Just another Day on the Farm

March coming in like a lion

Posted on March 3, 2021 by Just another day on the farm

The last day of Feb was mild, so mild that we had our first “misty” fogged in monring on the farm.. it felt like spring and things were melting.. but with over 3 feet as a base plus higher snow drifts ont he farm, it is just showing first hints of sugar snow on the top.

It was perfect timing to have our first lamb be born in that mild weather and its nice to have momma and babe tucked into the big barn in a jug.. the rest of the sheep are coming up closer to the house and being feed out on clean snow.. I am cheating by moving them from place to place, I am lightly seeding out my pasture while also giving each seeding area a boost compost wise with the sheep poo..

Soon enough we will need to go back to the raised feeders but right now, I have a window to keep the feed clean for the sheep and do snow seeding.. I will take it.

With the first hoarfrost morning, it can only mean one thing! Maple tapping time is here, time to get your taps in, your buckets set, your lines ready and to get your boilers or fires ready.. We had two days off run time and then we turned the page into MARCH

It came in as hard and fast as Remmi was coming on the plowed walking paths when I called him! The temps dropped from a high of 2c (which felt so warm lol) to -17 with 60km winds which dropped the cold factor to -30.. We kept everyone in the barn and feed out buckets of warm water and loved having small bales that this winter makes our life much easier at times like this.

The snow storm came and dropped another 3 inches, then another line came and did another 2 inches, then another with another 3 inches and this morning ont he 3rd, we awoke to another inch and half.. so 9.5 inch of new snow on top of our already heavy snow pack in the past 72 hours. So much shoveling and snow blowing.

By next week, they say we will be back up to more normal temps and starting out first maple sap runs proper.. crossing fingers for a good couple weeks of those above 0 daytime temps and below 0 night time.. The maple sugar shacks were hard hit last year with Covid and many of them are struggling big time with year as well. No meals, no maple taffy on snow, no wagon rides.. Those spring weeks of crazyness is what brings in a huge amount of their “extra” money

Hubby’s work has done some big time push back that he has to much unused “paid” time off so he was given a choice of buy out or he must take some time off. March is not good time on the farm for time off but so be it.. Figure its a good time to do a indoor house project, weather will let us open windows enough that we could paint if we wanted. It would appear that many of the staff have not taken their “time off” this year working from home.. what a mismatch.. so much work, so many overtime hours, so many weekends worked.. but now someones said.. wait.. they are not taking their time off.. sigh!

We will not be heading off the farm much, I will pay to have the needed items (if we do not have it already) done as a driveway drop off.. In the last week of Feb, we have had our first local UK varient Covid outbreak at our local cheese factory, they closed the shop, tested and found X cases and tested all 180 staff and are watching it closely.. that work place is about 20ish min drive time from the farm..

Thankfully we have our seedlings to start, so many baby plants to look after, hundred plus daily feathered friends visit and light up our yard, the singing is a delight and they make me want to grab my camera and spend time trying to catch them at their best or funniest. The hounds keep us busy in so many ways.. ah teenagers.. never ending training, you can teach them by training or you can teach them by letting them get away with it..

The horse’s have come though the hard part of winter in good shape, they are not to fat but they are for sure out of shape, but we will be starting walks and getting ready for riding season coming. We are planning on bringing in a couple truck loads of sand to create better drainage in the one area and ideally I am hoping to get some outdoor drainage mats. I love my land so much but not when its a wet/horse combo..

I will be looking forward to getting a home cowboy horse course set up this year and getting up in the saddle in 2021. I am not at all sure how much off farm riding I will be doing, at least not on the forest horse trails but I will do private land riding for sure. Maybe this will be the year that I can finally get a bridle that works with Bojangles odd head lol.. part of his head is draft size, part if warmblood and then he has this tiny mouth/bit size.. he is very hard to fit tack to.. thank goodness for saddle blankets now that you can add shims into the pockets to get saddles to fit better.. Caleb’s tack is all good but I will give it all a good going over and make sure nothing needs to be replaced or repaired.

I need a new “farm” camera, one of those smaller waterproof, drop from this height, outdoor its a active hard knock life camera’s that fits in my hard case.. Man, in day to day life, I am hard on my camera’s.. I baby my BIG ones but burn though the active one’s in about a year, maybe two if I am very lucky.. but on the other hand (knock on wood) my phone is going strong after 5 years, which in todays world makes it old.. not that I care really.. it does the job and I see no reason to replace it till I need to do so.. but I will be honest, I also grab hubby’s phone for certain things as its newer and I can get better photos and video’s with it.

I was gifted a go pro as a thank you gift for a job well done and I will need to learn about it and see what I can do in that regards as well.. Well, other then that, what can I say. we followed up on what I had talked about, teeth cleaned, new glasses done, some prepping while the items are in stock, some topping of stock used and the day to day grind moves on..

How are you things with you? Did March come in like a lamb or lion in your neck of the woods? Things still nice and quiet in your area in regards to Covid? Have you been enjoying winter? What is your snow cover like? Have you been out Birding in the past weeks..

Posted in Life moves on daily | Tagged Catahoula, Common Red Poll, Deep Snow pack, Farm Life, fog, Hoarfrost, Hoarfrost on tree rings, horse back riding, Maple trees, Misty mornings, Sheep in fog, Snow pack, Sugar Snow, Tapping Maple trees | 8 Comments

Raven Picking out wool and dry felting it for travel

Posted on February 25, 2021 by Just another day on the farm

What a amazing thing to happen today.. I was in the kitchen and a flash of black caught my eye by the sheep flock out eating hay that I can see from out the living room window..

Ravenpullingwoolfromsheep

Sorry for some of the photos, It was a very long distance even for my camera and it was though the living room glass but I knew that this was a WOW and I really seeing this moment..

Raven collecting wool directly from the sheep

Picking the best wool bits

and here comes the WOW.. double wow.. the raven is dry felting these wool bits into a travel ball! Weaving each bit into the ball, pulling up and shaking it to fluff and then working in more bits.. look at the size difference!

Dry felting the wool into a travel ball

Here comes his mate? He or she hopped off the sheep and gifted the wool ball to the other bird on the sheep pathway.. I was only able to get a photo of the other bird coming in for a landing, they were moving to fast from such a distance that I was not able to get more then black blurs in the trade off..

while it is very common for birds to collect the shed under coat of dogs, cats, horses’ and my shed hair sheep wool, its it normally done off the ground, off the rubs spots on trees or branches.. Lots of peaple brush out their dogs winter coats and put it out for the birds..

This is the firest time I have ever seen a raven go on the sheep, carefully select the best wool bits it wants and then collect them into a pile and then pick up and weave the bits into a wool ball that is well enough made that it was handed off to its mate? and flown away with?

Have you ever seen this? For that have sheep, directly on the sheep, carefully taking each wool shed out and then piling and then loosely dry felting it into a travel ball??

Posted in At the kitchen table | Tagged Canadian northern Ravens, Raven, Raven collects wool directly from the sheep, Raven creating sheeps wool balls to fly with, Raven dry felting sheeps wool, Raven takes the sheeps wool and dry felts it into a travel ball | 14 Comments

Feb (Baby Greenhouse Update)

Posted on February 23, 2021 by Just another day on the farm

The new indoor greenhouse has been preforming its job in a outstanding way, baby salad greens by the tray have been produced.

The pea shoot have been lovely as well, cooking up with that lovely green with hits of bitterness that works so well with a nice fatty meat to eat with it.. The Pawpaw seeds have had 8 sprout to date, and we are waiting yet on 9 more.. I am hoping that we will get at least a dozen or more to go into the big pots this year, everything tell me to raise them in pots for year 1 and not plant them out in the food forest till year two.. so i will just plan and prepare the plantings spots.

I have started some of the very long starts.. Leeks and Celery has been planted out in long rows in full trays, These typically take a good while to come up, in terms of Celery, on average 3 weeks but in my new indoor greenhouse, they were fully up by day 7.. I will admit that worries me a touch on my planned timing.. everything in the greenhouse is starting and growing faster then I normally get in older set up, which means I might have some issues with spacing in regards to transplanting and fingers crossed that I can bring trays in and out from the side house greenhouse to the living room at a later point once they get to a certain size,

I was finally able to get a reasonable amount of seed starting soil and potting soil but not as much as I need, it worry’s me a touch but I will keep on it, they say they will be getting more in, and I hope they are correct, for some things once it warms up enought I might have to really make a few compost piles really hot and turn them rapidly and then screen them for soil and back to the piles.. One of the good things is that I have been able to confirm that I can get another load or two of wood based/well turned cow deep back one year old compost blend, each load is right around 22 tons and I have asked that I am ideally looking for at least two loads at 44 tons of soil/compost.. Given its age, it’s not really compost per say, it is in fact soil age wise.. but it is lovely and its water holding ability with the wood is very nice.. Plus of course my own livestock compost piles etc.

What a lovely root system

So this weekend I needed to trainsplant my 6 week old very early tomato starts, I started with 4 seeds, three came up, they were transplanted into their pots at their first set of true leaves and they were just thriving. but it was clear that they needed to be moved to their 2 gallon pots, what a lovely root system they have and they were certainly ready to be transplanted, I did the normal trick of planting these very deep indeed, they were taken very close to their last bottom set of leaves, which will allow that lovely thick (what a thick stem these guys have) to root out.

They did a bit of a droop of couse with the man handling but they have perked up and the little greenhouse has its own spider now, I saw him or her so far I have not seen much in the way of bugs but I have seen one little something but I put a asian beetle in (what most think of a ladybug out here) and it cleaned up nicely.. the spider came on its own but i will let it stay..

I can hardly believe these are 6 week plants and I will be starting my peppers this weekend, but will be holding a number of things a extra week or two off from starting as its clear they will start and push faster then I am used to, which means they must size up an I do have limited space and i can imagine tha that the shock of going from the indoor greenhouse to the 3 season outside greenhouse will for a number of things need hardening off even more then normal.. and I already do that alot, taking them from the living room to the greenhouse for the day hours and back to the house for evening..

I think its safe to say that the patio tomato’s will next go into their 5 gallon pots and that we will have flowers and eating tomato’s in spring while I normally only have 4 to 6 inches starts 🙂 A good thing really.

On the other hand, we have snow.. we have added another 12 inches plus since my last post and we are expecting another foot easily this week yet.. the big pups are having much fun, but if we want to goin the fields you need snow shoes, ski’s or a skidoo.. Only plowed or packed trails are walkable at this time. We are not lacking snow cover this year..

Hope you are doing well?

Posted in Gal in the Garden Series, Garden, gardens | Tagged Early seedlings, indoor greenhouse, indoor seed starting in feb, Salad greens, Seed starting, Snow pack, Tomato plants, Transplanting Tomato plants | 5 Comments

Freezing Sheep Colostrum

Posted on February 19, 2021 by Just another day on the farm

Lambing and Kidding time is here.. a great post on putting up extra colostrum when possable in case you need it..

Just another Day on the Farm

Below is a really great post on Freezing Colostrum but first a update.. I missed the post yesterday, what a day.. I was up before the sun, showered and ready to head off the farm for Eco-farm day about an hour away.

Very excited about it, lots of good talked and seminars that I was wanting to attend and even better a dear girlfriend was going to be there so a nice planned visit at lunch.. but the sheep had other idea’s, Hubby came in and said, hon. you need to check this ewe..

he was right, she needed some supportive care and I assumed that she would also be birthing pretty quickly, yes on the support, no to the quickly, and a second female yearling girl started as well

We are still waiting on the bigger female with twins and the yearling had a single stillborn lamb, so we have…

View original post 715 more words

Posted in Life moves on daily | Leave a comment

Changing Ocean Patterns..

Posted on February 19, 2021 by Just another day on the farm

https://www.severe-weather.eu/global-weather/gulf-stream-amoc-ocean-anomaly-united-states-europe-fa/?fbclid=IwAR1Me04U8QadrJHuIrEsFRGtlKFZDmOU3IzhVjwFKY0FySe89IrIctFV78o

122588056_3980380688643381_1656022904674846431_n

Hello Folks, I truly hope that you have had some good things happen this week, we have had the local lockdown move to orange and we have a very low case count at the moment locally so we are catching up on a few things, getting our teeth cleaned/checked any worked needed, order in another set of glasses with the check done late last fall in the last break, we took the check when we could but we have held off till the new year rolled over so we could get coverage for a percentage of the cost.. which only happens every 2nd year. We also have a couple other check ups and so on that will be happening while we have the ability to do so..

There has even been some bits of good news around the world, which is nice.. can always use that.. then there has been some not so good.. what is happening in Texas right now, my friends stay safe down there and that is going to be a BIG cleanup job when that starts..

However the really big news, the longer term going to effect us, canada, and globally that came across my radar is the post I have linked to above..

It is a big long read and honesty some of it for me as a crazy long slog because they are starting and writing this from the point of view that you do not have a basic understanding of the process so i found myself struggling to get though the explaining the process to get to the good stuff.. But the bottom line is.. ITS NOT GOOD STUFF..

if they are right and it surely looks like they might be, its going to to effect our growing season all over in a many ways.. Now I do not just mean, my growing season or yours, I mean it has the ability to effect growing patterns in a number of countries..

On the larger farmer scale, to a point, you can change your crops, there are crops that do better in wetter springs, but wetter falls means higher drying costs, which rises prices over all and because so many are in line for the dryers, it means loss of crop value.. the difference between taking a human grade crop off and getting it dried properly vs having that crop stay to long in a cool wetter fall with a line up for the dryers can easily drop it down to livestock quality.

Now for us personally in terms of growing our food and for our local farmers market gardeners.. this is a HEADS UP! You really need to dig into that read (if you have the basic’s the meat starts about 50 to 60 % downward) and figure out where you are in terms of living and see how you are going to be effected I have readers all over the globe and some are going to be effected by the “warmer” wetter big nasty in the middle.. and many others are not going to have their normal milder climate due to the effects (UK overall) and then there is N.A. Again changing massively to a point on which coast line side you live on.

Someone living in Western Canada is not going to feel the same effects in such a direct way as someone living on the East coast will. I had few folks locally seem to think we would not feel much effects here in the central.. I even had one bold enough to say.. the great lake effect will moderate it..

NO.. while it will make a difference, it WILL not stop what is coming, there is a reason they are called super storms, and their reach will be MASSIVE, I do not want to consider the infrasture damage while trying to figure out help in the middle of C-19..

However for ourselves, we are now living a age that we can plan, prepare and use many garden knowledge and tools to help us continue to have a good year, maybe not a great year for everything.. but with careful planning a good year with care and work, I think its very possable.

I can not take this knowledge and use it to figure out the general overview for where you live as each of you will have your own location and your own personal micro climates and so on.

However for me on the farm, the outtake for my local area looks to be this.

Longer Cooler Spring

Overall Wetter Growing Season with overall lower heat units

Increased possablity of heavy rains

Cooler shorter fall

More Snow with at least a section of a colder winter.

Each of those factors will need to be looked at as its own and I will certainly be watching this very closely but if it continues to look like this is happening, it will effect a number of my garden plans, from how I make the beds, to placemend or even direction of swalls, to putting a couple very shallow rain gardens to more cover crops to shorter growing climbing plans and more..

If you are planning a big garden to help feed your family and to fill your pantry, I strongly recommend you give this information its due and plan accordingly.

This is my heads up.. the AMOC is changing its patterm and we are going to feel its effects globally!

Ps, I will go over all the different adjustments in the garden as those posts go up and make sure to point out, how or why I am doing them in regards to the AMOC weakening..

Posted in At the kitchen table, Gal in the Garden Series, Garden | Tagged AMOC, Amoc Weakening, canadian Homestead, Farmgal, Garden, Gardening for reduced heat units, homestead, Ocean patterns effecting food prodution, Planning ahead, Planning for a cool season garden | 4 Comments

Gardening Giving Thanks for the Deep Cold..

Posted on February 15, 2021 by Just another day on the farm

From Coast to Coast the winter cold and snow has truly arrived, breaking records in the west dropping down into the -50C, tipping into the -40 easily in alberta, sask, manatoba and so on.. even the moderate B.C. has been tipping over into cold enough for snow instead of rain.. and the east coast of canada has been cold and so much snow.

We are gearing up this morning for yet another snow storm which could easily drop a couple feet of snow on the farm, our snowblower will be getting a good work out as will the shovels, and fingers crossed that the pressure drop does not mean new lambs but it often does..

I have been hearing the general public focused on the cold in the sense of.. o winter, why, its so hard.. etc.and I get that.. for anyone that is having trouble paying the heating bills, does not have money for new winter gear or just does not have winter gear for this kind of cold, call and see if there is programs to help you, stay safe out there.

However as I listened to the radio talking about the fact that this deep cold would last days an that it would be three weeks of steady -20 or below for province after province.. a smile great on my face..

Can you guess why? Did you think because

Its Killing Cold..

Well if you did, then I know you are a gardener and might have a eco bend to you..

Yup. that smile on my face was because that kind of deep cold is going to due wonders for our forests, for our gardens, its hard enough and long enough that its going to do a great job at killing out huge swaths of invasive bugs that have been pushing up our way from the states due to our mild winters and warmer summers.

“While most Albertans despair the cold, those on the front lines of the fight against the mountain pine beetle are quietly rejoicing, said Janice Cooke, an associate professor in the University of Alberta’s department of biological sciences.

Untold numbers of young beetles are freezing to death, Cooke said.

“The colder we go, the more we kill,” Cooke said in an interview Monday with CBC Radio’s Edmonton AM.

“We’ve been very fortunate this year; the cold snap that we’ve had has been particularly vicious where the outbreak is of most concern and that’s not only in Jasper National Park, but beyond the park gates towards Hinton.”

News – Alberta’s cold snap likely decimated mountain pine beetle – The Weather Network

While I do believe in a very active bio yard and of course the birds need those bugs and catapillers, even the mostly seed eating adult birds need lots of higher protein creepy critters to feed their young on, I am still going to do a little happy yes as I know that this deep cold is helping control some of the local “pest” populations in my yards and area.

Its a good reset for the bugs that have over the generations adapted to our climate and it will help kill off a good percentage of those that have been in a growth pattern due to the milder winters we have been having locally..

What do you see less of in the yard or gardens or bush on the years after a really good hard deep winter freeze?

Posted in Climate Change, Garden | Tagged cold winter weather, Deep cold helps kill off larva, Gardeners understand why the deep cold in winter can be a good thing | 8 Comments

Friday Rambles.. Grab the “O S$#^T Bar” and hold on..

Posted on February 12, 2021 by Just another day on the farm

Hey Folks,

I wish I could say come over, have a coffee but nope.. I am dreaming of summer visits around the newly designed visiting area’s outside.. So grab your zoom screen, your hot cuppa and pretend we are all having a big old at the table meeting in the new way..

So first the good news.. As most will remember we had some very hard core (I am truly break down into tears grateful to have my husband each day) medical issues this past year.

The heart issues are stable with meds at this point but we have been working hard to get with medication his blood sugar numbers down.. We have changed so much and he has been faithful in his excerise plan and weight loss and so much more.. In later fall we got his AIC which was at 9.7(canadian System numbers being used)

We got our first AIC test results since all the changes this week and he came in at 5.5.. this is outstanding, its in the normal range.. but its in the normal range with meds, excerise and a VERT strict meal plan.. He is also around 50 pounds less in weight over the same date last year now being around 160 to 165. Very proud of him.. One day at a time will help create better health overall.

Now on to the bad news..

I am not sure if its a canadian thing? or a truck or SUV 4 by 4 thing but our vehicles that are going to be taken on rough rides, rough roads the passangers side has this grip handle bar on the top of the door and when things are going to really throw you around even with or without your seatbelt.. everyone locally tells you to grab the ” O shit bar”

That lead car is me in the ice races a number years ago, that car was slipping and sliding all over the muddy track, the windshield was so covered with mud/slush that it was almost impossable to see ahead and I have never been so glad for seat belts, crash hemlets and steel toe boots .. I think what is coming locally for me is going to be just as a crazy ride..

Well for everyone locally in my province and in other places and counties, you had better be grabbing for your bars..

Ok, so if you do not believe that Covid is real.. just stop reading right now, unless you want to get the release of yelling at your computer screen or email or phone depending on how you read this, in which case read on.. we all need a release.. but if you want to try and tell me so in the comments, please refrain.. I will not read them, I will delete them, I will not reply and I WILL not post them on the blog..

So we are still in lock down here in ontario and they think we are going to be opening up to “orange” on Feb 16th.. We already have hundreds of found cases of the UK varient, we have found the South Africian Varient and we have had one Brazil Case in my province to date.

Now we are tracking the waste water in ottawa which will help to a point and there are this and that that will help if its used properly.. but we have also had a preview of what the UK Varient can do..

We watched it roll into one of our elder homes, rip though the elderly, the staff, the staff’s family and we had a over 40 percent dealth toll, never mind what the effects will be longer term (which is unknown).. the last offical report I read was that it was a 46 percent dealth rate.. It spread so fast, so hard.. it was crazy at the difference.

Right now, I have had more peaple’s lives touched by “the effects of covid lockdowns” in terms of early deaths due to health issues not being treated properly, suicides, overdoses, Marriages coming apart, peaple losing their homes, mental health issues coming to the front then I have had peaple that have gotten it.

In my own friends, I know 4 peaple that have had it confirmed by a test, I know a few more that I am sure did have it without a test, I have sadly had a few peaple who have lost their parents or their uncles.

And that is without a doubt part of the problem we are facing.. we are hitting a brick wall, a year into this peaple are getting really tired, they are in many cases between rock and hard place.

Sadly, it has not “personally” touched enough lives to really get the point home.. we have in so many cases had that 1st world protection.. the CERB made a huge difference to millions of canadian lives to get them though the first country wide lock down.. the roll out of programs after programs have been pushed.. not all of them great, some of them truly sucked and everyone will tell you none of them were enough..

But! for a huge percentage of canadian’s between never having had covid yourself or in your family, never having had anyone in your circle die and having the layer after layer in the past year of different forms of goverment and community support, we just do not undestand what is coming..

I am a strange one, I love storms, other peaple run from storms, I love them.. I love the power, I have never been a storm chaser but I have never hid from them either.. I meet them as they come.

when it comes to this brewing storm that is building right now in my province, I am preparing for it as best as we can, but it scares the M@^@%& F@%&@%& out of me..

We are in a race between vaccines (not going to happen) the provincal goverment need to open up to give everyone businesswise a 4 to 6 to 8? week window of sales before they EXPECT the UK varient to overtake the one we have now and that we will be in the thick of a brutal 3rd wave and fo us locally a 4th lockdown

Now they could all be wrong.. I could be wrong.. I am ok with being Wrong! I want to be wrong..

All the peaple lulled into a sense of safety, safety due to being young, safety due to being healthy, Safety due to being able to work from home, Safety due to where they live, Safety due to their job choice in life, Safety due to having enough income that they are midagating their risks..

Its all about to fly out the window.. its a numbers game.. and just like a gambler that has rolled well for the last 4 rolls, they are on a high.. and they are riding it.. they wil beat the house, they have the luck, they have more skill..

Nope, its all about the stats peaple and the house always wins..

In this case, its all about the numbers, the stats and the “house” aka some version of Covid 19 and its growing lists of varients are about to collective call the bill due..

Its going to hurt.. Hurt in so many ways.. HURT BAD..

and I am about to say something that will seem like I do not understand what everyone is saying in regards to safety. and after everything above, I am sure you are going to go WHAT?

Here it is.. Find your godram bubble folks, and HOLD IT TIGHT! We were NEVER meant to go though something like this alone.. NEVER..

The govements got that one right, we need each other, we need to support each other, we need hugs, touches, talk and it is NOT fair for a second to think that our spouse or our roommate or even in a busy household a mixed age family was EVER expected to deal with a pandemic mental and physical needs alone. We need our Tribe

So for what its worth, pick carefully, if you are not lined up perfectly.. DO NOT DO IT.. but they are out there, talk and talk and TALK some more.. find your peaple, find your tribe.. make your bubble, I do not care if you have to hide that bubble from the “snitches” or that it “breaks” the rules..

Bubble up peaple, create, use and be a support group for those you care about..

The goverment will try and throw this and that peice meal.. the community will try and help when it can.. but that WE ARE ALL IN IT TOGETHER..

Its a tag line peaple and good one , its also a bold face lie..

If We are lucky, very lucky.. we are out for our loved ones, ourselves and if we stretch wide enough, the next level of who we care about, be that friends circle, be that our church group, be that our garden or book club or our AA group or the coffee circle at the tims..

What we are not out for is EVERYONE.. Globally we are a big country that loves to act like a big fish, but if you have been watching, reading and listening, we just had our hat handed to us by the EU and the USA.. with a BIG OLD.. NO(USA) and WAIT YOUR TURN and we will tell you when that is by the EU..

O there was spin.. but that is the sum up.. you are on hold.. spin it whatever way you want.. but they are getting their vaccines.. you are not.. made that suddenly became real..

Don’t believe in the vaccines but still reading anyway.. fine.. that will apply in other things as well.. Take your pick.. it will apply..

Real and clear on where we fit in the order of thigns.. a hard pill to swallow because its not how we see ourselves.. Its a lesson but I am not sure we will have learned it fast enough that will stop 10,000’s or 100,000’s of thousand of more canadian’s deaths.

For those of you who hare living this right now.. Brazil, you are in my prayers.. for those that are in the grip.. I watch with compassion and fear in equal parts (the UK an the EU) for those in the slide downward, my heart does a double thump and my gut gets that tight sick feeling.. (USA)

and for those that have locked it down, keep it out! AUS, NZ and our North and so on.. stay strong, don’t bend at this point.. but don’t think you are out of the woods yet..

Stay strong, Stay Safe, Support your peaple, Share your faith in each other..

And hold on to that bar.. hard.. because the road is going to get real f$##&%” rough for the next while..

Posted in At the kitchen table | Tagged At the kitchen table, find your tribe, Friday Rambles, Friday Rambles around the table, prepare, support each other | 9 Comments

Cold.. So cold and still in lockdown..

Posted on February 11, 2021 by Just another day on the farm

The Cold has clamped down across the country, the west is in the deep freeze, I have a couple family members that have woke up to minus 47C.. that is deep biting cold.. bitter to your bones cold..

So while we are also having a cold snap on the farm, and it is a chilly minus 27C with nasty winds, we are still having sunshine.. which is awesome, because its pouring sun heat into the living room.. pull the heavy winter curtains for the dark and open them wide for the sun warmth..

The sky’s are clear which makes it colder at night but gives us such pretty blue during the day, something I always loved about my birth province is alberta.. big sky country!

Highbushcranberryfruit

Its that odds time of year when we can be in the “frost bite” warning temps while the sun if you lay in it can warm your bones.. Grateful for the small sqaure bales on these days in the barn.. so much faster to grab those bales and get them out to the horse’s and sheep.

A Evening Grosbeak Male enjoying his BOSS

The wild birds by about 200 give or take a few dozen on any given day are thriving on their BOSS.. While they have cleared all the other trees, the seed bearing grasses they are not eating the high bush cranberry fruit.. spoiled birds lol

What a good looking Catahoula Remmi is!

The younger pups are having lots of in house training, dog puzzle, mental work, find it and toys and bully sticks but they still must have a couple runs a day.. they are just big active breeds that need to get out and move.. So I layer up, and walk the paths that we have blown and shoveled out.. we have not left the farm in to long.. even I want to have a driveway visit.. or a bush hike.. when warms up a touch, we are hoping to go snowshoeing.. I hope to get you some nice photos on the trip..

We are starting to e-collar train Remmi so that he learns when he gets “buzz” that he needs to turn and run back to us and get cookies and reward.. this NOT a shock, its only a buzz feeling and sound.. So it will be starting to show up in his off farm photos at times.

They say the cold out west is settled in and will be keeping there till the end of the month, for us however, we have four more days and then its to start to warm up just a touch.. I hope they are right..

Taking each day one at a time, meeting each issue as it comes.. Working hard to see each small blessing and taking the time to reflect as needed.. Its always a harder week for me between Feb 2nd and Feb 7th.. This year had a number of outside our control added pressures.. nothing you can do but dig in and hold hard.. time will bring you to the other side..

I hope you are all layered up, safe and sound with warmth in your homes and in your hearts..

Posted in At the kitchen table | Tagged At the kitchen table, Catahoula, Evening Grosbeak Male, high bush cranberry, winter cold on the farm, Winter Feeding the wild birds BOSS, Winter high bush cranberry fruit for the birds | 15 Comments

A little light hearted fun.. Mrs. Brown and her twins.

Posted on February 10, 2021 by Just another day on the farm

A lovely friend of mine made this adoreable knitted sheep.. She is a Brown girl with a black mask and a lovely full sized ewe 🙂

But she has a surprise.. She was ready to have her lambs..

What a handsome set of twin she had and you will note, she was fully bagged up and ready to nurse them 🙂

I have seen online that there is patterns for dairy cow that has calves, a pig sow that has four to six little piglets.. ..

On a slightly more then that is just so CUTE, I do like that I can line them up and could do a little bit of teaching or as a lambing tool, as you can move the legs and so on.

Have a Great day folks..

Posted in At the kitchen table | Tagged Its the small things, Knitted lamving wool mother sheep with twin lambs, Knitted Wool Sheep, Knitted wool sheep with lambs, Knitting, Lamving, sheep, Take your breaks when you can | 5 Comments

Native Plants are the must have “hot garden item ” of 2021

Posted on February 9, 2021 by Just another day on the farm

When it comes to landscaping, garden centers and the local garden groups locally, provincally and across N.A.

The HOT trend for 2021 is without a doubt..

Native Plants with tag lines including plant natives, support the bees, support the butterflies and other native bug life and more..

Now the really great thing about this trend is that it works for both types of peaple.. landscaping company’s really can plan and plant your city yard with stunning native choices that will do amazing, and support all kinds of wildlife.

BUT they also need to include the knowledge that that tree that is a natural native host to say 11 native butterflies cycle means that in real life, you will have catapillers on that tree and that sometimes it will not be as pretty as the “imported that will not support” this means many things that the average city home owner can find challenging , including the fact that a health amount of catapillars means that wasps will come to your yard and sadly most peaple just see the colors and think they are all jack-ass’s like yellowjackets when point in fact many many yellow and black wasps are in fact part of a nature yard and gardens in a healthy and postive way.

Same with birds, I love my birds and it never occurred to me that someone would have a issue with birds but I have heard it, the birds are pooing on this or they are making a mess..

So let me round that out in a very clear way, putting in native’s in the back and front yards of the urban is great but not if they still have the yard sprayers coming once a month, not if you still spray the trees and so on..

In that case, the plantings will not help the over all issue but it can be a boon to the landscape company’s and the native producing company’s.

Now lets flip this from the average urban and move it over to urban homesteaders, the burbs, small and large homesteads and big community gardens and urban or country food forests and hedge rows and more.

I want to look at this from two angles..

So the first is that you MUST as the gardener, the homesteader stop undervaluing your local native plants. We have for so many years loved our wild natives, what many of us call our “Bird Gifts”, our ditch finds or they grow in a huge patch down there or its a straight line, so one of the past owners of the land or great-grandpa or grandma must have planted them at some point.

Many of us have had a bad habit that “new” improved and bought has more value, we put more value on our bought “eurapean” plum vs our native plum.. The one I see alot now is bought elderberry’s vs wild elderberries.

Now I get it for a very small yard, if you only have room for one or two of each, then of course you want to get the most for your small space and ideally have proven results.. but if you have any length of garden time under your belt, you know that is WAY to simple. soil, water, weather, feeding, pruning and sun hours all effect your yeilds from year to year..

We all adore reading those seed plant catalogs and what do we love best.. Aunt Bess’s Y, found in 1800 or early 1900’s.. and so on..

Here is the exciting NEWS.. that can and should be EVERY SINGLE one of us!! .. Stop right there and let that sink in..

farmgalsblackchokecherries

Farmgal challenge 2021.. I want you this spring to find all your wild fruiting bushes/trees.. we are going to take walks and we are going to spot those flowers and we are going to map and mark out our wildlings and we are going to try all of them.. I am going to walk us though find, learning, marking (in a careful way that ideally does not bring others looking lol) and taste testing, how we can help them, recipes and ways to bring out their flavours

farmgalshighbushcranberries

We are going to get out there and do this for ourselves but I also have plans to lay out a plan to help all your garden folks and homesteading folks to come up with a way to create a small income stream if you want to do so.. we will get to that at a later point and I will link all the posts together interlaying them.

So lets bring this back to my comment about undervalue.. I have plans to buy very few extra’s to bring to the farm but I saw a post on my local native plant group that a larger producer of trees, bushes and so on so off I popped to a nursery that is 45 min from my farm.

I was thrilled to see all of my food forest native plants and then i looked at the sizes and the prices.. the most I went from plant to plant to plant, my frown lines got deeper, which menat I was thinking hard..

I finally shook my head, and did a little number crunching.. Rounding things out to a average between the lowest and the highest and then figuring out that x the amount of Native plants that we transplant out of our nursery area’s, wild bird started, ditch babies and farmer fields local edges that we moved into the two new massive hedgerows planted out into 2020..

I am rounding out to 150 to make it easier and that means we moved well over 3 grand of natives.. if I had ordered, bought the same plants form the nursery, by the time we paid, tax, shipping/handling and so on.. we would have spent 4 thousand.

When we spent days moving these, at no point did it cross our minds at the value of plants we were moving, the value was in our time.. and of course our time has value but we often forget that if you needed to BUY these mass plants at those sizes that it can be worth a great deal of money.

We are often focused on food production, what the cane, plant, bush or tree looks like, maybe we are also looking at it from eco as well.. but we also need to a starting value.

If you have wild blueberries and they grow freely in your bush lots and you pick all you want each year and never think anything of it.. the fact that right now, a 24 inch high low bush blueberry bush in a 3 gallon pot will locallly start at $22 and could go as high as $29..

Now I will fully admit that five years ago, you could have found them 12.99 to 15.99 but just try and find that right now.. maybe you can in your next of the woods but you can not in mine!

Each type of plant needs to be looked at as its own.. some can be spring sold as a bareroot/little soil, ready now to plant!, others if you have the pots to do so, can be prepped a bit more and be done in the spring but sold for fall plantings.

If you took the time to carefully dig and transplant 5 or 10 plants, this spring filling in those holes with a good mix of acidic needles, a little bit of compost, so you have no holes to step into, and gave them a small prune for shaping grew them with care over the spring/summer and then offered them at 100 for a lot of 5 for fall planting.. they would sell!

In 2021.. a extra hundred here, a extra 50 here, a bonus 20.. will be a good thing..

Of course we are not only talking about fruiting bushes, canes or trees.. there is much more and will get there..

Now do not think you need a website, or lots of shipping and you DO not need to get big on this.. I am talking micro here folks.. Facebook local buy and sell’s, Kijji and so on will get the job done.. live in a even smaller place.. go old school.. sale write up on the local grocery or church bullitin board..

So what is YOUR more common ditch, hedgerow, forest edge wild fruiting bushes.. in middle alberta, the saskatoon rules.. in northern alberta, the blueberry was king, in NWT.. o the blueberries.. in Iqaluit.. cloudberry, in Quebec, I had the most amazing pincherries, moving to the farm, my farm’s only “wild” fruit that it had was wild strawberry and Elderberry.. but a walk took me to huge patches of Black ChokeCherry and Black Chokeberry..

farmgalselderberries