The Wonder of a Blow Torch

All the chores get harder right before we bring the animals back to the barn for the winter. Thankfully, these last few days it's been a breeze just walking across the barnyard with a few buckets of water. The cows are in the pasture behind the lower barn and the sheep are cozy in their straw inside.

Before all this happened, however, there were days of frozen buckets, frozen faucets, frozen valves and frozen water troughs. We spent a frustrating week driving the monster truck (an enormous, red behemoth with two 50 gallon tanks on the back) out to the cows. The trick was to leave the tanks empty and the valve open at night so that it didn't freeze shut. One night, however, we discovered that our vigilance just wasn't enough. Caught between needing to get to an engine mechanic class and the approaching darkness, there was only one answer to the frozen pipes. The blow torch.

We spent a chilly few minutes while Theo heated everything up until it worked. This was after the chilly thirty minutes spent looking for the blow torch in the first place.

But, the cows got water, we got dinner before our class, and the blow torch got a new permanent home where we always know where it is. Success!

Jersey: The Dramatic Cow

I apologize for the poor quality of this picture, but it's worth pointing out that Pride, our dairy cow was thrashing around so much it was impossible to get a good shot. Our vet, Dr. Ledeoux, was showing us how to give an IV which is an important skill for a farmer when the vet is either too far away or unavailable. We tied Pride's halter to a post and he put a small needle in her jugular. All hell broke loose.

I admit that getting shots is not the greatest thing in the world. However, it's not as bad (I imagine) as being eaten alive by rampaging tigers, which is how Pride was acting. She immediately dropped to her knees and, hanging by her halter, began to flail around as if she was dying.

Dr. Ledeoux assured us that this was completely normal behavior for a Jersey and something about their breeding causes them to put on a show like this.

Goodbye and Good Luck!

Our Head Grower, Nate is leaving us to start farming in Northampton, Ma. We're very happy for him and very sad since he's a great teacher and great friend. In the best way of saying goodbye, we drank beer, ate s'mores and burned brush. We're looking forward to getting to know our new grower, who will join us this winter and hopefully we'll have a great season together!

We Are Not Deer!

Hunting season is going strong in Western Mass and sometime you just need to stick dish gloves in your pockets to keep from getting shot.

Chicken Love!

How sad that we're culling chickens. How nice that they love each other.

This moment actually happened during a dissection (gross). Caitlin and I went to get eggs, not being cut out for sheep insides. Taking pictures of chickens was much preferable.

Also, This Happened

I found this on Brian's facebook page: www.factoryfarmmap.org

10 Days...

So 10 days is a long time to go without writing anything. There's not even a good excuse: no illness, no cow escapes, no dire internet outage. But I have lots of good stuff coming up including water: it freezes, how tractors and animals are completely the same, hunting season clothing, fire, blowtorches and more! Stay tuned!

Meat CSA

If you ever want to become even colder during late November, pack up the meat CSA. It's a chilly job.

We run a CSA (community supported agriculture) of meat through the winter. It's 12 pounds of meat once a month for five months. We try to give a good variety of the lamb, pork and beef that we raise and, as you can see, folks lucked out with some bacon this month.

The whole CSA versus farmers markets conversation is very interesting (right up there with meat versus vegetables). On the one hand, in a CSA you are paid up front by your customers and deliver your product later. You have a stable income before even beginning the farming process. The downside is that if your turnip crop fails (horrors!) or your freezer doesn't work, you've lost the product that someone has already paid for. Farmers markets offer a bit less stress, since if you thought you'd have 50 chickens and only have 45, you haven't lost five customers you've promised chickens to. However, you then have to move all your meat/veggies/whatever out the door with no guarantee that you'll be able to sell all that you've produced.

So, as ever, the conclusion is that you'll never make much money farming. At least I'll always have something to eat!

Find the Turkey!

Can you spot the turkey? Did you even know turkeys could fly that high? Cause we didn't.

Hannukah

What did you do today? Because in honor of our Hannukah celebrations (it helps to have our very own Rabbi), I made a menorah out of purple top turnips. Can't wait for latkes and applesauce for dinner!