Busy, busy winter and spring! We built a new run-in shed, fenced in an additional 2 acres, took in a horse, found the horse a new home, got two baby calves, helped birth 26 goat kids, brooded 25 more chickens, and had a litter of 9 puppies. Not to mention the garden. We are wiped! We have been itching to fence in the 2 acres for years, especially after the "great pig escape", but last year we were offered a beautiful horse - Remy - and we finally did it. We slogged through slush, ice, and snow and got everything finished by the beginning of February... only to find out that Carol's dream of raising horses was just that - a dream. I found that horses don't actually fit into my permaculture view of the world (at least three purposes for everything). Anyway, Remy found a much better home with lots of kids and horses to play with.
Now I knew the goats couldn't keep up with the 2 acres, so why not cows. We had just finished buying a 1/4 cow from one of the local farms around here when our friend Sharon had a blog post advertising some smaller sized calves bred and born on pasture. Raised organically, bred for milk, beef, and for grazing...everything we wanted. Now we could expand cheese-making in the future and use goat milk this year to nurse the calves.
The calves have been a lot of fun. We got a boy (who will later end up in the freezer) and a girl (who will end up as our family cow) who were just about a week old. They are now three weeks old and doing great. The girl (shown above to the left) is named Queen Nadine (from a great kid's book with that title) and her loyal companion is Sir Loin (shown above to the right). They have thrived on our goat milk, but I am pretty sure they think they are goats.
We are looking forward to watching these guys grow and creating a four pasture rotational grazing system. We hope to use the grazing and browsing power of our ruminants to reclaim our pastures. The pigs allowed us to seed in a lot of great species - which are definitely doing well, but we need to encourage their growth.
So what else is new?? Of course we have tons of goat kids running around the pastures... several wethers are still available and you can see them here. And our beautiful Cassidy (aka Cassie) has given us 9 gorgeous puppies. We know that at least four are staying within the family, but the rest are for sale as family farm dogs. I can't express how awesome Bordernese (Border collie/ Bernese Mtn. Dog crosses) are. Unlike any other dog I have ever known or raised - gentle, loving, intelligent spirits.
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