The Antics of Herman Beefsteak

September 18th, 2007

Rosie’s calf, otherwise known as Herman Beefsteak, is growing bigger and meatier all the time. He’s also getting more and more cheeky and unruly as time passes. Fortunately, his respect for electric fences is increasing as he grows in size and becomes more likely to hit the live wires as he dashes underneath. Still, at times we look outside and find that he has managed to become separated into a different paddock from his mother, who bellows at him in annoyance.


Cheeky beast

A couple of evenings ago, Kevin and I wandered down to the cow paddock to milk Coco. Kevin had separated Coco from her calf in the morning, and we were eagerly anticipating all the creamy milk that would be saved up for us. When we reached Coco’s paddock, there was Herman Beefsteak, licking Auntie Coco’s neck and looking very pleased with himself. We were soon to find out why. Once Kevin started trying to milk Coco, he found that her udder was almost completely empty. Little more than a few miserable squirts of milk could be coaxed into the bucket. That cheeky little devil Herman Beefsteak had managed to feed off Coco and had drunk all the milk.


Soooo cheeky!!!

Poor Rosie was very disgruntled and eager to be reunited with Herman. Her udder was full of milk, but Herman Beefsteak showed no interest in feeding off his mother. His belly was full. Henrietta Hamburger, on the other hand, was ravenously hungry after having been separated from Coco for the day, but she had to be satisfied with the little bit of milk left in Coco’s udder by Herman. Coco was getting fed up with people and calf messing with her empty udder. Kevin then suggested that we try to milk Rosie. Problem: Rosie has not yet been trained to go into the bale, and was very distracted by all the goings on with Coco and the calves. We tried to coax her into the bale. Alas, she seemed to suspect that we were luring her into some kind of vile trap and would have none of it. As we trudged back to the house with our almost-empty milk bucket, Kevin declared that as far as he was concerned the cows, calves and milk could all go to the devil. None of it was worth the bother. Indeed, it had been a very frustrating evening in the cow paddock (for all but Herman Beefsteak).

The next time we separated Coco for milking, Kevin took extra care to shore up the electric fence around the gate. We needed to be doubly sure that Herman would stay in his own paddock. Kevin’s efforts were rewarded with an abundant haul of milk from Coco. Things were back to normal, and we walked back to the house feeling blessed to have such lovely cows and delicious milk. . . not to mention two healthy calves fattening for the freezer.

Posted in Cows | 5 Comments »

Preparing for Our Little Darling

September 12th, 2007

Now that the cows have all had their calves, I seem to be the only pregnant creature left on the Farmlet. The baby is due in just over two months, so my belly is pretty big by now. Fortunately I’m still feeling comfortable, despite being a lot bigger and fatter than usual. When Kevin wanted to take my photo, I started thinking about the photos he took of Esmerelda before she calved, and wondered what kind of caption he would put on the photo: perhaps “woman the size of a mini-van in the morning light”?


Becky in the garden

As well as sorting out the garden for spring, we have been busy preparing for our new arrival. Several months ago, we found a good deal on a second-hand rocking chair in the local paper. The rocking chair was in perfect condition, except for the cushions, which were looking very shabby and dusty. I’ve finally finished washing and re-upholstering them. Nobody who knows anything about uphlostery would be fooled into thinking that a professional fixed up that chair, but we think the result looks like a very comfortable place to rock a little baby. Actually, the rocking chair has already become a popular spot for Kevin and me to relax.


Rocking chair, with baby wraps and wipes

I’ve also been busy sewing cuddle rugs, muslins, and re-usable cotton baby wipes, as well as a selection of baby slings and carriers. It has been good to work on these projects over the colder, rainier months, and it’s nice to have things almost in order now that spring is here and the due-date edges closer.

Posted in Crafts, Owen | 14 Comments »

Early Spring in the Garden

September 8th, 2007

It is beginning to feel like spring here, and there is a lot to do to prepare the garden for the new growing season.

Recent work in the garden:

* We have covered the area designated for the maize patch with black polythene, hoping to knock back the kikuyu grass before digging the new bed. We have also covered over another area for a new potato bed.

*The first potatoes have already taken off, and I’ve been outside weeding and mulching them. We hope to have new potatoes in time for Christmas.

*Jerusalem artichoke and yacon tubers have been planted in a well-dug bed, and Chinese yam is just beginning to sprout inside the living room window.

*We have been clearing out some of the crops that have over-wintered to make space for spring planting. Some of last year’s collards are now massive. We are giving them to the goats as we pull them up.


Becky with collard. Bonnie the dog likes to help.

*We have harvested the first of the “red drumhead” cabbage and globe artichokes. We enjoyed the artichokes last night, with a dipping sauce made of melted butter and juice from freshly-picked lemons. The cabbage has been transformed into two jars of stunningly purple sauerkraut. We are waiting eagerly for the sauerkraut to ripen, so that we can sample it!


Early bounty

*The chamomile I dried last summer for tea has kept us supplied right through the winter — and I drink a lot of chamomile tea! Now the chamomile is flowering again, and it is time to start harvesting it once more.

*I have planted out the first of the spring lettuces in the garden (green “tree lettuce” and “asian red”).

*Three kinds of peas have germinated, and are almost ready to transplant into the garden. This year we are growing “green feast” (a green shelling variety), “purple flowered snow pea,” and “marrowfat” peas to dry for winter soups. We have to hurry up and fix the trellises for all these peas to climb on.

*Carrots, beets, salsify, cilantro and summer brassicas are also sprouting.

*It still feels a bit cold outside for summer crops like tomatoes, peppers and beans, but I plan to start sowing seeds for summer crops in pots inside the living room window next week, so that they will be ready to go into the garden as soon as possible.

We are hoping to have the summer garden quite well established by mid-November, when our baby is due. We’ll see how we go!

Posted in Garden | 6 Comments »

Farmlet Reader Contributes $50

September 5th, 2007

Regular Cryptogon and Farmlet supporter, Eileen, sent $50. Thanks, Eileen.

Posted in Announcements | Comments Closed

Dried Pumpkin Seeds

September 4th, 2007

A while back, we decided to purchase an electric dehydrator. This was a tricky decision for us, intent as we are on cutting back on electricity use. We decided to get the electric dehydrator because it is much more energy-efficient than our electric oven when it comes to drying food. Ideally, we would use the sun for drying extra food, but in a humid and changeable climate such as this, open-air solar dehydration is difficult or impossible much of the time. I have seen designs for solar dehydrators that would work here, at least on fine dry summer days. It would be fun to experiment with one of these at some stage. Also, once we install a wood-burning stove in our kitchen-living room (yes, this step is on our medium-term “to do” list), we will be able to use it to dehydrate food, as well as for cooking and drying laundry during the winter. In short, we hope we will be able to cut down our use of the electric dehydrator as we implement further improvements here on the Farmlet. In the mean time, it seems like a relatively energy-efficient method of preserving and preparing certain kinds of food.


Austrian Hull-Less Pumpkin Seeds

Once the dehydrator arrived, our first project was to dry the Austrian hull-less pumpkin seeds that we grew last year. (We attempted to dry the first of these in the sun late last summer, and ended up having to finish them in the electric oven when the weather changed.) We were relieved to find that all but one of the pumpkins were in fine condition, despite many months of storage. It took quite a while to pick all the seeds out of the twelve pumpkins we had saved, but it was gratifying to see the quantity of plump green seed yielded from each fruit. We washed and soaked the seeds overnight in brine, before spreading them on the dehydrator trays. We were pleased to note how quickly they dried (a few hours at 60 degrees centigrade).

Now Kevin and I are both enjoying these tasty and nutritious treats. We look forward to growing more of these delicious seeds in the garden this summer.

A bit more information about the dehydrator:

*We purchased the dehydrator second-hand off Trademe (New Zealand’s equivalent of Ebay). I was able to get a good deal on one with a broken lid, since one of my cousins happens to have a spare lid for this kind of dehydrator.

*It is a “Harvest Maid” dehydrator (the 1,500 watt model), in good condition other than the lid! It can work at temperature settings up to 70 degrees centigrade.

*On my cousin’s advice, we got one with lots of trays. We will give some of these to her in exchange for the lid! Having more trays will allow us to dry more items at once, for greater energy efficiency. Slicing the food nice and thin will also help cut down on electricity use.

There are a number of other dehydrator projects that we are hoping to try when the time is right. We’ll let you know how they work out.

Posted in Food and Recipes | 2 Comments »

« Older Entries
Newer Entries »