Attaching the hoops. Old red barn in the background. We're remodeling an old red barn that was used for milking cows in the 1970's and 80's. It's been abandoned since then and was infested with termites, brown recluse spiders, and who knows what else (actually, I know everything else that...
We are just wrapping up our first attempt at breeding the dairy goats naturally. We are not using AI (artificial insemination) this season. But I won’t bore you with the specifics of all that. This is a time for stories. Stories that are a daily experience of farming. Stories that...
Willow, happily munching on the rose bushes around the house. She's quite spoiled that Willow This was a question posed by one of our readers a few weeks ago. It's a subject I've often thought about addressing. A common belief is that goats will eat anything. Many people imagine a...
Levon, exhaustedThe other day I asked on our Facebook page what people wanted us to write about. I like to ramble about electric fencing, guinea fowl, and so forth, but I have to imagine our readers would rather hear about something else. So my loving sister suggested I write an...
Gozer, putting the moves on Tijeras A few months ago, Scrapple and I had a little kitchen table meeting to strategize our first breeding season. We decided that we would aim to kid at the beginning of April. By that time the grass is growing and the sun is warm...
Through the woods I went this week, hunting for Lion's Mane. It's a delicious edible mushroom that looks like something from Dr. Seuss' imagination. Please please do not eat mushrooms that you find in the woods (or in your yard) until you have been trained to ID them (googling...
Pig Maze? While we're on the topic of letting wild animals loose, I might as well write about what the pigs have been up to. They aren't yet roaming in electrically fenced areas like the bucks (and the rest of our animals), but they're getting there.
This isn't a happy post. Nor a post about how to fence cows with polywire. Corrina, the day we got herWe had our first big loss on the farm today. Corrina, our 10 month old heifer cow died. More accurately, she strangled to death. Farming isn't always pleasant, although most...
