My Chickens Have Come Home to Roost!

Since the farm manager quit, and my parents aren't living in the country, the chickens are back at my house.  Here you can see them giving their seal of approval to my new construction.  It's fun to have the chickens in my backyard; instead of saving food scraps in my "chicken bucket" I just toss them out the back door.

Here you can see what happens when you are absent-minded and leave the chicken feed on the ground where the chickens can get at it. For a while, she was one happy chicken!

I made it to Judo tonight, but not to the gym.  I need to go on Thursday to have 17 check-ins this month.  It might or might not happen, as I am scheduled to castrate that day.  Castrating is a pretty messy business, though, so maybe I'll go shower at the gym and call that a "check-in."

OK, I'd never do it, but I crack myself up thinking about the horror that would greet my mud and blood-splattered self if I showed up at the gym after castrating all afternoon.  I think this must be the famous "farm humor" that you're always hearing about.

No-Spend, Iced in Edition

The entire world is ice out here, so I basically spent the day at home.  $0 dollars spent.

I did manage to make it to the gym, to discover that the pool is closed and the entire place is closed tomorrow due to weather.  I didn't have real workout clothing, but I did thirty mins on the elliptical machine so that I would have something to show for my time.  Judo was too far for iced-over roads, though.  Since the challenge starts tomorrow, I guess I'll relive my time in Michigan and go for a jog in the cold.  (I'm not supposed to jog, but I can go a bit if I'm careful.)  As I recall, it's quite bracing, after the first five minutes.

You know it's the coldest day of the year because we had two calves born today:

Beva

Kali (taken through the fence; she's a protective mama)

2011 Goals

Here we go ...

1) Religious/Spiritual 
     A) Continue to Tithe - one of my big wins in 2010, let's keep the streak going!
     B) Start a daily religious practice - I tried to get really specific about this last year, and ended up burning out. Rather than setting up a to do list, I want to give myself 15 minutes a day where I pray, meditate, read the bible, write in a gratitude journal, sing, or do whatever the spirit moves me to do that day.  Once this is a regular activity, I'll see where my spiritual journey needs to go.

2) Health
     A) Eat within my Weight Watchers points every day - I weighed 169 lbs on the scale yesterday, which puts me 21 pounds over my "thin" weight and 12 pounds over my lifetime weight.  Rather than worry about a time line and a weight goal, I'm just going to eat right and exercise.  I'll re-evaluate in March - if I'm not losing weight, I'll worry about it then.  On that note ...
     B) i. Exercise six days a week - I have Judo 2x a week.  I'll go to the gym the other 4, even if it's just for a light, 20 minute swim.  A sub-goal, because I am this anal, is to ii. make the check-in list at my gym every month.  To get on the list, I must check in at least 17 times a month.

3) Financial
     A) Have a side business (or multiple) netting 1K a month before taxes by December 2011  I've got several ideas on this front, from farm eggs to online jewelry.  I need to just keep plugging away at it until I find something(s) that works.  More on this as events develop.
    B) Fully Fund 2011 Roth IRAs Needed - 10K, currently have 0K - see 3A
    C)  Save in anticipation of (hopefully very temporary) loss of primary income.  It's coming.  The more I can cut from the budget, and the more I can sock away, the longer we'll have before we have to make desperation kinds of decisions.

4) Dreams
     A) Get the farm books in order, facilitate farm improvements, and manage the goats.This year, I am going to take over the farm bookkeeping.  This will free up my Mom to assist the new farm manager into transitioning into his duties, incorporate the new 152 acres into the property, and work on a national lecture tour, which is one of her big dreams.  She's actually speaking at the 2011 Southern Sustainable Agriculture Conference in Tennessee later this month, her first national conference.  I also need to manage the goats more closely.  We've been in growth mode on the herd for a long time, but now it's time to maintain what we have and begin to cull the bottom 10% and replace it with better genetics.  This will require near-daily monitoring to watch for health problems, as well as miscarriages and stillbirths.  It will also require meticulous record keeping.
     B) Begin again on piano  Talked to my dad about this today and we are going to get started again.  My goal is still to be able to accompany at my church on the piano when our current organist is out of town, busy, or sick (our back-up organist is very talented, but she's over eighty, and won't be around forever).
     C) Re-connect with my Chinese friend  We got busy and it stopped happening, but she's a sweetie and I need to spend more time with her.  Also, it's fun to speak Chinese, at least until I run out of words :)

5) Prosaic
     1) Practice with my carry firearms at least once a month This was a big fail for me last year.  I was late getting my Louisiana permit application in last year (long story), so I don't have a valid carry permit and probably won't get one until mid-March at the earliest.  The silver lining is that this gives me time to brush up before I am carrying again.
     2) Consistently do Flylady routines.  Last year, I decided to give up having a housekeeper and do my house myself.  When I follow her routines reasonably consistently, my house is acceptably neat.  I am not trying for Martha Stewart neat, just reasonably not dirty.

Accountability 
In an effort to give myself some accountability, I'm going to review these goals monthly on the first of every month.  Wish me luck (and good health too, please).

Cheating on Eating Sustainably

I love the convenience of steaming vegetables in a bag that I plucked right out of the freezer.  But I feel guilty every time I do it.  I know there's nothing good about encasing your vegetables in plastic and running microwave power over them.  I know that it's 100 times better for me to get stuff from the farmer's market and quick-steam it over the stove.  Not to mention half the price.  But I confess that I steam veggies-in-a-bag probably twice a week.

I am also addicted to Weight Watcher's Mint Chocolate Chip ice cream.  In addition to being the most expensive ice cream in my grocery store on a per ounce basis, it's a pile of completely non-nutritive crap.  But such tasty non-nutritive crap that I eat it almost every day.  Sometimes twice a day.

I'm so committed to the local and sustainable food movement that I live and work on a farm.  But even I am seduced by the convenience and packaging of industrial food.  I tip my hat to people in big cities who are fellow travelers in the cause - the huge time commitment required makes them as much heroes of the local food movement as the farmers from whom they buy their produce.

Summer Garden

Here's today's harvest from the summer garden*:

Add some tomatoes I bought from a roadside stand yesterday and

Yum!

*This is actually from my parents' garden.  But I think it should count as mine too since I turned over the bed and planted the plants :)

Emergency Chicken Harvest

Harvested a chicken today for the first time since I was 10. My mother's dog killed it right in front of her. So then we were left with the decision - should we try to make it useful, or throw it away? I'm sure all you PF bloggers out there understand why I didn't want to waste it. This is a 100% real grass-fed, free-range chicken - I'm not throwing that in the trash if I can help it. (The dog had not chewed on it in any way). But we had to act fast to keep it from spoiling.

We don't usually harvest our own animals at the farm. As I have said before, the art of red meat harvesting is a lifetime mastery. We've got someone local who does it spectacularly well, and we use him for our usual beef and goat needs, simply because he will do it so much better.

Luckily for me, though, we have one customer who insists on harvesting himself at the farm. So I've assisted on a couple of goat harvests in the last year. Extra-luckily for me, he just gave me a book on how to harvest a variety of animals, including chickens. I also had Joel Salatin's Pastured Poultry Profits to use as a reference, although he advises you how to harvest 400 chickens at a time, not one.

So, basically, it was me, a dead chicken, a knife and two books. An hour and a half later, I have the ugliest-cleaned chicken in the world sitting in the fridge, and I'm having chicken gumbo tomorrow.

I had several bad moments. First, my knife wasn't sharp enough to take the head off, and I had to look for a cleaver. Second, I tore the skin while trying to pluck it. Then, I had trouble eviscerating the chicken, as the guts did not scoop out neatly as both books intimated. Fourth, only one of the books gave any advice about getting rid of the craw (a pouch full of gravel and recently-eaten food, the first stage in the chicken digestive process). Finally, I couldn't find the gizzard (a necessary ingredient for a good gumbo). After looking through the guts again, I realized that I had save the gizzard, mistaking it for the heart. The heart is much smaller - doh!

I'm sure that anyone who knows anything about processing chickens would have laughed their heads off at my noobie efforts. Still I am very proud of myself for getting this done, and turning what would have been a total loss into dinner.

Know Anyone Who Wants to Lead the Sustainable Farm Lifestyle?

For various reasons (including the fact that if Mr. Goat loses his job, he'll never be able to get a comparable one here) my time on the farm is probably limited. The inconvenience of being so sick has made me realize that it would be better to find a replacement for myself before I go, rather than afterwards. My parents agree, and so we are looking for a partner on our farm.

Our ad in the Stockman Grass Farmer reads as follows:

South Louisiana Family Farm seeks self-motivated person or family passionate about sustainable farming. Our small, grass-based farm produces grass fed and finished beef and grass fed goats that we market locally (primarily through networking and our web site). The ideal candidate(s) will have experience with raising grass, handling animals, and operating and maintaining farm equipment and the desire to partner with us to expand the farm and to add additional, complementary enterprises. We can provide housing, salary, and a share of profits. Priority will be given to those with a farm background who wish to lead the country lifestyle for the long term. If you are interested, please contact us by email at FarmFamily@brookshirefarm.com. Include a short description of your background and why you would be interested in joining us here at Brookshire Farm.

If you or someone you know is interested, they can also contact me through this blog. Please feel free to pass it along to anyone you think might be interested and qualified. We are looking with someone with a real passion for sustainable farming and a real appreciation or how much work, physical and mental, is involved.

I'm also looking for feedback on the ad - what kind of person do you think this ad will attract, and why?

Farm Visit

Today we had three kids come to visit the farm. Their grandmother is a friend of my mother's, and their mother went to school with me, so there's no way to say no. But, in fact, my mother loves taking kids on tours of her farm, so she'd totally have said yes even if she didn't know them from Adam.

The children in question are 6, 4, and 3. Their mother was two grades younger than me, which makes me feel a bit odd. My husband and I haven't even decided if we're having any, and she's already got three. They have been living in a large southern city, in a condo. They are not country kids. The four year old is afraid of bugs, for instance.

So we ride out on the Kubota to the barn to see the cats. We are very excited by the cats, which we refer to as "she" regardless of genitalia. I fail to point out the difference, too busy trying to make sure that the three year old does not try to jump out of the hayloft.

Mom asks me to get some of the goats. I manage to get just my most feed-addicted goats to come to the barn. They are pretty calm, and one of them has our newest kid, so I figure it will be a match made in heaven. I fail to anticipate three simultaneous, shrill, squeals of delight, which make my goats suddenly realise that they are *gasp* away from the heard. They run back to the heard, bleating as they go. So much for that.

It's back on the Kubota, out to the cows. We are out of range cubes, which means we are "treating" them with goat feed. Cows are slobbery animals to being with, and the tiny goat pellets mean that prodigious amounts of slobber are generated. We have our two most docile cows on one side, eating out of our hands. The two older boys cower on the back of the Kubota. As their mother and grandmother attempt to coax them to come feed the cows, or at least to pet them, the three year old charges off the seat smack in the direction of our craziest cow. Fortunately, Mom diverts her to a cow that is not insane and probably won't kick her from pure spite. Eventually, the cows have been sufficiently gawked at, and we head for the goats.

In the heard, the goats are anything but shy. In fact, my second billy, Jim, is so feed-greedy that I am a bit worried that he will bowl the kids over, so I don't let any of them hold the bucket. The four year old is interested in feeding the goats from his hands, while his mother and grandmother take copious pictures. He continues to refer to them as deer, despite multiple corrections. I finally figure out that it is because my nannies' horns look a bit like those of does. If you have never actually seen a deer, that is. Of course, as soon as we turn our backs, the farm dog bites the three year old. Happily, no skin is broken, and her mother is way less upset than expected. She stops crying before Mom and I stop scolding the dog. You can tell that she is going to be a firecracker when she gets a bit older.

Later, I will once again try to convince my mother that the farm dog is dangerous and should be locked up when people are around. He's bitten ME for goodness sake (and gotten his butt whooped for it good), and I am generally acknowledged by all the sane dogs I know to be dominant. I am not sure how many people that dog will bite before she gets the message, but she persists in believing that he is not dangerous. In vain I plead that one serious bite will require that he be put down, and thus we ought not tempt him. She loves this dog the way Pairs Hilton loves her little rat dog, and he can do no wrong in her eyes.

For now, though, it is off to the porch to eat watermelon. Copious amounts of watermelon are eaten, and copious amounts of juice are dribbled on the front porch. The adults watch the melee with glasses of the 2004 Pesquera in hand. The farm dog is locked up for the duration. The three year old plays alternately in the dirt and in the dog's water bowl, no doubt seriously fortifying her immune system over the long term.

Eventually, it is time for dinner, and they load themselves into the van and drive away, hot and grubby but waving happily. I am not sure how their mother does it - I only had them around for three hours, and I am already ready for my nap.