Saturday, August 9, 2008

Summertime Update on the Farm

It's been a while since I've done a good farm update. So, here she is....

It was a bit of a rough July, as the coyote family living behind us, found an easy way in, and called the Rube Farm their lunch box. The week after losing both of our geese, we realized that sweet little Cindy was gone. (She was named after Cindy Crawford, because of the cute mole on her face.)



We have located the hole in the fence (a rather elaborate tunnel through the blackberries) and seem to have the situation under control.

The sheep and Julio are living together now, in the hopes that Julio will help protect the sheep from coyote predators, although he was seemingly useless the morning Cindy was taken.
We haven't sold any sheep this summer yet. There are a number of lambs that we are keeping, but there'll be a few heading to auction in the next month or so.





The pigs - cute, smart and disgusting - are growing. Both in size and on me. I kind of like them now. They're very playful and pretty funny. Witnessing one of them eating the poop right from another's butthole this morning kinda set me back a bit, though.




There hasn't been much to report on the bunnies until this week, when we had our first bunny litter bred with our own rabbits. Bunnies are actually called kittens or kindles. Two nights ago, one of our New Zealand rabbits gave birth.
We aren't able to go into her nest yet to check the babies - not until tomorrow - so I can't report how many are in there. Yesterday when I went out to check on them, I found one poor little kit dead outside of the nest. Based on its appearance, I would guess that it had died shortly after birth (or stillborn). I took a picture of it. This is what a newborn baby bunny looks like. Please excuse the lack of a heartbeat and lack of blood flowing through its little body. (Think of it as educational.)


The playground construction project that I mentioned earlier:
Here's the end of Day One (dismal)


And, finally, some real progress can be seen by the end of Day Two


One of my favourite views out my kitchen window this summer:


1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Awesome update.
Love the pictures of S & B Rube....could have done without the dead bunny.

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