FarmerDenise's journal - full on harvest time = busy, busy, busy

[FarmerDenise]

We've buchered some of our others. He always finds something wrong.
I told him today, that I don't mind doing the deed. If that is what it takes. He has this idea of manlyness,... involving him having to do the butchering, .... not to me ...
my grandma butchered and I know many a woman before me butchered.. I think of it more of a woman thing... feed the family no matter what it takes.....
I am looking forward to doing some of those little belligent fighters in...

I think if I cook them up and not tell him which chicken he is eating, store bought or home raised, until after... I will have a better chance of convincing him that home grown is better....

 

[Farmfresh]

Probably you are right.

In the past the men usually took care of the fields growing the grain and they also were in charge of beef cattle and hogs - including butchering them.

Most women tended the kitchen garden, the children, did the milking and took care of the poultry. All small animals, like chicken and even any rabbits that were shot, were butchered and cleaned by the women folk. If he gets his history right, he would be doing woman's work when butchering the chickens.

 

[FarmerDenise]

So I finally decided to put a sweater on Susie. she was fairly nakied again. Our roo keeps jumping on her and it wears the few feathers she has off. We still have some pretty darn cold nights and I wanted her to be warm. So here is Susie with her "new sweater"

And here is a nice pic of one of the feather dusters.

SO went turkye hunting this morning and finally got a turkey for himself. He decided to go for a younger bird. I was very happy about that. We cleaned it and it is now sitting in the fridge to chill. I hope to cook it up for sunday dinner.
I ate the liver with onions for lunch and our dog got the heart. Yummy. It has been a busy day.

 

[FarmerDenise]

One of the nice things about our little goats is that we have to sit outside with them when they are out in the field.

Several times a day we let them out of the little pen, so they can run and jump about and nibble on all the goodies in the field. We don't trust them to be out all by themselves, because there is too much for them to get into. So I sit in the field, watching little goats play or graze. If I am under the peach trees, I will sometimes start pulling weeds and then the chickens come 'round to explore. Next thing you know the dog is also sitting under the peaches. I am noticing the geese fly over or the mocking bird. SO often comes to join me and we have a nice chat and usually also a good laugh or two at the critters antics.

 

[freemotion]

We call this "psychotherapy" at our house! Or "goat therapy" or "chicken therapy..." As in: "I'm going outside for some goat therapy!"

 

[ohiofarmgirl]

that little sweater is the business!! and everyone is so darn cute!!!! yay you!!!

great work with everyone!

 

[FarmerDenise]

We've been busy, busy, busy... Nothing like having some nice weather to get us going on all the work on the farm.

Got a whole lot of seeds up in the greenhouse.
Planted some more.
Seeds are up in "my garden"
Doelings are growing and munching on greens in the field.
I have moved them to a bigger pen, next to the chicken yard. They seem to like it. It used to be our nursery/hospital pen for the chickens. It is a nice size for baby goats and we have managed to secure it for now
I put the hay feeder we got from the neighbor in there, as well as a mineral lick, the jar with baking soda and 2 buckets of water. They have old lug boxes to climb on in there and the blackberry vines are growing through the fence from the neighbor's yard.
They still spend their nights in the living room. I think tonight will be the last night though. They are predicting some fairly low temps. I have just been waiting for the nights to be closer to 50. Also one of the doelings has had diarrhea and I rather have her in the house at night so I can keep an eye on her.

I thoroughly cleaned out the rabbit pen this week. I filled up a wheelbarrow with the greens that had gotten piled up. He likes to dig in them and burrough under them, so I am usually not in too much of a hurry to clean them out. But I like to get all of it out every other month or so. He seems to like it too. He usually goes running around and skip hopping this way and that after I clean his pen out. Then he comes over for head scratches. He'll nudge me and grunt at me, if I should fail to comply

Cecilia is sitting on 6 eggs still (they are due to hatch next tuesday), Gretchen is helping her. Gretchen is the one who hadn't been laying. Then when I gave her "the talk" she started laying robbin's eggs I guess now she is trying to ingratiate herself to me, by being a good nanny and giving mamma Cecilia a break from the nest
Cecilia decided to have her nest in the little dog igloo that I had put in the henhouse for the featherdusters. It is rather cute. I figure if there is a problem with leaving her and the chicks in the henhouse, I will easily be able to take the igloo out and put it in the chicken tractor/nursery that the goats just vacated.

Today I will be turning the turkey that SO shot and I cooked on Sunday and making it into stock, stew and dogfood.

I've been reading about goat husbandry and country living. One of the books I borrowed from the library is" Country Life" A Handbook For Realists and Dreamers by Paul Heiney. SO and I both love it. It has loads of illustrations and what looks to be good directions. I plan on buying it, if I can find it for sale.

Yesterday I went to the neighbors and brought them some chick starter and shared some of our rolled barley that I just bought. She had recently bought an incubator and now her chicks are hatching I figured bringing over some feed was a good excuse to see them This is the neighbor we always trade stuff with. She had a really cool setup for her brooder, made out of a large and sturdy cardboard box her hubby brought home. She had one lone premature chick in there. While we went to check on it, it ran into the waterer and got itself all wet. I have a tiny chick waterer and ran home to get it for her. It is so small it is really only usefull for barely a week. This way she didn't have to worry about the chick drowning in there or getting wet. I also suggested to her that she put marbles or small pebbles in her larger chick waterer to prevent them from drowning themselves.

Upon leaving I noticed they had a large animal carrier in the yard and I asked how much they wanted for it. They said just take it and use it. They said it was so nice to have a neighbor who cared enough about their animals to bring them the supplies to prevent their animals from dying. I said: "yeah, nice to have neighbors who help each other out."
They always do the same for us.

Their property looks like one of those you see on "hoarders" and lots of folks ask us questions like doesn't it bother you that their place is such a junk heap or aren't you worried about a fire hazard? Our answer is always: "We'd rather have ten of those kind of neighbors than one of So-n-So (other neighbor) with the clean yard and snoopy uppity I'm-better-than-you attitude or "the ganghouse"!! (with 22 roosters in individual cages and pitbulls, both of which they are breeding for fighting and who steal from others in the neighborhood.) The neighbor with the messy yard sells the stuff, at least that is the idea. They also share with us all the time. If they have someting we need, it is ours. Sometimes we pay them money, sometimes we trade, sometimes we work for it.
There are chickens and goats in there somewhere. The critters really cleaned it up a lot too!! It used to be a lot more overgrown.
If the proverbial S were to hit the fan, I'd rather live next door to them, because between what they have and what they know, we'd make a good team for survival.

 

[big brown horse]

Wow you have been busy! Isn't it a wonderful thing to have such nice neighbors? I love my neighbors too. I would love to sort through all that "junk" and find neat treasures! I love junk piles, just not on my land.

I have a quick mama chicken question for you, Pumpkin Pie hatched 3 eggs on Sat morning. The rest still have not hatched, when do I take them away? I should do it at night, right?

 

[FarmerDenise]

I took Susie's unhatched eggs away about 3 days after the last hatch. She wasn't paying that much attention to them anyway, she was busy with her hatched chicks and would keep kicking the eggs out of the nest. Just to make sure I candled them and then broke them open. No embryos... phew! I was glad I was right
I just took them away in the daytime. If you want to slip a coupla chicks under her, do it in the evening, early enough that you can keep on eye on things for a maybe an hour. If all goes well you'll have a happy little family, if not you're stuck raising a chick or two :/

I just came in with the little goats, I just love watching them run and play. The dog joins in on the games. Funny thing is, when the dog comes running to me at full speed, I know I have to brace myself because she often runs right into me. The goats have the curtesy to miss me. Nice goats.

 

[big brown horse]

I took Susie's unhatched eggs away about 3 days after the last hatch. She wasn't paying that much attention to them anyway, she was busy with her hatched chicks and would keep kicking the eggs out of the nest. Just to make sure I candled them and then broke them open. No embryos... phew! I was glad I was right
I just took them away in the daytime. If you want to slip a coupla chicks under her, do it in the evening, early enough that you can keep on eye on things for a maybe an hour. If all goes well you'll have a happy little family, if not you're stuck raising a chick or two :/

I just came in with the little goats, I just love watching them run and play. The dog joins in on the games. Funny thing is, when the dog comes running to me at full speed, I know I have to brace myself because she often runs right into me. The goats have the curtesy to miss me. Nice goats.

Thanks!! I'll get those eggs out now...I am too scared to crack them open!! (You are a brave woman!) I will candle them though, all I have is a tp roll and a stong flashlight...hope it works!

I wan't goats!!