We have scheduled our two pigs to go to the butcher on May 17th. They have been very good pigs, and while we will be sad to see them go, they have served their purpose and we will greatly enjoy the food they provide to our family. How amazing for them to turn grass, food [...]
Jamie let the ducks out to the pond today for the first time. She opened up the run by their house and herded them down to the pond all together. They seem much more herd-able and docile than chickens (not to mention much less mobile on the land). On the way over, one even got stuck in [...]
We’ve just posted our farm standards regarding animal care. We consider it a work in progress. It provides information for anyone who might want to buy from us, but more importantly any time you buy meat you should ask yourself these questions:
Where did the animal come from?
What did it eat?
What medications and vaccinations was it given?
How [...]
Today Jamie finally got around to “planting” the rest of her mushrooms. Earlier this week, she planted her morels where the old pig-pen was. That basically consisted of crumbling the inoculated peat moss around and lightly working it into the soil. Today, she did brown shiitake and oyster. They were a little more complicated.
First, you start by [...]
The cows have been out in the big pasture almost every day for a couple weeks now. They do seem to love the green grass. At the end of the day, though, when Jamie calls them back to the barn (with the reward of grain and hay), they sure do come running.
Before all the rain the last couple days, the chickens had a good time running around.
This morning I was supposed to go the the post office to pick up the rest of our poultry order: 12 geese, 6 Indian runner ducks, and 6 turkey poults. A friend was coming to buy 4 of the ducks and 1 goose for her farm down the road. I called the post office at [...]
There is no question that to be successful at running a farm, you must run it like a business. Now that we pretty much have all of the livestock that we are going to raise and have a good idea of what it costs to feed, shelter, and butcher them, we will be trying to [...]
It was a really nice weekend here, temps in the 60s and a bright blue sky. It was a bit blustery, with our open fields and slightly elevated position, the winds can be very strong. However, it will likely be very nice to have some cool breezes come summer. We had a productive weekend. We [...]