Morning chores

• feed chicks
• refill waterers for chicks
• lay down another layer of pine shavings for chicks
• watch chicks to check health and make sure everything is ok
• lift garage door a smidgen to let in fresh air
• fill water bottles for rabbits
• feed rabbits
• check rabbits for health
• try not to trip on barn cats
• head to chicken coop to check food/water
• avoid annoying Mr. Meany
• walk down to the old house to collect pieces of wood
• try to figure out why the geese are so noisy this morning
• head back into the garage to lower the door, check that the chicks are still warm and put the wood under the waterers. They need to be raised up to help keep the water as clean as possible and to keep the chicks from falling in the water and getting chilled
• count the cattle

Winter brooding

We started out with a 12x12 stall.  Added two bags of pine shavings and a dividing board. 
The door was covered with a tarp to help keep out the wind and cold.

Five heat lamps were added (and tested).

Sheets of reflective insulation were added and decreased the brooder size down to 8x6'. 
The insulation was to help keep the chicks closer together and warmer.

Two hundred chicks arrived from Mt. Healthy Hatchery. 

The chicks did well for the first night but they were bunching up
together too much, a sure sign that they were cold.  Chilled chicks
is a bad thing and a sure way to kill them.  The tempers were about
to drop dramatically and the wind chill was predicted to be -5.
We had to find a solution to get the chicks warm enough.

Friday night as the snow started to fall, we pulled three 100 gallon water troughs
into the garage, covered the bottoms with pine shavings and transported
the chicks from the barn to the garage.  This was absolutely the right choice.
The bunching stopped and the chicks were able to rest while remaining warm.

Chicks need as little stress as possible. Often when stressed, they develop mud butts. Basically, their poop sticks to their butts and can dry, covering their vent, making it impossible for them to poop. This can kill the chicks.  Between the cold, not resting well the first night and moving to a new brooder situation in the garage, our chicks started showing signs of stress.  We spent several hours on Saturday cleaning chick butts. Glamorous, right?  But very necessary.

That's the thing about animal husbandry. We are responsible for the welfare of these little fluff balls is 100% up to us. Normally, the momma hen would peck the chicks clean. So now we're the momma hen. We spend lots of time just watching the chicks, making sure they are happy, clean, healthy and behaving the way they are supposed to behave.  That means cleaning manure. A lot. In many forms. It means that the health and well-being of the animals in our care is top priority.  We have to be alert for changes in their behavior, no matter how small, and we have to figure out what they are telling us so we can make appropriate changes.

We lost one chick Thursday night. I spent most of Thursday trying to help him recover but he was too weak and didn't survive the night.  Losing one out of two hundred is not bad at all.  Most people expect up to 10% mortality in the first week.

The rest of the chicks look great - they're active, hungry, thirsty, playful and growing.

Three Days Old:
Buff Orpingtons - 1 3/4 oz ea

Red Sex Links - 1 5/8 oz ea

Leader of the Pack

Spending Locally

It's easy to spend your money at the grocery store.

It takes effort to spend your money at a farmer's market or through farm pickup directly from a farmer. You have to find a place. You have to adjust your schedule to their hours. You have to contend with seasonality of produce. And if you don't get there early enough, they might sell out of the ingredient you were counting on having for dinner.

These aren't issues you'll find when you run down to Food Lion, Martin's, Safeway or Kroger.

So why visit a farmer's market? Why consider buying a whole, half or quarter of beef? Why join a CSA? Why drive out to a farm on processing day to collect your freshly processed chicken?  Why pay $15 for a pasture-raised chicken fed grass and non-GMO feed vs paying $1.99/lb for a factory chicken at the grocery store?

Eating food produced locally is not a new concept.  All our families lived this way just 50 or 60 years ago. Everyone planned their menus based on what was available in the garden at that time of the year. No one had a Shopper's Food Warehouse.  Not only is eating locally going back to the traditional farming our grandparents lived, it's in line with sustainable farming, reducing your carbon footprint, and promoting a healthier lifestyle.  And it promotes your local economy.

I won't sugar coat it: farming is hard and it's expensive. We are so used to bargain basement pricing brought to us in the grocery stores from commercial factory farms based on animals and plants genetically altered to grow bigger faster, often to the detriment of the animal. 

When the factory farms can grow chickens from hatching to processing as quickly as 23 days and it takes us at least 45 days to reach that same chicken size, you have to wonder what is going on with those 23 day-old chickens. Antibiotics and growth hormones lace their water and/or feed. They often grow so fast that their bones aren't strong enough to support their body weight and they become lame and can have heart attacks from the stress. But you can get it for a bargain at just $1.99/lb if you wait for those boneless, skinless chicken breasts to go on sale.

When you purchase a $15 chicken, your local farmer can put his chickens out in a pasture of green grass. He can give the chickens access to sunlight and fresh air every day.  He can let the chickens live like chickens should live.  He can give them time to grow naturally without growth hormones.  He can feed them organic and/or non-GMO feed to supplement their salad bar diet.  He can take time each day to watch them; observe them; get to know them. Why would he do that? Because it's his job to know his animals and be aware of any problems as soon as they appear.  For $15, your farmer can afford to do all of this and make a small (very small) profit to help him buy the next batch of chicks, fix a few fences and order the next round of feed.

If you buy one $15 chicken a week or $10 of produce from a farmer's market or a few gallons of raw milk from a cow or goat dairy, not only are you supporting those farmers but you're allowing them a modicum of profit that they will most likely spend locally to further expand or enhance their farm. Your $10 or $15 might go to a local feed mill, the local tractor parts store, or even the corner store selling a sausage biscuit for breakfast.

Local dollars circulate locally.  The small farm farmer understands the value of buying locally and is apt to return those dollars back into the local businesses of his community.  The Virginia cooperative extension office did a study and learned that if every household in the northern Shenandoah Valley area spent only $10 per week on local food every week of the year, it would benefit our community's economy by $170 MILLION.  Yes, million.

So where can you spend your $10?  Here are a few places:

• Cristina's Cafe, Strasburg.  They purchase as much locally grown products as possible for their menu and also host a spring/summer farmer's market on Friday evenings.
• One Block West Restaurant, Winchester. Another restaurant sourcing as much local food as possible
• Linda's Mercantile, Winchester. Farmer's market, grower
• Freight Station Farmer's Market, Winchester. Year-round farmer's market
• The Butcher Station, Winchester. Fresh food eatery and market
• Panache Catering Co., Middletown. Caterer

This is a very small sampling. There are so many ways to find locally grown food. If none of the above are near you or aren't what you're looking for, head over to Local Harvest and do a few searches. Find some pick-your-own fields and take the kids strawberry picking this spring! Contact individual farmers and ask about their food (I promise that you will totally make their day). Make the effort.  Is $1.99 chicken really such a great deal?

Breeding stock has arrived

Matilda, Happy Jack and Big Bertha

We have added three New Zealand meat rabbits to the farm.  In addition to Davidson, one of the bunnies Sammy got last year, we now have two does and two bucks.  Let the proliferation of bunnies begin!

For the short while, all the rabbits are in the empty barn stall.  We're slowly transitioning the new rabbits to a grass diet. All four will go out into the pasture in portable pasture pens (same concept as our broiler chickens).  Davidson is used to a grass diet but the three new rabbits aren't. We don't want them to become sick on too much grass so we'll get them ready for the salad bar lifestyle.  Their feed will be supplemented with organic, non-gmo (if we can find it) pellets.

Apple... chutney?

The girls and I spent a few hours yesterday afternoon in beautiful Gore, VA on top of a mountain picking apples at a friend's house.  I could go on for hours about how magnificent the view was, and how generous our friends were to allow our entire mom's group to come glean the trees.  I brought back an embarrassing overload of apples and some pears too.  I'm so inspired by all these apples that I had to dive in and start working with them!

This recipe will produce enough apples to fill one 1 qt jar.  It's a chutney I suppose.  I plan on heating it in a small pot and pouring it over a pork tenderloin.

3 Stayman apples
2 Golden Delicious apples
1/8 tsp black pepper
1/8 tsp ground mustard
1/4 tsp ground allspice
1/4 c. orange juice

Pour the OJ into a bowl. As you dice your apples, toss them in the OJ. This will keep them from turning brown and add some flavor.  Once all the apples are cut up, mix in the seasonings.  I winged it with the measurements, so taste and adjust accordingly.

I packed all the apples and the OJ into a quart jar and put it in a hot water bath. You can pressure can if you'd like.  I'm no expert on canning so do what you think is appropriate.  I think we'll be having this for dinner tonight so I'll let you know how it turns out!

- Sharon

Escapees

What a delicious view

These are our Buff Orpingtons out in the pasture pen.  They love the fresh grass every day and are growing really well.  They are almost thirteen weeks old now.  They'll continue to grow larger for a few more weeks.  We'll be culling the cockerels and will most likely keep the pullets for our layer flock.  We have quite a few older hens who will be culled this fall once they stop laying. They'll be replaced by these pullets.

Because these birds are much lighter than the Cornish Cross were, they are energetic and are eager to roost and jump out of the pen.  Every time I try to feed them by myself, at least one escapes.  Mitchell, my seven year old son, was supposed to be helping me feed them today but was distracted by one of the barn cats. In the mean time, these chickens kept trying to jump out of the pen while I was trying to hold the roof up and grab the feeder out of the pen.  I was able to keep all but one of them in the pen.

Then, the chase began.  I let her walk around the pen. She stayed pretty close to it because she wanted the feed I had just put inside but she couldn't figure out how to get in.   I was holding the roof open with one hand so she could jump in, all the while trying to make sure others didn't jump out and try to catch the escapee with my one free hand.  My son just watched.

I finally got him to hold the roof up while I chased the chicken through the pasture. She finally made her way back in and went straight to the feeder.

I will admit that this is not the first time this has happened to me.