Farm log 10/20/12

This post is more for me than you.  I've tried to keep a log book before but I end up looking up old FB or blog posts anyhow to figure out what I did when.

Sonny- weight taped at 105lbs, dosed with ivermectin (wormer), given CD/T vaccine, BoSe shot, hooves trimmed and iodined.  Sonny has a goiter we noticed a week ago that has been shrinking with the addition of Thorvin kelp free choice every evening.  In a week, I want to reworm him and see if I can give him some RedCell (I'm slightly concerned his "goiter" is actually bottle jaw so I'm treating for both just in case).  In a month he needs hoof trimming and his second CD/T as well as copper bolus.

York- weight taped at 180, dosed with ivermectin and CD/T.  Hooves trimmed and iodined.  I'll probably reworm him along with Sonny and he also needs hoof trimming and his second CD/T as well as copper bolus.

Pictures 10/7/12

'I only have eyes.....for yoouuuuu'  Sonny, now a year old and currently in rut

"Angel"- our currently broody Ameracuana x Wyandotte cross from last fall's hatch. Ironically she's quite mean and will peck your hand off.

The boys, Sonny and York.  Poor York has to deal with stinky Sonny.

The blue slate turkeys....1 jake and 4 hens (are they called something different at this age?)  

Free range hens.  They really like to roost in the pine trees.

duck duck duck goose goose :)  The gosling girls are about 3/4 of our grown gander's size now

this rooster is one of the "school" leghorns, he's just a white leghorn but LOOK at that tail! I've never seen a leghorn with such a fancy tail and none of the other roos have it.  Too bad we aren't trying to keep leghorn roos.

Early Fall.  From my dining room window.

October '12 update

It feels like fall!  We had such a hot, dry summer that I'm not ashamed to say that I was glad to see it go.

I'd love to tell you that so much has happened in the last month, but really it's nothing too exciting.  We lost a duck, one of the girls from the spring hatch.  She disappeared one evening without a trace and we still have not seen any sign of her.  She may have went broody and we'll see her later this month with a bunch of ducklings of her own.  She may have been picked up by a predator, however this theory puzzles me since the only airborne predator I've seen lately is too small to carry away a duck of her size.

Which brings me to the airborne predator in question, the Cooper's hawk.  For a few days we had a Cooper's hawk scoping out our flock and our African geese were so kind as to alert every living creature around that it was nearby.  I believe that hawk has moved on and I don't think it caught a meal here.  Have I mentioned how much I love our geese?  Low maintenance, easy keepers, hearty flock protection.  I can't wait to see the goslings next year.  We've never had goose meat but we are looking forward to trying it.  I was browsing around for prices on goose...wow!  I mean the low end I found was $8/lb and the high end nearing $12/lb for whole goose.  If we weren't raising it, I can't imagine we'd ever afford it.

The goats.  Well, they stink to high heaven right now.  Sonny is in rutt and if we are lucky they he didn't just pee all over his head just before we have to handle him.  Boy goats are gross!

The human kids are doing great.  The new baby was 10lbs, 9.5 oz today at the doc's office :)  My son has taken a liking to jigsaw puzzles.  I have no idea what skill level he should be at with puzzles but the last couple puzzles were probably too easy at 24 pcs.

With all these animals we raise for meat, it had me thinking about our menu.  If we grew all of our own meats our menu would include: chicken, duck, turkey, goose, goat, with rabbit and pork as later additions.  I don't know about you but I grew up with the typical beef, pork, chicken, fish, turkey diet....none of which were grown on pasture like we're doing here.  So it really is going to require me to branch out my cooking skills.  I've never cooked goat or goose or rabbit.