Hanging with the animals

Chicks

Now that the chicks are older, we've named them and want to introduce them to everyone.


This is Echinacea, one of our Americanas.This is Sweet Cecily, our other Americana.

Lotus, one of our speckled sussex.
Multiflora Rose, one of our silver laced Wyandottes. We have another named Japanese Honeysuckle. We can't tell them apart yet, so one picture will do.
Sweet Gum, our other speckled sussex. She is our sweet, friendly girl. She even put herself to bed in the coop last night! They all want to sleep in the run-in and I have to move them every night.
Dusty Miller, our special, rare bird. It is a silver spangled hamburg. We think it may be a boy. As long as it gets along with Yarrow and doesn't wake me up too early in the morning he can stay. Hopefully, we are wrong and it is a girl, but signs don't look good.
2 of the meat birds. We have 10 of them.
Their names are:

Green curry chicken
Red curry chicken
Peanut chicken
Thai basil chicken
Chicken and vegetable stir fry
Chicken and Dumplings
Chicken noodle soup
Fried chicken
Barbeque chicken
Sesame pasta with chicken

Damn good cheese!

We made cheese earlier this week and it is amazingly good! I'm really impressed. I've made cheese a few other times and they were ok but not great. This one is great. Logan and I have been eating a ton of it over the last few days. It is a spreadable cheese and we've been eating it on crackers.

It is a good recipe because it only used 1 quart of milk instead of the gallon that most recipes call for.

Recipe:

1 quart milk (we used fresh, raw goat's milk of course)

1 cup buttermilk (I used cow's from the store, I plan to make my own soon)

1.5 tsp lemon juice

3/4 tsp salt

Heat the milk over low heat to 175 degrees F

Add buttermilk

Turn off heat

Add lemon juice

Stir well until curds form

Let sit for 10 minutes undisturbed

Drain through cheese cloth, let sit for 5 minutes

Gather up corners and let hang for 30 minutes

Stir in salt and any seasonings or herbs you want (we used minced garlic and black pepper YUM!)

Pack into a bowl, cover with plastic wrap, and let sit overnight in fridge

The next day it will be smooth and spreadable

It was really easy and wonderful. I think I'll make more tomorrow and try freezing it. I know what people are getting for Christmas this year!

Thank you Kudzu

We have sad new on Whistling Wind Farm. Kudzu, our favorite hen was eaten by a hawk last week. She was a wonderful girl, she liked to be picked up and cuddled. Every time we went out, she ran over to us and crouched down to be picked up. She will be greatly missed!





We had never seen the hawk until the day he got her and we haven't seen the hawk since. We have heard it in the woods behind our house. The chickens are now spending a lot of their time in or near the run-in. Kudzu was an easy target because she was too big to fit through the fence easily. I assume when the hawk came, everyone made a dash for the run-in, but to get there they had to go through the fence. I guess she was having trouble finding a way through the fence. The sad thing is, there was a hen house 3 feet behind her, but she was trying to get to the run-in on the other side of the fence. We had talked many times about cutting a hole in the fence that she could fit through, but we didn't have the tools to do it so it never happened. I wish now that we had done it.

Our speckled sussex are starting to be friendly, so I hope we will have another friendly chicken someday. Buttercup, our other buff is not friendly.

Garden

Well the weather has been tough on the garden. Little rain for the last month. I'm watering but just can't seem to keep up with the scorching temps during the day.

The tomatoes are doing well. Here is one of our speckled sussex chicks enjoying a tomato that was starting to rot. Tonight I had all the chicks in the garden eating bugs. I was planting late corn and stirring up lots of bugs. The chicks were very happy. The guineas were there too. I'll do a guinea post soon. I wish I had the camera with me, but didn't want to stop what I was doing to go get it. Hopefully, I can get pictures tomorrow. The chicks are getting really big.

A sunflower thinking about blooming. My sunflowers are really looking bad. You know it is dry when the sunflowers are wilting!
The corn is tassling. I sure hope I get some corn.
Overview of the garden. Still way too many weeds, but I've given up fighting them.
About 1/3 of my tomatoes ripening in the window. I have to pick them before they are ripe because if I leave them on the vine something eats the bottom of them.

I made and canned 6 jars of salsa. Only the tomatoes in it are from my garden, but it is delicious! I'm freezing all the cherry tomatoes whole to use in making sauce later.

A nasty rumor

It has come to my attention that there is a nasty rumor going around about me. Some mis-informed people are saying my animals are spoiled. I'm going to prove that rumor wrong in this post.

For example, I would NEVER cut lamb's quarter out of my garden and hold it while the goats eat it.
And I certainly would NOT hold a bowl of food for a deformed meat bird to eat.
Nor would I let a goat sleep in my lap while I trim his hooves.
And I can guarantee, NO goat of mine would be sleeping on the couch!
Only a fool would hand feed her hens corn every morning after letting them out of their coop.
And there is absolutely NO way, I would walk a goat around the back yard after milking her because the weeds in the yard are better than the ones in the pasture.

These animals are livestock and are treated as such!

Weekend to do list

The boys are out of town this weekend, so I've got a whole list of projects to get done. Sometimes things are easier to do when no one is around to distract you. Of course, some things like unloading and stacking hay are easier with help. But I'm frontier woman and I will prevail!

Plant basil - DONE
Plant jalapeno - DONE
plant coneflower - DONE
rig up cistern - DONE
put up tomato cages - DONE
water out front - DONE
pick up hay - DONE
unload and stack hay -DONE
set up ladder on climbing structure
put tarp on sheep cage - DONE
stake down sheep cage - DONE
move guineas to garden - DONE
dishes - DONE
put hay around plants - DONE
set up drip line
weed around sunflowers - DONE
Kaplan grading - DONE
Move mineral feeder - DONE
Make ice cream
make fudge - DONE
make sesame noodles - DONE
make and can salsa
harvest - DONE
fertilize garden
shred and freeze zucchini - DONE
pick blackberries in the neighbor's pasture


I'll update my progress as I go, wish me luck! I started working on the list Friday, so I'm spreading the work out over 3 days and I'll probably make Mark do a few of the things when he gets home.

Update: It is 9:30 Saturday night. I'm done for the day and settling down on the couch with a glass of wine to watch a chick flick.

Cute goat pictures

These pictures remind me of a joke.

How many goats does it take to clean a stall?

None, but they'll all help you anyway!