Reality

This post is about being real and honest. It pains me to share, but for the sake of education I must.

The past few weeks have been a battle on our homestead. Miracle got mastitis as soon as she freshened. It took three doses of Nuflor, an antibiotic shot that stings horribly, to get her healthy. I'm still not completely satisfied with the condition of her udder. She is no longer showing clinical symptoms of mastitis, however, and I am comfortable pursuing natural means to get her back to top-notch health. While the vet was examining Miracle I told him I was not happy with her body condition, despite the fact that I have done everything I know to do to make her healthy. He ran a blood test and discovered that she was infected with a blood borne protozoa (transmitted by lice) that attacks the red blood cells. If she had it, the entire herd did as well. This meant an antibiotic (CTC-10) added to their feed for 30 days and a pour on treatment called BOSS. There would be no milk for human consumption for 30 days. He also did a fecal exam and said she had a high worm load. I had just dewormed the entire herd with Ivomec only two weeks prior. This meant I had to give every animal in the herd daily Panacur dewormer for five days straight, and repeat in ten days.

A few days after Miracle's diagnosis, Twilight's twins started to scour. I had put the bottle babies back with their mommas when I got Miracle's diagnosis so they could be treated with the rest of the herd, and I thought the scouring was from too much milk. I began giving a blend of Sour-Halt and Pepto Bismol, but the scouring didn't improve and the babies were acting like they were in pain. I called my goat mentor and she came down to check them out. She was armed with Neomycin, Banamine, and Kaospect. I already had Di Methox on hand for prevention of coccidiosis. She said that we needed to get them started on all of these medicines and be very careful to keep them hydrated as well. I gave them all their medicines religiously for a total 10 days. I was able to stop the Banamine after four days, and the Kaospect after about six. It was so stressful! Diarrhea is a very serious illness in young kids, and our triple digit weather was not helping their chances of beating this. I set up a fan outside the fence for them to stay in front of, which they took advantage of.

I can finally say that all my animals lived and are off all meds except the CTC-10 that goes in their feed. We have another week to go on that one.

*WHEW* Talk about a wake-up call!

I have always managed my herd using herbs, vitamins, and minerals with only rare detours into pharmaceuticals. The past 10 months have been particularly difficult, though, and I couldn't seem to get my act together. I kept forgetting to give the herd their herbal dewormer every Saturday. That herbal dewormer has many health benefits besides just deworming. The herbs have nutritional value and help build up their bodies in the same way good nutrition helps us humans. After missing several doses of herbal dewormer I decided that I was going to have to bite the bullet and go synthetic to get me through this season in my life. I started giving my herd Ivomec dewormer. However, it didn't occur to me that I needed to start them out with a more rigorous deworming schedule and then switch to maintenance. I think this is what went wrong with the worms.

I have also always kept an immaculate goat pen. Our goats have a lean-to that is about 20'x50' with a concrete floor and full access to lush pasture. (I know goats aren't supposed to be housed on concrete, it was here when we bought the place.) I had heard so much about the benefits of deep litter method for the winter months that I decided to try it. Bad, bad, BAD decision! This was the mildest winter of my life! The deep litter bedding was okay for quite some time. But when the insect population indicated to me that it was time for the bedding to GO, it was all at once! I had to clean out that entire lean-to one wheelbarrow full at a time. It took me two days. Wayne was appalled that I pushed myself that hard to empty it, but I knew my animal's health was on the line. I fear it was too little too late. Now I keep the lean-to swept out with a push broom. I will never try the deep litter method again. Ever.

All these factors combined to create conditions favorable to the deterioration of my animal's health. I have been sufficiently slapped in the face and am (precariously) on the ball with maintaining their health needs now. For the past three weeks chores have been taking me two hours, twice a day. It is exhausting. If I had simply done a better job of keeping my animals healthy in the first place, none of it would have happened. Now I am having to play catch-up: get them healthy, get their bodies back up to their healthiest, and get back on natural preventive health care. I intend to continue using synthetic dewormer and whatever else is necessary to keep my animals healthy until I have proven to myself that I can keep up with the natural methods. I will overlap the two during that proving time, and then transition off synthetics.

Killing Cone

     When we decided to raise meat birds I did lots and lots of research on processing. We wanted our birds to be raised as close to organically as possible and then processed in the most humane and efficient way possible. The conclusion of my research was that we would use a killing cone for processing our chickens. The reason for this is that when you use a killing cone, the method entails cutting the chicken's jugular. The bird looses consciousness very quickly due to a loss of blood pressure to the brain. However, it's heart continues to beat, allowing virtually all of the blood to be removed from the body. The chicken is restrained in the cone, so there is no flopping around. Birds processed in this way are much cleaner to work up. There if very little odor when you are doing the rest of the processing compared to other methods such as complete decapitation.

     I was asked a very, very long time ago to share a tutorial on how we built our killing cone for processing chickens. It's been in the back of my mind on my to-do list ever since. I kept putting it off because I didn't want to waste our sheet metal making a second one, and I couldn't think of any inexpensive materials to use to make a prototype. Today I stumbled across this article on how to do just that! I see no reason to reinvent the wheel. The author used essentially the same method as we did. I hope you enjoy learning how to make this simple, but quite valuable homesteading tool!

La Mancha Babies!

We've been waiting for two years for this moment! Miracle was given to me as a five month old doeling. I just loved her to pieces. When it was time for her to be bred we took her to visit her chosen boyfriend and then brought her back home. Miracle had a precocious udder, so it was very hard to tell what was going on, but we thought she was pregnant. She gained a lot of weight and her udder continued to develop. Spring came and no babies appeared. We finally gave up hope of her being pregnant. In the fall I took her to be bred three times. (She kept coming back in heat.) The third time I informed the breeder that she was staying a month, and I would pay room and board. The breeder insisted that I didn't need to do that, and that Miracle was welcome to stay for the month. At the end of the month we brought her home and waited. The breeder had thought she "settled" after the first time she was bred. He due date came and went. Nearly three weeks passed. Nothing. We were giving up hope of her being bred despite her weight gain and hugely swollen udder, and chalking it up to the precocious udder and a false pregnancy. I'd made up my mind to start milking her on June 10th (one month after her supposed due date) if she hadn't kidded yet. On Monday morning, June 4th, when I did chores I noticed her staring meditatively at the back corner, and her "vent" was turned out just a teensy bit, but I've seen more obvious signs of "pending labor" over the past several weeks with nothing to show for it, and shrugged it off. Frankly, I had just about given up. I went about my day as normal. Late in the afternoon I went out to the barn and discovered this:

I just love his little ears. They look like rosettes!

It was so exciting to see that she had a baby! Hooray! I was so worried that she had infertility issues, which is not a good quality in a milk goat! I confess I was disappointed, though, because I thought she had a single kid. Even though I was giving up hope of her pregnancy, I still expected her to have twins if she was indeed pregnant. I looked around and found this beautiful thing snuggled in between the gate and the wall:

Isn't she beautiful? She's so dainty and energetic, too. Her brother, on the other hand, is Mr. Sleepypants. :-)

Here they are getting acquainted and checking things out. Poor Miracle. Her udder and teats are SO tight!

Having a little midmorning snack. Sister thinks that's not such a bad idea!

*sigh* We are all content here at the homestead. These are the last of this year's babies. Everyone is healthy and well. Milk is flowing. We are thankful, indeed!



An Honor

I was stunned yesterday afternoon to discover that Jessica from Mosquito Creek Farm had given me the Liebster Blog Award. My eyes bulged out and I just sat there for a long time. Things ran through my head like, "Has she seen my blog? I bet I haven't made three posts this year?!" I am so honored that she would choose me. Now I am given the joy of choosing five favorite blogs with less than 200 followers and passing the award on to them.

The very first blog I ever read was by my cousin, Jenny. Growing up we were like sisters, and she is my mentor in many ways. In her blog, Up on the Roof, Jenny shares about her life as helpmeet to her charming husband and homeschooling mother of three beautiful children.

Jenny introduced me to The Hurricane Report by her friend, Camille. I enjoy and relate to Camille's poignant style very much.

The first blog I started reading outside of people I know in real life was Mary Grace's Books and Bairns  Mary Grace remains one of my favorite writers. A homeschooling mother of seven, she is living the life I dream of!

Living Our Way is the online home of Laura. Laura's family strives to live a self-sufficient life in unusual ways. I enjoy reading about their adventures very much!

Last but not least is Crystal at The Adventures of Noodleville Her blog is simply amazing! Every time she puts up a new post I have to read it immediately. Her quirky, humorous style is the best!

Internet at Home and Updates!

Last night we went and bought the things necessary to have Internet access at home through our PC. If this works out, I will be able to post regularly! Woohoo!!! So far, though, Wayne is unimpressed with the speed of the Internet service. It does take a while for pages to load, but I'm not surprised given our location. I'm just excited to be able to have Internet without having to buy a satellite! We have two weeks to decide if we are happy with the service and if so, continue on. If we are unhappy with it we will simply return the items we purchased for a refund and the contract will be cancelled. I really, really hope it doesn't come to that.

Homestead updates:

Garden:
I really wanted this to be the year I had a successful garden. However, life had other plans. The storms that ripped through our area in late March/early April caused a lot of unplanned work in the yard and interfered with out ability to get the ground prepared for planting in a timely manner. One thing I've learned is that I MUST get the garden in as early as possible in order to get a harvest before school starts in the fall. I absolutely do not have the time to deal with the garden once school starts. However, I can plant a bit in the evenings and weed on the weekends in the spring until we get out of school for the summer. All that is to say that I planted what I am calling a "micro-garden." It contains tomatoes, peppers, onions, lettuce, basil, and cilantro. I also have some tiny yellow day lilies, mints, and lemon balm that are supposed to be permanent residents in that bed. I have containers with rhubarb and hens and chicks as well.

Early in the spring I planted grapes, muscadines (one of my favorite things in the whole wide world!), and raspberries in the front yard, at the perimeter of the orchard. Most of them are doing well. A couple of the plants appear to have died back, but I am continuing to water in hopes of something springing forth from the roots.

We lost almost all of our orchard due to the hard winter of 2010/2011 and the drought of the summer of 2011. I have planted nine fruit trees since we moved here. Only three remain. Two are peaches and one is a pear.

Poultry:
Our chicken flock has grown dramatically. At the end of winter I had four Welsummer hens and one Welsummer rooster, one Delaware hen, and five bantam hens of unknown origin. A good friend decided that she didn't want to mess with chickens any more and gave me her hens, who are less than one year old. That added seven girls to the flock. One of them lays a lovely olive green egg! They are what she calls "barnyard mix." There appears to be two barred rock, one Welsummer mix, one Cochin, one Black Austrolorp, one Rhode Island Red, and one (?)blue grey beauty!

I found Silver Laced Cochin pullets at Atwoods about the first of April. I seized the chance and bought six of them. Cochins are my favorite breed. I hope they will turn out to be excellent layers as well!

I had ordered six Golden Laced Wyandottes through my feed store (Midwest Ag in Carthage) in very early spring. I got the call that they had arrived the first week of May. When I got to the feed store only four of my chicks was there. Someone had accidentally gotten my Wyandottes! I was pretty unhappy about that, since I had ordered so few to begin with, there is little margin for error. One of our big goals is to have enough eggs to sell, and I know that Wyandottes are the best layers I've ever had, bar none! The only other chicks the feed store had on hand that I would even consider adding to my flock were Easter Eggers. I ended up taking four of them.

This brings my chicken flock to a grand total of 32! Eeek! My goal was 25 hens. Oh well, that just means more eggs, right?

The week after I bought my latest eight chicks I was back at the feed store and they had ducklings for sale. Now, I've been wanting Khaki Campbells for a long time, but they were always too pricey, and I thought it would be years before I could get any. I offhandedly asked what kind of ducks they hand and when they said Khaki Campbells I embarrassed myself with the squeal that escaped my lips! I bought five. This has been an adventure and an education! What I read about them has proven to be untrue thus far. I really hope it wasn't all a lie! Khaki Campbells are supposed to be land ducks and not require water for swimming. Everything I read said that they enjoyed it, but it wasn't necessary. Those poor babies were FILTHY by the end of the first week!!! I ended up bringing them inside and filling the bathtub with warm water because they are still downy. I added the water a little bit at a time because I have heard of people accidentally drowning their ducklings. Apparently mine were ready, because as soon as there was enough water, they took off! It was so much fun to see them swimming and preening in the nice, warm water. When one decided to take a dive (like ducks do) it freaked all the others out. It was so funny! A couple of the others tried it and they had great fun. Every time I would think they were getting tired and it was time to let the water out they would get a new burst of energy and start all over again with dunking their heads and scratching them vigorously, standing on the water, splashing, etc. They are definitely very messy critters, but what a joy to watch! I love their call, too! It makes me smile every time. The benefit to the homestead (according to my reading) is that they are avid eaters of bugs, snails, and slugs. Supposedly, they won't bother the garden plants, but will eat broad leafed weeds with relish. I sure hope SOMETHING I read was true! The ducks will definitely be getting some sort of pond of their own!