Inky and Stamp

Inky and Stamp

And a Little of This and That

 Inky was dedicated and sat on her eggs for weeks.  She was rewarded with one little (and I mean tiny) chick who we named Stamp.

Stamp is the second animal born on our homestead.  So she will go down in history.  I say she because we hope she is a hen.  

Inky has been a ferocious protector of her little chick and prefers to keep little stamp safe under her wings.  I had to be careful as I maneuvered her off the nest to get these pictures.

Sheep Shearing 

Thank you to Natalie for a shearing lesson so that we can get our lambs show ready for this season’s fairs.  Look how handsome Lambert looks with his fresh cut.

This is a batch of raw wool  we got from shearing our two adult Southdown sheep Dolly and Rosie.  I researched how to wash it and dry.  Now I must decide if I will try dying or taking any other steps to process it.    I’m leaning towards felting instead of making yarn.  This was only a small sample of what we sheared.  I tried to be picky for this first attempt.

Farm Improvements 

Can you tell what is going on in this picture?  Pepere Larry and Justin are turning our two chicken coops into one duplex with a central winterized outdoor run.  This middle part will be fully predator proof.

While things are getting rearranged outside, the barn is also getting some helpful additions.  Here we have a full sized shelf for tools on the upstairs railing.

  

Look at how little extra room this functional railing is using up.

We have running water in the barn thanks again to Pepere Larry.  This has tremendously helped with the effort and time for morning and evening chores.

The electricity has been running, so we have lights and can run the heat lamp for the Turkey poults.

The Turkey Poults

We’re trying something new out with our turkeys and will keep a few for breeding.

I am putting together a post just about raising the heritage breed of Turkey.

Here is Pickles.  She is much bigger than her siblings because she arrived a couple weeks sooner.

Brownie came out on a little road trip to visit Acadia at hockey camp.  We hope you still get a chance to get away, get a break, and enjoy a summer trip.  Even if it is just a short drive.

What’s Two More?

I wasn’t born a farmer.  I didn’t dream of being one when I was a little girl.  It didn’t cross my mind while I was making my way through college.  It started as a slow growth like a seed being planted in the earth. First the large vegetable garden, then some blueberry bushes, and wouldn’t chickens be nice.  Our little seed of a farm grew to a seedling when some  years later  pigs seemed like a good addition, as they most certainly have. Now we have this growing herd of sheep.

Rosie and Dolly the Southdown sheep have joined our family farm.  They were both very shy their first night. We are expecting little lambs this February because they have been bred.  We can’t wait to update you when that happens.

It took a while for the new sheep to get friendly with our two Katahdins, but they did not fight or get aggressive as we expected.

They spent a lot of time in separate parts of the pasture.

Now they all spend more time together and are beginning to act like a herd.  

Justin’s staycation this October has been very fruitful.  A whole new pasture has been born behind the barn.  The sheep will have a pen in the big warm barn this winter.

Thank you for checking out our new additions and while you’re here, mark yourself a follower of our Castonguay This’N’That Family Farm.

Welcome Dolly and Rosie!

Introducing our farm

A Quick Tour: Introducing Our Farm

My husband is a Mainer and I am a transplant but I love calling Maine home.  We are medical professionals and we wanted to try our hand at backyard farming. I would like to introduce you to the this and that of our backyard farming adventure.  Above, Natalie and Nala, the Katahdin sheep, are interested in their visit from CV the leader of our flock of hens.  She has survived  through two springs of weasel attacks. Thankfully we have been spared this tragedy since then.

all.  

Come along and meet the the new animals that call our farm home.  We are on our way to check on the turkey chicks. We’ve just moved them to their outdoor coop.  They have been making themselves comfortable with their heat lamp and cozy quarters.  When they’re a little bigger, they’ll be ready to use the outdoor pen.   It is honestly, not yet completed, but that shouldn’t take us too long. 

We’re  very happy that all six of our chicks have made it past their infancy. This is our third year raising turkeys and we usually aren’t that lucky.  Our goal is to move them to our big barn, but that is not yet complete for this season.

This is our first year having ducks and these ten little ducklings are just the cutest.  They follow one another around in circles.  They splash in their water all day long.  They now live in a terrific hand built coop with a window up front.  When they are little chicks, we put up cardboard barriers so they can stay warmer in a smaller space and then remove it when they are ready.  This particular coop has a back room, back deck, little ramp to the ground and extra room under the house.  The outdoor yard is fenced in for safety. I’ll share more pictures when the ducks are using that space.

It is planting time. We started some seedlings in the home and now we’re ready to plant the garden.  The garden has been our tried-and-true every year since the beginning of our farm, which we established in 2007. Memorial day weekend is always our planting weekend. Living in Maine we want to plant late enough to avoid any cold nights.  Since we are always looking ahead, our next goal for the garden is building a greenhouse.

Every year we raise two to three pigs.  Last year we had three fine pigs.  We are very happy with the service and packaging from Castonguay Meats in Livermore, Maine.

We have apple trees, they are blossoming beautifully now.  We have an assortment of Macintosh, Granny Smith, and Cortland.  One of our chicken coops is the backdrop.

Maine blueberry bushes are blooming!  We have traditional Maine blueberry bushes and Patriot blueberry bushes.  We are very fond of our berries and just bought 20 more berry bushes.   From jam to muffins to freezing, these plentiful berries are harvested and devoured.

Strawberries are delicious and have found a place on our farm year after year. Our biggest adversary for a productive harvest are the chipmunks.  Considering the option of dealing with a net or getting a cat, we’re looking to add a barn cat to our barnyard friends.

These three bunnies have been with us for a few years.  There is Oreo the boy, and Brownie and Hazel the sisters.  These guys have been living in our home, but as the barn finishes, they’ll be moving out back with the others.

We really do a little of this and a little of that.  Here are our sap buckets to collect our own Maine maple syrup.  This photo was clearly taken a few months back.  There is more work involved; we’ll delve into this whole process another day.  Until just this year we either bought from local farmers or bartered one of our turkeys.  Introducing our farm to you and other farmers has been fun.