13 Moons Farm

Mother’s Day on the farm

May 11, 2009 in Chickens | Tags: Baby chicks, incubator chicks, Red Star chicks | Leave a comment

This Mother’s Day, all I wanted was to check things off my To Do list, and that meant farm chores. Getting the baby chicks into a bigger brooder, for example, finishing the installation of a “baseboard” around the garden that will prevent me from tearing vast holes in the plastic deer fence with the string trimmer (note to self: never use plastic fencing again), and brushing the winter coat out of Emma, the livestock guardian dog. Emma’s fur is rather intriguing from a fiber standpoint. Dog fiber actually has a name, “chiengora,” and as a spinner and knitter, I’m thinking maybe I don’t need sheep after all. Maybe all I need is my sheepdog. It’s 80% warmer than wool and sheds water, but I wonder, would my chiengora sweater smell like a wet dog after I’ve been out in the rain for a while? And would the cat sit on my lap while I’m wearing it?

The chicks were a bit freaked out when we moved them to the new brooder, so I took one that seemed in distress and lay down on the hammock with her on the bib of my overalls. The little incubator chick, who has never known a mother, soon fell asleep under the “wing” of my hand. These pictures are a bit fuzzy because the camera was so close to the chick, but it was such a sweet moment that I want to post them anyway.

Going . . .

Gone

Bee day

April 11, 2009 in Bees | Tags: Bees, installing a package of bees, New World Carniolan bees | Leave a comment

Our hive and bees arrived today. Adrian suited up and watched David Neel, the president of the Whidbey Island Beekeeper’s Association and owner of Island Apiaries put the three-pound “package” of New World Carniolan bees into our hive. New World Carniolans do better in our cooler, more humid weather than other strains of bees do. They’re winter hardy, build up very quickly in spring, and are good wax and honey producers.

David removed the teeny cage containing the queen from the package and brushed the worker bees off into the hive

Her highness, the queen, in her teeny cage

Her royal highness, the queen. She will lay about 2,000 eggs a day during her 2-year lifespan.

David removed the cork from the queen's cage using a dental pick

David used a dental pick to remove the cork from the queen's cage

Then he plugged the hole with a mini-marshmallow. This plug is called "candy." The worker bees will eat through the marshmallow in about three days and release the queen.

David poured the rest of the bees into the hive

Adrian looks on while David gingerly places frames over the bees in the hive. Ours is a second hand hive that we bartered for. The frames have wax and goo on them, but the bees will clean them spotless within the next three days or so.

Ours is a second hand hive that we bartered for. The frames have wax and goo on them, but the bees will clean them spotless within the next three days or so. Here, Adrian looks on while David gingerly places frames over the bees in the hive.

David placed an empty super full of frames over the one containing the bees

After hanging the queen's cage between two frames, David places an empty super full of frames over the one containing the bees

David pours the syrup that Adrian and I made into the top feeder. The bees will consume this and start building comb. How they turn sugar water into wax is as a mystery to me.

Adrian places the cover on the hive

We build a hive stand

April 3, 2009 in Bees | Tags: hive stand, keeping ants out of beehives, stand for beehives | Leave a comment

Our bees are coming soon, and we need to have a stand ready to put the hive on when they arrive. By following the verbal instructions of David Neel (the president of the Whidbey Island Beekeeper s Association–web site by yours truly), we built a hive stand today. Having found nothing like it on the Internet, I thought I’d describe the process.

I found a cedar plank that was left over from building the house and cut it in half with a hand saw. Because I don’t have a power saw, this was easier for me than cutting a piece of plywood to size. I knew that if I connected these planks via braces, they would accommodate the 22 x 16.25-inch dimensions of a L an gstroth hive’s bottom board.

It took two trips to the hardware store, but we eventually gathered:

four half-inch galvanized flanges
four half-inch galvanized pipes (threaded on both ends). These come in various lengths. Ours are about seven inches long.
four half-inch galvanized caps
three 6-inch galvanized braces
28 one-and-a-half-inch wood screws.

I marked and pre-drilled holes for the flanges. Or tried to. Both drill batteries were dead thanks to the offspring, who got a talking-to.

Once the flanges were screwed onto the boards, I pre-drilled the braces and screwed those on. Then we put the caps on the pipes and screwed the pipes onto the flanges. I suppose you could do it without the caps, but I found that they offered a cool self-leveling feature. It was easy to loosen or tighten them to level the stand.

The finished stand looks like a little coffee table. We placed it on six 2 x 8 x 16-inch pavers, and placed tin cans under the legs. Pouring oil in these cans creates a “moat” that prevents ants and other invaders from scaling the legs of the stand and entering the hive. This is why I opted not to use regular cinder blocks or a wooden frame as a stand. I like the idea of keeping uninvited guests out of the hive.

Baby pictures

April 2, 2009 in goats | Tags: kids, Mini-Nubian kids | Leave a comment

While she stayed at the Writer’s Refuge, Carolyn Gale took the following pictures of our goats, for which I’m grateful. Now that they’re grown, it’s fun to be reminded of how downright adorable they were.

The goats are named after four of Saturn’s 23 moons. The does are Pandora and Rhea, and the bucks are Calypso and Pan. Moon names are inspired by the name of our farm: “13 Moons Farm.”

Molting–it’s not pretty

March 27, 2009 in Chickens | Leave a comment

Our chickens hit the 18 month mark, which is when they molt. They stop laying eggs during that time, so they can devote all their energy to “changing their clothes.” Buying eggs just feels wrong when you have a bunch of chickens and it was a strange feeling to have to ask guests to bring eggs for a pasta-making venture.

Photo by Adrian

Thankfully, they have begun to lay again. After they molt, they lay fewer, but bigger, eggs.

There’s a chicken in my bedroom

January 26, 2009 in Chickens | 2 comments

The Big Snow took out the net above the chicken yard, and today some chickens figured that out and flew over the fence. We were dog-sitting for friends while they went skiing over the weekend, and the dog attacked one of the escapees. Adrian thought the chicken should be dispatched right away to put her out of her misery, but despite the deep puncture wounds in her back, she looked like she had a chance to me.

So I brought her inside and, with Adrian step-and-fetching, held her on my lap while cleaning and dressing her wounds. She remained bright-eyed and calm throughout most of it. We wrapped her in an an old towel and put her in a plastic tub.

Chicken hospital

It’s funny how conscious we are of the threat that wild animals pose to our livestock. Though owls, hawks, eagles, raccoons, and coyotes could all kill our chickens, none ever have. Three Four have been killed and one has been injured by the dogs of friends or neighbors. And unlike wild animals, none of them did it because they were hungry.

A postscript: the chicken died around midnight of the second night that she spent in my room. Rest in peace, little hen. Thanks for all the eggs.

Birds, bees, and bucks

January 2, 2009 in goats | Tags: bucks | 2 comments

The other day, Adrian came in and told me (in his own words) that bucks are capable of self-administering fellatio.

I thought raising him on a small farm would be educational, I just didn’t realize how educational it would be.

Desparate times call for desparate measures

December 18, 2008 in Uncategorized | Tags: goat blankets, goat coats, goat jackets | Leave a comment

The weather is in the teens and the goats are experiencing their first snow and freezing temperatures. Worrying about them in the cold kept me awake at night, so I got out some unused polar fleece scraps and got creative.

Here is a pictures of the does and bucks sporting their new polar fleece blankets.

The does in polarfleece jackets

As you can see, Pan thinks Calypso looks HOT in his new outfit.

The bucks in polar fleece jackets

Farming in the YouTube age

November 28, 2008 in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

For months, now, I’ve needed to give the goats a pedicure. But not knowing how, I put it off again and again. Finally, I decided to check YouTube, to see if anyone had posted a movie on trimming goat hooves, and you know what? Someone had!

I don’t know what possesses people to film themselves as they do things like this, but I’m so grateful they do! The goats have now had all their hooves trimmed and I feel much better.

“Helpful” goats and an unhelpful dog

October 26, 2008 in Livestock Guardian Dog, goats | Tags: helpful goats, Maremma | Leave a comment

We have a long list of things we need to do to get our little farm ready for winter. Among the items on the list was putting “baseboards” on our quonset-hut style goat shelters to make sure the wind doesn’t blow in. Goats hate the rain, and I knew ours would be spending quite a bit of time in their shelters this winter.

I forget how curious they are. They often positioned themselves smack dab between me and my work. Here is a picture that Adrian took of me drilling holes through the boards, so I could wire them to the stock panels and fence posts that make up the shelters. It’s a wonder that I didn’t drill a hole through Pandora’s nose.

Adrian took a picture of our livestck guardian pup Emma, too.

She has the sweetest personality, and we adore her, but her puppiness drives us insane. Her playfulness means she can’t yet be trusted to be alone with the livestock. She chases and mouths the goats, ducks, and chickens. She plays with Adrian as if he’s a puppy and sometimes inadvertently hurts him. We get mad at her for a minute. Maybe two. And then, well, look at that face. She is as sweet as she is cute. She doesn’t mean to hurt anything, it’s just that she’s 7 months old.

Only 13 months to go until she’s an adult . . . Oy.