January sort of blew by us this year, leaving us a bit behind on our farm chores checklist. February, short and sweet will hopefully bring us less madness in the weather department, a few baby goats and those first fearless leaders of Spring, crocuses. And March, well, March is always crazy, with 3 out of 4 of our family members celebrating birthdays, starting seeds, garden prep, etc. As always, I make a checklist of our must-do's then proceed to be completely freaked out by it! ;)
Our list of chores by month -
January -
*Storm Cleanup (a BIGGIE this year!) - assess, treat/trim trees as needed, clean up, sort wood/limbs into firewood, chipper fodder and goat snack piles. Set some big limbs aside for an epic mid-summer bonfire. :)
*Cut & Stack firewood
*Garden Planning & Seed Orders -Check!
*Turn Compost
*Replenish Emergency kit supplies -In progress. Costco here I come. :\
*Replenish Animal first aid/med kit in anticipation of kidding -Check!
*Purge Freezer -Also in progress. One Layer at a time...
February -
*Goats due to kid (Chardonnay/Blue)
*Start early seedlings indoors with heat mats/grow lights (late in month)
*Trim Trees & Shrubs
*Fence Building/Repair
March-
*Goats due to kid (Cassie's Alpine doe & doeling)
*Start up milking again
*Plant out Brassicas & Lettuces, weather permitting
*Order & Plant new trees, weather permitting
*Forage - Stinging Nettles & Dandelion, maybe mushrooms if the weather is right
Our plans for the months following depend a great deal on how well we manage to get these tasks ticked off in a timely fashion. As you might have noticed, we're adding two Alpine does to our goat herd. They are the sweet babies of my cousin, Cassie, whom we will be looking after for the foreseeable future. Both Alpines have been bred to an Oberhasli buck, so we're going to be dealing with an entirely new, much larger breed than we have in years past. The big upside is that they give really great milk and lots of it, so we should have cheese, cajeta and maybe even soap aplenty this year!
