The bounty of blogging

If I have a dismal season in the garden or hay department this year, maybe I can eat my words!

Blogging makes me feel even more accountable about what I say and do, here are some examples of things I’ve said of late that fit in the category of “DO AS I SAY, NOT AS I DO…”

♣  Have your milk cow freshen in late spring, so you can make that deep yellow butter that we all covet.
♣  Don’t water your garden.
♣  Don’t grow grain, or eat bread.
♣  I don’t like bucket calves.

Here are my feeble reasons excuses why I’m not practicing what I preach.

# 1
I am the proud owner of a recalcitrant purebred Guernsey heifer Jetta, and her 10 year old mom Della.  Said heifer is living the life of leisure (for now) and I dried up Della who is due on Labor Day.
I’ve been milking Della since last summer, and  she needs a rest.  In her calving career, she started out calving in mid-April, and through all the trials of tribulations of breeding a cow at the opportune time – she will now calve in September.  I never had this kind of problem until I decided to not keep a bull anymore and to rent one each season instead.  Now when the bull is here doing his thing, Della will still be pregnant and not in the mood.  Correcting things like this on a farm, can take years to overcome.  The simple act of buying a dog on a whim started me down a path that I can’t seem to get off of yet.  That dog and bull story and it’s ramifications will be a post in itself, with many characters… . 

So while I counsel future family cow owners on spring calving, I have been unable to keep that goal for myself.  Luckily I still have 25 # of butter in the freezer, and hopefully the fall grass will be good.  And  I won’t be milking this summer at all – unheard of.  I will relish this “vacation” as this is unlikely to happen again – I hope.

“Mom, what’s a permanent vacation?”   “Well, that means many things, but look at it this way, you will be donating your horns for science.”   Finally, I can make some horn manure biodynamic preps.

#2  While I go on and on about dust mulch and using less water – the temperature this weekend is supposed to  reach 95* to 100*.  We had a low of 39* yesterday.  I also know that my newly planted seeds will not germinate in hot dry soil.  Sooooo – I’m watering the garden that I just direct seeded and all my brassica transplants.  Liar, Liar, garden on fire!  I didn’t say I never water, I just try not to, I will not be watering the already established plantings.

# 3  Danielle caught me on this one.  I baked rolls last weekend for hamburger buns.  I not a big bread fan, but DH is – so I do bake bread occasionally.  Here is the recipe for Flax Seed rolls, that I got from our straw farmers wife.  Her original was for a bread machine, so I adapted it since I don’t have a bread machine.  If anybody wants her original version just ask, and I’ll post that too.

FLAX SEED ROLLS         12 Large bun size rolls, or ??? smaller.

6  cups of flour
1 1/3 cups milk
6 T honey
6 T lard, butter, or olive oil, or ???
4 t  salt
2/3 c warm water
1 T yeast
6 T flax seed, chopped coarsely with a knife.

Scald milk and add honey, fat, and salt.  Let cool to lukewarm.  Dissolve yeast in warm water.
Combine 4 cups of flour, flax seeds,  and liquids.  Turn onto floured board and knead in remaining flour until dough is smooth.  Let rise until double.  Punch down and shape into rolls of desired size.  Let rise, and bake at 350* for 20 minutes or until golden brown.

 Oat shocks circa 1930.  This field is currently in permanent pasture.
While oats grow here quite easily, I don’t have any plans to grow any grain crops, other than maybe continuing the flint corn start that I have.  However, corn is not very productive and is a heavy feeder.  So that may not be in my gardening future too much either.   We have made oat hay from a nurse crop of newly seeded pasture ground.  However, oat hay is hard to store (rodents) and our grass hay does the job.  Part of the grain crop on this farm historically went to feed the horses that were necessary to work the ground, so that in itself is just a treadmill of break ground, plant crop, harvest crop to feed the animals necessary for growing the grain in the first place…   

 

# 4  I don’t like bucket calves – well most of the time I don’t.  We love Lath.  She is smart and has been easy to care for.  However, with the cow dry, now I have to buy milk replacer.  Not all that long ago, you had to order medicated milk replacer, the standard was non-medicated.  Now, you have to special order non-medicated.  It took a while to find it, but I was able to locate a “local” source of LOW HEAT, NON-MEDICATED milk replacer.  Cost:  $63.00.  I’m glad she is an avid grazer.  She’s had the nose dew since she was two weeks old and she is doing a good job of working on the yard.

I’ve had to teach her things she can’t learn from other cows, since she is away from the main herd.
This was the hardest for me.

So that pretty much takes care of my list.  I better go move my sprinkler!