Catching up

It's been a while.

We've had life and death since last I wrote: Jazzy died. However Mojo still seems to be doing well. Carolina's milk dried up due to a mastitis infection, and for some time I was dividing my time between sleep and four hour feedings. We're past the worst of it.

The newest babies have hatched and are doing well, although we had one little girl with spraddle leg. A splint seems to have helped. She was a "peel" baby... something many people recommend against. However, she had pipped successfully, but I could see her position was wrong to be able to make it out on her own, and I chose to help. Poor little thing.



Hatching is tiring in any event.


The other chicken babies--not so young, now, perhaps--are doing well in their coop. They have caused my daughter to roll off her chair laughing as they fly to my back or the top of my head to see if there's anything interesting up there. Occasionally Fanny, always the troublemaker, will launch herself into flight and break out of her enclosure. For now, it's more of a temporary playpen until we get the electric fence hooked up.

She takes off like a rocket for no apparent reason, clearing the two-foot chicken wire and then skimming the ground in wild flight toward the apple trees for 20 or 30 good feet. Finally she comes to a halt, and--distressed to find herself so far from her companions--comes screaming back, panicked, until she can find a way back inside.

I can't say that I am fond of Wyandottes if she is a typical specimen. Bossy, noisy, willful, always picking on the other two... how much more pleasant are Jean-Jacques and Marguerite! In my darker moments, I can smell the curry...



Perhaps she senses it here. She looks a bit cowed. Really, though, I won't have a creature terrorizing my flock, be it coon, 'possum or diva.

They won't all fit in the bath, though they do try.



You see Fanny here getting ready to drive out Jean-Jacques. She drew blood. He's the rooster, for goodness sake--you'd think he'd be a bit more inclined to defend his territory, but Faverolles are simply not fighters. They're genteel. Driven out, he mutters astounded at her gall, but nothing else, really. He thinks of her as a mannerless ninny, I should guess. Marguerite, timid though she is, does try to stand beside him when Fanny is at her worst, and Fanny usually backs down, then, because Marguerite is so much larger... though I don't think marguerite has the least idea of what to do should push come to shove. In fact, Fanny is always stealing her food, and would much rather steal a goody from Marguerite than come to The Hand and get a fresh bit of her own. Poor Marguerite. She's always so bereft. It's especially sad, too, I think, because Marguerite is the one with the quickest eye, most likely to catch a tasty bug or grub to begin with... while Fanny simply waits for Marguerite to find something to steal. How I love curry.

Beautiful Marguerite:

A pleading look:


I will have to get some more Marans from MX Farms. Marguerite has such a wonderful temperament. I hope she'll lay well, too. I'm hoping to have eggs by August or September. And I have hatched new plans, as well. For more chickens... naturally. It seems to me that our Cellar house would make a wonderful chicken coop. At 12' x 20', I could probably house 6o chickens in it (although I think I'd want 20 or 25 layers at the most. But the flexibility would give me the opportunity to raise out extra chickens and choose my favorites. Here is the cellar house. What do you think?

Let There Be Goats

Carolina has had her babies--unexpectedly early. I was worried about all I might be called upon to do... in the case of a breach birth, for example, or in case of any other trouble she might have. I needn't have worried, but I wish I had been there.

She had no trouble. I fed her Sunday morning, and she ate voraciously. In fact I heard nothing from her--no disturbance at all--all day. Eowyn can raise quite a ruckus when she chooses. When I went out in the evening to feed them, Alan came with me. He was going to change the light bulb over her stall, and I was going to install the baby monitor, so I could hear her at night if I happened to be sleeping when it began.

She was standing in the middle of the stall, however, a little black lump of fur beside her.




At first, I couldn't imagine what it might be... a raccoon?!! A possum?!!! A giant rat?!!! But, no...

When I came to the realization that she had already given birth to at least one baby, I hardly knew what to do. She seemed okay, but I had no idea whether or not the little one had survived. It was, after all, early.

When checked, however, it was merely curled up and sleeping, and there was another behind Carolina that I hadn't been able to see from outside the stall... also quite alive. Both were bucks. I could have wished for at least one doe.



They are tiny, certainly smaller than Spider, our cat. One was much smaller than the other, and seemed to be chilled, unable to get his feet. I warmed him against my body until he stopped shivering, and then held him up to his mother's teat.

Now, first-time goat-mothers like Carolina can be like any other mothers. They may not know exactly what to do. They may not be prepared for these little aliens to begin sucking on portions of their anatomy--very sensitive portions, I might add. However, Carolina accepted it all with aplomb, nuzzling the little creatures maternally and daintily stepping around them when she needed to move. What a patient mama.

The chilled one, whom we called Carolina's Jazzy Star (Satchmo or Jazzy, for short) was the black one with the little galaxy of stars flecked on his coat... on on his forehead and chest, a couple on his ears, some on his tummy. He needed extra care. I went out every four hours for the first 24 to hold him up to his mother's teat to make sure he was getting enough sustenance.

However, he still didn't seem to be getting quite enough. It was as if he couldn't quite find or keep the nipple in his mouth long enough to get a full belly... so while his brother (Maestro's Sweet Mojo) was getting fat and happy and strong, Satchmo was still unsteady.

At last, I did something I did not want to have to do. I bought "milk replacer" for Satchmo and bottle fed him. I plan to feed him by bottle once or twice a day as a supplement until he can get the hang of nursing from his mama. The formula will not be as good for him by a long shot as his own mother's milk will be. However, if he's not able to get enough, for whatever reason, from her, then it's best he has something additional until he can. Luckily, Mojo will be able to keep Carolina's milk going until Jazzy can join him at the buffet.

In the meantime, I have to admit that bottle feeding has its charms. There's nothing like seeing the tiny little tail wag in greeting.




And his little face is so love-y as he waits for the bottle, it's hard to stop kissing his long enough to offer the food.



Cuddling him is also fun at this point because he hasn't quite figured out where the food comes from, so he'll try to nurse anything that's put in front of him. He's particularly fond of my chin. And when I'm done feeding him, he falls to sleep, just like a human baby might.




Unfortunately, this is when I must return him to his real mother. It really wouldn't do to teach him that he can snuggle with me in bed, which I admit is where I--like a fool--would like to take him. But it wouldn't be much fun when he's a 250 pound stinky buck, I imagine. I don't think it would even be much fun when he's a 40 pound stinky buck.

However, I've got a few more pounds and months before he starts putting on his mature nanny-killah scent, so I'll just have to enjoy the snuggling and chin-sucking now while I can.

The Countdown Begins

The eggs were delivered this morning, a day later than they should have been. The package had seen some rough handling during shipping; the box, which had been stamped "F-R-A-G-I-L-E" perhaps a hundred times, had been pierced through in one spot and dented smartly in another.

However, when I got it home and opened it, the clever breeder had double boxed the eggs and packed them quite securely. He also sent many extras, so that I actually ended with more than I ordered. He even sent some Silkie eggs, in case I wanted to try hatching them. Naturally I do. Silkies appear to be furry rather than feathered. Their feathers lack the barbicels that normally give feathers their shape, so they look rather like adorable little mops, and not very much like gallinaceous birds at all.

This photo, from Storm Stryder Poultry, where I ordered, is of a partridge Silkie--quite possibly the hen who laid the eggs now in my incubator:




Actually, Silkies are not considered very good layers because they're so often broody. Hens stop laying, of course, when they're trying to hatch their clutch of eggs... and Silkies are reputedly such good mothers that they will adopt anything... even golf balls, if eggs aren't available. I understand many people utilize Silkies to set eggs for birds that won't otherwise hatch their own eggs, or that won't do so in captivity very often--birds like Leghorns, or even quail.

What I had ordered were more Salmon Faverolles eggs--seeing as how I didn't get any pullets last time--as well as eggs of the Wheaten Ameraucana, a beautiful bird loosely similar in appearance (to my untrained eye) to the Salmon Favs, but smaller. The coloring is slightly different, and the number of toes is also different, but they also have the bearded appearaqnce that I love, and the eggs are a beautiful blue-green.

I do love the Faverolles. The friendliest bird of the three I currently have is still my Faverolles rooster, Jean-Jacques. I have to wonder if it's because I hatched him myself, unlike the other two... or if it's because I had the time to really spend and choose the friendliest of his bunch to keep... ALSO unlike the hens I have. Fanny and Marguerite are both friendly, of course, but Jean-Jacques is literally ecstatic to see me when I enter the room, and can't wait to perch on me.

Regardless, I should have all those factors working for me again with this hatch, and with all the different breeds and eggs, my incubator is colorful right now.

Here are the Faverolles eggs, much larger and darker than my last batch:




These are the Ameraucana eggs (with the three Silkie eggs):




Here is the whole incubator full:



For the hatch this time, my husband was kind enough to have purchased an automatic egg turner for me. This means I can leave the house for more than a six hour stretch at a time. I'm excited about that, but I think I will miss the personal connection with my eggs, feeling their warmth as I turn them with tentative, gentle fingers.

Animal Husbandry

Animal Husbandry is defined as "controlled cultivation, management, and production of domestic animals, including improvement of the qualities considered desirable by humans by means of breeding." (From the Britannica Concise Encyclopedia)

One wonders why they call it "husbandry." Does that refer to the practice of managing "husbands" for the animals, in the sense of breeding them? More calves, more chicks, more kids, more lambs... perhaps it does, according to the definition. But in a very real sense, I think it also refers to acting the role of "husband" to your animals.

Of course I'm not talking about what might be put humorously as the droit du seigneur. I'm referring to the near spousal sort of care one must take of them if one means to keep them healthy. For industrial farms, perhaps it is quite a different thing altogether. They are mere commodities; the goals are different. Often the goal there is only to keep the animals alive long enough to slaughter, and this by filling them full of antibiotics that thin their intestinal walls enough to allow for optimal growth in as short a time as possible. Just lovely. Of course, there are marriages like that, too.

For the small farmer it is a different matter. For example, I just spent 45 minutes in the stall this morning with my new goat, hand feeding her oats. She feels poorly and is not inclined to eat. After her trip here on Saturday, she hasn't eaten as much as she should. She's pregnant, and should be freshening on the 15th. We hope for two kids... but with a first freshener, sometimes you get only one.

Here she is, Carolina:





She's a darling. Because I appreciate her position, I find myself running to the fields for fresh handfuls of multiflora, burdock or dandelion... cutting up carrots and apples to please her dainty palate, and--yes--spending 45 minutes with her in her stall tempting her to eat racing oats since the regular goat feed, a change from the feed to which she's accustomed, affronts her goatly nature. Here, she shows me what she thinks of it:





I am a husband sent to the store for Rocky Road ice cream; I am the spouse who cooks her partner's dinner. I care for a sick family member. I hold your hair out of your face when you throw up. Didn't you think that was Animal Husbandry, too?

I know what it means.

It also meant, sadly, staying by until the end when my buck, Mathazar, was dying of listeriosis... feeding him through a syringe, cooling him with ice, brushing him, singing to him. It means not going to a party you'd love to go to because one of your animals needs you.

It means staying by the house for 21 days when you're incubating and you don't have an automatic egg turner.

How could I go somewhere, when, perhaps, Eowyn would be relying on me?





Who could resist this face?





Or this one?





Or even these butts?