Taking the Plunge

I have wanted a greenhouse for as long as I can remember.  Every year there is something keeping us from building one...usually time and/or money.  This year it is a necessity if I hope to grow any vegetables over the fall and winter.  We've made the plans, we have a lot of the materials...but it's just not going to happen yet.  Maybe in the spring.

So imagine my delight when I was in Lowe's this week and spotted a greenhouse display.  Most greenhouses I've seen for less than $250 could easily be built from scratch for much less.....or they just aren't worth carrying home.   This is another reason why I have never had a greenhouse.

I found one this week that I thought would suit our needs until we can build our own.  With just the two of us here now, I do not need to put up bushels of tomatoes.  At this point I just want to keep us having fresh produce year round without spending an arm and a leg....and be able to can a bit.  With the drought this year I think the thing I missed most is having fresh cucumbers every day.  Everything in the garden withered and died.  After talking with Bob, today I made the trek back to Lowe's and bought a greenhouse.

Okay, so maybe it's a Greenhut.  But the walls are a thick re-inforced vinyl...and the frame is steel.

It is small enough to be portable if you want to use it like a coldframe.......

I will give some product reviews once we get it together and full!  I am very excited about the prospect of being able to grow cucumbers and canteloupe over fall and winter....and I LOVE the thought of not having to bring plants into the house over winter!

Orange Conserve

I'm playing a bit with this recipe to suit our needs.  I'm thinking it will be dreamy on Ham, Smoked turkey, or even as a dunking sauce for bacon (just kidding....sorta).  It's really easy to make...you start with 6 plump oranges....wash them thoroughly because you will be using the peel.  Cut them into quarters, then use a very sharp fillet knife to cut the skin from the flesh.  Remove the membrane from the flesh, and dice the pulp.  Discard the membranes and seeds. (we fed ours to the pigs....start to flavor that ham from the inside).

Then you run the orange peel through your grinder or food processor until it is pulverized ..... and put it into a large stock pot with 5 cups of water.  Bring it to a boil and boil it for 20 minutes.  Add the pulp and boil for another 20 minutes.  Then add the other main ingredients....Except the nuts.

Lime juice, ground raisins, and sugar is added....and cook for about 30 minutes....

And our flavoring profile......I used a 2" cinnamon stick, 1/2 tsp ground clove, and 1/2 cup Grand Marnier....

For the nuts....I'm using walnuts.  Anyone remember these lovely choppers?  I LOVE mine and use it all the time.  It's efficient at it's job, has a measurement in the bottom catch jar, and uses 0 electricity!

While the conserve is still boiling, I very lightly toast the nuts in a sautee pan to bring out their flavor....then mix them into the main pot.  Bring it all to a full rolling boil and ladle into hot sterile jars......

Process them in a boiling water bath for 10 minutes and then let them cool!

What a shame....we made 6 pints....with enough left over to put some into a lonely jar.  Guess we'll try it on chicken tonight!

For the full recipe, click here.



Could It Be?

Okay, I have heard of this....but never actually witnessed it in many years working with dairy goats on a day to day basis.  A couple of months ago I noticed that my darling Fiona appeared to be developing an itty bitty baby udder.  Not unusual of course....she is after all a dairy goat.  She is the daughter of the world's best homestead goat (in my humble opinion).  So why wouldn't she develop an udder early.  But then I began to worry that maybe Frodo had bred her before we skeedaddled him out of the kid pen and into the buck pen.  So about a month ago when I was pulling blood for our CAE testing....I had her blood checked for pregnancy as well.  It was negative.

I have heard of precocious milkers.  In fact, our buck Manny is from such milky lines that his sire War Chief had to be milked on occasion or he would develop mastitis. I can not imagine how disgusting THAT chore was!  But I have always heard that a doe can develop milk spontaneously without being bred.  I've just have never actually had it happen.

Okay, you folks that read my blog and are not "goatie" type people will not appreciate this next picture.  Fiona wasn't thrilled with me taking the picture.....but for the goatie folks.....what do you think?  She's 7 months old and not bred.

This was her first time up on the milking stand besides for disbudding, tatooing, and hoof trimming...so I didn't want to upset her.....but sure enough....there were a few drops of milk in them there teats!

Now obviously we're not going to survive if that's all the milk she gives....but the fact is there was some MILK!  I plan to put her at the end of the milk string and get her used to the routine for a week or so.  If I see improvement by the end of the week, I'll keep going.  If I still only get a few drops, then I'll chalk it up to hormones or something.  By the way, I've never seen her behave as if she's in heat.....but you know how the does swoon over a good stinky buck and we've got 4 here.

As for Fiona, she loves the extra attention.....because she knows exactly how special she is.  Please ignore the cobwebs in the milkroom and the dirty nose on the goat.  It's hot, dry, and dusty here!



Goatie Grins with Cheesy Smiles

Just to make the record clear.....can you imagine what kind of smiley kids we would get if this darling precious girlie goat......

Made babies with this handsome hunk of goat.....

Lots of milk, yes.  Silky udders that are easy to milk, yes.  Luscious ears, yes.  But OH MY GOODNESS would those kids smile!!

Okay so what's the problem?

Storm Damage, Dove Update, and Carrots

Nothing like cramming a bunch into one post, right?  We finally got some much needed rain Wednesday evening!  Unfortunately it came with high winds that caused a few minor spots of damage.  We lost 2 chickens in the storm....a meat bird and also one of my favorites...one that was raised free ranging in the woods and he'd lived long enough to be independent of his mama hen. 

The other damage just pointed us to projects that we needed to get to.  It rolled up the tin roof on the backside of the brooder house that acts as a lean-to for the small buck pen.  We've already sketched the plans and started gathering materials to re-do the brooder house, buck loafing area, and hen house.  The storm just reminded us that it has to be done SOON.  Money is tight, days are over 100º for the 64th day in a row, and now Bob is working very long hours....excuses, excuses...

The henhouse now has a skylight....

Our big Bois D' Arc (pronounced bow-dark) tree....already dead from the drought....lost it's top...

The good news is.....when the top fell....it did not hit an animal, a building, or a fence!  The top was blown about 30 feet over...onto the top of our Mulberry tree, breaking the top off of it....Bummer since I love that tree, the bucks love the leaves and fruit (it's in the big buck pen)...but thank God it did not fall on the new buck barn or any of the fences.

The little lost Ringnecked dove survived the storm, and is still our daily visitor.  He will even get on your finger if you are patient with him.  He flies off into the trees in the evenings, but usually makes his appearance around 5 or 6 in the mornings and sticks close most of the day.  His feathers are smoothing out, so I am assuming his wound is healing. 

Nearly every time I go to the grocery store I try to pick up a bag of carrots.  I feed them to the rabbits, goats, and even to the pigs as treats.  Cleaning out my barn fridge and the crisper in our kitchen fridge I discovered that I had 7 opened bags of carrots....and something needed to be done with them before they spoiled. 

In the past I have always canned carrots in quart jars, since that's what we needed for a big family.  Since most of the time it's just the 2 of us at supper nowadays....I decided to do them in pints.  First I sorted, rinsed, and peeled them...and held them in cool water until I had them all done.

I like using my crinkle cutter on carrots that I'm canning.  Not everything looks pretty in a jar once it's canned....but I think crinkle cut carrots make very pretty jars....besides, it doesn't really take any longer to do than just cutting them with a knife.

To fill the jars, I add 1/2 teaspoon of salt to each jar (9 pints in this case), add the carrots...and top them with boiling water....

I capped the jars and put them in the canner.  While it was heating up my kitchen doing it's thing.....


I went out and gave MissPiggy her daily shower and told her of the carrot tops and peels that were coming her way for supper tonight..

After all, ya gotta keep the bacon happy!

Canning Ham

The big sale this week is shank portion hams!  At .99/lb I bought 3 this morning....and plan to buy one or two more tomorrow.  Home canned ham is great for casseroles, ham n' taters, soups, ham salad sandwiches....for all sorts of things!  Here's what I got this morning....for about $30.

They were around 10# each, totalling about 31 1/2 pounds.  I removed the skin, fat, and bones....and cut the meat into chunks.  The skin and fat can be fed to the chickens...the bones will be used for beans.

I added boiling water to the jars, capped them, and have 3 canner loads running now.  In all, it made:

6 quarts

8 pints

11 half-pints

All 3 canners going full blast in my kitchen.  I will be SO GLAD when the burn ban is lifted!  Please pray that we will get rain.  But for now, I'll keep canning!

Bean Week Ends....FINALLY!

I LOVE canning, it's very rewarding.  Yes, it is hard work...but you reap the benefits for the rest of the year.  I said that because I don't want to sound like I am complaining....but WOW am I glad to have the beans done!  With our record high temperatures, a severe drought (worst drought since 1958), and a burn ban in place....all my canning has to be done indoors.  I have been very spoiled by the ability to cook and can outside and now that ability has been stifled until we get rain.

Not that I can let something like that stop me from canning.  It must be done, I NEED those quick meals in a jar...not to mention that if something goes on sale that I can preserve ... I buy in bulk and put it up!

So to recap. 
First it was a 16 bean mixture with keilbalsa.  12 pints 2 quarts.
Then I moved on to pinto beans and black beans...with sausage of course.  13 pints  1 quart of pintos, 3 pints black beans.

And then I got creative for the grand finale of bean week.  I had 2 bags of the 16 bean soup mix so I decided to make soup!  I started with sautee-ing onion, celery, garlic, venison ham, pork ham, and smoked sausage. 

Then covered all that with water and seasoned to make a yummy broth.  I put my prepared beans (see previous post) in the jars, then added the broth/meat/veggie mixture.  Canned for 90 mins at 10# and now I have 11 quarts of yummy bean soup!

Now to see what will be on sale this week!

Bean Week

We go through a lot of beans.  It's one of the few vegetables my husband will eat, plus it's a great accompaniment to BBQ.  Sometimes if we're having a big BBQ I will make a big ol pot of fresh beans...but most of the time I prefer to have home canned beans ready.  There are a number of steps to get them finished, but the really are worth it!

We started this batch with one each of our home cured & smoked venison hock, and hog hock. 

These are placed into a large stockpot with about 20 quarts of water.  Bring to a boil and then reduce to a simmer for a few hours until the meat comes off the bone.  Once you allow it to cool, you will have an ugly blob of fat on top that is easy to scoop off.

From there strain the stock and put it aside.  Remove any skin and bones from the meat; and reserve the meat (the meat will be used in a batch of pinto beans later in the week).

Today we're canning a 16 bean soup mix, using dried onion, kielbasa sausage, and some of the stock.  The beans must be rinsed and sorted....

Once rinsed and sorted, put them into a heavy pot and cover with water.  Turn the heat to a medium high and bring them to a boil.  Boil them for about 30 minutes, then remove from the heat and set them aside.

Bring the stock back up to a boil, this will be the liquid used to can the beans.  Meanwhile prepare the jars by sterilizing them.  Add 1 Tablespoon of minced onion to each jar.

Next add a few slices of the keilbalsa to each jar.

Next drain the soaked beans, and spoon them into the jars.

Pour the boiling stock over the beans and fill jar to within 1" of the top.

Cap the jars and process in the pressure canner (appropriate altitude directions) for 90 minutes.

When done, you have a quick and easy side dish...just heat and eat!

Other notes....it takes about 2 1/4 pounds of beans per quart.  I used 3 - 20oz bags of 16 bean mixture and finished with 12 pints and 2 quarts.

Off the beaten path....you may wish to bail out now....

Last night I was INFURIATED about reading YET another article about animals taken from law abiding citizens.....without just cause.  Now keep in mind.....I have rescued many animals.  Most of our dogs are rescues, and certainly all of our cats are.  My beloved herd queen Faith is a rescue.  I support animal rescue 100%.  I do NOT support animal rights.

Read that again please before you continue.  ... and I will put it in all caps....

I DO NOT SUPPORT ANIMAL RIGHTS.

If you don't know by now that I think animal cruelty is wrong, then you are NOT reading my blog.  It is NOT a contradiction of terms.  Humans have rights, God given rights.  Humans have a responsibility to care for the animals in their care, and the right to raise them in a humane fashion, butcher them humanely, and eat them.  Animals do not have those rights.

Anyway .....that has led me to start another blog which will most likely be unpleasant reading because it will bring to light the reality of the law enforcements' active role in a movement that is neither legal or moral. 

Last night I was flipping out because of this particular rabbit seizure case....and my husband made the mistake of saying "so what are you doing about it".  So here it is.  Bail out now folks.....or you can stand up with me and proclaim that what is wrong is wrong and what is right is right. 

The battle is here.....and it won't be on this blog....I promise this is the only post....if you care to watch the battle you can find it here http://humanunrights.blogspot.com/

You homesteaders, please be aware.  Our rights are being chipped away  every day.  When they come for your animals there is nothing you can do.  And then you will be labeled a criminal despite years of hard work to provide and do what you do.

A Whole New Stink....

Oh yes, it's breeding season!  We began breeding yesterday, but the boys have been perfumed and ready for weeks!  With 4 bucks....lemme tell you, the scent can drive even the most shy doe insane.  Oh and drive humans away!

This year we are breeding for udders and milk. Our goal is to provide an affordable homestead milker to folks.  All bucks born this year will be wethered, there are no exceptions unless we keep them.  This year has taught us that you can not trust planning , because things happen.  We still plan, but when things get changed, you have to regroup and go to plan B.

So the line-up is:

Ditto - he is always accused of being too feminine....but I say..."when he's in rut he's a black angus bull"....do you doubt me?  He is very dairy, he is eye catching like his mom was.  His daughters have very good attachments with a strong medial ligament.  We rested him a bit last year, this year we are repeating the breeding to Faith, as well as using him on our MoonXLace crew.

Pete - we LOVE Pete!  He came here last year and I really hope he will be a permenant resident!  We used him heavily last year and we are thrilled with his daughters....and son!!  I don't plan to use him this year, we are waiting to see how his daugthers mature.

Manny - Manny is from a very milky line and we plan to take advantage of that this year crossing him with Lace.  We rested Manny last year but plan to put him to work this year!  Manny always looks bad in pictures...he's a goofball...but he is a very nice boy....smooth throughout and he puts very nice udders on his daughters!

And the new kid......Frodo!  He is SO nice....and he's sentimental to us.  I really wish we'd have kept our last buck that was sentimental to us... he was Happy's last buckling, Echo.  This year I'm not repeating the mistake...and we'll keep Frodo for a while.  Frodo is our only unregistered buck....but his pedigree goes back to my favorite goats.  His mother is Angel....who was half sister to Exadore....and his grandmother is Legacy.  With Pete as his sire, how could he be anything but OUTSTANDING.  We're planning to breed him to Fiona....for milk.  Oh and bizzare color.

So there's the boys, right now they are SO much more pleasant in picture.  :)

Dove

For over a week, I have been seeing a pretty little ring-necked dove in the wee morning hours while doing barn chores.  I sort of kept his appearance to myself, since most people look at me sideways anyway.  I mean if you go around saying..."this lovely little dove flew down and was eating grain that I put out for him while I was still standing there".... well, you get those sideways looks.

I tend to internalize a lot.  I do a lot of pondering and thinking....not to get in the way of a lot of talking, of course!  But this little dove really touched me.  Rebekah had a pair of doves when she was young.  I think she was maybe 8 or 9 years old....we went to Canton Trade Days and she saw them there.  Of course I gave in and got them for her.  Eventually we moved them from their cage in her room (which was quite large) to a flight pen outside.   I don't know how old the doves were, I'm not even sure we did right by them....but she loved her doves until they died.

Ringnecked doves are domestic and are not like the ruddy doves you see outside.  They do not do well "in the wild".  This dove that has graced our presence is indeed a Ringnecked dove.  He appears to have some sort of wound on his chest, he has ruffeled feathers in a spot that don't smooth out.  But I won't catch him to do an exam.

His appearance was finally witnessed by some friends over the weekend....and then the next day Bob coaxed him onto his finger!

Yesterday I finally got a picture of him.......

Besides reminding me of my daughter, I think of the Biblical symbols that the dove represents.  I am happy to have this guy visit any time....and he is welcome to all the grain and cool water he can drink!

YAY! No Oopsies!

Faith's daughter, Fiona is a very big girl for her age, always has been.  Like now she is 87# as a 6 month old.  But a few months ago before we moved Frodo to the buck pen, we were afraid that they had bred before getting him away from her.  So since I was pulling blood from all the babies to do their annual CAE testing, I decided to go ahead and have a pregnancy test (BioPryn) done on her.  I am VERY pleased to say that she is NOT pregnant.....so hopefully her growth rate will continue and she can be bred later in the year!

All of the turkeys that we are planning to sell for the year have been sold!  That brings us one step closer to fall!!  The birds that remain will either be butchered this fall or held over as breeders.  God has really blessed our turkeys this year.  We've moved them to the growing pen and hopefully by Sept/Oct they will be moved on to the freezer.



You know it's hot when....

You find an egg in the yard laying in the sun, give it to the pig...and when she cracks it you realize it's soft boiled!!  No kidding!

Rabbit Processing

Compared to processing chickens, rabbits are a breeze.  It takes me about 30-40 minutes to do a chicken from start to clean up.  I can do a rabbit in about half that time. 

I will warn you now, this blog post is about how useful a rabbit is on the homestead.  There are no graphic pictures of the killing of the rabbit, nor do I go into the details about the processing.  There are plenty of places to get that information.  The purpose of this post is to show the usefulness of rabbits on the homestead and how very little waste is involved in their processing.  But there are pictures of the processed rabbit and how to use the meat and pelt.

We are raising the rabbits in a colony style, which means they have a large pen, dig tunnels, burrow through hay, and jump around and move.  Our buck is in a traditional rabbit cage, the does share a pen.  This weekend we discovered that one of our "does" was indeed a buck....so he was immediately separated and put on the calendar for processing.  Our rabbits are about 3 1/2 months old, and we've raised them on my own feed recipe that contains 0% commercial rabbit pellets.  They are happy, muscular, active, and in excellent condition.....and the feed cost is about $12/100#.  100# of mixed feed for 5 rabbits lasted about 6 weeks.

Before processing, we fast a butcher rabbit overnight.  They get plenty of clean fresh water, but we remove the feed.  The first step was to weigh him so that we had an accurate live weight.  This one was 6# 12.2 oz.  That is live on the hoof so to speak. 

Raising our own food is very important to us, and raising it in the most humane possible manner is priority.  The same goes with butchering.  We send nothing out to be processed...our animals are born, live, are loved, and die here.  To me, loading a goat or hog onto a trailer to haul it to a processor .... which is usually a very noisy concrete building with very uncaring folks .....well, I just can't do it.  I was at a goat farm many years ago and the lady was selling a butcher wether.  The people that were buying the goat hog tied his feet and put him in the back of their pickup truck to haul home.  This was a bottle raised goat that trusted people as part of their herd.  I knew back then that if I was going to have a goat for meat, I would do it myself.  I could not imagine what that baby goat went through.

I know it may sound a bit hypocritical, but there is such a thing as humane butchering.  I wrote an article a few years ago regarding butchering poultry that may or may not interest you that can be found here http://www.queenacresonline.com/poultrybutchering.html .  Keeping an animal without stress, treating it with kindness and keeping it calm is not only more humane, but it also makes the meat taste better.

Sorry for the detour, back to the rabbit.  Okay...his live weight was 6# 12.2 oz.  Since we thought he was a she, he has been in the big colony pen so he was pretty bulky for a younger rabbit.  Once the rabbit is stunned and bled, it is carefully skinned.  When skinning, you don't want to ruin the meat...but you also don't want to ruin the pelt.  When finished you should have a pelt that looks like an inside-out tube sock....and a freshly skinned rabbit.

The next step is to remove the back feet, and the tail...along with all the entrails.  We keep the heart, lungs, liver (removing the gallbladder), kidneys, and neck to use as dog food.  The head, feet, tail, stomach, and intestinal tract, is either burned, buried, or left out in a remote area for wildlife.

Look at the lovely carcass size when the rabbits are not cage raised!

The rabbit yielded enough meat for 6 large BBQ portions, or it could be turned into a nice stew that would feed 20 people.  Rabbit meat can also be canned.

Besides the meat, we save the pelt.  It's too hot to do anything much with pelts except salt them and save them for later.  Which is exactly what we did.

Split the hide and open it up....and start the salting process. 

You want to get every inch of the pelt salted, and you can not use too much salt.  You want NON iodized salt for this procedure.

Once it's well salted, roll it up.

If the weather and bugs were less intense, I'd leave it open outside and salt and scrape it for a couple of days.  Since it's 104º and the flies are running rampant....I wrapped it with paper towels and newspaper and it's in the freezer for another day.

At the end of the hour I had a huge plate of meat, some snacks for the dogs, a pelt in the freezer, and a bit of meat for wildlife.

Live weight = 6# 12.2oz

Offal = 1# 6.4 oz

Meat & bone weight = 3# 11.4 oz

Yep.....rabbits will always have a place on our homestead!!