 |
| With the time and season changing, we decided to take a walk down to the pond after dinner one night |
We had family visiting this week so I wasn't able to post to the blog. Here are a few comments and updates about the farm:
We had ordered chicks but the incubator at the farm we were buying them from failed so we're waiting for the next batch to hatch.
We will be getting piglets at the end of the month so bought some of the GMO-free feed that we use to get ready for their arrival. It was bought early because we have to order it from a farm that is about 3 hours away and they only deliver to this area every two weeks. We're now talking to them about using our farm (or another nearby farm) as a drop point because we still have to drive about 35 minutes to the closest delivery point right now.
Our billy goat Johnny is hanging in there. He's 9 or 10 years old, which is old for a male, but he's hanging in there. He has fathered over 200 kids so he's had a busy life. He fell down in the pasture earlier this week and Bill had to go help him up. I gave him some sweet feed and an iron supplement so he has a little more energy. I'm glad he's able to live out his old age on the farm. Despite what you might hear about billy goats being mean and dangerous, this one is a sweetie and is gentle as can be. It's probably due to the fact that he was born on the farm and was handled by people all his life.
Neo is still bottle fed but we'll be tapering off his bottles in a couple of weeks. He's now eating solid food (grass, leaves, etc.), so he can be weaned. We did switch him from regular cow's milk from the grocery store to kid formula. We had had a bad experience with the formula when we first started raising goats. We now realize that was due to complications not associated with the formula. Neo is thriving on it and actually never seemed to notice that we were gradually introducing it to his diet while reducing the amount of cow's milk in his bottles. He's now 100% formula fed and doing well on it.
Spring is in the air, although it's not quite here yet. We've had some relatively warm days and the grass is starting to grow, but we've also had some cold. This morning we even had a little bit of sleet. Unfortunately, we've had rain this week (and last) and that will interfere with our planting schedule. As much as we need rain, sometimes there's a little too much. The plants under the grow lights are doing very well this year and I also managed to get a few herbs started this week.
 |
| Gratuitous photo of Mr. Fabulous enjoying life |
Have a great week!
1 comment:
Cherie, nice picture of your pond. We are having warmer temperatures here in Nebraska as well. it's been middle 70s the last couple days with temperatures in the 50s and 60s for the next 10 days. The soil temperature is up to 49 degrees and will keep climbing if the warm days continue. Potatoes will be the first to go into the ground but the soil temperature has to be above 55 degrees. Our usual potato planting for this area is on Good Friday. It just might work this year. We are experiencing some dry weather here. We didn't get our normal amount of snow this Winter and so far this Spring there's been no hint of rain. The 10 day forecast doesn't show any rain so that might be the garden issue for this year.
Yea Neo. He just may defeat the death odds for bottle fed goats and become a thriving adult after all. I'm hoping that he can do it. I hope your weather dries up so the planting can begin. I'm still a little cautious here as the last frost date is May 15th and we had a hard frost two weeks after that last year. I'm having a real urge to start the tomato plants but it's still to early for that. Maybe in a couple more weeks the seeds with go on the heat mat.
Have a great Virginia farm day.
Oh, and congrats on selling the condo.
Post a Comment