by mannytheseacow » Sun Apr 26, 2015 3:44 pm
It's been ages since I've posted any updates on my place here, and mostly because I don't have much to update (or too much to update, depends on how you look at it). After coming back from the Gambia I feel like all I've done is work, classes, and managing my animals. We kidded in March this year which doubled the size of our herd, and recently we added another show quality registered boer doe. All are up for sale at any time so we may have more or sell them all, it's at the whim of the market. Our runty little buck produced some beautiful meaty kids. At 4 weeks they were already averaging 50 pounds. The sheep are finally gone, but we still have way too many animals.
I've been hatching eggs. I built a simple incubator from a thermostat, a lightbulb, and a foam box. The chickens, ducks, and geese have been laying like crazy, so I've been putting all the excess eggs in the incubator and selling the hatchlings for $2.50 each. Once gnat season is over I'll probably raise 25 of each to put in the freezer myself.
I've got enough wood gathered to replace what we used last year. I haven't started splitting yet because I'm trying to get the grass to grow in the yard again. Hauling all that wood to fill my shed last year just destroyed the yard. But now I'm 2 years out with split wood and easily replacing what I've burned. I seeded the yard back down with a "no-mow" mix of low-growing fescues. So, it really was a good thing that the yard got destroyed because it opened the window for converting the lawn to a better system.
I also made a rain garden this year. We have adequate rain water storage between the barn and my house, so I converted my front yard gutter into an underground tile which outlets into a retention basin planted in wet-mesic wild-flowers, selected to be more pollinator habitat.
I have lots of starts for the garden, but it's still too cold to put them out. New beds for potatoes and sweet potatoes, the old beds are prepped for tomatoes, beans, peppers, and the like. The cold frames are producing insanely. We're already getting asparagus and morels are just starting to pop. At some point, I've got so many projects I want to do, but then I look at my wife and it's like, "we're already there." Just need to do a little tweaking to get things perfected.
The little food forest I planted last year came back near 100%. All that watering last year really paid off. I lost one almond, and my two older apple trees to a rabbit wild rabbit. Once I realized it was eating the bark I took care of the rabbit, but the damage to the trees was already done. All my rasperries, hazelnuts, and other fruit and nuts came back, though. We had so much manure bed pack from the barn this winter that all my beds, trees, garlic patch, artichokes.... they all have a healthy dose of compost, and it's really paying off.
Well, that's what I've been up to. Hope life is well for everyone else too.
"Knowledge is power. Arm yourself."