Springtime means milking the Goats
Archive for February, 2009
Milking time
Thursday, February 26th, 2009Looks like spring is here…
Thursday, February 26th, 2009Well the milk is starting to trickle – not flowing yet, but we have a few more does to go. The first girl, Hope, is just a first freshener so she’ll have probably another year before we get much – but her bag looks very promising. There will be milking does for sale and/or shares in a few of the goats in a couple months.
The new chicks are starting to lay – about 3 dark brown eggs a day. It’s a good thing too – the oldies, but goodies are laying very few eggs right now. And, no, the roosters still aren’t in the freezer yet and Thanksgiving & Christmas (the Narragansett Turkeys) are still strutting around contrary to their specific names . . .
The new, retro-looking kitchen isn’t complete yet – but it’s down to painting the shelves and making counter tops with the flat laminate sheets. All this to house my beautiful 1950′s Chambers Gas Stove which I got “free”. (My husband cringes when I get something free – well deserved too I guess). It’s waiting patiently to come upstairs after the gas is plumbed and several of its parts are put back on. Can’t wait to do my cheese classes on that stove!!!
What else have we been doing? I helped Pat put in a stove pipe for the wood burning stove – what a nightmare trying to get it into the firebox area! He ended up cutting a piece of the top of the metal firebox out to get the pipe to make the turn into the area where the insert goes – hopefully it’ll make all the difference in how this stove heats.
We are getting ready to head down to Versailles to make product. We are going back to putting Ostrich/Emu oils in most of our products – we miss the qualities they impart.
We are deciding right now when to have a soap making class. Many of you out there have asked – and we try to do as much as we can to please you . . .
We have onions, lettuce, spinach, kale and wheatgrass growing in the basement. We will be starting tomatoes, peppers and flowers very soon. Some of this can be set out during the raised bed class if the weather allows.
The bulbs are starting to push up through the ground, the garlic is peeking up and the babies are starting to be born – it must be Spring is really coming – I just can’t wait!!
The Goatwoman
Almost Spring
Tuesday, February 17th, 2009Good morning!
We have new babies – both Nubian bucks. We’re beginning to milk the doe. She’s not too happy about it – but loves the grain involved!
We have two more does due soon. These does will kid Nupines – a pleasant blend of the finest Alpine/Nubian genetics – with “airplane ears”. Then we’ll be back to fresh milk and no more frozen milk.
This will be the best time to be making cheese. Mozzarella is awesome when made from fresh spring pastured goat milk. Signed up for the 3rd cheese class for this season yet? Hurry, they fill up FAST!
I can’t wait for spring and pasture. Flowers, herbs, setting the starts out of all the heirloom and organic seedlings. The garlic is showing signs of growing – even in all this ice and cold. I’ve even seen some bulbs poking out and the fruit trees in the orchard are getting ready to leaf out.
We are adding emu/ostrich oil back into all of our products that we can. We love what we have found that these oils do for skin. We stopped adding them since they are trans-dermal and would take fragrance oil deep into your skin along with the beneficial ingredients. We will also be adding honey again to most of our products.
The new blueberries are on order and should be here in March-May. We bought much older plants this year so that they can be producing faster. If you signed up for the raised bed classes then you will be helping us by getting some of the beds started for these new plants as well as the continual building of our soil in the market garden.
I hope you’re staying warm and safe!
The Goatwoman