Posts Tagged ‘Brianne’
A Year in the Life of a Suburban Homestead
SUMMER
July
Ever since I was a little girl I have always enjoyed roses. Over the years and as my tastes have changed I find myself drawn more to the antique rose varieties than anything else. I love their fragrance and the look of them reminds me of quite days lived in country castles. I have dozens of David Austen roses around my place and during July they burst into bloom with an intoxicating perfume that hangs over the whole garden. The garden as a whole keeps use pretty busy during July. The weather is hotter and keeping things moist is a daily challenge. But, it’s also a time of great reward. Seeds and transplants started earlier in the year now bear constantly.
First tomatoes come off around Fourth of July
More direct sown seeds planted
Water daily
Weed and mulch as needed
Spent veggies fed to chickens
Mid-season berries picked, eaten fresh and frozen for winter
Peach harvest continues
Peaches canned and frozen
Beans canned and frozen
Pickled beets canned
Herbs dried
Preparations made and animals groomed for State Fair
Attend and show at State Fair
August
Our family has shown at the county fair for more than 30-years. Now it’s Brianne’s turn. She loves hanging out in the barn visiting with friends while grooming her sheep. I love watching her grow with each passing year. She and her friends are fiercely competitive inside the show ring, but outside they are just a bunch of giggly silly teenagers. It’s so much fun to watch. August is a hard time to be away from the homestead, so much is going on this month. But, I have wonderful neighbors who feed animals and water gardens. Secretly, I think they like when we’re gone because they get paid in free range eggs and fresh produce.
Weeding and watering are our life
Tomatoes harvested daily; frozen for future processing
Other veggies harvested; what can’t be processed is frozen for later time
Onions braided and hung to dry
Fruit trees and berries fed
Turkeys butchered and wrapped for freezer
Preparations made and animals groomed for County Fair
Attend and show at County Fair
Left over fair lambs sold or butchered
Broiler chicks arrive end of month
September
With fairs over and prizes displayed, our mind turns to school. Brianne actually starts school the last week of August, but with our busy schedule we are never prepared. The bulk of the shopping takes place on Labor Day weekend – usually the hottest weekend of the month. The homestead seems quiet this time of year, with most of the animals gone. Only the broiler chickens remain, but they are easy to care for. The garden seems to rebound in September, as late spring and summer plantings come off, fall plantings of onions, garlic and root vegetables take their place. We even get a glimpse of our future squash and pumpkin harvest.
Dried beans harvested, vines given to chickens
Zucchini, patty pan, crookneck and other squash harvested
Zucchini relish canned
Broilers butchered at 4-weeks (Cornish game hen size)
Lay in firewood for a warm winter
Clean trailer and store for winter; bedding used in chicken coop as winter bedding
All livestock equipment cleaned, oiled and stored for winter
Shearing blades sent to be re-sharpened
Show blankets repaired and stored
photo credit: andrewodom
The Practice of Keeping Chickens
Keeping chickens isn’t just a hobby, it’s a practice. There’s a ritual you fall into when you take care of them every day, or at least we do. Each morning, after the sheep are fed, before breakfast or getting ready for school or work, Brianne bundles up, throws on her mud boots and trudges out to the barn near the garden. Once inside she pours fresh lay mash and scratch into the hanging feeder, and makes sure the water trough is topped off. Sometimes the hens get a stroke or two and hear about the world outside and the news about the day’s activities. She checks for overall health of the birds, and leaves with an egg or two, warm in her hands.
But, night watch with the birds is my favorite time. I love to let them out of the coop and watch them run around the barn, eventually making their way out into the yard. The routine is the same; the clothes are the same – mud boots, sweatshirts and jeans, only it’s after a long day’s work, after a walk with the dogs and a healthy meal. I’m tired, but content with a warm coat and full stomach. I stay past dark and even in my semi-rural area it’s black and dark without the distraction of streetlights or porch lights. My eyes dart around looking for owls or rats in the brush. Sometimes I see one (rat) and shake a feed bucket to make a ruckus, fending them off.
Needing to bed down the coop means I get to breathe in fresh dark air, see the stars, stare at the moon and smell a mix of wet leaves and burning fireplaces from other chimney’s on the street. These are things I’m grateful to do, and those birds make sure I do it every night.
Besides being outside with a purpose, keeping chicken’s means taking care of something, knowing that they rely on you for protection and food and their general well being. It feels really nice to provide all that. It really does. And it’s not all giving either – the ability to collect fresh eggs, a source of protein that doesn’t require taking their lives, is unique and special to the hens. I don’t know many other bi-species relationships that can offer feelings of responsibility, enjoyment, and a killer morning omelet. Well maybe ducks, but we all know ducks are assholes. And, the spring chicks ain’t bad either.
So thank you chickens, thank you.
Sometimes it really does take a village.
Meet Blue, a standard blue Cochin; senior rooster and king of the coop. Blue and his girlfriend, a black Cochin hen came to us quite by accident a few years ago. Brianne and I were at a poultry show, where she had entered some of her birds. These shows often hold raffles for all kinds of fowl and poultry supplies, and this one was no different. Brianne had seen a black hen she wanted. But, I thought we had too many chickens already so I told her no. The more I thought about it though the more I started to change my mind. So, on the sly I bought $5 worth of raffle tickets and put them all in the bag in front of the little black hens coop.
Now, poultry shows are interesting events, unlike any other type of livestock show because the show barn is closed while the judges evaluate each entry. There’s no need for the exhibitor to stick around. We usually take this opportunity to tour the town or visit friends in the area. This time we drove over the hills to the ocean to check out some of our favorite garden shops in a little seaside village. On the way back to the fairgrounds we got a call from the show organizer congratulating us on winning the PAIR of Cochins. I gasped and said there was just one – a black hen – to whit she replied, “No, it was a pair. The person who cooped in the chickens made a mistake and penned them separately.” I swallowed hard; we didn’t need another rooster, especially not a standard. Back at the fairgrounds we headed straight for the raffle birds and sure enough they had fixed the mistake and penned together was the little black hen and a giant blue Cochin rooster standing almost 2-feet tall!
I took a deep breath and resigned myself to the fact that we were adding two more birds to our coop. We scoured local markets for a box big enough to transport the rooster, but small enough to fit in the back of the Suburban. Once home we settled them into their new home and let everyone get acquainted.
Want to know what feels great? Seeing productive animals bedded down and eating a meal in a house you built for them.
We were happy girls. Well – at least one of us was.
Farming Across the Pond
I found this magazine breezing through Tractor Supply this past weekend and bought it because it looked interesting, something I hadn’t seen before. It’s called Home Farmer , and is about small scale farming and homesteading, with a heavy emphasis on backyard livestock. I snatched it up and thumbed through it over the weekend (while Brianne and I were at a sheep auction). When we got home, lambs in tow, it kind of got lost in the shuffle and tasks of settling in a new batch of lambs. But, last night, after designing my new quilt project (and an excellent DVD on Queen Elizabeth) I finally had a chance to dig into it. It is wonderful!
Turns out the reason I wasn’t familiar with it is because it’s a British publication. But I was so excited reading through it because it was like walking around a backyard in England talking about gardens and chickens and farming in small spaces. I’ve spent many weeks in England on vacation and can tell you the British have perfected raising backyard birds. Not to mention the array of gorgeous and fanciful coops. (Check out Forsham.com and Framebow.)
Anyway, my favorite take away from the magazine is how universal homesteading is. This was an English publication, but could easily apply to suburban homesteaders from the beltway of Washington, D.C. to the tract houses of Los Angeles; same birds, same dreams, same understanding; that freedom isn’t in our bank accounts or the cars we drive—it’s right in our own backyards, just past the garden gate.
This is one of my favorite things about suburban homesteading – everyone needs to eat, and we all want to eat a little better, a little fresher, a little more local. To some “better” may mean a better restaurant, but to others it means a hen house and a veggie garden. I’ll always be on the back side of those options, and I’m excited that the later is so well undertaken “across the pond”.
If you haven’t checked out a Tractor Supply store yet, click here to find one in your area
Life is not all about work…
…and neither is homesteading.
Personal Journal – November 22, 2009
It’s a point I try to make often to my more skeptical town friends. Sometimes even we homesteaders have those quiet lazy days where little is thought about and even less is accomplished. Yesterday was one of those days. We woke up late, about 7:30 (a luxury that is not afforded us when there are sheep in the barn). I could hear a young rooster trying to master his crow. The hens were scratching, and fluffing themselves in the dirt, chattering as hens always do. The dogs were on patrol. I could hear them in the bushes, sniffing and prowling about, looking for treasures. These are the kinds of mornings that beg you to stay in bed and quietly listen to the sounds of the farm. You can learn so much by just listening.
By the time I stumbled through the house, Brianne was already laid out on the sofa, buried under a mound of quilts making friendship bracelets and watching a movie I found at a local book sale a few weeks ago. Dakota was at her feet begging for more room to stretch out. Last nights fire was gone, but you could still hear crackles and pops as the embers cooled and died. It was dark and lonely, but could easily be revived with a little encouragement and a few pieces of kindling.
Breakfast was a steaming bowl of porridge, topped with nuts and brown sugar, bananas and milk. By the time it’s ready I’m on my second cup of tea (i’m not a coffee person…so not a coffee person), Earl Gray with a splash of milk and a bit of sugar. From the kitchen I can hear the twitter of birds. I don’t know what type; we have become a kind of way station for passersby’s. Some have a sharp trill in their voice, while others chirp on and on for quite awhile. The crows are back, I can hear their caw, caw, caw, but no sight of the red tailed hawk that perches himself on the arbor.
No – life is not always about work. Sometimes it’s about quiet, easy mornings, warm and safe in a simple home. Oh, don’t get me wrong, there will be work done this weekend, but it will be slower, less rushed, with less urgency for completion than other days. I have a few errands to run in town, the truck needs gas for the coming week, Brianne’s birthday is next week and I need a card, the nesting boxes in the coop need to be refilled and the floor raked out. There’s mulch to lie out in the garden and I want to finish the quilt I’ve been working on. Yes, there will be lots of work this weekend. But there will also be time for sitting back and listening to the sounds of this farm. Time for a second (or third) cup of tea, time for snuggling with a mangy dog trying to hog the sofa and time to just relish what we’ve built with our own two hands. No – life isn’t all about work. A lot of life is about paying attention and enjoying what comes our way, the fruits of our labor. And, if we get a few bumps and bruises or have to tend animals in the rain so be it.
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