Peaceful Heart FarmCast

Raising goats to make your own cheese is a great goal. Today I’ll go over the basics of how to get started. Making the cheese is another topic for later. Let’s just start with what it takes to raise and care for the animals that make it happen. First let me take a minute and say welcome to all the new listeners and welcome back to the veteran homestead-loving regulars who stop by the FarmCast for every episode. As always, I appreciate you all so much. Thank you. There is no show without you. Our Virginia Homestead Life Updates Before I get started on today’s topic, just a very brief update on our animals. All of the animals are doing really, really well. No issues so far, even though we had that really deep cold snap. Fortunately, we did not have any lambs born during that time. That was my only concern. Right now, it looks like it will be February before we have lambs. It always takes longer than I think. Lambs Lambs gestate for about five months. And the pregnant ewes end up looking like they are going to burst for days and days before the lambs actually arrive. You would think I would get used to it. I looked at one of our ewes a few days ago and thought to myself, “she’s going to have her lambs in the next couple of weeks.” Then I looked at her again yesterday and now I’m thinking it is going to be much later. This is the way of things when we leave the animals on their own for breeding. Scott keeps really close eye on the cows because they come up to the milking shed every day. The sheep and goats stay out in the pasture, so knowing when they come into heat is just not feasible. Because we know the date that the breeding ram or buck goes in with the ewes and does, we know the earliest date that babies can be born. But after that, we just wing it and figure that all will be born within two months. That usually works. These animals are healthy and can be bred easily. Cows We expect our first calf of 2023 the first week of March. The entire herd is all in one lump except for the two heifer calves that were born last year. They are too young to be bred and must be kept separate until we are ready for their breeding to commence. If I remember correctly, that will be some time in the summer. June, July or August. They will go in with the bull and have their first calf about the time they reach two years old. Chickens The chickens are doing well. At least three of the four roosters did get a little bit of comb damage during that cold snap. We kept them locked in their coop so their combined warmth would help keep everyone warm. Unfortunately, our roosters have very large combs. Those are those big red things sticking up from the top of their heads. They are quite subject to frostbite. There is only a small bit of damage that I saw. Maybe a ¼ inch or less on the tip of one or two of the points.   So other than that, all is well with them. Goats My young goat girls are doing fantastic. They are still quite small, but will enter the breeding cycle in less than a month. They also require five months of gestation for their kids. We will be looking for our first kids from them in the height of summer. July and August should brings us those cutest of cuteness, goat kids. Well, it’s kind of a toss up between the kids and the lambs. They are both just as cute as they can be when young. Speaking of goats, how about some info on how you might get set up for raising your own goats? Raising Goats I’m going to recount, to the best of my ability, the steps we took to prepare for raising goats. Then I will talk about some of the challenges. The rewards of owning and caring for goats far outweighs the challenges. Keep that in mind if you decide to go on the goat journey. Getting Set Up As you are making your plans for bringing goats into your life, the second highest priority is deciding how you will contain them. I’m going to say with near complete certainty that no matter how well you plan this and prepare for it, your goats will escape. Why do I say that? Because they are goats. It’s what they do. What Do Goats Eat? The first priority is deciding how you will feed them? Grazing is always the first choice here, but there are times when feeding a little grain is useful. And then there are nutritional supplements to be considered. Today it is popular to think that we are going completely back to nature and they can just live on grass. That is a fallacy in today’s world. Domesticated animals have been bred for generations to be cared for and so we must continue this practice. Our soils are depleted and the grasses that grow no longer have all of the required nutrition for healthy animals. You will need to give them mineral supplements. You will need to manage their pastures. And sometimes, as much as you may try to prevent it, you will need to use modern medicine to save the life of your animals. These are skills you will build over time and I’ll try to cover the basics a little later. Grass vs Browse There are many types of grasses such as orchardgrass, crabgrass, fescue and so on, and your goats will eat them. However, they prefer what is called browse for well over half of their daily diet. What is browse you say? It’s brush, small deciduous trees like those small pines intruding at the edge of your pasture, and small saplings. They love things with thorns like briars, brambles and small black locust trees. They like wild roses and wild blackberry plants, also thorny. Then there are what we normally call weeds that they love. Things like pigweed, various kinds of docks, plantain and lambs quarters. The pigweed and yellowdock have deep roots and are hard to get rid of like dandelion. Plantain and lambs quarters grow wild all over the pasture and are great goat food, while we spend hours trying to get them out of our gardens before they take over. So, keep that in mind when deciding what your goats might eat. Grain What about grain? We personally don’t use a lot of grain with our goats, or the sheep for that matter. But there are uses for it. In the commercial world, young lambs and goat kids are fed what is called “creep feed”. It is used to get their weight up so they can be weaned off of mother’s milk at an earlier age and remain healthy. As far as I can tell, its purpose is to get animals to market quicker and at less cost. Neither of these goals are our goals, so we don’t use creep feed. We do use grain for other reasons. The number one reason is the health of a doe about to give birth as well as her kids. Where we live, the soil is depleted of selenium. You will need to check your area to see if this is the case where you will be raising your goats. Selenium is vital for the health of your animals. White Muscle Disease In the beginning, we used to have kids just disappear after a week or so. Our first goats were really wild and we couldn’t even catch them. They had their kids out on the pasture and we let the does take care of the kids without any intervention. We assumed that predators were getting these little guys. Then one day I caught one of the week-old kids not able to get up and stay standing up. I quickly drug out the book on goat health that I had on my shelf and discovered the problem. It's called white muscle disease and it is a result of too little selenium. In our case, the kids would not have enough selenium and quickly became too weak to stand. The kids are very clever at hiding and that is why they just seemed to disappear without a trace. I found one once hiding under a small pile of wood and once in the trunk of a tree. They are small and very easy to miss. Anyway, White muscle disease is quite easy to remedy if you catch it quickly. A bolus of selenium and vitamin E and the kid is back on its feet within hours. But the better treatment is the preventative treatment. We feed our does just a bit of grain containing selenium supplement every day beginning about two weeks before we estimate they will give birth and then for about a week after. That ensures that mom has the selenium she needs and is passing it on to her kid via her milk. This completely eliminated losing kids to white muscle disease. Goat Taming The second reason we use a little bit of grain is to tame the goats. Right now my two baby girls will follow me anywhere. I can even pet Lian and she doesn’t run away. Admittedly, I do have to wait for her to come up to me. If I try to walk up to her in the pasture, she might walk away if she doesn’t see me with a bowl in hand. It is a very small amount, less than a cup between the two of them, and not every day. I’m loving the friendliness that I have not had in the past. Just a quick note. Our first goats were purchased while we were still traveling back and forth from Virginia to South Carolina and back every single week. I didn’t have the time to spend with my goats that I have now. And they were wild. We could not get within 50 feet of them. It was a real learning curve to get them into the corral. The tasks was accomplished but not without frustration. Travel Lanes Scott has built the useful system of fences to move animals from one large area to another. We call them travel lanes. These were so useful in herding the goats. If we could get them into a travel lane, we could move them to a smaller and smaller area until we could catch them up to check on their health. One, we called her Julie Jumper, could escape even this arrangement. It was nearly a year before we were able to give her a health check. Every time we would corral them, she would jump over the five or six-foot fence. It took Scott building that fence up to 10 feet high to keep her contained. It was a small area, so it wasn’t like we had to redo all of our fences. Just those in the corral. So, grain feeding for taming it a great thing. You want to be able to catch them up to check for general gut health and hoof health. Ok, enough about grain. Let’s get to creating the most nutritious pasture for your goats. Rotational Grazing We set up a rotational grazing system. This system is the best way to maintain their health with minimal intervention with things like worming chemicals. I’ll talk more about worms in a minute. Rotational grazing is also the best way to maintain your pasture. Maintaining pasture is essential for having good foraging and grazing for your goats. You want them to have lots of good grass and browse to maintain their weight and for nutritional support. How much pasture you require will depend on where you live. In Texas and Oklahoma, you will need more acreage per animal than we require here in Virginia. If you have questions in that regard, email me and I’ll try to give you resources to find out what is best for your part of the world. Basic rotational grazing for us was setting up a perimeter fence around all of the pastures and then creating smaller paddocks within those larger areas. You will want to set it up so that each paddock will have no goats for a couple of months. This has to do with letting the pastures regrow as well as keeping the parasite load under control. That means those pesky worms I mentioned earlier. Fencing There are a couple of different approaches you can take with fencing. One, a permanent fence system. Two, an electric fence system. In my humble opinion, option two still needs a permanent fence perimeter. What do I mean by that? Permanent Fence As I mentioned, the goats will get out. Even with a “permanent” fence, they will find a way out eventually. You will want to be able to catch them up quickly so be ready for that. But here again, prevention is best. We can’t have them getting injured by getting out in the road. And we can’t have them damaging the neighbor’s property. A good strong perimeter fence is your best insurance for managing this risk. Permanent fence needs to be designed specifically for goats. The wires nearer the bottom are closer together so the smaller kids are contained. I’ve seen our full-grown goat girls get through a fence wire that was barely 6” square. I can’t remember her name, but any time of the day we might find her grazing outside of the perimeter fence. Thankfully, they are herd animals and she never went far from the rest of the herd. Later she would be back inside just going on about her business. Taller is better. Most goats like to jump and some can jump really high – Julie Jumper was as pro. Keep it close to the ground. If the land is not level and uneven, be aware of gaps at the bottom as you move across terrain. We use two strands of barbed wire at the top for extra height and deterrence from jumping. As far as the dividers between paddocks, this is where electric fence is an option. We chose permanent fence here as well, but it is not absolutely necessary. Electric Fence The advantage of electric fence that is commonly used for all sorts of pastured animals is the ease of moving it. In the spring there will be lots of grass and browse, therefore, you may keep them in a smaller area to make sure they eat everything before moving on to the next paddock. Later in the summer, they may require a larger area for the same amount of time grazing as the grass is not as tall and definitely not growing as fast. Being able to vary the size of the paddock is easily accomplished with electric netting. It facilitates a more regular schedule for you. Again, we chose permanent fencing so our trade-off is that sometimes they might be in an area for a week and other times as much as two or three weeks if the grass is strong. It’s a little different way of thinking about it than just automatically moving them every few days or every week or however much time you decide is optimal between rotations. We move on their schedule. Electric wire lets you move on your schedule. Source of Electricity Things to consider with electric fencing is whether you have electricity available close to your pasture, or are you going to use a solar charger to keep the electric fence hot. While a hard wire is more reliable, it’s not that practical unless you have only a few goats that basically in your back yard. If you have more extensive pasture, then solar becomes almost a requirement. The solar unit moves with the fence. You can also use a marine battery that will move with the fence. All things to consider in planning your system. Plus, these are great conversations with your spouse. I love our dream building conversations probably more than anything else we do together. That’s just me. I’m not sure Scott would rate the conversations that high, but he does like spending time with me. So, there is that. Housing Sheep will stay outside in the worst of weather. Goats do like a bit of cover from the worst of it. Though it is not absolutely essential, it is recommended. Of course, how elaborate will depend on your individual situation. They really don’t require a lot of space and will bunch together and snuggle each other. We have a calf hutch and a couple of dog igloos. Some people build wooden structures including a space where hay can be stored close by for use in the winter. A simple lean-to or covered area with open sides are also options. Just a little something they can get under when the rain comes down hard. Supplements and Disease Management A couple of last things to consider in your planning is how will you supplement their minerals. This is a requirement. They must have access to free-choice minerals. Options here include a simple system of buying a pre-mixed, all-purpose mineral or going the more elaborate route. There are systems were you can buy each mineral individually and keep them stocked in their own box. The animals choose how much of each mineral that they want to consume. The prepackaged minerals leave less choice, but are balanced for the average needs of a goat. It must be goat minerals. They need copper more than other animals. Minerals made specifically for goats will address that need. Wormer As far as disease management, there are a few things that you should have on hand. First, a good worming medication. While you may not want or need to use these chemicals, there will be times when it might save the life of one of your animals. Hoof Trimmers Hoof trimmers are essential for most goat breeds. If you don’t keep them trimmed, you are going to see your goats limping around every time it rains. It is an easy and necessary skill to learn. We got Kiko goats to minimize the need, but I have no doubt that it will be a need from time to time. Final Thoughts There is so much more to know, but I am going to leave it here for today. How will you feed them? How will you contain them? How will you house them? How will you care for their physical health? These are the main areas to consider first. Building the physical structures will be led by the decisions you make after having these discussions and thought exercises. Let me know if you have questions. As always, our Locals subscribers have direct access to us. And you can always drop me an email if you have specific questions. Again, I covered only the very basic thoughts to consider. There is so much more. And should you decide to embark on this journey, I believe it is one that you will have a blast learning about with your family. Jump in with both feet and enjoy the experience. There is nothing like raising and caring for your own animals. If you enjoyed this podcast, please hop over to Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify or whatever podcasting service you use, SUBSCRIBE and give me a 5-star rating and review. It really does help. If you like this type of content and want to help us out, the absolute best way you can do that is to share it on all of your social media platforms. Share it with any friends or family who might be interested in this type of content. Let them know about the Peaceful Heart Farmcast. And come on over to our Locals community. Subscribe at peacefulheartfarm.locals.com. We’d love to have your support and input in the community. And we’d love to help you out by answering your questions. See you there! Thank you so much for stopping by our homestead and until next time, may God fill your life with grace and peace. To learn about herd shares: Visit our website Herd Share page To share your thoughts: Leave a comment on our Facebook PageShare this show on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram and all your social mediaIf you are a paid subscriber, meet up with us on Locals. To help the show: PLEASE LEAVE A REVIEW for Peaceful Heart FarmCast on Apple Podcasts.Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher Radio, Google Play Music, TuneIn or SpotifyBecome a community member on LocalsDonate on Patreon Website www.peacefulheartfarm.com Locals peacefulheartfarm.locals.com Rumble https://rumble.com/user/peacefulheartfarm YouTube youtube.com/peacefulheartfarm Patreon www.patreon.com/peacefulheartfarm Facebook www.facebook.com/peacefulheartfarm Instagram www.instagram.com/peacefulheartfarm

Have I mentioned that knitting is my favorite winter activity? Things have slowed down and I can have some time to catch up on my knitting projects. The garden has been put to bed. I’m still making cheese, butter and yogurt, but canning is done for the season. I have even gotten all the frozen fruit out of the freezer from this past spring and made the promised cherry and blueberry jams. For the first time, I made brandied figs. This and so much more coming up in this podcast episode. But first . . . Welcome to all the new listeners and a hearty holiday season welcome back to the veteran homestead-loving regulars who stop by the FarmCast for every episode. Thank you, thank you, thank you. I appreciate you all so much. Let’s get on with some homestead updates. Our Virginia Homestead Life Updates Let’s talk about the animals first. We love all of our animals. What would our homestead be without our animals? Pretty boring, don’t you think? Cows Finally, we have good news on the bovine front. We believe that all of the cows are now bred. Glory Be to God. Natural breeding is superior by far. We have one calf scheduled for birth on March 5th 2023. Then the next two will be around the 16th of July. Then the bull comes along and we have six that will give birth between August 4th and September 4th. Here is the run down. Princess Princess is a lovely purebred A2A2 Jersey heifer, soon to be cow, giving birth to that first calf around the 5th of March. We used sexed AI semen for her so her calf will be 50% Jersey and 50% Normande and likely a girl, a heifer. She looks great and we are anticipating great genetics in her calf. She is small and so is her mom. Not quite miniature Jerseys, but close. Rosie is her mom and in her first lactation cycle she was giving us about three gallons of milk per day. We will expect a similar amount from Princess. We plan on selling her in the future as we move to a 100% registered Normande herd. Keep your ears open about when she comes up for sale as she will make a fantastic milk cow for some lucky family. Rosie Speaking of Rosie, she is in the second group of two giving birth in near the middle of July. Rosie is also a registered A2A2 Jersey. She was bred via AI to the bull Fullblood French bull Jacaranda. The semen was unsexed so the gender of her calf will be a surprise. This calf will also be 50% Jersey and 50% Normande. We will be keeping heifer calves that are 50% Normande, but like her daughter, Rosie will come up for sale sometime in the near future. Ginger Ginger is the second animal giving birth in mid-July. She is 75% percent Normande. That means she is not recognized as purebred, but her offspring will be as their percentage will be high enough to meet the minimum standard. The sire is also the Fullblood French bull Jacaranda. Ferdinand’s Offspring The last group of six are all bred via Ferdinand. You will recall that he is the Guernsey bull that we purchased a couple of months ago. He did his job well. In one month, two hormonal cycles, he has impregnated all of our remaining cows and heifers. At least it appears so as of this recording. I’m not sure if we will be able to registered his offspring as 50% Normande. I’ll have to check on that. Violet, Virginia and Wanda are all purebred Normandes but it may not be enough for proper registration. We shall see. Butter is a registered A2A2 Jersey. And the last two, Molly and Cookie are mostly but not registered Jersey cows. Though they are also A2A2. We will be keeping Molly as she does have 25% Normande genetics, but Butter and Cookie will also be moving on to another family. In the end, four of our cows will be up for sale in the next year or two. They are all great animals, but again, we are building a 100% Normande herd. Each year we will probably move out a couple more as we slowly inch toward our preferred genetic goals. Nickel We have Nickel waiting in the wings to get big enough to be our breeding bull. Ferdinand will have one more round of breeding our cows and then we will also sell him. As you can tell, he is a great bull and will be a wonderful addition to someone’s herd. After that, Nickel will be our herd bull for a couple of years. And we will continue using AI as we can to improve the herd genetics. Scott is coming on board as our primary AI technician. Scott’s AI Training This is a really great piece of news that I have to share. I mentioned in the last podcst that the idea was for Scott to be able attend an AI workshop and learn to do the procedure himself. Hallelujah, he was able to attend an AI tech training session just a couple of weeks ago. It was literally only an hour away and we made it happen so he could attend. He now knows the basics of how it is done and what challenges he may face. And we have lots of cows for him to practice on as he builds his skill. The first day he came home a little frustrated with his lack of skill. According to him, it is much harder than it looks from the outside. On the second day of the training session, he got the hang of it and all that is left now is for him to practice. The very next time that any of our cows get bred, Scott will be trying out his new skills. That is months and months from now but we are both excited about the prospects of being able to use AI much more effectively. We will share how that goes when we get there. The timing of this training session was truly a Blessing from God. Mack, Finn and Charlotte Now on to the livestock guardian dogs. There is not much to say here. I am still feeling so blessed that Finn returned after six months of roaming the countryside. We are still treating an infection in his left eye. It is a stubborn infection. Sometimes his eye is clear and then it will cloud up again. Just today we aggressively upped the amount of antibiotic cream we are using in that eye to see if we can knock out that infection once and for all. Otherwise, he is putting on weight and is very happy to be home. There was an early escape and one a day or so ago that was my fault for letting him loose with an open gate, but he is still with us. Charlotte is going along just fine. Sometimes she tolerates me petting her and sometimes still she won’t let me near her. I just go along and pet her when I can. She is a great dog and I love her so much. Both Finn and Charlotte are currently with the sheep and the goat doelings. There are a couple of calves in there as well. I forgot to talk about Jill and Penny. Jill is currently up for sale if you know of anyone looking for a young heifer calf. We will be keeping Penny. She is 50% Jersey and 50% Normande. All is well in that pasture for the moment. Mack is with the cows. They don’t really need him, but what else are we going to do with him. At some point, I would like to see all of the dogs and animals together. I’m not sure that will ever happen. We will always have heifer calves that need to be kept away from the bull and/or vise versa, but bull is kept away from the cows/heifer calves. And then there are ewe lambs and doelings that need to be kept away from the breeding ram and buck. I’m pretty sure we will always have two groups of animals. The best I can hope for is that all the of animals and dogs will eventually become interchangeable. At the moment I don’t trust the large animals with Finn and Charlotte and I don’t trust the small animals with Mack. So, there you have it. This may be our standard operating procedure going forward. I’ll keep you posted. Kiko Goats Now for a little update on the goats. Things are going fairly well in that area. I have managed to tame all of the goats a fair bit. They will follow me anywhere if they think there might be a treat at the end of the road. All are growing nicely. It will be another two months before the girls can meet up with the boy. Lian and Amys are with the sheep and Rhuarc is right next door in the lower garden with a ram lamb as a companion. As soon as the girls are old enough, these two boys will be able to join the main group of sheep and goat girls. Sheep Several ewes are looking quite plump. I expect that we will have lambs in January or February. Not the best time of year, but I have found that these Katahdin sheep are really good moms and the lambs are generally hardy even in winter. If the weather is particularly bad, we can take them to shelter. Otherwise, this breed is very used to giving birth out in the pasture, even in the winter. I have heard of several breeders that specifically breed for birthing in January and February as they are looking for their lambs to reach market size by the time November rolls around and the various religious groups are looking for lamb and goat for their feasts. We may look at that market as well. Otherwise, we like to keep ours all the way up to the 12th month of growth. I’ll keep you posted, but the sheep have dogs protecting them at the moment and I expect that we will actually have lambs soon and that we will be able to raise them to market weight without predators running off with them. At least that is the current expectation. Chickens The last animals to discuss are the chickens. Last time I mentioned that Mack had made mincemeat of one of the hens. We still have all of the rest of the hens and roosters. Just a few days ago, we added six new hens to the flock. One of our herd share members had more chickens than she wanted and she gifted us these hens. We are not sure whether they are Cinnamon queens or Rhode Island reds. Either way, they are providing us a couple more eggs a day. Of the eleven others that we have, we were getting 2 or 3 eggs per day. We added half as many hens but doubled our egg production. Now we are getting 5 or 6 eggs per day. Go figure. I don’t know if I mentioned that I am looking at perhaps changing my mind of what breed of chickens that we raise. There are always good logical reasons for the breeds we choose for any given animal. However, the literature seems to be flawed on the chicken breeds I chose. I expected way more eggs from the American Bresse and Black Copper Marans. And it seems that the traditional Rhode Island reds are just better at producing eggs. I’ll have to look it up. It may be that they are primarily egg producers and not a dual breed chicken. In the end, I may just give up on the whole dual breed idea for chickens. I’m really in it for the eggs. We just don’t eat that much chicken so the meat is not a really big deal. That’s for another day. In the spring we will do some incubations and hatch out some birds and see where we go from there. In the end, we may just have mutt chickens and forget about trying to raise specific breeds. Right now, as long as they lay lots of eggs, I don’t really care. Creamery Let’s move on that huge creamery project. Where do we stand with that? All of the floors are complete. As I mentioned in the last podcast, Scott was racing the clock to get that done. The temperature-sensitive nature of the glue and grout were driving that carriage. He made it. There were a few cold days where he had to wait, but in the end, he got it done. There are a few details he is working on for the pull box covers, but other than that, the floors are complete. Next up is the electrical. And of course, the plumbing. That is still looming large in my mind. I don’t know how he will do it, but I do know that he will make it happen. It’s just who he is as a person. At the moment he is moving his attention to fixing fences in the back fields. There is a good bit of standing hay back there but trees on the fences need to be cleared and those fences repaired. Another task on his calendar is gathering up pine wood for the wood stove this winter. For the past two winters we have not used the wood stove as other priorities and factors interfered with the collecting of wood. This year should be the time that we get back on track with using wood for fuel in the winter and getting that electric bill back down to a reasonable cost. Especially at this time in our economy when prices are rising. These tasks will take away from the time he has in the creamery. But I’m pretty sure we are still on track for USDA certification sometime in the spring or summer. Knitting, Cheesemaking, and Other Milk Products I want to talk a little bit about cheesemaking and other milk products before getting into my knitting projects. Cheesemaking Because we have had so much problem getting cows pregnant, we are currently planning to milk the cows as long as we can before drying them up for birthing their calves. Normally, that would be about a one-year cycle. This time, it’s going to be nearly a year-and-a-half. Their milk production will continue to decline over time. And the cold of winter will also decrease milk production. These are additional days of learning and having new trials of which we have yet to have. Currently, the cows are still producing enough for herd share milk and for me to make cheese. I’m perfecting my techniques in cheesemaking and trying a couple of new ideas to improve flavor. We shall see in a few months if my efforts have paid off. Additionally, I’m still making yogurt a couple of times per week and butter every other week or so. It’s a bit of a different winter experience to still be dealing with milk after the end of November, but it seems to be working out great for both Scott and myself. So far. I’m happy to continue the creative art of dealing with dairy products. Knitting My favorite winter pastime is knitting. In the summer it’s all about the garden – planting, weeding, harvesting, canning and so on. But in the winter, things slow down and I get to take a break. What do I do with all that free time? Well, to be honest, there isn’t that much free time. I just do a lot of stuff that was put off because I was in the garden and in the kitchen for every hour of every day in the summer. It's so funny that I have these knitting projects that sit for months on end without any progress whatsoever. Then winter comes and I can work on them. Do I get them finished? I guess it depends on the project. Victorian Newborn Set Knitting Pattern The one I’m going to talk about today is a really beautiful baby layette. It has a blanket, bonnet, booties and sweater. I’ve been working on the blanket for some time. It is a Victorian themed pattern. Lacy edges and cream or off-white base color. The contrast color is burgundy. I’ll put a picture on the Locals platform and maybe I can work one in on the website. Perhaps I’ll make it the featured photo on this podcast. Yeah, that could work. I started working on this at least two years ago. It is the most difficult project that I have ever done. First it was all about getting the pattern correct. I must have started over at least four times. That was the first year. The second year (and when I speak of years, remember that it is a few months in the winter) – The second year, it was all about starting the lacy edge. I have taken out that part at least six times. It was late last winter when I discovered that the pattern I was trying to use was flawed. Recreating the Pattern Here’s that little story. As I get older, it is harder for me to read small print. And the pattern that I was using was already a year or more old and the pages stuck together and the print was mangled. So, what did I do? Well, I searched on line to try and find a “clean” copy of that pattern. I did find one. It was great for the “rosebud pattern”. It is the main theme in all of the pieces. But when it came to putting the rest of the pieces together, that pattern was a disaster. So, what do I do now? On the evening that I made the discovery that it was the pattern that was flawed and not my knitting skills, I set out to recreate the pattern from the original. And so I did. I spent about an hour in Microsoft Word. (Okay, it may have been more than an hour. At this point, I have no idea. I just know I needed the pattern to work.) I typed out every single instruction, every detail. Then I proof-read what I had typed. It all seemed to make sense. I still have the original just in case I made a mistake. I can go back with my magnifying glass and see if I can decipher what the actual instruction is supposed to be. However, I am pretty confident that I got it right. There is a pattern to patterns and I could see it clearly. After all, I had created it over and over again, incorrectly. So when I saw the correct instruction it made perfect sense. My Greatest Achievement Now to my greatest achievement so far. I’ve never been successful in making joins look natural. My work has always looked sloppy. But not this time. As I got started once again on this new adventure, I could clearly see the pattern this time. I could clearly see that it was working. I finished the first end of the blanket using a stitch I had never done before. But the instructions were clear and it worked the very first time. Yippee!! That’s not the greatest achievement. No the greatest achievement was picking up the stitches on the starting edge of that blanket. YouTube helped me out. I watched a couple of videos on how it is done. In the past I just did the best I could with the instructions which read “pick up and knit X number of stitches. I don’t know why it never occurred to me that there was an actual method to make it work smoothly. So, I watched these videos and gave their suggestions a try. Lo and behold, I created a seam that looks unbelievable. The top is just a continuation of the knitting. The bottom has to be created as if it is a continuation. Finishing the First Piece of the Project I never knew I could do such good work. I can’t wait to start up the sides. I’ve already watched that video and I will watch it again before I start on the sides. First, I have to finish the bottom. And I have every confidence that I will make it look just as awesome as the top. Take a look at the picture to see what I am creating. This will be the most awesome knitting project I have ever done. Did I mention it was the hardest thing I have ever attempted? It is going to give me confidence to make the other really complicated pieces. That sweater, hat and booties are waiting in the wings. Now, in closing, I must mention that once I finish these difficult pieces that I already have in progress, I’m going to switch to making hat, scarf, mitten sets to give to the homeless. It’s going to be my new mission for quite some time. These are simpler projects, but with a great deal more purpose. I have all of this yarn and patterns for Afghans and such that I have collected over the years. If you are a knitter, you know exactly what I’m talking about. Large Afghans are a lot of work and, when finished, I can only give it to one person. For the same amount of time and yarn, I can make something useful for those in need, several somethings in fact. I don’t really know how many hats, mittens and scarves will come out of the vast amount of yarn in my closet. But I’m going to find out. There you have it and that is the end of my knitting story for this podcast. Take a look at the pictures of my current project on our Locals platform. That’s peaceful heart farm DOT locals DOT com. Final Thoughts Well, that concludes this podcast. There is always something going on the with animals and I love sharing our stories with you. I hope you have your own dreams going and adventures going on. It may be the trials and tribulations of your children, your career or your family. Please share with us on our Locals platform. We’d love to hear from you. I hope you enjoyed my knitting story. I’m so excited to be getting back into the groove and feeding that creative impulse. What do you like to create? Let me know. If you enjoyed this podcast, please hop over to Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify or whatever podcasting service you use, SUBSCRIBE and give me a 5-star rating and review. It really does help. If you like this type of content and want to help us out, the absolute best way you can do that is to share it on all of your social media platforms. Share it with any friends or family who might be interested in this type of content. Let them know about the Peaceful Heart Farmcast. And come on over to our Locals community. Subscribe at peacefulheartfarm.locals.com. We’d love to have your support and input in the community. And we’d love to help you out by answering your questions. See you there! Thank you so much for stopping by our homestead and until next time, may God fill your life with grace and peace. To learn about herd shares: Visit our website Herd Share page To share your thoughts: Leave a comment on our Facebook PageShare this show on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram and all your social mediaIf you are a paid subscriber, meet up with us on Locals. To help the show: PLEASE LEAVE A REVIEW for Peaceful Heart FarmCast on Apple Podcasts.Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher Radio, Google Play Music, TuneIn or SpotifyBecome a community member on LocalsDonate on Patreon Website www.peacefulheartfarm.com Locals peacefulheartfarm.locals.com Rumble https://rumble.com/user/peacefulheartfarm YouTube youtube.com/peacefulheartfarm Patreon www.patreon.com/peacefulheartfarm Facebook www.facebook.com/peacefulheartfarm Instagram www.instagram.com/peacefulheartfarm

I’m back from my podcast vacation. It has been three months since I recorded anything. We were both very, very busy and the things that keep the homestead financially solvent become front and center. It’s good to be back in front of the microphone. Let me take a minute and say welcome to all the new listeners. The subscriber numbers continued to go up even though I was absent. Again, thank you so much. And a big welcome back to the veteran homestead-loving regulars who stop by the FarmCast for every episode. I truly appreciate each and every one of you. I’m not sure how much I’m going to include in today’s episode. As I said, it has been three months and a whole lotta stuff has happened in that time. Our Virginia Homestead Life Updates Those of you that are members of our Locals.com community will have heard about some of the things I’m going to talk. That’s thanks to Scott. He posts weekly about the cows and the creamery. If you’d like to hear his perspective, go to peacefulheartfarm.locals. com and join our community. It’s free to sign up. We also have specific data that is for subscribers only. Also, anyone can read, watch and listen, but only subscribers can comment and make their own posts to the community. There is a minimal fee $5 per month to subscribe, though you can support us at whatever level you choose. And again, read, watch, listen for free. A shout out and huge “Thank You” to our Locals supporters. You help us keep going. Again, for those of you interested in more content, the address is peaceful heart farm.Locals.com. Let’s start with the cows. The centerpiece of our operation as a small dairy and creamery. Cows Breeding season with artificial insemination began the last week of May. In August, when I last published a podcast, we had one confirmed pregnancy with a second AI procedure in progress, waiting on preg confirmation the first week of September. Today, we STILL have only one confirmed pregnancy and the last AI appointment for this cycle was completed about three weeks ago. We have spent hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of dollars on this AI process. I believe there have been a total of three tries. We have to work with the vet’s schedule so the timeframes have stretched long. The second attempt produced three or four additional pregnancies and we set up the third AI appointment to try and get the four remaining cows impregnated. The second attempt girls were preg checked with ultrasound and three or four confirmed. However, before the next AI session, they all aborted. The aborts were likely related to a spirochete infection that is spread via deer urine. We treated all the cows. The next AI appointment was scheduled so we could start all over again and get them cycling all at the same time. Time just kept moving forward and here we are in November and still only one confirmed pregnancy. The third attempt is completed. Last AI Vet Visit The vet will come again a few days after Thanksgiving to see where we stand. One of the reasons this has stretched so long is the vet waits 65 days or so to be able to confirm pregnancy with ultrasound. We already know that only two have not come into heat again. Five have been bred by Ferdinand. We can tell because of what are called “heat stickers” If they get mounted, the stickers are rubbed clean and the underlying fluorescent orange becomes visible. That means possibly two out of seven on this last try. So why do I keep saying it is the last try? Well, that’s because we finally bit the bullet and bought the bull I just mentioned. We purchased Ferdinand about a month ago. He’s a gorgeous guernsey bull. Of course, this is not ideal because our plan is to have 100% registered Normande dairy herd. But we had to do something just to get calves so the cows would be in milk. We can’t support the herd shares and make cheese without lactating cows and we don’t have lactating cows if they don’t give birth to calves every so often. Even if we are able to continue milking them, their milk production continuously declines the farther they are from their last delivery. We don’t know how long they will produce milk before they naturally dry up. Some say around 12 months. Others say they have had cows lactate for two years. We may just find the answer to that question for our girls. Ferdinand is Our Hope of Success The bottom line is that Ferdinand will get our girls pregnant and we will have milk in the fall of 2023. Most of the calves out of Ferdinand will be sold as they won’t add to our goal of a 100% Normande herd. I believe I talked about our particular plan was to always have calves in the spring and not milk in the winter. That plan has been completely turned on its head. We may end up milking year-round for a little while. I won’t explain the details here, but it requires going without calves again for more than a year. It may work out just fine, but it will take time. Again, keeping up with the herd shares and having milk to make cheese is the priority, whatever it takes. Otherwise, we simply cannot remain financially viable. Nickle is on Deck On the upside, we have a registered purebred Normande bull named Nickle that was born in April this year. We kept him intact because a neighbor wanted to buy him after he was weaned. In the end, we backed out of that sale because we do actually live and learn. We will keep Nickle around for at least two or three years, perhaps more, before replacing him with another. Ferdinand will likely have another chance next year as we expect Nickle to be still too small to get the job done. It was a good idea on paper to not keep a bull around and feed him hay through the winter for just two months of work in the early summer. AI seemed to be the best way to go – and to be sure, we have not given up on that completely. However, our AI experience has now shown us the necessity of keeping a bull. Scott Needs to Learn the AI Procedure The first two years we used AI, I believe we had about a 50% success rate on the first try. And that’s pretty average according to the stats. But this last go round has been a nightmare – a very costly nightmare. So where do we go from here? The plan is for Scott to learn how to do AI himself. There are workshops available and he will be attending one sometime in the future. I’m sure he will be very good at this task. He has a strong medical background. Right now, he is still very busy with building the creamery (more on that later), and with the bull, we are good-to-go for breeding at this point. As we get to the place in our journey where Scott can act quickly when a cow comes into heat and we are not reliant on the vet to perform the procedure, I believe AI will once again become a good fit for us. We will still keep a bull on hand. A bull is going to be needed if we expect to keep our calving season in a specific window of time. Ok, enough about the cows. Dogs Have I got a story for you regarding the dogs? It is pretty wild. I’ll start from where I left off, but stay until the end. About a week ago, something crazy happened. We started with three livestock guardian dogs. Mack was born and raised with sheep and cows. His owners sold all of their livestock and Mack needed a new home. Charlotte and Finn were guarding chickens and turkeys and their owners also decided to get out of the business. Let’s talk about Mack first. Food Aggression I have mentioned several times that Mack is a great dog, but food or resource aggressive. In the last episode I talked about trying to get him to bond with the sheep and getting the sheep to be okay with him in their space. And I talked about how he barked and growled at them to keep them away from his food. Well, that situation escalated a bit because Charlotte also became food aggressive and the two of them went at each other’s throats twice before I separated them. Finn disappeared and Charlotte ended up hanging with Mack and the sheep. The first time there was an incident, I saw Mack go to Charlotte’s bowl. He was finished eating and she was goofing off with a treat a few feet away from her bowl. As she saw him invade her bowl, she went after him. It was pretty intense for about 5 or 10 seconds. She won that battle and I thought it was over. Fast forward a few weeks. They have now been moved a couple times. They go with the sheep when the sheep need to move. They are all back in paddock #8 when it happened again. This time Charlotte tried to eat out of Mack’s bowl. They went at it again for 5 or 10 seconds. It’s a really scary thing to see. They definitely meant business. The next day, Mack would not approach his bowl when I brought it to him. I knew that was very wrong. Progress at Last After a quick consultation and a post to the Livestock Guardian Dog Training Facebook page, I was informed they were both now food aggressive and needed to be fed separately or it would end badly, with one of them cowed and skinny or dead. I immediately began taking Mack completely out of the pasture and over to the garden area before giving him his bowl. The garden is fenced so he could not wander very far and he is easily moved from one place to another. I gave Charlotte her bowl in the pasture well away from the livestock. Mack always eats right away. Charlotte did not. But she is a very smart girl. It only took one time of me picking up that bowl and walking away with it and not returning until the next day for her to learn that when I bring it, she needs to eat it. We have not had a problem since. This change of feeding practice has changed everything. This change provided such an immediately productive outcome that I was, and still am, elated. I talk a lot about our challenges with one thing and another here on the homestead. And when one challenge is not only overcome but produces this kind of productive outcome, I’m on cloud nine. Within days of beginning the new feeding regimen, these two dogs became the best of friends. Charlotte was immediately willing to work with and hang out with Mack. Up until then, she had been aloof with Mack. And better than that, she started becoming more friendly toward me. Charlotte is My Friend It has been a while since I talked about this, but all of our dogs have had some kind of issue that I deal with on a daily basis. Charlotte’s issue was that she would not let anyone near her. We had to trap her in smaller and smaller areas just to get close enough for the vet to examine her. She is a really beautiful Great Pyrenees and I just wanted to love on her. It was frustrating that she would never let me close. A few weeks after the change between her and Mack, she started to change her attitude toward me as well. Oddly, she still runs away from me and won’t let me touch her when I bring her food. But when I come at any other time and even after she finishes her food, she lets me pet her now. She will still shy away if I move too quickly, but I’m so pleased to be able to actually pet her. And this morning, while I was out checking on the baby goats (more on that later), she actually put her paw on me to get my attention while I was looking away at the sheep. She touched me. Twice she did this. I feel so blessed to have finally made so much progress with her. It has been just barely over a year since we got her and finally, she will let me love her. Finn is Back Now for the bombshell. Finn is back. Some of you are new and have no idea what I am talking about. Here’s the scoop. Last year when we got Charlotte, another dog also came with the package. Some of you will remember him but I’ll recap here for all the newbies. Finn is an Anatolian/Great Pyrenees cross. He is like a big cuddly bear. As I said, there are challenges will all of our dogs. They were all rehomed to us as adults and, as is common, they have not been the perfect livestock guardian dogs that we imagined. Many of the posts on the Livestock Guardian Dog Facebook page are about issues with rehomed or rescued dogs and the consensus is that these dogs are always a roll of the dice as to whether they will actually work with your livestock and your operation. It is just about the only option, though, if you want an adult dog. With a puppy, it is two years before it can be trusted alone with the livestock. Anyway, Finn’s vice is that he roams. It was impossible to keep him inside our perimeter fence. And that fence was built to contain goats. But goats got nothing on a dog that loves to roam. Finn’s Story In the first six months of his time with us, he escaped at least three or four times. Luckily, I had immediately gotten tags for all of the dogs that have our farm name and phone number printed on them. He may have escaped even more than four times, now that I think about it. Three times we got a call from a neighbor and we had to go pick him up. One time he was about five miles away. I’m pretty sure there were other times when he didn’t go far and we were able to get him back home quickly. It’s hard to remember, so much has happened since then. It seemed like he escaped every day. About six months ago, he escaped and never returned and there were no calls from a neighbor to tell us where to pick him up. Up to that point, he had never been gone for more than a day or two before someone called us. Six months ago, he disappeared. We grieved the loss. Charlotte grieved the loss also. Then, about a week ago, Scott found him walking along the fence line near the road. It was easy to get him to come inside the fence and he is happily residing with Charlotte once again. Is that not the most amazing thing? Six months and he just showed up. His tag with our farm name and number was missing. Did someone keep him for themselves? I never thought that was possible. Mainly because he was impossible to contain and he would have escaped from that person also. We will probably never know. Finn’s Health Upon His Return He was covered with more cockleburs than I have ever seen and his left eye is injured. He will not hold it open. I tried a couple of times to cut out the cockleburs but he was having none of it. We were exploring ways to be able to get this done without him biting us. The point became moot. He cleared those cockleburs himself within two or three days. I have no idea how he got the giant mat of them from under his neck. I can see how he probably pulled them off of his legs and I had successfully clipped them free from his back. There are still a few and it is good to know he is so good at keeping his coat clean. Anyway, he is a little thin and has that issue with his eye and I’m monitoring that, but otherwise he looks good. What Happened with Mack? There is one other bit to throw in here. Only a few days before his return, we had decided that Mack was simply not going to work with the sheep. He kept charging at them to exert his dominance. He didn’t really chase them, but he would bark and run toward them until they moved, then he would stop and trot away. Then he killed a chicken and that was sort of the last straw, though it was not all his fault. The chickens go anywhere they want and I was worried in the beginning about him chasing them. Charlotte was guarding chickens at the farm where we picked her up so I was not worried about her. Anyway, it only took about two weeks before my fear was realized. I went down to feed him and he did not come when I called. I found him guarding his prize. She was not quite dead, but mortally wounded. We processed her and put him back in with the cows and left Charlotte with the sheep. Charlotte and the Sheep Charlotte was doing fairly well with the sheep, though she is actually afraid of the them. She runs if they come close. But she was staying in their general vicinity as they mosey around the pasture grazing. So, when Finn returned, we put him back in with her and the sheep. What else could we do? The paddock she was currently occupying seemed to satisfy her – she used to escape just about every day also, but she seemed to be bonding with the sheep to the point of actively protecting them even if she did still run from them. And she stayed in the pasture with them. When Finn arrived back on the scene, she went immediately up on the hill where the sheep were grazing. She greeted Finn but seemed to have no interest in him and returned to her job. That was the first day. It didn’t last. Now a week later, she has warmed up to Finn again and is not really staying with the sheep anymore. That was our original problem that led to the final escape of Finn. We had given up on Charlotte and Finn being useful for guarding the sheep. They were more attached to each other than the livestock. They bark much more when they are together than Charlotte alone. And they both escaped regularly. We were looking to rehome them and just work with Mack. That was the fateful time when Finn escaped and did not return. As I said, both Charlotte and Finn escaped regularly, but Charlotte was always right back in the morning or sometimes even the same evening. Every time we moved them to a new place where they had never been, we spent days finding and fortifying their escape routes. On that fateful day, we put them in the orchard while we moved Mack in with the sheep. This was their first time there and it was not fortified. Less than half an hour in the orchard and they were gone. Charlotte returned before dark and Finn was gone for six months. It is good to have him back, but we are back to square one. In the end, Mack didn’t work out with the sheep any more than Finn and Charlotte. We Still Have Issues I know I’ve rambled on and on about our defective livestock guardian dogs. And we may still have to make some hard decisions. You probably realize that at this point, I’m really attached to all of them. Now, only a week after his return, Finn has converted Charlotte back to her original self. She escapes and goes wherever she wants, never staying where we put her, not really staying with the sheep. She hangs with Finn. So far, Finn escaped a couple of times but seems to be secure at the moment after Scott spent time patching up his escape locations. Not so with Charlotte. She could always get out no matter what we did. But again, she always came right back so she was not so much of a worry. Without Finn, she had stopped that behavior. I have no doubt that Finn will eventually escape again and he may disappear again. We are back to square one with all three dogs. My rational self tells me that we need to get some actual livestock guardian dogs that will work with our animals. And then my emotional self can’t seem to get moving on that, can’t seem to imagine being without them. Sigh. Enough of that. Let’s talk about the goats. Kiko Goats I’m not going to say a lot about the goats as the podcast will get too long and I want to talk a bit about the chickens and the creamery. We have had our new registered 100% New Zealand Kiko goats for a little over a month. They are so cute. Rhuarc is the buck. The does are Amys and Lian. All of those names will become familiar to you if you watch Amazon’s Wheel of Time series. At least I hope they will. I’m not happy about what they are doing with my all-time favorite book series as they adapt it to the screen. Not true to the books at all and those names may never appear in the screen adaptation. But there is always the books. These are beautiful animals and they came from a great Kiko goat operation right here in Patrick County Virginia. The farm owner is a wonderful woman with a wealth of knowledge about this breed of goat. She has a couple hundred. Small Challenge The only challenge I have had so far is getting them tamed down a little bit. We definitely did not want a repeat of the last goats that we had that ran from us wildly for the first couple of years. This time we put them in a 16’ x 16’ pen where we could begin to make friends with them before sending them out to the larger acreage. The buck is now separated from the does. They are not old enough to be bred though at this point it is likely possible. So, the plan is to keep them separated for a few months until the does get old enough to be bred. Rhuarc now comes up to me and eats out of my hand. I can’t actually catch him up, but he does not run wildly in every direction when he sees me as they all did in the beginning. This plan has worked out really well. Just this morning I let Lian and Amys out of their pen into the paddock with the sheep. I introduced the dogs to them. Both seemed quite disinterested so that was good. It was important that they not hurt my new babies. So far, so good. That’s about all I have to say about the goats. I’ll check on them in just a few minutes. I pray all is well on their first day out. Chickens Moving on to the chickens. To recap, we have two breeds. Black Copper Marans and American White Bresse. The Marans lay chocolate brown eggs and the Bresse lay tan eggs. I’m not happy with the current egg production. I was looking for more eggs, but the jury is still out on whether we move forward with these breeds or switch to another. I hatched 14 Bresse and 9 Marans. When they reached maturity, we processed the excess roosters. There were 8 Bresse roosters and we processed 6 of those. We were blessed with six Maran hens, exactly what I wanted, and we kept two of the three roosters. The Chicken Plan Right now, the rooster-to-hen ratio is way off. We need lots more hens. That will come in the spring when we hatch out lots of baby chicks. We wanted to have backup roosters but now I think that if we lose a rooster, we could just buy another group of chicks and raise a new rooster. That is the likely path we will take. In the next processing cycle, we will downsize to just one rooster of each breed. These are great chickens. Well, I can say that chickens in general are very interesting creatures. And they are easy to care for and maintain. The American White Bresse are a special breed that has been bred to eat milk-soaked grain in the last two weeks before processing. Their meat becomes almost like marbled beef – or so they say. We haven’t tried it yet. We processed that first batch without the milk-soaked feed. That’s it for the chickens. I’m not going to talk about the garden and orchard. They are going to sleep for the winter. I do have some thoughts there, but not for this podcast. Creamery Let me finish up by talking about the progress on the creamery. We are nearing the end. The light at the end of the tunnel is now visible. Floors, electrical, plumbing and hooking up the gas will finish it out. I expect we will be a USDA inspected cheesemaking plant in the spring. That’s about six years from start to finish on this project. Without Scott’s bout with cancer last year, I would have been able to say five years. I am so blessed that he is fine now. So, six instead of five is just fine with me. It was a bit of a scare and a very tough season of life for him, but he is strong and healthy and continuing on with the crowning creation of his life. I hope you will visit once we open for business and see all that he has done. Tile Floors Currently, Scott is in a race with the weather. He is working on the tile floors. Both the glue that holds the tile to the concrete floor and the grout that goes between the tiles are temperature sensitive. The temps need to be above 50 in order for the chemical processes to work effectively. As of today, he has all the tiles in place and is working on completing the grout. That is going to take several days. I’m not sure how many. He has probably posted about it on the Locals page. It’s hard for me to keep up with the exact days, especially when it can change on a daily basis if something goes awry or another task for the animals takes president. Caring for the animals always comes first.  Electrical and Plumbing Once he has completed those floors, I believe he will go back to the electrical. If I remember correctly, he said he is about 50% done with the electrical. The next big thing is the plumbing. He wanted to contract that out. It has probably been nine months since he started trying to find someone to do the work. That was like pulling teeth. No one was even willing to take on the job. No one had the time. Then when he did find someone, the bid was double what he expected to pay. We found that out just yesterday. At this point, he is back to having to do it himself. That means lots more time with YouTube videos and phone consultations with his brother in Florida. This makes me sad, but I also know he will get through it. My Scott is a tough guy and very goal oriented. He will get it done, whatever it takes. Large Cheese Cave on Hold He does have one room that is sitting untouched. The large cheese cave will not be completed until after the initial USDA inspected status is completed. Once winter sets in, he won’t be able to do the tile in that room until the spring. Until then, we have the small cheese cave functional and available. I’m going to end it here. There is a lot more I could say but this has already gone long. You can find lots more information on the creamery posted on our Locals platform. That’s peacefulheartfarm.locals.com. Scott is always uploading videos of the animals and his work on the creamery. Final Thoughts That’s it for today’s podcast. It feels good to be back. Things are slowing down for me for the winter, though there is still a lot to do. I hope to get back on schedule with regular podcasts. Even in the winter there are exciting things going on here at the homestead. Scott will continue his hectic schedule even through the winter. I am feeling the excitement of this project coming to fruition. Even with all the challenges of getting the cows bred and dealing with our less-than-perfect livestock guardian dogs, we keep putting one foot in front of the other. I went on and on about the dogs I know and there is still so much that I did not say. I hope you enjoyed life on our homestead through my eyes and that you will continue to follow our journey as we build on our homestead dreams. If you enjoyed this podcast, please hop over to Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify or whatever podcasting service you use, SUBSCRIBE and give me a 5-star rating and review. It really does help. If you like this type of content and want to help us out, the absolute best way you can do that is to share it on all of your social media platforms. Share it with any friends or family who might be interested in this type of content. Let them know about the Peaceful Heart Farmcast. It really is the best way to help us out. And come on over to our Locals community. Subscribe at peacefulheartfarm.locals.com. We’d love to have your support and input in the community. And we’d love to help you out by answering your questions. I’ll be posting another episode in the productivity series that I started on the Locals platform. The first was on concentration and the next will be on developing and maintaining memory. See you there! Thank you so much for stopping by our homestead and until next time, may God fill your life with grace and peace. To learn about herd shares: Visit our website Herd Share page To share your thoughts: Leave a comment on our Facebook PageShare this show on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram and all your social media To help the show: PLEASE LEAVE A REVIEW for Peaceful Heart FarmCast on Apple Podcasts.Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher Radio, Google Play Music, TuneIn or SpotifyBecome a community member on LocalsDonate on Patreon Website www.peacefulheartfarm.com Locals peacefulheartfarm.locals.com Rumble https://rumble.com/user/peacefulheartfarm YouTube youtube.com/peacefulheartfarm Patreon www.patreon.com/peacefulheartfarm Facebook www.facebook.com/peacefulheartfarm Instagram www.instagram.com/peacefulheartfarm

Multitasking. How do I get so much done in one day? This is a question I get often. I do a lot of multitasking on the homestead. I didn’t just wake up one day and do this. There was a process that I went through to get from a scattered, unfocused, ineffective person to one who can just get things done. Now of course, I’m not always in that zone and there are days when I’m going into a room and wondering why I am there, multiple times a day. There are remedies to the unfocused mind. And I’m going to talk about that today. I want to take a minute and say welcome to all the new listeners and welcome back to the veteran homestead-loving regulars who stop by the FarmCast for every episode. I appreciate you all so much. I’m so excited to share with you what’s going on at the farm this week. Our Virginia Homestead Life Updates I’ll keep this part brief as I give you the updates on our animals, gardens and the creamery. Cows The cows are still undergoing various artificial insemination routines. The first attempt we inseminated eight of our cows. Cookie had just given birth a few weeks ahead of this so she was not in this first rotation. Princess is the only one that took. We did eight again. No Princess but adding in Cookie this time. We checked the semen and it was viable. However, the bull with the semen sexed to produce heifers was much less active. In the end, we used this semen on our Normande cows and we used the unsexed semen on the jersey girls. We will pray for greater success this time and know for sure in about three weeks. I don’t expect all of them to take. That would be wonderful, but it is not statistically likely. At that point, we will need to think about the next step. We would be getting very late in the breeding cycle. We may continue on anyway because we need the milk to make the cheese. It’s just so frustrating right now. We plan for births in March and April. If we try again, it would push the births back into May and June. Then we get into the situation like we had with Cookie this year. The cows will not be ready to start the breeding process again in the first week of June if they give birth in May. I think I’ve mentioned this before that we make choices every single day trying to create our homestead exactly as we imagine. In the end, it never happens as we imagine and we must roll with the punches and make another plan. Dogs and Sheep The dogs and sheep are doing well. I have them collected together so they can get used to each other. I’m still waiting on that magic moment when the dogs and the sheep bond. So far, the sheep are still afraid of the dogs. Sooner or later, they will cave and become used to these noisy beasts in their space. We closed them up into an even tighter space so they are more likely to get to know each other a little bit better. I’ve watched the sheep watching me feed the dogs. I even saw one start to approach Mack’s bowl while he was off munching on a bone. He is very sharp and spotted the advance right away. He immediately went to his bowl and growled very ferociously at that sheep and she backed away. As I said, I don’t want them to be afraid of the dogs, but I do want them to respect the dogs and their food. I’ve considered making a separate place for feeding the dogs and that may still happen – likely will happen. But I’m going to wait a little longer. I want the sheep to know that he will only growl at them when protecting his food. Any other barking, I want them to assume he is doing his protection job. Goats I’m getting a plan outlined to integrate the new goat kids into the group as well. It looks like that will happen sometime in early fall. We will have three new goat babies to add to our family. I’m excited about that and a little apprehensive as well. They are young and small and I’m still learning about these dogs. Praying it all goes well. The goat kids will also have to learn to leave the dog food alone. It’s not likely that they will learn. That’s the point when feeding the dogs separately will become most important. The goat kids will change that dynamic and I will need to get that separate space going. Creamery The electrical wiring is getting moving along rapidly at this point. Scott has gotten the hang of it and that part will soon be complete. I’m helping out by occasionally holding up pieces of metal as we get the ceilings in place. We’ve completed the barn, milking parlor and milk storage room. The cheese make room is in progress. I’m not sure what room is next. I just show up when he asks for my help. Garden The garden is in full growth and production mode. That keeps me moving too. Like the fruit, vegetables need to be taken care of quickly or they spoil. Fortunately, I’ve had some customers lately that needed squash and cucumbers. What a blessing they have been in taking my excess veggies home with them. I’m about to have lots and lots of eggplant as well. It has been a while since it rained and I am back to watering in the evenings again. Some of the cucumbers are looking a little worse for wear as is the zucchini. They may be close to completing their cycle this time around. Now that I think about it, I could start more plants inside and have summer squash and cucumbers back in the garden in time for a late harvest. That sounds like more work than I have time for but I will still consider it in the next few days. Chickens I’m looking for my first chicken eggs any day now. Scott has completed the nest boxes and the hens have been trying them out. I think they like their new boxes. We have six white and one black rooster that need to be processed. That will be enough for quite a few months for us. We don’t eat a lot of chicken but I am looking forward to these American Bresse chickens. They are supposed to be prize winning meat birds. I’ll let you know how that goes. That’s it for the homestead updates. Let’s move on to the main topic. Multitasking. How do I get so much done in a day?  Multitasking – Concentration is Key I have several things in motion today. A gallon and a half of yogurt and a pot of bone broth are both long term tasks that I don’t have to monitor. Well at least I don’t have to monitor them after I get them set up. The yogurt has an in-between step where I need to cool the milk and add the cultures. Then it just sits in the Instant Pot for eight hours. I have the juicer/steamer going. That is full of blackberries. I’ll extract the juice and then make seedless blackberry jelly. It’s a crowd favorite. I also need to process about a gallon and a half of strawberries and get them into the jam pot. That should keep me pretty busy throughout the day. Waiting on the sidelines are the cherries and blueberries still in the freezer. Grab them as they ripen and put them in the freezer. Putting them in the freezer is a great method of getting done what would otherwise be an overwhelming task. Fruit can go bad quickly so it needs to be dealt with quickly. I can go back later and make the frozen fruits into jams and jellies. I love it. Low stress is great. So, what is the secret to being able to juggle multiple tasks efficiently? What does it take to multitask effectively? A strong mind with skills in concentration, memory and imagination. Everyone has these capabilities. As far as I know, none of these mental skills is related to intelligence. To develop these skills require specific exercises, just like you would exercise a muscle. The more you exercise a muscle, the stronger it becomes. Perhaps there is a limit to how strong your mental muscles can become, but I am not aware of one. On a side note, I am aware of the physical limitations of memory. Alzheimer’s is a real thing. Dementia is a real thing. The physical changes in the brain are real and strength in memory requires a healthy brain. Past, Present and Future Concentration, memory and imagination. These are three mental capabilities and they relate to the past (memory), the present (concentration) and the future (imagination). There are exercises for each of these mental muscles. When they are all strengthened and working together, juggling multiple tasks becomes easier. Staying focused becomes easier. Regaining focus after distractions is easier. Developing the Skill of Concentration Today, I’ll start with concentration. This is probably the most important area for me. Indeed, this skill is required as a foundation to develop memory and imagination. We will get to those two in later podcasts. Practicing concentration is where I always start when I feel out of sorts. Focusing my attention into the present moment relieves a great deal of stress and calms my anxiety. The key is to practice concentration and focus of attention outside of any stressful situation. In other words, you need to train the muscle so when you need it, you simply call on it and it is there. Trying to learn how to concentrate in the midst of chaos is futile. Set aside a specific time to practice. Make this a time when you will have no interruptions. Turn off your phone and any other electronic devices that may distract you from your practice session. You want to set aside this time to develop muscle memory related to concentration. First Develop Muscle Memory If any of you have had dance, music, art, or singing lessons you know what I am talking about here. Let’s say you are dancing the ballet. You did not just wake up one day and perform. It takes hours and hours, weeks and weeks, months and months and years and years to perfect your dance steps. You practice them in small pieces, repeatedly moving your feet, arms – your whole body in particular ways. You are repeating particular motions over and over again. And when the time comes to put it all together into a dance, you are simply repeating those motions in various combinations. Your body knows exactly how to position itself when your mind calls upon it to perform a long-practiced motion. Another Example of Muscle Memory The same with playing the piano. Hours and hours go into playing the scales. And not just playing the scales, but playing the scales with your fingers in particular positions and repeating the names of the notes in your mind. Those notes become drilled into your brain’s memory. Eventually, when someone puts a piece of music in front of you, commanding your fingers to play the notes you see before you will come easily. Each note is engraved in its own memory hole along with the hand and finger motions to make it happen. The training embeds into your memory muscle memory what it takes to play a G# or middle C without having to think a whole lot about it. Without that foundation, you are left to pick out a tune and play the same tune over and over until you get it. Sure, it can be done. You can learn the song, but you will always lack the flexibility that someone with the muscle memory has ingrained in their brain. Concentration is Also a Learned Skill With concentration, the same is true. Instead of a physical muscle memory, I built a mental muscle memory. Because I have practiced the skill of concentration, usually it takes little to no effort to call on it anytime I feel scattered or unfocused. I can play my mind and make it dance according to my desire. Your Physical State Affects Your Ability to Concentrate I say it “usually” requires little effort because I am also aware of how my physical state of being can affect my ability to concentrate no matter how much I know what to do, I may have something else going on that overrides my skill. Perhaps I didn’t get enough sleep, or I ate lots of sugar or I’m in pain and all of my attention is naturally drawn to it. I can practice and develop the skill but I also recognize that human beings are complex and even with the best of intentions and the best will in the world, God and life can step in at any time and rearrange my carefully constructed plans. In any case, even if my life is scattered to the wind, I can regain some control in any situation. My ability to concentrate may not be perfect in times of stress, pain and poor nutrition, but it definitely is much better than no skill at all with concentration. Here is an exercise that I used to develop my concentration skills. You will need several items. 1) a candle, 2) piece of paper and a pencil, 3) table and chair, 4) timer. The candle will be burning for 10 minutes at a time. Keep that in mind as you choose the size of your candle. A kitchen timer is fine or even a timer on your phone. Concentration Exercise Steps: Sit comfortably in a chair at a tablePlace the candle directly in front of youPlace the paper to the right or left, depending on your right or left handedness. Place it where your arm is comfortably able to hold the point of the pencil on the paperLight the candleSet the timer for 10 minutesFocus your attention on the candle flame and start the timerHold your attention on that candle flame.Each time you notice that your attention has wandered from the flame, make a mark on the paper and bring your attention back to the flame That’s it. Practice this exercise every day. Set aside 10 minutes a day to train your brain. There is no need to keep the paper. The paper and pencil marks serve as a physical stimulus to refocus your attention. That’s all. It’s not about how many marks you make. That is irrelevant. The pencil marks are a way to grab hold of your attention and then move your attention back to the flame. You may want to keep the paper with marks as a record of your consistency with the exercise. Your goal is to do this exercise every single day. If you run into trouble, let me know. I will be offering guidance on the Locals platform. Again, that is Peaceful Heart Farm dot Locals dot Com. Support my work over there and I will be there by your side to support you in your work. Further instruction in memory and imagination will also be available there. I’d love to help you reach your goals and improve your concentration, memory and imagination. Final Thoughts That’s it for today’s podcast. We are moving along at lightening speed here on the homestead. I’m practicing concentration and mental focus every single day. It makes my life so much easier. I hope this exercise helps you as well. Oh, I need to mention that you will want to give it time. You’ve spent a great deal of time letting your mind move you. It will take some time for you to get ahold of those reigns and begin to direct your thoughts more purposefully – for you to move your mind. There will be some good days and some days when you won’t be able to concentrate to save your life. But gradually, you will develop greater and greater skill. You will see the results in your daily life. All it takes is a little practice. Okay, okay, a lot of practice. But it’s just 10 minutes a day. You can do it! If you enjoyed this podcast, please hop over to Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify or whatever podcasting service you use, SUBSCRIBE and give me a 5-star rating and review. It really does help. If you like this type of content and want to help us out, the absolute best way you can do that is to share it on all of your social media platforms. Share it with any friends or family who might be interested in this type of content. Let them know about the Peaceful Heart Farmcast. And come on over to our Locals community. Subscribe at peacefulheartfarm.locals.com. We’d love to have your support and input in the community. And we’d love to help you out by answering your questions. See you there! Thank you so much for stopping by our homestead and until next time, may God fill your life with grace and peace. To learn about herd shares: Visit our website Herd Share page To share your thoughts: Leave a comment on our Facebook PageShare this show on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram and all your social media To help the show: PLEASE LEAVE A REVIEW for Peaceful Heart FarmCast on Apple Podcasts.Subscribe on iTunes, Stitcher Radio, Google Play Music, TuneIn or SpotifyBecome a community member on LocalsDonate on Patreon Website www.peacefulheartfarm.com Locals peacefulheartfarm.locals.com Rumble https://rumble.com/user/peacefulheartfarm YouTube youtube.com/peacefulheartfarm Patreon www.patreon.com/peacefulheartfarm Facebook www.facebook.com/peacefulheartfarm Instagram www.instagram.com/peacefulheartfarm

Today I’m doing a little bit of Homestead musing. More “a day in the life” sort of podcast. I’ll make is a short one and I hope you like it. I love sharing my life with all of you. I want to take a minute and say welcome to all the new listeners and welcome back to the veteran homestead-loving regulars who stop by the FarmCast for every episode. I appreciate you all so much. I’m so excited to share with you what’s going on at the farm this week. Our Virginia Homestead Life Updates We got a late start this morning. I was Chatty Patty before morning prayers so we started an hour late, that’s 7:15 instead of 6:15. It’s now just about 10 am. I have fed and watered the chickens, emptied the dishwasher, sorted and started the laundry and am on my second load, cut down an entire 3’ x 8’ bed of swiss chard and disposed of it (more on that later), cooked about 3 pounds of swiss chard (some we will eat and some will be frozen), froze 2 gallons of blackberries and 3 gallons of blueberries and set up 1½ gallons of milk to make yogurt. I also need to set up for waxing last week’s cheese. Scott is currently pouring the milk into the cheese vat so I can make Pinnacle. That is our aged alpine-style cheese – sort of like gruyere. Yes, today is a cheese make day so I’ll have to get back to you later for the rest of the podcast. Love ya. Bye for now. Ok, I’m back. Just a short update. I’ve got the culture in the cheese milk and I have a few minutes before the next step. I have to bring the temperature of the milk up to 90 degrees for the cheese that I am making today. The way that I do that is to put hot water in the metal jacket cheese vat. It is sort of like a double boiler except that it is completely closed. Well, not quite completely closed. There are a couple of openings at the top that let the displaced air out as the water fills the jacket. Focus is Really Important I have to be quite focused when I am doing this part because I tend to check on the milk and then go do something else and then check the milk again. If I am also filling the water in the jacket, a disaster can sometimes happen. It has already happened once this cheesemaking season. If I forget that the water is running, it will completely fill the jacket and then overflow through the opening at the top onto the floor. What a mess that makes. I think once I forgot and it was overflowing for like five minutes. There was water everywhere. If I was in the actual cheese make room we are building, this would not be a big deal. It would simply go down the drain in the floor. But at the moment we have a temporary set up in our storage room. There is a drain in the floor, but the floor is tile and not meant for lots of water to be on it. Anyway, no such disaster happened today. More homestead musings. I’m going to get in a few animal updates before I need to go tend to the cheese again. Cows We are in the midst of the AI process with our cows and it is not going well. You know, one thing and another. I say this often. Life on the homestead is never dull. There is always something going on that you did not plan. We plan for pregnancies but God has the final say. We had one – possibly two – heifers that appear to have taken on the first try. That’s one or two out of eight. We have to start over with the other six. Add to that an inconvenient medical condition and we are way behind on getting these cows bred. We are praying for the health of our vet. She got the Covid and is still under the weather. Once she is back on her feet, we will preg check the two girls we think took and give the other six another chance. Actually, there are seven because Cookie is now far enough past her delivery to begin the AI process as well. If we don’t have success this time, I’m not sure what we will do. It is extremely expensive to do AI over and over and over. So expensive that we are reconsidering keeping a bull. Keeping a bull is also a huge expense because the bull is eating and eating and eating while only being useful for a couple of months out of a year. It’s a dilemma. However, at this point, the AI is going to cost more than feeding that bull through the winter with hay. Will it be that way every year? Who knows? We do the best we can and make new choices. Ideally, Scott would be able to do our AI but that is a long and involved learning curve. I’ll keep you posted on that topic. Quail and Chickens We are out of the quail business. The last of the quail were processed last week. I have quite a supply of eggs saved up. Hopefully, the new pullets will start laying about the same time I run out of quail eggs for Scott. The chickens are doing fantastic. I couldn’t be more happy there. We have at least six American White Bresse hens and eight roosters to choose from to fill out the breeding flock. There are a total of nine Black Copper Marans. The distribution there is nearly perfect. There are six hens and three roosters. I’ll be keeping two each of the roosters and the rest will get processed for eating. Garden A few thoughts on the garden. I mentioned that I took out an entire bed of Swiss chard. We had a dry spell throughout June. So much so that we bought extra hay to get the cows through this winter. Well, now it is raining every day. The weather is always weird. Anyway, the Swiss chard got a fungus, some kind of unpronounceable leaf spot. The red variety got it, but the giant white looks fine at the moment. I cut down every plant in the bed of red. We shall see if it grows back and if I eradicated the fungus. Everything else looks really, really good. This is the fifth year of using this particular raised bed system. The first year we started with cut up trees, fill dirt from around the homestead and a top layer of purchased organic composted soil. The next four years, Scott added our own composted soil to the beds. This year it has really paid off. The eggplants are huge. As are the squash. The peppers took a little bit of time to catch on but there are going great guns right now. Homestead Musing About Plants: Do I Have Too Much Plant and Not Enough Produce? Because I planted everything so late, I’m not sure whether I am growing too much plant and no fruit, or if I just need to wait for the blooms. This morning the squash was covered in blooms and bees. I’m still not sure about that eggplant. It may be all plant and no fruit. My cilantro survived the dry heat of June. So far, so good there. The tomatoes are going to need more support in the next couple of days. I have small tomatoes and lots of healthy plants. The lima beans are blooming. There are three beds of winter squash. The butternut I grew from plant starts so they are already producing squash, too small to pick, but there are lots of them. The other two beds are a variety of other winter squash that I started from seed. They plants look great. They are fending off the squash bugs and I look for a great crop there. The summer squash looks like all plant and they are huge, but as I said, they are now covered with blooms as are the cucumbers. It’s little weird that it is July and I am just now getting the first squash and cucumbers. I really didn’t get my garden planted until June. Normally, it was would have been a month earlier, but I was holding on to my plants to sell at the farmer’s market. And Independence and Galax are both in a different USDA planting zone. The elevation there is about 2,500 to 3,000 and we are between 1,200 and 1,400 here. There is a big difference in temperature. Making Cheese Well, I’m off to tend cheese again. And now I’m back. That’s the last time I will tell you when I leave and return. When making cheese, there are often timespans of 5, 10 or 15 minutes – or even 30 minutes to an hour where I need to leave the process to continue what it is doing and return later to go to the next step. The cheese make process is going exceptionally well. I probably shouldn’t say that as superstition would indicate that I just jinxed myself. Oh well, I don’t believe in superstition, so there you go. I expect it will continue to go well. Creamery We are getting closer and closer to completing this project. Scott is sometimes down that he is not getting more done. There is always another something that needs to be done instead of working on the creamery. My advice to him and to you is to keep your attention focused on what is in front of you. Do what needs to be done right now and the rest of it will take care of itself. No sense ruminating over what didn’t happen. Let’s be grateful for what did happen. Let’s be grateful for what we have gotten done. Let’s be grateful for the people that touched our lives this week. We thought it would be complete in late summer summer/early fall. Then spring happened. Even though the cows would need to be dried up and we wouldn’t have milk to make cheese, we thought it would be complete by year end. Then summer happened. At the moment, I’m feeling pretty confident that it will be done by the time the cows give birth in the spring. We can have a USDA inspected cheese facility just about the time we have milk to make the cheese. That sounds like a plan. . . right? We shall see. Cheese Update! It did go well. The cheese is in the press for the final time. I’ll check it in the morning and move it to the brine tank for salting. And at least five months until it is mature. Seven months is better. And a year is the best.   Final Thoughts That’s really about all I have to say for today. I just wanted to check in with you all and let you know the status of our homestead and give you yet another window into the lifestyle. As always, we love it and wouldn’t have it any other way. There are always more tasks to be accomplished than there are hours in a day. It gives us purpose and motivation. Sometimes it can seem overwhelming but at those times, I just let some of those tasks slip a notch or two down the list. There are a few things that have to be done on a specific time schedule. But many more do not. I choose what I do on any given day. I choose how much I will do on any given day. Most of the time I choose to do an unbelievable amount in one day. Or at least it seems so to me. Actually, I only think that in contrast to the other days when I laze around and get very little accomplished. Well, there are fewer of those days. I get bored pretty easily and get right back to it. How about you? Do you get bored easily? Are you dreaming of the day when you get to call your own shots? Are you working toward that goal? If you are, here is a little encouragement. It may seem like you will never get there. Don’t lose heart. Just keep putting one foot in front of the other. That’s What We Did At first, we planned five or 10 years into the future. Many times, it seemed like we would never get there. But here we are. We worked seven years longer than our original plan. We blew through our savings that was supposed to last until the creamery was built. It is still not done and we came up with other ways to make ends meet. We started our dream in 2003. That was 19 years ago and we are still going, trying to get this creamery built. In between then and now, we have changed our plans more times than I want to count. It was in 2012, ten years ago, that we decided to be artisan cheesemakers. It has taken a lot more steps, time, money, effort and so on than we ever imagined. But we never stopped imagining. Scott is currently getting the electrical work done on the creamery. I help him with the ceilings from time to time as he moves from one room to the next. Electrical, plumbing, floors – we are nearly there. We Appreciate Your Support If you enjoyed this podcast, please hop over to Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify or whatever podcasting service you use, SUBSCRIBE and give me a 5-star rating and review. It really does help. If you like this type of content and want to help us out, the absolute best way you can do that is to share it on all of your social media platforms. Share it with any friends or family who might be interested in this type of content. Let them know about the Peaceful Heart Farmcast. And come on over to our Locals community. Subscribe at peacefulheartfarm.locals.com. We’d love to have your support and input in the community. Thank you so much for stopping by our homestead and until next time, may God fill your life with grace and peace. To learn about herd shares: Visit our website Herd Share page To share your thoughts: Leave a comment on our Facebook PageShare this show on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram and all your social media To help the show: PLEASE LEAVE A REVIEW for Peaceful Heart FarmCast on Apple Podcasts.Subscribe on iTunes, Stitcher Radio, Google Play Music, TuneIn or SpotifyBecome a community member on LocalsDonate on Patreon Website www.peacefulheartfarm.com Locals peacefulheartfarm.locals.com Rumble https://rumble.com/user/peacefulheartfarm YouTube youtube.com/peacefulheartfarm Patreon www.patreon.com/peacefulheartfarm Facebook www.facebook.com/peacefulheartfarm Instagram www.instagram.com/peacefulheartfarm

Raising animal protein for food on the homestead. What are some of the options? And what are some of the factors to consider when making your choices. As you may know our choices for raising animal protein on the homestead currently includes cows, goats, sheep and poultry. In the very near future, we plan on having pigs. There are other types of protein that we may have or have considered. I’ll talk about all of those. But first, as always, I will never take you all for granted. You make this show possible. Welcome to any and all new listeners and welcome back to the veteran homestead-loving regulars who stop by the FarmCast for every episode. You mean so much to me. Thank you so much for your support of this podcast. It has been a while and I’m so excited to share with you all about the homestead. Our Virginia Homestead Life Updates We’ve had a busy morning already. Scott is milking. I set up for making butter in a little while and put some yogurt on to ferment. It will be ready in less than 8 hours. I’ve been out to the garden and planted a half dozen flowers, stocks this time, and let the chickens out to play. Chickens/Quail Chickens you say. When did that happen? If I remember correctly, the eggs began hatching on April the 8th. I had 24 eggs each of American White Bresse and Black Copper Maran. There were two incubators running and all went well. I hatched 17 White American Bresse and 7 Black Copper Marans. Due to the low hatch rate on the Marans, the eBay seller sent me another dozen for the cost of postage. I incubated those and hatched three more of the Black Copper Maran from that batch. The first batch of low hatch rate was not my fault. Most of the eggs were not fertile or perhaps were “scrambled” in the shipping process. But I must say that of those that didn’t hatch in the last dozen, four were nearly or fully formed. I have no idea why they died just before hatching but have to believe it must have been something I did or did not do with that last batch. At the moment, I have 14 American White Bresse and 9 Black Copper Maran. I lost three of the Bresse and one of the Marans. That last loss happened just a few days ago. That particular chicken was hatched six days after the rest of the crew. It was always smaller, but a little over 2 weeks ago, it developed some kind of disorder. It couldn’t really stand up. The vet happened to be here that day and took a look at it. She recommended antibiotics for a few days and see how it goes. That seemed to help a bit but eventually the chick succumbed to whatever the ailment was. The vet did not have a lot of information on chicken issues of this type. She said there are just too many variables without testing. And chicken generally are not worth the cost of testing. So, there you go. Dogs There is a lot to talk about with the dogs. I’ll try to keep it brief. Let me start with the current state of affairs and then go back and fill in a few details. Finn disappeared about 4 weeks ago and has not returned. While he and Charlotte escaped a lot, Charlotte has always been back the next day and Finn never more than two days. We did have to go and fetch him three different times. He seemed to get so far away that he did not know how to get home. Charlotte and Mack are now guarding the sheep. They seem to be doing well with that task. Charlotte still goes wherever she wants, whenever she wants, but she stays relatively close. She grieved for about two weeks after Finn disappeared. I had her on a tether so she could not run away, but even after I let her loose, she was very quiet. Being a Great Pyrenees, she generally barks a lot. But there was nothing for many days. Now she is back to barking up a storm. Fear of Thunder Speaking of storms, on the day that Finn disappeared, there was a storm and Charlotte returned home only hours after they both escaped. I found that she is very scared of thunder. Still, after seven months, she will not let me walk up to her to pet her. But if there is thunder, she is right there beside me looking for comfort. I can pet her all I want in those moments. But Finn did not show up with her, not unusual. Let’s see if I can be brief regarding of the circumstances of Finn’s final escape. Starting about six weeks ago, we were trying to get them to bond with the sheep so we put all of them together in the front pastures. We had already been trying this for some time in the field next to the house. We were able to contain the dogs there. The same was not true when we moved them to the front fields. For several days we tried patching places in the fence to keep them contained. They still escaped nearly every day. After an escape that had Scott going a few miles to pick up Finn, we put both of them back in the field right next to the house. Finn was put on a tether. Charlotte will stay close by to him. We then spent long hours discussing what we were going to do. Another Coyote Attack In the meantime, we left the sheep in the front pasture. Within three days of the dogs being out of the pasture, we had a coyote attack. We lost six of seven lambs and one of our new ewes. The remaining sheep and lamb were moved back into the field next to the house with the dogs. Just three days alone and the coyotes zeroed in on them. We suffered yet another huge emotional and financial loss. It’s far in the past now and I am over it, but as you can probably imagine, it was quite traumatic at the time. Again, I was questioning whether we wanted to have sheep and goats. I got over that bit of negativity and we still have the sheep and a deposit on some goat kids. More on that later. After lots and lots of research, I decided to try and train Charlotte and Finn with an ecollar. It was recommended over and over again in the Livestock Guardian Training group on Facebook. No matter the ecollar system, it is an expensive and time-consuming undertaking. We were keeping Finn on the tether and Charlotte always stayed with him. But what to do about protecting the sheep? We can’t keep them in the same field forever. The sheep must be rotated from field to field for their health and the availability of grass. The idea of fixing fences every day, every time we move them to another field or paddock was completely unrealistic. The time to complete the ecollar fence and training would be months and months. We decided to go back to an original plan before we got Finn and Charlotte. Mack was to be the sheepdog. We had kept him separate with the cows because he chased the sheep. He bonded well with the cows and we were preoccupied with trying to train Charlotte and Finn to guard the sheep. All was well there. Now that Finn and Charlottes plan with the sheep was scrapped, we decided to bring Mack back into the picture. And this was the fatal day that we lost Finn. Let’s Train Mack Now that we decided to train Mack with the sheep, what was the plan to make that happen? We needed to check the health of the flock after their coyote ordeal. The plan was to bring all the sheep and Mack to the corral together so he could see us working with the sheep. Then we would bring the lot of them back to the field next to the house for a week or so until Mack could start to see them as his animals to be protected. Well, we needed to move Finn and Charlotte out of that field while we made this short jaunt up the travel lane to the corral and back. We put Finn and Charlotte into the lower garden fenced area. We had held them there before and there was no problem. We didn’t take the time to move the tether. By the time we returned with the sheep and Mack only about 30 minutes had passed. I’m guessing that within 10 minutes Finn and Charlotte had gotten into the orchard and then completely out of the perimeter fence. I’m still grieving over Finn. Tomorrow will be four weeks. There is not much hope, but I still cling to just a little bit of hope. He has a collar that has our farm name and phone number clearly visible from 3 feet away. I can’t imagine someone would steal him. How would they know they needed to strongly contain him? He could have run afoul of a bear or that pack of coyotes. He could have been hit by a car, though we have found no evidence of that. Someone could have shot him. He could have gotten to the Primland resort. They have all sorts of bears, lions, and who knows what else over there. It’s an internationally known hunting resort. I just don’t know. I just don’t know. And that’s the worst, not knowing. He could still be out there. A Brief Hope Still Burns About three weeks ago, we had a call from someone who thought they had “our dog”. I was so relieved, but then it wasn’t our dog, it wasn’t Finn. It was a Great Pyrenees dog that was extremely skinny and had some medical issues. Perhaps Finn is still out there somewhere like that trying to survive. There is that small string tied to hope coming up again. I better move on. Sheep/Lambs The remaining sheep and lamb are doing really well. We moved forward with the plan for Mack guarding them. Charlotte was also in the same field and I let her off the tether after only a few days. She was so despondent I thought it was best. My instincts were correct for once in that situation. No more escaping. She stays pretty close, though she does still roam around various places on the property. I will eventually have to train her to stay within the perimeter. I think Mack is beginning to bond with the sheep. Moving him out of the field next to the house has sealed that deal. Before that move, the sheep were with Mack and Charlotte, but the calves were also in that field. Mack immediately bonded with the calves, but not the sheep. Moving the dogs and sheep to a separate paddock from the calves seems to have worked. Fingers crossed, so far it has worked. The sheep are still wary of the dogs. It will likely take months and months for them to become comfortable with Mack. I mentioned in a previous podcast that he is food aggressive. He has chased them away from his food multiple times. We are working on a system where the dogs can have their food and the other animals cannot get to it. The sheep are easily chased away but we really want them to get along with the dogs. Eventually, all of the cows and sheep will be together and the cows are not so easily chased away. And truly, the dogs should not have to fight for their food. Yet another plan is a work in progress. Scott is working on that today. Goats I’ve gone back and forth about whether I want to bring goats back onto the homestead. I already decided that I want Kiko goats. They are very expensive goats. And when I say expensive, I mean very, very expensive. The kind of expense that would really hurt our finances. I have put down a deposit on a trio of Kiko goats. It will be late summer, fall or even next spring before we have these goats. Two does and a buck as a starter herd is the plan. Not only is it imperative that the dogs begin guarding the sheep so I can feel confident they will guard the goats, but more training will be needed so that the dogs don’t harm the goats when they arrive. Thankfully, that is still quite a few months down the road. There should be plenty of time to get the dogs and sheep stabilized in their symbiotic relationship. Adding the goats will be just a short training period with the goats in the next field over where they can be seen but with no contact. After a few weeks, we would introduce them to the dogs with close supervision until we are comfortable that the dogs will accept them as part of the family.   More on the goats as that time gets closer. Cows/Calves Luna went to a new home. We sold Luna and her bull calf to a lovely couple looking for a family milk cow that was not going to overwhelm them with milk. Luna was perfect for them. And her bull calf is going to be breeding their other cows. It was a great fit and I’m so glad that we could rehome her so well. Since Luna is rehomed and Cookie finally had her calf, we are now milking three cows. Butter, Cookie and Claire. I make cheese on Mondays and the rest goes to the calves and fulfills the herd shares. All is going well with the cows at the moment. AI for Spring 2023 Calves AI for birthing in March has already started. We AI’d eight cows. By Monday we will know whether we need to try again with any of these girls. If we see signs of any of them coming into heat again, we call the vet and she will try again. We also have a tentative plan to breed one or two in the fall so that we have milk year-round. Perhaps if only one or two do not take, we will let one slide and try again in December for births in September 2023. And there is always Cookie. She calved so late that she did not make it into the initial AI session. At the moment, she is already slated for December AI. Of course, we can still change our mind at any time until mid-July. AI can be done as late as Mid-July for projected births no later than mid-April 2023. There are always so many decisions to be made.   Garden I’ll briefly mention the garden. Finally, the entire garden is planted. Yesterday I put in the last of the winter squash and melon seeds. I may plant a few more flowers, but the veggie part is done. Tomatoes, Lima Beans, Eggplant and Chard I ended up with a lot more tomatoes than I had planned. Who knows that I am going to do with them? I have four beds of baby lima beans that are looking good. The eggplant is going to be stellar this year, as is the chard. The chard is pretty easy, but I must say I am more than pleased with the eggplant. I haven’t grown it in four or five years because of repeated failures. I had given up on being able to raise that vegetable. I’ll say it again, these plants look fantastic this year. This could be the year of my success with eggplant. Summer Squash and Cucumber I also planted cucumber and summer squash which is also a first for several years. They have never done well for me. We shall see how they progress. It is too early to tell how they are going to do. We only transplanted my plant starts less than a week ago. I see many of them catching on, but time will tell. Onions and Herbs The onions look fantastic. I also have cilantro, parsley, and peppers planted. The cilantro looks weak. That one I keep trying but cannot say I have been successful with it – YET. No basil. I only started Thai basil and I sold all of those plant starts at the farmer’s market. I may have to buy a plant or two of sweet basil just to refresh my stock of dried basil. We shall see. Winter Squash/Pumpkin The last few beds have winter squash and pumpkin. Some of those are from seed which has not yet sprouted. I hope to see a jungle of plants out there in the next month.   Creamery As far as the creamery, Scott and I (mostly Scott) are putting up the ceilings in the barn and milking parlor area. He has finally gotten caught up on all of his other tasks and is moving ahead with completing the creamery. As usual, we are behind schedule, but you know what?, we will keep plugging along. It will get done, but on God’s timeline and now ours. That’s about all I have to say about the creamery today. I hope to have lots of updates on this topic in the next podcast. Let’s get on to the topic of the day. Raising Animal Protein We have lots of resources that I’ve already talked about. As you can tell, there are always challenges, no matter how well you think you’ve laid out your plan. And every day brings new decisions that you never knew you would have to make. No matter how educated or prepared you think you are, just know that every day is a learning experience. You will never get it done, settled, never to change. Large or Small to Start Unless you have previous experience with large animals, cows may not be your first goto animal for raising protein. My suggestion is to start with something smaller. Sheep and goats are smaller, but even smaller than that are chickens. Chickens are always a great place for anyone to start. Comparatively, they are easy. In many places, you can raise chickens in your backyard. If you have an HOA, maybe not, you may have to forgo the chickens, but there are other options. I’ll talk about some in a moment. The thing to keep in mind with chickens is whether you are looking for egg or meat protein – or both. If you are looking for both, check out dual purpose birds. There are many other factors to take into consideration, but this one is the most important. Choosing Chickens You don’t want to get caught up in exotic chickens, really cool looking chickens, that don’t produce the meat and eggs you require for your family. While many exotic-looking chickens can provide exactly what you need, it is important to check the statistics regarding the finished size of the bird and/or expected numbers of eggs per year. Some may be as little as 150 eggs per year, while others may produce nearly 300. Generally, the more eggs, the less body size. And vice-versa. More body size can produce significantly few eggs. It’s not 100% true, but a good rule of thumb. Rely on the published statistics for your chosen breed. While you may not buy from Stromberg’s or McMurray’s (those are the two biggest outfits that I know), they are a great resource for comparing one breed to another. They each have lots and lots of information about the chicken breeds they carry. It really helps in making your decision. Then you can choose who and where to get the chicks for your enterprise. Once you’ve chosen your breed, the internet, in general, is your resource for details. Search engines are amazing for providing answers to specific questions. Just today, I looked up the age at which my chickens should start laying. For the Bresse it can be as early as four months old, while the Marans can be as late as six months old. I didn’t really consider that in my decision for which breed to choose, but it may be an important stat for you. How quickly can you begin to get eggs? Which breeds may have health issues? Are there any climate issues to consider based on where you live in the country? And so on. Choose your breed, but then read up on it to make sure it will be a good fit for you. And as always, you may make a mistake and need to start again. No problem. You won’t be able to think of every single question and get every choice correct the first time. As I said, every day is a learning experience. You may consider ducks, though often we keep ducks just because they are cute and not so much for meat. Having said that, they do provide good meat and they come with their own set of challenges related to water. I don’t have any and can’t provide much more information than that. They always seem like more trouble than they are worth. Your mileage may vary. Rabbits and Quail Other small animals to consider are rabbits and quail. Both of these can be grown in the smallest of environments. And an HOA will likely not even know you have them as long as you keep the manure cleaned up regularly. Both tend to produce a lot of odors from excrement. Out here, I can get away with any amount of odor I can stand. In an apartment or HOA subdivision, you will need to find ways to dispose of the manure likely on a daily basis. As with all animals, there is learning to be done, but both of these animals are relatively easy to raise. Goats and Sheep I would say that the next largest animals up the scale are goats and sheep. Obviously, you need some land for this. I can’t imagine any HOA allowing grazing animals in your yard. But you also don’t need a huge amount of acreage for just a few sheep or goats. You will need fencing. If you keep them close to you, a family dog can often provide deterrents to predators such as other dogs and a coyote or two. An acre or two of good pasture will suffice for one to five goats and/or sheep. Of course, it depends on where you live, but supplementing with hay is always an option if you don’t have the grazing space. You’ll likely need hay even if you have the acreage. Pigs Next up would be pigs. We haven’t given these guys a try yet, but it is only a matter of time. We have been so focused on the cows, sheep and goats that we simply haven’t had the time to get this enterprise started. You can also keep one pig in a relatively small area. They are generally friendly and easy to work with from everything I’ve seen. Of course, it depends on the particular animal. You could end up with a mean or unruly animal. Just like humans, there are all kinds of personalities out there. Visit the farm where you plan to purchase your pigs and see how they interact with them. Is the breed you are considering a docile breed? Will it do well on pasture. Sad as it is, there are some breeds that will require some confinement and lots of feed to live and grow. They have been bred to thrive in that environment. If you have woods, you have a great environment for raising pigs more naturally. This is another animal with which I have no experience, so I’m not going to say more here. Just listing it as an option for animal protein sources.   Bovine Animals If you are into the big animals, cows and even bison might be a good choice for you. Even with a cow, you can get by on a couple of acres. You’ll need more or less hay according to where you live. And as an aside, all of this info is for the US. I am definitely not your resource for anywhere outside the continental US. And I don’t have any info on raising bison, but there are plenty of them available out in the Oklahoma and Texas areas. They are a big, scary animal but it’s definitely doable. Check out Arms Family Homestead for info on bison. How Much Do You Need? Anyway, as far as beef, one butchered cow will provide protein for at least a family of four for a year. It depends on how much meat that your family consumes and that in turn depends on their ages. A couple of teenagers and you need the whole cow. If your children are younger, you might only need ½ a cow. And you will need to factor in what other animal protein sources you have chosen to raise. Now that I am on that subject, I’ll give you our stats and you can perhaps scale it up for you and your family. For the two of us in a year we plan for as much as ¼ cow, ½ pig, 1 lamb and 1 goat. That amount changes depending on which animals we have available at any given time. But if all things were equal, that is what I plan for the two of us for a year’s worth of animal protein. Add to that lots and lots and lots of eggs from the chickens. As far as chicken meat, I don’t have a very good idea of how much we consume. Unfortunately, I’ve been buying them at the grocery store at irregular times. Usually, when I’m shopping and think, “gee, I haven’t had chicken in a while” and then I buy one of those rotisserie ones. All of that is coming to an end soon, thank God. At the moment we don’t eat a lot of chicken simply because it requires that trip to town. I’ve heard others plan the number of meat chickens from one a week to one a month. There are 52 weeks in the year and 12 months. Your needs will fall in there somewhere. And all of that has to change if chickens and rabbits are your main source of animal protein. You might need two a week or some other number. Make your best guess and then adjust each year as you narrow those numbers down for your changing family situation. Again, your plans will change as you learn. Final Thoughts That’s it for today’s podcast. I’m changing my schedule to make it easier for me to publish podcasts more often. There is always so much going on and the animals and gardens have first priority – and of course getting that creamery up and running. We will get there eventually. In the meantime, I’m assessing how I use my time and opening up more opportunities to share our homestead updates and a little bit of wisdom on how you might get started. God willing, I think I’ve given you enough basics on animal protein sources to get you started. Shoot me an email with any questions you have about getting starting with growing your own animal protein for food. I’m always happy to take a few moments to respond. Tell me what you are trying to accomplish and I will try and provide some guidance or at the very least, where to find more information. If you enjoyed this podcast, please hop over to Apple Podcasts or whatever podcasting service you use, SUBSCRIBE and give me a 5-star rating and review. It really helps with the algorithms. If you like this type of content and want to help out the show, the absolute best way you can do that is to share it on all of your social media platforms. Share it with any friends or family who might be interested in this type of content. Let them know about the Peaceful Heart Farmcast. Thank you so much for stopping by the homestead and until next time, may God fill your life with grace and peace. To learn about herd shares: Visit our website Herd Share page To share your thoughts: Leave a comment on our Facebook PageShare this show on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram and all your social media To help the show: PLEASE LEAVE A REVIEW for Peaceful Heart FarmCast on Apple Podcasts.Subscribe on iTunes, Stitcher Radio, Google Play Music, TuneIn or SpotifyBecome a community member on LocalsDonate on Patreon Website www.peacefulheartfarm.com Locals peacefulheartfarm.locals.com Rumble https://rumble.com/user/peacefulheartfarm YouTube youtube.com/peacefulheartfarm Patreon www.patreon.com/peacefulheartfarm Facebook www.facebook.com/peacefulheartfarm Instagram www.instagram.com/peacefulheartfarm

Planting the garden this year is a little tricky. Each year I have to determine what vegetables I want to grow. I don’t plant everything. After years of just planting everything that caught my eye, I am now choosy about what I plant. There are quite a few farm updates to talk about. Before I get to it, as always, I want to take a minute and say welcome to all the new listeners and welcome back to the veteran homestead-loving regulars who stop by the FarmCast for every episode. I appreciate you all so much. I never want to take you for granted. Thank you so much for being here. Let’s get started on some homestead updates. Our Virginia Homestead Life Updates It’s officially spring according to the calendar. We are still having quite a few cold days, but birthing is happening and planting the garden is on the horizon. We have calves, lambs and chicks in the incubator. Let’s start with the calves. Cows and Calves We had and/or have four cows and/or heifers that were bred this year. Three have given birth, all within 8 days. That’s how AI works. Everyone is fertilized at the same time and the births come close together. We have two bulls and a heifer so far. We bought Cookie and added her to the homestead last year. She was not bred with our other cows and her delivery date is sometime in April. So about two to three weeks before we have that last calf. Incidentally, we expect to breed seven cows and two heifers beginning the first week of June. We will have lots of calves, more calves next year than we have ever had on our homestead. Just in time for the cheesemaking to get into high gear. But I’m getting ahead of myself. The calves are beautiful and growing like weeds. We are still looking for names for the two bull calves, but the heifer is named Penny. You can see pics of these guys on our Locals.com community or on our Facebook page. Sheep and Lambs As far as the sheep and lambs, the ewes were pasture bred. That means we stick the ram in there with them and he does his job according to their cycling schedule. Interestingly enough, all five ewes delivered within three days. They delivered even more closely than the AI’d cows. We had a total of eight but lost one that was part of a set of triples. Stellar Ewe It is very unusual for ewes to deliver more than one lamb in their first season. One young lady had triplets. She is currently raising two of them and doing really well. I think we can probably expect triplets from her every year. The oldest ewe consistently has twins – really big twins. They were the last born and looked to be a week old compared to the others. The breakdown on the lambs is four girls and three boys. We will be keeping the girls and enlarging our sheep flock. For quite a few years we have kept the flock small. But quite frankly, the market for lambs and goats is going crazy right now and we need the extra income to finish the creamery. And we really like these animals. It’s great that they can now support themselves and provide a bit of income. In the past, we worked at a break-even margin, eating a lot of the lamb ourselves. That does save money on groceries, so there is that. Goats We have not had goats on the homestead for over a year. Next week we are visiting a nearby goat operation. They have registered Kiko goats. I’m not sure we will be able to get a starter herd this year, but we plan to go and see what she has and ask a lot of questions. They will be really expensive as goats go. We need to prepare and budget for that as well. We keep goats for their meat of course, but they are also very useful in keeping the pastures cleaned up from unwanted brush and pine trees. Goats love woody stemmed plants. They will completely clear out all of the wild blackberries, wild rose, and generally all thorny plants that sheep and cows will not eat. It’s exciting to think about having these love creatures back on the homestead. I’ll keep you posted on when that might happen. Quail and Chickens The quail are doing well. I will be hatching out at least one batch of quail in the near future. However, at the moment, I have two incubators running with two dozen chicken eggs in each. I’m so excited about having chickens. American White Bresse I ordered fertile eggs instead of live birds. The reason was the cost for the breeds I chose. The first breed is call American White Bresse. They are a heritage breed that originated in France. Goes well with our French breed cows. Anyway, they are bred to forage well and are traditionally raised with their feed soaked in milk. Isn’t that cool. I always have skim milk after taking the cream for butter. Now we have yet another place the milk can go. These birds are dual purpose. They lay lots and lots of eggs and also grow to a good size for meat. Another advantage is they reach their laying age about 6 to 8 weeks earlier than typical American dual-purpose chickens. Black Copper Maran The other set of eggs are Black Copper Maran. These birds don’t get quite as large and I’m okay with that. I personally don’t care for the really large chickens. The cool thing about the Black Copper Maran is they have the darkest brown eggs available. They are milk chocolate colored. They are so beautiful. They also lay quite a few eggs and mature more quickly than American dual breeds. The Black Copper Maran is also a French breed. Post-WWII France, the breed was endangered and close to extinction. The French Department of Ag rescued it and began a breeding program. Today, there are lots of varieties. The Black Copper Maran is still quite rare in the US. This is yet another expensive bird which is why I went with the eggs rather than trying to get chicks. The day-old chicks can cost up to $80 a piece. Two dozen eggs were about $85 I think, perhaps more with shipping. Anyway, we will have baby chicks in a few days. If I get a 50% hatch rate or a dozen of each breed, I will be happy. That will be plenty of hens to lay eggs and the rest for meat. Then next year we raise more. Orchard Scott has been working diligently in the orchard pruning and cleaning up old canes in the blackberry rows. He still has a long way to go. The trees are done and the blueberries are done. Somewhere when he was working in the blueberries, he placed an order for more plants. There was a particular variety that did really well for us. He ordered 50 of those. That meant he had to dig 50 holes along with fertilizing and other soil treatments. It’s raining today so the blackberries will have to wait still another day before he completes that trimming job. It has been years since they were pruned and cut back. The rows he has completed look fantastic. I look forward to lots of berries this year. The berries always grow better when the plants are trimmed and maintained. More energy can go into making fruit and not so much into keeping up old canes. Garden The garden is still patiently waiting to be revived. Planting the garden is currently on hold. I have lettuce and onions ready to plant. Steps still needed there are getting the compost over to the garden and getting is sifted so it can be used as top dressing for each bed. Last fall, Finn the wonderful livestock guardian dog, dug holes – really big holes – in a lot of the beds. There is a lot of work that needs to happen there. In total we have 20 beds and two long and thin areas that connect 10 boxes each. So, 10 boxes that are 3 feet wide and close to 7 feet long are all connected at one of the short ends. That continuous bed is 70 feet long and about 2 feet wide. And there are two sets of those. I’m still not completely sure what I am planting in the 70 feet long areas. Last year it was 50 tomato plants down one side. The other had early green peas and then nothing for the rest of the year. I may plant flowers in there this year. Who knows? I still have time to make that happen. All 20 beds are planned. I’ll come back to that when I talk about today’s topic of what I am planting and why. Creamery First, let me finish up the homestead updates with the creamery. We have lots and lots of materials all over the place. Scott ordered just about everything we need to complete this project. With prices skyrocketing, he ordered fast and furious to keep the cost as low as possible. It will cost a bit in interest, but nowhere near the cost of waiting as prices are still rising and sometimes nearly double what they were just a few months ago. As soon as he finishes with the orchard and readying the garden, he will be hot and heavy on getting that creamery finished. We are looking for that to be before year end. Yay. It will be about 5 ½ years since we broke ground on it in the spring of 2017. Let’s get on with planting the garden this year. Planting the Garden What will we have and why? Back to those long pieces that connect all the beds, the current plan is to have cherry tomatoes and cucumber plants along the orchard wall. I may need to start more cucumbers as I plan to sell some of those plants at the farmer’s market beginning in May. Now that I think about it, I may need to rethink how many plant-starts I have and get on the ball with planting more if needed. All along the other wall will be Brussel sprouts. Scott loves these little cabbages and I want to see if I can grow them successfully. We do have problems with all sorts of pests that attack the cole crops. That’s c-o-l-e crops. At a basic level, they are all plants that belong to the mustard or brassica family. They descended from the cabbage. They grow better in cool weather. Some people think that is where Cole came from, but alas, no. Cole is a Latin word that means stem. Cole Crops The most common plants in the Cole category are: broccoli, brussels sprout, cabbage, cauliflower, collards, kale, kohlrabi, mustard, turnips and watercress. We have tried most of these plants and have had consistent problems with the cabbage moth. I’m not sure what I will do this year to stave off this pest. What do you do? Anyone out there got some tips on this? So that takes care of the two outlying beds. Now, for the 20 individual beds, 10 on each side. Right now, my plan is three beds of lettuce. For the most part, that will be sold at the farmer’s market. Three beds of spinach because Scott loves it. I haven’t ever successfully grown spinach so, fingers crossed, this will be the year I make a breakthrough on growing beautiful spinach. I plan on a couple of beds of herbs including basil – two types – parsley, and cilantro. A bed of Swiss chard and one bed of eggplant. Again, Scott loves these. I have been quite successful with Swiss chard and I want to get better at growing eggplant. I was successful one year, but not in any successive year. We shall see how it goes this year. Squash and Onions I will have three beds of onion. Only white onions this year. I have found they keep the best and it just doesn’t make sense to me to grow onions that go bad after only a short while, no matter how pretty red they are or how sweet the yellows may taste. I’ll have three beds of winter squash, spaghetti, acorn and butternut. We love squash. And finally, four – yes count them – four beds of lima beans. Last year it was green beans and crowder peas. The year before that it was various dried beans, red – black and white. This year is the year for lima beans. Plants for Farmer’s Market Other things I’m growing for market are Jet Star tomatoes, hot peppers, cucumbers, summer squash (yellow crookneck, zucchini and white scallop) and herbs. I’m also going to start some flowers. I need to get going on that. Spring is moving along rapidly. That’s about all I have time for right now. I still have lots to do before the day ends. Scott is in here waiting for me to finish so we can go milk cows. I love milking cows. It’s so peaceful. Final Thoughts I hope you enjoyed getting up-to-date on the homestead and learning some about our method of madness in gardening. Planting the garden always encompasses many considerations. Perhaps my thought process is more complex or even less complex than yours. In the end, it is one of the most enjoyable times of my life is thinking about what my plan is and then executing that plan. And each year planting the garden will be different and I love it. Life on the homestead is always evolving. There is never a dull moment around here. Thanks so much for traveling along with me. Hope you tune next time as well. We love having you. If you enjoyed this podcast, please hop over to Apple Podcasts or whatever podcasting service you use, SUBSCRIBE and give me a 5-star rating and review. If you like this content and want to help out the show, the absolute best way you can do that is to share it with any friends or family who might be interested in this type of content. Let them know about the Peaceful Heart Farmcast. Thank you so much for stopping by the homestead and until next time, may God fill your life with grace and peace. To learn about herd shares: Visit our website Herd Share page To share your thoughts: Leave a comment on our Facebook PageShare this show on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram and all your social media To help the show: PLEASE LEAVE A REVIEW for Peaceful Heart FarmCast on Apple Podcasts.Subscribe on iTunes, Stitcher Radio, Google Play Music, TuneIn or SpotifyBecome a community member on LocalsDonate on Patreon Website www.peacefulheartfarm.com Locals peacefulheartfarm.locals.com Rumble https://rumble.com/user/peacefulheartfarm YouTube youtube.com/peacefulheartfarm Patreon www.patreon.com/peacefulheartfarm Facebook www.facebook.com/peacefulheartfarm Instagram www.instagram.com/peacefulheartfarm

Today I will be continuing the conversation on producing your own food. There is a lot to cover and what I can include in this podcast will only whet your appetite for more. Growing food for you and your family is one of the most satisfying occupations in the world. That is of course in my humble opinion. I’ll keep talking about it as long as you want to keep listening to it. Welcome new listeners and welcome back veteran homestead-loving regulars. Thank you so much for stopping by the FarmCast for every episode. I appreciate you all so much. There are so many exciting things happening around the homestead. Let’ Our Virginia Homestead Life Updates Let’s start with homestead updates. I have some fantastic news. Well, it’s fantastic for us. I’ll save it for last, just before I get into the next “producing your own food” segment. Cows We have three cows and one heifer that are scheduled to give birth very soon. Claire and Butter are two of the cows, Luna is the heifer. All of these girls are due sometime around the 23rd of March. Our newest cow, Cookie, is due in mid-April. I forgot to tell you all about Cookie in the last podcast. She is our latest addition to the homestead. Cookie is about 4 years old. We were a little concerned about meeting our needs for milk in the early spring so we started looking around for a good milking girl to add, at least temporarily, until we get our younger girls bred and producing milk. Cookie is a great cow. She is a from an organic dairy about an hour and a half from us. She is mostly jersey but has some guernsey in her as well. Originally, she was a 4-H show cow. That makes her very friendly and an attention seeker. We love her already. And it looks like she integrated into the herd without issue. Sheep We expect lambs in the next two weeks. There are five ewes that are currently pregnant. Two of them are older and I expect at least one of those girls to have twins. The other three are just about a year old. Normal birthing is for yearlings to have a single lamb. We are looking for five to seven lambs this season. Dogs Finn and Charlotte are on patrol duty for keeping these guys safe. Finn is still escaping regularly and we are working on a training regime for him. Every time he goes where he is not supposed to be, he gets put on a tether for two days. We are hoping this will be effective. However, it is well known that any dog with Great Pyrenees genetics will tend to roam. Recently, he hasn’t been roaming outside of the perimeter fences, but we really want to train him to stay in the area he is assigned. We shall see how it all works out. It may be that we simply have to live with him going wherever he wants, whenever he wants. It is obviously dangerous for him, but we do not want to deflate his spirit and ruin him as a livestock guardian dog. I hope that the birth of the new lambs will give him better incentive to stay with his charges. We shall see. Quail The quail seem to cause me perpetual grief. So many people love walking in nature and I do too. It seems so peaceful and calm and beautiful. The true reality is that nature has a really brutal side to it. You all know this. Storms and drought and fires and floods are all daily happenings around the world. What we tend to overlook is how brutal animals can be with each other. The quail have been a real challenge in this area. After months of no issues, all of a sudden, I might have one, two, three birds that are brutally attacked by the others in the cage. It is heartbreaking. I then have to make special arrangements for healing of these unfortunately bullied birds. If I can find the culprit, I separate her from the rest. One dilemma is where do I keep all of these? What quarters do I have available for housing? Quail Clinic Right now, I have two roosters in the bottom right cage. One is in the main part and the other is in the enclosed box the hens use for laying eggs and all use for taking dust baths. The one in the main part of the cage was not too badly injured. The other was in really bad shape. Yesterday it looked like he had his eyesight back in at least one eye. This is after three or four days of complete blindness. I’m happy he is healing. I still don’t know what I’m going to do with these two guys after they are healed. That cage is meant for hens who are laying eggs. I believe I found the perpetrator. I took a chance and put her in another cage. I took out the rooster in that cage and put him in another cage. That was risky also. It is always risky to put one bird or another into a group of strangers. So far, after a few days of this setup, there have been no more incidents. But I have a cage of hens with no rooster. That means eggs, but no fertility. Do I dare put a rooster back in there with the mad hen? I know, you probably think I should just cull her and be done with it. I agree, though the problem I have is that one quail is barely enough for one child. We need three or four to make a meal. I could take the two injured roosters as well. But the risk there is I need them for breeding later. It’s all so complicated. So, what is the solution? Chickens Well, the solution is for me to give up on quail altogether. Maybe another could handle it, but not me. We have ordered baby chicks which should arrive around the first or second week of April. It will take them many months to get large enough to provide us with eggs. I will deal with the quail until then. Once the chickens are grown and producing eggs, all of the quail will go to freezer camp. Their cage will be repurposed. Perhaps at a later date we will add rabbits to the homestead and this will be the perfect housing for them. I shopped in detail and we discussed at length which chicken breed we wanted to raise. In the end, we settled on two breeds. First the Barred Plymouth Rock. These are black and white spotted chickens. They lay brown eggs. Second the White Plymouth Rock. These are pure white and they also lay brown eggs. Dual-Breed Chickens There were several reasons for choosing these two breeds. The first and most important reason is that they are what is called “dual-breed” chickens. Like our cows that are abundant in meat and milk, these chickens excel at producing both meat and eggs. Both breeds produce large brown eggs and top out in weight at nearly the same size. I thought I had decided on a different breed, the Buff Orpington. I loved their beautiful tan color and fluffy look. However, after comparing breeds, it became obvious that the Buff Orpington, while dual-purpose, leaned toward meat more than eggs. They produced an equal number of eggs to the Plymouth Rocks, but medium rather than large. And the fully grown Buff Orpington is significantly larger than the Plymouth Rock breeds. I’m very happy with my choice. Eggs were the most important to us, but not to the exclusion of meat. Egg Layers There is a breed of chicken called Easter egg. They lay multiple colors of eggs. Then there are the really productive egg layers, but the birds don’t put on meat like the dual-purpose breeds. I may check them out in the future because, as I said, our primary need is for eggs. And I may raise a few high producing egg layers and see how the carcass compares with the dual-breed chickens. It’s a whole new adventure. Scott has been watching videos on various types of chicken coops. Our goal here is to provide just enough protection for two or three years. So a simpler, more stream-lined chicken coop is in order. We want something that can be completed in a day or two. Later, after the creamery is built, Scott can spend some time creating the perfect chicken coop complete with an attached garden shed. The coop will be in the garden area with immediate access to the orchard. This is for free-range grass grazing in the orchard and pest control in both areas. Let’s move on to my continuing series on producing your own food. Animals and poultry will come later. Right now, we are focusing mostly on vegetables in the garden. Producing Your Own Food Today I am going to focus on the planning aspect of gardening. I’ve talked about deciding what kind of planting you will do – container, raised beds, row crops and so on. Last time I touched on starting plants from seeds. But how do you decide exactly what you are going to put in those beds and containers and seed starting plugs? Planning The first and most important thing you need to hear is to grow what you like to eat. There is no point growing lots and lots of gorgeous lettuce if you only eat salad once every two weeks. And while peppers are easy to grow, how many do you think you will use? And what kinds? These are decisions that need to be made before you go into your big box store and start looking at those rows and rows of seeds. Decide before you open that giant catalog. I can’t tell you how much I love looking at those different plants and all of the various vegetables that can be grown. It is really fun – and it is so easy to get bogged down in the details and endless options. Tips Here are some tips. If you are going to grow zucchini, start small with one or two plants. Some kinds of vegetables produce all summer long. Zucchini, yellow squash and the various white scallop squash are examples. Even a couple of each of these plants will sometimes be overwhelming for two people. By the end of the season, you may never want to see another zucchini again. On the up side, I guarantee you that if you love this veggie, this aversion will dissipate to nothing over the winter. By spring you will be chomping at the bit to grow it again. While lettuce and tomatoes sound great for your salad, they are not necessarily complimentary in the real world. Lettuce likes cool weather and turns bitter in the hot summer and will bolt. That means it goes to seed and stops producing. On the other hand, it’s not unusual in this part of the country to not get your first tomato until July. The lettuce is long gone. Of course, you can grow late summer/early fall lettuce and likely still have tomatoes to go in your salad. Eating with the seasons is a bit of a learning curve and can catch first-time gardeners by surprise. While I said grow what you like to eat, you might find that what you like to eat doesn’t look quite the same in the garden as it does on the grocery shelf. How Much to Grow Let’s see, what else? There is no good solution to knowing how much you should grow of any given vegetable. While crop reports and projected crop yields may give you an idea, your soil, your location in the world, your average weather, the fertilization schedule, pest attacks all contribute to outcome of your crop. Pest and weeds are a greater problem in infertile soil. That means in the beginning, before your soil is built to perfection, you can expect lower yields. Every year I expect greater yields. I learn more about when and how much to water, how much fertilizer is required and how often. The weather is different each and every year and that will never change. So how do you plan for how much to grow? Some of that is limited by the space you intend to use. Beans come in a packet that usually has about 40 seeds. Plant one packet and see what it produces. Learn about how to grow the plant before settling on how much you will grow. Use your first year or two or three to simply learn how to grow things. Tomatoes I’ll give some examples with a raised bed garden system with a bit of a ground crop on the side. Let’s start with tomatoes. One cherry tomato plant will provide a constant supply of candy all summer long. You might plant one or two more if you have several kids that like tomatoes. Then you might want a few plants that produce a good slicing tomato. You will find these distinctions clearly identified in your seed catalogs. Cherry tomatoes, slicing tomatoes, paste tomatoes, tomatillos. One other thing about tomatoes. There are determinant and indeterminant species. Determinant plants will produce all of their tomatoes at once and stop producing. Indeterminant tomatoes produce over and over and over all summer. They also grow very large plants with lots of greenery and needs a couple of feet of space between them. Don’t be fooled by how small they are when they are first put in the ground. These are very large plants. Only grow paste tomatoes if you plan on trying your hand at making tomato sauce, salsa, spaghetti sauce, ketchup, bar-b-q sauce, etc. Peppers Peppers: Keep your choices down to a few. There are so many different kinds of peppers. And I must admit, they are very fun to grow. I love growing peppers. But what do you do with all of them? I grow lots of green bell peppers. At harvest time, I chop and freeze lots of them and use them throughout the winter and spring any time I need chopped peppers for a recipe. Hot peppers are a different story. Cayenne peppers can be threaded together and dried. They will last a very long time and it’s easy to reach up and grab a pepper and crush it into whatever dish you are creating. Jalapenos can be pickled. Last year I grew Pepperoncini and pickled those. Banana peppers are easy to grow. I also chop and freeze them when I get too many. Lettuce Lettuce: This is a tough one for me. There are just too many options here. If you are new to garden grown lettuce, you may need to do a lot of reading. In the grocery store you usually have access to ice berg lettuce (which no one that I know grow in their garden), large heads of romaine lettuce, and usually a green and/or red leaf lettuce. There are sealed packages of greens that are also available now that can give you a bit more of an idea of loose-leaf greens. All of these are available in your seed catalog. The romaine lettuces are usually smaller and yummier than the large heads you see in the grocery store. You know the ones that have that big white stem that you often cut out. Garden varieties will have smaller, leafier greens. There is a variety of garden lettuce that I just love. It is called butter head. These are head lettuces but the heads are really quite small and very loose. Butter crunch lettuce is probably my absolute favorite lettuce to grow and eat. Once you get to the loose-leaf lettuces, the variations are endless. These lettuces are sometimes called cut and come again. You cut most of the leaves off and leave the plant to grow more leaves. There are smooth leaf, ruffled leaf, curly leaf, red leaf, green leaf, purple leaf, and more. I gave up a long time ago trying to grow individual kinds and just opt for one of the salad blends. Succession plant your lettuce. What I mean by that is you decide how much space you will use and then divide that up into four to six sections. Plant one section, wait a week to 10 days and plant again. Do that until all sections are planted. Like the first section will be producing about the time the last one just gets started. That will space out your lettuce over time so it does not overwhelm you all at once. Beans Beans: Our 3-foot by 8-foot raised beds require at least two packages of beans for a full planting. This is another place where you can try all sorts of beans just for the fun of it. And you may find you have a favorite that is simply not available at the local grocery where you a limited to green beans. There are purple beans – though they cook up green. Some are as long as 3-feet. I forget what those are called. I stuck with tried and true favorites with a few purple and yellow wax beans thrown in for fun. Keep an eye out for “bush beans” and “pole beans”. I stick with bush beans. I have tried various methods of growing pole beans and always come back to the bush bean. Pole beans require support and they can climb ten feet or more. My mother had a really neat setup. Some day I may try it myself. She had a metal pole about ten feet sticking out of the ground. At the top my dad somehow mounted a bicycle wheel like a little flat top. Mom would tie string to the bicycle wheel and secure it in the ground with a tent stake. All the way around and when she was done it looked like a string teepee. She planted the pole beans at the tent stakes and those beans would climb right up those strings to the top and beyond. Squash Squash: again. Start with one zucchini, one yellow and perhaps one scallop. Winter squash is something else. Squash, melons, watermelon and pumpkins require lots of space. They will spread all over the place. For instance, in our raised bed system, I might have two to four plants in one bed. It will cover that bed, flow over the sides and into the walkways. I’ll keep moving the spreading vines back up onto the bed, but if it were only on the ground, I would just let it run all over. I can grow small pumpkins in the raised beds, but most pumpkins need at least a six-foot-by-six-foot area for each plant. Same with watermelon. These would be challenging for someone trying to container garden on their apartment balcony. There really are too many options for me to cover in this short podcast. I hope I’ve given you some food for thought and if you have questions email me or contact me on our Locals page. That’s peacefulheartfarm.locals.com. More Tips Other things to consider. Think about buying open pollinated seeds as you can save them and not have to buy the next year. That is another learning curve for some things and you may not be ready for that, but consider it. I talked about tomatoes, peppers, beans and squash because they are easy plants to start with. Seed saving is also relatively easy with these plants, though squash has a trick to it. Once you see how to grow things you like and you’ve whittled down what you intend to grow into the future, then you can decide how much you think you need – and then you will need to double it if you plan to save food for the winter. You can always give it away to family or those in need if you over produce. Trust me, you will need more than you think if you plan to feed your family throughout the year. I know I talked about starting seeds indoors in the last podcast, but buying plant starts instead of trying to start from seed is a great option when you are just getting started. It also gives you the freedom to select lots of varieties without buying a package of seeds just to try one plant variety. That really is all I have time for and please visit our locals page and start a conversation to get more information. That’s peacefulheartfarm.locals.com. Final Thoughts That’s it for today’s podcast. Let me know if I’m missing any animal updates. I didn’t get to the creamery today so I’ll give that special attention next week. Likely, we will have babies next time I do a podcast. That means spring is coming. And I just love this time of year. I hope the gardening information is useful. Let me know if I can give you more information. There are likely many who listen that can also provide guidance over on the Locals platform. If you enjoyed this podcast, please hop over to Apple Podcasts or whatever podcasting service you use, SUBSCRIBE and give me a 5-star rating and review. If you like this content and want to help out the show, the absolute best way you can do that is to share it with any friends or family who might be interested in this type of content. Let them know about the Peaceful Heart Farmcast. Thank you so much for stopping by the homestead and until next time, may God fill your life with grace and peace. To learn about herd shares: Visit our website Herd Share page To share your thoughts: Leave a comment on our Facebook PageShare this show on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram and all your social media To help the show: PLEASE LEAVE A REVIEW for Peaceful Heart FarmCast on Apple Podcasts.Subscribe on iTunes, Stitcher Radio, Google Play Music, TuneIn or SpotifyBecome a community member on LocalsDonate on Patreon Website www.peacefulheartfarm.com Locals peacefulheartfarm.locals.com Rumble https://rumble.com/user/peacefulheartfarm YouTube youtube.com/peacefulheartfarm Patreon www.patreon.com/peacefulheartfarm Facebook www.facebook.com/peacefulheartfarm Instagram www.instagram.com/peacefulheartfarm

Today, I’ll follow up on the basics of getting started with gardening with an intro to seed-starting indoors ahead of planting in the garden when the weather warms. But before we get to that, more homestead updates are in order. I’ll be talking about our beautiful livestock guardian dogs for the most part. There is so much to share about these fantastic dogs. I want to take a minute and say welcome to all the new listeners and welcome back to the veteran homestead-loving regulars who stop by the FarmCast for every episode. I appreciate you all so much. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. Now, on to homestead updates. Our Virginia Homestead Life Updates I have a bit of cow news that I’ll add at the end. Let’s talk about the dogs. Our Livestock Guardian Dogs We have added two new wonderful dogs to our homestead. I can’t tell you how ecstatic I am about these beasties, Finnigan (Finn for short) and Charlotte. We purchased them from a fellow vendor at the market who is scaling down and exiting their business. They were guarding chickens and turkeys. We don’t have these kinds of birds yet but we will at some point. It’s nice to know that we have dogs that have at least some experience with poultry. It can be hard for livestock guardian dogs to learn how to guard and not chase and chew on poultry. Finn is ½ Great Pyrenees and ½ Anatolian Shepherd. He is a big baby. Loves to have his tummy rubbed. Follows us everywhere. We have had these guys since mid-October so they are still learning about us and the sheep. They are kept exclusively with the sheep. At first, we had to hold Finn in a fenced area next to the sheep because he was chasing them all over the place. He has since proven he can be trusted to not run them to death and now resides with them and Charlotte. I have not seen much evidence that the dogs have bonded with the sheep. That will come in time. Right now, they are learning to love us and we definitely love them. Charlotte Charlotte is a Great Pyrenees. She is the most beautiful dog I have ever seen. Well maybe I’m biased. For whatever reason, she is very shy of humans. At first, I thought she had been mistreated. Lately though, I’m thinking she was not socialized to humans at an early age. She just has an innate mistrust of humans. She is not aggressive or anything. It’s just that we cannot walk up to her and pet her. The first time I was able to pet her was when the vet was here for a general exam and heart worm tests. While the vet was working on Finn, Charlotte came over next to me and was kind of hiding behind me. I was able to pet her and hug her. Alas, it was only for the moment when she thought she needed protection and Finn was not only unavailable, but may have needed protection himself, in her mind. Getting to Know Each Other From the beginning, she would come up and quickly take a biscuit from my hand as long as I had Finn between us. I reached over his back and she would take the biscuit and run off to chomp on it. A few days ago, she started coming up without Finn between us. I still can’t just walk up to her but she has improved greatly in just a couple of months. Yesterday I was able to pet her and give her some love. She is tied on a lead at the moment and allowed me to walk up to her fairly easily. It is so satisfying to finally be able to love on her. For weeks and weeks, she held back and just watched Finn get petted and babied and loved. Now she is getting some of that. She is scheduled to be spayed next week. We don’t like having her tied up, but she has escaped twice in the past couple of weeks. The Great Pyrenees breed is harder to contain than goats. Who knew? Well, I knew there was an issue with roaming with this breed. However, I had no idea they were so successful as escape artists. We have been so concerned that she will escape and get pregnant. I’ll be so glad when this escape artist is safe from pregnancy. Finnigan (Finn) Now let’s talk about Finn. That’s short for Finnigan. He is such a sweetie – as long as you are not the veterinarian. He does not like the vet. Yesterday, he showed her his teeth and growled relentlessly. Even with me standing there assuring him it was okay, he was in full protect mode. She is a brave vet and also quite familiar with working with livestock guardian dogs that are aggressive with her. We were able to get their vaccines done without much incident. I just had to be very careful to have him contained and tied before she approached. A quick stick in the rear and it was done. Normally, we can introduce him to new people and he is fine with them. Though trusting him with someone new without us being very close is never allowed. He is very protective of us. And such a big baby when interacting with us. He loves to lay down on the ground belly up, begging for a rub. Brushing and combing him is also something he enjoys. Escaping We love both of these animals, but they have been causing us grief when they escape. I mentioned Charlotte escaping. She is the leader in that regard. Once she makes it out, she has shown him the way. For the most part, he is the leader. Only in creating the escape path does she lead. The first time they escaped, she returned home sometime overnight. Finn was found about 5 or 6 miles away. He was hanging out around a local farmer’s barn. After a few hours, the farmer ventured close enough to read his collar. We have a large yellow tag on all of our dogs that has our farm name and phone number plainly displayed. Finn allowed him close and he got our phone number. I was so relived to get that call. He was missing nearly 24 hours. We had Facebook messages posted to our friends. The local radio station also broadcast it. We know this because the second time they escaped, another local farmer, only a quarter mile away this time, remembered hearing it on the radio and gave us a call. They were only gone for a couple of hours that time and Scott walked them home on a leash. Unfortunately for Charlotte, we were done with worrying ourselves over them. She is secured until her surgery next week. Mack We have one other dog, Mack. He is now comfortably bonded with the cows and calves. We started him with the sheep, but he also chased them. Mack is just over 2-years-old and still exhibits puppy behavior from time-to-time. As we knew the other two dogs were coming, we decided to try and get him bonded with the cows and save the intense sheep training for the older dogs – Finn and Charlotte. He was fairly easy to acclimate with our cows. We started with a few calves from this year and then added the yearlings. Once he got comfortable with all of them, we added the three new heifers I talked about in the last podcast. And finally, all of the big girls were added to the mix. He is very comfortable with his new charges and takes his responsibilities quite seriously. When we are looking for him, we simply find out where the cows are hanging out and he is sure to be close by. Mack is also a sweetheart and also a loaner. He is very comfortable on his own. Where Finn and Charlotte want more attention, he is fine with seeing us once a day with his food and some petting. He was born and raised with sheep and is used to being completely on his own. The only issue we have with him is his coat mats so easily. At this point, he is matted all over and will likely need some serious trimming in the spring. After consulting with the vet, it looks like he will likely get a spring trim every year. We can comb him out regularly, but he is still going to get mats that will need to be cut out. It’s just the nature of his coat. The fine undercoat is very similar to that of our cashmere goats. It is so fine, that rolling it between your fingers makes it instantly matted. We love him very much and he is definitely worth this extra effort. Let’s talk about the sheep. Sheep I briefly mentioned the dogs being in with the sheep. Did I mention in a previous podcast that we had replaced some of our sheep? I can’t remember. Anyway, we purchased registered stock from a local farmer and now have five breeding ewes, one breeding ram and a whether that will go to market soon. When the Finn and Charlotte first arrived, they were both in a separate pen next to the sheep. The new sheep, who had been raised around dogs, would lay down just outside their fence. Then we put the dogs in with the sheep and all of that changed. Finn chased them and the veterans who had already been chased multiple times by stray dogs showed the new girls and guy how to hide in the woods. Even after putting Finn back in the separate pen, they pretty much kept their distance from the dogs. That was a small step backward. Dogs are Okay In an attempt to get the dogs to attach to the sheep and to get the sheep to overcome their fear of the dogs, we began feeding the sheep a little treat each evening. This seemed to work. Number one, Finn saw that we care for them and does not chase them anymore. The sheep were still very standoffish at first and would watch every move that Finn made. In the evening we let him lose in the field. We would supervise him either on a leash or let him run freely and watch him closely. After a few times of getting their special treats, the sheep no longer warily watched Finn’s every move. In fact, they come right up to where he is to get their food. They are jostling around with each other trying to get their head in the feed trough. We feed both the dogs and sheep within a few feet of each other. The sheep have now become so friendly that we can actually touch them a little bit while they eat. Once they are done eating, they still go back to the woods. But they are calm about it and do not stand up with their ears pricked forward listening for the evil beastie. They will calmly lay down and chew their cud. They are all together now. During the day, I can see both of the dogs sleeping in the field and the sheep wandering around and grazing. The day I am looking for is the one where the sheep let the dogs lay down next to them. I plan on keeping them close where I can watch everything until well after the lambs are born in the spring. That may be a great challenge for the dogs. New animals and blood and afterbirth and so on. Hopefully, they will see the new lambs need to be protected and not eaten. That’s a worry for another day. God gives us each day in its turn. Right now, we are happy with how things are progressing. Creamery I cannot tell you how many hours and hours of work Scott has put in on material lists. Prices for construction materials are skyrocketing so we are trying to buy all materials now, though it may be months before they are installed. Ceiling panels for the milking parlor are the same material as the roof. Quotes showed now double the price. Scott did get a price break and got it down to perhaps 1 ½ times the price he paid last year. That has been delivered. Meetings with the power company and propane gas representatives have been accomplished and orders placed for materials. Electrical wiring and conduit and all the bits and pieces for that project have been ordered. I believe Scott is still chasing down some of those parts – again availability is an issue for some things. He might even have gotten the flooring materials ordered. Are you starting to get the picture of how much time he has spent thinking and thinking and calculating and thinking and calculating some more in order to accomplish this monumental task? The plumbing is going to be contracted out. We shall see what the estimates are for that bit of work. I don’t know what his plans are about whether the commercial kitchen will be plumbed and outfitted at this time. We are just ready to get this project completed and to get started selling our cheese to the public. The fifth year of construction just began. I can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel. Starting Plants Indoors Following up on the last podcast where I talked about getting the soil ready and improving it over the years, I want to touch on what it takes to start plants indoors. The goal is to get them large enough and healthy enough to plant out in the garden when the ground temperature has reached the proper level. The first step is calculating when to start them. Some plants require six weeks of growth and others eight weeks or more. For instance, tomatoes and peppers are on the eight weeks side of that calculation and summer squash and melons hang around closer to the six weeks mark. If want to venture into celery, that may require as many as 12 weeks of indoor growth along with repotting and so on. Perhaps save that for after you have a year or two of success with other plants. I do recommend getting to the point of growing your own celery. It’s not commonly grown but it is so good. That tasteless stuff purchased from your local grocery store will fall by the wayside once you know how to grow your own. To recap, read the descriptions on what you plan to grow. They will clearly state how many weeks ahead of last frost date to start your plants. Last frost date is determined by where you live in the US. It is divided into “zones” with zone one being the farthest north and zone 8 and 9 are way down in Florida. Here in southwestern Virginia, we are in Zone 7A. Just a few miles from us, the elevation is significantly higher and those living up the mountain are firmly in Zone 6. For Zone 7, the last frost date is April 15th. For Zone 6, I believe it is May 1st. Not sure on that as it is not my zone. Look up USDA planting zones to find out where you fall in the schemes of things. USDA Zones Once you have your USDA zone identified, you have your first and last frost dates. And let me be clear on this. When they say last and/or first frost dates, what they are referring to is the approximate date when the chance of frost is 50%. You can have a last frost after the official date, which can be devastating to whatever you have already planted outside. Same for first frost date in the fall. You can have plants still out in the garden that you hope to harvest before the first frost comes. It can come earlier than expected and ruin your fall harvest. Now that you have all of that straight, you will count back from your last frost date the number of weeks recommended to grow your indoor seedlings. I usually transplant my tomatoes out into the garden two weeks after the expected last frost date. That is around the 1st week of May. I count back eight weeks from the first of May and that will be when I want my tomato plants to be started. Check your package instructions. No matter the plant, it is generally clearly stated when is the best time to plant outside and how many weeks to grow the plants indoors prior to transplanting outside. Post on Locals if you have questions. Seed Starting Mix Purchase good organic seed starting mix. There are all kinds of bags of potting mix and planting mix and garden soil and so on at your local Big Box stores and even more choices on line. You are looking specifically for “seed starting mix”. Jiffy and Miracle Grow are popular organic brands. There are others. Just make sure it is seed starting mix. Decide how many tomato, pepper, lettuce, squash, etc plants that you plan on growing in your garden. I try to start that many seeds for each item plus 25%. So, if I want four tomato plants, I start five or maybe even six. It’s nature. Not all seeds will sprout and some plants may be obviously weak. Strong plants are important. Once you know how many of each plant you intend to start from seed, you will have a better idea of how many containers you need. Filling Containers For planting containers, I use the 6-cell seed starting trays. They are about an inch and a half square and about two inches deep. It is beneficial to also have purchased plant trays that hold the 6-cell containers. These all come in standard sizes. The standard tray will hold 12 of the 6-cell containers. That’s 72 plants in one tray. There are other sizes of pots you can buy, but this is my choice for starting from seed. Once the seeds have reached a larger size, I transplant them into 2” x 2” containers. Each of the standard sized trays will hold 32 of the 2” x 2” pots. Additionally, you will want those clear plastic covers. Sometimes they come with the tray and sometimes you need to purchase them separately. You will need them.  You have a couple of choices about filling your containers. There is the option to fill each cell with dry mix and add water or another option is to wet the seed starting mix first and fill the cells with damp soil. I’ll leave that to you. I like to fill it dry and add water after. In either case, give yourself time to do this right. It takes some time for the seed starting mix to absorb the water. You want it just damp enough to clump together but not soggy. When wetting it ahead of time, don’t get in a hurry. Add a good amount of water and wait for it to incorporate fully before adding more. Keep it up until you reach the consistency you desire. If adding water after the fact, I use a two-step method. I wet from the top and then add water to the tray. The dry mix will pull the water up from the bottom. You’ll want to get good at adding water to the tray. It is the preferred method of adding water once your plants have sprouted. More on that later. Planting the Seeds Once you have the soil in the containers and dampened, you are ready to add the seeds. Many seeds are tiny and it is hard to get just one or two in the cell. Don’t worry about it. If you have several that sprout, you can thin them out by pulling the weakest sprouts out and focusing on the strongest for each cell. Tiny seeds can be laid on the surface and then sprinkled with a little dry soil. With a spray-mister you can dampen this additional layer after you have filled all the trays. I plant larger seeds by making an indentation in the seed mix with a pencil or small stick, placing the seed or seeds and gently moving the dampened soil over the seed. The rule of thumb is that seeds are planted at a depth equal to their diameter. Lettuce seeds are laid on top of the soil. I use the pencil idea for tomatoes and peppers. Cilantro is planted a little deeper as the seed is even larger than the tomato seed. Each seed has just enough energy within it to push above the soil and begin to get sunlight. If a seed is planted too deep, it will run out of energy before reaching the surface. If planted too shallow, its roots may not get a good grip on the soil which makes a weak plant. Planting too deep has always been a bigger problem for me. I can always add soil if a seed sprouts on the surface. Cover, Wait, then Fertilize Once you have all of your precious seeds nestled into the potting mix, you will want to cover that tray with the plastic cover. This keeps the moisture high. Now we wait. I’ve had seeds sprout within days that the package said would take 7 to 10 days. You just never know. Check daily. Some seeds require 2 weeks or more to sprout. Do not give up too early. Once the seeds sprout, take the plastic covers off. You want to let the air circulate. Molds can kill off your seedlings overnight. Once your seedlings have their first set of real leaves, it’s time to fertilize. There is usually a pair of initial leaves that sprout. They are generally roundish. After a day or two, a second set of leave will sprout that are usually shaped differently, more in line with a full-grown leaf of the plant. Look for leaves three and four coming up out of the center. You will see what I mean. To fertilize, I use fish emulsion in a spray mister. My particular mister model has a stream setting. I mix the fish emulsion and spray right at the base of the stem. Just one or two squirts is plenty. This fertilization is important at this stage. Do not leave out this step. Light and Water Now you are cooking. Keep lights on your plants 12 to 14 hours. Water about once per week. Don’t let the seeding starting mix completely dry out. Don’t make it too wet. Remember the mold. I like to water from the bottom as it encourages the roots to reach down for the water. It’s also easier than trying to spray-mist those delicate seedlings when they first sprout. It’s so easy to just drown them with even the smallest of squirts. Okay, that will get you started. I’m going to put together a more comprehensive list of materials and such to help with the planning stages as this was more focused on the actual planting. You will find that information at peacefulheartfarm.locals.com.  Final Thoughts And we are done for this podcast. I still have lots more updates on the homestead to share. I hope you enjoyed the update on the livestock guardian dogs. I never thought I would love dogs so much. But I truly enjoy these wonderful animals. I was so worried I would be a really bad dog owner, not knowing anything about raising dogs. As per our usual, we read a lot, asked lots of questions and found that it was not as hard as I thought. Oh, for sure, there are challenges we are facing, but I feel up to the task. The vet has helped tremendously. I can always ask the expert if I ever have any doubts. It's not quite time to get started with the garden yet, and I hope this podcast topic is just in time to get you in the mood for the planning parts. We will start around the end of March, perhaps a little earlier. We shall see. It all depends on what I decide on for the garden this year. I hope you will check out our Locals page. Again, that’s peacefulheartfarm.locals.com. You can support us there either financially or just by visiting us and sharing this post on your social media pages. If you enjoyed this podcast, please, SUBSCRIBE on your favorite platform and remember to give us a 5-star rating and review. Reviews are important to expand our reach. If you like this content and want to help out the show, the absolute best way you can do that is to share it with any friends or family who might be interested in this type of content. Let them know about the Peaceful Heart Farmcast. Thank you so much for stopping by the homestead and until next time, may God fill your life with grace and peace. To learn about herd shares: Visit our website Herd Share page To share your thoughts: Leave a comment on our Facebook PageShare this show on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram and all your social media To help the show: PLEASE LEAVE A REVIEW for Peaceful Heart FarmCast on Apple Podcasts.Subscribe on iTunes, Stitcher Radio, Google Play Music, TuneIn or SpotifyBecome a community member on LocalsDonate on Patreon Website www.peacefulheartfarm.com Locals peacefulheartfarm.locals.com Rumble https://rumble.com/user/peacefulheartfarm YouTube youtube.com/peacefulheartfarm Patreon www.patreon.com/peacefulheartfarm Facebook www.facebook.com/peacefulheartfarm Instagram www.instagram.com/peacefulheartfarm

I’m back, finally with a new year, new projects. Hope you are doing well. I hope you had wonderful Christmas and New Year celebrations with your families and friends. It has been four months since I’ve talked with you all. It takes a great deal of time, energy and money to make this podcast happen. More on how you can support us later in the podcast. For right now I want to say how much I appreciate all of you. I’m putting forth the effort to get back on track and to once again interact with all of you. I’ve been slacking and you deserve more from me. We’ve all been lonely and isolated these past two years. I intend to bring a little bit of love and light into each of your lives. I’ve always talked about tradition and the value of tradition. From summer 2021 into winter 2022, I’ve come to appreciate God and our Lord Jesus Christ in a deeper fashion. Probably none of you know that I am Catholic. If you do know that, it will probably not surprise you that I attend the Traditional Latin Mass. It’s just another place that tradition permeates my life. I’ll continue to talk about traditional homestead living and our traditional raw milk products and artisan cheese. But don’t be surprised if you hear more exclamations like glory to God or praise God or praise Jesus. We all need more reminders that we are loved. Locals I’ve started a Locals community. It’s a place where we can come together and talk about whatever we want. There is no censorship. Think along the lines of a Facebook Group page. Everyone is posting, commenting and supporting one another. There is no cost to become a member and get access to these podcasts as well as select other content. Pictures of the animals I talk about. Maybe even some short videos. In order to support me and this podcast, I’m looking for people to become paid subscribers. The biggest advantage you have in becoming a paid subscriber is that because there is a little bit of financial investment, there are no trolls. Should someone be willing to paying the minimal monthly fee only to come in an harass our community, I can remove them. We have complete autonomy within our community. And no one is going to collect your data and sell it for advertising. That’s not what Locals is about. In fact, it is designed to free us from that intrusion into our personal lives by technical oligarchs getting rich from our love for each other. I urge you to check it out. Support this podcast by becoming a paid subscriber – or just enjoy the free stuff. That’s perfectly fine too. I’m considering starting a subscription-only group of followers over on the Locals platform for those that are looking for more faith in their daily lives. Whether you have your own homestead, dream of having one or are perfectly satisfied living the suburbs and purchasing food from your local farmer, faith plays a part in all our lives. And definitely let me know if you are interested in participating in religious conversation in an interactive way on the Locals platform. I’m still trying to figure out how the plat form will allow me to separate this content from the rest. Sort of like how to make a playlist for specific content topics. Again, to support the show, become a paid subscriber. Again, it’s not required. However, when I make a post, a paid subscriber (which is $5 per month) can do more than comment. You can make your own post on the topic or post o a topic of your choice to start a conversation. Other paid subscribers can comment on your posts and/or mine. It is a community. Enough of all that. Check it out and let me know what you think. If you have trouble figuring out what you need to do, email me (at email address). Let’s get on with the podcast. Appreciation for All of You It has been about four months since I’ve talked with you all. There is so much that has happened I can’t possibly just pick up where I left off last fall and go forward. Nope, I’m just going to start from where we are and go from there. If there is something I’ve talked about in a previous episode that is still hanging in the air that you need an update on, just let me know in an email. Messaging is also available on Locals for paid subscribers and free on our Facebook page. Just type in Peaceful Heart Farm in either platform and we should pop right up.  Our Virginia Homestead Life Updates It’s 2022. Scott is healing well. I’m still a little unsettled but on the upswing at the moment. There is so much going on I hardly know where to begin. As usual, the cows are the stars. But keep listening. I can only do so much in one podcast. While today may be dedicated to the cows, I’ve got some wonderful dog and sheep tales to tell. I’m going to keep to the cows in this podcast and expand to the others animals as I go along so you can all catch up with the homestead’s evolution. Additionally, I’m going to start a series on developing your own food production system. Today I will begin with the basics of gardening. But first, the cows. Cows If you are a veteran listener, you already know about our girls. For the newbies, here is a rundown of our Normande and Jersey girls. Claire and Buttercup are the oldest Normande girls. They were the original stock we purchased way back in 2011. From the moment we purchased this breed, I fell in love. They are the gentlest cows I have ever had the pleasure of husbanding. If you haven’t ever heard of this breed, check out our Locals page or our Facebook page. You will be able to see pictures of these beauties. Their coloring is unique. The two matriarchs are now 12 and 11 years old respectively. Cows can go up to 15 to 20 years depending on the breed. But this is likely Claire’s last calf before she retires. She has had consistent issues with mastitis and now produces only enough milk to feed her calf. To be a viable business, we need more than that. It has been fine over the past years because we were not fully operational as a dairy, but that is coming to an end this year. At least we hope so, barring any further unforeseen medical issues or some other catastrophe. And, according to the vet, Buttercup has gotten too fat to conceive easily. She has not taken this year or last year. That means early retirement for her as well. Who knew that we had such healthy and abundant grass? But she is not even giving us a yearly calf. It’s just money down the drain because the girl can chow down on some grass and hay. We love our original girls and it will be hard letting them go. Violet and Cloud came to the homestead next. Cloud is a year older than Violet but she is also slated for replacement. Cloud is ¾ Normande and has never been an ideal cow for milking. I don’t recall why we purchased her. Perhaps because she was bred at the time and Claire, back at home, was not. Anyway, she is a lovely cow but does not fit our dairy operation. While Violet has been a bit of a problem, we will get her back on track next year. Last time she was bred, she didn’t deliver until June. That’s the exact time that we are breeding again for calves to be born the next spring in March and April. Cows have a nine-month gestation period just like humans. Because she delivered so late in the year, she is out of the rotation for breeding this time around. We expect her to be fine for next year. She’s a great mom, a moderate milk producer, and she produces beautiful calves. That’s it for the older girls. I’m going to throw in here a short saga of how we came to purchase Jerseys which I will get to in a minute. They are next on the list of cows added to the homestead. Some years back, we ran into a drought situation. I’m thinking it was around 2014 or 2015. We had lots of cows, calves and about 70 sheep. No rain for an extended period of time and all of sudden the pastures were gone. Pastures are the lifeblood of our operation. We aren’t animal farmers so much as grass farmers. We acted quickly. We sold all of our steers and heifers as well as most of the sheep. We dropped the sheep count to six, one ram and five ewes. I don’t recall how the number of cows that we kept. I’m thinking about 5 or 6. Claire, Buttercup, Cloud, Violet, Lilly (who is gone now) and Dora (who died a few years ago following a premature delivery and infection). So that is six. The pastures began to recover now that there weren’t so many animals eating it down. The next year after the drought, we sold all the calves again and the pastures recovered. Following that recovery, we seemed to have had nothing but bull calves. So here we are in need of cows that we can milk. We also culled one cow, Lilly, that we probably should have kept. Two years in a row she didn’t conceive so we culled her. Later we found out that we probably could have treated her and she would have been fine. These are learning experiences that we will share with you as we talk more about raising your own food. And then Dora died nearly three years ago. She had some kind of infection and delivered about two weeks early. The vet saved her calf and treated her as best she could, but did not give us a favorable prognosis. Dora died three days later. At that point we were reduced to only four milk cows. So, bring on the Jerseys. Jerseys About 3 or 4 years ago, we purchased a registered A2A2 Jersey heifer. A fellow vendor at the farmer’s market was getting out of the herd share business (that’s the legal way to provide raw milk to families in Virginia) and asked if we were interested in picking up the slack. We purchased Butter from her to supply the extra need for milk. That’s how our herd share operation got started. The next learning experience was artificial insemination. We had also sold our herd bull somewhere along the way. Our first AI experience produced a shortage of cows having calves and freshening with milk. In short, even with Butter producing her wonderful abundance of Jersey milk, we did not have enough milk for our herd shares and cheesemaking. In comes Rosie. Rosie was also a registered Jersey A2A2 heifer. I was skeptical, but Scott said he had a good feeling and we made the leap of faith. Rosie was bred when she was just nine months old. That’s equivalent to a young teen pregnancy. She was scheduled to give birth at 18 months. That is a whopping six months too young in conventional wisdom. But again, Scott had a good feeling about it and she produced a beautiful heifer calf. So now we have three registered Jersey cows/calves. It was beginning to look like the herd was shifting to another breed. But Au contrare. I’m not putting up with that. We want the center or our operation to be Normande cows. Wisconsin Being aware of our continued shortage of heifers, we have been on the lookout for replacement stock for a couple of years. Normande cows and heifers are not easy to find in this area of the country. This fall, we finally bit the bullet and Scott drove all the way to Wisconsin to pick up three new heifers. (By the way, for newbies, a heifer is a female bovine animal that has not yet had a calf. She doesn’t graduate to officially being a cow until she has successfully delivered her first calf.) Anyway, Scott and “almost son-in-law” left for Wisconsin around 11:00 pm on a Saturday night. They drove through the night and arrived Sunday evening nearby to the target farm with just time enough to have a nice dinner and get a good night’s sleep at a local hotel. The next morning, they arrived at the Wisconsin farm and were loaded up in ½ an hour. It’s now Monday morning about 8:00. The return trip took almost 24 hours. Yes, it was Tuesday morning around 7:30 before they got home and unloaded our new girls. Our New Girls It’s time to meet Wanda, Ginger and Molly. For our cheese operation we need specific genetics to make the best cheese possible. These girls have it. Genetically they are all A2A2 with the BB kappa casein protein. Wanda and Ginger are percentage Normande. At 75% Normande and 25% Guernsey/Milking Short Horn, their calves will be considered pure bred Normande when adding in a pure-bred French bull. We like the 25% being milking genetics. Another issue with getting Normande cattle is so many of the large breeders are breeding for meat. We will still get decent meat production from our steers, even with milking genetics. But we need good udders and sufficient milk production to be a profitable dairy and cheesemaking operation. So, these girls fit the bill perfectly for everything we were looking for in breeding stock. Wanda and Ginger are mostly Normande. Molly is quite beautiful, but she is 75% Jersey. Again, good milking genetics. She will be bred later this year along with everyone else and we will use full blood Normande semen. Her calves will be 62 or 63% Normande. Those calves will be registered and then bred again to a different full blood Normande bull and that offspring will be 82% Normande and considered pure bred. And the percentage continues to go up from there. Sometimes the only way to get what you are looking for is to breed it yourself. Another trip to Wisconsin is just not what we want. Molly had the genetics and could be quickly useful in adding Normande genetics to our herd. And did I mention how beautiful she is? Breeding for Genetics The bull semen we purchased also has the proper genetics. A2A2 and BB kappa casein protein. All of the offspring from these new heifers will have the proper genetics. I guess I left out the piece that none of the current cows had the complete set of proper genetics. Butter, Claire and Buttercup have the A2A2 genetics. Violet is A1A2 but has the BB kappa casein trait. We have one other heifer who will have her first calf this year. Luna is out of Cloud. Cloud is also A1A2 and she does not have the bb kappa casein trait. Again, she is a wonderful cow that we used as a nurse cow, but we really need the proper genetics and we only have so much land to raise these animals. Those that don’t fit the bill need to go somewhere else. Luna’s test has been sent off but we do not have the results yet. She has very strong Angus genetics and I am not hopeful that she has what we need. It shows in her coloring. Likely she will not actually produce milk in the quantities we are looking for in a cow. On the upside, she will make someone a great family cow and we will sell her as such next year or later this year. Likely her production will produce just enough milk for a family looking to provide milk, cheese, yogurt, and butter for themselves and their children. She will also produce beautiful calves that can be raised for beef. It’s a win-win for a family. So, to wrap that up. We are culling our three oldest cows for one reason or another and replacing them with these wonderful new heifers. Going forward we are looking to grow the herd with the proper genetics. Quail Just a brief word on the quail. I have no idea where I left off with them. Their actual number at this time is even a mystery to me. We had one last batch hatched out in September. It was a poor hatch rate. I was trying to refresh our genetics but it was a little late in the year for hatching quail. These newbies went into the upper left penthouse to finish growing. All of the roosters had been cleared out of the other cages. I was looking for new roosters from this last hatching. When they were big enough, I took roosters out of that penthouse and put them in with the girls in the other four cages. One got mauled and died, but the rest are doing fine as best I can tell. We also lost one or two hens that just up and died. It is not an unusual occurrence. You go out there one day and one of them is just cold and lifeless. I’m not so attached to the quail as to the cows, sheep and dogs, so I don’t lose much sleep over this. Anyway, they are doing well. I feed them once a day but need to refresh their water usually twice a day if it is freezing outside. We usually get anywhere from 24 to 30 eggs. Although yesterday I got a grand total of six after a really cold couple of days. I have lots of quail eggs and we just started giving the dogs and occasional quail egg treat. They loved them. Dairy Parlor and Creamery Scott was temporarily out of commission over the past six months or so due to his cancer treatment but he is back on track now. He takes all of the cow girls through the dairy barn area a couple of times a week. It’s important for them to get used to the routine there. Right now, he just lets them mill about and get used to everything there. In the future he will move them around inside the parlor and get them used to going where he wants them to go. But getting them familiar is the first step. Cows are very wary of anything new or different. Once they have been there a few times and found that nothing actually happens, it’s time to move to the next step. As far as the building aspect of the creamery, the electrical wiring is the next step. On the drive home from Sunday Mass, we often talk about plans. Scott told me yesterday that he only needs to get the milking parlor, milk room and cheese make room up and operational to get us inspected. After that, he will gradually put together everything else. The bathroom, the large cheese cave and the kitchen. It is important that we get to a point where we can pass USDA inspection so that we can actually begin making money. This has been a long project, has cost us a lot more money that either of us ever expected and with the medical bills, it’s time to get some cash flow coming our way, God willing. I love selling meat, sauces, and jams at the smaller farmer’s markets but look forward to selling much larger quantities of cheese to local restaurants and wineries. Garden Planning If you are one of those that is getting more and more interested in growing more of your own food, this next part is just for you. I’m going to lay out, to the best of my ability, some thoughts and actions that you can take to start growing more of your own food. We’ll start with gardening and later add growing various meat products and processing them. Raised Beds or No Raised Beds From large plots of land that contain acres down to a few containers on your balcony, everyone can do something to grow their own food. With the current supply chain disruption, this becomes more and more important for simply feeding your family. Let’s start with what kind of gardening you will be doing. I’ll stick to what I know and offer a few additional notes as I go for ideas on how you might modify my ideas to fit your particular situation. I prefer the raised beds. They are not required. You can even begin in containers on your balcony if you live in an apartment. There is always a little bit that can be done. Of course, sowing your seeds directly into the ground is an age-old method of gardening. In any case, what becomes most important is the soil. Let me go over what to expect in that regard. I’m assuming that you have not done any vegetable gardening up to this point. Or perhaps you did a little and gave up because it just wasn’t working out. You decided you had a brown thumb. Well perhaps you just need a little more information to be successful. And keep in mind that it is a process. The soil will need to be worked and maintained throughout every single year of gardening. As each year passes, the soil improves. Container Gardening Soil First let me address container gardening. This may be the one instance where the soil is nearly perfect from the start. Don’t use garden soil. Use a potting mix. You can’t till or work the soil very well in a container. Therefore, you need soil that will be loose and retain water. There are several organic fertilizers that you can use to amend the potting mix depending on what happens with your plants. We will get to that later. Right now, we are trying to create the environment where seeds will sprout and plant starts will take hold. For container gardening I recommend using potting soil as it comes complete with vermiculite to keep the soil from compacting and to help with holding water. Every one I have seen also comes with fertilizer included. Let me know if you have any questions about this. I’ll put a more detailed description and explanation on Locals. Raised Bed Garden Soil Because you are using a specific sized area to garden, often it is not too expensive to fill your beds with organic soil. It depends on how many beds you want to create and how high you make the sides of your raised beds. In our case, the raised beds are 24” from the ground. Scott stacked cinder blocks 3-high. They are 8 inches each so that is 24” from the ground. Next, he put in lots of old chunks of wood. This serves two purposes. It fills in a lot of the space that would otherwise need to have some kind of soil and it also provides a longer-term source of fertilizer. The tree chunks eventually break down and create nutrients in the soil. Next, he added any kind of soil that he could scrape up from around the farm. We have several piles of dirt that were scraped up when some trees were being cleared. He filled each bed to within four to six inches of the top. The last few inches, contained organic material from other places around the homestead. When the cows are eating hay in the winter, they all gather around the bale and eat to their heart’s content. Out their other end, the fertilizer is deposited on the hay that has been pushed out of the hay ring. While going to and fro to the hay ring, they tread on this mess of hay, poop and pee and mash it up into a great big pile of soon-to-be composted material. Each year, Scott moves the hay rings around to other locations. That spreads out the mess – I mean compost. At any given time, he can go out there where a hay bale was a year or two earlier and just dig up that black gold and put it on the garden. He scoops it up in the tractor bucket and brings it over to the garden. Every year, new composted material needs to be added to the soil. After about three years or so, the soil will be getting really, really good. But don’t expect too much from the first year or two, even if you purchased the most expensive compost you could find. It takes time for the soil to settle down and begin to create all the little bugs, bacteria and such that are necessary for really fertile soil. The longer you work a particular piece of earth, the better is gets. That is, if you are continually amending the soil. Till the Earth If you’ve got the time, the energy, and the space, you can till up the soil and plant directly into the ground. This method takes the longest to start to produce a crop that will fully meet your expectations. Start with a few inches of compost on top – and it will take a lot of compost for even a ¼ acre. Every year, add another layer of compost on top. That, combined with regular fertilization during the growing season is the way to creating the perfect soil. That’s about all I have time for in this podcast. These were just the briefest descriptions of what it takes to get started in gardening. Look for more information on our Locals.com community. Final Thoughts That’s it for today’s podcast. It’s so good to be back with you. Again, I hope you all had a wonderful and blessed Christmas and are experiencing a joyous New year. We had friends and family over and had a wonderful time. I hope you did as well. We continue to move forward with our homestead plans. The updates on the cows are just the beginning. There is so much more with the sheep and our beautiful livestock guardian dogs. Look for more on that in the next podcast. I hope you enjoyed the garden planning topic and if you have questions, check out our Locals.com community for more information. The Locals platform is where we can come together as a community. I will be posting these podcasts there as well as other content that might have previously gone to Facebook or Instagram. You will need to be a subscriber to be able to comment and post. Subscriptions can be as little as $5 per month. For premium subscribers it is $25 per month. That gives you access to me via direct message on the Locals platform. I truly appreciate any and all support that you give to this podcast and to the traditional life. If you like this content and want to help out the show, the absolute best way you can do that is to share it with any friends or family who might be interested in this type of content. Let them know about the Peaceful Heart Farmcast. If you enjoyed this podcast, please hop over to Apple Podcasts or whatever podcasting service you use, SUBSCRIBE and give me a 5-star rating and review. Thank you so much for stopping by the homestead and until next time, may God fill your life with grace and peace. To learn about herd shares: Visit our website Herd Share page To share your thoughts: Leave a comment on our Facebook PageShare this show on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram and all your social media To help the show: PLEASE LEAVE A REVIEW for Peaceful Heart FarmCast on Apple Podcasts.Subscribe on iTunes, Stitcher Radio, Google Play Music, TuneIn or SpotifyBecome a community member on LocalsDonate on Patreon Website www.peacefulheartfarm.com Locals peacefulheartfarm.locals.com Rumble https://rumble.com/user/peacefulheartfarm YouTube youtube.com/peacefulheartfarm Patreon www.patreon.com/peacefulheartfarm Facebook www.facebook.com/peacefulheartfarm Instagram www.instagram.com/peacefulheartfarm

It has been a while so how about a homestead update and health update. I republished a couple of podcasts. I hope you got a chance to listen for the first time or relisten if you were interested in the topic of cheese. It’s going to be close, but I think I can get this podcast published today. Let’s hope all goes well and I am able to accomplish it. If it doesn’t, I am likely to abandon the effort for another week. My life is topsy-turvy and I only have so much time each day to take care of any given task. When things don’t go well, they get pushed to the next day. It’s my method of reducing stress. Let’s pause a moment. I want to take a minute and say welcome to all the new listeners and welcome back to the veteran homestead-loving regulars who stop by the FarmCast for every episode. Thank you for hanging in there with me. I appreciate you all so much. Let’s have a homestead update and then a little info on the status of our health here at Peaceful Heart Farm Our Virginia Homestead Life Updates The cows are coming up first. Cows Last night at about 9:15 we got a call from the neighbors across the street. Two of our cows were in their yard. Who could they be? There were two groups of cows with two animals. I knew it was most likely the two that were scheduled for freezer camp this morning. Sure enough, those two guys were out there wreaking havoc in the neighbor’s yard and trying to get into the pasture with their cows. It was a little harrowing to be trying to work with two very large boys in the dark. However, all of our cows are fairly docile. They were upset and confused of course. I believe that I’ve mentioned before that a cow does not like anything out of the ordinary. They want things to be the same all the time. Routine, routine, routine. So needless to say, everything about this situation was out of the ordinary. Perrin is Secured Nearby, just 20 or 30 feet down the driveway, was a gate to a paddock. Scott opened that gate and Perrin almost immediately went inside. Rocketman was a different story. He went back and forth in front of that gate at least three or four times, never venturing inside. Finally, he started down the driveway and Scott herded him that way and away from the neighbor’s cows. I followed with the car. Of course, once we got him down the driveway the next challenge was finding a way to get him into a pasture. Scott chased him up and down one fence a couple of times. I opened up a couple of gates. One was a gate back to where he escaped. The other was into the field with our nursery girls. It was a little risky letting him in there, but we needed some way to get him into some fence somewhere. Once he was back inside our perimeter fence, there were many options as to how to move forward. Rocketman is Secured Rocketman eagerly went through the very wide-open gate into the pasture with the girls. The girls themselves were way out in the field. We needed to get him contained before he joined with them. That would be a disaster if we had to single him out from that crowd in the dark. Scott quickly contained the girls in paddock number one. Perrin was in paddock number two. And Rocketman was in the travel lane that joins with all paddocks. The goal was to isolate both boys in the small holding area just inside the gate I opened for Rocketman. He had already walked most of the way down the travel lane toward the other paddocks. Scott met him coming the other way while herding Perrin down the travel lane toward the holding area. I was over in paddock number four which runs directly alongside the travel lane. I wanted to be close but not in the travel lane. That would have just confused everything and possibly herded them back out into the field in an attempt to get away from me. Chasing Cows Around Paddock Four Now for the next debacle. There are two gates at the bottom of a hollow. One opens into paddock four where I am and one opens or closes the travel lane where Scott and the boys are walking. I’m a little way up the hill in paddock four, just monitoring how they are moving. Everything looks Ok. Scott is coming down the travel lane headed toward the holding area. I just happened to mention that the gate into paddock four is open and they might come in there instead of continuing up the hill into the holding area. And you know what? That is exactly what they did. Now we are reduced to chasing them around paddock four, still trying to get them to go back through the gate and up to the small holding area. All Ends Well At some point I went down and closed the gate to the travel lane. No sense in letting them run back up that way. Now all we needed to do is get them to go through the other open gate out of paddock four and into the holding area. Somewhere along the way in this process, I noticed that part of the problem we were having is that they would go wherever the light was shining. Our headlamps and flashlights were actually confusing them. As Scott brought them back down the hill for the third or fourth time, I had just finished latching that travel lane gate. I shined my flashlight in the exact place I wanted them to go. It worked. Right through the gate they went. The travel lane gate was closed and now the gate into paddock four could be closed. Whew what a trip. It lasted about 45 minutes. Shortly after 10 o’clock we were back inside and grateful for it. The Girls The girls continued to happily exist up in paddock number one until the next morning. After loading the boys into the trailer, he opened the paddock gate allowing the girls access to the pond for water and cooling baths. Last week we had our vet and AI tech out checking to see who is and is not pregnant. There was good news and bad news. Three are pregnant and three are not. We are going to roll with that for the spring. Buttercup The vet gave us health information on the entire herd. Buttercup did not conceive. This is two years in a row. The vet talked to us about her weight. Too much fat is not a good thing, especially in an aging cow. I won’t go into the details, but her opinion was that, not only had she not conceived, but it was going to be harder and harder for her to conceive as she ages more. She will need to be replaced. Cloud Cloud was pregnant but miscarried. The vet was not too concerned about this. A late term spontaneous abortion would be a different story. But aborting early in the process is not so uncommon. We decided against trying to start over with any of our girls. Cloud is also marked to be replaced. Not because of her miscarriage, but because she kicks so much that we cannot milk her. Due to her strong angus genetics, she is also not really ideal as a milk cow. She simply does not produce as much milk as the others. Not by a long shot. Claire Claire appears to be pregnant but the vet could not 100% confirm it. She did mark her as pregnant but noted that she could not move the uterus to a position where she could know for sure. However, the fact that she could not move it was a good indication that Claire is pregnant. We shall see. Claire is also marked for replacement as she is getting on in years and is prone to mastitis. Her udder is in bad shape. She produces enough milk for her calf and not much more. Luna Now on to one we will keep for a little while, though we may offer her up to anyone looking for a family cow. Luna is pregnant. She is a heifer which means this will be her first calf. We do not expect her to produce lots and lots and lots of milk. Her mom is Cloud and Luna exhibits a lot of the angus coloring traits. We don’t really know how much milk she will produce, but it is likely that it will be substandard for what we are looking for in a milk cow. However, it may be perfect for someone looking for a little milk for their family and a good beef calf every year. We shall see. At this point, her fate is still up in the air. Violet Just a brief note on Violet. She did not make it into the rotation for artificial insemination. And we did not expose her to the bull. She is not pregnant and will remain open for the coming spring birthing season. In June next year, she will make it back into the breeding rotation. Violet has really good Normande breeding genetics. She has the BB kappa casein genetic trait that we want for cheesemaking. I asked about her weight and the vet said that even though her belly is really big and round, she is not overweight near her ovaries and therefore does not have Buttercup’s issue with weight. She’s a keeper for now. The Jerseys, Butter and Rosie Now on to the Jersey girls. Butter is a champ. She is pregnant and looking good. No issues there. Rosie, on the other hand, is not pregnant. The vet had already warned me that this was the most likely issue with a heifer having a calf when she was so very young. Getting pregnant again might take a little time. Scott and I were just discussing this morning that we might want to have one cow that gives birth in the fall so we have some milk year-round. Right now, we dry them up in November and have no fresh milk products until March or April the following year. Rosie might be an ideal candidate for a fall delivery. We shall see. There are still a couple of months ahead of us before we would need to make that decision. Special Cheeses Any cow that gave birth in the fall would be completely out of the rotation for making cheese. Do we really want to give up that milk? It’s still under consideration. It would be nice to have a very small amount of milk to make cream cheese and yogurt throughout the winter. And perhaps a bit of camembert, reblochon or other cheese that we might make in smaller quantities for personal use. Calf Sharing If we decide to do that, we would do what is known as calf sharing. That means the calf stays with mom. Anytime we want to have milk, we simply separate them overnight and milk in the morning. For any of you thinking about having your own milk cow, this offers tremendous freedom. Normally, cows get milked twice a day. But if you are calf sharing, the calf takes care of the milk during the day. Overnight mom makes lots of milk and we get to keep that part. The calf rejoins mom and gets all of the luscious milk throughout the day. As I mentioned earlier, even Luna would produce enough milk to make this work. And if the day comes when you don’t want to milk at all on any given day, just leave calf and mom together for the entire day and night. It’s a win-win situation. The calf really appreciates the extra juice and the homesteader gets a break from milking every single day, seven days a week. Well, that was a lot of cow updates. On to the sheep. I won’t be as long-winded here I promise. Sheep and Mack Mack is doing a good job of protecting the few sheep that we have left in the flock. We had one ewe that had an abscess on her chest. The vet drained it and gave us instructions on how to care for it. She is nearly healed already. Lambert, the ram had deeper issues. We don’t really know the cause but he had some pretty severe hoof issues. The vet seemed to think it was perhaps related to running around trying to get away from predators that precipitated this issue. His feet were really sore. She tried trimming his hooves but there wasn’t really much there. We treated all of the sheep for hoof scald and hoof rot. This is a problem that we are aware of but have never encountered. It usually happens when their hooves are not in top shape and they are exposed to a lot of water. And it appears, that lots of stress on the hooves can caused problems. Worms Again? In addition to the hoof problem, Lambert also had an enormous worm load. He had lost lots and lots of weight. He is still actually quite weak. The worms suck the blood out via the stomach. The animal becomes very anemic. It does take some time to heal. Hopefully, Lambert will turn the corner soon and regain his weight and strength. He was pretty far gone and his health is still up in the air. The remaining two seems to be in relatively good shape. We wormed all of them just to be sure. Lambert’s worm overload was also likely precipitated by the enormous amount of stress they all endured during the predator attacks. Stress can weaken their systems enough to give the worms the window of opportunity they need to begin to multiplying uncontrollably. It has been a good long time since we had any issues with worms and we may have been a little lax. Going forward we will be keeping a closer eye on these guys. Hopefully, they will all stay relaxed and continue to live peacefully on the homestead. We are also still looking to add a few more ewes to the flock soon. Rebuilding will take some time and we want to get started on that process. Two more dogs are lined up to help us out as we rebuild from the disastrous spring and summer. More on that later. Personal Health Update Before closing today I’ll give a brief health update for both Scott and myself. Scott is doing very well with treatment. He is two and a half weeks into seven weeks of radiation treatment. No chemo, thank the Lord. He drives an hour each way to receive the treatment, Monday through Friday. I will be accompanying him in the coming days. He is managing the treatment very well. A sore throat makes it more and more difficult to eat. There are lots of treatments to help with that as well. Taking daily naps is a way of life for him. Sometimes for a couple of hours, but yesterday for only a half hour. We are still fairly early on in the treatment so we will see how he progresses. Treatment Side Effects At this point in the treatment, the worst side effects start to manifest. I already mentioned the difficulty in getting food down due to the pain in his throat. Add to this that his taste will change. Doctors have let him know that everything will begin to taste horrible. Their experience has shown that the taste issue will continue for a month or two or even more past the time when the treatments are complete. As you can imagine, this adds insult to injury. He already has trouble swallowing. How much worse will it be when he has to force himself to even put anything into his mouth? Scott is a trooper. He is a stoic individual. I fully expect he will plow through this just like he does any other issue that presents itself to his world. I am here to support him in any way that I can. My Health My state of health is stable. That is the best way I can describe it. The time prior to the treatment starting was more stressful. I can say that at this point. Who knows what the future will hold? I could be off-the-scale stressed next week. The uncertainty of what the future would hold, one appointment after another in preparation for treatment and my own insecurity about whether I was mentally and emotionally up to the task of caring for Scott was wreaking havoc on my normal schedule and making me a little cray-cray. Now that we are settled into a routine, I am handling it much better. I feel much more relaxed and confident in my ability to respond to Scott’s needs as they arise. We are blessed to have all of you praying for us. Thank you so much. Please continue to pray for us and we will pray for you. Final Thoughts That’s it for today’s podcast. I know the cow updates were long and perhaps too detailed. I didn’t even get to the quail. Well, too late now. I need to get this podcast published and then on to the evening chores. It’s time to wake Scott up from his nap so he can start on his evening routine. The regularity of routine is a life saver when your life is topsy-turvy. Again, thank you so much for your prayers. And I will add the shameless plugs because we need your support. If you enjoyed this podcast, please go to Apple Podcasts or Google Play whatever podcasting service you use, SUBSCRIBE and give me a 5-star rating and review. If you like this content and want to help out the show, the absolute best way you can do that is to share it with any friends or family who might be interested in this type of content. Let them know about the Peaceful Heart Farmcast. Thank you so much for stopping by the homestead and until next time, may God fill your life with grace and peace. To learn about herd shares: Visit our website Herd Share page To share your thoughts: Leave a comment on our Facebook PageShare this show on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram To help the show: PLEASE LEAVE A REVIEW for Peaceful Heart FarmCast on Apple Podcasts.Subscribe on iTunes, Stitcher Radio, Google Play Music, TuneIn or SpotifyDonate on Patreon Website www.peacefulheartfarm.com Patreon www.patreon.com/peacefulheartfarm Facebook www.facebook.com/peacefulheartfarm Instagram www.instagram.com/peacefulheartfarm Locals Peacefulheartfarm.locals.com

How Cheese Makes You Happy! Today’s Show Homestead Life UpdatesCheese and Nutrition Nutritional contentCheese tastes goodFacts about fat contentLactose intoleranceWhy cheese makes people happy Cheese Fondue Recipe Homestead Life Updates Scott is working hard on getting the creamery built. Every day that does not bring adverse weather sees him out there building the walls. There are also lots of other odds and ends and details he adds in there that breaks up the monotony. I’m am so blessed to have such a wonderful life here with him. Our life has purpose and meaning as we both work hard to bring you the benefits of traditional hand-made artisan cheese. The winter drags on. Seems like a long one this year doesn’t it? Every year winter is the same 13 weeks on the calendar but the weather conditions during that period of time alters our perception of time, I think. There is a common winter ailment called seasonal affective disorder. I’m sure some of you know of what I speak. It’s a type of depression that’s related to changes in the seasons. Symptoms can begin as early as the fall and continue into the winter months. Occasionally, SAD causes depression into the spring or early summer, but that is rarer. Spring usually brings a rush of relief. I experience SAD every year. This year is different. I’ve significantly changed my diet and it shows. While I can still feel the effects of this winter season, it is muted compared to previous years. I feel kind of heavy sometimes; slightly weighted down by life in general.  As an aside, I generally just suffer through it. However, there are things you can do. Light therapy or phototherapy is the most common treatment. Some schools of thought attribute the issue to reduced vitamin D from the sun as there is less light due to the length of the day.  More severe cases may require medication or psychotherapy. The symptoms may start as a minor issue such as having trouble sleeping or a general loss of interest in doing anything. Low energy, feeling sluggish or maybe agitated for no reason. As the season progresses, the symptoms get worse and worse. In the past it has seemed overwhelming to me. And then, poof, spring arrives and it all evaporates like mist. Let’s talk about how cheese might help with that. Did you know that cheese has nutritional properties that stimulate our happy hormones? First, let’s cover the basic nutrition in cheese. Cheese and Nutrition Cheese is a delicious and tremendously efficient source of nutrition. It supplies many valuable nutrients, including proteins, sugars, vitamins, minerals, and trace elements. A 4-ounce piece of solid farmhouse cheese, for example, supplies more than half the adult nutritional requirements for protein, fat, calcium, and phosphorus as well as significant portions of vitamins A, B2, and B12. If you compare the nutritional content of a 3.5-ounce chunk of a hard, aged cheese such as Cheddar or Emmental to an equivalent amount of chicken eggs (two eggs are about 3.5 ounces), the cheese contains about twice as much protein and one quarter the cholesterol. The miracle of evolution has ensured that milk is an extremely nutritious food. After all, without it how would mothers, down through the eons, have guaranteed the survival of their babies? Cheese concentrates the nutrients in milk. It’s a highly efficient method of getting vital nutrients for our bodies. Another advantage to cheese is that its nutrients are “predigested” by bacteria and enzymes during cheesemaking and aging. That means the process of breaking down the proteins, fats, and sugars began before it was savored on our palette and began the journey to our tummy. Plants in the pasture have absorbed nutrients from the soil; the dairy animals have extracted those nutrients, packaging them in the form of milk. That’s another place that a lot of gathering nutrients has already been done for you. Your body has to devote less effort to processing cheese than it does with many other comparably nutritious foods. Cheese Tastes Good Cheese tastes good and satisfies us. A big reason for that is the fat. There are beneficial fats available in milk. Many of them work as antioxidants and also provide fat-soluble vitamins good for our skin and other organs. In cheese, milk fats undergo lipolysis, which breaks them down into more easily absorbed and beneficial fatty acids, some of which in turn enable us to metabolize the fats from other foods. CLA Cheeses, especially those made from the milk of grass-fed animals, are a good source of conjugated linoleic acid, or CLA, a highly beneficial nutrient. In small studies involving animals, CLA has been shown to prevent heart disease and several types of cancer. It also appears to enhance the immune system.  CLA is considered a fat-reducing fat. You heard that right. There are studies on this. Let me give you some info from one study. I’ll put a link in the show notes. Jean-Michel Gaullier, PhD with the Scandinavian Clinical Research Group did the study. It was a relatively small number of participants. 180 men and women were followed for a year. A third got a typical off-the-shelf pill of 80% CLA. Another third got a 76% CLA syrup formula, disguised in a capsule. The last third took a placebo capsule of olive oil. No one had to change their diet or exercise habits. All reduced their calorie intake a little bit during the study. Likely that was due to tracking with a food diary. That can really wake you up to what you are actually consuming. As far as exercise, all got about the same amount. The results were: Both CLA groups lost weight – about 4 pounds; the placebo group stayed the same.The CLA syrup group had a 9% body fat loss; the CLA pill group had 7% body fat loss; the placebo group had no body fat loss.Both CLA groups had similar improvements in muscle mass. Good news ay? Losing weight was good, but I found the conversion of fat to muscle mass to be the most interesting to me. CLA is found naturally in beef, lamb, goat and dairy products. Facts About Fat Content Because cheese contains fat, naturally, it raises concerns. There are some valid concerns there. Not for the fat, but for the calories. A little bit of cheese goes a long way. Real cheese delivers a lot of nutritional bang for your buck and a lot of caloric bang for your buck. The fat is the culprit there. The key is to eat moderate amounts along with your other dietary choices. Let’s talk about the fat content of various cheeses. Contrary to appearances, hard, grainy cheeses such as Parmesan may actually contain more fat than creamy, luxurious ones such as any triple cream cheese. The rich triple cream types are labeled “75% butterfat” while a Parmigiana–Reggiano claims around 35% butterfat. The trick is that cheeses are labeled by percentage of fat in their solid materials, not in their total weight. Cheeses retain water, even after much of it is extracted during cheesemaking. The less water a cheese retains, the harder or denser it will be. A dense cheese with, say, 50% butterfat, could actually deliver more fat per serving than a soft, gooey one with 70% butterfat. Lactose Intolerance Let’s talk about lactose intolerance. Well–made, aged cheeses are actually one of the few dairy products that will not cause problems for many people with this difficulty. The first and most important step of cheesemaking, alongside protein coagulation, is the conversion of lactose into lactic acid – the souring or fermentation action of lactic acid bacteria on milk. The small amount of lactose left over after active cheesemaking ends is further broken down by glycolysis during aging. What this means is that for people who have trouble digesting lactose, it’s not a problem because the digestion has already been done for them by the cheesemaking and aging process. Give it a try. You, too, can be a happy cheese eater. Speaking of cheese making your happy. Why is that? Why cheese makes people happy A wonderful piece of info I ran across wherein a neurologist talks about how cheese literally makes you happy. Dr. Thomas C Morell is the neurologist. Link to the article will be in the show notes. The title of the piece is Nutritional Neuroscience. The central core of the article is using nutrition to help heal TBI or traumatic brain injury. There is some really good information about how the brain functions along with how and why nutrition is important to maximize brain function. Later in the article he gets specifically to cheese as “the first food that will help your brain.” He cites cheese as an extraordinarily rich source of proteins and amino acids. One of those amino acids is Tyrosine. Dr. Morell’s comments on the relation of tyrosine to neurotransmitters in the brain are noted in the article. Some quotes from the article: (again, reference in the show notes) “The body does not produce Tyrosine so it must be obtained from outside sources, of which cheese contains very high concentrations. We quickly began to realize that cheese is one of nature's perfect foods for the body and for brain functioning! Furthermore, the pleasure of eating cheese in its multitude of varieties is not just for the sensuous pleasure of taste and smell, but actually has nutritional importance that will help the neurotransmitters in your brain. Cheese not only supplies calories for metabolism as well as being an excellent source of Calcium, but contains proteins and amino acids that are intricately associated with manufacturing many important brain chemicals.” Then he talks about how cheese makes people happy. “Cheese can make people happy. Why? It starts with Tyrosine which is a building block for many of the neurotransmitter chemicals in the brain. It can improve mood and well-being particularly during times of stress. Tyrosine is a substrate of many well-known neurotransmitters including adrenaline, norepinephrine, and dopamine. Cheese may be one of the basic primordial foods that improved the performance of our brain, with deep connections from the olfactory bulb to the parts of our brain responsible for memory and emotions. Cheese may just be the perfect food to capture the nutritional-emotional duality that our bodies and brains need!” I find it so refreshing that our medical profession is starting to look at food as nutrition for building, maintaining, and healing the body. “Cheese contains high levels of casein which is the primary protein found in milk. As casein is broken down and digested it is converted into Tyrosine. Casein is also broken down into the chemical casomorphin, an opioid molecule in the same family as morphine. This may explain some of cheese's addicting qualities!” I can relate to the addicting quality of cheese. As my diet has improved, my urge for eating too much food is strongly diminished. However, once I start eating cheese, I may overeat if I don’t pay attention. “There are many receptors for the Tyrosine molecule in the olfactory bulb where our sense of smell courses through the Central Nervous System. The Tyrosine in cheese is broken down into several chemicals. One of them is epinephrine (adrenaline) which has many positive physical and mental effects to make us more alert. Epinephrine also increases the flow of oxygen and glucose to the brain and muscles which elicits the "Fight or Flight" response to stressful or dangerous situations. Norepinephrine helps fight off depression and can improve our attention and concentration skills. Dopamine is a powerful neurotransmitter involved in mood stability and accounts for pleasurable feelings and activation of the brain's reward systems. Tyrosine is also a precursor to levodopa which is used to replace deficiency of Dopamine in Parkinson's disease. Finally, Tyrosine is also a precursor to Melatonin, the skin pigment that protects us from ultraviolet sunlight damage but is also associated with insulin production which regulates blood sugar levels.” How perfect is cheese? It makes you feel good with the neurotransmitter action and supplies energy and protein. All are critical for brain performance and memory retention. As a final note on the topic, have you ever wondered what those little crunchy pockets that develop in the paste of well-made aged cheeses are? Those are crystals of tyrosine embedded in the long chains of amino acids of the casein molecules. When they make your mouth water, they are not only providing cheese eating pleasure but they’re also setting into motion a series of very real and tangible benefits to your body and brain. Let’s move on to today’s cheese fondue recipe. Cheese Fondue Recipe Cheese fondue can be fancy or it can be a quaint and close tradition in any family or group of friends. As an added bonus, it’s easy to make. The only skill needed is the ability to stand at a stove and stir. Cheese fondue is a Swiss invention which became popular in the US in the 1960’s. I’m looking to revive that tradition. As its core fondue is melted cheese served in a pot over a portable heating device and enjoyed communally. It can be made with or without the official fondue set. A double boiler set up will work just fine. Using a crock pot is also an option. The key is low, slow heat. Add some wooden skewers and your homemade fondue set is complete. How to Make the Perfect Cheese Fondue at Home The perfect cheese fondue is rich and smooth. First, I want to go over a few tips to make it easy for that to happen for you. Stick to them and your family and guests will be transported to the Alps from their first bite. Use Good-Quality Cheese. It will be more expensive but worth it. Even if you ignore all of the other tips, keep this one. Fondue truly is all about the cheese, and the quality and types of cheeses you use will have an enormous impact on the final product. For classic Swiss cheese fondue (meaning one like what you would find in Switzerland), a mix of traditional, firm alpine mountain-style cheeses is best. Gruyere and Emmental come to mind.We make a cheese called Pinnacle that will serve you well. There are lots of other cheeses that will also work. No need to be bound by the “Swiss” label.You want a buttery, creamy cheese that melts smoothly. Cheddar cheese would work. Even though the flavor would be less traditional, it would still taste fantastic. I’ve used our Clau d’ ville Cheddar mixed with alpine-style Pinnacle and the blend warms the heart. Grate – do not chop – the Cheese. Grated cheese will melt much quicker. Toss the Cheese with Cornstarch Thoroughly. Cornstarch helps thicken the fondue and prevents the cheese from clumping. You don’t want lumpy cheese! Classic cheese fondue does call for white wine. Use a good wine. Choose something dry and high acid, such as Sauvignon Blanc. The taste of the wine directly impacts the taste of the fondue. The acid in the wine helps keep the cheese smooth and gives it an even texture. Again, we don’t want lumpy fondue.You can substitute unsalted chicken or vegetable stock if you do not want to use wine.For beer cheese fondue, swap out the wine with your favorite beer. Beer works really well in a cheddar cheese fondue. Add the Cheese Slowly and Stir Constantly. This is SO important to make sure the cheese fondue is buttery smooth. Grab a small handful and sprinkle it into the pot. Stir constantly and wait for each addition to melt before adding the next.Don’t try to rush it—you won’t win. Just enjoy the moment at the stove at peace with yourself, the cheese, and the promise of a luscious fondue. What Should You Dip? Bread. Always delicious. French or sourdough cut into 1-inch cubes so that it can be easily skewered.Apples. Tart apples like Granny Smith are fantastic dipped with cheese fondue. Cut the apples into cubes.Cherry Tomatoes. One of my absolute favorites!Roasted Baby Potatoes.Steamed Broccoli. Reminds me of broccoli cheese soup.MushroomsGame Day Delights: Potato or tortilla chipsSoft or hard pretzelsHam, Turkey or BeefBacon. Even better than you think it’s going to taste. Make sure the bacon isn’t  too crisp or it will break off in the pot.Shrimp or musselsKielbasa or hot dogsPepperoniMeatballsPickles. The choices are up to you. There are no rules there. Anything that tastes good with cheese it going to be heaven. It takes about 25 minutes to make the fondue. What You Need 1 pound (4 cups) of 2 or more cheeses of your choice – Gruyere, Emmental, Appenzeller and of course our Pinnacle2 tablespoons cornstarch1 cup dry white wine — such as Sauvignon Blanc1 clove garlic — minced1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice1 tablespoon kirsch – Kirsch is a clear colorless fruit brandy. You may substitute a brandy of your choice1/4 teaspoon nutmeg – ground1 teaspoon Dijon mustard (optional)Assorted Fondue dippers What to do Grate all of the cheeses. In a medium bowl, combine the cheeses with the cornstarch, tossing thoroughly to coat all pieces.In a stove-safe fondue pot or large heavy saucepan, bring the wine, garlic, and lemon juice to a simmer over medium-low heat. Add the cheeses to the simmering liquid a little at a time, stirring well between each addition to ensure a smooth fondue. Once smooth, stir in the brandy, nutmeg, and mustard.Arrange an assortment of bite-size dipping foods on a platter. Carefully pour the fondue into a fondue pot. Serve with fondue forks or wooden skewers.Dip and enjoy! Recipe Notes: If using a crock pot, no need to wait for the wine and lemon to simmer. Put it all in there and stir as needed until the desired consistency is achieved. Final Thoughts I’ve run out of words for today. I hope if you have the winter blues you are taking time out of the day to pamper yourself. And remember, this too shall pass. Enjoy some cheese to get that tyrosine going and get happy. I hope you’ll try the fondue. You can let me know what creative ideas you used and traditions you started by commenting on the Facebook post @peacefulheartfarm. As always, I’m here to help you “taste the traditional touch.” Thank you so much for listening and until next time, may God fill your life with grace and peace. Recipe Link Cheese Fondue References CLA: The New Miracle Weight Loss Pill?Nutritional Neuroscience – Dr. Thomas C. Morell To share your thoughts: Leave a comment on our Facebook PageShare this show on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram To help the show: PLEASE LEAVE A REVIEW for Peaceful Heart FarmCast on iTunes.Subscribe on iTunes, Stitcher Radio, Google Play Music, TuneIn or SpotifyDonate on Patreon Website www.peacefulheartfarm.com Patreon www.patreon.com/peacefulheartfarm Facebook www.facebook.com/peacefulheartfarm

A cancer diagnosis is causing temporary changes to the podcast. We have had a cancer diagnosis and that will affect what I am able to do on a daily basis. I will be caring for Scott and picking up a lot of tasks he normally handles. In the end, it looks like he will be fine. However, getting to that end point will entail traveling a very difficult road of chemo and radiation. I want to take a minute and say welcome to all the new listeners and welcome back to the veteran homestead-loving regulars who stop by the FarmCast for every episode. I appreciate you all so much, even more so right now. Our Virginia Homestead Life Updates I’m going to start with a few more details about our health situation and then give you a few livestock and garden updates. A Cancer Diagnosis Over the past four weeks we have been to one appointment after another. Specialists, CAT scan, biopsy, surgery and a couple more specialist appointments all in little more than 30 days. Scott has had both tonsils out and the healing for that procedure is quite lengthy for an adult. I’ve been milking the cows on my own and with a little help with the heavy lifting from a neighbor. It has been going pretty well. Getting things in Order Scott and I are streamlining as much as possible so we can get through this time period with less stress. We have plenty of cheese stored up, so I will not be making any more cheese for the rest of this milking season. Milking twice a day changed to once a day almost immediately. That reduces the amount of milk that we are handling on a daily and weekly basis. Between the great herd share folks, feeding the calf, making yogurt and having drinking milk for ourselves, I think we will be in good shape here. Oh yeah, and making butter every so often as well. Cheese Cave Changes We are changing how we store the cheese in the cheese cave. Scott handles all of that, and rather than me trying to add that to my already full schedule, we are going to try vacuum packing a lot of the cheeses. I’ll let you know how that goes. Garden Changes The garden is in full swing and there is not much I can do about that except get out there every day or so and bring in the harvest, process it quickly and move on to the next task. I’ve determined that if I get behind on that, the compost pile will be loving it. Podcast Changes The biggest change will be with this podcast. It takes a tremendous amount of time to put out each episode. My plan is to replay some of the older episodes. If you are new this will be a benefit for you. And if you are a long-time listener, I hope you will bear with me as we get through this time. The doctor let me know to expect drastic changes in lifestyle for four to six months. We can do this. Now for a few homestead updates. Creamery Of course, the creamery is completely on hold. This will be my last mention of that for several months.   Cows The cows are hanging in there. I’m a little worried about getting hay to them in the winter. I’ll be looking for help from a neighbor or two in that regard. Moving them from one pasture paddock to another is something I can easily handle. But when the grass runs out, they will need hay brought to them. That means someone who knows what they are doing with a tractor. That’s not me. Fortunately, that task can be done once or twice a week in an hour or so and should not be too much of a burden for those helping us through this time. Sheep The sheep are hanging out with Mack, the sheepdog. They seem to be getting along quite well. We may add a few sheep back to the flock over the next few weeks. Again, moving them from place to place is not hard. So, having six or eight instead of four is not a big deal. We shall see how that plays out. If it seems stressful to try and accomplish it, I will let that do as well. There is always next year. Donkeys Because we now have a livestock guardian dog, the donkeys are going on to another home. This is a high priority in the next few weeks. The donkeys require regular hoof care that I simply will not be able to provide. It will be better for all of us if they get resettled soon. Garden and Orchard The green beans are done. I’ll be canning the last batches this week and next. The crowder peas are just coming on. Today, I packed up quite a few one-pound bags for the farmer’s market tomorrow. There are more out there to pick. Crowder peas are an overall joy for me. I like picking them, shelling them and, most of all, eating them. The tomatoes are also just starting to ripen. They are ripening quite late this year. I’m happy that there is a lot of plant and not so many fruits. I really have no idea what I am going to do with these tomatoes. They are slicing tomatoes. Perhaps I will make the effort to get them to the farmer’s market. Again, if any of these tasks falls behind or becomes overwhelming, the compost pile is always open to new food additions. The last of the fruit is picked. I have several gallon bags of blackberries in the freezer. I can make jelly out of that at my leisure – even next year if needed. Scott harvested the elderberries this year. The bushes have been producing for a few years now but this is the first time we’ve taken the time to harvest the berries. Elderberries are really, really small. They form small tree-like bunches all over the bush. Scott snipped off each little tree and filled a five-gallon bucket. Then he gently stripped the berries off of the twigs. I believe I have maybe a gallon and a half of those berries. I’ll be processing those in the next few days. They will be made into elderberry syrup. It’s good for sore throats and general immune system support. Lots of vitamin C. Final Thoughts That’s about all for today. Again, I will be rerunning some older podcasts beginning soon. If I feel up to it, I may create a new one here and there. Please bear with me and please pray for Scott over the next few months. Oh, I almost forgot. So many have asked how they can support us. Number one is please pray for us. Number two, if you live near, I may need your help from time to time to get Scott to and from his appointments – and with the hay, as I mentioned above. These are my most pressing concerns. This will be a huge financial hit for us between the medical bills and the loss of income from products we would normally produce. If you feel moved to help us out financially, there is a very large “Donate” button on our farm website. You will find it on the podcast page. I originally set this up for donations to support the podcast in general. I have not promoted it, instead footing the bill for the podcast from our profits. At this time, I will open it up for all of you. Not only will you be supporting the cost of the podcast, but at this time you would also be supporting our homestead in general. You can make a one-time donation or set up a recurring, monthly donation. You can also send money via PayPal. Our PayPal email is melanie at peaceful heart farm dot com. Please know that listening and sharing the podcast is also supporting us. It is absolutely one of the best ways to support us. Share it on all of your social media and with friends and family. That helps the most to grow the podcast. Thank you so much for stopping by the homestead and until next time, may God fill your life with grace and peace. To learn about herd shares: Visit our website Herd Share page To share your thoughts: Leave a comment on our Facebook PageShare this show on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram To help the show: PLEASE LEAVE A REVIEW for Peaceful Heart FarmCast on Apple Podcasts.Subscribe on iTunes, Stitcher Radio, Google Play Music, TuneIn or SpotifyDonate on Patreon Website www.peacefulheartfarm.com Patreon www.patreon.com/peacefulheartfarm Facebook www.facebook.com/peacefulheartfarm Instagram www.instagram.com/peacefulheartfarm Locals Peacefulheartfarm.locals.com

Today I want to talk about what I love about homesteading. Quite a few of the previous podcasts have contained lots of information about animal predator issues we have been having. I know it has been a real downer. As for me, it has definitely been a downer and I want to do this podcast to bring a balanced perspective and more positive outlook on our life here on the homestead. We don’t always have such a bad time of it. In fact, what I love about homesteading is a much better representation of what it is like for us most of the time. Let me take a brief minute and say welcome to all the new listeners and welcome back to the veteran homestead-loving regulars who stop by the FarmCast for every episode. I can’t thank you all enough. I appreciate you all so much. And I’m so excited to share with you what’s going on at the farm this week. We have big news. Our Virginia Homestead Life Updates The greatest thing is finally happening. If all goes well over the next few days, we will have a new dog on the homestead. Sheep and Goats We had yet another attack on our sheep. This time it was dogs. The tracks left behind were definitely from dogs. At least two. I’m not going to give the details this time, but we are down to four animals. The flock ram, a yearling and two breeding ewes. Thank God for the imminent arrival of a livestock guardian dog. We can now rebuild our sheep flock and start a new goat herd. The most stressful thing about the whole situation is that we could not rebuild the flock or introduce the new goat breed we are adding to the homestead. I wanted to get back to normal flock size but we simply could not risk bringing new animals onto the homestead that would simply be killed by stray dogs. They are still out there. Yesterday we found dog tracks down in the very creek bed where the previous destruction occurred. It had rained hard the day before. These tracks were fresh yesterday. I’m so grateful that we have finally found a dog. Let me tell you a little bit about him. Mack the Catalonian Sheep Dog Mack was rehomed from a family that sold all of their sheep and therefore he no longer had a job. He was born and raised in the pasture with livestock, which is what we were looking for in a guardian dog. The lady from which we are getting him has had him for just a few months. She began having a bit of an issue with him going to visit the neighbors while she was not there during the daylight hours. At night he protected his animals. Wandering is Not Good As she does not live on that farmland where he was housed, he began seeking company elsewhere. She expected him to stay with the animals all the time. It seems that while she was only a few miles away, he still needed to know a human was around and sought out the neighbors to fill that role. We are hoping that because we are here all the time, he will be comfortable knowing we are always around and that he will be diligent about staying with the sheep. We shall see. It has been many, many years since either of us has had a dog. I, for one, am looking forward to this new adventure. I hope Mack will be happy with us and with his new flock of sheep. Adding the goats later will be an interesting exercise in introducing new animals to Mack. I’m sure I’ll be regaling stories of the ups and downs of livestock guardian dog ownership. Stay tuned. Cows We are still waiting on Violet to come into heat. Does it seem like to you that we are always “waiting on Violet” for something? I know it seems like it to me. We are pretty confident that all of the other girls are gestating a new calf. Will Violet get with the program? Only time will tell. She needs to conceive in the next few weeks or we end up in the same situation again. We have just a few weeks to meet our schedule of having her pregnant and due for delivery no later than the last week of April. Quail New quail babies will hatch in a few days. I have 84 eggs in there. I’m not sure what is going to happen this time. A couple of days ago we had a power outage. A tree fell on a line during a particularly heavy thunderstorm. We were out of power for several hours. This is not a problem during any time when the incubator is not running. After about an hour, we started the generator and plugged in the incubator. The temp was quite low and the humidity was really high due to the moisture from the rain. It stabilized quickly but I have no idea how this will affect the hatch rate. I was going back and forth trying to decide between getting a battery big enough to jump start the car or one that would simply be enough for the cell phone and credit card reader. I need those two things working when I’m at the farmer’s market. This power outage clarified that decision. HALO Bolt There is a product called Halo Bolt and there are several different models. It comes with a small set of jumper cables, a couple of USB connections and even a place to attach a small device with an AC plug. It costs just under $100 dollars. On the other hand, I can get a small charging device without the AC outlet and jumper cable capability for about 20 bucks. I was leaning in that direction. I just got a new car battery and don’t expect to have to use the jumper cables for quite a few years. But the experience of being without power for the incubator has convinced me to invest in the more expensive unit. Let’s Get One and Test It Out We cranked up the generator. But that was overkill for one little incubator. The more practical solution would be to be able to plug it into that battery for a little while. At least I think that will work. It is designed for charging a tablet or laptop, but I believe you can plug in any AC cord and run the device. We shall see. I’ll give it a try and let you know how it turns out. These are the kinds of things for which everyone needs to be prepared. You simply never know when the power is going to be out. For you it might be that you need to be able to charge your cell phone. For us, it’s going to be keeping the incubator running for those quail eggs. Garden I have three 5-gallon buckets of green beans in the cooler. We picked them Sunday evening. Tomorrow I’ll be packaging them up for the farmer’s market. They look beautiful. I’m so glad we got this great harvest. In the next few weeks, the Mexican bean beetles will come out and take over the plants. We don’t use any pesticides on our garden, not even the organic ones. We pick them off or squish them. But using this method ensures that eventually the bugs will win. Planting extra and making sure the plants are healthy and not a magnet to bugs are my two strategies for pest control and reaping a decent harvest. There are small tomatoes all over the place out there. That’s going to be another great crop to harvest in the very near future. Orchard In the orchard, the blackberries are all that is left to pick. Scott cleaned out the wild blackberries that have thorns so it is easy for me to pick the remaining blackberries. We still have quite a few that are red and not yet ripe. I have a couple of gallons in the freezer right now. My plan for those is to steam the juice out of them and make seedless blackberry jelly. I don’t know what happened to the apples. We had several trees that had apples for the first time ever but those apples disappeared. I suspect the deer that briefly invaded the orchard area is the culprit there. There is always next year. I was hoping to see the strawberries bloom again. They are supposed to be everbearing. The deer ate all of the green leaves a while back, but they have grown back and the plants look great. Still waiting on those blooms and more strawberries. Creamery Still nothing going on here. It may be another couple of weeks before anything gets going again in the creamery. Scott is so busy with the high summer tasks of keeping the fields and orchards cut. Repairing fences takes up him time and so on. He has three or four more fields to mow and then maybe he can get back on the creamery tasks. You never know though. Some other tasks may come up. We shall see. Let’s talk about what I love about homesteading. What I Love About Homesteading I’m just going to run through a list of things that came up when I thought about what I love about homesteading. They are not in any particular order. Setting my own schedule The first thing that I love is that I’m in charge of when I get up and go to work. I say this with some ambiguity. It’s not like I can sleep until noon on any given day. In fact, there are still chores that need to be done on a regular basis, usually at a particular time. But as I have chosen to make those chores part of my life, I’m still in charge. I’m free to change the routine at any time. It might involve changing what animals we house here, but I certainly have that option. Daily Planning Meetings Another thing that is an absolute delight is having daily meetings with Scott about what we are going to do on any given day. It is a continuation of the hours and hours that we spent dreaming about what we were going to do once we were living here all the time, no longer working for someone else. We still dream together on a daily basis. Making cheese Once a week I make cheese. I love making cheese. It is a peaceful occupation. Sometimes it requires a bit of heavy lifting and that makes me tired, but in the end, I get these wonderful masterpieces of cheese on which to gaze. The entire process is still so amazing to experience, even though I’ve done it hundreds of times. To see liquid milk turn into a solid wheel or two or three of cheese is still awesome to see. Gardening Gardening without having to work it in around other things, well for the most part. This is like saying I set my schedule. There are sometimes when I need to do things in the garden but I also need to make cheese or go to the bank or clean the bathroom and so on. So, I do end up working it in around other things. But what I don’t have to do is try to work it in after a day at the office or in a limited time frame on the weekend. I have the whole week to figure out where I am going to fit in the gardening. Perhaps this sounds too simple. But we spent years and years driving back and forth from Virginia to South Carolina for work. I had all day Saturday and Sunday until 6 pm to get all of the gardening done as well as laundry and cleaning and on and on. The garden was always overrun with weeds. It was not really that fun. Now it is a joy. And of course it is hard work when it is 85 or 90 degrees out, but it is a good work out. And if I don’t get it all done in one day, I have other days in which to work out when to get out there and water, weed, and pick veggies.   Experiencing the Seasons Experiencing each of the seasons up close and personal is part of our everyday life. The gardens brought that to mind. In the past, we experienced spring, summer, fall and winter as changes in temperature. Perhaps whether it snowed or rained was the most important aspect of the season but daily activities remained pretty much the same. Get up, go to work, come home, watch a little TV, go to bed and then do it all over again. Now, each season brings us a change in what we do on the homestead. There is a lot of activity associated with spring, summer and fall. But each activity is different. In general, spring time is for planting, summer for weeding and watering and the fall is all about the harvest and preserving the harvest. Some of that happens all along the way, but in general, this is how I think about my life. The primary focus in the spring is getting the planting done. The primary focus in the summer is weeding and water, though there is a lot of harvesting happening as well. It just moves around a lot from one plant to the next to the next. In the fall, it is all about getting everything in and preserved for later use. And I never thought I would say this, but I love the winter now. It is a time to slow down, take stock of what worked and what needs to be changed in the next season. I used to hate winter. Seasonal Affective Disorder is something I have struggled with most of my life. As the winter season wore on, I would get more and more inactive and more and more depressed. Recently, in the last few years, I’ve changed my diet, eliminating most carbohydrates. My moods stabilized. Now I experience the winter with joy. I still slow down. That’s why winter is useful. It is a time to rest up and revitalize the roots so the organism is strong and bursting with energy in the spring. I’m having a great experience with that deep revitalization in the winter. And I’m ready to get up and go when spring arrives. Losing Track of the Day and Hour Not knowing what day of the week it is or what time of day it is can be a little disconcerting. But I really only have to think about it once or twice a day. In the morning I determine what day it is and what I need to accomplish for the coming days. Things like getting ready for the farmer’s market or doing a podcast or newsletter. These things are done on specific days so I need to be ready for that. Otherwise, I check my list of things to do and get going on the first item. In the evening there is a bit of reflection on what to prepare for the next day. One of the farmer’s markets requires me to get up at 5:15 am and the other 6:00 am. Other days of the week, the alarm goes off at 6 but we may or may not get up immediately. We have some leeway on those days. But market days, we pop up and get going as soon as the alarm sounds.   New Life The new births that happen in the spring. I never get tired of the new births. It is stressful for me, as I’ve said before. But I wouldn’t trade that joy of new birth for anything in the world. Tours for Kids Sharing our homestead with kids that come to visit. They love it so much. I watched a group of 8 kids just a few days ago which they explored the quail. They delighted in watching these quirky birds. They didn’t just look at them and say, “Oh they are cute.” No, they watched and watched and watched them. They looked into each section of the cages. They opened the cage doors and looked for eggs. It was so beautiful to see. Clean Eating Another thing I love about the homestead is cooking with ingredients that I raised myself. I know the exact contents of everything I eat. I either raised it myself, purchased or bartered for it from another farm or homestead, or I purchased a single ingredient item in the store. This was the first and most important reason that we started our dream of living the homestead life. I get so tired of reading the labels on foods in the grocery store and seeing all kinds of things that I cannot even pronounce. There are so many fillers and everything has sugar or wheat or gluten added. Even the meats now are injected with flavoring and fillers to bulk up the product. The label says something like, “contains 10% of something or other” to maintain freshness or enhance flavor or whatever. That’s 10% of the meat that is something that did not originate with the animal. I’m so glad those days are past. Spending Time in the Kitchen I get to spend lots of time in the kitchen storing food and being food self-reliant. When working for someone else, time in the kitchen was a dreadful activity. I wanted to eat out as much as possible. Who wants to cook after working all day? I’m ready to sit down and let someone else do the work. Of course, I was eating a lot of really bad stuff. Chinese take out was a favorite. There is a lot of sugar in that stuff. So that is all in the past. I spend time in the kitchen when I choose. Sometimes I make a meal that will last for days. In the intervening days, I might be making jam or canning pickled peppers. Canning is another task that I used to dread when I worked for other people. It was something I had to do and I had to do it right away in a limited time frame on Saturday or Sunday. It was stressful. Now there is still stress to get the harvest processed but the window of time has expanded. I have every day, seven days a week to plan for the next harvest and canning session.   Long Term Dreaming/Planning Sessions Long term planning of the next step in our journey or modifying the previous plan is just as wonderful now as it was when we were just dreaming. We spent years dreaming about what we were going to do once we lived full time on our homestead. We wanted to do everything. We soon found out that we had to pick and choose what to do. There are simply not enough hours in the day to do all of which we dreamed. But the dreaming and planning is so much fun. And it continues. There is always something new to be added, changed or deleted from our homestead. Daily Communion with God And the final thing I want to say about what I love about homesteading is just getting up and going outside and communing with God. Living the homestead lifestyle makes it effortless. While all the work is going on and on and on, seemingly endless, there is always time to just stop and listen to the birds, feel the sunshine and soft breeze, and to watch God’s creations grazing in the fields, the children playing and the amazing plants growing and changing each day as they blossom and produce their fruits. We are truly blessed. Final Thoughts That’s it for today’s podcast. I may have rambled a bit here and there but I hope you enjoyed the uplifting ideas I talked about. Let me know what your dreams are and how you are progressing toward them. It doesn’t have to be the homestead life. We are all unique in our hopes and desires. Please share your dreams with me. I’d love to hear your story. Send me an email. Let me know what’s beautiful in your life. If you enjoyed this podcast, please hop over to Apple Podcasts or whatever podcasting service you use, SUBSCRIBE and give me a 5-star rating and review. If you like this content and want to help out the show, the absolute best way you can do that is to share it with any friends or family who might be interested in this type of content. Let them know about the Peaceful Heart Farmcast. Thank you so much for stopping by the homestead and until next time, may God fill your life with grace and peace. To learn about herd shares: Visit our website Herd Share page To share your thoughts: Leave a comment on our Facebook PageShare this show on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram To help the show: PLEASE LEAVE A REVIEW for Peaceful Heart FarmCast on Apple Podcasts.Subscribe on iTunes, Stitcher Radio, Google Play Music, TuneIn or SpotifyDonate on Patreon Website www.peacefulheartfarm.com Patreon www.patreon.com/peacefulheartfarm Facebook www.facebook.com/peacefulheartfarm Instagram www.instagram.com/peacefulheartfarm Locals Peacefulheartfarm.locals.com

A day in the life on our homestead. My brother-in-law says we are always working. He is so right. And we love it. There is never a dull moment around here. For sure, sometimes it seems like just too much and wouldn’t a life of leisure be preferable. No, not really. As I imagine that life, I can only see boredom and always searching for something new and interesting. Here we don’t have to search for it as it comes to us every single day. Today I’ll give you an overview of a whirlwind day I recently experienced. I want to take a minute and say welcome to all the new listeners and welcome back to the veteran homestead-loving regulars who stop by the FarmCast for every episode. I appreciate you all so much. I’m so excited to share with you what’s going on at the farm this week. Our Virginia Homestead Life Updates I’m going to skip most of the updates on the animals as they will show up in my rendition of a day in the life on our homestead. I will just briefly mention that Sweet Pea and Johnny are still looking for a new “forever home”. We love them but we simply do not need four donkeys. We intentionally reduced our sheep population and now the coyotes have reduced it even further. It will take time to rebuild what we have lost. In the end, we will still have only a small number of sheep, perhaps a dozen or so, compared to our high of 70 animals in the flock. We are winding down our cashmere goat herd this fall. Next up will be bringing in a few Kiko goats. Perhaps I will do a whole podcast on this breed of goat. They were bred in New Zealand. The wild goats were bred with domestic stock to create a breed that is disease and parasite resistant. And my favorite attribute they bred for was little to no hoof maintenance. Most domestic goats in the US have a really hard time with their hooves. I look forward to raising goats that can be comfortable on their feet without constant attention. That’s it for now. I want to get on to the topic of a day in the life on the homestead. I hope you enjoy this brief glimpse of the story of our life. A Day in the Life Our day begins the same every morning. Scott and I pray the rosary together. It’s a great meditation and starts our day off in the right frame of mind. God first. Morning Milking Now we get ready for morning milking. There isn’t much for me to as Scott handles most of the milking tasks. I handle some of the cleanup at the end. The only thing I have for this morning is to tend to the baby quail chicks. I make sure they have food and fresh water. The little ones get checked on twice a day. The grownups, only in the evening. Everyone looks good this morning and they are happy to have food and water. Morning Gardening Scott is still working on the milking so I take the opportunity for a brief walk through the garden. I decide to harvest some fresh herbs for the farmer’s markets. It’s a spur of the moment decision just because I have some time and it’s a beautiful morning to be in the garden. I sprint back to the house, pick up some scissors and a bucket and I’m back out in the garden in a flash. I love cutting fresh herbs. This morning it’s basil leaves, oregano sprigs and bunches of thyme. The smell is heavenly. The herbs are quickly stored in the cooler. I will package them later – probably tomorrow. Making a Snack I need to have protein snacks quickly available. Hard boiled eggs are one of my favorites. My Corsori, an Instapot lookalike, can handle 18 eggs at a time. Six minutes under pressure, six minutes cool down and natural pressure release, followed by a quick pressure release and open the lid. Six minutes in a cold-water bath, then peel. I like using my pressure cooker because the shells always just fall off when I am peeling them. We generally eat just two meals a day. Scott makes us brunch somewhere between 10:00 am and 1:00 pm. It is usually in that 11:00 to 12:00 range. If I plan well, dinner will be around 5:00 pm for me. Scott’s dinner is always much later. Well, not always, but usually his preference is to work outside right up until milking time in the evening. He will eat after all of that is done and he has had a shower. That’s an Italian evening meal time around 9:00 or 10:00 in the evening. So