Helperss

Having help is a wonderful thing!  I signed up with HelpX, a help exchange network this summer, and it has been a very good thing.  There have been a few no-shows, but I've had 5 great people come and help me get things done on the farm.  Got about half the firewood in now, the garden is ready for winter, lots of little things have been done, it's great!  I've met some neat people, too.  Thanks Heidi for telling me about that organization!

   The bears have been active around here this year.  Neighbors have had visits, and I've had an almost close encounter with one while out in the woods with the goats.  I haven't taken the goats out now for over a week.  Do not want to run into a bear.  The goats would run for home, leaving me there to deal with it by myself.  No, Nellie would go after it, or at least bark at it and scare it away.  :-)  Still, I don't want to take a chance and have a close encounter.  It might just go after a goat or something.

  The deer, or I should say one deer, has decided that the gardens are her territory.  I've been chasing her off and throwing rocks at her when I see her, but now she's only coming in at night.  The apples are starting to ripen and she's going after those.  The bears aren't coming in because of the three layers of fence and the dogs barking, but this deer jumps the fences and ignores the dogs for the most part. Nellie is finally realizing that this deer will run from her if she charges towards it barking.  "Grandma" would just stand there and take her on, but she got ate by a mountain lion last winter, and her descendants aren't quite as brave as her.  The only problem is Nellie only goes after her if I yell "get outta here" at the deer.  Otherwise, the deer have the run of the place.  The trees look pretty bare in the deer eating range.  The tops still have leaves and apples, but the mid to bottom of the trees are well trimmed.  Most annoying.  Next year we are getting a real fence up that the deer won't destroy.  The black snow fence stuff they just blast through.  Now it looks horrible with big holes in it where they jumped through it, not over it.  It's archery season, but no one has shot these deer around here yet.  I keep waiting and telling all the bow hunters where they are hiding out during the day, but the deer are still around.

   The long dry spell in the cashmere sales is finally over!  Thank heavens!  I've only got 13 fleeces of mine left to dehair, then I'll be done and get can them all up on the website and other places and get them sold.  I'll make some yarn with it, too.

  Miss Astrid is the first, and hopefully only, unplanned pregnancy of the breeding season.  Midnight got out when the herd was out in the lower pasture and had a grand ol' time out there.  Thank heavens she was the only one in heat that day!  February babies are not what I want around here, it's usually too cold then.  I don't have a good barn, just a bunch of 3 sided shelters that work great in the late winter, early spring, but not so much in the dead of winter.  I guess if I have to, I can make something in the hayshed.  I just don't have heat lamps or anything.  Good thing cashmere goats are hardy!

  Well, that's the latest news from around here.  Happy Fall everyone!   

  

Out with the Goats

Here are the goats on their way home from eating out in the neighbor's places.  They are quite full and going rather slowly. ☺ There is a ton of food this year for them everywhere but on our property.  They have eaten that all down already.  Luckily all the neighbors want them to eat their weeds and tall grass to keep the fire hazard down.  In this lower picture they have found a big thistle patch and keep going back to it each day we go down there.

  It only takes them about 2 hours to eat their fill and want to go back home for water and to digest it all.  I take them out almost every day unless I have a project that really needs to get done, or I don't get home in time from town to take them out.  Saves on hay, and it's quite pleasant to take my folding lawn chair and follow them around the forest for a couple of hours.  A good way to connect with Mother Nature and contemplate life.  I started out fretting about all that I wasn't getting done in those couple of hours out with them, but then I decided that it was a good break, it saved on hay, and I felt better when I got back, so it was worth losing a couple of hours of work time to feed the goats for free.

  There sure has been an active bear in the area!  Everywhere we go, there are shredded logs, stumps and over-turned rocks.  So far I haven't seen a bear when we've gone out, but there sure has been a lot of signs that one is around.  The goats sound like a herd of elephants crashing through the brush, so that probably scares everything away long before I can see anything.  A couple of times the goats have been rather nervous and stay in the open meadow areas and stick pretty close together, so I know they sense something is there. Nellie, the LGD goes out with us, too, so she keeps an eye out for anything.

  I have come to the conclusion that trying to stick to a set schedule around here is just a lesson in futility.    Something always happens to change things.  Either a goat has an issue, someone comes or calls, or I have some kind of issue that I wasn't expecting.  So to keep stress at an acceptable level, I've decided to just do as much as I can in a day and not get too worried about what didn't get done.  There is always tomorrow....and if not, oh well. 

   Now that the weather is hot and dry, things are starting to turn a bit brown.  The yard is mostly brown, except for the gardens that I keep watered.  The deer got in the veggie garden and severely trimmed and ate my winter's food supply.  It ate every single broccoli plant, a lot of the peas, beans, carrots, and spinach.  Luckily I hadn't weeded the strawberries so the grass was thick and tall and hid the berries, or they would've been eaten too.  Dang beast!  Why she had to come in here when there is so much food out in the woods,  10,000 acres worth to eat, is beyond me.  I think a mountain lion got her two nights ago.  I heard a deer scream (which sounds an awful lot like a goat!) in the wee hours of the morning, the dogs all went ballistic, and I haven't seen her since.  I jumped up and went outside to make sure it wasn't one of the goats, but they were all just laying around not concerned at all, and the scream was a bit farther out in the neighbor's place anyway.   Hopefully it was her and then she won't be back.  She had a fawn this year, so I wonder if that got eaten, too.  I know this sounds rather mean, but she needed to get eaten so she'd stay away from here.  She was way too familiar with the place, thought she owned it.  She even has the dogs afraid of her.  Her mom, who I called Grandma, went after the dogs a couple of times, so they learned that when she stomped her foot and tipped her head, they had better look out.  She taught her kids that, too.  She got eaten last Spring by a lion, and now I think her remaining daughter got it the other night.  There are more to replace her, but they are more afraid and won't come in the yard.  It's nice to have the lions keeping everything in check out there.  As long as there are deer around, I don't have to worry about the goats getting attacked.  

  To be safe, I don't take the goats out till afternoon and then I make sure they are back in the pens a couple of hours before sunset when the predators are taking their afternoon naps and not looking for food.  It's worked good so far, knock on wood.

 Well, that's all for now.... Here we are, back on our property heading for the water troughs. 

   Here's a cow elk on the forest service road, down from our place a couple of miles.  The rest of the herd is in the woods already.  There is a small herd roaming the area around us.  Beautiful animals!

Helpers

   Boy, summer is going by fast!  It's been an interesting one so far.  The weather has been pretty good.  No real problems, all the big thunder storms have gone around us, for which I'm very grateful!  We get rain from them, but no close lightning or anything.
  I've sold all the dairy kids for this year.  Sweetpea and company went to a great home.  She is being treated like the princess she thinks she is.  The other four have it pretty good, too.  I'm happy.  Now I just need to sell 10 more and I'll be set for numbers for this year.   
  I've got my hay all lined up for the coming year, so that is a big relief!  I haven't been able to take the goats out to browse very many times this week.  There is a mountain  lion in the area and the goats are very nervous when we go out.  I'd decided to give the lion a few days to move on to the rest of it's territory.  I think it has moved on now.  I took the goats out yesterday, and they were their normal selves.  Before they would stay in the open meadows in a pretty tight bunch, but yesterday they were a little more spread out and back into the trees again.


   I've started a fund raising campaign on Indiegogo.com.  Pine Needle Farm Fiber Arts Retreat Center.  I want to build a retreat center for fiber artists to come and relax, learn some new techniques from well-known teachers, and hang out with like-minded people for a week-end or a week-long workshop.  There will be informal spin-ins and other gatherings, too.  It's going to be a great place when I'm all done building it.  There will be six guest cabins that sleep 6 people each, with each one made out of a different "green" building  material, a main classroom, dining building, and a big gazebo in the middle of the complex for evening gatherings and get togethers.  There will also be a few spots to camp at, too.  There will be walking/hiking trails all over the property, with lots of natural dye materials to search for.  It will be a good place to re-connect with Nature, relax, and have a great time with other like-minded people, enjoying all that Mother Nature has to offer.
  I did kind of goof when I was writing up the campaign.  I didn't read the fine print soon enough and put a big amount to raise, thinking I could use some of it to buy the piece of property next to us to build the Center on.  I guess you are not supposed to use money raised to buy real property, so I only need about half of what I'm asking for to get this up and going.  My goal is to have the Center open and going on June 15, 2014.  A lot has to happen between now and then, and most of it costs money, so if you or anyone you know would like to contribute, I would hugely appreciate it!  Please pass the word on to all of your "fibery" friends.  Thanks!!

   I've got quite a few helpers lined up for the month of August.  I got a camper!!!  Now they can stay in that instead of in the house, and everyone can have some privacy and their "own space"  It will be much better than having people staying in here on the couch.   I am so excited to have the camper.  That opens up a whole new world for me.  I can go to fiber festivals and stay in that instead of hotels, saving me a lot of money.  I can buy more fiber! :-)  Not that I need more, I have enough going on with the cashmere, but I can't resist all the colorful rovings and new fibers out there just waiting to be spun.   There is some pretty cool stuff out there!
  Well, I hope everyone is having a good summer, despite all the wacky weather.  It seems that you are either drowning or burning.  Not much in the "just right" category this year.  

Cool rainy day

  Today was a nice cool rainy day.  A nice break from the sun and heat.  Even though we haven't had that much sun and heat, after a few days of it, I'm ready for some clouds.
  A deer got into the garden last night and ate the broccoli that was just starting to grow well.  It also ate the tips of most of the peas, the carrot tops and even had the nerve to walk up by the front porch and eat the pansies that are in the wheelbarrow planter!  There is so much food out in the woods there is no reason at all for it to come in here.  The goats get full after an hour and a half out there.  They come in looking like they are about to pop!  Oreo was actually waddling. :-)  She's an "easy keeper" anyway, so when she gets out into the good food, she really expands.  She's as wide as she is tall.

  I sold the dairy cross kids, including Sweetpea.  That was sad selling her, but she will be going to a good home where she will be treated like a little princess, which she thinks she is anyway.  I'm delivering them this week sometime.   They've already been paid for, but the people had to build some fencing before they were ready for the goats.  I'm starting to wonder, though.  When I tried to call her tonight, I got a recording that said that number was no longer in service.  Rather strange.  Hope nothing is wrong!

   I got a couple more boomerang goats back this last week.  Out of the 4 wethers I sold two years ago, they have all now come back here.    Alex and Andy are back, and now Nicolas and Maxwell are back.  Alex and Andy have really nice cashmere, I was kind of glad to get them back.  I don't remember what Nicolas and Maxwell's cashmere is like.  If it's not really nice, they are nice big goats, so they can go in the freezer with no problem.  They are also rather wild and can't be caught too easily.  Not sure what all happened to them when they weren't here, but whatever it was didn't tame them down any.  It's funny, they won't let me touch them, but they are the first ones in when I call them all in from eating out in the woods.

   I've decided to sell Speckles, one of the milk goats.  She's the nicest of the three, doesn't have any horns, and is giving me a good amount of milk.  I'm getting way too much milk, so I came to the conclusion that I really don't need three of them.  She's only 5 years old, births out her kids easily, and takes her milking job seriously.  Jumps right up on the stand and eats her grain calmly while I milk her.

   I'm debating on whether or not to sell a bunch of the cashmere goats.   I'm not selling as much cashmere as I need to and I have bills that need paying, so I'm thinking about selling a bunch.  But, I also keep getting a strong feeling that I'm going to need every hair of cashmere I can get next year, so I'm hesitant to sell very many goats. It's a delimma!
    I do have a buckling that I'm going to sell pretty soon. Flash.   He's a beautiful shade of light brown with a stout build.  I'll put his picture on here one of these days.  I'm 99.9% sure he's going to have outstanding fleece, his parents both do, and he's looking like he is going to, too.  He has a nice square build also.

 There is a bear or two out there.  I saw one as I was coming home mid-morning one day last week.  Then when I've been taking the goats out to browse, I'm seeing shredded logs and stumps all over the place.  Overturned rocks, too.  The dogs have been barking a lot at night lately.  I'm glad we have the perimeter completely fenced.  It won't keep out a serious predator, but it keeps out the curious and lazy ones.  Between the fence and Nellie, the animals are rather safe here.

  Well, that's it for now.  Have a good summer!  

Summer!

The goats are enjoying the freedom of being out in the pasture, especially this area, as you can see it's already eaten way down.  They head here first, then move out around the rest of the place.  This used to be a round pen when I had horses, and then it was just pasture, then the bus was parked here when H&C lived here, and now it's back to pasture.  I've been taking the goats out into the neighbor's places to eat, too.  Good for reducing the fire hazard out in the forest.
  We've had a lot of rain this month.  I think we are 3 inches above normal for precipitation this year now.  It's rained almost every day.  Makes for lots of food for the critters anyway.  I haven't had to water anything but the greenhouse.  I need to figure out how the best way to get the rain water off the roof into the greenhouse when it's raining so I don't have to water anything.  I have a couple of ideas, I just need to experiment and see what happens.
   The garden is still waiting for warm weather to really take off and grow.  I haven't even planted most of it yet.  Later this week it's supposed to warm up finally, then I'll plant.  The peonies are about to put on their show.  They are such pretty flowers.  The columbines are starting to bloom now.
   The grass is getting out of hand in the garden and inner yard.  The weed-whacker decided to quit working last week, and I finally got it into the repair shop today.  It won't be ready till next week, so I'm going to have a hay crop for the goats when I do get all the grass cut, it's getting so long.  It's even going to seed!
   With all this rain we are going to have a bumper crop of raspberries this year.  The apple trees all have a ton of blooms on them, too.  Apple cider, applesauce, pies, and all that good stuff this fall!!  Yum!

  The Bluebirds that nested in the eve of the house have hatched out some babies.  I can hear them yelling when their parents bring them food.  Sounds like a full nest in there.  This is the first time we have ever had bluebirds up here.  They usually like more open field areas.  I guess we are open enough for them now.  I hope they all survive.  That would be neat if next year a whole family returns!

   I have a couple of different helpers coming from HelpX now.  One couple is coming in mid-July and one is coming mid-August.  Now if I could just get someone here the first parts of July and August, that would be great.  There is so much to do around here, it's almost overwhelming.  Not quite, but almost.

   I've tweaked the dehairing process and prices again.  It is just too slow of a process to be able to make any money at.  That is why there are so few mills that dehair cashmere.  If I were to even  come close to making a profit, I would have to charge at least $6 an ounce.  That would be way too expensive for the growers to pay and be able to make any profit on the sale of their cashmere after they get it back.  So I think the only way the cashmere business in this country is going to go anywhere is to have a few people go in together and get a dehairing machine, and just do whoever buys into the machine's cashmere.  If little groups in all the regions did this, then the mills around the country could spin it up fairly fast and the American Cashmere grower would be able to have a good business and make a decent profit.  Give the foreign cashmere a run for it's money.   The machine is not hard to run.  It's a very slow process, so one has to have patience, but it's interesting to put it into the machine and then see how it looks coming out the other end.  It helps to have a window to look out of, too. :-)
  I also do not know why anyone shears their goats.  It might save time on the harvesting end, but you lose any advantage there during the dehairing process.  It takes way longer to run through the machine, and the yield is so low compared to combed, I see no advantage to shearing.  Since you pay on the incoming weight, and at least 60% of that weight is guard hair, which gets thrown away in the process, it's like you are just throwing money down the drain.  Plus, if you have to pay someone to do the shearing, you are really losing money.
  I know I've only been doing this dehairing thing for about a year and a half, but I've seen a lot of cashmere in that time, both combed and shorn, and the combed is the way better deal.  It's got a better return, it's faster to dehair, and there isn't so much waste.
  Well, that's my humble opinion on it, anyway.  :-)  
  Happy Summer!!      

It's raining finally!

       It finally rained today!  Now the forest will grow and the goats can get out to eat by the week-end.  They ate the yard down fairly fast!  If the deer would stay out of our property and stay out in the forest service land, it would be even better.  I don't know why they have to come in here, when there is far more grass and food out in the woods.  I guess they feel safe in here.  I think one deer eats as much as two goats do.
     

     I have 69 goats now, counting both the dairy and cashmeres.  The kids are way too cute.   Here's Flash when he was about a week old.   Then there's Otis jumping onto the rock and promptly sliding off the other side.  Between the hollow log and the rock, the kids keep themselves entertained pretty good.

   
   The garden is is starting to grow.  I've got carrots, beets, lettuce, radishes and garlic planted so far.  This week the spinach and broccoli will go in.  I have some salad greens and peas growing the the greenhouse this year.  So far, I've had two salads.   The asparagus is up and I'm eating that almost every night.  A great way to fix it is to saute' it in a mixture of coconut oil and butter with a little onion and when it's tender sprinkle some goat cheese on and a splash of soy sauce,  Yum!!  I also have cooked a chicken breast, chopped up, with it, and put it over the salad greens.  That was really good!


  Now that my interns have moved on to their next adventure, I'm looking for someone else to come along that would like to learn about cashmere goats, and the off-grid lifestyle.  We have 20 acres, gardens, goats, and chickens.  It would be nice to have a couple again.  I'll share the food we grow here with you, (lots of goat milk, etc,) but we don't have any guest quarters yet, you would have to have an RV of some kind.  There is a good flat spot to park in that is private, yet close enough to walk up to easily.  If you want to take a working vacation for a couple of weeks, and don't mind a little bit of somewhat hard work, you are welcome to come for a visit.
  The things I need help with are cleaning the pens, gathering firewood for next winter, and some gardening.  I need to spend more time in the dehairing room and working with the cashmere fiber, so I need someone to get these other things done.  
  We are only two hours away from Glacier National Park, one of the most beautiful places on earth.  It is a good day trip from here if you leave early in the morning and don't get back till almost dark. ( I've done it many times)  We live out in the middle of the mountains, with one other neighbor that is close by, up a forest service road that's in pretty good shape.  We're 45 minutes, or 21 miles,  from Kalispell, and the Flathead Valley.  There is lots of wildlife up here to see, too.    
  My husband is working back east till this fall, at least, so I'm trying to do everything by myself, and it just might get to be a little overwhelming.  I do not want anyone who uses drugs of any kind, or drinks alcoholic beverages in excess.  A nice, responsible couple in good physical shape that is not afraid of working outdoors, and that likes goats, would be perfect.  Kind of like  H&C were! :-)  And, if you know anything about solar hot water installations, that would be really great!
  
   Well, it's time to go out and feed everyone, water the greenhouse and get things all shut down for the night.  One thing about having the greenhouse, it needs watering even if it's raining out.  I"m going to have to figure out an irrigation system to get run-off from the roof inside and watering things when it's raining.

Springtime in MT

What a beautiful day we had today!  I spent most of it weeding and landscaping the gardens and yard.  Tomorrow it's back to dehairing my cashmere.  It's looking like I won't be able to get all of mine done before the outside cashmere starts coming in. I've got 36 fleeces to do.   But, I'll get enough done to fill the CSA orders and a little more, then do others, then go back to mine.
  I have 69 total goats now.  11 dairy and crosses, and 58 cashmeres.  The kids are all doing great.  I'm only keeping two of the boys bucks, the rest are getting "wetherized".  One of them is white with a silver dollar sized spot on his neck, and the other is a pretty shade of brown with some neat looking facial markings.  Both are nice square bodied kids.  The white one is really stout.  He's a chunk.  He'll make good meat babies, along with the fiber.  His parents both have outstanding fleece, so he should, too.  The brown one isn't quite as stocky, but he has nice conformation and is just cute. :-)  He comes from parents with great fiber, too.  When I get decent pictures of them, I'll put them on here.
   The baby chickens had their first day out in the big world today.  They weren't quite sure what to do at first, but by the end of the day, they were having a grand old time out there.  They are big enough now that I don't have to worry too much about a raven or hawk picking them off anymore.  I'm so used to the Jersey Black Giant chickens we used to have, that these are looking a bit strange.  They are Silver Laced Wyandottes, with two Golden Wyandottes in there as well.  The golden ones are really pretty!  I might have to get a couple more of them.  It's nice to have something besides black in the poultry department around here.  I'll be ordering turkeys again here pretty soon.  I have a few people that want me to raise them a turkey or two, plus we want some for ourselves, too.  I'm going to get some Naragansett ones this time.  They are a heritage breed that gets to a medium size from what I've read about them.  Somewhere around the 18 to 25 lb range.  I might keep a breeding pair and let them raise a hatch or two.  

  My daffodils are blooming nicely, and the tulips are about to start.  There are over 100 buds in the tulip garden again.  It's going to be pretty!   I'm going to start planting the vegetable garden this coming week.  We had a couple of really good frosts this last week, so I'm glad I hadn't planted anything yet.  I got the beds all ready to go.  One nice thing about raised beds is they don't take long to get ready for the new season.  The Square Foot Gardening method really works good, too.  It's surprising how much food you can grow in a small space using that method.

  Well, Happy Mother's Day to all the mothers out there.  Have a great day!