Rex, The Motivational Chewer

This is Rex. Rexy is our new foster (soon to be adopted) livestock guardian dog/farm pooch. He is a Great Pyrenees mix who looks and behaves very much like a standard Pyr, with the exception of his pink nose and his lack of black "eyeliner" that is a hallmark of the breed.

I initially learned about Livestock Guardian Dogs (LGD's) at the same time that I was learning about keeping and caring for goats. There are many LGD's who have been bred for hundreds of years to protect the critters and people in their charge. The Great Pyrenees breed was developed and used in the Pyrenees mountains of France and Spain, as well as elsewhere throughout Europe, to guard sheep and other livestock from various predators. An LGD is not a herding dog. His job to to alert you to the threat/presence of predators and to keep predators at bay.

I found our fella through a Great Pyrenees rescue that works primarily out of Texas, where Pyr's are a favorite livestock guardian choice for ranchers. Unfortunately, because the dogs live out in the field with their flock, and are often not neutered or spayed, the result is unchecked breeding and an overwhelming abundance of Pyr's and Pyr mixes flooding Texas shelters.

Our boy was either picked up by or surrendered to the Ft. Worth animal shelter, where he lived for three months - an extraordinary length of time in a "kill shelter". He was repeatedly passed over for euthanasia because his sweet demeanor melted the hearts of his caregivers, and caused them to lobby on his behalf for more time to get him to a foster or forever home. They contacted SPIN (Saving Pyrs In Need), and Rex and another Pyr were rescued by Lynnette, a small-scale goat & chicken hobby farmer, just like me. She took him home to her pack and gave him the love and socialization that he'd missed out on for so long. She also managed to feed him up good - he came into the shelter weighing 51.5 lbs, and came to us weighing 65! He's still a lean boy, so I can't imagine him 15 pounds lighter. God bless foster parents of all kinds!

So our pup finally arrives here in the great northwest after a 5 day long trip from Texas. He's nervous, itchy and very tired. His first few days here were bumpy - he chewed into a computer cord, ruining it, ate two skeins of yarn, one shoe, one knitting project and the handle of a Care Bear umbrella. He also put his teeth on Livy, which gave us pause about whether or not he was going to be a good fit with our kids. Time and behavior modification (on all of our parts) has since convinced us that he is the right dog for our little place. He has twice alerted us at night to deer and possibly raccoons in the vicinity of the compost bins and goat pens, and has been "leaving his mark" all over the place, letting the foxes, raccoons, opossums and coyotes know that the era of easy pickins is over, and that there is a new carnivore in town. It's only been 10 days since he came home with us, but the chicken thief, whatever it was, hasn't struck again since.

So he's keeping us safe, as advertised, and seems to be sending me a message with his choice of chewing items - the computer cord, the yarn, the knitting needles - basically telling me, Mama, if you sit on your butt and ignore me, I will remove the things that are distracting you via CHOMP, so that you can play with me again.

Message received, buddy. Let's get out there and frolic with the goaties! :)

The Obligatory List of Goals for the New Year

I don't do the whole resolution thing, never really have. I like to jot down a few ideas and plans for the coming year, but nothing that I'd go so far as to say that I am steadfastly resolute about making happen. Inflexibility equals anxiety for me, so I like the idea of a list of want-to's and try-to's better. It fits my ever-changing mood and general slackerish lifestyle better.

So here are my want-to, try-to and really oughta's for the coming year -

*Move and expand the veggie garden, which entails tilling up sod and soil that haven't ever been (oy!), setting up deer fencing, moving and spreading a metric s&!# ton of compost and manure, and building new raised beds. This is project numero uno in my book.

*Re-fence the pasture. (This is really Bill's project.) If we can let the goats out of their pens and give them the whole back acre+ to graze and nibble at their leisure, we'll save literally thousands on hay every year. This is Bill's project numero uno.

*Build a pole barn - another of Bill's projects. While our does have a nice house right now, our bucks & wether have completely destroyed theirs, making the building of a stout new barn with enclosed stalls, a milking parlor and hay/grain storage an increasingly pressing issue. The barn and pasture fencing are essentially one item in Bill's mind, but let's be honest - they are two huge undertakings unto themselves. Getting even just one of them done will be a big and costly job.

*Re-vamp the front yard according to the plans draw up by our landscape architect, Brighida. This project includes adding berms and trenches for better drainage, removing the current plants and shrubs that are ill-suited to their present location (and to our purposes) and replacing them with hand-selected varieties of native, rain-loving trees, shrubs and veggies that will take our front lawn from all maintenance and no food, to a low-maintenance, edible landscape. This project will be a spendy one, and therefore might not be in the cards for us this year, speaking realistically.

*Have all of our fruit trees professionally pruned and brought back into shape by an arborist.

*Expand our herd of milk goats (already under way!)

*Get set up for a pair of pigs in the Spring. Our windfall of lovely, free produce makes this project especially appealing and worthwhile to undertake asap. As an offshoot of this, seek out additional free waste food streams for piggy consumption - restaurant food waste, offal, etc.

*Plant more evergreen trees in the chickens' yard for future Christmas trees and for the lovely oxygen that we so enjoy.

*Explore further the requirements of raising turkeys. (This is loooooow on the list.)

*Learn more about the possibility of installing a hive or two of honeybees.

*Forage, fish and hunt for more of our food.

*Replace all or most beef/cow dairy products in our diet with goat meat & dairy.

*Raise a small flock of meat chickens - enough for us to have 1 or 2 per month and to share with/sell to friends and family.

*Make more and different cheeses with our goats' milk.

*Try our hands at making goat milk soaps.

*Can, freeze and dry A LOT more produce, meat and fish than in years past.

*Research the market for milk-fed kid goats and adult meat goats in our community. Including cultivating relationships with and learning more about different cultures/religions/ethnicities traditional food ways, and being able to honor their needs and provide them with their traditional and hard-to-find foods.

*Research/explore the steps necessary (and associated costs of) becoming a licensed raw milk farmstead dairy/creamery/cheese maker.

*Simplify and streamline our chore and maintenance schedule, so that things don't get behind or broken before they get our attention.

*Implement a solid routine for animal vaccinations, grooming, worming, etc. (We've been a little behind the 8 ball with this one, sadly. We want to be more proactive about critter health maintenance now that we have something of a grasp on who will be needing what and when, etc. Bottom line - being proactive should save us from having as many surprise issues pop up. It's a tall order when you have so many species and individuals with particular needs, but we're hell-bent on doing right be each and every one of these critters in our care.

*Attempt to comprise our diet of 20% or more of our home grown foods. Part of the challenge here will be figuring out how to measure this. I'll also have to try harder to find my taste for goat milk. ;)

*Earn enough on egg sales to cover the chickens supplemental feed costs completely. (This means their layer pellets, cracked corn, bread, grit, etc.)

*Prime and paint the chicken coops. This is a must-do!

*Work on my knitting, upcycled crafts and homemade preserves for Etsy, bazaar and farm stand sales.

Oy - I am thoroughly daunted by this list of mine. Let's hope that the financial, health and networking stars all align for us in 2012, so that me might make a real go of this little venture of ours.

Here's to a happy and prosperous new year for everyone! :)

xoxo - Michelle

The Garden (take two) and Other News

We can all agree that last year's garden was an unmitigated flop, yes? And yet, here I am again, feeling that garden fever, brought on by an inundation of seed and nursery catalogs.

I heard it mentioned within the farming community, that a seed catalog received before mid-January or so is considered tacky, bordering on pushy. Our minds and backs have earned the right to a Winter of not even thinking about gardens, fertilizer, seeds and weeds, so what's the hurry?

Well, the hurry is about getting the seeds you want from the supplier you trust before everyone else does. Because once they're out of stock for a season, you have to find a backup source or nix that crop for that year. I buy almost exclusively from Victory Seed Company and have learned the hard way in years past that if you snooze, you lose.

So I did a quick inventory of what we have leftover from last year, and found that we are all set in the greens department, but could stand to stock up on carrots, pumpkins/squashes, sunflowers and herbs. So a-browsing I will go to see which cool old varieties are on offer. This bit of the garden planning is cake. It's figuring out the logistics and layout of the new garden that is going to drive me (but even more so, my poor Billy) completely mad.

We've consulted with an amazing edible landscape designer, and decided on a new, sunnier, less soggy location for the garden. Now we "get to" till fresh ground, slog a couple thousand pounds of compost and critter poo down through the hollow and back up the hill, and disassemble and move our deer fencing. My knees and spine weep at the very thought.

On a completely different subject, which doesn't pain me at all - yay!, is the happy news that we're finally getting a dog!

We found our little fella, Rex, though a Great Pyrenees rescue organization. He is not a purebred Pyr, but does have (according to his foster Mom) all of the friendly and desirable traits that you could want in a livestock guardian and family companion. We are very excited, especially the girls who love dogs. We are going to foster him for a few days in order to make sure that he is good for us, and we are good for him before locking him down as our forever pooch, but we're certainly hoping that that will be the way things work out!


The newest member of the Boggy Hollow crew!

It's shaping up to be a very full 2012 here in the Hollow! ;)

Pikshurs of my Baybeez

Sorry, I get all mushy like that when it comes to the little ones. Also, I've been spending maybe a little too much time on the Corel PaintShop software that came with my camera, tinkering with pics of the babies. For your viewing pleasure-


One of the babies (a hen, we think) from the clutch hatched on 10/1/11. Mama was a red/brown Ameracauna and Papa was a White Crested Black Polish Frizzle. We are tentatively calling this mix "Policauna". ;)


I want to go outside, but I'm a little chicken. (BWAHAHA!)


A non-frizzled Policauna. This little dude/dudette is always very curious about visitors.


My Oreo-girl snuggling up to her Mama, Fritzen. It will be hard to see Fritzy move on to her new home, but I know that they are going to treat her like a queen.


Sisters :)

The Days of our Goats

...or maybe "As the Goat Turns"? "Guiding Goat"?

Well it's a soap opera of some sort up there in goatlandia. Who's pregnant, who's the daddy, is he your brother? - stuff like that.

Using my entirely unscientific method of staring at goat butts and boobies, and visually gauging goat girth, I believe that 5 of our 6 lassies are pregnant.

The one that is most obvious is our dear Blue.


Blue and her steamy goat breath say "Hi".

While our sweet Bluey has always been a low rider of generous proportions, she is now honest to God wider than she is tall. Drink it in, peeps -


Girl knows how to work it!

As a basis for comparison, I snapped a pic of Blue next to our only confirmed non-pregnant goat, a yearling mini-Lamancha named Hop. See the difference for yourselves.



Our other girls are looking pretty rotund as well. Here are Teeny and Oreo, yearling twins who weren't supposed to be bred this year -



Because we didn't get to engineer who was bred to whom and when, we have a whole lot of surprises coming our way. I *think* that Blue will go first, but Chardonnay is looking pretty plump too, so it's hard to say. I'll be keeping an eye on their udders, watching for them to "bag up", as that seems to be the single best way to tell when they're getting close.

The excitement, the drama, the clothes nibbling - are you sure you don't want a goat of your own? 'Cuz I know a lady who might be able to hook you up...

Cheddar Check-in

August - Day 1 - Still in the mold


Day 2 - Just turned out of the mold and air drying


September - Just waxed


November - After 12 weeks of aging. It is still "young", quite sharp and definitely goaty. The texture is firm and creamy, and melts nicely.

I only made the one cheddar, as I had no idea what to expect. Cheese making is a lot like wine making in that you don't really know what you've got or if it's even edible until months or years down the line; making it imprudent to spend a heap of time and raw material on a pursuit that may be all for naught.

Anyways - this one turned out! It's too strong for me and the girls, but Bill has been enjoying it, so come Spring, when our does kid and the milk is flowing again, I'll make another one or even two.

By the way - this cheese was made using Ricki Carroll's Farmhouse Cheddar recipe. Everything was by the numbers except for us using goat milk instead of cow's milk, and my improvised cheese press (I have a real one now) meant that this cheddar didn't get pressed with quite as much weight as was recommended in the recipe.

Next Year

I say it pretty much every month, season, year - I'm almost there. The crazy is about to let up and carefree, easy-livin' will reign in the land o' Jackson once again!

So either I'm a hopelessly optimistic simp, or have a heavy case of willful amnesia.

Another farmer chick and bloggy-buddy of mine were just talking about this idea - the mythical "next year" that is the perpetual, elusive finish line and jackpot payoff for this year's (and every one before) efforts, losses, lessons learned. Next year, the soil will finally be *spot on* and my veggies will be EPIC! Next year, we'll have all of our fencing fixed and up and caring for the goats will be practically effortless! Next year, I'll start knitting for my bazaars in the Spring and avoid the crunch!

Ah, "next year", you tease, you! The faster we run, the more we push, the further away you get.

When the frenzy of Spring - planting, planning, births, cleaning - finally gives way to Summer, it's foraging, fishing, fretting over babies, milking, canning that consume our days. Then Fall comes, promising some relief, and delivering some, in addition to harvesting, breeding goats, putting food up, crafting, weatherproofing and putting the farm to bed for the Winter.

Winter is maybe the biggest trickster of all. The season when a farmer/homesteader is supposed to take their ease from a year of laboring and scrambling to keep things running, is instead just as busy. Keeping housing (people and animal alike) warm and dry in a Western Washington winter is job in and of itself. Sump pumps, five-gallon buckets, muck boots and rigging up ratty old tarps are all in a day's work.

Winter is also the traditional time of year to butcher stock. We will be harvesting a rooster or two and goat this Winter, and next year will likely have a pig or two to do as well. The amount of prep and labor that goes into harvesting and butchering might surprise you. It surprised me the first time! Segregating the animal (sometimes the night before), sharpening your tools, boiling water, gathering all of the odds and ends that you'll need for catching and holding "stuff" as you move through the process. And that is just the basic setup.

Then there's the cutting, wrapping, putting up of your harvest after the fact. It makes for one (or several) very long days.

Winter tends to be the time of year that we try to tie up the loose ends on all of our other hobbies and projects - racking wine, bottling vinegar, non-stop knitting, waxing cheese, smoking fish, tying flies, mending and endless planning, plotting and dreaming about next year.