Several years ago, I would publish almost daily accounts that I called, I believe, my view from the milk stool. I’m not spending any time on the milk stool this year, at least so far. I’m not sure how I feel about that, but what I do know, I don’t miss the difficulties associated with finding a home for that milk that I was taking from those goats.
I started selling raw milk some ten (or more) years ago. I’m pretty sure when I first started it was at $12 a gallon. It may have been less when I first started but I do know that I’ve been selling it for $12 a gallon for quite a few years. I wish I could say that feed prices have not risen over the past years, but that’s far from true.
Wally and I made the decision to cut the goat herd down to just three adult does (females), the one buck (male) and his wethered (castrated) companion – “Uncle Buddy,” That’s fewer goats than I had in a long, long time. There’s three babies that were born this year who are females whom I may keep back. The four male kids (baby goats) will be sold for meat at the end of the summer, early fall.
My feed bill is a lot easier to handle. It wasn’t as if I was making enough money by selling milk to pay for their feed and our (Wally’s and my) labor. It was far from it. We’re blessed with a good pasture so the goats are hardly eating any hay which helps a lot.
Then there were the people who would buy five gallons one week, go down to two the next, want three the next then go on vacation at the beach for two weeks so no milk.
What’s the vacation?
So now I just enjoy the goats and not worry about milking for others. When we have to separate the male kids from the females the end of July I’ll have to separate them so I may need to milk then. We’ll see. That’s okay – I’ll make cheese and freeze it.
Wally and I have been spending a lot of time in the garden. I finally purchased a grow tent to start seedlings inside. I sold a photography flash kit that I never used and purchased it. It’s really too late to start tomatoes and peppers, but what I’m really looking forward to using it for is starting fall crops. It’s hard to start cold weather crops when it’s 90+ degrees out. I can start tomatoes and peppers next week.
I did start some things on March 18 in the greenhouse but nothing has grown yet. The goal this year is to not buy any seed – except for cover crops – and work my way through what I have. A lot of my seed is old. I should just mix it all together, toss it in some dirt and see what comes up.
I may be pleasantly surprised.
Instead of sitting on the milk stool, I sit in the rabbit barn and watch the rabbits. I find a lot of peace there. I missed having rabbits.
As a final project for the Production Design class that I’m taking, I have to create a 14 page “magazine.” I would like to do it on the integration of meat rabbits and vegetable farming. Not that I’ll be doing either of those things on a large scale, even with a backyard set-up having a couple of meat rabbits along side a vegetable garden is advantageous.
I was speaking to a friend yesterday who has a vegetable garden and she mentioned all the weeds she was clearing and throwing away. Some of those weeds are chickweed and cleavers – two things the rabbits absolutely love and are really good for them. Spring “weeds” are nutritious for any creature that eats them. We have a ton of purple dead nettle – which the rabbits eat but it isn’t their favorite – plus the flowers provide food for early bees so I like to leave as much of that as I can. When it dies back or if it’s in a planting bed I’m prepping I’ll pull it for the rabbits.
My Instagram feed is now very pleasantly aligned with farming.
Until later …
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