Summer Begins

 "It was June, and the world smelled of roses. 

The sunshine was like powdered gold over the grassy hillside."

~ Maud Hart Lovelace

Summer is here. Real summer. 80 + degree-summer. 

Oregon-strawberry-summer. 

Reading-in-the-hammock-summer. 

The beach-with-cousins-summer. 

Outdoor-chores-and-projects-are-enjoyable-again-summer.

We headed into summer with some excitement. In May, our red Irish Dexter, Nutmeg, gave birth to a perfect bull calf.

Due to some (mis)adventures in cow fertility, it had been 3 years since calving occurred on our farm. Because Nutmeg is small and this was her first calf, I was really nervous about it. Caleb and I came out early one morning to find her in labor. Progress appeared to be slow, so I kept my finger on speed-dial to our farm-vet and eventually Caleb ended up helping to pull the calf out. It made him late for work, but I told him he was probably the only person in his office who had pulled a calf that morning. I love my gentleman farmer. 

3 hours old, just snoozing in the sun

Since the bull was black, we were very pleasantly surprised that our calf was red, or actually more of a strawberry blond. He is truly beautiful.

Our only disappointment lies in the fact that he is a he. Because when you're raising beef cattle the hes don't stick around for longer than two years. Our previous two calves had also been bulls and we longed for a calf we could raise and spoil and name and love and keep. We briefly considered keeping him as a bull, but since his mom is our only female, that didn't make any sense. So Caleb and our neighbor made him a steer, and we will enjoy his cuteness while we can. 

For two years we have fantasized about clipping our chickens' wings. They have 8 acres to free range on but mostly prefer to be all up in our business: dust bathing in the flower beds around our house, eating the plants near our front door, and pooping on our driveway and front walk.

This is an action shot: see the dirt flying?

I'll never forget when we were remodeling our kitchen and our contractor was storing his tall, standing tool box in our garage. One of our chickens was obsesssed with nesting in his box of nails. I kept booting her out and she kept returning. Finally one day he walked into the house with a look of distaste on his face, held an egg out, and said, "It's still warm." I sent him home with a complimentary dozen eggs, including that one, and told him to tell his kids it had been laid in his nails.

I have felt the need for more flower-beauty in my life, but knew I had to ensure the chickens would not dig up my flower beds by first clipping their wings. This would ensure they could free-range in the pastures but not fly up over the fences to be in our yard space. We watched a Youtube video, pulled them off their roost one-by-one under the cloak of darkness, and clipped those suckers. 

Feathers are like fingernails - they have no feeling, so no pain. We just clipped the eleven flight feathers half-way up. It was suggested that just clipping one wing was enough to hinder flight, so that is what we began with. The next day, all the chickens were out as usual, so we snuck back in that night, plucked them off the roost again, and clipped the other wing.

Wing-clipping will likely need to be done yearly, but was so much easier than we expected, and has literally changed our lives with chickens. I have lovely flowers growing near the house, the kids can go barefoot in the grass (watch the dog poop!), and the chickens are relegated to the pasture where they belong. We wish we had done it sooner.

Many summer glories still lay before us: 

Sunshine, 

growing animals,

garden bounty,

 long afternoons.

and a very full bucket list.

(We might be the only family with "dentist" on our summer bucket list.)

We can now scratch S-mores off, but we've still got a lot of adventuring to do. And we're off...

The Long Winter

No matter how long the winter, 
Spring is sure to follow.

~Proverb

The title is a bit dramatic if you're comparing our winter to the one in Laura Ingalls Wilder's book by the same name. We are not nearing starvation and we have not suffered blizzard upon blizzard. But we have had four rounds of snow, weeks of sub-freezing temperatures (we had a hen freeze to death), and record-setting rainfall this month. All of it has made for a very un-inspiring homestead winter, thus my longest ever blogging hiatus. Not much to report!

However, since we had not seen substantial snow in three years and longed for it so badly (many prayers were offered up by my children beginning in October), I refuse to "complain" (at least officially), but I will state that we are ready to be done, even as it snowed again this morning. 

At the dinner table we often go around and say the best part of our day, the worst part of our day, and what we're looking forward to tomorrow. In that spirit, I am going to reflect on the best part of winter, the worst part of winter, and what we're looking forward to in Spring.

The Highlights:

The sheer beauty of it all

After we got the cows closed off 

we opened up the pasture and had a fantastic sledding hill right on our own property! 

The goats in the snow were one of the cuter winter sights around here,

Marianne and Elinor staying warm in their thick winter coats.

...as were the cows

The cows really don't seem to mind it. They look very simple as they just stand, staring straight ahead, and get blanketed in snow. 

Brody and I got out on some "farm walks" even in the ice and snow, meaning we walk (or run if it's not too slick) from the house to the barn and back, from the house to the end of the driveway and back, which equals .27 miles. I usually try and get 3 miles in, but Brody-the-behemoth-Golden-Retriever usually poops out about half-way through. 

We completed the annual (dreaded) task of pruning our six apple trees, two pear trees, one plum and one cherry tree. I actually pulled my weight this year and did about half myself.

The Lowlights:

*Having 25 hens and collecting only 1-3 eggs per day. (Thankfully production is ramping back up.)

*Hauling water for the cows from the house to the barn for days on end. (With temps below freezing we have to turn the water off to the barn so the pipes don't burst. Ask me how we learned this.)

*ANNABELLE (see below)

We'd had Annabelle for a year and didn't know what to do with her. She was supposed to be pregnant when we bought her, but wasn't. She was 10, and her heat cycles weren't very regular. She declined to be loaded in a trailer to be taken to a bull last summer so we missed that opportunity. This winter had been hard on her and she was moving slower, not eating as much, and I had seen her fall a couple times. My inexperience with cows did not allow me to know if it was just her age or if she was truly ill. I now believe I should have called the vet. 

The day after we returned home from Hawaii in January with a million other things to get caught up on, I noticed she was in heat and so decided to seize the rare opportunity and called an AI (artificial insemination) tech. She came out that evening and did the procedure. Our plan was to give Annabelle this opportunity to get pregnant, and if it didn't take, to butcher her with her son in April. I loved this cow, but couldn't justify keeping her as a pet. We'd already fed her for a year with nothing to show for it. 

Before we could even determine if she was pregnant, we walked out to her broken body wedged between a tree and fence. It was a bizarre sight that we can't really account for. Somehow she had fallen, though why she was trying to pass through this narrow space is unexplainable, unless she felt like she was dying and was trying to get to a protected place. We think she either broke her neck or suffocated in the deep mud. It was horrific.

I sobbed face down on my bed in a way I hadn't done in years. I allowed myself a good five minutes and then pulled it together. She was the friendliest, loveliest cow I could ever hope to own. She came to me that way and I have no knowledge of how to gentle a cow on my own. But with my girl Nutmeg, I'm sure going to try now. 

Spring Hope:

* I have permission to buy six new chicks - we're just waiting for the weather to warm up a bit since they'll be living in the barn. 

*We plan to raise our second batch of meat chickens - this time in a chicken tractor that Caleb is going to build. 

The garden, which so recently looked like this, will soon (with a lot of preparatory work) be ready to plant.

Nutmeg should be calving sometime in April.

Nutmeg soaking up rays on a recently sunny day

And beautiful sights like this give me hope for the future, no matter what it holds.

If we had no winter, 

the spring would not be so pleasant.

If we did not taste adversity, 

prosperity would not be so welcome.

~Ann Bradstreet

Moving Forward, Loading Cows, and a Not Unpleasant Surprise

Summer is rolling by. The pastures are parched, the garden is growing, and the kids are enjoying mostly unscheduled days.

Last blog entry I shared how three animals in the photo at right should be pregnant, but are not. Marianne, the little black goat, was our last hope and her possible due-dates have come and gone, even though we saw her mating with Westley the buck during two heat cycles. I belong to a "goat health care" Facebook group and asked the question: Why would a healthy doeling with regular heat cycles NOT get pregnant??? There are many possibilities, but the most common reasons suggested were a vitamin deficiency (most likely vitamin A) or cysts that prevent pregnancy. We really want goat babies, but after Elinor's stillbirth and the time and money it would require to have a vet assess Marianne and then try and get them both to a buck (pretty sure we don't want a buck here again) on the one day they are in heat (which likely will not be on the same day)... I'm just burned out on the process right now. Perhaps we'll re-assess next spring. 

When we bought Annabelle the black Irish Dexter cow in January we were given the name of a lady who has an Irish Dexter bull that we might be able to use in future. We contacted her and though she didn't want her bull to come to us (she has a closed herd, meaning she does not vaccinate or worm because she does not allow her cows to come in contact with other pastures) she was willing for our two girls to come pasture at her farm for a couple of months. Though we offered to pay her or have a large quantity of hay delivered to her as a useful thanks, she declined. She is just being extremely generous to us, people she's never met. I'm finding that country folks are mostly really kind, giving people.

So the date was set for us to load our two cows into the livestock trailer that we bought from the people who sold us Annabelle and drive them an hour into the hills. I think this trailer is pretty sweet. Originally it had a bumper sticker that said "Back off city boy, country girl on board!" But mercifully I peeled it off before Caleb had to tow it for the first time.  

Bless you, Nutmeg

I asked my experienced neighbor for advice on loading the cows and she said, "Allow yourself plenty of time and just feed them into the trailer. Whatever you do, do not get frustrated. If they know that you want them to get in, that is the last place they will go." Knowing that these girls will follow me anywhere if I'm holding a bucket of grain, I really was not too worried. At this point I will abridge the story and say that after two hours of continuous effort we had loaded zero cows. The grain did not work. Apples did not work. Hay did not work. I was a sweaty mess (that trailer does not breathe!), near tears, seeking guidance from God, and was about to give up, when Nutmeg decided to just hop right in. Praise the Lord! 

Daylight was waning, so we tried Annabelle one last time, but she declined. She is 11 and perhaps wise even beyond her years. She has had several owners. She has calved every year of her life. She understands that no good comes from riding in trailers. 

Annabelle does what she wants. And as I now realize, she also doesn't do what she doesn't want. I have to respect a cow who knows her mind. Nutmeg is still hanging with Buddy the Bull and is hopefully pregnant even as I write this. Annabelle is still un-pregnant in our pasture. 

Annabelle's not hating that grain bucket now

One species of animal we have not struggled to breed are chickens. Last week Caleb came in from the barn and said, "Here's one for you. Apparently we've been missing a chicken for 21 days because there is a black chick running around the barn." Yes, we've gone from naming our chickens to not even counting them at night because I can't remember how many we have and half of them are black (black being the dominant trait in the "barnyard mix" chicks we keep hatching) and I don't know who's who. So it was quite feasible that we had missed a chicken for three weeks without realizing it. After hearing this, I just assumed a hen had sat on one of her own eggs and hatched one chick. The next morning I went out to find not one, but ten adorable fluffy chicks scurrying around the barn. 

We really didn't want more chickens right now, but it's hard to be too upset with this much adorableness pecking and scratching around the barnyard. 

And there's something about summer that just makes everything all right.   

A Time for Everything

Hope is tomorrow's veneer over today's disappointment.

~Evan Esar

We started the year with such excitement and high hopes.

In Janurary we purchased a pregnant Irish Dexter named Annabelle with her steer (neutered male) calf.

She was expected to calve in February or March, and we desired to keep a heifer calf (female) to raise and breed or raise a bull calf for beef, along with Annabelle's other boy.
Although Annabelle is 11, we bought her for a good price and hoped to get a couple more calves out of her before allowing her to live out her retirement years in our pasture. She is such a sweetheart and will greedily accept my pets, brushes, and scratches all day long.

A few weeks after purchasing her, she began wheezing, while also having runny eyes and discharge coming from her nose. I waited a while before calling the farm vet, but eventually decided to. When he came out, I casually mentioned that she was due to give birth "any day". He took one look at her and said, "I hate to tell you this, but I don't think she's pregnant." Since he was doing lab work on her anyway, we opted to have a pregnancy test done and indeed, she was not pregnant. I don't believe the prior owners had been dishonest with us. They were lovely people and I do believe she had been with a bull for two months. The vet surmises that at her age her cycles are slowing down and it will take longer for her to get pregnant.

We felt quite foolish for buying this old, un-pregnant cow. She was ultimately diagnosed with lungworm, a treatable parasite, but one which she introduced to our previously-clean pasture, and we therefore had to worm all our animals. We spent $300 on the vet and lab bills, and it was discouraging to think how one thing going wrong with an animal can wipe out any profit a person might have been hoping to make. Not only would we not have a calf to raise and sell for beef, but we had to pay the vet bill, find a way to breed her, and then feed and care for her for the next year before she even calves. We obviously aren't trying to make a living doing this, but I have a huge respect and concern for people who do. The margins are extremely tight, and it is not easy. 


On a much smaller scale, I have realized this truth in raising hens and selling eggs. When hens are young and laying an egg a day in summer we can about break even on paying for feed and keeping a couple dozen per week for ourselves. In the winter when hens lay once or twice per week, or when they turn two and begin to slow down altogether, there is no margin to cover expenses. When a predator takes out two hens at once, hens we have fed and cared for and gotten to a place where they lay daily, it is a great loss. When we have to buy new chicks or medicine or cedar chips to clean out the coop (not to mention the several hundred dollars it cost to build the coop), there is no way to recover that cost. There is only so much we can charge for a dozen eggs. We charge $4/dozen for organic, pastured eggs, which is on the higher end of what people are willing to pay anyway. (Even Costco with their massive buying power charges $3.50.) And though we are certainly not the most efficient egg farmers around, I am mindful that those able to produce and sell eggs for $2/dozen must be scrimping somewhere, most likely on quality feed, animal welfare, and humane practices. (Have you ever watched one of those horrifying industrial-egg-factory videos?) It's all somewhat discouraging and disappointing.

But I will return to the subject of cows. Since we were going to need to bring a bull in for Annabelle, we decided we might as well get one more female cow to breed along with her.

And so we purchased Nutmeg, a red Irish Dexter heifer (a female that has never given birth - I define terms because it has taken me a long while to understand them myself). Now, six months later, we are still attempting to track down an Irish Dexter bull to breed them both. A woman has kindly offered to pasture them with her herd, which includes a bull, for a couple of months this summer and we will likely take her up on that. If that doesn't work out, we have the number of two different people who offer AI (artificial insemination) services.

Another major disappointment has been the ordeal of breeding our goats. We purchased a buck (un-neutered male) in January, went to the expense of registering him with the USDGA (United States Dairy Goats Association) because our doelings (females who have never given birth) are purebred and we wanted to be able to sell our kids as purebred registered Nigerian Dwarfs. We also had a vet tech out to do disease testing on our girls and the buck because when purchasing kids, many people want certification that they come from a clean herd. Nigerian Dwarfs usually have between 2-4 kids per litter, so we were expecting to have several kids to sell. 

After Westley did his job, we were quite ready to send him on to his next home. We then noticed that a large population on Homesteader's Classifieds (a Facebook group we belong to) were trying to unload Nigerian Dwarf bucks much cuter than ours and no one wanted to buy them. We became worried that we would be stuck with this stinky, horny goat, so when his previous owners offered to take him back (because they really did love him), but not refund our money, we readily accepted. We chalked the purchase price up to a "stud fee". 

Elinor

Five months passed and Elinor's due date approached. She was confirmed pregnant by a test we had the vet tech do when she was here for disease testing. Ten days prior to d-day, she began having discharge that, from all my internet research, did not look healthy or normal. I was fairly certain that she was miscarrying but being completely new to this realm of animal husbandry, I was at a loss as to what to do and was worried about Elinor's health as well. Our farm vet came out for an emergency call on a Sunday and extricated a single very under-developed fetus. So, so disappointing. 

We had thought our farm would be abounding with new life this Spring, but it has not been so. Our very last hope for a baby lies in Marianne. She was not confirmed pregnant by the test because she would not have been far enough along. She is the tiniest thing and we are all a bit suspicious that there could even be a baby in there. If there is, it's likely only one. So our goat venture has cost about $600, a lot of hassle, and may not amount to anything. 

Marianne

The disappointments in the Little House book series are truly heartbreaking. I often think with amazement of Pa because no matter what calamity befell his family - plagues of locust, ruined crops, months-long blizzards, being forced off his homestead by changing boundaries - he began again, and with a twinkle in his eye. "There is no great loss without some small gain" was a common Ingalls Family saying. Our losses and disappointments are absurdly minor compared to theirs and to those of many others. 

The barnyard on a summer afternoon is about the most peaceful place that exists. All is still and quiet, as the chickens dust bathe in the shade, the goats snooze on their wooden wall, the cows lounge under trees to avoid the flies and heat. Recently I strolled out one blazing afternoon, and it was all so good and beautiful on our property that I couldn't even conjure up those disappointed feelings I had felt two-weeks prior when I held a screaming, trembling goat with tears streaming down my face. 

There is a time for everything,

    and a season for every activity under the heavens:

 a time to be born and a time to die,

    a time to plant and a time to uproot,

    a time to kill and a time to heal,

    a time to tear down and a time to build,

    a time to weep and a time to laugh,

    a time to mourn and a time to dance,

    a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,

    a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,

     a time to search and a time to give up,

    a time to keep and a time to throw away,

   a time to tear and a time to mend,

    a time to be silent and a time to speak,

   a time to love and a time to hate,

    a time for war and a time for peace.

~Ecclesiastes 3:1-8

What else can you do but joyfully and resolutely move forward?