Whippoorwills and Fireflies

             Yes, they are both back on our farm and yes, I am very excited. Two of my favorite things are whippoorwills and fireflies. Although here in West Virginia, we call them lightening bugs. I have never seen them this early but I suppose with the crazy winter we had, they have decided to show up a couple weeks ahead of time. I heard a whippoorwill on the opposite hill from our farm last night when I went out for my nightly stroll of shutting up chickens and the greenhouse. It didn't take long and one started to answer from our woods. I just stood there and listened and while I did, I saw a flash go by me and then I realized the  lightening bugs were back too. The moon was blazing in the sky and I didn't need a light. This Saturday we are having what they are calling a "Super Moon" however the Almanac calls it the Full Flower Moon. Whatever you want to call it, I plan on being outside to take it all in. 
           The baby goats are growing quickly and are just about to be weaned, which means we can make a trip to the livestock sale and get some pigs. The Freedom Rangers are amazing. I think you could see them grow right before your eyes. They will have to come out of the brooder this weekend. We are also planning on shearing the sheep and the angoras on Saturday. The bluebird boxes are full and the robins and the catbirds are setting on their nests. The phoebe is starting to build a nest on one of the rafters in the barn but I haven't see a barn swallow yet. I will be watching for their return. I love to hear them chatter to me while I milk. 
           I feel so fortunate to be able to experience all this beauty that God has given us. Can you only imagine what heaven will be like?

The Freedom Rangers are coming!!

        Yes, they are. They shipped out yesterday and will be here  tomorrow. What is a Freedom Ranger, you ask? You can go to their webite here, http://www.freedomrangerhatchery.com/ In our ongoing search to be more self sustainable, I found these chickens through a fellow blogger. They are a meat bird, bred to be raised in a free range environment. This is perfect for us. An added bonus, is that you can butcher as they get big enough. A few here and there. We usually raise the Cornish Rock X, which is a great meat bird but grows so fast and they all seem to be ready at the same time. It is a daunting task when you have to butcher 25 birds in one day. This is my first time with these kind of birds, so I will keep you posted on how things go. 
        My new chicks have outgrown the brooder, with the exception of the bantys, and are in a pen in the milk room. So they keep me company while I milk. The Black Giants are already getting so big. I left the bantys in another pen on the other side of the barn. Some of them are so tiny yet, although they are all feathered out. I have three Mille Fleur banty chicks. The name means in French "Thousand Flowers" due to their beautiful plumage. They are known to be the friendliest of the bantys. They are already so funny to watch. This morning while I was milking, I heard this strange sound coming from the other sound of the barn. I stopped my milking and listened.....nothing. So I continued on, then I heard it again. It sounded like someone was stepping on one of the barn cats. Then it dawned on me that I was hearing right after Chantecler crowed. It was one of the banty roosters crowing for the first time. Boy, does he need some work!
         The new sheep have fit in perfectly. I would like to get some more. They are so nice and quiet compared to the very vocal Nubian. I am still missing Tulip so much and I guess I always will. All our baby goats are growing nicely and are starting to eat grain now. I am bottle feeding seven, which takes three gallons of milk a day to do. I will be glad to get them weaned so we can get some pigs. The greenhouse is full to the brim with all our vegetables and flowers. The garden is plowed and tilled and ready to plant. We need to get the potatoes in.
       I have cottage cheese on the stove and it is time to add the rennant, so I better go. I have to get the brooder ready for 25 baby chicks too. Busy day planned....talk to you later.

Life continues on...

       It has been a while since I have posted on the blog, mostly because I didn't want to open up raw wounds. The last time I wrote about the exitement of kidding. I look forward to it every year and feeling those baby goats take their first breath in my hands never grows old. I was not prepared for the great sadness that has gone along with the happiness this year. Those of you who read this blog know that I had some reservations about Tulip catching and freshening this year. She turned eleven in February but was in such good health, I thought things would be fine. I was at work when her kids were born. I made it to the barn just in time to see the last one delivered. She was rather disgusted with me because she had never kidded without me, but I quickly got her milked out and fed her three beautiful babies, all of them spotted from head to toe. From that first evening she didn't act right. It was like she just gave up. She had no appetite and was very listless. I started antibiotics right away in case there was something going on I couldn't see. She had passed the afterbirths with no problem so I knew it wasn't that. There was no sign of mastitis. I honestly cannot tell you what happened but two days later at 1:00 am, she took her last breath in my arms. While she was dying, two pens away, Lilly was giving birth to twins. I thought to myself, "The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away. Blessed be the name of the Lord. " She was a wonderful goat and I miss her everyday. I thank God that she gave me a beautiful black and white spotted doe kid to carry on. None will ever take her place, she was one of a kind .
        On a much lighter note, we were able to head to Sharon and Anita's and pick up three beautiful lambs today. They were in the midst of their annual shearing, so we were able to watch and learn as the shearers made it look so easy. They have a wonderful farm on the top of Cheat Mountain. It was without a doubt the most beautiful place I have ever been. All their sheep are gorgeous and I was able to bring home a Border Leicester fleece to spin. I cannot wait to start working with it. I named our three girls, Esther, Ruth and Naomi. They will be picking out a ram lamb for us this spring and I will be naming him Boaz. I am so excited to start this new part of our life. After we got the girls settled in their pen in the barn, I went back to the house to get my milk bucket and bottles. When I walked back in the barn, one of the sheep baa'd and I was so happy to hear that new sound in our barn.
        Two weeks ago, we brought home 5 Kiko goats for meat. Two does and three kids. They are all doing well and settled right in with the Nubians. They are very quiet goats and very docile also. All together we had 15 babies this year and other than Tulip, it went off without a hitch. I've already made our first batch of cottage cheese this year. I am so grateful to have our wonderful goat milk again.
       So life continues on... we are very busy with all of our newcomers. I thank God for all the blessings He has given us. Oh, I forgot to tell you the brooder has a bunch of new chicks in it and some of the sweetest little banty chicks you have ever seen.
      Sometimes I go to Tulip's grave and just sit and wish I could see her just one more time but I am so grateful for the wonderful years we had together. I was up there the other day, missing her and I felt something pulling on my braid. I turned around and there was little Aurora peeking at me and for a second I could see her mama's twinkle in her eye.

The Wood Frogs are singing

    Friday evening brought us some more thunderstorms. Nothing like Wednesdays storms, just lots of lightening, thunder and plenty of rain. After it had passed, I went out the back door to close up the chickens and I was met by a chorus of quacking ducks in the koi ponds. I knew it was the wood frogs, but they do sound like ducks. It was too dark to see how many but they were pretty loud. They sang to us all night long. By morning, it seems they had called all their friends out of the woods and I counted somewhere between 20 or 30. They were in all 3 ponds and they were singing their little frog hearts out. They will lay their masses of eggs in the ponds and then go back up into the woods. When the tadpoles sprout legs, they leave and then I never see them all summer. I assume they return to the woods.
    Just as I am typing this post, the snow has started to fall outside the window. The frogs are quiet this morning but the snow doesn't bother them. I have seen their eggs freeze in the pond and then they thaw out and go right ahead and hatch. Just another one of God's miracles.
     The lights and cameras are set up in the barn, so we can watch the does at night. It was a beautiful sunny day yesterday, although a bit breezy. The goats and I took a walk on the hill. Tulip, who turned eleven last month, chose to stay by me and take a nap in the sunshine, while the others ran and hopped and played. I sat beside her and I could see little hooves kicking her side as she tried to sleep. She and I have had a lot of good years together and I hate to see her age and slow down. I am a little worried about her, although she has never had any trouble freshening before. Hopefully all will go well.
      I made a batch of strawberry jam yesterday and I am going to go enjoy some on some freshly ground wheat toast. Have a blessed day.

What a Leap !

       Yesterday's Leap Day was one we won't soon forget. The day started cloudy and warm, very unlike February. By the time I had gotten to work, it had started to rain and rain it did. We had a break during the afternoon and then we really got it. Thunder, lightening and the whole nine yards. The old timers around here have a saying " Count the thunder claps in February and that is how many frosts you will have in May". I hope after yesterday, this is one time they are wrong..... I had to go through a lot of high water to get home but by the time I did, we were flooded. The whole back yard was under water. The creek that runs beside our house was roaring. Tim had all the ditches open as far as he could, it was just too much water. He had all the animals in the barn, so I waded across the field to my sisters house to check on her. She has to walk across a wooden bridge to get to her barn. The creek was over that bridge, which is about 4-5 feet above the water. She had to walk across the bottom and around to tend to her animals last night. I headed back home and went in the barn to check on our animals and I noticed the water had started to come in the door and had flooded 3 of the pens. The goats in those pens were about to have a heart attack (they hate water) So I quiickly got them out and then we were able to go outside and divert the water from the door. When I clean pens last week, I dumped the old hay outside the door and Tim hadn't moved it yet with the tractor. So all that hay didn't let the water drain down to the creek. What a mess but at least all the animals were alright. I took a head count on the chickens and it looked like they were all there, although they were a bedraggled bunch. I moved goats around so everyone was in dry pens and headed back to the house. By this time it was dark and had stopped raining. I stood in the dark and listened to the creek roar. It is amazing how quickly our little creek can change from a bubbling brook to a raging torrent. I could hear it roaring from my bed most of the night. This morning it is calming down and is back in it's banks. The song sparrows are singing loudly  "Maids, maids, maids, put on your tea kettle, ettle, ettle." They are our first birds to sing in the spring. I love to watch them sit on a fence post and just sing their hearts out. So life is calming down here on this first day of March, although a bit soggy. I had invisioned maybe putting out some onion sets soon but from the looks of the water standing in the garden , thats's probably not going to happen right away. I wonder....does the leap day count toward being the first day of March, so we can say it came in like a lion??

Getting Ready

        Yesterday was a beautiful day, perfect for barn work. It's hard to clean stalls when you have 50 some hooves under your feet every time you take a step. But with the warm weather and the sun shining, the animals spent most of the day on the hill and that allowed me to clear out the winter build up. The hay was so high in some of the stalls, I could barely open the gates. Now all is clean, with new straw spread down and not even a thank you from one of them. We still have a couple of weeks yet before the does start to freshen but I am ready. I need to do some straightening in the milk room and get the baby pen clean but that won't take long. We have decided tio purchase some Kiko goats to add to the herd. We tried some Boer goats years ago and they have so many problems, we sold them all. The Kiko's seem to be much hardier and we really want some meat goats, so will give them a try. I'll keep you posted.
       I noticed yesterday when I walked past the koi ponds that a lot of them were up at the surface getting some sunshine. The pussy willows are out and the crocus are blooming. After chores last night, Tim and I put pelleted lime on the garden and while we were out there, I went over to the bee hives and lifted the lids. Both hives lived through the winter. It is a little early to start feeding them, but it won't be long. The horseradish is up in the garden too. The birds are singing and I saw a blue bird in one of the nesting boxes. The peppers seeds are all started too.  There are signs of spring all over the farm. We haven't had much of a winter but I am still ready for spring. Oh, I know winter hasn't had it's last say  and I'm sure we will still see some more snow but winter is losing it's grip, I can feel it.
       Along with the lambs we will be adding this spring, I think I will get some more chicks. I can't keep all my customers happy on fresh eggs, so I need a few more hens. I also miss having some banty chickens around, so I am going to get some of those too. A banty hen comes in handy when you want to set eggs. They stay broody so much longer. I'm still trying to talk Tim into a couple of geese too. He isn't real keen on the idea. He has had some bad experiences with geese. How bad can a goose pinch hurt, right? It can't be that bad....
       Anyway...we are getting ready for the rush of new baby goats and all that goes with it. I can hardly wait to start milking again. I hope you are enjoying your "almost spring" where ever you are.

Versatile Blogger Award

     Thanks to Michele at http://simplyscaife.blogspot.com/ She awarded me with the Versatile Blogger Award. It is truly an honor to have received this but even more of an honor to know that there are  fellow bloggers out there who are interested in reading my aimless ramblings of our farm life. There are rules with this award and they are as follows:

       1: Add the award to your blog
       2: Thank the blogger who gave it to you
       3: Mention seven random things about yourself (see below)
       4: List the rules
       5: Award to fifteen bloggers
       6: Inform those fifteen by leaving a comment on their blog
 
     Here are my seven random things about myself:

       1: I love to stay at home, it is my favorite place in the world.
       2: My animals are some of my best friends.
       3: I get some of my best praying done while I am milking.
       4: I love old farm kitchen items.
       5: I love a freshly mown hayfield, I think it is the sweetest smell on earth.
       6: I love to hold a brand new baby goat and feel it take it's first breath.
       7: I love my Lord and Savior more than all these things.

      Below are my blog nominations. I did not have fifteen but I gave you the ones I follow. I enjoy them all and have learned so much from them. I hope you will visit them. It is always nice to leave a comment too. We bloggers love that.

http://firecrackerfarm.com/
http://theblessedhearth.blogspot.com/
http://whitewolfsummitfarmgirl.blogspot.com/
http://missabigailshopechest.blogspot.com/
http://ajoyfulchaos.blogspot.com/
http://frugallysustainable.blogspot.com/
http://canninggranny.blogspot.com/
http://theredeemedgardener.blogspot.com/
http://wonderfullifefarm.blogspot.com/
http://sheepsandpeepsfarm.blogspot.com/
http://amazinggrazefarm.blogspot.com/