At last...a break in the action

Maple season is finally over.  We look forward to it's arrival every year, and are always happy to see it go, simply because there is so much else to do!  And it seems I cannot blog AND do maple syrup.  Either I am away at the trees gathering, chopping wood, or cooking, or when I am inside finishing I must NOT get distracted by the computer or we will have maple goo all over the stove.  And I haven't found a profitable use for maple goo...

My constant companions are never far away; following me everywhere, but also contented to catch a nap in the back mud hall while I have a snack or hit the loo.  Normally, I would NEVER show you the nasty mud hall, but how else to share the view out my back door? - Max is in his bed, and Candy (who we have now figured out is a boy - sorry, Candy for a year of calling you "girl"...) with head tucked under for a quick wink.

And there's been a little bit of time for some charity knitting by the maple fire, as well as tucking in several flats of onions, mesclun, herbs, broccoli and lettuce.

EVERYBODY is laying, even the turkeys!  The Bourbon Reds have mastered the art of walking around the pen without stepping on the eggs, so we are incubating a pair of those, and have sold some.

And we have three new additions to the flock:

Our Silkie just died, and I got the opportunity to replace her. And I thought one chick amongst all those hens might get picked on, so better to have a companion, and besides, how could I choose between the two colors, and well, what if I had somehow chosen two roosters?  Just to better the odds, I had better get a third, that way we will at least have a hen to breed if we chose poorly and got two roosters, and, well, you understand...

I did it again...

I did it again....waited WAY too long between posts.  But I have been busy, I promise...

Planted Something: I'm forcing tulip bulbs, but they're to tiny to bother with a photo right now...just imagine four sprouting bulbs in a purple pot.

Harvested Something:  It continues to be eggs, but every day the girls surprise me...someone "new" is laying, can you see?  I suspect it is our white Silkie, Sapphire.

Preserved something: In the manner that this refers to storing away food...I baked 7+ loaves of bread.  (See the entry under "Local Food")  Thank God I was able to control my hunger around the fresh baked bread and most of them got into the freezer...

Prepped something:  Right now, the only thing that comes to mind is all the dyeing we are doing to build up inventory, as we are applying to vend at the Massachusetts Sheep and Woolcraft Fair.

Cooked something: Nothing too exciting here; can we just acknowledge that I cook every day, and change this category to Knitted something?  (at least that comes with a picture...)  I was inspired by my friend Susan's ear warmer, and pulled together one of my own design with mittens, using some local wool that I dyed last year.  Funny how last year I didn't like the color or dye job, and this year...go figure.

Managed reserves:  This time of year, that means hay.  I am still searching for those final 3 dozen bales to get us through Spring.  I am reluctant to pay for hay, when my previous employer still owes me money (for which I was planning on getting hay...) but soon I will have to break down and fork over (eek!)  $5 a bale....sigh

And my friend Susan is also a farmer who preserves our reserves of endangered and heirloom populations.  We visited her about a week ago to see her American Buff geese:

and her Icelandic sheep.  Don't they look just like the Shetlands?  You have to get close enough  to check out the fleece structure to tell the difference.

Worked on local food systems:  I've met a Mennonite woman through our local knitting group that makes all her own bread, and WOW! is it good.  I had to beg only a little to ask her to  teach me, (since baking decent bread has so far in my life been a skill I cannot master) and besides her patient teaching, apparently the secret is using the right flour.  She uses Occident flour (which can only be had by waiting till the next trip to Pennsylvania and buying a 50# bag for our house) and Red Star yeast.  I was so happy when my stuff rose the first time, you'd think I won the lottery!

It was the start of a wonderful system - we are bartering for even more skills lessons in the future - pickling for dyeing yarn and so on...

Reduced waste/Recycled:  Well this category was also satisfied by knitting - I used stash yarn to knit up helmet liners for military personnel.  It was a satisfying  project, and I encourage anyone with needles and some wool yarn to think about it...

Learned something: No matter how ridiculous it may seem...the cat knows better.  I thought she was nuts spending 6 hours a day parked in front of the stove like this:

Until I turned on the self-cleaning feature (which heats up the oven quite hot) and out scurried a mouse.  Which she grabbed in her mouth and wouldn't give up until I  put a can of fresh cat food down on the floor nearby.  And so I was left to capture the mangled, yet still perky, mouse.  Which my husband helpfully suggested I could put out in the back hall until he got home to dispose of it.   Yeah....well, not actually.  The mouse had other ideas and left before DH got home by leaping tall garbage cans with a single bound and scurrying for freedom.  Which may  have simply meant back where he came from...because guess where Lucky is spending her days????  Hmm....

Fall Shearing, #1

It was a nice Fall day, so I HAD to get some work done outside.   First project up: shearing.  Hattie, my flock matron, went first as she is the best behaved (and had the halter on so I could catch her without too much gymnastics)

Hers is a pretty nice fleece; each year her silver gets lighter, and this year it looks almost white...

She is standing next to Secret, her granddaughter, making the perfect "before and after" shot.  Photos of anything "during" were more challenging, as many of the farm's other inhabitants were on hand to "help"...

The turkeys hovered around, in case anything edible should appear.  They tasted the bits of fleece that were flying about, but settled for pecking the freckles on my legs in case they were bugs.  (Thanks guys.)

BTW - Anybody know how to sex turkeys?  What exactly is one supposed to look for when deciding who goes to the chop shop and who gets to stay home making babies for next year???  I mean if there is some visual difference in plumage or something, please clue me in.   Based on last year's comedy of errors, I need all the help I can get.  (For those of you that don't remember, we apparently ate the hens...)

And the geese...

...kept squeeking and squawking until I sat down and took a break with them.  They seem to want me to sit with them and pick grass for them to eat out of my hand.  It must be some kind of geese ritual, because they eat three or four handfuls, then they settle down and either take a brief siesta, or walk off to continue grazing.  But if I ignore them, they keep up the anxious squeeking...(I have learned this from experience)

And once the word was out we were taking a break...

Max came by to soak up some attention.  Somedays I just want to be a cat...

Things I've learned from Geese

We were given two Canada Geese goslings to foster, and we started right from the beginning saying they were destined to move on to a farm that could handle them, as soon as they were "ready".  

Lesson 1: Small, vulnerable, fuzzy things cause considerable weakness and lack of will.  They can erode even the most steely resolve NOT to keep them around.  My husband, who would not settle down the first day until he heard me say ten times that I had alternative plans for them, has now been heard to tell friends, "We are raising them.  And the one can't fly, so she may have to stay here, probably in the barn for winter."  He only says this when he thinks I am out of earshot.

They were clearly imprinted on humans by the time we got them, and they wasted no time in seeing us as foster parents, following us around the yard.  They would frequently come into the garden and sit with me as I weeded, and soon began to display what I thought was funny behavior.  They would squeak quite urgently and come over to see what I had pulled from the garden, tasting every clump and plant, seeming in the end to prefer the grass.  It took several days of this activity for my light bulb to go on...they clearly thought I was "eating", and came to taste test whatever I had pulled.

Lesson 2: The laws and intricacies of Mother Nature are not fool proof.  Sure, they had imprinted on us, but until we started to show them what was expected goose behavior, it was going to be hit or miss whether they learned what they needed to know, unless us dumb humans could get ahead of the curve.

How many times had I counseled teachers and educators that work with challenging kids that you need to teach the desired behavior, not just quell the problem behavior?  (Thousands of times would be the true answer, in case anyone is wondering...)

And the lessons did not stop with eating grass.  We made the same naive assumption when it came to the pond.  Sure, they would just take to it like, well, geese to water.  Right?  No.  Not until I donned the waders one day to pull the cattails did they dare to venture into the water; first a tentative few steps, then a quick jump in and right out again, and only after much trial and error did they settle down to glide and enjoy the pond.

I repeated the "grass picking" behavior, this time with pond plants, and now they easily will graze in either domain, although they seem to prefer the grass.

This pattern of behavior does leave me a little concerned, however, as I do not know how to fly, and have absolutely no intention of purchasing an ultra-lite.  (A reference to the movie, Fly Away Home, for those who have never seen it-check it out.)

Lesson 3: Puddle play and slapping one's feet when you walk are FUN.  Mothers everywhere should reconsider discouraging their children from these activities.  I have seen the geese do this repeatedly, and tried it plenty of times myself lately just to see what they see in it.  And I swear, when I do it along with them, they look at me sideways, and they approve.  I see it in their eyes.

Candy and Cane

So named, (according to Madison) because they are so sweet.  I have to agree.

A friend called, two weeks ago now, and asked if we could help with two baby ducks she found aimlessly wandering the busy road in front of a party she was attending.  Mama was no where to be seen, and she scooped them up in a craft storage bin, and whisked them away to us.  (Really, how many people do you know that have heat lamps, cages, starter food, waterers and such just lying around?...so we farmers always get those calls.)

My husband just shook his head and muttered...don't know how he missed the part about my being pre-vet in my undergrad....hmmm

The "ducks" as the city girl called them, turned out to be Canada Geese goslings.    Kind of a love/hate relationship with them in these parts.  Far too many of them have become squatters on local parks, ponds, riverways, and yards and have made poopy pests of themselves.  At the same time, they are wild animals, and we have screwed up their habitat and normal hibernation patterns, so what to do?

There was no wildlife rehabilitator available, and these guys were already pretty imprinted on humans, so when my boss volunteered to take them to her mother's farm in Massachusetts, we agreed to keep them for a few weeks.

Look how incredibly fast they grow!  In just two short weeks they have tripled in size.  They are very endearing - nothing like the happy slip slap of gosling feet behind you as they waddle in determined focus, never letting you out of their sight.

It is going to be very hard to let these guys go...