Me and Daphne

Me and my livestock guard dog Daphne.  :)

Suffolk Sheep Coming

Looks like we will have some suffolk sheep coming.  2 ram lambs for meat and maybe one saved for breeding and 1 to 2 suffolk ewes for breeding.  I was surprised when I found all the same breed.  I wasn't planning on that, it just kind of happened that way.  I was just wanting lamb for meat, but it looks like I might have a place to take them and have stock for next year.  The lambs will be 5 weeks old and I'm saving up some raw milk to feed them until they are 12 weeks.  Oh, that reminds me I need to see if I still have a couple lamb nipples for bottles to feed them with IF I can talk them into taking milk from a bottle that is.  It's getting exciting!

Progress on the Duck Pen Structure

 The new awesome door to my duck structure.  Look, its not all catewompous. 

Very nice, now just need wire on the rest.

Baby Plants!!!

 Seed trays.  I used my thingymabob.  Yeah, I know, I don't remember what its called, but its handy for making seeds cells in big trays.

 I put leftover plastic on top from the sheep shelter to keep the heat in.  They are on a mat with light over the top.

 Lookie there.  I got some Isis Candy tomatoes coming up. : )

And sweet basil.  This is basil I saved seeds from 2009 from my garden in Smartsville and they are still germinating like crazy.  :D

 From this

 To this:  My farmer friend (former carpenter) is helping me build the new winter enclosure for the ducks.  So far so good.

The door is being flattened, we'll see if it stays flat or not.  So far so good.  I really need to start getting some wire on there so we can put some ducks in there soon and then move them out to the chicken (well, now it will be a duck) tractor.  :)

My New Farming Blog

I thought I should start a new blog.  Farming adventures on my own!  Of course, with the kiddos sprinkled here and there.  These are my thoughts so far.   This year on the land I'm still living on at the moment I'm going to start a couple of projects. 

First, I'm going to see if I can find 4 lambs that will still be under the age of one year by the time its September, October.  I will mob graze them just like I did last year.  The two we harvested from last year were very tender and I want to do that again and sell 3 of the 4 at harvest time.  I need to figure out pricing too.

Second, I want to use the chicken tractor again.  This time I will be buying some muscovy ducks. Supposedly they lay really well when not trying to sit on eggs.  I think I will also hatch and sell fertile eggs.  Duck eggs are good for people who are on an alkaline diet like me.  Chicken eggs make your body acidic when you really want to be more alkaline.  So, we'll see how it goes.

Third, I will be putting in a good sized garden.  I'm hoping all the compost I have in my piles once they defrost and I turn them will be somewhat usable this coming year.  Digging in the dirt is one of my favorite places to be and I plan to be there A LOT this next season.  

Wish me luck on these new adventures.  I'm excited!