Though we've been working hard here at Spring Creek Farm for six weeks, this week for the first time the tempo has picked up to the fast-paced farm life we'll be living this season. However, we haven't just been sitting around eating bon-bons for the last month and a half! We've been busy preparing garden beds, starting seeds in the hoophouses, transplanting starts, and caring for the animals.
Spring Creek Farm has a diverse array of animals. If you stop work and look around you, chances are you will see at least one animal staring back at you framed by picturesque surroundings. From rabbits to rams, there are a lot of mouths to feed, each with its own personality.
Cast of Characters:
Ducks and Geese: Our aquatic feathered friends aren't raised for meat, but add to the quirky menagerie. Their antics are always amusing, especially a full-fledged goose fight, which consists of two geese nipping each other's necks while their wings beat against each other.
Quails/Bobwhites: It's amazing how much personality can fit into such tiny poultry. As the cages open for the morning feeding, some quails call out an alarm, some fly about, while others may attack your hand, impatiently awaiting their food. Bobwhites on the other hand, only seem to flee from everything. Even though they've been feed every morning at the same time for at least 50 days, it still takes them by surprise. The quail also produce about fifteen eggs a day, which are set aside to be hatched out in the incubator.
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| Somehow, molting turkeys just aren't as impressive |
Chickens and Turkeys: These free-ranging fowl provide us with enough eggs to supply our over-a-dozen-eggs-a-day habit, with plenty left over to sell. The three tom turkeys spend most of the day puffed up, trying to impress someone, and any turkey warble impersonation, no matter how poor, will prompt a response.
Guineas: There are about two dozen guineafowl, a mildly domesticated bird that originated from Africa. Their hobbies include aggressively chasing chickens in random directions, and consuming any tick on the farm. We don't eat them here, but apparently menus boasting "pheasant" are often actually serving guineafowl. Their piercingly grating call can be heard anywhere on the farm at most times of the day. Matt, a WWOOFer here, pointed out that guineafowl are sometimes used as an alarm animal, to give warning of any threatening or unusual presence. Based on our experience, this concept is ridiculous since guineas seem to be inherently alarmed at everything, from the harmless dog they've lived with their entire life to someone looking at them crossways. Their screeching cackling is so constant that we've learned to tune it out, though most newcomers need earplugs to sleep the first night.
Rabbits: There are eighteen
adult meat rabbits and seven younguns housed in the barn. When we first arrived, multiple mama rabbits were pregnant, and we got to see lots of baby bunnies born. Unfortunately, with temperatures dipping below freezing, and some not-so-great mamas, more than once we found babies who had died in the night. About a dozen did survive, and we have enjoyed watching these babies grow. Although it's a cliche, baby rabbits are super cute. Most of them spend the majority of their day in a big cuddle puddle, nestled so closely together it's hard to tell how many babies there actually are. Around Easter time we sold four as pets to people in the area. However, the fate of most of these rabbits is not as a pet, but on the dinner plate. One day we slaughtered four of them to fill an order for a local eatery. To keep the event of slaughtering as stress-free as possible, Adam takes them out one at a time, and holds them until they are calm. Then he shoots them in the head, and it's over before they knew what happened. Adam's rabbit-cleaning record is nine minutes, though since he was explaining everything to us it took a bit longer. First, the rabbit is submerged in a bucket of water to saturate its fur. The wetter the fur, the less hair gets on the carcass as you clean it. Then the rabbit is skinned, gutted, and given a final rinse.
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| Big Mama and her unexpected lamb |
Sheep: The bulk of the animal population at Spring Creek Farm is sheep, numbering over 60. morning we awake to their impatient bleating as they await the daily feeding. We arrived here in the middle of lambing season, and by now most of the lambs are weaned. The few that aren't still follow their mamas around, tail wagging enthusiastically. The sheep are never sheared, just used for meat, however some of the higher quality sheepskins are saved for luxurious rugs.
Dogs: Two great Pyrenees dogs, Pedro and Paco, do a great job keeping the sheep safe. Spending all day with the sheep makes them eager for any human interaction, and whenever we go in the sheep pasture within a few minutes they will be nudging your hand, looking for a head scratch. Shelby's chocolate lab Hershey enjoys eating quail poop, but also does a decent job of keeping any varmints at bay.
Cows: There is a small herd of Angus-Limousine beef cattle; four cows, one bull, and three new calves are pastured on a hillside overlooking the farm. We often look up from our work to the sight of cows grazing serenely above us. They have been compared to Ents because they change position in the field but you never see them move, except the three calves who are often seen jumping and frolicking together. One of the calves, Cowboy, was born with enlarged joints and had trouble standing. His mama refused to care for him, so he became a bottle baby. When we first arrived we were feeding him milk substitute daily, and when the bottle was gone he would headbutt us trying to make more milk come out. Although this works on cows, it does not work on plastic bottles. Now he seems rather indifferent to his fellow bovines, but he has formed a special bond with Shelby, and anyone else who has fed him. He still meanders hopefully down when anyone approaches the pasture, though now he's doing fine grazing on his own.
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| Maybe not their best side, but the side we see most frequently |
Pigs: Adam and Shelby also have three pigs that are doing a great job of turning our kitchen scraps into delicious bacon.
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Every species enjoys relaxing in the sun
(except maybe jellyfish) |
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| Pedro and Paco getting some attention from Marcus |
Though we've been working hard here at Spring Creek Farm for six weeks, this week for the first time the tempo has picked up to the fast-paced farm life we'll be living this season. However, we haven't just been sitting around eating bon-bons for the last month and a half! We've been busy preparing garden beds, starting seeds in the hoophouses, transplanting starts, and caring for the animals.
Spring Creek Farm has a diverse array of animals. If you stop work and look around you, chances are you will see at least one animal staring back at you framed by picturesque surroundings. From rabbits to rams, there are a lot of mouths to feed, each with its own personality.
Guineas: There are about two dozen guineafowl, a mildly domesticated bird that originated from Africa. Their hobbies include aggressively chasing chickens in random directions, and consuming any tick on the farm. We don't eat them here, but apparently menus boasting "pheasant" are often actually serving guineafowl. Their piercingly grating call can be heard anywhere on the farm at most times of the day. Matt, a WWOOFer here, pointed out that guineafowl are sometimes used as an alarm animal, to give warning of any threatening or unusual presence. Based on our experience, this concept is ridiculous since guineas seem to be inherently alarmed at everything, from the harmless dog they've lived with their entire life to someone looking at them crossways. Their screeching cackling is so constant that we've learned to tune it out, though most newcomers need earplugs to sleep the first night.
Rabbits: There are eighteen adult meat rabbits and seven younguns housed in the barn. When we first arrived, multiple mama rabbits were pregnant, and we got to see lots of baby bunnies born. Unfortunately, with temperatures dipping below freezing, and some not-so-great mamas, more than once we found babies who had died in the night. About a dozen did survive, and we have enjoyed watching these babies grow. Although it's a cliche, baby rabbits are super cute. Most of them spend the majority of their day in a big cuddle puddle, nestled so closely together it's hard to tell how many babies there actually are. Around Easter time we sold four as pets to people in the area. However, the fate of most of these rabbits is not as a pet, but on the dinner plate. One day we slaughtered four of them to fill an order for a local eatery. To keep the event of slaughtering as stress-free as possible, Adam takes them out one at a time, and holds them until they are calm. Then he shoots them in the head, and it's over before they knew what happened. Adam's rabbit-cleaning record is nine minutes, though since he was explaining everything to us it took a bit longer. First, the rabbit is submerged in a bucket of water to saturate its fur. The wetter the fur, the less hair gets on the carcass as you clean it. Then the rabbit is skinned, gutted, and given a final rinse.
Sheep: The bulk of the animal population at Spring Creek Farm is sheep, numbering over 60. morning we awake to their impatient bleating as they await the daily feeding. We arrived here in the middle of lambing season, and by now most of the lambs are weaned. The few that aren't still follow their mamas around, tail wagging enthusiastically. The sheep are never sheared, just used for meat, however some of the higher quality sheepskins are saved for luxurious rugs.
Cows: There is a small herd of Angus-Limousine beef cattle; four cows, one bull, and three new calves are pastured on a hillside overlooking the farm. We often look up from our work to the sight of cows grazing serenely above us. They have been compared to Ents because they change position in the field but you never see them move, except the three calves who are often seen jumping and frolicking together. One of the calves, Cowboy, was born with enlarged joints and had trouble standing. His mama refused to care for him, so he became a bottle baby. When we first arrived we were feeding him milk substitute daily, and when the bottle was gone he would headbutt us trying to make more milk come out. Although this works on cows, it does not work on plastic bottles. Now he seems rather indifferent to his fellow bovines, but he has formed a special bond with Shelby, and anyone else who has fed him. He still meanders hopefully down when anyone approaches the pasture, though now he's doing fine grazing on his own.
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