Farm update
Well is been a while since I wrote so sorry. My health hasn't been that great but I am on the road to recovery and look forward to posting more often!
Lets see whats new on the farm....
We sold our sheep herd down to 4 ewes. We kept my two black n white ones and our two favorite tri colors ewes who should be ready to pop any day now! I cant wait to have baby lambs running around again. Its a big change going from 59 sheep to 4! They would eat an acre every 3 days and it would take us around 4 hours to move them every time. So we decided to cut back and use that time for other things on the farm for now. I will build the herd back up but go slowly this time! :) We did have a good set up and I would recommend this way to anyone who has a small herd. We have multiple sections of 164' electric mesh fencing that we would hooked together and moved every 3 to 4 days. We have solar panel on the drag roof that is hooked to a battery that is sitting in the drag and a fence charger hooked to a battery. So no more replacing the battery every 2 days! I loved watching them run, eat and play! I do miss not having a big herd anymore but the work load is already a lot easier.
These are the ones we kept!
Chloe has been asking for donkeys for a couple years now and someone gave us two of them! They are really sweet and stubborn and so kid safe! It didn't take the kids long to learn to tie carrots onto sticks with bailing twine and holding it in front of them to make them walk! Its the cutest thing to watch! The first time we heard the donkeys "talk" we all just started laughing! They make the cutest and loudest sound ever! They are impatience for their breakfast in the morning so its been a morning cheer quite often!
We upped our beef herd so now we have 20 cows to feed over the winter and our goal is to get to 30! We have 7 that are conformed bred and 2 more that should be but we haven't had the vet check them yet! I should be milking our milk cow in March!!! I cant wait to have fresh milk, ice cream, yogurt, cheese and BUTTER again!!!! Although not looking forward to fly season which bring tail swinging and face slapping with the end of the cows tail across the face! LOL But it is worth it for fresh milk...I think! lol
We bred my two fjord mares to a fjord stud so we should have July BABIES!!!! I AM SO psyched! I just cannot wait to have baby foals running around!! Its going to be awesome!! We had someone log with them in the harness and they did fantastic!!! I drove them once and realized its harder work then I thought it would be and I am pretty sure I learned more then the horses did that day! lol The guy doing it was very sweet and patient with me and took the time to teach me and I'm so thankful!! Lots to learn still but excited to keep working at it.
We got grow lights in my little heated greenhouse a few months ago and LOVE it! We are growing lettuce, Swiss chard, broccoli, and cucumbers in December in Maine! Everyday I go out there and dream of spring, cant wait to get my hands dirty in my big garden!!
This last year I also started my rock flower/herb garden! We have this rocky hill behind the house and I have dreamed of having my flower garden there for some time and finally started it! We had a friend help me make a trellis and planted grapes on both sides of it. This coming spring I am going to build a bench swing to hang inside it!!!! Every year I will add a little more beds and plants and soon it'll be full of bright sunny flowers and delicious herbs!
Our grains didn't do great this year because of the drought we had all summer but the corn did awesome! Well the critters LOVED the corn! :/ We had a little battle all fall, we lost and the Raccoons and porcupines won. Also one Saturday we left to visit a friend and when we came back about 6 hours later we went down to check on the sheep and they had gotten out and flattened ONE whole acre of flint corn in 6 hours! They ate the whole stalks right to the ground level! It was really impressive but very hurtful at the same time! That many sheep getting out can do some damage fast! lol Next year we are going to fence in the corn patch so the raccoons and porcupines don't eat half the field too.
I made polenta with the corn we grew and boy is it tasty!!!! Its my new favorite breakfast!!! And its SO easy to make. You can flavor it however you want sweet, creamy or buttery. Ill post the recipe soon! You should try it out!
OK well that's all the time I have for today!