What's Happening On The Farm?

Today was beautiful and we took full advantage of the sunshine by working outdoors. We're still cutting and splitting wood. So far, we have cut and split 70 logs and we still have a lot to do. We'll do another 20 logs Tuesday and Wednesday while the weather is nice. The goats sure enjoyed the sunshine today. Everyone was lying in the sun taking full advantage of it too. There is a lot of mud and wet ground from the rain that we had on Saturday night in our bottom but they find higher, dryer ground to lounge around on. Still waiting on some Nigerian Dwarf goats to kid. Of course, they wouldn't kid today while the weather was so nice. I suppose they are waiting for the rain to come in on Thursday of this week. That's the way goats are. They will hold their babies in until the weather is terrible. I've got triplet Nigerian Dwarf doe bottle babies that are growing and doing well. Their mom, Annie, has an udder problem so they nurse from one side of her udder while I supplement them twice a day with a bottle. I believe she could raise all three on one side but I just feel better helping her out some. Had some Flemish Giant rabbits picked up today along with one Nigerian Dwarf kid. It seems as though everyone was out and about in this nice weather. Oh, I almost forgot. I bred rabbits today to have Easter bunnies. I already have requests for certain colors of lionhead and mini-rex bunnies. Tomorrow will be more rabbit breeding. I'll have all of my pet rabbits bred by tomorrow and will have to continue breeding the Tennessee Redback rabbits for about one week. I have approximately 23 Tennessee Redback does so it takes time for the two bucks to make their rounds.

Rain Today

Wednesday was a rather misty, messy day. The temperature was in the 50's but it felt a lot cooler. I delivered a Lionhead doe and a Flemish Giant buck rabbit to the Farmer's Cooperative Livestock Market in Lexington, NC Wednesday morning to two buyers. The Livestock Market is a good place to meet to schedule deliveries of animals. After we got all our animals fed, I began working on my soap. I'm going to be selling my soap at My Sweetheart Candle Boutique in Hillsborough, NC beginning next week. Because of the distance to the shop, I'm shipping my soap to them using a Flat Rate box from the USPS. It is hard to believe how many bars of soap you can fit into one of those boxes. After I get the soap tagged, it will be ready to ship. NOTE: As of May 21, 2010 our soup is no longer available at My Sweetheart Candle Boutique. Please visit our website for other locations near you or to order online. Had a new addition Wednesday morning to the farm, a Hawaiian Black ewe lamb. By the time I found her, she had gotten separated from her dam and had taken up with the Nubians. Needless to say, she doesn't want anything to do with her mom and now she's now in a playpen in my office next to the wood stove. She is quite active and already drinking 3 ounces of milk at a time. She "baas" wanting to be held and sit on my lap while I do my computer work. In a day or two, she'll go in the back of the barn and be Cain and Abel's buddy.

Hippity Hop

These are some of the weaned bunnies that we have for sale. Now is the time to purchase rabbits if you want to raise your own bunnies for the Easter season.

Lionhead Bunnies ($15)

(Some Adult Breeding Age Rabbits Available Too!)

Flemish Giant Bunnies ($20)

9 week old bunnies available now are varying shades of brown. 6 month old Flemish Giant brown bucks ($20). (Bunnies that will be available in 3 weeks are white, gray and black.) Dutch Bunnies ($15)

Soap Making

On Monday and Wednesday nights of this week, I've been making soap. Monday, I made unscented Goat's Milk soap in bars and the molded Nigerian goats and Nubian goat heads. Wednesday night I made some Happy Camper soap. The Happy Camper soap is a good outdoor soap with citronella and eucalyptus oils. I love the citronella smell. This soap will be ready to be packaged and sold in 6 weeks after it cures. Tonight, Thursday, I plan on making some Shepherd's Pride soap that contains goat's milk and lanolin. I made a quick trip to Sadie's in Stokesdale this morning to purchase some aloe vera liquid that goes into this recipe. They were out of it the last time I visited so I had to make a special trip to purchase it. Soap making is getting easier and quicker for me to do. I continue to find ways to make the process easier, faster with less cleanup time involved. I've been using a different stick blender this week and it has make the mixing process so much easier. This Hamilton Beach stick blender doesn't overheat like my previous one did and blends the oils and milk together without much effort. Today, the sun is shining but we got off to a cool start this morning in the mid 40's. As I was getting my goat's ready to milk on the milking stand, the steam was rolling off of their udders as I washed them. I think they enjoy the hot water bath. I'm milking three Nigerian Dwarf dairy goats now. One of them, Sara, has never been milked before. I just recently took her kids off of her to wean them. Sara's naturally polled doe kid is being picked up on Sunday to live in Sanford, NC. I've been milking Sara for three days now and she already knows the routine. Poppy went out to visit Stormy this morning. She is the last of my Nubian does that are being bred for March babies. The others are being held back until March, 2010 to be bred. We also did all our yard mowing today since we will be having a busy weekend and some showers are in the forecast. We are going to NC A&T Technical State University early Saturday morning to attend the Swine & Cattle Artificial Insemination workshop at their farm in Greensboro. The university farm is situated on 490 acres at 3136 McConnell Road. The workshop has two sessions including a "hands on" segment. The Swine segment runs from 8:30 AM until noon and the cattle session will start at 12:30 PM and will run until 4:30 PM. A light lunch will be provided in between the two sessions. This workshop is being given with grant money from A&T and is free for participants. They also will reimburse you for your round-trip mileage from your place of residence to the university farm. These courses normally run $250 - $350 per participant so we thought we would take advantage of this learning experience. Early on Sunday morning the Dairy Goat show will be at the Dixie Classic Fairgrounds. I hope to attend some of that show before heading back to the farm for some goat deliveries. Rabbit sales are up. I've sold many Tennessee Redback bunnies this past week for hunt training and the sales of Lionhead and Mini Rex rabbits are picking up. I've also begun to sell some of my Flemish Giant bunnies this week since they have reached the 8 week old point.

"Love Is In The Air" Part II

Today was a bright and sunny with highs in the lower 70's. It was a bit windy but very nice. We moved some of our Nigerian Dwarf dairy goats into the buck pen with Zeus for March kids. Bridget's Girl, Tabitha, Christine and Cinnamon's Girl went to visit. Clara went to visit Dude in his pasture. We divided the buck pen into two parts and added another hay feeder and water trough to one of the sides . We have some meat goats in one side with a few hair sheep and the Nigerian Dwarfs that are getting bred on the other side. We also picked up litter at the road and mowed from the Boy Scout hut up to Highway 65 on both sides of the road. This will be the last mowing of the season. Yesterday I sprayed grass and weeds that was coming up in our gravel driveway. With the rainy weather we had last Saturday, lots of grass started sprouting through the gravel. This will also be the last time for that chore. We finally got around to washing all the deck furniture and got the deck arranged for the winter minus the log rack. We'll bring that up sometime during October when we need to start firing up the wood stove. It will not be long with lows already at 50 degrees the past few mornings. Last night I weaned some of my Flemish Giant bunnies. I have many colors from several shades of brown, to gray, and black.