Consolidated Kansas

[chicken danz]

Trish you probably planted garlic chives. I did that and had them everywhere for several years. I also had horseradish and I for one love horseradish but it's too painful to process. I was trying to tidy up with roundup a few years ago and over sprayed and it killed it out in a second. I would love to have another start but I don't know if I would ever be able to stand to process it.

 

[HEChicken]

Trish you probably planted garlic chives.

I planted garlic chives this year but not a thing came up in that entire row

They were new seeds too - just purchased from Seed Savers Exchange. Oh well - we certainly have enough garlic to make up for them. I have since replanted that row with some onion sets so hopefully they'll do better.

Today was dog treatment day. I found a large tick on Kilo last night and then a smaller one on Karina. Funny that the last Frontline treatment apparently expired on both of them at the exact same time. I figured it was my hint that it was time to treat everyone again, even though I hadn't found anything on the other three dogs.

I made some Curried Mango ice-cream a couple of days ago, that is really, really good. This morning I made a batch of "Goat Cheese Balsamic" that I can't wait to try. In addition to the cream, it had 8oz of Goat Cheese (chèvre) in it, and then right at the end the instructions said to drizzle in some balsamic vinegar. That combination of flavors was just too intriguing not to try.

This week I also made a Cheshire cheese. This is related to Cheddar so the process is similar but varies slightly to wind up with a cheese that will be a little different when mature. It had to press at maximum press weight for two days and by the time I pulled it out of the press it already smelled amazing - and it still needs time to mature. I think it will be a very dry, crumbly cheese. It consolidated so nicely in the press and formed such a nice wheel, that I had to photograph it, as they don't all turn out this well. Here it is just out of the press:



And a little later after I had waxed it:



I'm having a quiet day here. Other than milking, there is nothing pressing that has to be done, so I decided to take the day off. It is Saturday after all.

 

[chicken danz]

Wow, HEChicken yesterday was just the total opposite here. I had my little 9 year old friend for a play date all afternoon. She was extra extra busy and totally wore me out. I feared the heat would be a factor and went to my sisters and got a whole box of crafts for her to do and she flew through them like the wind. I figured she would take her time and want to make them perfect. Not so much. We usually spend a lot of time with the chickens but her enthusiasm was short lived out there. I am sure the heat was a factor. I'm going to have to come up with a new bag of tricks.
I bought Seresto collars for my dogs because I had them highly recommended by several people who deal with multiple dogs who said they were amazing. I don't know if it's the long hair or what but I haven't been impressed at all on my dogs. They've had gobs of ticks. I'd used front line for several years but it seems to stop working this past year.
I hadn't put a Seresto on Precious cause she had the pups. And last night I discovered she's got a huge hot spot on her back end. That means a trip to the vet with her Monday. Grrr. More bills. She had had one when I first got her and she had done really well and not had further problems at all and now she has one. I am guessing it must be a flea allergy or something. I never had a single flea on any dog until we got these cats to keep the mice under control. And most of them are too wild to keep treated. If I could get them to just drink in one place it would be great but they come and go and there's some that are wild and some that are tamer. I'd personally like to trap them all and have them all fixed and dispatch or rehome the wild ones somewhere but of course I can't afford it and DH would never let me have them put down.
I gave the puppies their first shots yesterday and wormed them the day before. Hard to believe they are 6 weeks old already.
I didn't get a chance to do any more work in the building yesterday. I'm hoping for a cooler and peaceful day today to catch up. I need to pick beans and get a bunch canned today as well.

 

[sharol]

I gave the puppies their first shots yesterday and wormed them the day before. Hard to believe they are 6 weeks old already.
My foster pups are 6 weeks old today too. I wormed them the end of last week. To my surprise it is the same stuff I use with the chickens under a different brand name. They were not fond of the taste, but it is done now. They will be getting their first shots Tuesday or Wednesday at the shelter (the manager likes to do them herself). I'll be glad when they are completely weaned so that I can get shots for their mother and treat her for worms and fleas too. She and I have come to an understanding: if she gets to sleep with us, she won't whine all night. LOL. She is a sweet little thing, and we will probably be adopting her. She is pretty old to be relocating yet again, and she gets along fine with everyone here. I got the chickens wormed last week, and they will get the second round on Thursday and Friday. They drank the water fine, but it was really hot and miserable all week. I'll be glad to have that done so I don't have to worry about that at least. My silly little Araucana hen with the 4 chicks has figured out how to get out of the yard under the fence, and she has been taking her little brood out into the pasture area. I found her hole and covered it with a steel post and a log (I'm nothing if not creative). I really don't want her eaten by something. She is a really good mom, otherwise. Graycie and Copper have adopted the White Orps chicks (she abandoned them to roost on the roost in the coop last week), and they are all getting along just fine. All the hens help protect the babies. It is nothing short of amazing how they work together.

 

[Trish44]

I planted garlic chives this year but not a thing came up in that entire row

They were new seeds too - just purchased from Seed Savers Exchange. Oh well - we certainly have enough garlic to make up for them. I have since replanted that row with some onion sets so hopefully they'll do better.

Today was dog treatment day. I found a large tick on Kilo last night and then a smaller one on Karina. Funny that the last Frontline treatment apparently expired on both of them at the exact same time. I figured it was my hint that it was time to treat everyone again, even though I hadn't found anything on the other three dogs.

I made some Curried Mango ice-cream a couple of days ago, that is really, really good. This morning I made a batch of "Goat Cheese Balsamic" that I can't wait to try. In addition to the cream, it had 8oz of Goat Cheese (chèvre) in it, and then right at the end the instructions said to drizzle in some balsamic vinegar. That combination of flavors was just too intriguing not to try.

This week I also made a Cheshire cheese. This is related to Cheddar so the process is similar but varies slightly to wind up with a cheese that will be a little different when mature. It had to press at maximum press weight for two days and by the time I pulled it out of the press it already smelled amazing - and it still needs time to mature. I think it will be a very dry, crumbly cheese. It consolidated so nicely in the press and formed such a nice wheel, that I had to photograph it, as they don't all turn out this well. Here it is just out of the press:


I'm having a quiet day here. Other than milking, there is nothing pressing that has to be done, so I decided to take the day off. It is Saturday after all.

Wow HEChicken, that cheese looks amazing! You're getting to be quite the cheesemaker. Let me know if you ever want to sell any, my DH says he would buy some. We love cheese here. Well you're probably lucky none of those garlic chives came up if they're what I had, they spread like wildfire & you have them all over the place, even where you don't want them.

Wow, HEChicken yesterday was just the total opposite here. I had my little 9 year old friend for a play date all afternoon. She was extra extra busy and totally wore me out. I feared the heat would be a factor and went to my sisters and got a whole box of crafts for her to do and she flew through them like the wind. I figured she would take her time and want to make them perfect. Not so much. We usually spend a lot of time with the chickens but her enthusiasm was short lived out there. I am sure the heat was a factor. I'm going to have to come up with a new bag of tricks.
I bought Seresto collars for my dogs because I had them highly recommended by several people who deal with multiple dogs who said they were amazing. I don't know if it's the long hair or what but I haven't been impressed at all on my dogs. They've had gobs of ticks. I'd used front line for several years but it seems to stop working this past year.
I hadn't put a Seresto on Precious cause she had the pups. And last night I discovered she's got a huge hot spot on her back end. That means a trip to the vet with her Monday. Grrr. More bills. She had had one when I first got her and she had done really well and not had further problems at all and now she has one. I am guessing it must be a flea allergy or something. I never had a single flea on any dog until we got these cats to keep the mice under control. And most of them are too wild to keep treated. If I could get them to just drink in one place it would be great but they come and go and there's some that are wild and some that are tamer. I'd personally like to trap them all and have them all fixed and dispatch or rehome the wild ones somewhere but of course I can't afford it and DH would never let me have them put down.
I gave the puppies their first shots yesterday and wormed them the day before. Hard to believe they are 6 weeks old already.
I didn't get a chance to do any more work in the building yesterday. I'm hoping for a cooler and peaceful day today to catch up. I need to pick beans and get a bunch canned today as well.

Yeah kids are hard to entertain these days, they have too many electronic devices & don't know how to just play any more like we did when we were kids. We were sent outside & we entertained ourselves. We didn't have all of the video games or a cell phone to sit with all day.

Yesterday was busy, we got our new refrigerator & it was a chore getting it in the house & then getting the old one out. Our house wasn't built for ease in getting anything big in or out, so we ended up having to take the doors off the new fridge before we could get it past the inside entry door & even then we barely made it. We may have to think about enlarging that opening some day, the thing is only 32 inches wide, not big enough for things like a big appliance or furniture for that matter. I have an old fridge in the garage that I have there just to keep my eggs in that I sell & that's where I had to transfer all of the food till we got the new one in. That wasn't fun either because our garage is detached & all the way down the driveway from the house. At least I had somewhere to put it though temporarily. The new fridge is quite a bit bigger than the old one so now we have lots more room in there, it's nice, plus I finally have an icemaker & working freezer again. The old one was failing & it wouldn't stay cold enough to make ice, a hard thing to deal with when it's so hot.

 

[HEChicken]

I'd used front line for several years but it seems to stop working this past year.

Yep - I found last year that Frontlne had quit working on fleas. I had seen a flea on my little cairn terrier and treated him, but a week or two later found another flea. I went to the vet and asked what to use when Frontline quits working, and they recommended NexGuard. It is a chewable and so far, so good. That is what my cairn has used every since and I've never seen a flea or tick on him. However I already had pre-purchased a bunch of Frontline and as you know, it isn't cheap. When I found ticks on the big dogs this spring, I treated with it because I figured even if it is no longer effective against fleas, if it works for ticks, that was what I needed right then. A few days after treating, Karina flopped on her back for a belly rub and I saw a tick on her belly. With dismay that the Frontlne treatment hadn't worked, I went to pick it off - only to find it was thoroughly dead. So I wound up elated to know that a tick had tried to latch on and been killed when it encountered the Frontline. Last night the same thing happened - I felt a small tick on Kilo, pulled it off and found it was already dead. So - it does appear to still work against ticks, thank goodness. I don't see the big dogs scratching ever, so I don't think they have fleas (fingers crossed). It would be so hard to find fleas on them with that long hair.

She is a sweet little thing, and we will probably be adopting her. She is pretty old to be relocating yet again, and she gets along fine with everyone here.

I'm so glad to hear that. That is my only issue with foster care: *we* know it is foster care but the dogs don't. All they know is they had a home, started to bond and then were returned to the shelter to be rehomed yet again. I feel that "abandonment" isn't good for their psyche. We used to do foster care for the local humane society but gave it up when we had a dog particularly bond with us. He had ringworm so was in foster care so he could be treated for it, with the plan being he would be placed for adoption once he was free of it. However when I returned him, he just looked so sad that I couldn't bear to put any more dogs through that.

We may have to think about enlarging that opening some day, the thing is only 32 inches wide, not big enough for things like a big appliance or furniture for that matter.

Yep, a 36" door opening will make all the difference. It should be standard on homes that they be required to have at least one 36" door to give access to big items to get into the house. Yep - you may be right about the garlic chives. I hadn't heard that before I planted them, about them spreading, so maybe I should be glad nothing came up.

One of my turkey hens went "missing" a couple of weeks ago. I figured she was probably broody somewhere as I know where she was laying her eggs and then the eggs suddenly stopped. I would see her very occasionally but even at meal times she was scarce. I figured she was in the lagoon somewhere but after walking it several times and not finding her, I started to worry. The thing about turkeys is, for as big a bird as they are, you'd think it wouldn't be that easy for them to hide. But, I've found in the past that they are quite capable of hiding in plain sight. Sure enough, I had just about given up on finding the turkey (and thinking maybe something got her after all), when, as I walked to the gate to leave the lagoon, I just about stepped on her. She built a nest right out in the open grass of the lagoon (though in her defense the grass is quite tall at the moment). She stood up when she realized she'd been spotted and all I can tell you is there is a boatload of eggs under her - I didn't have a chance to count them before she settled back down. And, of course, I have no idea when they're due to hatch either. At least she is relatively safe as the lagoon is fenced all the way around. The LGDs have access to protect two sides of it, and the farm dogs protect a third fence. So the only thing that would be able to get her is something coming in from the hedge and climbing directly into the lagoon fencing. Hopefully that won't happen.

However her location poses a quandary for us as we were planning to put the sheep and goats in the lagoon in a few days, to get it eaten down for us. So, we're planning to take apart a 4x6 chain link dog run and reassemble it around her so that the goats can't step on her and break her eggs. That will also allow us to put a tarp over to give her some shade. The silly thing is out in the open where she isn't in shade until about 4pm. I don't know what she was thinking when she chose her location.

 

[Trish44]

HEChicken I'm glad you found your turkey hen, gosh those things can really hide but I agree she could have found somewhere with some shade. My one duck hen is still sitting on eggs & the last three days has hatched out a duckling each day. I have to hurry & catch them so they don't get out of the duck pen & get eaten by the cats. They have learned to sit outside of the pen & watch for them. I have 6 now in my little pen I made just for the ducklings & goslings. The goslings got big enough to go in with the adult geese now & they're doing very well out free ranging during the day & follow the adults into the hoop coop at night. The one adult goose is kind of miffed about me bringing two new girls in because the two ganders tend to want to be with the new girls now a lot of the time. I guess they will all get in sync eventually & become a group. I have a plastic pool for the geese & ducks & they really love getting in that.

 

[sharol]

I'm so glad to hear that. That is my only issue with foster care: *we* know it is foster care but the dogs don't. All they know is they had a home, started to bond and then were returned to the shelter to be rehomed yet again. I feel that "abandonment" isn't good for their psyche. We used to do foster care for the local humane society but gave it up when we had a dog particularly bond with us. He had ringworm so was in foster care so he could be treated for it, with the plan being he would be placed for adoption once he was free of it. However when I returned him, he just looked so sad that I couldn't bear to put any more dogs through that.

That is our problem. She is pretty old for a mother dog, and she has been through a really bad patch.

I do ok with orphaned kittens and puppies (well, all but that one black kitten that wasn't finding a home, LOL), but the older dogs just steal my heart.

All the doors in our house are 36." The guy who built the house wanted it to be ADA compliant, and it is except for one pocket door that is only 30" into the second bathroom. It was ahead of its time when it was built in '86. We absolutely love having everything on one level and nice wide doors.

 

[chicken danz]

My last house had 32" doors and in order to move any big appliances in we had to take the doors off the hinges. This house has all 36" doors and I am really happy. The worst part though is that it still takes steps to get into the house. Even when I bought it that wasn't a huge concern but that was before my first lower back surgery.
Things are still so busy that I am having trouble finding time to post unless it is a really quick line. I've decided my life really needs review even more when things are like that.
Today I have to find time to take one of the dogs to the vet which is at least an hour on the road plus time at the vet. I have to go get a load of feed which is at least two hours another round trip. And I have to go get a load of chick starter which is 2 and half hours round trip yet a different direction. Plus all my normal chores.
I got some green beans canned yesterday but still need to pick and can a whole other group today. I've not had time to get any more work done as far as setting up temporary pens in outside the building, building more pop doors, dipping chickens or worming them, or moving any more to other pens.
Tomorrow I've got to go sex some geese for another person so she can sell them.
I got a big bale of straw late last night but it looks really awful. I just wanted some to use for bedding and to mulch the garden with. After seeing it this morning I sure hope it isn't moldy. It looks awful. I guess if it keeps the plants moist it will be helpful. It's been very difficult to find straw this year.

 

[chicken danz]

I got my have to's done yesterday but not much more. I got to feeling really lousy when I got home after my final trip, and ended up sick in the evening. I figured it out this morning. I am dehydrated. I have done that before. For some reason when I get to a certain point of dehydration I don't feel like drinking and yesterday was one of those days. I'm going to have to make myself guzzle water today. I've ended up in the hospital on IV fluids more than once for dehydration. I guess I wasn't out working when I was on the road so I wasn't drinking like normal.
I think I had panicked about the dog. I thought she had hot spots, but she just had a few spots where she had scratch that weren't infected. He gave her a steroid shot to help the itching. I had left her Seresto collar off of her because of her puppies and I think she has a flea allergy.
However he couldn't find any fleas, ticks, or anything on her in the exam. And he also said I was doing a great job on her with my worming because she had no worms of any kind in her fecal. I had wormed her while she was was pregnant on the regular schedule with every one else.
I had postponed her rabies booster because of the pups so he went ahead and gave her that while she was there.
The poor chickens didn't get much attention yesterday. By the time I got home I was feeling sick and all I did was water them. No one was completely out of food anyway. It's supposed to be cooler the rest of the week so I'm hoping to get caught up on some of this work around here with the birds and sorting and moving them.