A Chicken on Every Blog

Did you know?

It is much easier to reduce a wild turkey to its least common denominator (soup) than a tame one? It comes off the bones so very neatly...

You can put homemade Italian seasoning on just about anything (except ice cream) and not go wrong? (And yes, that does include wild turkey) (Recipe 2T dried oregano, 2T dried marjoram, 1Tdried thyme, 1T dried basil..double as needed)

That you should not try to build a large wood fire when you are stupid with sickness. You might get too close to the stove door and melt your forelock.....dang it...my hair smells like the permanents my aunts used to give each other (and me if they could catch me) in my grandma's kitchen...with a little soupcon of dehorning calves thrown in.

Did you know that it has been raining here? I have my barn wheelbarrow out in the yard and it has been half full....twice...in the past week. That is a lotta rain...the river in the story runs right past us....who knew that you could close a river?

When you have a terrestrial ecology project due that requires pressed, dried upland plants (supposed to be pressed for 6 days minimum) and yet you and your team mates view procrastination as a viable alternative to getting 'er done on time, you can dry your plant specimens under the forced air hand driers in the men's room. People will look at you funny, but you CAN do it. (Not to mention the ones done that way turn out better than those pressed in the proper manner.)

World's Worst Cold

Or very mild flu. I dunno. Went to bed without supper. Spent most of milking leaning on the wall watching Alan milk my cows. Can't type for......See you later....

Wordless Wednesday

Thomas Sowell on Dismantling America

This is a great column and I thank Jeff at Alphecca for pointing it out.

"

Vet Check

Had our favorite veterinarian in yesterday to preg check most of the cows. Did better than expected, mostly because I guess my expectations have gotten pretty low this year.

Anyhow, Bayberry and Lemonade, both show cows, are pregnant. So are a couple I need to dry off now so they can rest before calving. It will be great not to have to milk number 203, Cider, a Straight-Pine Elevation Pete daughter on my side of the barn. She loves to lean on me...and she is a LOT bigger than me. Liz was pretty proud because she put some of the calves in there so to speak.

Other than that the guys got the trailer fixed so we can ship some stock today. Alas for Magma, aka Red, and Dixon, and the heifer Crispie, they will be leaving to pay some of the school tax. I hope the powers that be enjoy spending good cows on some of the nonsense and extravagance they find up there.

Macro Monday

Other folks have already done this but I couldn't resist. I have always loved milkweed

For more Macro Monday

Sunday Stills, Landscapes Fall Folliage

This one was a bit hard as most of the leaves are already down. Things are getting plumb
Novemberish around here.





For more Sunday Stills

G'Day

It has long been my habit to arise with the chickens (figuratively of course) in order to have a bit of a while to be by myself in the gentle not-quite-morning-yet time of day. For many long years that time was filled with what my next younger brother calls God's peace. I felt calm and joy, heartfelt uplifting somewhere in the region of the center chest... a special brand of alive that helped me be ready for the challenges of the coming day.

Over the past few months, that peace has missing no matter how I search for it. The space it left behind has become filled with fear and worry. Restlessness and nervous concern.

I have talked to others who feel the same, a vague malaise that something is not quite right. Perhaps the recipe for all this is made up of frightening flu and family illness and dairy disasters and distrust of the government. I don't know. I am not sure that I want to know.

What I do know is that this morning I awoke to drizzling rain and rumbling trains, comments to answer, cat to feed and dogs to air and offer sustenance to and all the usual morning routine. Facebook games needed my attention. It was dark. All were sleeping.

And just like an old friend who calls unexpectedly to put an unanticipated shine on an otherwise gloomy day, there it was.


That sweet calm and peace that may just possibly be a taste of what Heaven might offer. Like the rising of a lark, only this time the rising of a heart. I have no idea why, and no idea how much I had missed that soft and gentle delight in just being alive.


I am thankful for it. I hope you feel it too....

No New Plates

In an act that seems outrageously anti-upstate NY, (we don't have subways!), our illustrious governor has decided to soak us all for new license plates (at $25 a pop) next April, whether we need them or not. Seems a lot of folks think not, as the petition linked to below already has over 5000 signatures.

New Yorkers, go HERE to sign the petition against this action. St. Lawrence County Clerk Patricia Ritchie began it and says, "It’s an outrage to ask families and businesses to pay more for new license plates they don’t need or want when they are being battered by the ongoing recession."

If Wishes Were Horses

This bill would pass.


Yeah, we pay thousands every year to have our milk, which is mixed with other people's milk on the truck, hauled to the plant that is buying it. I can't think of any other product where the sender pays the shipping. Sure isn't the case when we buy parts for the machinery.

Isn't This Nice

Time Warner Exposes Customers......to hackers....

I have been having over two months worth of sometimes heated and certainly frequent discussion with that particular company, as they signed us up with a nice year long offer, then sent us a bill or something else. Which was considerably higher.

They keep promising to fix it.

And then not fixing it....and hanging up on me, not returning calls, etc. etc. I had thought better of the company, as they have treated us exceptionally well in the past. However, I gotta tell you, one more bill for the higher amount and my next call will be to the Attorney General.

Just sayin'

Meanwhile, the blue bomber is finally fixed. (For which I am amazingly grateful). The wiring and pump that sits in the gas tank went bad and it was a major project to get it fixed...long story.

Now we can sell some livestock to pay the rest of the taxes. I am so leery of sending anything as prices have been appalling, but we simply have no choice. Guess I should be glad we still own them so we can sell them.

Old Dog, Young Cat

Gael and Chainsaw, a small and quite appropriately named pestilence.

Wordless Wednesday

Because I spent the morning being wordy writing the Farm Side.

Dang it

This is just lousy. We have been overrun with illegal hunters since turkey season started. (We are completely posted against trespass so they are breaking the law the minute they cross our fences.) We know they are out there because we hear the damn fools bang, bang, banging away at their prey, until if there is any turkey meat left, it is pre-ground and ready to spread on bread.

We can't catch them though because they wear full camo and hide in the bushes if we go out there.

One morning last week at 5:30 AM, with still at least an hour to go before crack o' dawn, someone shot about fifteen times in quick succession in our maple woods, then there were a bunch of scattered shots. You know and I know that they blasted a flock down out of the trees and then picked off the stragglers. Not too sporting and also illegal....besides the whole trespassing issue.

We still have fourteen heifers at pasture. It is a big pasture, they have lots to eat, the woods to sleep in, plenty of water and are content.

Except when nut cases start shooting in that pasture. We have noticed the heifers running real bad a couple of times the past week and heard more gun shots than we could count. It has been tempting to bring the stock in, but if we do we will run short of winter feed. Besides, barring hunters harassing them, they are much better off outside as long as the decent weather holds. Even the milk cows are outside days with a feeder wagon and inside just at night.

Now comes the lousy part. Liz went up just now to walk through the herd and check on them, something she does most days. Normally she has to take a stick to keep them from climbing all over her. They are absurdly tame and will knock you down looking to get petted and fooled with. Today she could barely get near them. Even the Jerseys, Moments and Hillbilly, ran away and Sugar, her purchased heifer, who is too tame to even be safe, wouldn't let her anywhere near.

Then she saw that Moments, who was pregnant and due to calve in January, had just aborted her calf. Of course I can't prove that the running away from the fusillades from the turkeys chasing turkeys was the cause, but I know what I think.

And I think I wish they would go hunt on state land, of which there are thousands of acres within a few miles from here, and leave our cattle the heck alone.

Windmills

Saw these and dozens more near the restaurant where last Saturday's NFO cooperative meeting was held. (Quack's btw, one of the best meals I have ever eaten that wasn't cooked by a relative.)

If I could, I would have a half a dozen or so on the back forty. I find them lovely. I find the idea of renewable energy for the public and renewable income for the farmer truly encouraging. Desirable even.

We could use a little renewable income just now. The tax man loometh and all.
(And if I could find some renewable personal energy and get my fanny out to the barn right now; that would be a good thing too.)

Macro Monday

Denizens of the China Closet

Better Late Than Never

For more Macro Monday...

Steve Earle

And the Del McCoury band playing The Mountain

Thx to a good Facebook and MySpace friend for this one...you know who you are.
I will get Macro Monday done asap/

Sunday Stills, the Letter C

Clouds Color

Cow Calf

Crew Campus

Cold

Cool

For more Sunday Stills

Another Day Another Meeting

(The Potsdam Potties, an infamous yet entertaining display of yard art not far from the college. If I could I would consign animal rights groups to a venue like this.)

Thursday Liz and I spent all day and all evening at meetings....except for when we were milking on both ends of the day. (Yesterday we spent recovering from same.)

The first meeting was an animal welfare conference, which featured David Martosko, Kay Johnson-Smith, Cari Rincker, and Richard MCNally, as well as a number of other outstanding speakers. Evening was county Farm Bureau annual meeting, where we were both elected for new terms on the board of directors.

One of the biggest things I took away from the animal welfare conference was the futility of compromising with animal rights zealots. Moving the goal posts until there are no tame, captive, farm, or pet animals is their avowed agenda. Changing the way you do your job will not stop them. They don't want you better, they want you gone. Too many people simply don't get that, and I was delighted to hear speakers point it out.

I have long thought that well-meaning initiatives put forth by farm and livestock groups to appear more compliant with these groups are misguided, if not downright wrong. If you aren't doing anything wrong, why pretend that you are? Why give them traction to do you further damage? Why not educate the public as zealously as they do?

One thing that separates us from them is dollars. They have them. Most folks don't. And most of us work hard, have lives and are busy living them. We don't have time to lobby senators and congressmen and put our folks in Washington as czars of this that and the other thing.
If you have a few minutes watch this video and hear some of the sort of things we heard.

Today, it's "another day another meeting", this time a milk marketing cooperative meeting, which I must attend with our milk inspector. I am such a stay at home, happiest here in jeans and a ratty old sweater, puttering around feeding critters and taking pictures. However, there is an ancient truism that the world is run by those who show up. I feel that it is my job to show up whenever I can....so I'll see you tomorrow for Sunday Stills.