A New Beginning!

Wow.  A lot has happened in the last two years.  We started a business, moved to a new farm, raised new types of animals, and moved again.  To the other side of the country.  Yep.  We picked up and moved to Virginia.  That decision was made about two weeks after the idea was brought up and we were packed up about three months later.  Our new place is 113 acres and has two barns, two three-stall equipment sheds, a greenhouse, a smokehouse, a 1 acre pond, and of course a house for us.  Currently under construction past the pond and up the hill, is my parents' new house.  They moved here from their place in Arizona and I am thrilled my boys are going to be so close to their Grandparents.

Some pictures of our new farm (some of these were taken when we first saw the property in March and some more recently).

Waiting on Blackberries

I took the kids up the mountain today to see if the blackberries are ripe yet.  The small bit that we have here at the house was done fruiting at least a month ago but the mountain berries always take longer since it isn't as hot up there.  I had an idea that even if there weren't enough to make jam, I would make a little blackberry syrup to have on our pancakes in the morning. 

We did get some, but they were mostly still green.  The kids ended up eating all of what we did manage to find almost before I got the engine turned on to come home.  I guess blackberry syrup and jam will have to wait another week or two.  I'm just glad we didn't miss the harvest entirely!

Harvest picture

I braved the heat (3 steps outside my front door), to pick some tomatoes yesterday.  My tomatoes have done quite well so far.  I can't say the same for my peppers.  A few moments ago I picked the only four jalapenos that were anywhere near big enough.  I hope they will be enough for some decent salsa.  The zucchini is destined for bread and muffins.  The pattypan squash will probably be grilled or sauteed alongside some chicken for dinner tonight.  The pathetic onions are some of the only ones I managed to salvage from my sorely neglected back garden.  The whole thing got so overgrown that we put about 30 meat chickens in there a couple evenings ago to hopefully eat some of it down (though I suspect they are more likely to just poop on everything really well).  I pulled the brussels sprouts before letting the chickens loose so those will be dinner tonight as well.

My new Easter Egger girls finally started laying (well, at least two of them).  Their eggs are a very nice medium green color.  If they could just figure out to lay them in the nest box instead of the middle of the coop where I practically have to crawl in to get them.





Anyone want some zucchini?  We have plenty of extra...

Lettuce Gutters

I got this idea from a gardening forum I belong to.  Someone had posted a picture of gutters that had been mounted on the side of a house and were being used to grow lettuces and other shallow-rooting plants.  I thought it was a great idea that would fill a blank spot on the front wall of our house.  We modified it to look a bit more decorative and keep the gutters from touching the house itself and therefore trapping water against the house and possibly causing a problem. 

Here is the wall we wanted to put the gutters on.




Dave started by mounting two 4x4 posts to the wall.




Then put 2x4s going across to support the gutters.




Attached the gutters to the 2x4s.




We didn't put a gutter on the top row because it would have been too high to comfortably plant, water, and harvest.  We didn't put holes in the bottom for drainage because we thought that it would dry out too much in the hot weather we get here but we should have.  The first planting, things didn't sprout because underneath the very top layer of soil, the dirt stayed too wet.  I will be planting pictures again once it is all sprouting but that will have to wait until fall since it is too hot to try and plant lettuce now. 

Goats!

I don't believe I have ever shared pictures of our goats on this blog other than the header photo.  We had mini-LaManchas for a while and absolutely loved them.  I have a thing for goats in general, but specifically for LaManchas.  I even have an "I Love LaManchas" sticker on my car (which gets a lot of odd looks since we are smack dab in the middle of the suburbs where most people only see goats at the county fair and certainly don't know what a LaMancha is.)  We loved having the goats and loved the milk we got but we finally decided that our property just isn't suited to goats.  They spent almost all of their time hanging out on our patio, which meant that almost all their poop and peep ended up on our patio.  Not to mention, I lived in constant fear of upsetting neighbors with the noise they made.

Before they left us, both of our lovely does had kids and that was undoubtedly the best part of having goats.  The kids loved us and we loved them.  They climbed in our laps to nap, they chewed our hair, and left little goaty footprints on all our clothes.  The ran and jumped and hopped and in general were just adorable.  When I went out to do milking, I had to braid my hair, put it down the back of my shirt, and then put on sweatshirt with the hood up to keep them from eating all of my hair while I was busy with milking.  I would love to live where we could again have goats and hope to get that chance someday.

Bella was the queen of the herd and the mother (or grandmother) of all the goats we had.  She definitely had the queen attitude.  She made sure everyone knew their place; dogs, the other goats, even us.  She was always the one who woke me up in the morning telling me as loudly as she could that it was time for me to get up, let her out into the yard, and get her some grain.  She had the most evil stare I have ever seen on a goat when things weren't going her way.  The first picture is an awful one but gives a good impression of that intimidating stare.






Fleur was one of Bella's kids and wasn't nearly as trusting of people.  Bella knew exactly what people were for, to provide her with food and back scratches.  Fleur had to be convinced that we weren't actually trying to eat her.  Once we gained her trust, however, she was just as demanding of treats but could still do without most of the back scratches.  When she thought we were up to something nefarious, she would scream like the devil was biting her butt.  She was a fantastic milker, however.




Bella had three kids while she was with us.  Triplets that were just the cutest little goats in existence.  Lupin was the first one born and was the pig of the group.  He was constantly whining that he was hungry and was always the first one to try and steal grain when I was concentrating on milking.




Sirius was the second-born and had only one thing on his mind from the moment he was born.  Girls.  All he ever thought about was trying to impress the girls, and since they were the only ones around, he concentrated that attention on his sisters Fleur and Tonks.  When he went to a new home, no one was more glad than Fleur who had certainly had enough of him.






Tonks was the only girl born to our does and was secretly our favorite.  She had a great personality, was very out-going and definitely the most attention-seeking of all the kids.  She was probably the most active of all the kids and constantly entertained us with her antics.




Dobby was Fleur's first and only kid.  He was cute but somewhat reserved like his mother.  He certainly preferred to spend his time with the other goats rather than with the humans.








Goats are still one of my loves, just one I can't indulge at this time.  Hopefully in the future, we will be able to move and have more lovely LaManchas.  At least we have still have dogs and chickens to sustain us!

Winnowing is for the Birds

We grew some Mammoth Russian Sunflowers this summer.  My youngest really likes sunflowers and very much wanted to see them in the garden.  I think part of it may have been due to a book I loved when I was a child and have read to my boys a few times when we have been at my folks house.  My parents saved a number of wonderful books that I read when I was young and it's always fun to read them to my own children.  This particular book is called The Sunflower Garden and is about a young native American girl who wants to plant some sunflower seeds that were given to her by a friend from another tribe.  Her father didn't want to be bothered by what his daughter was doing when he was busy raising his sons but let her plant the seeds.  She carefully tended her garden and in the end made her father proud of her with her efforts (and by saving her baby brother from a rattlesnake).  I like to think that that story had some influence in my youngest's decision to plant sunflowers.


Luckily, they were very easy to grow and required very little room.  Here they are before they were in glorious full bloom (please pay no attention to the weeds!).




I, of course, neglected to get pictures of them in their glory days; all I have are pre-bloom and post-death.




When I thought about getting sunflower seeds, I thought it would be a fairly simple process.  Well, it is simple in that there aren't that many steps, but it is certainly tedious!  We cut the heads off the stalks when the petals had died back, the heads were curling backwards, and the backs of the flowers were turning brown.  We hung them in our side yard where they were protected from sun and moisture but they got plenty of fresh air to help dry them out further.  Then I promptly forgot about them.  I don't go into the side yard very often, just to get out my scooter to take the dogs mushing and usually when I go in the get my scooter my mind isn't thinking about gardening.  When we hung up the sunflowers, I found some garlic that I had put there earlier in the summer to cure and had also forgotten about.  Hmmm, maybe I should go out there now to see what else I left lying around...

Anyway, when I finally remembered the sunflowers, we pulled them down, brushed off the spiderwebs and started removing the seeds.  This was more difficult than I had anticipated.  First of all, the seeds weren't all that anxious to be removed.  They were packed in there pretty tightly!  I found that working from the outside in worked fairly well but there were lots of sharp edges and prickly things that kept making the process slightly painful.  I enlisted the help of my boys who didn't do too bad but probably got as much chaff as they did seeds in the bucket.








We did get a healthy amount of seeds, but there was a lot of chaff that needed to be winnowed out.  I put the bucket in the garage (really play/storage room), and again, forgot about it.




A week or so ago, Dave and the boys were out for the evening and I decided it would be a good idea to tackle the bucket of seeds and just get it done.  I had even more effective help this time.




I ended up with the bucket and two bowls in front of me.  One bowl for the chaff, and the other for the cleaned seeds.  As I took out the chaff, I also checked for seeds that hadn't formed properly and were just empty hulls.




After an hour or so, I had about 1.5 cups of seeds and it didn't even look like I had made a dent into the mess in the bucket.  It was not fun and didn't really feel at all rewarding as some chores that aren't fun but have a good result do.  I put the bucket with the rest of the seeds and chaff back on the shelf in the garage.  It's still there a week later.  The seeds are good, but I'm thinking of just tossing what's left into the chicken run and letting the chickens sort it out.  I think next year, the heads will be given directly to the chickens as a treat and forgo keeping any for myself.

Chicken Clipping

We spent a few minutes clipping wings this morning.  It is an insurance measure since we have been letting the girls out to forage in the yard after our big rain storm hit and they had been spending so much time standing around in the mud.  Since they love foraging out in the yard, I worry that they might try to get back in there even when they are closed in the run.  The vast majority of the roof of the run is covered in chicken wire but there are a few small spaces where the young ones might be able to get out.  Just in case, we clipped all of their wings except the girls who are still in molt.

I have posted a link on how to clip wings previously but this time we had the 10 year old take pictures.  This is something that can be done by one person but since Dave was available, I had him do the holding while I did the clipping.  It is easiest to do while sitting as your legs can support the chicken underneath while your hands can restrain the rest of the body.




Dave holding Hedwig.


Gabrielle.


Gabrielle's wing extended.  You can see the primary flight feathers are easy to distinguish.  They are those first six or so long feathers.


Simply trim the primary flight feathers back using a sharp pair of scissors.  This doesn't hurt the chicken at all.  Some people only clip one wing but I clip both as I have had birds figure out how to deal with only having one side clipped but none of them have been able to fly well with both sides clipped.


The finished wing.




When the bird is sitting or standing as they normally do with their wings folded, you can't tell that they have been clipped.  You only see the clipped feathers when they have their wings extended.

I feel that clipping wings makes our girls safer since they won't be able to fly out into the yard where the dogs would be waiting to eat them.  If your birds free-range, clipping wings may not be a great idea as you want them to be able to get away from any predators that they may encounter and having clipped wings will impeded their ability to get away.

Where is winter?

I know some of world is currently under siege by a massive storm but here in southern California we are having a heat wave.  It was already 74 at 9:30 this morning.  Truly depressing.  After living in Alaska, Wisconsin, and even northern Arizona, I really don't care for these California "winters".  We don't ever really get winter, just some brief periods of cooler weather.  Last year, my kids never even changed from wearing shorts to wearing pants unless we were on vacation somewhere it actually got cold.  The only thing I really like about all this warm weather is that I can garden year-round without ever having to do anything special to baby my plants.  Of course, sometimes my cool-weather plants don't get enough cool weather to fully mature.  Last year, my brussels sprouts started flowering before the sprouts even got to be eating size.  I'm hoping not to have a repeat of that this year though with the current weather, I'm not holding my breath!

I've still only planted half the garden.  I am hoping to find the inspiration to get the rest of the back garden planted this week.




My tall raised bed is currently hosting spinach and red onion.




One of the brussels sprouts plants that I am currently pinning all my hopes on (they are my very favorite veggie!)




I planted twice as much broccoli this year as we went through it very quickly last year.




The garlic came up much more quickly than last year and I planted it earlier in the season as well.




A flower from the trumpet vine that covers the top of the chicken run.




Just for fun, some gratuitous chicken pictures!

This Delaware is the only adult hen I have who has finished molting for the year.  She still isn't laying again though.  I am getting exactly zero eggs a day right now.  I hope they are resting up and will start again soon!




My other Delaware that is finishing with her molt and looks mostly normal:




One of the young pullets I got a month or so ago (this one is an Ancona).




The young girls hanging out on the roosting bar in the run with my Rhode Island Red who currently has a lot of bare patches from her molt.




Next post will be on trying to figure out how to winnow chaff from sunflower seeds.

Pomegranates Galore!

I love pomegranates.  Their sweet, tart taste is fabulous.  I like them on salads, plain, and especially as jelly.  This year, I was able to pick up just over a dozen at a decent price from a local source.  Making them into jelly was a long, involved process, but it was worth it!

The first thing I did was quarter them and soak them in water.  I have been told that this helps to pop out the seeds easily.




The next step was setting up my work area.  I clipped some cheesecloth (doubled over once), to a large bowl and put my food mill on top.






As I got the seeds out of the bitter pith, I just dropped them into the food mill.  When I had a decent amount in the mill, I just cranked it for a while until all of the juice had drained down through the cheesecloth and into the bowl (the boys liked helping with this part).




The resulting juice, while not completely clear, was perfectly good for making jelly.




I set up my jelly making area just like normal.  Water bath canner on one burner, jelly pot on another; and the lids steaming in the back.  I had a cloth spread over the counter to make cleanup a breeze and put all my utensils on that.




The jelly didn't set as hard as most of my other jams and jellies this year, but it is still firm enough and it tastes great!