Unplanned Birthday Suprise

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May 062012
 

6 Muscovy ducklings

Bittersweet moments are pretty common with farm animals.
After sitting on 6 eggs for 35 days the mamma duck is missing.
Luckily we had the incubator out so it didn’t take too long to get it up and running to dry off the ducklings. Now that they’re dried off they’ll be moved to a tub until they are old enough to live in the barn.

Turkey Eggs

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Apr 182012
 
It’s the second week of the Leap into Spring photo challenge!
I somehow forgot about it so this week there are two Wordless Wednesday posts.
You can find my Daffodil photos here
The topics for this week are Easter/Eggs.
Due to my sister being in the hospital I missed out on Easter (I do have 3/4 of a blessed butter lamb in the fridge though!) so I went with eggs. 
The light is best on the front lawn. So second day in a row I’ve been laying on my lawn with a camera. Thank goodness I don’t have close neighbors!
This is a Royal Palm Turkey Egg, now in the incubator
<em>Leap Into Spring!</em> Photo Challenge”></a> <div style=

WW: Glimpse of a Country Spring

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Apr 112012
 
It’s been a long week.
Finally, after 6 days in the hospital, my sister is home.
Gallstone pancreatitis and a potential case of C. diff meant baby juggling (not literally) for the entire family. By the way, if you happen to take a baby to a restaurant and don’t immediately know how many days old he is people will assume you are the Worst Mother In The World. When you tell them it’s not your baby they will assume you stole him. It’s important to mention you’re related!

She’s only 21 but I had mine out when I was 22. My mom and dad both had theirs removed as well. Must be genetic….

Anyway! I haven’t had a whole lotta time for crafting this week so I’ll just be sharing some fun pictures instead.

If I still dyed my hair I would want Sophia’s color. Shes a little shit very, very pretty (should cut back on the white eyeshadow though)

I admit I over edited this one. But I like the ‘feel’ of it.
Do I sound like I’m in high school art class?

The eastern fence line
(yes, those were telephone poles at one point, no idea why they are a fence now)

Soon to be lilac

Leap Into Spring Photo Challenge

Rainy Sunday

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Mar 262012
 

Ugh. It’s been a day and a half here!

I’ve been working on my super awesome project for the last two days.
Hopefully I’ll have it done and ready to share by Tuesday when I have help putting it up.

Got a bit side tracked when a neighbor stopped by to tell me my turkey was down by her barn.
Cut to 1 hour traipsing trough the woods looking for the hen.
Almost caught her once but then she got away.
We lost her about 1/2 mile from the house so I’m hoping she’ll hear the toms (all 4 are gobbling up a storm these days) and make it back.

So far we’ve been incredibly lucky with predators. We’ve lost one duck and 2 polish hens that refused to go in the barn at night, preferring the life threatening strategy of sitting in the middle of a field.

Who wouldn’t come back for this? Check out that beard!

I’ll keep you updated!

WW: A Few Good Eggs

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Feb 222012
 
It seems like the girls are kicking it in to over drive a bit early, but I’m not going to complain! I’ve been getting at least 18 eggs a day [I got 22 last Saturday!] for the last few weeks. 
For those of you counting I’ve got 28 hens. 7 Brahmas, 7 Silver Laced Wyandottes, 2 Blue Laced Red Wyandottes, 2 Buff Silkies (tiny but I get 1 silkie egg a day!) and 10 TSC chicks (at least 2 white leghorns, and some crazy egg hybrids). 
 18/28 might not seem like an awesome ration but I’ve got several girls that are showing signs of moulting (I wouldn’t want to lose my feathers just yet, it is only February!) and a few that the roosters pay a little too much attention to, if you get my meaning. Those ladies look a bit rough. The TSC specials are all fairly svelte compared to my brahmas and wyandottes so my guess is they aren’t laying too much with the cold weather.
I love the variety in size, shape and color I get from my backyard buddies. Even though I collect them every day, it still amazes me that those dumb little birds manage to provide me with food and income day in and day out.
 At the moment they are the only animals that contribute to the household income. 
[The alpacas are trying to convince me that they poop and their poop is good for the garden so they will in fact, be paying me lots come garden time]
We also have this on our kitchen counter:
Those are the eggs that are so dirty I don’t waste the time cleaning them or that freeze (and crack) or that I manage to crack on my way in to the house. Those go to Mr. Alfie. The cat doesn’t really like eggs unless she thinks she’s getting something away from the dog.
Sometimes if we have a lot of ‘bad eggs’ we let kids throw them at roosters. 
But you didn’t hear that from me. 
(Those boys are bullies!)

Farm Life Confessions – Not for the faint of heart

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Feb 062012
 

 
I’ve got a favor to ask, but before I get to it I have to tell you all a little something about myself.
I went back and forth in sharing this. But I’m all for honesty and this really is a part of my life.

I.. uh.. kill things. And then eat them
(few more steps between A and B but you get the idea)
Mostly roosters, but also a duck. 
It’s a new thing for me. 
My death toll (also Mikes, we do this together) has reached 7.
It’s not really that hard 
(I’ll spare you all the details here, but if you have any questions please, please email me: chickenscratchny {at} gmail.com)
Doesn’t really take that long
But it’s not something most people are comfortable with. 
I know why, but at the same time I don’t really get it.
I kinda feel like people think I’m in training to be a serial killer.
It’s not that at all. 

I don’t enjoy it. 
But I do think it’s something that needs to be done. 
I have lots of reasons to do it. 
[Better meat for me, healthier hens in the barnyard, lower feed costs
Owning up to the fact than a living creature really did die so I could eat]
And very few not to.
[People think I'm a freak]
But I don’t care (I guess I do a little)
Because in the end I know the chicken on my plate had a good life
I remember them, I respect them, I thank them
If you made it this far, I really do need a favor. 
I need a recipe for duck
A really good recipe
that I can’t mess up
I owe that much to my little scoliosis duck
Weekend Bloggy Reading

Down on the Farm: Thanksgiving Edition

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Nov 242011
 
Happy Thanksgiving All!

This is my beautiful boy, Gobbles. He is a 1 1/2 year old Royal Palm turkey. We currently have 13 RPs. We started out June 2010 with 22 turkey poults. 11 RP and 11 Bourbon Red. In the end we lost one poult, 2 went to friends of mine, 14 went…. in the freezer and 5 stayed with us.

A younger Gobbles and his four ladies.

I’ve been through a lot with these critters. They started out as day old poults in my mom’s garage. They moved with Mike and I to the small house we rented. Then finally with us to our new home. They predate the cows, chickens, ducks and alpacas.

Checking out the chickens. We keep the chickens separate for health reasons. It’s also the reason we may be discontinuing our turkey raising. He was really interested in the white ones.

Mean looking hen sitting on some eggs

We had some hens pretty serious about brooding but they never hatched anything.

We did a bit better with the incubator. These are freshly hatched. Turkeys are notoriously hard to breed, low fertility and hatch rate makes this a pretty good turn out for first timers. We hatched 15 but lost a bunch to unknown causes. We ended up with 8 to raise for… the freezer.

Another picture of my pretty man. Ignore his broken tail, it’s grown back now but I can’t find a better picture.

Down On the Farm: Dorothy and Sophia

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Oct 082011
 

 This is Dorothy. I bought her about 13 months ago at an auction. Her back story: she was the ‘family cow’ (basically a term for a non-commercial dairy cow who is used for milk production on a home –scale), her owner died and his kids didn’t want her. She looked so sad and confused at the auction. She was in a stall all by herself in a back corner. I was drawn to her immediately. I spent most of the day in the stall talking to her and petting her neck. The ‘real’ farmers probably thought I was nuts. We bought her bred, she delivered freshened had  Sophia about two weeks later.
Sophia Day 2 – See how Dorothy is always trying to lick the camera?
I love my cow. When we bought her her name was Friendly, and she really is. She loves people. When someone new walks in the pasture she’s the first to run (talk about scary, 900+ pounds at a full run AT you) up and slobber  sniff.  Up until yesterday I have never lived with my cow. She has been at my boyfriends mothers since we got her over a year ago.
Dorothy and Sophia, left, Mable and S’mores, right. Couldn’t this be a card for a Mother’s Day Buffet?

Dorothy is my miracle girl. (Warning! Sad story with a happy ending)
The Cow Who Lived – New Years Day
Last year, on December 17, 2010 Dorothy almost died. She got out of her stall and got her head stuck under a board trying to get to another animals food. My boyfriends mother (BFM) found her laying on her side with her head stuck. She removed to board and tried to get her to stand up. They tried to temp her with food and tried rocking her back and forth but she couldn’t stand.
Mike (my boyfriend) called me at work and told me what happened. At that point I didn’t realize how serious it really was. I left work and drove over to meet the vet. He tried to rock her and then used a cattle-prod to test her reflexes. I felt horrible, like I was being shocked. She didn’t stand but she did move her legs. He eventually told us that she must have hit her back on the wall and injured her spine. He didn’t know if the damage was permanent and he couldn’t  tell us if she would ever be ok. He gave us steroids and told us to come by the office for hiplifts to try and get her standing.
One of the worst parts of this ordeal was the weather. It’s December. In Central New York. Cold, Cold, Cold. Of course she somehow crawled out of the barn and was laying in mud (her body heat melted the frozen ground). I has begun compulsively reading anything I could about cow health and found out the bottom of a cows thermal neutral zone is 20 deg F. (That means an acclimated cow isn’t affected by the cold until it’s 20deg). My definition of cold changed. I checked the weather constantly. We made her an igloo. We piled hay bales around her for windbreaks and used a tarp to keep the snow off her. She hated it. The buckets and buckets of warm oat and sweet-feed mash I made helped a little. 
The second vet that came out told us that as long as she was trying (eating) we could keep her alive but the longer she was down the less chance there was she would recover. Cows are large animals and their muscles can atrophy very quickly. Generally with farmers, if they don’t get up that day they turn into hamburger. Before you hate on them, realize that it’s HARD to be a dairy farmer, they aren’t making money because they can’t charge what their product is worth. The ones I know try their best for their animals, but if it comes to feeding their kids or meds for an animal that might not recover the kids win. Off the soapbox now…
This all happened right around Christmas, I spent a lot of time crying and screaming. We had some moments hitting rock bottom. It was so cold the tractor wouldn’t start and we couldn’t get her to stand. She didn’t seem to be making progress and it seemed like everyone else was giving up on her.  I was literally crying all the time, in the car on my way to work, from work to BFMs house, on the way back to my house. Good thing I didn’t get pulled over right?
Mike and the Girls, she’s skinny and filthy but standing
Then the miracles started. We had a warm snap for a week or so before New Years. And she started moving. No one saw her so we don’t know if she was walking of crawling. I remember walking back to the barn to get aspirin (ever try to shoot a pill the size of your thumb down an angry cows throat?) and I walked back and she was 10 feet away from where she had been.
Fast forward 15 Days. New Years Eve. Walked out of the llama barn after delivering 3 goats (I am multi-talented) and saw a cow-butt sticking up in the air. I swear my world stopped. As soon as she saw us she lay back down. The next day we got the call that she was up AND WALKING. By the time we got there she was laying down (in the barn at least) but we got our miracle.  She had lost a lot of weight and was very filthy. She had mastitis in one quarter (more farm lingo, bacterial infection) that we treated with antibiotics. My boyfriend and I had actually decided to ‘pull the plug’ if she wasn’t up by Monday, THE NEXT DAY. I honestly don’t know how if we would have gone through with it.One of those things I don’t like to think about.
Grazing, she gained back all the weight she lost and more
Fast forward again. October 6, 2011. My girl is home with her baby happily grazing and laying in the sun. It’s been such a long bumpy road. I feel like we’ve finally come full circle with her. She has an admirer, Fred is completely enamored. They keen touching noses and he stares at her like a little boy with his first crush.
Love is in the air
linked up to Farm Girl Friday

Down On the Farm: Meet the FuzzButts

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Sep 232011
 
Say hello to George and Fred. Or as they would say hmmmmm.
(NOT the Harry Potter twins)
They are both male alpacas. They are the newest additions to the farm. They are incredibly sweet and generally low maintenance. They are a bit skinny at the moment (really under all the fiber they are quite wee) so they get grain in the morning and evening, fresh water and free range of the pasture. They get shots 1x a month for parasite prevention and regular toe clipping and yearly shearing. 

Grass, Yum
My long term goal is to spin yarn from their fiber but even if that never happens the boys are so worth the ‘trouble’. No matter what happens at work I come home and they make all seem ok with the world.
The boys expect me to follow them so I can make food appear in the bowl
Some people use alpacas and llamas for animal assisted therapy. They are both a bit too skittish for that right now, but they like to be hand fed and are ok with some petting so hopefully we can work our way up to it. It would be a nice way to ‘give back’ and all that jazz

 Fred being dramatic
In a nutshell alpacas are Fuzzy. And awesome. And Fuzzy. 
Stay tuned for more gratuitous fuzzball pics