Almost forgot! I requested a custom set with steaks & cakes (my favorites) and they’re adorable:

I wrote the WPI – gauge conversions on the back of the WPI tool because I can never remember them. My Rhinebeck yarn is worsted, as expected.

The fence is a go! Well, not entirely–but all of the main property/pasture fence is now officially finished. We still have to plank the courtyard fence to close the perimeter for good and all, and cover the gate frames with matching wood, but the really hard part is done. In the meantime, I’m going to wire cattle panels to the courtyard fence frames the sheep and chickens will be secure from dogs and coyotes (we’re practically in town, so I’ve never seen coyotes on our property, though they’re all over the surrounding countryside).

We’ll be clearing the perimeter and maybe eventually mulching it all (mulch fund? mulch bake sale? The City of Topeka has very cheap mulch from brush clearning, so it’s a matter of paying for transportation to the country) so we can have a half-mile public running/walking path around the whole thing. One of the wooded corners is angled and has a good space for a small picnic table or benches.

In other Cupcake Ranch news, Bridgette is fully recovered (minus a full tail) and laying normally, Zoe has joined the broody pack (which is fine since she wasn’t laying, anyway), and I think Inara & Kaylee may be molting.

And me, I’m trying to purge an UTI with mighty antibiotics before I leave for vacation, but I’m feeling a little worse for the wear. It’s vexing because I’d really prefer a little boundless energy to TCB of everything I need to TCB before I leave. I already had to cancel my plans with Cathy because I didn’t think my poor bladder could handle the 4-hr round-trip commute. Tonight, we’re going to have a little Mad Men-inspired hors d’oeuvres dinner and watch the season premier. I’ll have my one cocktail so as not to disrupt the antibiotics and make myself feel shitty, but I wish I could really tie one on to get into the spirit of the thing.

Can you tell I’m excited about taking a vacation!? I’m taking the Southwest Chief to Chicago for a few days to visit Jason! I was going to get a roomette because they’re so fancy and glamorous, but then the price jumped up between looking and booking, so I decided to blow it off and let myself spend the difference if I went shopping.

I’m going to bring my Rhinebeck knitting and my ipod and a little sack of sandwiches and fruit. Maybe a spindle. If I’m really brave, I’ll sing loudly along with my ipod to guarantee avoiding much conversation or interaction (the beauty of the roomette–you only have to talk to the nice conductor and whoever you get stuck with at meals). The funny thing is, sometimes I really love talking to strangers. But this is a LONG train ride, and I don’t want to start anything that’s going to make me want to gnaw off my own leg an hour down the tracks.

In other exciting news: Faith is still sitting on the duck eggs! Zoe has also joined in part-time, but she’s not as dedicated. I candled them last night, and 6 of the 8 are alive and kicking. You shine a light through them in a dark room, and if they’re alive, you’ll see a network of blood vessels and a little blob floating around. One just looked like blotchy shell (stuck yolk?) and one had died–you could see something floating around, but not in the dreamy, mermaidy way of the others, and there were no blood vessels–but not blood ring, either. I cracked it open and found a dead embryo the size of a bean. It looked like a bean-sized cartoon alien, with big black eyes on the side of its head and a slit mouth, and everything below the head just looked like a stringy glob. Both of them smelled absolutely horrendous, as you can imagine.

I’m going to candle them all again the day before I leave for vacation so I can dispatch any duds and prevent a smelly rotten eggsplosion under Faith while I’m gone.

It plumped up, as I had hoped. Before & after washing:

I should probably schedule in some time to properly design the sweater so I don’t do my usual frog-and-reknit-seven-times routine. In my imaginary world of make-believe, I want to start scheduling stuff so I don’t constantly live in my dropping-everything-to-address-the-unnecessary-crisis-that-throws-off-my-whole-week style. What’s with the hyphenation?

My week-throwing activities this week: finishing the hay shelter, which I’ve known I’d need since, what, last year? I do congratulate myself on actually making sure the posts were set well in advance. That’s the one part that just doesn’t work last-minute. Likewise, I had the pallets all set up on concrete chunks so I didn’t have to restack 75 bales (just the 8 that didn’t fit). Then there was batt club, which is also no surprise, at least theoretically, but which always sneaks up on me. I actually got them done before the end of the month, which I haven’t done since early spring. Then making some inserts for the city’s utility bill & setting up the web registration for the new Art Share pinhole camera workshop. And of course, the last-minute run for duck eggs. More on that later.

All of that (well, except the eggs) could have gone on the calendar & I wouldn’t have had a zillion dishes stacked up in the sink. Plan ahead! Plan ahead! Plan ahead, dummy!

It’s funny, on the way home from our DSLR class, Marta was howling about The Calendar, and how important it is to schedule things, or they’ll never get done. I was tickled because she’s apparently a known Calendar Nazi, but I completely agree. I completely agree, but I am also completely incapable of actually doing that.

As long as I’ve been old enough to understand the concept of a schedule, I’ve longed for a routine. When I was growing up, my mom would always go to the gym after work, then come home, and immediately decide on and set out her outfit for the next day, down to the accessories, shoes, and panty hose. She’d even try it on (I’m assuming because, like me, being a chronic dieter and optimist, she had a range of clothes which may or may not flatter on any given day). Very smart. I’m more the sleep-as-late-as-possible-and-then-frantically-try-on-and discard-to-the-floor-twenty-outfits-that-make-me-look-fat-and-leave-near-tears-twenty-minutes-late type.

I also have a hard time saying no and I’m willfully optimistic about how long things take, all evidence of the actual passage of time to the contrary. What’s my point here? Oh yes, so today I canned beets with June (and learned canasta! Ohmygod it’s so fun!), and aside from a few chores, I don’t have any soul-crushingly pressing tasks, so I’m thinking of taking Ron’s laptop outside and making up my super amazing master plan for home domination, then strategically festooning my calendar with a few key things that I’d otherwise delegate to do lists and continually ignore until they were caving in around me. And then, here’s the key part: actually do them. Maybe there should be some prize if I succeed.

What leaves a little tender, hard bump with a dark spot in the center when it bites you? Something new has been biting me.

Okay, so the duck eggs!

Since I couldn’t get Faith out of the nest, I decided to get her some duck eggs to (hopefully!) hatch out. I contemplated getting some chicken eggs, maybe a new breed, but I didn’t want to deal with roosters and eggs are obviously luck of the draw. And with ducks, apparently the girls are the noisy ones. I figured if the ones not earning their keep were relatively quiet–and didn’t have pointy beaks and spurs–I’d be cool with freeloaders. I settled on Indian Runner ducks because they’re hilarious and good layers. I’m not sure if it will work–ducks hatch in 28 days, compared to a chicken’s 21, but she’s been sitting on the nest FORever, so apparently she has the patience of Job and will persist until she gets something out of it. I’m hoping having a nice big clutch I don’t steal twice a day will keep her enthusiastic. Andrew from Geek Farm Life (yes, I called the Farm Phone. Farm Phone rocks!) said the other trouble could be the humidity–ducks splash around in the water & keep the eggs moist. Jennifer, who I bought them from, suggested misting them a couple times a day toward the end, so I’ll give that a whirl.

If it doesn’t work, it doesn’t work, but in the meantime, she seems pretty into her new job, and if all goes well: ducklings! Followed by: hilarious upright ducks!

She takes her job very seriously.

When you disturb her, she gets all riled and puffs up her feathers and clicks. Luckily, duck eggs are larger and smoother than chicken eggs (as well as lighter than most of ours), so it’s easy to grab the chicken eggs out from under her. Well, easy for me. I’m well acquainted with eggs. I think I may need to label the duck eggs somehow so when I’m out of town, whoever collects them doesn’t take the wrong ones. I wouldn’t want a dead duckling omelette or an exploded rotten chicken egg under Faith.

I guess I should read up about ducklings, in case this works…

Here’s what she’ll hopefully hatch out for us:

So today, instead of being truly productive, I’ve had pockets of productivity alternating with pockets of wayward procrastination. I was digging around in my procrastination pocket (which, by the way, is a mess!) and I read this article Suzanne sent me.

I immediately felt like I should organize something! But before I could, I got distracted and started looking for for organization or consumption challenges.

I was thinking of the Tour de Fleece and knitalongs and back when I did Stashalong, and how mightily productive in a smallish way they encourage you to be. I’m very much a teacher’s pet–I love to be graded and I love assignments and rules (this is also why I love board games)–so challenges and -alongs are right up my alley.

I’m thinking maybe I should refocus my whole life around challenges. Here are some I think I would enjoy:

• Consumption challenge: Don’t buy anything new for a set period. And if you buy something used, you must get rid of something new.
• Clearing challenge: Eliminate a set number of objects a day from your home for a set period of time
• Pantry/Freezer challenge: Eat only from the pantry/freezer, supplemented (because it’s summer for frack’s sake!) with fresh produce and maybe fresh dairy
• Destash challenge: Knit/spin only from stash and/or eliminate a set weight of fiber
• 5 servings challenge: Eat your 5 servings of fruits and vegetables
• Garden challenge: Spend 10 minutes a day in yard or garden upkeep for a set period of time
• Waste not, want not challenge: Go a set length of time without wasting any food
• Etsy challenge: list something new every day and keep up with orders daily
• Ebay challenge: as above, but selling crap on ebay
• Photo challenge: photograph something new or from a new perspective each day
• Closet challenge: work 10 minutes/day organizing closets
• Dental challenge: floss every day!
• DIY wardrobe challenge: make a new garment each week for a set period
• Recipe challenge: Cook something all new each week for as set period
• Taste test challenge: Make a club to taste test a bunch of different types of something you’re curious about: olives, blue cheeses, soft ripened cheeses, Chillean wines, regional ales, chocolate cakes, pickles, etc.
• Empty bin challenge: Limit garbage to a fixed amount over a certain period by reducing, recycling, composting, etc.
• Fix-it challenge: Repair something broken or wonky that you’d like to keep using each week for a set period
• Magazine challenge: Find appropriate new homes for all your old magazines
• TV Diet challenge: Reduce TV consumption by a fixed amount. And Hulu counts as TV, you big cheater.
• Budget buster’s challenge: Track all your spending for 2-3 months, and actually come up with a workable budget

Man, I’m good at procrastinating. I wish they gave a prize for that. As a side note, did you know that in Canada, the red ribbon is first place and the blue ribbon is second?

I’m going to our CSA farm tonight! They’re even giving me a ride, since Ron’s got the car & I was on their way. He’s supposed to pick me up. I’ll take lots of critter and vegetable pictures.

Yay! We actually got the hay shelter in a good, if temporary, state for keeping our hay dry and out of the sun. The posts are set in concrete and the cattle panel roof is all set, but the current tarp configuration is temporary.

Jay delivered my hay Sunday while I was at Spinsters Club. It was super humid during haying (more on that below), so he put up my hay in large round bales instead of small square bales, and swapped me out an equivalent of my share of small squares of prairie grass from their pasture.

Hay Primer

(By the way, this is largely what I’ve read in books or extension flyers, or been told. My firsthand expertise is limited to watching someone else hay my pasture, and the 40-odd bales I’ve fed, the 20-odd bales I’ve let get spoiled in the weather and later used for mulch/hay bale garden, and the 75 new bales sitting under my shiny new hay shelter.)

So hay. Hay is basically dry plant matter packed together for longer-term, compact storage. Think of it like dried fruit versus fresh fruit: way less perishable, way less juicy, somewhat less tasty but still good, and a little more nutritionally dense pound-for-pound because they water weight is much lower.

Hay can be legume (e.g., alfalfa or clover) or grass (e.g., brome, prairie grass, etc.–what we usually have around here). Legumes are cut multiple times in a season and certain cuttings are considered better than others. I know nothing about it, as we have grass hay, which is cut once. Legume hay is richer, with more protein and nutrition by volume. However, grass hay has the benefit of providing more roughage with fewer calories, which can be advantageous for mature animals who might be prone to getting fat.  You can think of it like granola versus shredded wheat. Yeah, granola is tastier, but I can eat way more shredded wheat without adding to my fat ass.

Hay is different from straw, which is the leftover stalks from other crops, usually wheat. Straw is more inert, less prone to rot, and makes great bedding because its thick, smooth stalks don’t get all worked into the fleece. Hay has little nutritional value but is good roughage, and the sheep will sometimes eat it. I think some farmers feed it deliberately to add more roughage volume to an otherwise rich diet. It’s also a good dry mulch (think strawberries) and the basis for straw bale construction.

In the winter, I feed the sheep all they hay they want, with a little grain as an evening treat. If you’re not sure about the nutrition of the hay, you can kind of keep an eye on the animals and supplement with grain. For instance, last month, I noticed both the ewes seemed a little bony, so I quit backing off their grain, which I was inadvertantly doing too quickly, because they lambs were eating bigger and bigger shares of the same amount, effectively backing off the ewe’s ration naturally. On the other end of the spectrum, right now, the wethers are fat, and are clearly getting too much grain, because they’re pushy and have horns. I should probably move the little trough out to the pasture and grain them scantly and separately from the moms and the babies, who aren’t piggy enough to fight them.

(They’re actually eating pasture right now, but it’s the same idea: you can give them a little more grain if they’re eating all the pasture they can and they still seem thin.)

All hay it is mowed, left to dry a bit (sometimes turned or raked at that point), and then gathered up and packed into bales with great big farm machines.  (Hay can also be mowed, loaded, and baled or stacked with draft horses or by hand, but that’s a whole other process.) The idea is to bring down the moisture to safe levels without getting it completely sun-baked. This can be really rough if it’s humid, or worse, rainy.

You can have small square bales (what hobby farmers typically want), or large square bales (you don’t see those much in the US), or large round bales (the most common in the US). Each type of bale is made with a different machine, and they’re all fun to watch

The large round bales are the ones you see dotting freshly-shorn pastures this time of year. They’re tied with either rows of twine or sometimes a plastic netting or wrap. They’re most commonly used to feed cattle or horses–big animals. But they’re also used for larger numbers of smaller animals. They’re not for the hobby farmer because they’re huge (typically 5′ high by 4′ wide) and heavy (500-1200 pounds).  You can’t just roll one around. You need special equipment to move it–a big spike thing that stabs the center of the bale and either lifts or drags it around with a truck or tractor.

Apparently if the hay isn’t getting dry quickly enough, the big bales can be a better form, because the drier hay (the stuff exposed most directly to the sun after mowing) can absorb some of the moisture from the wetter hay, so you get a good net effect. Also, the big bales, with their lower surface-area-to-volume ratio, hold up better in the weather (so they very outside might get beaten, but there’s proportionally way more good stuff in side). Their round shape means rain is more apt to run off it than to soak in as it would with square bales.

The small square bales are what you think of on a hay ride. They’re 3-4′ long, 18-24″ wide and 12-18″ tall. At 40-60 pounds, they’re also the easiest to handle. They’re tied in two places, longways, with either twine or baling wire.

You can carry the bales by grabbing both pieces of twine like the handles on a shopping bag, but an easier way is to use a hay hook, which you can plunge into the bale behind the twine for support, then use to drag the bale around. It’s especially handy pulling down a bale at the top of the stack. I didn’t have one last winter, and I’m super excited about it. With its red finish, it’s easy to spot and cheery, which is a nice counterpoint to the inherent menace of a big metal hook. Those big, colorful machines in the distance are used in haying.

When you cut the twine on a small square bale, it kind of heaves a sigh and expands a little but basically stays together if you don’t try to move it. From the side, you can see the “slices” of the bale, called flakes, which fall away from the bale like slices of bread but stay reasonably well compacted together, so it’s easy to grab a couple of flakes and pop them in a feeder.

This hay doesn’t look as nice and fresh to me as they hay I got from my own pasture last year, but what do I know about hay? And you can’t really tell until you crack one open, which I won’t be doing until fall.

Below you can see a couple of flakes (the one on the left has been mangled a bit by a dog sleeping on it; the one on the right is pretty intact). From all the leafy green bits, I think it’s alfalfa hay.

Flakes by thejesse on flickr.

Hay needs to be covered and stored away from the rain, wind snow, etc. It also suffers nutritional loss from exposure to sunlight, so even when the weather is fair, it’s good to put it out of the sun. Wet hay can get moldy or can rot, which can lead to even more problems. You don’t want to feed moldy hay (it can be toxic), but you don’t need to be super panicky, because you can usually tell if it’s bad by looking at it; and besides, most animals won’t eat it unless they’re starving. They’ll just spill it everywhere and root around for the better stuff. Some animals will simply refuse hay if it’s not just perfect (I’m not talking moldy here, but just not cut at the prime moment they prefer); I’ve heard goats and alpacas are both way pickier than sheep. My sheep will even nibble the ancient mulch hay I bought for bedding, though I’m guessing it has zero nutritional value. It’s like eating celery. Dry, withered celery.

(BTW, If you do let your hay get spoiled, all is not lost (well, from the animals’ perspective, yeah it is). You can still use it as an excellent mulch–the flakes make it easy to lay out over a garden like tiles–or you can plant directly into rotting bales. From my limited experience hay bale garden isn’t as fruitful as a conventional garden, but it’s way convenient for several reasons. They have many of the benefits of raised beds without the expense: all the plants start a couple feet off the ground, so care and harvesting are easy on your back; rabbits can’t get to your plants; you’ll get the odd weeds, but they’re much easier to pull out than in a real garden; you can plant densely but sill have plenty of room to walk around them; you can start them anywhere–mine are on the impenetrable gravel of the school’s courtyard, which can normally only accommodate weeds; they hold water fairly well, but also drain nicely; and when they rot away entirely, you can just push them into a pile and compost them!)

So here’s my perfectly serviceable if half-finished hay shelter! It’s got two posts in concrete, with rails between, and curved cattle panels forming the framework of the roof. Right now it’s a quilt of tarps, but I ordered a great big, heavy-duty recycled billboard tarp that will replace the curved top and straight wall. Then the current roof tarp will be moved to form the curved wall over near Agnes, silver side out. I’ll want to come up with some kind of door opening on that side. When it’s done, I’ll be able to go inside and shove a bale of hay onto that ramp above Agnes, then walk into the barn and open the little door over the ramp and grab my hay. Much better than my awful “system” last year of dragging a bale out from under the tarp, which was weighted down with a hodgepodge of bungies, boards, and bricks, dragging it over for middleman storage in the empty chicken coop. Besides, next winter, there will be actual chickens in the coop!

On the curved ends, the tarps are attached to the cattle panels 4-6″ in from the edge so that the roof overhands the sides, which should hopefully keep everything nice and dry.

The roof is supported with 2 ranch panels (trimmed to about 14′ long) with leftover woven wire fencing filling the gap.  The hay is stacked 4-6 bales tall on seven old pallets, which are resting on chunks of concrete. I imagine there will be a whole world of rabbits and mice under there (and hopefully a successful barn cat), but at least the hay will be dry and off the ground. The shelter is big enough for 3 x 3 pallets, so There’s also a 2-pallet-deep empty space leftover where I intend to move the dead deep freeze to store grain, as well as some implements like the manure fork, random buckets, etc.

Hay Math

If you have pasture, you can pay someone to hay it, either in a share of the hay or cash. Last year, I paid in hay and still had plenty from my share to feed all winter (or, more accurately: I would have had enough if I hadn’t let a bunch of it get rained on or later destroyed by a shredded tarp–the winds out here will turn a sturdy tarp with a little slack into threadbare chiffon in no time).

This year, there was an extra little chunk of pasture Jay couldn’t hay because of branches jumping into his mower, so I ended up with a handful fewer bales coming my way than last year. With last year’s flock, it would have been no trouble, but with my flock 75% larger (and probably doubled by weight once the lambs are grown), I had to buy some to be on the safe side. I got a total of 75 bales.

Hm. I just redid the math and realized I probably should have gone a little higher.

Here’s how I figured it. I reckoned about half a bale a day for 5 months. Last winter they were eating 2-3 flakes a day, or a bale every 4-5 days, until the spring when Agnes & Fudgy got closer to lambing (when it almost doubled for about a month). So I doubled that amount, because Uncle Honeybunch and Mr. Shivers are small, so I figured it’s more like going from 3 sheep to 6 than 4 to 7. So: 0.5 x 30 (days in a month) x 5 (November – March) = 75 bales.

To check my math, I sussed out my per-animal average for the winter. Last year, I probably threw out a good third of the 58 bales I got. So 40 bales + 8 more I bought = 48 bales.

48 bales/4 sheep (I’m counting them as whole sheep here, since you’re averaging in two piggy pregnant/nursing ewes for part of that time) = 12 bales each. 12 x 6 = 72 (I’m back to counting the Shetlands as half-sheep, since there will be no pregnant/lactating animals to up the averages, and you need 2 Shetlands to = 1 Romney).

But to be really safe, it’s smarter to figure on 6 months’ worth of hay, which would be 90 bales by method #1 and 87 by method #2. Our first frost date is 10/1, but the grass doesn’t freeze then. Typically, there’s still grass until the end of October. If that’s the case this year, I can graze them until the beginning of November and… Hm. April isn’t reliably grassy yet, either. Usually April gets all nice and green and then screws you with a big freeze. The freeze usually isn’t enough to wipe out grass, though; more of a tender growth killer. Well, anyway. We’ll see.

Spontaneous Combustion!

Apart from not wanting the expense of waste of moldy or rotten hay, it’s especially important for hay to be dry enough when it’s baled for general safety. Too-moist hay invites rot/composting, which creates heat (like the center of a compost pile); if enough heat builds up, voilà: spontaneous combustion!

In non-hay-related news, Spinsters Club was on Sunday at Jen’s & fun as usual!

Here was my carpool on the way home:

Register now! Hooray!

We’re doing Yarn School & Felt School back-to-back again. You can take both or either one. There’s a 3-month installment again (no refunds on installments, so make sure!) and if you take both workshops, you get a free overnight stay and a free Dye Lab session on Sunday! Links to the skinny on both workshops are on the registration page.

Last night, I plied up all of my Spinners Hill singles while geeking out on Torchwood: Children of Earth. I got through the first 4 days of the miniseries. Here’s the result, unwashed. I’m hoping it will fluff up a bit when I wash it.