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