Doughboy - our wandering bull

Our bull, Doughboy, has been a bit naughty over the last few months, and has started testing the fences and going on to neighbouring properties. We got a call from the stock squad a couple of weeks ago to say he had wandered on to another property, which ended up being a neighbours property.

They have been using molasses traps to catch the steers on their property, and Doughy can smell molasses from miles away. So he has broken through our fences to get over to the molasses, and keeps getting caught in their yards - which then means they can't catch their own cattle! They dropped him back for us, but he quickly disappeared again.

After looking for him for a few days while we have been up at the farm, I rang them to see if they had him again, and they did, so we arranged to go to the property they have taken him to, to keep him out of their molasses traps, about 30 klms from here. So yesterday Damian headed out to pick him up. In the meantime, the owners of the other property were rounding him up for us, Hugh...the owner, who is 73, has ended up having an accident on his quad bike, coming off, passing out and having to be choppered in to the local hospital! Nothing is bloody quiet around here! He has ended up having a few broken ribs, punctured a lung and bruising. He was actually very lucky. Quad bikes can be so dangerous, even if you know how to ride them.

Apparently, the news has been in contact with them today, and their grand-daughter has been giving interviews about children ringing 000, as she is 9 years old, and the one who rang the ambulance.

(Hugh being loaded in to the chopper for the ride to hospital)

We are so glad he is ok,  He has left hopsital today, and is managing well.  We have been up at the farm since the Thursday before Easter, and I was due to head back today, but I have been sick since last Friday, waves of headaches and nausea, and ended up going to bed at 4pm yesterday and was not up to the 4 hour drive back to Brisbane today.  Not sure when I will head back yet, probably will spend another day or 2 up here and then head back. I want to do some painting in the kitchen here, and we have been having a big clean out here, and clearing out bits and pieces from the shed while we have been here. Well, I better go and make sure the bull is behaving himself and hasn't wandered off again!

Newest Addition

Our newest addition was born overnight... a gorgeous little bull calf born to our Hereford, Hertie Gertie...he is sooo tiny, as Mum is only little herself. We were a little concerned that she may have had a difficult birth, but she seems to have managed fine, we noticed her milk bag filling up the other day, but didn't expect her to have her calf quite so quickly. He's a little cutie...

A big day of cattle handling...and another chicken processing day

The new heifers and bull calves are all about 8 months old now, so it was time to round them all up and brand them, needle them and castrate any bull calves, and put all of their NLIS tags in. We organised for a musterer to come in and he and his dogs rounded them all up and in to the yards. We put all the mothers through as well, as it was time for worming for all of them anyway. The musterer is an experienced cattle handler, so we organised for him to bring his brand heater etc so we could brand them all. He also castrated the 3 bull calves while he was there. It was a hot day, but it all got done.  We had a few very angry cows to deal with as well, so it can be a bit dangerous at times, and you have to keep your wits about you so you don't get hurt, they are very big and can be very dangerous if you get in their way.

 

I felt so bad for the cattle, but it is very quick, and they don't seem at all worried about it as soon as they are let out of the crush. The little bull calves all handled their castration really well too, it just amazes me that they just stand there, no reaction whatsoever, and then they just wander out of the crush like nothing has happened. This little bullcalf (the darker one at the front) has just been castrated, and he is just standing around here, completely calm, and oblivious to what has just happened to him.

We are hoping to send a few of the heifers off to the sales as breeders in May, along with some of the older cows as well for breeders, as we don't want to go in to winter again with too many cattle. We would eventually like to get down to about 6 heifers and 1 bull, with maybe a few steer to grow out each year. We're never going to make a lot of money out of cattle on 150 acres, so it is just to keep the grass down really.
The next day we also processed all of the excess roosters, we had 6 in total to do, not a nice job, but it has to be done. They were all just starting to harass the girls, and fight with each other, so the time had come. So 6 birds in the freezer, I roasted one up, much nicer when they are younger, as opposed to the older ones we did a while back which were all tough,  I managed to eat a little bit, but still not sure if I can do this eating our own chickens thing..

Two new additions...

Our girls are finally starting to have their babies. 2 have come along in the last 2 days...
A gorgeous, tiny little girl...soooo tiny, and looks just like her mum

And then this bully little bull calf...

I think he is going to end up just like his Dad....Mum's and bubs are doing well, and doing all the right things....there should be some more coming along soon as well hopefully as there are some fat looking girls wandering around...

Tagging the cattle and improving the yards

We spent our weekend here out in the heat, doing some work outside. I am not a fan of summer, I would rather do things outside from autumn through to spring when it's cooler. Damian had to hire a dingo digger to do a plumbing job on Saturday, so we hired it for the weekend and did some things around here. He dug some trenches to bury the poly coming from the dam up to the top tank underground, he also ran a trench from the tanks to the chook pen so I have water there instead of lugging buckets of water over each day. We also dug LOTS of holes for future use, for planting trees etc or burying the odd chicken that dies. We dug holes down at the cattle yards for the corner and strainer posts to build our laneway in to our cattle yards. Most of our cattle will go in to the yards fairly easily with a molasses bribe, but we have a few that refuse so by having the laneway, we hope to be able to force them in a lot easier. We got 2 sections of fencing done, and just have one more run of about 50 metres to do to finish them off.
Our cattle are also being plagued by buffalo flies at the moment, and were due for worming again. A few came in to the yards while we were working down there, so I ran them through the crush and wormed and tagged them. I put hot pink ear tags in to identify them as ours easily from a distance, and I also put insecticidal ear tags in to treat them for flies. I put 4 girls through and the bull. We have 14 to go, so will try and do them one afternoon this week. It makes it so much easier by ear tagging them as I know which ones I have wormed and which ones I haven't. It was very hot, but we achieved a lot.

(Hertie Gertie, our mini hereford, after tagging)

We got just under 30mm of rain here last Thursday, so the cows should have a bit of green pick to eat now hopefully. They have all lost condition over the last few months of dry weather, and with the flies giving them a hard time, they were starting to struggle.
The rest of this week will be spent working on finishing off Christmas presents, and then we will head down to Brisbane on Sunday or Monday to spend some time down there and spend Christmas with family.

Predator birds, and farm goings on...

I lost my adolescent light sussex rooster yesterday to an eagle. The eagle was an awesome sight...I didn't realise he was even around until he came back for a 2nd hit and all of the chickens and guinea fowl were carrying on and squawking, I went out to see them all running for cover to hide, and then I spotted the eagle, and the remaining pile of feathers, this was all that was left.

The rest of the chooks obviously saw what he did to the little rooster, and now realise they have to run for cover in an eagles' presence. I am hoping that they now know the drill and that I won't lose any more. They have never encountered an eagle before, so they didn't seem to realise it was a threat, but they do now. Our new bull has started to get to work on the girls, the jersey seems to be the first that has come in to season since his arrival, he has been hanging around her all the time, and trying to mount her, she isn't quite ready yet, but I don't think it will be long.

Hopefully in about 9-10 months I will have a cow to milk. I will need to start to work with her after a few more months and try to get her tame and used to coming in to a stall etc. as she hasn't had a calf before.
I started to make a sourdough starter last night, I am hoping it starts to ferment soon.

I haven't made a true sourdough bread before, so it will be a learning experience. I finished drying the large pick of chillies that I got from the track in to our property, I got quite a large jarfull, so hopefully that will see me right for chillies for the year. I also juiced up the 50 odd lemons from the neighbours tree, I think I ended up with about 15 cups of juice, which are all now in the freezer waiting for use.

I did use up 1/2 a cup of juice today, I made this yummy lemon loaf with lemon glaze, it's very nice, I didn't cook it long enough though, it's quite difficult cooking cakes in my George Foreman benchtop oven, as the heat is so close to the items being cooked it burns the top but doesn't cook through. The skewer came out clean, but after I took it out and it cooled, I realised it wasn't completely cooked so I did lose a little of the cake out of the centre, never mind, it is delicious anyway.

 Damian will get around to connecting up my gas oven soon I hope, then I can make a decent cake again.

Lemon Loaf

INGREDIENTS

· 1 1/2 cups flour
· 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
· 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
· 1/2 teaspoon salt
· 3 eggs, room temp
· 1 cup sugar
· 2 tablespoons butter, softened
· 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
· 2 teaspoon lemon extract
· 1/3 cup lemon juice
· 1/2 cup oil
· zest of one lemon

Glaze:
· 1 cup powdered sugar
· 2 tablespoons whole milk
· 1/2 teaspoon lemon extract


DIRECTIONS

1 .Preheat oven to 350. Grease and flour a 9 x 5 loaf pan.
2 .In a large bowl, combine flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt.
3 .In a medium bowl, combine eggs, sugar, butter, vanilla extract, lemon extract and lemon juice with a mixer until blended.
4 .Pour wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and blend until smooth. Add oil and lemon zest and mix well.
5 .Pour into loaf pan and bake for 45 minutes until toothpick comes out clean. (It took an hour in my oven). Remove from oven and pour glaze over it, then cool in pan on a rack.
6 .Glaze - whisk to combine, pour over top of cake.

I also planted up some garlic bulbs today, I still have to do the other half, but I need to get another foam box from the local IGA and then I can finish planting them up

They are now covered in dirt and watered in, so now I just need to wait for them to start to sprout.

Everything in my little veg garden temporary setup seems to be coming along really well. I am finding this small garden quite easy to manage as I don't want to take on too much there at the moment. So, I am on the lookout for a couple of alpacas to add to the farm. I have been wanting them for a few years now, and now that I have a hungry eagle to contend with, my chooks need a guardian, and from what I understand the alpacas will do that for me...and hopefully they will keep an eye on the 2 little dogs as well, as that is worrying me with a big eagle around. I am working on finishing off doing the mulching in the garden area around the house, hopefully I can get that finished over the next few days. I have also found some lovely new little Australian farm blogs thanks to Liz over at Eight Acres, and I am enjoying having a read through those, there are some very inspiring people out there.  The newby chickens are enjoying free ranging, I have a feeling I may have lost one of the adolescent guinea fowl to the eagle as well, I can't find it, I am hoping that it turns up

They young ones are also starting to work out the feeder and large waterer as well, I place a stopper in the feeder during the day so the smaller ones can feed without risk of them being caught until they are heavy enough to lift the lid with the treadle feeder on their own,

The little wyandotte pullet is growing fast'

Newby araucana's and guinea fowl are getting bigger

And the newbies are all learning how to use the big drinker as well

It makes life easier when there is just one feeder and drinker to worry about filling up rather than different ones for different chooks. The new adult wyandotte rooster has also settled in well, no major fights now and he has his own little girl followers

And I also managed to get some little maran chickens, I have been waiting to get these for a while now, they lay very dark chocolate brown eggs

So, now that it looks like I may have lost another bird today, I think freeranging may be off the cards until I can move this eagle on :( or get some protective alpacas....we are also getting there with our little Bichon Frise Stella, she is now about 2.3 kgs, and we had to have her baby teeth surgically removed on Saturday as they weren't coming out on their own and were all going rotten and her breath was really bad. Unfortunately, not having had the proper diet at her previous home has not given her teeth the right start, but now she is getting a healthy and mixed diet hopefully her adult teeth will fare much better. Even though she is still quite small, her frame is starting to fill out now, and her bones can't be felt like they could when we first got her, she still has a way to go, but she is getting there and starting to really come out of her shell as well.

Anyway, I'm off to look for alpacas :)

The boy has arrived.

Our bull has arrived today. None of the heifers have spotted him yet, but they will be beside themselves when they do.

He is lovely and quiet, a big sook. Hopefully in about 9-10 months we will have some babies on the ground, depending on how fast he gets to work. ;)

The year is flying by....

Things have been a little crazy here over the last month or so. The days are going so quickly, and it's been very busy. I can't believe we are nearly half way through the year already. I went to Ann's scrapbooking retreat in May at Kilcoy. Managed to get a few pages done, was a bit off my mojo though, so didn't get as many as usual done, I procrastinated a lot, but I had a nice break. I travelled down with a girl friend, and we went the scenic route on the way down, and stopped at a lovely cheese shop at Goomeri and bought some beautiful cheeses and pastes to indulge in over our weekend. These are the few pages I did:

Kasey feeding some poddy calves at a friend's place.

 These are a couple of my favourite photos. I hired a truck to pick up a lounge I bought off ebay, and Toni came with me to help me load it up. The first photo was when we were about to set off on our way...while we were loading the lounge, it bucketed down on us, drenching us both, the 2nd photo is the after shot...

 Then I thought I would do a few pages with lots of photos to get through some of my huge stash of pics, the first was of my chickens:

 This page is still of my chickens, but this was a class we did  on the Saturday morning, the photo's are on flaps which open out, revealing lots more photos underneath.

 Then this page was of a visit we did to the Flying High bird sanctuary, Kasey wasn't real keen on the bird on her shoulder

 This pic is of our gorgeous pups

 This page was based on the chicken page, and also has lift up flaps depicting lots of things from our farm

 I loved doing this page, very simple but elegant at the same time, depicting a morning scene here on the farm

The puppies are doing well. I have finally managed to get Stella putting on some weight, she has finally hit the 2kg mark and she is coming out of her shell more and more each week. Here they are curled up together on the lounge.

Sam has the biggest personality. He is so cheeky and loveable. He loves to play in the dirt, and even though he is white, he manages to clean himself up quite well...especially considering when he does this:

We also did a weekend holiday over to Fraser Island with 3 other families, even though it was only from Friday through to Sunday, we had a great time. I had a local animal carer come in and feed and look after the animals for me, which made things a lot easier.

I had a clutch of araucana's ready to hatch when I got back from Fraser, I had 2 hatch out and then Max knocked the incubator off the bench where it was, and the 2 that had hatched survived, but a number of others cracked and either weren't fertile, or were dead, and the rest did not end up hatching...so I only ended up with 2 out of the 9 eggs...seems to be the way it is for me, only a small number...I hope I can improve on that in spring. I have got a couple of big tubs now set up with some lettuce, silverbeet and shallots growing, and a few cabbage planted in the garden.

  I hope to plant up 1 or 2 more tubs of vegies, but I don't want to go overboard at this stage, just a little at a time. We have also purchased our first bull, a purebred registered Droughtmaster, he is due to arrive tomorrow. He is a lovely quiet boy, and he has been tested for fertility as well, so I hope he is easy for us to manage. The heifers we have here are all at the age where they are ready to breed, and I will put him over our Jersey as well, to get her started also. We chose the Droughtmasters for a number of reasons, and the small calf size was a big swing for us as well with the first time heifers. We hope to sell the calves once they are about 6 months old, and start to build up a purebred droughtmaster herd. I had a big de-clutter session here last Friday, as we just don't have the room here to hoard stuff, so I got rid of old magazines and general bits and pieces, and de-cluttered the bathroom as well and re-arranged things a little. I still have to finish off my decorating. I requested and received a Kreg drill jig for Mothers Day, so I will start to build myself a few bits and pieces to decorate with. Damian has also started doing up my craft studio, but I think that will take a few more weeks yet, as we have had a few weekends away. Anyway, I think that is all for a bit of a catchup for now...hopefully the bull arrives tomorrow and I can post a few pics then...

2 new girls and a new fence

I spent last Wednesday building a fence to keep the chickens contained down the back part of the property, to protect them from Reggie and also the other 2 dogs, who are starting to copy Reg and get too excited around them now. So, I have put a stop to it all, and penned them in. I clipped the wings on the chickens, and on the guinea fowl, but the guinea fowl still fly out anyway, but the dogs seem to leave them alone, so not a real problem at this stage. So they don't have as big an area to roam around in now, probably only the size of a normal suburban block to roam in, but I now let them out first thing in the morning instead of later in the day, as they can't come up on to the verandahs and poop all over them, which they tended to do when out all day with full run of the yard. But, I can now get some ornamental chickens to keep as well, without having to worry about them with the dogs. Belgian D'uccles are definitely on my list!

                                      
It is so wet around here, the ground is squelching under our feet. The sun is out today though, so hopefully things will start to dry out now. I am in the process of ordering in some dwarf bamboo's to put along this new fence line, to make the fence look better, and to also hopefully solve the problem of the wet areas along there, as the bamboo should dry those areas out. We also went out on the weekend and added 2 new additions to our cattle numbers. A lovely little jersey heifer, she is 18 months old, and came in to her first season last week. We will probably wait about 6 months or so before getting her put in calf, I will look at getting her put in to a Jersey bull and see if I can get a 2nd girl to keep the milk supply going for us once we start milking.

We also picked up a lovely little Hereford heifer, we may keep her to breed from down the track.

So at the moment they are in the front paddock at home, and we will take them up to the farm over the next couple of weeks.

So, lots to do around here today, flowers to order for a wedding next month, house and cabin plans to get to the architect, and a couple of bouquet preservations to work on. Also, some school lunch baking to get done, and need to get back in to cleaning out the sheds in preparation for our re-location to the farm a little down the track.

Where are you missy moo?

We are missing a cow at the property. There are only 15 that we have counted. Damian has ridden all over the property and can't find her at this stage. We have asked the neighbours to keep an eye out for her. Unfortunately because we don't have the crush yet we haven't been able to put coloured ear tags on our girls yet, which would make them easy to identify from the neighbours cattle, so we can only tell by the number on the smaller ear tags which is which. Hopefully she turns up soon. All of the boundary fences are in excellent condition and he couldn't see the fence pushed in anywhere, so it's a bit of a mystery at this stage. Damian also had the cattle grid installed yesterday, so now we don't need to get in and out to open a gate when driving in to the property...yay...

Things are pretty quiet around here at the moment, I have so much book work to do, and a couple of preservations to finish off...really not feeling like it at the moment, but it has to be done...so will kick myself up the bum later and get it done. I am looking at a course run through Milkwood permaculture for later in the year about market gardens, and another about mushroom cultivation, not sure if I want to drive all the way down there on my own yet, will put some more thought in to it as I think it would be worthwhile for the property. Anyway, have done the washing (better hang it out though) and the bathrooms and the floors today, so will head out to the office and try and get some things done before school pickup time.