Topics Archives

Eternal Optimists

Posted on 2014-02-17 by Andrea

Farmers are eternal optimists or crazy; maybe both. What else would explain the willingness to keep going despite all that Mother Nature throws at them? I am exhausted from shoveling snow, my knees are giving out and my hands are going numb, and I still haven’t finished shoveling all the usual spots from a big storm last Thursday. And yet, once I start shoveling, I enjoy being out in the elements and working hard. There’s a lot to be said for visible accomplishments as they buoy the soul even if they are physically challenging. You can immediately tell you’ve done something, even if it only lasts until the next snowstorm!

Over two feet of snow last week, on top of over a foot from the week before with no warm-up is giving the farm a canyon look. This is atypical winter weather here, luckily. As a small farmer I can’t justify purchasing the large equipment that would make the job less physically demanding that a large farm could. If all I had to do was shovel the driveway my life would be much easier! If this much snow were typical I’d also need to build a bigger barn to keep all the animals in one big area vs shoveling paths to run-in shelters and hay feeders out in the pastures. The chicken house also has flat roofs in the winter confinement area that was built to keep hawks out, and they need to be cleared after each significant snow storm. The run-in sheds are all flat roofs too. It’s also pretty much impossible to haul bedding and manure anywhere for composting at this point, so deep layer bedding (covering yesterday’s manure with fresh hay) is the way to go, but makes for a big cleanup project come spring! Also had to dig out the drainage ditch just outside the chicken compound so that melting snow doesn’t flood their main gathering area (it IS going to melt, right?). In other words, setup and equipment determine how much work is involved with maintaining the farm, and the small farmer has to put a lot more physical labor into the enterprise than a larger outfit.

[The photo immediately below is from 2 weeks ago, after a 10 inch snowstorm. Path is from west of the house looking to the wethers pasture with a run-in shelter and hay feeder visible. If you look carefully you can also see James (white goat in shelter) and Rembaldi (black goat). As of today you can no longer see into the shelter due to the snow pile in front of the cattle panel enclosure that surrounds the run-in shed].

The animals all seem to take the weather extremes in stride but it can be deceiving just how close to the line between life and death they are walking. Walking out to one of my small sheds (to clear the roof of the >2 foot of snow so it doesn’t collapse) was exhausting. Sometimes I could walk on top of the snow for a step or two, then I’d fall through, sometimes all the way to the ground, sometimes only down to the last ice layer; often falling over at the unstable footing. Needless to say I felt like I’d run a marathon by the time I’d make it to the shed! The small birds have it made as they can land on the snow without sinking through.

When I go out to feed the goats at night and lock them into their coyote proof enclosures they are frantic for their food and the alfalfa cubes I give them as treats. It’s hard to see as it tells me they are hurting. I bring them warm water too and they will drink most of the bucket before I’ve had a chance to lock up and make my way out of the pasture. Another dilemma due to all the snow is that the fences can be walked over by predators. All I can do is hope that the coyotes are not ranging as broadly as normal. Based on the lack of tracks, so far so good. I’m sure all the snow isn’t making their lives easy either.

Beauty and the Beast

Posted on 2014-02-06 by Andrea

It’s been a rough weather week so far and more snow is coming on the weekend. Just a gentle reminder from Mother Nature so we don’t forget who is really in charge. Although tired from 3 straight 8+ hour days of snow/ ice shoveling the beauty of the landscape is awesome.

On Monday there was so much snow stuck to the trees that the world looked almost entirely white, eerie and deathly quiet. I am so grateful to have not lost power!

After the ice yesterday, this morning’s sun striking all the ice on the trees is spectacular – all the trees and the snow are sparkling like diamonds.

The ice is so bad that the goats can’t walk on it – very unusual. Instead they are holed up in their compounds where the ice is roughed up from where they were walking in the snow yesterday before it froze over night.

Haven’t seen any large animal tracks since the snow on Monday so they must be holed up somewhere too. Very rough conditions for the wild things. Rabbits had spent the night under a large evergreen out front and the birds are enjoying the bird feeder. I can walk on top of the ice crust in most places but my bucks (~30 pounds heavier than me) were breaking through making walking slow, tiring and painful on the ankles. Rembaldi opted to stay in the run-in-shed rather than face the ice when I let them out this morning. There is still hay inside the sheds from their overnight rations which should hold him until he is ready to brave the snow/ ice.

Although this has been a snowy winter it isn’t even close in snowfall to some of the winter’s in the early 2000’s. I can remember feet of snow per storm and I was shoveling it all by hand! After one storm I used the truck to keep pushing the snow in the driveway back 10 feet at a time and it still took me two full days to clear the driveway so I could make it to work. 14 years later and over 55, I can still shovel all day but not with the energy I had, and I use a snow blower as much as possible! I’m definitely slowing down and wonder how much longer I’ll be able to handle all the work here at this small slice of heaven. The cycle of life and death is so much more obvious during extremes of weather and yet the beauty of it is also inescapable.

Farmer’s Dilema – Existence vs Thriving

Posted on 2014-01-30 by Andrea

You know it’s cold when your breath freezes instantly into icicles!

The animals handle the cold really well – much better than me! During bad spells of weather I am happy that humans discovered how to make fire and then invented central heating. You have to be impressed by the humbleness of animals and their ability to take what comes their way.

Goats and sheep are very similar but their personalities are very different. Goats are much more interactive than sheep. My goats walk in front of me in a blocking move to stop me from leaving. My sheep will follow me for a treat but would never try to trip me. One of my sheep, Bella, is more aggressive than the others and at nearly 300 pounds can be a handful. She will push me with her nose for treats if she smells them and follows within inches behind me with her head down, looking like a missile. An amusing sight! Mostly the sheep watch my activities with attentive paranoia but will come forward to take a treat if one is offered.

Goats really appreciate personal attention if they are feeling bad and will nuzzle you with their thanks. Sheep are generally so much more nervous about being handled that it doesn’t noticeably help them. They do love to be scratched, between the front legs and on the checks are favorites of my sheep, but they have to be in a happy, relaxed mood to allow such behavior. Generally if they are sick, they are fearful as they know they are more susceptible to predators.

Prey species don’t show they are hurting until it is very bad indeed so farmers have to keep a sharp eye on their charges. Even very minor behavior changes can indicate that an animal is in trouble. I can sometimes tell almost as a feeling, not because they are doing anything specific to indicate they are hurting. They all have their own personalities and knowing each of them well is the key to keeping them in good health. Large farms can’t possibly do this. I had over 50 goats and I reduced my flock size after realizing that I could not give them the care they deserved. Since animals “handle” what they are given I feel a greater responsibility to ensure they have healthy, happy lives.

As an animal lover I struggle constantly with the continuum of offering an animal an existence vs providing them a ‘quality’ life. I believe that it is better to put an animal down humanely than to keep them alive under bad conditions but where to draw the line? There is no single correct answer, but for myself I have become more conservative over time, feeling that the animals in my care deserve a good life and if I’m stretched too thin it is best that I don’t take on additional animals. Currently I have 10 goats and 3 sheep and this feels like a good number. All the same, it is always hard to pass on sheep or goats needing homes as their options are slim vs companion animals such as dogs.

Arctic Air Returns and Thoughts on “Natural” Dying

Posted on 2014-01-23 by Andrea

After 9 hours of snow shoveling I’m ready to sit at the computer and rest!

In between snowstorms I boiled a big batch of black walnuts I collected in the yard during the Fall. After collecting the nuts the outer shell has to be removed as that is the only part used for dying. I use a hammer to crack the outer shell, then peel the shell away and dump then into a pillow case and tie it closed. Next I fill a big pot holding the pillow case full of walnut shells with water and boil for about an hour to make the walnut liquor used for dying. Since the walnut shells are in a pillow case, the walnut shells are self filtered, I just have to pull the pillow case out of the pot for a clean, filtered walnut liquor. I then boiled the filtered walnut liquor with about 2 pounds of mohair locks for another hour, then washed them in an old washer. Washing wool or mohair is really just a series of rinses since you can’t agitate the fiber – unless you want felt!

So if you add up the time to dye 2 pounds of mohair it is at least 3 hours (~an hour to collect the walnuts, another to crack them, starting the fire, filling the pots, pouring the liquor off and starting a new pot about 30 minutes, and another 30 minutes for washing – most of the time is not continuous, but requires constant checking to see how things are going). 2 pounds of mohair is about all that fits in a big 16 quart pot, so it’s the largest batch I can reasonably do. Wool has a much greater volume for the same weight as mohair so much less wool will fit in the same sized pot as mohair. A lot of labor for such a small amount of fiber!

I love dying with walnuts because I have lots of black walnut trees so the out of pocket is cost is excellent (free!) and it requires only one step (boiling to extract the dye) and no mordant (pretreating with another chemical to ensure permanence of the dye) is required as is the case for most “natural” dyes.

Black Walnut Dyed Mohair Locks

I often have customers ask me if I dye with natural or chemical dyes. How to answer? All dyes, even those derived from natural sources (vs commercially produced industrial chemical dyestuffs) are still chemicals, and there is no way to dye without using a chemical. Dying is the chemical process of fiber reacting with a chemical (or mix) to alter it’s observed color. And naturally derived chemicals are not necessarily safer than commercially produced chemicals either. Many natural dyes require mordanting (pretreating) with chromium which is very toxic. Alum can be used as a mordant and it is much safer but it also produces a different effect on the final color than chromium. Even with black walnuts which can be used without a mordant, it is well known that black walnuts contain a chemical that suppresses plant growth. Thus walnuts have a toxic effect on other plants. Evolutionarily it improves the odds of the walnut growing into a great tree, but at the expense of other plants that might be trying to grow in the same general area. I heartily agree with philosophy of minimizing impacts to the environment, but which path to choose is not always a straight forward nor clear decision.

Related is the broader concept of ‘nature’, which can be beautiful and soul filling but is also quite brutal and does not think nor care what is destroyed vs saved. Many people are so far removed from nature that they do not realize how thin an edge life walks and how little impact people have in the short run. I am reminded of this constantly as it is so difficult to keep my animals safe and in good health. It is so hard to survive in nature that I find it amazing that any wildlife exists as sadly I lose animals despite continuous intervention.

Jessie and James

January Thaw

Posted on 2014-01-14 by Andrea

Ingrid is in the mood and letting the entire county know with her loud calls. Goats are very vocal about such things which is handy if you are breeding them; you know exactly when to introduce the buck and will have a pretty accurate due date. Sadly I came home last March to find my buck dead in the front pasture. No idea what happened, but I suspect his pasture mates broke his neck. Sienna was such a dear goat, never aggressive and did not fit into the goat world very well. He was a bottle baby as his mother wouldn’t accept him, living in the house for about 6 weeks with 2 cats. I suspect he always thought he was either a cat or a person.

Sienna with Sandy

His pasture mates broke his back hip when he was about 4 years old so it is easy to imagine one of the big wethers hitting him with more deadly consequences. Anyway…..sheep are much more subtle in expressing their interests. Sheep instead use a maneuver I call “kaschnoodling” instead of crying incessantly as goats do. Kaschnoodling involves rubbing heads and noses together, at times head on, staring into each other’s eyes for quite some time. It is also curious that ruminant voice volume is inversely proportional to physical size. Thus Ingrid is the smallest goat and has the loudest voice. Luckily the impulse only lasts several days (although repeating ever 3 weeks or so) and Angora goats are seasonal breeders which means they only breed ~late October through January.

Ingrid (right) with her twin brother Roberto.

Changes in weather always makes the goats frisky and Boo (aka Black Magic) never needs a reason to give me the “Sister Bertrille” move (look at her ears). She was also a bottle baby but was such an exuberant kid that she only lasted 2 days in the house. Unable to contain her in the laundry room, she was put out with her mother Megan and twin sister Starlight. Although Megan did not like Boo, she tolerated her (vs Sienna’s mother Ginger who made it a point to beat him to a pulp if he was left with her). This allowed Boo to play with her twin sister and grow up in a more normal environment. So Boo knows she is a goat, but thinks that people are also goats and thus can be a handful when she is in a frisky mood. Frisky goats like to challenge each other to some good old fashioned head butting but unfortunately this is not a good sport for humans.

Black Magic

When you have a kid which has been rejected by it’s mother you have to bottle raise them or lose them, and yet being raised by a human will totally change the goat they might have been. A bit like playing God. Although I always felt it was the right thing to do, and could not have left a kid to die without trying to save it, I always wonder about the long term impact of that decision.

The Beginning…..And It’s a Cold One

Posted on 2014-01-07 by Andrea

After thinking about creating a blog for several years, have finally done it! Hope to find time to post once a week or so as to what’s going on at the farm, my thoughts/ experiences on small scale farming and reflections on human-animal relationships.

Today is super cold….have done 2 trips so far to warm up water buckets and check for eggs since eggs freeze at 5 degrees. I have heated water buckets (so luxuriously decadent!) but the cold is more than they can handle based on the ice forming along the top. Seriously don’t know how farmers in the mid-west and the northern territories survive! I give them and their animals a lot of credit. All my animals look ok, although Starlight (goat) was shivering when I was out to check on them at 7AM. She has warmed up now that the sun has come out and it’s up to a gloriously warm 5 degrees with 15 mph northwest wind. The sheep seem to take it all in stride no matter what. The chickens are mostly huddled in their big house, with a third hanging out in their plastic enclosed winter “room”. They have an elaborate winter outdoor area due to the numerous hawks that also live in the area. So beautiful to see the hawks flying nearby, but not much fun when they decide to stop in for a chicken snack.

Fun photo from last week, a great blue heron was hanging out with the geese down at the pond. The Canada geese were washing up in the pond even though it was mostly frozen over. Talk about hardy!

Dec. 2013 Heron supervising Geese washing up in the pond