New pictures

We hadn't taken any pictures of the critters in a while, so last night we snapped a few to show how big they are getting. Above is a picture of 2 big turkeys. There are more in the albums at the Farm Pictures link.

The ducks still haven't laid any eggs, I guess they were just messing with my head. The other disturbing thing about the ducks is that they have started flying around, something they haven't done before. I hope they aren't planning on flying south for the winter!

We had some patchy frost the other night, I had to cover the tomatoes and peppers, and it looks like everything made it through safely.

Turkeys

Today we'll be talking turkey.

Business first. Anyone that has already ordered a Thanksgiving turkey from us, or anyone that would like to, please send an email to ardwyn_farm@earthlink.net including the following information:

1) Your name
2) What day you would like to pick up your turkey (Nov. 19 - 22)

If you have a preference in breed, feel free to include that and we will do our best to accomodate your request. New orders will be reserved on a first-come, first-served basis.

The way these turkeys are growing, the flat price of $75/ bird is looking like more and more of a bargain. If we were selling them at the national standard of $4/lb I think they might go for more.

Okay, now that we have that out of the way.
I had the opportunity this weekend to talk with an employee of one of the larger organic distributors in the country. During the course of the conversation somehow the fact that we raise a few turkeys came up and he was interested. He asked how many turkeys we raised and if we considered them to be a big hassle. The nub of the conversation was that the company is looking for someone to raise turkeys for them, but someone raising a dozen apparently wasn't worth dealing with.

I will admit that my first reaction was to think about converting the stock room and pasture area for turkeys and raising 120 turkeys next year. After considering it for a while, though, I actualy became a little upset. The concept of organic farming is supposed to be a farm full of biodiversity, with each animal and crop depending on others in a mutually beneficial way. But it seems that the tide is turning and now raising "organic" livestock is just a matter of reading the rules and not doing anything against them. A giant feedlot of steers eating organically-raised corn trucked in from 3 states away is hardly an improvement over the current system. So feeling pressured to ditch all of the other animals on the farm in favor of raising a single variety of animal makes me more wary of the growing corporate organic suppliers. It seems to me the better solution is to eat locally, see the places your meals come from, and judge for yourself if you're comfortable with the treatment the animals receive and the way the crops are grown.

No eggs yet..

..but the mallard hen has definitely built a nest next to the house. She has hollowed out a little bowl shaped area in the woodchips and has begun to line it with feathers, so it's only a matter of time, I hope.

It has been rainy, gray, and chilly all week so I haven't had the chance to do much outside other than the usual daily chores of feeding and watering everyone. It is less than a month now before the pigs go to the slaughterhouse. I'm still trying to work out how I'll get them there, hopefully I'll have bought an old farm truck by then.

Since Labor Day weekend has passed , and it is pretty much the end of summer here in WI, it makes me look back over our first full summer here on the farm. I think we did very well and I am proud.

The garden was big, but not unmanageably so, we never felt like we grew way too much of anything. the sweet corn was the only big failure and we realize now that was probably because that half of the garden has poor soil. We have cans of salsa and spaghetti sauce and soup in the pantry to last us into the winter, and memories of that first big salad from the garden as well.

We successfully raised 7 ducks to maturity, and it looks like all of the turkeys will make it, too. Turkeys are notoriously delicate in their first few weeks, and only losing one, to an unknown illness on it's first day, makes us feel confident. We have raised two little piglets into big old hogs, and have done it the way we intended, with no medicated feed, no added hormones, and giving them the best and happiest pig lives that we could.

Other benefits that the farm has given us are; knowing that we can work full-time but that there is still plenty of time for more work and play outside of our jobs, lots of exercise, less TV watching, healthier eating habits, more time spent together as a couple, a new appreciation for where our meals come from, the enormous amount of new things we have learned, giving our family and friends the chance to share in what we are doing and the products of it, and making new friends with people that are interested in the goings-on out at the farm.

Thanks to all of our faithful readers, please keep coming back and sharing your comments.

Watch those ducks!

I'm pretty sure I caught the mallard hen starting to make herself a nest next to the house in a big tangle of flower vines, which may mean she is getting ready to start laying eggs. I thought it would be about mid-September that we would see eggs from the ducks so I am happy that my prediction was probably pretty close. Although I shouldn't count my eggs before they are even laid! I bought some crushed oyster shell and started mixing it with their feed to help them get calcium for shell production. So we need to start keeping an eye on them for weird behavior and looking for eggs.

The turkeys are growing SO fast, it's really unbelievable. I am going away for the weekend and fully expect to be shocked at how big they are when I get home.

The pigs are really enjoying the fact that our pear tree was overloaded this year. They are going through a 5 gallon bucket full of pears about every 2 days. They love those pears. I also chucked a few butternuts into the pasture while they were standing at the fence and watching me hull. They have very powerful jaws, they crunched right through the shells and, judging by their spinning tails, they like butternuts too. I have also heard that pigs like acorns, so I'll try to rake some up from the big oak in the front yard.

I'm thinking about expanding next year's garden plot by tilling up some of the grass patch between the two garden areas. I've been watching the way the sun travels over that part of the lawn all summer and it looks like it would be plenty of sun for more veggies.

A bushel of butternuts

Our butternut tree produced it's first crop this year. here is the first bushel. I harvested them this morning and only got conked on the head once when shaking the limbs.

Butternuts are very similar to walnuts, but the hulls have a sticky, sort of resinous, feel to them. I am not sure what the evolutionary advantage of this is, I find it hard to imagine a butternut falling off of a tree and sticking to the coat of a passing mastodon. But, they have it anyway. So when you are picking butternuts, I advise gloves. They also stain just like walnuts do.

I got just about half of the butternuts hulled using the old corn sheller you can see in the picture. I borrowed it from my grandma, thanks grandma! I hulled 219 of them, to be precise. At that point I was already feeling a little strain in my shoulders and forearms, so I put the rest of them off until tomorrow. The black walnuts will be falling from the trees soon. I ran a few of them through the sheller today, too. They clean off a lot faster and easier than the butternuts do, that ovoid shape makes the butternuts difficult.

I also harvested some grapes today, we really got some giants this year. There were a few that were bigger than a quarter! I put some pictures up at the picture link.

All of the animals are still doing great. The turkeys are starting to create a little bit of stink, I suppose we should have realized that as they got bigger so would the mess. Somehow I conveniently forgot about that concept. Still not as bad as the ducks were though!