Farm Update

It's been busy and will get really busy this next week on our farm. I thought I would share what's going on here.

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Our little girl goat, Esther, who had a neurological issue with her rear hips and legs is doing so well. She is running around, jumping, and growing like a week. Her Mom tried to kill her so we had to pull her and bottle feed her. She's doing great with the bottle.

All the babies are starting to eat grass and alfalfa without spitting it back out. I have caught them chewing their cud a few times. I have heard the all telling burping sounds and felt their rumens, well, rumenating.

In about 2 weeks our two baby bucks will go to their new home. They are going together to hobby goat owners that we know personally.

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Our chickens are laying eggs so well, but they refuse to sit on them. This is not unheard of with chickens purchased from feed stores. They are pulled immediately and are not taught to mother, so they usually don't sit on their eggs.

However, our rooster has things figured out ... it appears. We were able to purchase a nice incubator with an egg turner at a trade days type sale last weekend. It's brand new and we got a great deal on it. We will set it up tomorrow, let it run all day, and then start collecting eggs.

If our rooster is as good as he thinks he is, in about 3 weeks we will have baby chicks. He needs to be as good as he pretends to be because it's the only thing saving his time on our farm. He's a mean old grouch.

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This has been a gorgeous winter. It's been what most would call fall/spring weather. It was 80 yesterday. It's never 80 here in February. The Farmer's Almanac says we are done with all freezes and bad weather so it's time to start planting.

We began our seeds indoors (except potatoes, we don't pre-sprout them). So far we have cukes, carrots, lettuce, large and small tomatoes, cilantro, and one corn plant sprouted so far. We have more that ought to sprout soon.

My tiller needs a tire fixed. My husband will be doing that on Thursday I will then till the area and we will start planting this weekend.

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I finally found a local source for raw milk. Who knew that would be so hard. Now that I have a reliable source, I am going to start making yogurt. We got our heirloom cultures in today and will start them tomorrow. Once they are cultured we will hopefully keep them going indefinitely so we have reliable and healthy cultures anytime we want yogurt.

I also shared our new tortilla recipe that my kids love. Tomorrow I am going to attempt to make baked tortilla chips with them. I will definitely let you know how those turn out. If they turn out well, I will share how I did it.

While we have a lot coming up, it's exciting. This is the first year we have everything humming so well. It seems we have finally hit our groove on our little farm. Gee, and it only took us 6 years.