Back To Normal

After many days of not heating the house, even after the kids had a day playing in the swimming pool, we're back to normal Minnesota weather. It sure feels damp and cold after the unseasonably warm weather we had at the beginning of March. This year it's in like a lamb and out like a lion, I guess. This means throwing wood in again. The kids so enjoy that! ;)

I've been just really busy lately, so haven't been able to keep up with all of your posts as much as I'd like. It has been good for my family to have me OFF the computer though, so I don't know how often I'll be "visiting" for a while.


Homestead Diary Update:

3-28-12: After two weeks of sitting on her eggs without moving so much as a muscle, the broody hen abandoned her 11 eggs. What a dissapointment for the kids! I'm wondering if it could be the eggs she was sitting on weren't fertile and she could tell. Our rooster is only a little bantam and he has 16 hens, most of them full size, to keep him busy. I think we're going to get an incubator and find some fertile eggs. That means ME being mama instead of the hen, so I'm not as thrilled about it. I was looking forward to getting out of that job after the last ones.

3-29-12: I decided the goats looked a bit copper deficient, so Copasure'd them this afternoon. I hadn't thought copper would be something they'd be low on here, since there's a lot of copper in the ground. However, I found out that if there's a lot of iron in the water (which there is), it bonds with the copper and leaves the body that way. I wanted to be sure they had what they needed for healthy babies. The bonus is that the copper oxide particles help expell stomach worms, and there were a few eggs in their last fecal exams. This crazy weather we've been having is really messing with a lot of herd management techniques that usually work well for parasite controll. There is so far no such thing as a clean, dry pasture to put the girls on. Many years we would have still been in the deep freeze at least half way through March, and the little nasties would be frozen too. I'm glad we're getting the needed moisture, but I look forward to it drying up a bit so I can move the girls to grass. I'd really rather not have to use a chemical dewormer after kidding if I can help it.