Archive for the ‘ Animals - All’ Category
November 15, 2009 – Mixing Winter Grain Ration
It’s a big mixing weekend. The bred ewes eat mostly hay over the winter, but we give a little grain supplement for the pregnant and nursing ewes.
First step is to grind up some corn – ground corn is better than shell corn as it is better to digest. Here Martin watches the electric ...Read more.
November 14, 2009 – Mineral Mix
We decided it was finally time to give up on the commercial mineral blocks and go to a more custom mix that we could control a bit better.
Many producers swear by Redmond’s trace mineral salt. I’ve heard it from enough successful producers who swear by it, that it’s time to bring it to high hopes.
Here’s ...Read more.
August 29, 2009 – Field Day at Grice Farms
Today we went to a PFI field day to what may be one of Iowa’s biggest organic farms, nearly 1,000 acres, located west of Iowa City in Keokuk County.
Linda Grice operates this farm and here shows off a 90 acre field of alfalfa that it transitioning to certified organic.
It’s a great place for one of ...Read more.
November 17, 2007 – Doesn’t Get More Old Fashioned Than This
After yesterday’s entry about sustainable enterprises and earning it – I can safely say that moving small amounts of manure from a barn to a garden are sustainable enterprises (however negligibly rewarding they may be).
It is strangely satisfying, though to move the fertilizer with only the labor of your own hands along with with a ...Read more.
January 28, 2007 – A Boy and his Fish
Martin is very proud of his fish. If you look closely, you’ll find a gold and grey goldfish in the bowl. There is much “discussion” of fish ownership between Martin and the girls, who want to hone in on the fish ownership. Martin said “I started the conversation about getting the fish.” ...Read more.
January 12, 2007 – Chicken Heaven
Today is an outstanding day (if you are a chicken). We have a few bales of oat hay, baled with the seeds intact.
Now that we are back in the single digit temps, the chickens got a fresh layer of oat hay in the coop – now they can scratch and peck to their heart’s content ...Read more.
December 10, 2006 – Roving Bands of Chickens
The warm weather continues. The chickens are liking the lack of snow cover. Once the snow comes, the free-range roaming instincts are limited.
This is one of the roosters we hatched ourselves. He’s pretty happy with himself this evening. (But then, the roosters always seem quite happy with themselves.)
He’s the leader of the group of “gypsy ...Read more.
December 8, 2006 – Photo Friday “Fresh”
This week’s Photo Friday Contest theme is “Fresh.” Here’s a shot from the high hopes archives of milk about as fresh as you can get it!
This is one of our milk goats, Paulina.
We all know there’s more than one meaning to “fresh” so keeping that in mind, and in keeping with the goat theme, here’s ...Read more.
November 21, 2006 – Thanksgiving Turkey
Here’s one of our thanksgiving turkeys. Today was the day they went to the locker – so they are fresh for Thanksgiving.
It was a rough start to the turkey season – first 10 of 15 of the poults arrived dead from the hatchery this summer. As the replacements weren’t sent for a month, we were ...Read more.
November 14, 2006 – New Pastured Poultry Breed – Finally!
I’ve been hearing rumors for years of a chicken faster growing than the standard breeds, but not quite as fast as the cornish-cross confinement-style chicken. I believe these birds were developed from some french stock. There are four different breeds with slightly different characteristics. They are distributed by a Canadian company, but there is a ...Read more.
November 5, 2006 – Turkey Moon?
Does the turkey moon follow the harvest moon? Here are the turks heading into shelter under a full moon.
The turkeys have been growing nicely and have ranged up to an acre away – all the way to the cornfield.
one year ago…
October 23, 2006 – Guard Geese
These ladies are our chicken protectors! At one time we were losing a chicken about every other night – it would be partially eaten in the coop overnight. Nothing too big could get in the building, so we are guessing unless some animal learned to unlatch the door, it was most likely a mink or ...Read more.
October 16, 2006 – Sugar (Shoog-uh!)
Yesterday the good people at Morning Sun Farm brought a young Alpine goat buck when they came over to make soap. His name was alternately “Whiteface” or “Sugar” and we decided to call him Sugar, pronounced “Shoog-uh” as his job is to impregnate Paullina and Blaze. The two young boys went to the sale barn ...Read more.
October 10, 2006 – Egg Production Slowing
It’s the time of year that egg production drops as the light decreases. We don’t “force” our hens to lay like the big egg houses do by keeping the lights on all the time, nor do we withhold feed the last days of the hen’s life to trick her into a burst of laying before ...Read more.
