I Like Days Like This

We are having a downpour and there is distant thunder.  I love the smell and the feel of the cool damp wind.  I ate my lunch on the front porch on the fringe of it all, first at the table and then standing just outside the front door.  Now, I have moved just inside as the thunder rumbles and the hard rain still pellets the railing and steps.

On days like this, for some reason, people always say "it's a good day for ducks".  On Saturday, I brought 2 baby geese (goslings) home to Cabin Spring Farm.  Mother's Day, they spent the day in a big box in the mud hall, and Monday, I put them in a small pen to enjoy the outdoors.  We watched them eat grass, find worms, and splash in in a low bucket of water.  I watched them from the fiber shed as rain started coming down first lightly and then harder.  I went out in the rain to make sure the shade cloth wasn't collecting rainwater that would collapse it on the goslings.  Later, we went in the house and when John checked on them in the late afternoon, one of them was missing.  We were devastated and locked for him all over the place, with no sign.  On closer inspection we found that on one end of the pen the chicken wire was up slightly.  I guess we will never know what really happened to him.

I spent that night and the next morning feeling like I was a neglectful mom and I kept wondering why it happened and what I should do.  My wonderful supportive husband said he thought I should call the woman at the farm where they came from and see if there was a extra goose looking for a place to go.

I called and she did have a few extra males.  She was sorry for what had happened and said we could have another gosling.

Yesterday, John and I went to the farm in Amissville and this time were able to see more of their farm.  Saturday, when I arrived to pick up the goslings, they were in a box waiting for me and it was late in the day of a long day, so we headed right home.

The young couple at Crowfoot Farm have only been at farming for 5 years and they have more animals than Karen!  They raise alot of heritage breed so they have Hog Island sheep, Cotswold sheep, Dorky chickens, Cotton Patch geese, and turkeys and guineas and even peacocks, and at least one horse and cow.  The geese raise the goslings so we had to go find the right clutch.  We saw several pairs of geese with their goslings running to keep in line, a funny sight.  The right one was found and scooped up and the others went along their way with seemingly only a brief moment of anxiety.  

Back at Cabin Spring Farm, the new gosling was introduced and the two spent the afternoon in the pen with several ground staples added for security.  

Today, is a good day for ducks but the geese are spending it inside.

 

As Promised - photos from my previous rotation

A Magical Place in Maine and reflections.  When I was 4 and 5 years old my grandmother had a farm and I remember walking to a big rock with a butter and sugar sandwich to have a picnic.  I am pretty sure the rock wasn't this big but it brought back the memory when I saw it.  Does anyone else see the sculpted face?

We found this trillium in a wet area near the brook

This is part of the future goat pasture, I think.

A calm pool in the brook, now that is a magical reflection.

 There are stone walls all over the property but they wouldn't hold any goats in.  The sheep clammered over a stone wall, here, just last week.

This is a spot picked for a special future purpose

 The brook changes character all through the property. Sometimes rushing and other times so still.

This farm is currently home to a very special person and 2 cats, that I know of.  I wonder how many other creatures call this place home.  

I returned from Maine yesterday but stopped on the way home to pick up 2 new creatures that can now call Cabin Spring Farm home.  Stay tuned.  

Rotating is Good

The new fencing is working out great.  A few days ago, it was time to move the sheep to a new pasture so I went out to the rails to switch them from one set of posts to another and the sheep came down, waited patiently, and ran into the new pasture with longer grass, dandelion blossoms, and an assortment of other new vegetation.

Rotating is Good.  I am in rotation now myself.  I am currently in Maine, exploring and consulting with Rosemary, who has been stewarding a 1790's house on 52+ acres of magical land for almost a year.  (pictures coming soon when I rotate back home where my picture transfer device is)

Yesterday, when walking part of the property, we saw a Trillium, patches of Bloodroot, and  other earlier blooming wildflowers.  With this rotation, it seems, I went back a calendar month to the first break of spring.  The deciduous  trees are just beginning to leaf but there are a great many species of coniferous trees in all stages of life.  There are signs everywhere, of previous human intervention; rock walls fashioned in different configurations, pieces of fencing, parts of irrigation systems, stumps of 100 year old trees, flat stones over the upper part of the brook.  I wish we could rotate back in time and see the mill working off the brook and see what some of the other stone walls were built for, and by whom.  As it is, we must just use our imagination.  While we were imagining, we envisioned 50 goats clearing some of the berry canes and other overgrowth in the future pasture areas.  We came back to the house to check Craigslist for someone needing to find a new place for their herd.  Instead we found a guy who had 10  21-29 foot fiberglass sailboat hulls he wanted to rotate to a new place for shelters for sheep, goats, or pigs.  He had a good imagination as well.

We ended the day by burning some brush and roasting hotdogs on a stick over the fire.  A, I, H, and M joined us for dinner.  A was in charge of the foil potatoes for the coals, I & H whittled the points of the hotdog sticks and helped feed the fire, and M, at almost 2, copied everything everyone else did.

I am hoping to do a couple of quick rotations before I find myself home, where I will be able to provide photos for the imagining readers of this blog.

I Did It Again

I got through 2 days of our shearing and fiber weekend without taking any pictures.  I am just going in too many directions to remember to take pictures.  I have asked people to take pictures every year but sometimes they don't show up and sometimes I can't figure out how to change the format.  Also it seems only part of the event get captured so  that doesn't work too well either.

 Here are a few pictures Courtney took last year.

We had a good crowd but sometimes
I feel funny sharing pictures of people on
this blog.  I am sure these guys don't care since you really can't identify them.

The fleeces were even more beautiful this year.

 This friend of Lyndy's is trying a new wig.

There was a great crowd yesterday for the shearing and demonstrations. We had fewer today but the people today all stayed a long while exploring all fiber techniques.  

I will take some pictures of Rosemary's and Jean's fiber art, that they did not sell, tomorrow.  

The event was free but we received some nice donations, everyone had a great time, and many thanked me personally for making this kind of event available.  Also, several of my fiber friends helped out and made everything run smoothly.   

I would say that this year's "Sheep Shearing and the Journey to Fiber Art" was a big success even if I don't have the proof to show it. 

Spring Fiber Camp 2014

As I was saying in the last blog, last week was Spring Break Fiber Camp.  The weather was a mix and one day we had to come to the house because the fiber shed was just too cold.  It was a great week, anyway. 

 It is always fun to have new kids that have not been to Cabin Spring Farm and introduce them to a whole new way to have fun; learning fiber techniques.  Equally fun is having campers that have been to Fiber Camp many times and see what they master and what new, captures their interest.  K conquered the spinning wheel and spun some beautiful yarn and R met the inkle loom.

These two have taken there skills home with them and

continued there in their spare time.  Actually, K

made his rug at school.

C is the queen of drum carding, and her brother C, is taking some fleece off the comb with the Oregon Diz

 We are always discussing new scientific discoveries while we create and the kids made one of their own.   Slugs eat stink bugs!  If we could get them to eat live ones......

 This session, the boys were in the majority and they really got into needle felting.  They were felting all kinds of creatures and couldn't keep up with a supply of felt so R's mom gave him some commercial felt to bring in.

and share

 In the end though, I think we all decided that hand me felt is the best!

Farm Work - Finally COMPLETED some Projects

Just finished a week of fiber camp.  It is Spring Break for the local schools. But before the cool pictures of Fiber Camp, pictures of all the work we got done before camp.

We brought two new fruit trees home to put in the orchard.  We built these hurtle panels from the design of the fences at the museum shown in a previous blog.  They are lashed together with baling twine (the next best thing to duct tape).  I hesitate to include these pictures because I have readers up north.  The grass isn't quite as green as it looks in this picture but the peach tree did blossom.  I hope not too soon, we are still having some night frosts.



The fencing is done in the upper pasture.
I like the way it turned out.  Now the sheep
are rotating and I can plant some new orchard grass & timothy seed in each pasture as the sheep move out.

John built two gates at the top of 2 pastures.

This picture is kind of like another but without the snow and the sheep are much smaller (eating some morning hay- was that last week?  Look how the walnut tree is almost dancing.

Maybe this week I can get some more planting done.

Blake 's Awake

Warm weather is finally upon us and there is much that we are starting in the way of spring chores.  John's least favorite, I think, is checking the water in the cabin and turning it on.  Every spring there is a  break in the pipe to fix.  He has to take off this box thing around the pipes since the cabin is log and doesn't have walls for the plumbing.

A few days ago John was in a tight area in the bathroom fixing this year's leaks, when Blake, the resident black snake, greeted him by poking his head up.  John said he looks to be 6 feet long this Spring.  I never did see Blake last year, since I didn't get around much with my broken ankle, and John only saw him a couple of times, which was I think a couple of times too many.  John is not fond of snakes and just tolerates them because of all they do for us.  I like snakes since I met many in trees that I climbed, as a kid.

Lyndy brought me a couple of bottles of Black Snake Mead last year and they are still unopened.
see earlier blog
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I hope I will have more encounter with Blake this year, but some very pleasant ones.