Join us in welcoming Taylor and Sarah Shea’s newborn daughter, baby Willow, to the farm! Though only a week old, little Willow is already being put to work in the greenhouse – we figure it’s never too early to learn the value of a hard day’s work!
An Addition to the White Oak Crew!
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Buckets of Rain
It’s been a wet two weeks here at the farm, and things are getting to a point where the moisture is literally putting a damper on our Springtime activities. On the to-do list: bring in fire wood, plant out potatoes, weed some of the farm beds, and plant out early season crops. The last two on that list are fairly pressing, as we’ve got a legion of a little starts rearing to go in the greenhouse, and no place dry enough to put them. We’ve exhausted our list of things that can be done under cover, which is never a bad thing as the animals find themselves in clean stalls with fresh straw, and the barn is also pretty sparkly. The greenhouse has benefited as well, with a full weeding taking place this morning and an up-potting of tomato seedlings to give them roomier accommodation.
We’ve got our fingers crossed that things will dry out in time for the spring crops and fruit trees to have a good season!
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Green Things
…from inside the Green House!
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Make your own potting soil!
Here at the farm we go through heaps of organic potting soil each spring. To buy it in bags from the garden center would be absolutely ridiculous, and even a bulk purchase wouldn’t sustain our appetite for the stuff. Mixing potting soil is easy and the ingredients are readily available in bulk, and we produce the prime ingredient right here on the farm!
We use a big galvanized tub to blend the ingredients together, and then fill flats and small pots with it as a perfect medium for germination and growth of tiny seedlings.
The key ingredient is sifted soil, over a period of months, the worms and micro-organisms get to work turning raw materials into rich planting medium. We sift it through a mesh screen to remove pieces of wood or other debris.
Recipe:
1 Wheel Barrel Sifted Soil (you can also use homemade compost)
5 Gallons Peat Moss (We use a 5 gallon bucket to measure.)
2.5 Gallons Perlite (Be careful with this stuff! It will irritate your eyes and lungs so wear a mask!)
2 Quarts Organic Fertilizer
2 Quarts Kelp
1.25 Gallons Sand (This one is optional.)
Method:
Mix it all together!
There is no substitute for giving seedlings a strong start with good organic soil. It is full of good things and is fairly inexpensive to produce.
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Chicks!
Getting bigger by the day, the chicks are thriving and learning to stretch their wings! They zip all around their miniature coop in a tiny game of bumper cars.
On the warmer days we’ve been having, we open up the curtain on their coop to let in fresh air and sunlight. Soon they will be big enough that we will start letting them out onto some grass in a little enclosure. The enclosure has a roof and is a tight mesh to protect them from hawks, stray cats, and other bold predators, but its open bottom allows them access to grass, bugs, and soil so that they can express their inner chicken-ness and practice for the big time.
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You’re Kidding
Our younger goat, Molly was due today, but went into labor last evening around 5 PM. She’s relatively new to mothering, last year was her first birthing year, so we’re still feeling out what to expect with her. She had two boys and a girl for her first litter, and together they formed a miniature gang that terrorized the lambs in epic battles of king of the mountain.
This year Molly was in labor for over 4 hours. The first one out was a little girl, a spitting image of Molly herself. Two hours of waiting and a massive cheer-leading effort by the farm crew saw the birth of her second kid, a stout brown boy, quickly followed by another small boy. All were born healthy, though goat kids are much more fragile than lambs, so today they are still learning the art of walking.
As a new mother, Molly needs a little bit of coaching, and the kids all need encouragement to nurse, so we’re checking in on them often to make sure they’re warm and getting plenty to drink.
Birth on the farm brings to light one truth of farming: nothing is certain. Books about rearing goats will often tout the hardiness of goat mothers, the ease of birth and low incidence of complications. We have found that each goat is different. While our elder goat, Tilia, tends to have very easy births, Molly struggles a bit and tends to take much longer. She has also had three every time, while Tilia has only ever had one kid at a time. The hours of waiting for Molly’s second kid were tense for sure, but we had patience and trust, and her last two came without difficulty.
In the moments of birthing, there is no book that will overcome the powers of intuition and experience, and most often a farmer must rely on his or her ‘gut feeling’ about what is the best course of action.
It certainly keeps us on our toes.
Posted in Critters, Daily Happenings, Goats, Photography
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News from the Coop
Late last week we stopped by our local Grange Coop and picked up a cardboard box containing 30 chicks (chicken chicks, that is!). Spring is absolutely the time to start chickens, and we’re trying to time it so that they’ll still be laying in winter.
We decided to go with an assortment of breeds, so that we can have multicolored eggs and a good variety of genetics and traits within the flock. For example, a heavier, more densely feathered bird might continue laying in cold weather, while a less bulky bird might lay better in hot weather. We also like to have a colorful flock with lots of personality.
Because they are only days old, we’ve got the chicks sealed tightly in a small, well-insulated, waterproof coop. They’ve got two red heat lamps to keep them warm, and constant water and feed. While they are small like this, we check on them several times a day, watching especially close to make sure they are healthy and active.
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Poultry Happenings
Just in time to restore our faith that Spring is indeed coming, the turkeys started laying eggs. Tyler and I were observing our resident Tom, Tómas, when Tyler noticed one of the hens was standing quite awkwardly and concentrating intensely at nothing in particular. Moments later, she knelt down and dropped an egg nonchalantly in the grass behind her, glancing at us briefly and then wandering away to eat more grass.
Since then, the hens have laid at least an egg a day, and there is now a pile of 8 eggs in a single nest in the turkey coop. One of the turkeys seems to have figured out that she is supposed to lay her eggs in the nest, but one is still laying eggs in the grass outside. Soon, at least one of the hens should become broody and decide to nest on her eggs.
Breeding turkeys is difficult business, mostly because the advent of commercial breeds (like the supermarket giant Broad Breasted White) and mechanized poultry farms aim to discourage broodiness in turkeys. During their broody period, turkeys park on their nest and may not leave to eat or drink, leading to weight loss and decreased production. In a factory situation, the eggs are incubated.
As an aside, commercialized breeds like the Broad Breasted White have traits that render them incapable of breeding (shorter legs, larger breast muscles) and require human assistance – our flock has proven plenty able to reproduce on their own, all while munching on nutritious organic pasture and stretching their legs and wings.
We keep heritage breeds here at the farm, because they have retained their breeding, brooding, and mothering instincts, and they are just better at being turkeys than we are.
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Getting Out
We ran Gabby and the lambs to the near pasture today, partially to give Gabby a break from being pushed up against a wall and forced to nurse her princess of a daughter (who to our knowledge does not nurse at all on her own, but will drink heartily when prompted with a shot of goat milk and placed in the right position), and partially to give the little ewe a lesson in the outside world. She doesn’t seem to connect very well with her kin, but she stayed with everyone in the field and slept beside her brothers. The lamb pictured is one of the boys, who is already becoming a challenge to pick up (because they are growing so fast).
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Hitting the bottle
Our beloved little ewe has just not taken to nursing like her two brothers, and we’re dancing on a thin line as we try to coax her to nurse but know that we have to supplement her diet so that she will thrive. It started out with a few shots of colostrum (from our goats, frozen from previous seasons) and some strong suggestions on our part (holding her head straight to Gabby’s teat, placing it in her mouth). Unfortunately, Gabby isn’t thrilled about our meddling and doesn’t like to nurse under pressure, and the lamb is not at all enthusiastic about being forced. She loves the colostrum, and now associates people with food. We have tried for a week now in our nursing campaign, to very little avail.
We bought goat milk today, and are still attempting to get the lamb to nurse by feeding her with a syringe instead of a bottle. If she doesn’t become serious about nursing within a day or so we are going to have to switch to bottle feeding the lamb, a necessity that we would all rather avoid…
Posted in Agriculture, Daily Happenings, Sheep
Tagged ewe, lamb, organic, sheep
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