Almost Worth It

The snow turned to rain overnight.  What a mess.  The pasture is a lake that extends right up to the cow shed.

The shed is dry, but the area in front of the feeder is part of the flood.  We just couldn't leave our cows to stand in that water all day long, so we dropped everything and moved sand.

The truck delivered a big pile out front two days ago.  After the compulsory eye rolling, we all bundled up and started working.  We started with wheelbarrows but quickly got out the baby tractor and trailer.

Neither the tractor nor trailer had been touched since last fall.  Three tires were flat.  My 14 year old daughter is a master at using the compressor and kept the tires filled.  They needed several refills to get through the morning.

While we were working, some chickens supervised.  Most spent all of yesterday in the coop and today too.  A few made a run for the cow shed.  This one has her foot tucked up out of the cold.

My husband dug out the holes and we dumped sand right into them. Both sides of feeder got it.  Some water had worked into a low spot in the cow shed and it a got a bunch of sand too.  We had the cows tied up in various spots in the shed while we worked.  They seemed to enjoy the show.

After four loads we called it good enough.  Working in the wet and rain is no fun, and it's a homeschool day.  Our schedule is all messed up.  But now the cows can eat without getting fungal infections in their feet.

When it dries out, we'll finish the job, but for now we're done.  As we put the last shovel away and began disrobing the wet clothes, we found the fire had gone out.  Within 15 minutes we had the fire going and hot chocolate simmering on the stove.  Hot chocolate with fair trade organic cocoa and Christina milk and cream is so good.  It's what hot chocolate was meant to be.  It made all that hard work almost worth it.

Snow Day!

The storm has arrived and is going strong. 

Normally when we open the coop, the chickens explode out the door.  Today, they did not.  They don't want anything to do with that white stuff.

There's an old farmer wisdom that if chickens stay out of a storm it will be short lived but if they go out in it it'll last a long time.  I don't know if that applies to snow.

The good thing about this storm is that it's supposed to dump a bunch of snow, and then promptly warm up and turn to rain.  Shoving is optional!

That great big egg turned out to have two really big yolks.  We're wondering if a goose snuck into the coop and laid that egg.

Christina is too skinny.  It's normal for cows to lose weight after they calve, but she looks skinnier than she should.  I found a "body conditioning" guide on the internet with pictures of tailheads.  See those dips on either side of her tail?  They weren't there two months ago and they shouldn't be there. 

We're feeding her all the alfalfa she's willing to eat.  So we called the experts (the dairy we bought her from).  They said that when she's in milk, it's pretty difficult to gain weight and she didn't gain enough on her last dry period.   We gave her straight grass hay and should have giving her some alfalfa.  Dang.  Okay, we'll do that better next time.

We found out that we're also not giving as much grain as we should.  We should be giving 1 pound of grain for each 3 pounds of milk.  I did some weighing and calculation and she was only getting only half as much grain as she should.    She's pretty pleased with the new big buckets of grain.  All that extra grain means she needs some sodium bicarb to counteract any acid stomach.  We put the bicarb out where she could get it and it she's eating way more of it than I expected.  Now I feel bad that she's been needing it and we haven't been giving it to her (did I tell you I'm pretty good at guilt?).

Our goal right now is to prevent her from losing any more weight and then catch up on her next dry period.  Christina shares the suffering of my oldest child, the one we do all our good learning on.

Winter Storm Prep

While out gathering the eggs today, my daughters found a giant one.  Look at the size of that thing!  Frankly I'm surprised they didn't find a chicken dead in the coop.  Whoever laid that one must have had a bad day. 

My twins are so excited to  cook this one up for breakfast.  Often the big eggs turn out to have two yolks.  They call them twinnie eggs.  They speculate that this one has three.  We'll find out in the morning.

Today we had a load of sand delivered.  We want to build up that area in front of the feeder to keep Christina's feet clean.  Buying it by the truck load is way cheaper than by the bag.

Last Friday we took sample of Christina's milk into the lab.  One quarter is showing some reaction with the CMT test, then it clears up, then it comes back.  We finally decided to take it in and find out.  The lab said it was negative for bacterial infection.  I guess we'll keep watching it and see if it clears up.  I sure am glad it's negative.

A big winter storm is predicted to hit tomorrow, bringing 6-10" of snow.  Today we got ready.  We moved wood closer to the house and we filled some jars with water.  Otherwise, we should be able to survive a power outage.  The solar panels will keep the freezers running.  We'll use the cellar for refrigeration.  We'll use the BBQ and trailer for cooking.  And the wood stove will keep us warm.  We will have to go without computer, movies, laundry, and showers, but I think I can do it!  But without power our water pump won't run, so we need water.  Ooo, and the dishwasher won't run.  Ack!  There could be some suffering.

New Adventure with Christina

We have embarked on a new adventure with Christina.  Dairy cows need their hooves trimmed regularly.  We took Christina out to the dairy we bought her from last September and they did it.  It was pretty traumatic for her because they had to take a lot off and it's a long ride.  We decided that we'd try maintaining her hooves at home.  Our plan is to do one foot each week so that every hoof gets attention once a month and therefore never needs too much removed.

Today we began training.  My husband pulled one foot up, we slid a bale of straw underneath, and he took a few swipes with the rasp.  He wasn't try to accomplish anything, just get her comfortable with picking her foot up and some handling.  She did pretty good.  For the next three Saturdays, he'll do the same with the other feet.  Then next month he'll try to actually do some work.  We ordered a book on how to trim hooves.

Every morning is a CMT test.  Christina had mastitis 12 days ago.  We treated two quarters with antibiotic but one quarter has not fully cleared up.  Some days it's a solid positive.  This morning it was just a trace.  Yesterday we decided it was time to know what we're dealing with and took a sample of the milk to the lab.  I sure hope it was a waste of time (that it comes back negative) and she's just taking a while to clear up.

We re-organized the freezers and discovered that we had much more frozen fruit than I realized.  Since we'll have to get a full beef in those freezers this spring when beefy goes, we have to make some space.  Fruit cobbler has become a regular evening treat.  We mix apples, peaches, apricots, and strawberries with some sugar and tapioca power and then make a cobbler topping with oatmeal, flour, brown sugar, cinnamon, and cream.  It is absolutely amazing.

Highlight of Our Day

Four weeks we've been waiting.  We put beefy in with Christina hoping to catch her going into heat so we could gauge her cycles and get her pregnant.  But nothing's happened.  Four weeks we've been waiting.  And then today, something happened.

As we were sitting at lunch, Christina walked out of her shed, waited for beefy to jump on her, stood for it, and then walked over to the fence and looked right at us expectantly.  We figured she was thinking, "I've shown ya, now go get me that funny looking bull."  In all the excitement, the girls said, "oh yeah, we think Christina might be in heat," and then told a story from the morning. 

We called the AI guy (artificial insemination).  He arrived at 5pm and got the job done.  This evening we pray for a pregnant cow. 

If this did the job, her due date will be October 24th.  That's a little early, but we figure that we want room in case it doesn't take this time.  We'll be watching for heat in early February and if she makes it to March without heat symptoms, we'll call it a success.

These are the excitements of our lives.  It truly is excitement.  When I posted on Facebook that Christina was in heat, a friend who is a long-time rancher said, "did you ever think 10 years ago that having a cow in heat would be the highlight of your day???"  No it didn't, but it sure was!

Morning Dragging

Our lettuce is up and growing!  This is seed I saved from last year but I didn't clean it up, so more seeds than we needed got into the pots.  I'll thin them soon.  My 10-year-old checked on them with me and said with a contented smile, "our garden is started."  The celery hasn't germinated yet but it takes a really long time.

Our mornings begin with the girls going out to feed the cows and clean the shed.  With the troubles we've been having with jerky, they decided that things were going to be different with pepper.  My daughter's been putting on a rope and walking him around.  Well, calling it "walking" is a bit of a stretch.  My husband looked out and said, "look, pepper's out for his morning dragging."

We are getting more and more excited about welcoming a second milk cow.  We are now certain about getting one so now the struggle is deciding which one.  We are down to an older cow who's currently giving milk and a young heifer who will have her first calf this fall and then start milking.    The pros and cons seem equally balanced right now, so we keep thinking and praying.

Sneaky God

The last milk we got before we gave Christina antibiotics has been set aside for cooking. It's probably fine to drink raw, but just to be safe we're cooking it.  The kids' first thought was pudding.  And it uses eggs.  That works!

The other day I was downtown protesting the death penalty, like I do every Wednesday noon, and a group of kids walked by.  They were wearing FFA jackets, Future Farmers of America.  A friend asked if I had been in FFA.  I laughed out loud.  I would never have been in FFA.  I was on the honor roll and I was going to college.  I was going to be a professional, a doctor or a professor.  I looked down my nose at FFA kids as those who couldn't make it in my exaulted academic endeavors.  God must have laughed at my hautiness.

Instead of becoming a doctor, I became an environmental science bureaucrat.  Then a magazine publisher.  Then a marketer.  Finally a minister and now a farmer.  And by the way, this farmer thing sneaked up on me.  I was just going on sabbatical and then returning to ministry.  I still may return to ecclesial ministry, but right now I find myself in a ministry of soil and life.   God has deepened the sense of meaning we find in working for the kingdom of heaven in caring for the land.  I still minister but now I minister to the land and animals, to the people who buy our food, and to my family. 

I have also learned a new and deep respect for those who make a life of farming.  It takes much more intelligence and knowledge than I ever realized.  I am constantly aware of how little I know in spite of all the books I've read.  Farmings takes compassion and an almost supernatural persistence and faith.  These are the people who work alongside God, the eternal creator, to do that most fundamental ministry of feeding people. 

I wasn't going to be a farmer.  We started this life just to feed ourselves.  But then we had more milk than we could handle, so we started selling it.  Then we had more eggs than we could handle, so we started selling those.  And now we are thinking of welcoming another cow. 

Yeah, God is sneaky.

Learning to Clean

Instead of watching TV last night or fooling around on the internet, I read "Less Mastitis, Better Milk."  Christina has mastitis again.  When we were milking yesterday one quarter just stopped milking and then some goo came out.  We pulled out a clot and were able to finish milking, but I ran for the CMT test.  Sure enough, it was a strong positive.  We treated the quarter and we now we go through the pain of dumping milk for four days.

I figured it's time to really learn about mastitis and how to prevent it.  Many of the things I learned comforted me.  Christina's mastitis rate, always without symptoms until now, isn't bad.  This case is "mild clinical" since she only has clots but no udder inflammation (whew!  mild sounds good, doesn't it?).  Many of the risk factors we've mitigated.  But, we have some work to do.

We have to keep Christina cleaner.  In the winter, the cows just live in the shed, which means lots of ick.  We've been cleaning once a day, but it's time to clean more often.  We added more straw to their bedding and tested it by kneeling to make sure nothing soaked through.

The book said that dirty legs can cause mastitis.  Yep, she has dirty legs.  We cleaned really well around the feeder and will add sand so her feet stay cleaner, but to get a jump start we washed her lower legs.  She didn't seem to mind, but it must have been creepy because she padded her feet the whole time.  The manure had dried in many places but I was able to soak much of it off. 

As a final precaution, we boiled all the rags we use to wash her udder.  They probably should be boiled periodically, but this moved up the schedule.  After a regular washing, they got a solid 15 minute boil and then hung on the line in the sunshine.  Before all the chemicals we use today, people had great success using boiling as a means of sterilization.  That should obliterate any harboring nasties.

While we're figuring out this mastitis, we're also watching for heat.  We want to breed her at the end of the month, so we're watching for heat now to find her cycle.  Beefy's been with her for almost three weeks, but no dancing yet.  Today she was walking around alone.  When she's in heat, beefy's all over her.  It's not today. 

Small World

It's time to start the 2012 garden with the arrival of celery seeds.  Last year we started celery in January, put them out in April or May, and enjoyed wonderful celery in the fall.  It was such a success that we're doing it again.

As long as we're going to have the lights on, we thought we'd start some lettuce too.  In only 5-6 weeks we'll be eating fresh lettuce.

The first step is to bleach the pots.  I skipped this step once and not a single seed came up.  They probably tried, but were immediately done in by fungus.  So, we bleach. 

We continue thinking about growing the business part of our homestead life.  I talked to a lady who has a small dairy in northern Idaho.  They sell their milk at the local co-op but their operation is pretty small — three cows and several goats.  Hearing that they hand milk the whole lot made me feel a little woosy, but I got over it. 

She had a critical piece of information — insurance.  We haven't been able to find liability insurance for our small operation, but their agent was able to find some.  I called and got a quote.  It's not cheap but it's doable. 

In talking with her we discovered that we both bought our cows from the same dairy in Emmett.  Christina has been such a blessing to us and she talked about their cows in the same way.  Those folks in Emmett are like a mustard plant, sending out seeds of grace all over Idaho.

My second call was to that dairy.  We told them we were thinking of buying a cow and they said they'd look over their herd.  Our criteria were a cow with a due date about the same as Christina's so we could keep our time off, teets long enough to hand milk, and an easy going cow who will be nice to Christina.  I hope they have a good match available.

Knowing that we may have more milk soon, and still getting a lot of eggs, we put an ad on craigslist.com.  My worry is getting enough customers to sell the milk of two cows.  We are selling 9 gallons a week of Christina milk right now but we decided we could go up to 13 in this interim.  It means no cheese-making, but we'll make up for it later.  The ad has been up for four days, advertising eggs and milk, and we've already gotten seven inquiries, each wanting about two gallons a week.  Yeah, I think we'll be able to sell it all.

Perhaps...

It turns out that getting a halter on jerky was easier than I expected.  My husband rigged one of the halters we have to fit him, called him over to the gate and just reached through to put it on him.  Okay, it wasn't quite that easy.  First jerky wanted to sniff it, then head butt it, but in the end my husband was able to just slip it on.   With a gate between them, the fear factor for me was low.

We were laughing that jerky was thinking, "oh, you have jewelry for me, we'll that's different!" 

The chickens have been enjoying their time on the pasture.  They've even figured out how to get to the water. 

The egg production has stayed high and we can no longer keep up.  We offered to friends and milk customers and are already selling five dozen a week. 

Over the holidays we took a year-end look at our finances and decided it might be wise to get a second milk cow.  The money we make from selling milk doesn't cover even half of our hay.  If we can rent pasture for the steers, we'll have room for another cow and the new income would help.

A decision like this will have a significant effect on the whole family so we talked about it.  Each of our concerns says a lot about us:

• the 10-year-old twins think it's a great idea and can't wait,
• the teenagers are concerned about any extra work,
• I worry about finding the new customers, and
• my husband is concerned that new cow might be mean to Christina.

When we started this adventure, it was just about feeding ourselves.  Now we've discovered what a joy it is to share the good food we grow with others.  Not everybody can have a milk cow and chickens, but we can.   Perhaps when God called us into this, God put a hole in our budget big enough to make us reach out to others.  Perhaps God has plans for the gifts of this land that extend beyond our family.

But another cow would bring added responsibility.  Are we ready?  I guess that's what's prayer is for.