Its been a while since I posted photos of the goings on here. Its a good dose of photo therapy and I hope you enjoy it.
We are using big square bales of hay, our own hay lasted well but we knew it was not enough. The chickens love these bales and have taken to laying eggs between them, here a New Hampshire is heading into the egg cave!
Kinky found a soft spot in a bit of left over straw. He is top Tom cat and seems to always be sporting new battle scars. He is such a big baby and if I pick him up.....he will let me hold him as long as I can pack him around.
Samson our Dorper Ram enjoying hay with some of his girls. We keep them in at night but during the day they enjoy the outdoors. When the hat leftovers build up, Ralph runs the Zero-turn over it and it chops the uneaten hay into an excellent mulch for the grass.
He is very chunky and meaty. We look forward to lambs.
The Sheep love Ralph and always come up to see if he has food. They love alfalfa pellets which we use as treats. I carry a ziplock bag of them in my coat.
A peach blossom bud, beautiful but so sad. Our Reliance, Majestic and Contender Peach trees are going to get hit hard as the forecast is for three days of killing frost and cold. Maybe even snow.
Prince.....formerly known as Princess. He is one of Spikes offspring and is very like our much missed boss Turkey. Its interesting to note when we crossed the Chocolate Tom (Spike) with our Royal Palm hens the poults were sex linked by color. The black ones with Dun feathers were all Toms and the plain brown were hens.
We do have a few quality control issues with our egg production. The new hens are laying well and we take eggs! to church to share our bounty. I chuckle when I sort and crate the eggs. White, Ivory, dark brown, pinkish, speckled, basic brown, oval, near round, flat on one side, rough textured, small to extra Jumbo. Every carton is an adventure!
The color and fluffiness of our flock has increased. These two are Dark Brahma.
I smile everyday when I go outside, the farm is hard work but the most satisfying of work at that.
The larger animals have covered the gardens with beautiful organic material. The pastures have perfectly pelletized poop all over them and the chickens make short work of the cattle manure.
The future is full of projects that are going to yeild aching muscles I am sure. Ralph has the gardens planned with a great mix of new and old varieties and each year I learn more about putting up the right kind of food for us.
Take care and God Bless
Great tour, Fiona, thank you.
ReplyDeleteYour sheep look very healthy. When do you expect kids? We started out with sheep many years ago before we went into goats. We found that the sheep were good for wool, pelts and meat, but the goats were better since we got milk. And the goats are significantly smarter. Since you're getting your milk from your Jersey's you have the best of both worlds.
We have the garden planned out and have really focused on what we eat, not as much experimentation as we did in the past.
Stay warm. Fern
Late summer lambs...we hope. Off season breeding is more of a challenge. We had originally planned on goats but this property has no browse and we want to keep the pasture and hayland healthy. Ralph got tired of bush hogging weeds. We hear sheeps milk makes the best cheese so we might have to try milking one or two.
DeleteRalph still loves to experiment with new plants but I am getting the house garden in stuff we actually use.
I loved this post! Loved your tour. It's always interesting to catch up on how things are going.
ReplyDeleteInteresting about milking the sheep. If I'm recalling correctly, sheep milk is higher in protein, which translates to more milk solids and larger cheeses. That will be interesting to follow.
Ralph brought some sheeps milk cheese home today, made locally. It is really really good. They milk Friesien Sheep which are a milk breed. We hope to tour their sheep dairy in June. After eating the cheese I have been thinking Friesien ewes cross ed with Dorper might be worth a try.
DeleteI am trying your brined cheese recipe with Katies milk.