Looking out on the World

Two of the puppies opened their eyes for the first time today to take a look out into the big wide world. We also moved them and Gizmo from the back room into the office. Gizmo has been chomping at the bit to have company once again so now she feels she is once again part of the family.

We've had nice weather for the last couple of days and have made the most of it, repairing fencing and replacing a whole side fence next to the lambing barn. Yet another skill we can add to the CV. Over the next few weeks we intend to replace and repair a lot of the fencing around the property. In some places it seems to have been cobbled together (for want of a better description) and while it gives the appearance of a fence, would scarcely keep anything penned.

During the week we also came to a gentleman's agreement with a local farmer to cut and bail our hay for us. He supplies all of the machinery, bails and stacks it in our barn and we split the hay 50/50. According to the previous owners there should be plenty that we will likely end up selling some of ours, especially as we will get a second and possibly third cutting from it.

Jen spent the day in the garden planting more vegetables and tomorrow we will cultivate some more ground for the next batch - corn. Monday we pick up our new Bobcat, and later in the week we've even planned on making some more cheese! Yes, that funny yellowish stuff that all this is really about...

We got a New Toy!

It will certainly make life easier around here that's for sure! With an 800 lb capacity and a backhoe attachment, we're going to get a lot of use out of this new toy.

It's been a good week all around

Funny how a bad week can be followed by an extremely good week. Of course the puppies were the highlight of the week and they continue to do well. We took them to the vet on Thursday and they all got a clean bill of health. Gizmo has finally decided that she wants to spend 10 minutes every couple of hours racing around the back yard to give herself a break.

Today we put together a whelping box for her which gives her much more room and there is less chance the puppies will get squashed and scream when she moves around.

Other news included a possible solution to our septic tank problems in the Milk Barn. The farm has an old lagoon that can be restored, and all the liquid waste directed to it from the milking room. As for a human toilet, the PMO allows us to use a chemical toilet, so we might be able to do everything for the cost of some drain/pipe laying and the acquisition of a pump. More on that as we get info.

First up we need to get the old lagoon/pit emptied so we can see if any of the original pipes drain into it. Hopefully thats a simple enough job we can have done next week.

36 Hours Old...

36 hours old....

Welcome to the World Iago, Macbeth, Mercutio and Portia

Yes we're still in shock. This morning, between 9.00am and 11.00am Gizmo gave birth to four little puppies. What is most surprising is that until it happened, we had no idea that she was even pregnant. Yes we had tried a couple of times before and thought the last time was another failure but it goes to show that one just never knows.

There are 3 little boys, all silver/black and one little girl who is pure black. All appear to be doing really well, feeding properly and making little squeaking noises.

More news to follow...

Anti-Septic

Another week has flown by during which we received some not so good news. It appears that the septic system in the Milk Barn, while actually collecting and dispatching effluent to the tank in the vegetable garden as it should, lacks one major component - a drain field. The upshot? We need to have a drain field layed out and then buried in the garden somewhere, and not just anywhere. It has to be somewhere that gravity can feed it as well as complying with all the rules and regulations the County and the State want to throw at us (including set distances from things like boundaries, fencelines, wells and swales).

So, considering the tank is old, concrete, and probably cracked somewhere (after all that water has to be going somewhere right?) we are going to get a new tank installed at the same time as the drain field is done. This way we can comply with the ODA regarding whey disposal as well as regular effluent.

There is some good news though, it seems we can bury the drain field in the end of the vegetable garden in the 'orchard'. More bad news is that the ballpark cost is $7,500 - $15,000 depending on what needs doing. The higher amount is a worse case scenario that involves pumps and a non-gravity system, the lower amount is if no additional work needs doing other than a straight install. Once its done though, the rest of the renovation will be the easy part as we'll have water and septic and of course the new roof. I can hear the bank account sighing at last.

Today is a lovely day to cap off the week, 88 degrees at the moment (29C for those of you on metric) and we've spent the day roto-tilling the vegetable garden, planting potatos, and mowing, and I got a tan to boot! During the week its been all go, water blasting the barn area and moving manure.

It also appears that our 24 sheep from Vermont Shepherd will be arriving a lot sooner than we had expected, the end of this month to be exact. In order to reduce the size of the flock then over the next couple of weeks we'll be retiring some of the sheep and filling the freezer with.....well, meat.

Milk Barn - The Internal Workings

I thought I'd begin the next stage of the renovation of the Milk Barn with a brief explanation here as to what is currently there, what we intend to do, and ultimately how we envision it looking when its done.

This is what we are faced with at the moment. Apart from the front 2 rooms (where the previous owner made honey), it hasn't been used for close on 25 years and was originally designed for cattle in a 5x5 herringbone configuration that could milk 10 cows simultaneously. All the original stanchions remain and much of the transport piping is still in place. The steel needs cutting out and the concrete herringbone over the pit needs to be redone so the pit is properly rectangular. Of course the entire ceiling needs replacing, new walls need constructing and the floor needs to be relayed (thankfully it appears that thr septic system piping is still working after all these years).

The above plan (click on the image for a larger picture) shows what the final layout will hopefully look like. We will be limiting our initial milking process to a maximum of 6 sheep simultaneously although the equipment we will be purchasing does allow for expansion by units of 2. Depending on the eventual size of our flock (yes we are still discussing it) and our production figures we may switch from bucket milking to a basic vacuum pipeline, but the bucket units themselves will be fully integratable into a vacuum system, so no additional costs other than constructing the pipeline and buying the vacuum pump are involved.

The Milk Barn has a New Roof

As predicted we had four wonderful days of sun this week. The roofers from Hunts Roofing and Construction arrived early Monday and inside three days did a great job in removing the old tin roof and replacing it with a tar shingle that matches the house. The plumbers came back at last and installed all of the plumbing, so we now have water in the back barn and capped piping in the milk barn area.


The next stage is to get inside and gut the place by removing all of the old stanchions, the ceiling and the wall coverings, then to begin the process of firstly cleaning all of the studs and then changing the locations of the doors and windows. With that done we can look at outside covering.

Thursday we completed the second half of the flock check up. We actually managed to put everyone through the tilter this time thanks in no small part to the weather and the lessons we learned last weekend. So all the sheep are tagged and wormed, and all the lambs have now been given their vaccination booster. We intend to do the run through about every six weeks in order to check for things like hoof rot, but after Thursday we have a lot more confidence in our ability to get the job done in a single day.

We also heard from David Major at Vermont Shepherd. He will be personally delivering our 12 yearlings and 12 lambs in June, sometime after we have thinned our current flock to 20.