Holiday Decorating

This past weekend, Jeff, David, and I brought home a tree from a local christmas tree farmer and decorated the house.

We also harvested a whole lotta horseradish roots. Anyone have good recipes for horseradish?!

The chicks are learning to go inside the coop at night and find a perch to spend the night- all on their own. Last night, there was only one straggler: the little Black Marans girl who tends to hide under the chicken house. She's the smallest chick and, therefore, must be at the bottom of the whole pecking order. Poor thing!

In addition to the gourd craft project I've been working on, I'm attempting to make a mosaic candle holder. I finished gluing the glass beads on the recycled glass jar this morning. Next, I'll fill in the gaps with a sanded grout. I'm not sure how this is going to go. The glue gun does not adhere the beads very tightly to the jar. Hopefully, the grout will hold them in place, if they don't all fall off during the grouting process. I recently completed a clay mosaic workshop at the local cultural arts center, which I enjoyed. So, I have a little experience working with mosaics. We'll see how this project turns out, though.

-Annie

Let it rain! Let it rain! Let it rain!

Well, it's pouring down rain outside, so it seems like a good time to blog. The outdoor projects can be put on hold for a day or so. The rain is much needed around these parts.

The fall garden has been struggling due to cold temps and the limited rainfall. The collards and cabbage are doing fairly well, but the lettuce has been especially hard hit by the freezing temps, even though I put covers on the garden when temps get really low. We're also growing kale, broccoli, cauliflower, and arugula this fall, and next year's garlic crop was planted recently. Other than that, there's horseradish ready for harvesting, and there are some Egyptian Walking Onions. The gourd harvest has finished drying, and I'm in the process of cleaning them, preparing them for various craft projects, including making birdhouses.

The outside of the barn is nearly complete. Yesterday, we finished adding more tin to one part of the roof that tends to leak a lot, but this morning there was another puddle in the middle of the barn. We also finished the floor and prepared it for bedding to be put down on the left side. We need to work on the stairs, do more caulking on the roof and cover it with a sealant, and then complete the interior. We plan to split the barn in half. On one side will be the milking station and hay storage, and the other side is for the goats. There will be two sections on the goat side, so we can have a separate kidding stall, when the time comes. Therefore, we need to section off the interior and make a hay trough and second milk stand.

This past weekend was a busy one for us. We thoroughly cleaned out the chicken house, made a batch of soap, and attended a Theatre on Cedar meeting to plan the 2009 season. It was a cold day on Saturday, and it took a while to get the water pressurizer machine to work, but we managed to get the chicken coop and yard ready for the chicks to move in. At the meeting that night, it was determined that Jeff will take the lead in producing some Monty Python skits to be preformed in March and Shannon will put together a script for the summer production, adapting the novel Jitterbug, by Tom Robins, to the stage. Additionally, there will be biweekly gatherings to do some improv work, which may lead to the production of an improv show eventually. The fall show is still undiecided. After the meeting, we transferred the chicks to the coop, so they woke up in a new home on Sunday morning.

The chicks spent all day inside, getting used to that space, and then they ventured out into the yard for the first time on Monday. However, they've needed a little help getting back into the house and finding somewhere to roost at night. Jeff crawled under the house on Sunday night to retrieve one little girl. She continued to be shy and confused last night, but, luckliy, we were able to use a net to get her out that time. Inside the house, some of the chicks choose to sleep on the short roost that Jeff and I made them for use in the brooder. Others want to get up on the "big bird" roosts, but most have difficulty getting up there. A couple successfully used the short roost as a launching point. The Ameraucana girl kept flying up where a bunch of chicks were already perched, knocking some of them off before falling back herself.

Hooligan, the barn cat, and her kid look on as the chicks feed in the photo on the left. The chicks have also found the waterer in the yard and enjoyed foraging for tasty bugs. The Welsummer baby roo (pictured in the foreground of the foraging photo below) is totally bad-ass. Not only is he the first of the baby roos to crow (which is actually a little weak still, but I pretend that I'm all impressed :) but he is the only chick that I've seen put up a fight- and win - when the older chickens peck on them. I don't think that the small Mottled Java (another relative newcomer) will mess with him again.

In other chicken news, the large Mottled Java has started laying eggs. We actually thought that she was a male, initially, but the roosters court her and now she's pumping out eggs. Way to go, Java lady!



Lastly, I have finally landed a paying job. While more income will be nice, I'll miss having so much time to be with the animals and work on farm projects.

-Annie

Cycles of life and death on a farm

Jeff noted that it was an interesting experience to walk out of the chicken house one day with an egg in one hand and a dead hen in the other (and perhaps he will elaborate on that experience in another post). I'll just say that while it's been wonderful being so involved with the animals here, getting to know them and developing attachments, it's hard to lose them (by whatever means). I wonder how these things might change over time.

We've had 4 chickens die over the past couple of months, which displayed the symptoms described in a previous entry. I did some research and discovered that there was a state-funded poultry lab in a nearby town that will perform a necropsy free of charge. At this facility a sweet old vet did the necropsy on poor Juliet (see the cast of characters entry), who had died the day before. He noted tumors in her intestine and diagnosed Marek's Disease, which is caused by a virus. Ack! A nasty disease has made its way into our flock. The disease usually strikes youngsters, so our 8-week old chicks are at risk. Their brooder is right beside the barnyard. We have nowhere else to put them, and they are outgrowing the brooder as well. Therefore, we will have to integrate them into the flock soon and just hope for the best.

The boys/young cockerels: an Ameraucana, 2 Black Marans, and the Silver Marans are on the left, while the little roo on the right is a Welsummer. They are changing and growing so fast! What distinguishes the boys from the girls at this point is the size of their combs. At first I thought the silver would be a girl, but its comb has become more prominent lately. Drats! that makes 6 boys and 7 girls (still more girls, though!).

The girls/young pullets: two Welsummers and an Ameraucana (who loves the camera - always ready to pose for a picture). The Ameraucana was our first chick to hatch from this group. This breed has "beards and muffs," which are longer feathers that grow from under and beside the face. Our two Ameraucanas are just starting to develop these feathers.

In other animal news, we have bred both of our does. About a week ago Lily was observed to be flirting with Arthur. At first I just thought they were sparing as usual (putting their heads together and pushing back and forth), but then I noticed that Lily was actually mostly rubbing on Arthur. She was rubbing her head all over his head, neck, and chest. It seemed that Arthur, being neutered, was not sure if he liked these advances or not. Anyway, we scheduled Lily a date with Paul and Terra's buck, Stripe. Lily was a little freaked out by the separation from her momma and the strange new goats. She was not as cooperative with Stripe as Hoppy had been with Tater Tot. However, over the course of 2 days, Lily and Stripe were observed to be getting it on multiple times. So, here's hoping that both goats have indeed been knocked up, and we may pursue pregnancy testing to confirm that.

Lastly, we have almost finished the outside of the goat barn. Woohoo! We still need to put a sealant on the roof and finish the interior, but the barn will soon be ready for the goats to move in.

Have a happy turkey day!
Annie

Fall comes to Deerfield

Beautiful fall colors













Our crazy and lovable little chicken, Dottie:

"MacDuff was from his mother's womb untimely ripped."

Theater on Cedar just completed its second production, "MacBeth." Jeff played MacDuff, I played Malcolm, and David played the everyman/old man/bar man/music maestro. Jeff got to do a really cool fight scene and kill MacBeth. I didn't get to kill anyone (darn it), but, at least, I got to to be crowned king at the end. Well actually, I did get to do a little fighting too. A friend of ours, Patrick, who is knowledgeable in the martial arts, choreographed the fight scenes for us. We had a great time with those. However, I think it was the emotinal intensity of the acting that got the most props. Ellen and Terra, as MacBeth and Lady MacBeth, were phenomenal. Oh yeah, we had very sexy witches too. :-)

You may have noticed that, in contrast to Shakespeare's time, we had girls playing dudes. It was an interesting challenge for Ellen and I. In fact, my acting career thus far has consisted of portraying a fairy and a guy. Who knows what's next?!


It was a lot of work, and things got a bit tense leading up to the show's debut, but we pulled it all together in the end. The play went very well (particularly the second weekend of performances), and we had a marvelous time. Lots of videos and pictures were taken of the play, so we hope that we will be able to link to some of those in the near future. I mean, it will happen; I command it! 'Tis good to be the king.

Lastly, Jeff and I are very happy that some of our family members were able to come visit us at Deerfield, meet each other, and see the play. Unfortunately, they came opening weekend, when the play was a little less polished and the weather was crappy. Our first performance had to be held inside due to rain. We all crammed into the living room at the house on Cedar, where there was not much room for sword fighting. However, the added intimacy the smallish space afforded turned out to be a nice experience, after all. Jeff now has dreams of putting on Monty Python skits in that space during the winter months. Stay tuned...

-Annie

First Freeze

As predicted, the temps here fell to 32 degrees the night before last. The day before the freeze, all of the peppers and tomatoes still in the garden were harvested. This included a lot of unripe tomatoes. So, along with some of the green tomatoes given us by Jeff's parents, we used our green maters plus our onions and apples to make a green tomato chutney. We canned 12 half-pints. Today, we are pickling the rest of the green tomatoes and canning tomato soup with the red ones. Our apple trees produced an abundance of fruit this year - sometimes breaking the branches. We've made lots of apple sauce and apple butter. Hopefully, we can try making an Indian chutney this weekend, using more of the apples. Here's our stash of preserves in storage down in the cellar:


The new goat barn is still under construction, but the goats are still able to seek shelter from the cold in another small barn. However, the goats used to sleep in a space beside the chicken house, but that got turned into the outdoor chicken brooder. A big heat lamp in the brooder keeps the chicks warm.


All 13 chicks appear to be thriving. In one last attempt to have one of our hens hatch and raise some chicks, David procured a dozen Barred Rock hatching eggs via the internet, which we placed underneath a hen who was setting at the time. The hen and eggs were given a private room in one of the old rabbit cages. Although she seemed to be setting on the eggs well, when we candled the eggs a few days ago, only a couple appeared viable. The next day, the hen gave up; she was off the nest and squawking to be let loose. Perhaps we will have better luck in the spring.

First days in the outdoor brooder at 2 weeks old

Four weeks old - growing so fast!



In other chicken news, two of our older roosters died in the last week or two. Both roosters started looking really depressed in the days/weeks before they died. It was sad to see them moping around. Hopefully, it was just old age and not some contagious disease. I guess this makes more room for the newbie roos, though. We still don't know for sure how many of the chicks are male. The older Wyandotte chick, that we've been calling Dottie, seems to be developing more male characteristics than the other two Wyandotte chicks, Wyatt and Annabelle. Dottie may turn out to be Wyatt. We shall see. However, we are in the process of integrating Dottie into the flock, following his/her stint in the infirmary. Being smaller than the other chickens and having only one good eye, I've been a worried mama hen. The poor thing hides in corners or under the chicken house most of the time. She also tends to seek safety, when we are around, by flying up on our shoulders and nestling down there. It's tough to be the new kid. Lastly, egg production is going back up now that they are almost done molting. We're getting 1-3 eggs per day now.

-Annie

Git 'er done

Yes, that's right, it is time for some goat news!!!

Well after a month of wondering, pondering, and considering we have now been successful. . . um, maybe.

You see, it isn't easy (at least it didn't seem so) to tell if a goat is in heat or not, especially if you a)aren't a goat, b)haven't had goats before, or c)don't have a virile buck around.  Annie and I strike out on all three counts.  So we have spent the past month trying to figure out if Hoppy and Lilly are in heat or not.  This has involved a number of considerations:  are they "whining" more, are they waggin their tails, are they more affectionate than usual.  Thus far we had strikes on all of those (well except that Hoppy is always whiney so that didn't help).  We have also been examining (visually only) their nether regions on a regular basis for signs of "excitement" but couldn't tell for sure if they were swollen or what.  The other test we had was a rag that I had rubbed all over the head and forelegs of a buck who was wanting some action (you see they pee all over this part of themselves, because the ladies LOVE that).  We let the ladies smell it and they react "like a teenager mooning over some boy" (that's close to an exact quote) then we have a doe ready for action.

So this past Saturday, after a month and a half or so of uncertainty we finally hit pay dirt.  Hoppy had been whining almost non-stop for two days (the first day it was raining, and she always whines in the rain so we wrote that off).  I let her smell the rag, and she rubbed her head all over it, and started wagging her tail.  I looked behind her and their appeared to be a secretion.  This was a goat who was feeling amorous.

Then the race was on.  Goats only stay in heat for 24-72 hours at a time and we now suspected some of the whining the day before had to do with her being in heat.  So we called all of our goaty friends and acquaintances, and there were no answers.  Aaarrgghhh!!!  So we waited, then I called one of them back, and - HALLELUJAH - he answered.  So quickly we rustled Hoppy into the dog carrier in the back of David's truck, and whisked her off to a farm about a half hour from here.  We got there.  I had my hand in her collar, and she was straining against me as hard as she ever has to get at that buck.  So we got her over there, and within - oh I'd say 45 seconds the deed was done.  We wanted to wait around to let him have another go at it, but he seemed to be exhausted - so we came on home.

Goats typically gestate for about 5 months, so probably sometime around March we will have some little kids born here at deerfield.  Lilly was acting kind of goofy today, so probably the next time or two she comes in heat we will breed her too (we want to space them out a little bit, so we don't have lots of newborns all at once).

So that is the latest news here from Deerfield.  Aside from that we are working on the barn still, the chicks are all doing well, we got our first frost last night, so gardening is changing, and I'm staying fairly busy with work.

Hope you are all well,

Jeff

ps.  Just in case you wanted to know, Hoppy's one minute stand was with a goat named Tater Tot, who is a La Mancha, which is a different breed of goat, but still a dairy goat.

"All my pretty chickens"

The chicks are 2 weeks old now and doing well. They are growing fast and need a larger brooder, so we will be setting one up down at the chicken house soon.

Here are the chicks at one week old.
Their wing and tail feathers are coming in. The black chick at the top of the first photo has developed some crooked toes on one foot, as can be seen in the photo. I've read that little cardboard boots can be constructed for it, if you want to show the bird, but chickens can live normal lives with crooked toes, so we've chosen not to intervene. Maybe they will straighten back out on their own. In the second photo, the brownish chick standing in the center is our first hatchling- the Ameraucana female.

The chicks at 2 weeks old.
Yesterday morning I entered the nursery to find the little black guy, in the first photo, enjoying the view from atop the brooder. While I will miss having the chicks so close, it does seem that they need larger accommodations than this box. At 2 weeks, the chicks have many more feathers coming in, especially the Ameraucanas and Welsummers, which are the brownish ones. The Marans don't seem to be growing as fast and still have a lot of their baby chick fuzz. However, what most of the Marans got, that the others don't, are feathers on their legs and feet, which might be evident in some of the photos.

Well, since we hatched the eggs in the incubator, our hens in the chicken yard have basically stopped laying eggs, leaving us eggless in Deerfield. We have, like, 20 chickens, and we had to buy eggs at the farmer's market this week. How crazy is that?! Well, the chickens are molting now, which typically decreases egg production, but the chickens are also rather old (a hen died this week- the second since Jeff and I moved in), which further decreases production. This will likely continue until the winter solstice, because most breeds of chicken reduce egg production in the winter, as the days shorten. The newbies should start laying by next spring, though, and hopefully give us a more steady supply.

One last note: Dottie, the chick with the eye problem, will likely have to get along with only one functional eye. The swelling and redness went away, and she opens the affected eye now, but the eyeball protrudes somewhat from the eye socket and it is all glazed over. She's a very sweet bird, though, and she will be the second one-eyed female in our flock, with which we will try to integrate her very soon.

-Annie

Barn Raising

Jeff and I have continued to work on the construction of our goat barn, and yesterday we finished one of the side walls - complete with window.














The razing of the old barn in Whitesburg is done. The structure has been completely torn down, and all of the usable materials have been salvaged. We almost got enough old tin to cover our roof, and we hope that we have sufficient wood to make all of the walls. This has significantly cut the construction costs. Here are some photos of the barn razing:










I'll post another chicken update soon. Then it'll be time for an entry about the goats - breeding season is here!

-Annie