Happenings on the Ranch

We hear it all the time.  We see it as posts on Facebook.  We see commercials about it.  It’s the “Monday Blues.”  This would seem to be more pertinent to those who work outside the home, forced to go back to the workplace and face another five days of madness, and for those parents who are committed to running children from school to soccer practices and music lessons during another crazy week-long marathon of events.  After a two-day respite over the weekend, Monday just always seems to be a lousy day for many folks.  Now, farmers are never really ever off the clock.  The busy season may have passed but there are still chores to do, animals to feed and water and preparations for winter and next season to finish.  Throw the upcoming holidays into the mix and I am still very busy, regardless of what day of the week it is.  Weekends don’t really mean respite around here but, apparantly, farmers have Mondays too.

Mine this morning started with checking on our sow, Lucy, who had a medical emergency over the weekend.  I won’t go into the details but let’s just say it wasn’t pretty and involved some hog anatomy and actions on my part not really fit for conversation.  She will be okay, thankfully, but I needed to check her status this morning anyway.  Coming back to the front of the house covered in mud and muck, I fully intended on heading in for a quick shower before loading up to make a delivery to Nature’s Own Health Market.  My animals had other ideas.

Our horses, Gem and Lacy, generally run in the back pasture most of the year.  This is mostly because the front part of the property is being used for crops and 1,000 pound hungry beasts and fresh veggies just don’t mix … if you want to eat any of the veggies, anyway.  But once the season is over the girls have free rein of the front part of the property, too.  This gives them more grazing area as the grasses die off for the winter and extends the amount of time we have before having to feed them hay.

If you’ve ever visited our farm (if not, we hope you do) you’ve seen there is no front yard, per se.  There is no fenced area that is designated just for yard.  Everything is wide open and the chickens frequently visit us right up to the front steps.  Technically the horses could do the same at this time of the year.  They generally don’t, though, because there’s usually nothing that interests them.  All the goodies are out in the now bare fields.  They spend their days grazing through the leftovers of greens, beets and whatever else tickles their fancy.

So imagine my surprise as I round the front of the house to find both my girls standing in the front “yard” at our patio table, LICKING the table top.  Huh?  It was amusing at first.  They would both use their lips to push things out of the way to get to whatever was on that table that was so yummy.  And they were licking very enthusiastically.  My only thought is that someone spilled a soda (or a beer – yes, horses and hogs like beer.  It’s nothing but grain, afterall) and they were licking the sugary sweetness from the table.  Cute.  Until they started to get aggressive about it, knocking things off the table and pushing each other out of the way to get to the next spot on the surface.  Lacy even put her front foot up like she was about to walk up on my GLASS table!  Okay, enough was enough.  I spent the next who-knows-how-long trying to persuade them to find something else to do.  I tried handfuls of feed, little horsey treats, even spraying the table off with water to get rid of whatever was soooo delicious.  Nothing worked.  Both girls stood their ground and actually got a bit ornery with me.  I finally had to push them both out of the way and flip the table on it’s side.  No way they could get to the tabletop now unless they bent down on their knees … not something horses are in the habit of doing very often.

I finally thought I had the situation under control and turned to head to the house.   I suddently heard a loud crash of glass, but not in the direction of the horses.  I checked to be sure my table was still intact and both girls were just staring at me like, “Not me, mom.”  I then realized the glass crashing had come from the largest chicken coop.  I looked over in time to see a small chicken running from the scene of the crime.

We have (um, had) one glass window in the front of that coop.  It serves to let in light in the early morning hours of the summer so the girls will get the sun even before we let them out to roam (important for keeping the eggs coming).  One of the birds either saw another one through the window or saw their own reflection and flew up at the glass, shattering the window.  This was one of our younger birds so they really must have taken a running leap to hit the glass that hard.  Thankfully the bird wasn’t injured, only startled, and she just shook it off and went running away leaving me to come over and pick up the shards of glass.  After removing the remaining glass from the frame, and making a mental note to cover the now gaping hole with chicken wire tonight, I made my way back to the porch.  Upon seeing the horses still hovering near the upended patio table, curiously licking at the seat cushions now, I simply rolled my eyes, sighed deeply and walked into the house for my shower.

The delivery I had to make was intended to be at the store by 10am.  I didn’t get there until almost 2pm.  Thankfully Monica, the produce manager, understood that farmers have “Mondays” too.

As a farmer, it becomes second nature to pay attention to the weather and its patterns.  Current weather conditions are usually a predictor of conditions to come.  I kept saying all summer and fall that we were going to have a wet, nasty winter.  Considering we are in the fifth snow storm in three weeks and it has been bitterly cold, it looks like I may have been right.

Mind you, I love the snow.  It’s beautiful and usually gives a little bit of an insulating layer for the animal shelters.  This winter so far, though, has turned out to be one of the coldest we’ve ever had.  The high during this time of the year is usually right around freezing or just slightly above.  Today the high will be around 19 degrees (which is an improvement over the past few days) with a cold blast coming in that will make the high on Friday around, gulp, ZERO.  And nevermind the overnight lows that are frequently below zero, not including the wind chill.  Yipes.

In most instances the shelters we have built for the animals are adequate for winter weather.  In temperatures like these, though, we’ve had to make some adjustments.

First things first, the rabbits have all been moved from the Bunny Barn into the basement.  Although the cages we have them in now are a bit more cramped than they are used to, they are all staying toasty warm by the word burning stove in the newly christened Chateau de Rabbit.

Secondly we’ve added extra wind blocks for the hogs, goats and chickens.  Especially since the potbellies have newborns and two goats will be giving birth soon, we want to make sure they don’t get chilled.  Chester, our boar, has been moved to a pen with a much larger shelter where he can dig and make his nest area to his hearts content.  The poultry and pheasant houses have extra tarps added to block the wind and most of them are very happy to just stay inside all day at this point.  In fact, they look at us like we’re crazy when we open the doors in the morning to let them out.  The only ones who seem to be acting like it’s no big deal are the geese, who wander around in the snow the same way they do in the rain.  Of course, since they are all white it’s often hard to see them sometimes unless you catch a glimpse of an orange beak.

The horses don’t need any additions to their shelters but I feel for them because they seem truly bored.  Horses naturally spend 90% of their time slowly grazing.  Of course with the snow cover on the ground we are feeding them a daily ration, but that doesn’t last them very long.  With nothing to occupy their time,  they’ve taken to pulling dead branches off the barren trees on the property.  They even chase each other around with them in an equine version of keep away.  Occasionally one of our dogs, who often plays chase with them during nice weather, will head out their direction and they happily participate in a game of cat and mouse for a short time; but it’s too cold to do that for very long and the dog gives up and heads in the house.  When the weather breaks, I’ll have to give the girls a well deserved trot around the property – as long as the ice is melted.

As you can imagine, nothing is growing.  Actually we do, surprisingly, have some surviving spinach under the a-framed raised beds but not much to write home about; I doubt it will survive much longer.  Not to mention it’s just too darn cold to go out there and dig it up.  Seriously, I’m not craving spinach salad that badly.

Unfortunately we haven’t been attending our winter market in the last few weeks due to a combination of illness and lack of items to sell.  We do still have whole free-range chickens available if anyone is interested.  They are $3.85 per pound and average around 3.5 pounds.  Once these are gone, we won’t have any more available until late spring.

CSA sign ups are still going strong.  I have managed to fix the website link to our CSA contract so anyone who hasn’t signed up yet can now download with no problem.  Of course, if you have any questions you can always feel free to email us.

Until next time, stay warm!

~Karin

It’s been a while since I’ve written because there has been so much going on.  Unfortunately, not all of it has been good.

We took a week’s vacation to head to California to visit family over the Christmas holiday.  It was a nice relaxing break.  Anthony did a great job of taking care of all the animals while we were gone.

 Sadly  immediately upon returning we were hearbroken to discover that Megan’s horse, Rosebud, had an intenstinal disorder.  Her body was not absorbing the proper nutrients no matter how much she ate.  We were forced to decide whether to try to extend her life by using some drastic measures and constant monitoring, which may or may not have helped, or to relieve her of her misery.  As sad as the decision was to make, we decided we couldn’t be selfish and keep her around knowing she was weak and so uncomfortable.  Rosie was humanely euthanized on January 3rd.  We will really miss this beautiful girl.

We were also hit by another predatory at the beginning of the year and Devon lost his prized Dominque rooster, Pepper.  The kids are very quickly learning how hard it is to lose an animal you really love.  I have to remind them that the joy we get from caring for these wonderful animals outweighs the sorrow we feel when we lose them.

On the plus side, our girls have started laying eggs again and the juvenile birds have started laying for the first time.  We’ll soon have plenty of farm fresh eggs available locally and it makes me excited that farmers market season is just around the corner.  Also makes me panic a little bit because there is still so much to do to get ready for planting season!

Hope you are all having a wonderful New Year.  Cheers from the farm!