisture will drain it completely. So today, I thought for sure I could get the thing hot. I disconnected the wires that were joining the end to the beginning, hooked it up to the new charger, the new charger was registering a good voltage so I grabbed a piece of grass, took off a shoe and... Nothing. Tried the other 2 wires. Nothing. The tester isn't even registering anything at all, even when connected directly to the charger's terminal. So, now I'm throwing in the towel. I'm moving the goats in there and I'll watch and see where they get out, if they do, and patch the hole with barbed wire. I'm out of ideas. But I'm open for any that you might have!
Monday, March 3, 2008
One month old and other news
Aaron the Red is one month old today. Hard to believe, actually. Seems like it was just yesterday. Glad it wasn't or I still wouldn't be walking. Anyway, we've noticed that his hair is rather red. Its hard to see in pictures... and its not little orphan Annie red either, but we've been calling him Aaron the Red in celebration of his highlights.In other news, we've not had such great luck weaning Noel. For 2 full weeks now I've been keeping Fudge out of the pen after milking. We put her back in with the others in the evening when we're separating Noel and Sundae (Annie's doeling) into the kid pen for the night. However, Sundays are different as we're gone all day and don't like to tether a goat when we're not here to keep and eye on her. So on Sundays we've just let them run together, but it does not seem to be helping the weaning process.
Two days in a row Fudge got loose from her tether. She broke her collar the second day. Got her a new collar and she broke it today. Yesterday (Sunday), we tethered Noel out at the neighbor's house instead. She was very able to slip right out of her collar no matter how tight it was. So... I have no idea what to do now.
On another note, we've decided to cheat on the land clearing. Rather than blazing a path, putting up a fence around the brush, letting the goats eat what they will then getting pigs to root up what the goats won't and still having to haul it all into burn piles or out to the road, we've decided to spend the good ole American hard earned dollar and let the oil companies get a share as they power large heavy machinery. This is scheduled to happen sometime in the next couple weeks. We actually got a very good price as the guy has a saw mill and so doesn't need to charge us disposal fees for the 50 some yellow pine trees he's going to be taking down.
And we've ordered another set of meat chickens... and 4 turkeys to go along with them. Rumor has it turkeys are difficult to keep alive. We shall see. I think the lack of agricultural pursuits surrounding us will work in our favor... fewer turkey-germs floating around.
Until next time...
Saturday, January 26, 2008
Annie's babies
Last night we went for a nice romantic stroll down a quaint beachside street to aid in the birthing process. I'm still pregnant, but we came home to find 2 adorable new goat babies. Annie was a wonderful mother and must have done a great job birthing these two in a very short amount of time.
The white one, unfortunately, is a buck. He's so cute, but we just don't have room to keep boys (we keep reassuring Aaron that he will be neither sold nor castrated). The black one is a doe. Mama and babies are all doing well. Fudge is not so nice to her half brother and sister... of course they have tried to nurse on her as well.
Milking is going well. Noel is now weened all night and nurses all day. We were increasing in milk production until we got some mixed up hay and also forgot to separate Noel one night. So, basically we get 8 oz each morning from Fudge. This really must increase at some point though. Annie was a very good milker for her first time. Once she got through the initial jitters, she just stood there, didn't even eat, as I milked out almost 9 oz. That's a really good first milking especially since 2 kids were probably sucking on her all night!
And, we're open to name suggestions for our black doeling for any creative goat-namers!
The white one, unfortunately, is a buck. He's so cute, but we just don't have room to keep boys (we keep reassuring Aaron that he will be neither sold nor castrated). The black one is a doe. Mama and babies are all doing well. Fudge is not so nice to her half brother and sister... of course they have tried to nurse on her as well.
Milking is going well. Noel is now weened all night and nurses all day. We were increasing in milk production until we got some mixed up hay and also forgot to separate Noel one night. So, basically we get 8 oz each morning from Fudge. This really must increase at some point though. Annie was a very good milker for her first time. Once she got through the initial jitters, she just stood there, didn't even eat, as I milked out almost 9 oz. That's a really good first milking especially since 2 kids were probably sucking on her all night!
And, we're open to name suggestions for our black doeling for any creative goat-namers!
Friday, January 18, 2008
How to win friends and influence people
1) Get cute goats.
2) Ignore a neighbor's request and keep them in the front yard close to the road.
3) Have cute baby goats.
Yes, since Christmas when little Noel was born, we've had a constant stream of visitors. Everyone on the street has stopped by to admire and hold Noel- except the neighbor who complained about livestock bringing down property values. Oh wait, the nudist hasn't come by either, but I certainly don't mind that. I haven't
seen him out much recently anyway. When his daughter comes to check on him, she slows down or stops in front of the fence to watch the romping. The word has spread to other streets that we have a cute baby goat. Families take walks and bike rides to see her. One family wanted the full farm tour and will probably be getting chickens with our next order. Noel has fostered such a wonderful sense of community. One that apparently was there years ago, back when everyone on the street had geese and chickens and pigs and various other animals. Recently, the old-timers have complained that the new residents aren't so friendly. We're finding evidence to the contrary... they just need a reason to stop and chat. Maybe we'll start a new trend on North Pinedale Road- oh what will the property values be like then?!?!
2) Ignore a neighbor's request and keep them in the front yard close to the road.
3) Have cute baby goats.
Yes, since Christmas when little Noel was born, we've had a constant stream of visitors. Everyone on the street has stopped by to admire and hold Noel- except the neighbor who complained about livestock bringing down property values. Oh wait, the nudist hasn't come by either, but I certainly don't mind that. I haven't
seen him out much recently anyway. When his daughter comes to check on him, she slows down or stops in front of the fence to watch the romping. The word has spread to other streets that we have a cute baby goat. Families take walks and bike rides to see her. One family wanted the full farm tour and will probably be getting chickens with our next order. Noel has fostered such a wonderful sense of community. One that apparently was there years ago, back when everyone on the street had geese and chickens and pigs and various other animals. Recently, the old-timers have complained that the new residents aren't so friendly. We're finding evidence to the contrary... they just need a reason to stop and chat. Maybe we'll start a new trend on North Pinedale Road- oh what will the property values be like then?!?!
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