The sun is out this afternoon! Yeah! Tomorrow is predicted to be sunny, warm, and not too breezy.
We’ve been just maintaining on the farm. Planning for spring, looking forward to it, but not able to do too much. Basically, it’s muddy here. The rain is good because we’ve been so dry for so long, but we are ready for sunshine.
The kids have been outside a bit more anyway. Jim went running out in glee one morning because the sun was out (briefly) and the snow dusting had melted off. He was sure it was July! Five minutes convinced him that it wasn’t warm enough for bare feet, shorts, and t-shirt yet. The hens are outside and roaming now, so they have to go on an egg hunt everyday. That’s a fun excuse to get outside.
Sadly, our dogs didn’t realize the hens had moved and didn’t guard them the first night. Something got in and killed 10 of them–about 1/3 of our flock. The next night it got one, but hasn’t been successful since then.
We are waiting for Penny to have her calf. It should be any day. She looks like she’d be happy to have the calf, too! Spring is the time for babies. The beef cows will calve in May. It’s much warmer then, and the cows get the spring flush of grass to help them in the last of their pregnancy and as their milk comes in. That helps them be in good shape going into lactation, bear a well nourished calf, and set a good threshhold for milk production for the calf.
Tomorrow we will be at the Transition Cadillac Earth Day event. There will be a lot of information about gardening, many vendors and demonstrators, and good live music. We are bringing a chicken tractor for demonstration and will have biochar for sale. We are looking forward to talking to folks about the new Buying Club as a way to have the farm’s produce available to families. We’ll also have a table for Anyone Can Farm, so there will be information about that, also.