I'm Back! With even Bigger Ideas!

So it seems as though I have went almost two years without so much as a hint of blogging. Up until I recently logged onto www.backyardherds.com ,an excellent site and forum might I add, I had forgotten all about my little blogging endeavor.

Things have changed significantly in these two years. It almost is funny how much can change. Two years ago I was on top of the world. A high school student, and a homesteader. Not really a likely pair, but I did a fair job. Since then I've moved on. High school has turned into college. College means city life, and city life means farming a whole new way.

That whole new way of farming I haven't really explored yet, but that is all about to change. I am about to embark on a little experiment. This December I move into a small seven hundred and fifty square foot apartment. It is just a little one bedroom. Nothing special in the least except perhaps a porch. Which is the only upsizing I'm doing. Of course I live on the typical college budget, and in a typical college city. With the size constraints and the lack of land to dig into I've been losing my mind, but that's about to change, and I want you to be a part of that!

I now live in the city of Chattanooga, TN. This little city has lost a lot of its relations with where its food comes from, and that has got to change! I am going to attempt to turn my small little apartment into a model for self-sufficiency when it comes to apartment living, while maintaining a stylish home, and an esthetically pleasing atmosphere on a college style budget. Please join me on my new journey of changing Chattanooga and peoples ideas about food and farming! Along the way hopefully if anyone even reads this little blog you will learn some homesteading ideas, and perhaps implement them! Want to know more about me? Well please feel free to click on the link below and visit my Instagram!

Thank you!

http://instagram.com/austintgraf

Simple Goat Kidding Kit

Seeing as December and January are known kidding months and the spring kidding season is simply right around the corner, I felt it was appropriate to share how simple it is to make an at home kidding kit. This kidding kit is very simple and will provide you the means to better manage your herd through the kidding season. Below I have a list of the items inside it and what their function is, it goes as following:

Sterile Scissors - used to cut the umbilical cord to an appropriate length also to cut the string used to tie the umbilical cord.

Thin String - string is needed to tie the umbilical cord to stop bleeding after it is cut.

Iodine - used to dip the umbilical cord in in order prevent infection.

Shot Glass - used to hold the iodine.

Snot Sucker - unsure of the proper name, can purchase in the baby section at most stores. Used to suck fluids out of nose and to stimulate breathing. Be sure to squeeze the air out before inserting into the nostril.

Iodine Swabs - kidding can be a traumatic and stressful time for goats, in labor the constant readjustment in attempt to get comfortable can be hazardous and the goat may snag on loose metal and injury itself one way or another, same can happen with the kids, use swaps to treat these cuts(if there are any) to prevent infection.

Molasses - in labor the doe loses a lot of fluids, provide her a container of warm water with a couple tablespoons of molasses to encourage her to rehydrate.

Vitamin B Complex - a shot of this will help restore energy and iron. Allow your doe to bond, with her kid. Use this only when the kid is completely cared for or when the doe is having a difficult time. ( Another less traumatic solution is about 15 cc of Red Cell orally, it will serve the same purpose).

Syringe & Needle - have the needle already attached to the syringe, so all you have to do is take the cap off and give the shot (used for vitamin b complex, if utilized).

Surgical Gloves - a must for any kit, use the entire time while utilizing the kidding kit to ensure sanitation.

Lubricant( not pictured) - in the case your doe has problems kidding you will need this to lubricate your arm so you can try and readjust the kids, remember don't interfere unless your sure of a breach or your doe has been in labor for an overly long time.

Clean Clothes - used to dry off the kid(s) assuming it is to cold to allow their dam to lick them clean, always if possible let the doe clean her babies, but be sure to clear the face to ensure the kid doesn't suffocate.

I hope this inspires you to start your own kidding kit! This is completely transferable to lambing as well. Remember to always have on hand electrolyte mix, bottles, nipples, colostrum, and milk to feed you kids if issues arise. As a homesteader, I encourage you to try as hard as possible to give the animals you raise the best possible chance at survival as you can. When you brought these animals to your farm you excepted that very responsibility, don't just let a kid or lamb or any other animal die because your tired of trying. Give it your best shot, after all, as homesteaders, animals are a vital part of our culture, treat them with respect.

Update....

Oh man, how time does fly. Just a few days ago, so it seems, it was Fall and I was cutting the dead trees on my property down and splitting wood. Now its full force Winter time, though fairly mild here currently. Christmas is right around the corner and I would swear that just yesterday I was eating turkey and pumpkin pie. Time got away from me and though I have plenty of post ideas I simply never actually sat down and put finger to key. It hasn't been to terribly busy here, of course we have our project of course. We have finished building the hen bantam coop. We recently fenced off for more acres for the cattle. Calving season is done and now its just the art of maintnence. Now that I have little more free time, I plan to post daily or more often. I have a good many topics, and would like to introduce you to my personal homestead.

Thanks,
Austin Graf

Chickens: Winter Time Blues

With the sudden arrival of winter, comes the change in lifestyle for a farmer as well as his stock. While a farmer may still indulge in everyday luxuries, his livestock may not. Typically my chickens are freely running around my farm eating ticks, bugs, and veggies. This is a luxury they have spring through fall, but as the cold winter sets in and the forage dies out, they can still run about but they become bored and more prone to wander into the den of some desperate creature waiting to gobble them up. So, naturally in order to counter act their sense of adventure, I keep them in the coop through winter. While, I have nothing against chickens enjoying a seditary livestyle in a coop, I would like to keep my birds as happy and entertained as possible. Remember, a happy hen is a healthy hen, and a healthy hen lays lots of eggs.

- The first of many thing you can do is "Cabbage on a String"( pictured above) sounds silly right?? Well they love it and its simple and relatively inexpensive. You just take a drill bit and hollow out a small hole through the core of the cabbage. Then take a string and thread it through. Tie the string back to itself then hang it anywhere in your coop. With the lack of forage in the coop yard, it is a great supplement that will keep them occupied for hours and hours.

- A similar option is a commercial "Flock Block" made by Purina available online or at tsc or other feed store. Though it isn't the cheepest option(you could buy about 6 cabbages for the price of one block) but its all about personal preferance. It provides, probably a better balance of nutrients, and probably last just a little longer than a cabbage, but either will do the job of entertaining the birds, just is all on how you want to feed your birds.

- Another great way to keep your birds busy for hours and hours is a "Hay Mound". Implied by the name it is literaly a mound of hay, though leaves work just as well, if not better. You simply take old hay or leaves and mix your everyday chicken feed of your choice, corn works best because it wont turn to mush if it rains, in with the hay or leaves. You then mound it up in their run and sprinkle a little extra on top, and they will sratch at this and enjoy it for days!

- Another rather odd and unconventional way of keeping your birds busy is "CDs"(also pictured above). Yes, the disks, old ones in which you no longer listen to or blank ones. Siply tie them up in your run, and the chickens are fully intruged by them. The CDs catch the light which makes the chickens curious. They peck at them and enteract with them. Some people write novelty encouraging words for egg production on them such as "Mosart for prime Egg Laying". Of course that is just for fun.

- Another way, is cutting a pumkin in half and simply throwing it in the run. They will peck it for bout 3 day depending on the size of the pumkin and the size of your flock.

I'm quite sure there are many other ways to occupy your flock of chickens through winter, this is simply a few ideas to keep your chickens happy through the winter time and to avoid "Coop Fever".

Thanks,

Austin

Homemade Bread.

REMEMBER when you were little and you spent the night at grandma's and when you woke up there was the smell of fresh bread and a nice big piece of buttery toast on the table? Don't you miss that? Well, why not make it yourself! Making bred is easier than you could possibly think. I personally think it is a great thing to do on a rainy day, when you can't work much outside due to inclimate weather work on being self-sufficient by baking your own bread! There are tons of recipes from beginner recipes to master recipes. The photo above shows homemade dinner rolls that taste better than anything from the store. They are great, and you can cook them for a shorter time period and freeze them and re-heat to have homemade fresh rolls anytime.

Other breads such as the one above and below are loaf breads, these would replace your sandwich bread, and you can produce a couple batches of bread for a lot less than what you can buy a couple of loafs at the store! Homemade bread is made from natural ingredients like flour, yeast,butter ,honey,milk ,salt, and eggs.

Most homemade breads typically have around seven ingredients, most loafs from the store about twenty! What is all the extra stuff for,other than to make us overweight of course. If your are trying to homestead I highly recommend baking your own bread, it is a small amount of work for a big increase in being self-reliant. The taste is unmatched and there is nothing better than knowing exactly what has gone into your food. If interested in the recipes used in baking the above bread feel free to contact me, and I will be glad to provide you the recipes.

Color is the New Black in Beef Cattle

It has been awhile since my last post but over this span a wonderful thing has taken place. Calving season has arrived. I raise beef cattle and for the most part they calve relatively easy, but calving always brings up worries in my mind. No, not whether my cows going to calve successfully, though that is on my mind as well there is something that weighs more heavily. Most farmers breed to a black Angus bull now days, this is a huge problem in my mind. The trend started with the fact that Angus beef supposedly has a prime amount of marbling, small amounts of fat throughout the beef which makes it taste better. Because of this many commercial beef producers are striving to produce naturally polled(hornless) calves with black hides. Due to this many breeds of cattle which don't come in a solid coat color, such as longhorns, and Randall linebackers are in endangered. With black cattle prices so high small sized farmers who would like beef but desire calves to sell to pay for feed cost are having to resort to black coated cattle. For small time farmers, such as myself,it is difficult to take the hit on a spotted beef cow when its just as easy to breed a black one and make money off of it. Its simply uneconomical for small scale farmers to breed any other cattle. This is the outlook most have on this subject. One in which I don't fully understand. Beef is beef regardless of coat color it taste the same practically. Angus beef has caused a whole new market of fraud. Hardee's so called "Angus beef" actually comes from HOLSTEINS!! That's not even a beef cow! As long as the color of the hide is 51% black it can be marketed as 100% Angus beef. Personally if I am paying for Angus I want Angus! By attempting to breed a majority of our nations cattle to be black we are loosing some important genetic diversity. The high prices of black hybridized cattle is contributing to the depleting valuable gene pools and breeds of cattle going extinct. So make the switch! Breed heritage breeds of cattle whether you are going to breed black or color and avoid breeding black hybridized cattle. So make the switch and my color the new black! SIDE NOTE: I realize this blog post discusses a highly debatable issues. Most post will not be like this one, but in order to establish a base for my blog I first need to allow those viewing this blog to understand what I stand for and that homesteading isn't just about farming but also about protecting something we deeply love, the farm life.

Heirloom Sweet Peas...Easier or Harder to Grow??

I felt seeing as it is the time of the year fall sown peas are producing fruit it would be an appropriate topic for a blog entry. To first begin analyzing this particular point of debate you first need to define heirloom. Heirloom typically something of old origin, describes none hybridized plant in the world of gardens. The benefit is with heirloom you can dry your own seeds and re-sow them into the ground next year. This fits in perfectly with self-sufficiency and if you garden, heirloom plants would complete the produce your own theme by you not having to rely on virtually anyone to have a garden. Hybridized plants you can NOT save the seeds from due to the fact that when re-sown they may not germinate or if they do you won't receive any fruit. With food terrorism such a threat in recent years, being able to keep your own seed may help give you peace of mind and secure your food supply. However, in peas there are benefits to having both. There is a vast variety of peas to choose from when sowing. The hybridized ones, in general, are short and meant to provide the ease of not requiring to trellis them. The are capable of producing high yields and they are perfectly good for food production, but as I choose heirloom over hybrids when I have the choice I am more inclined to heirloom peas. This year happens to be my first year growing heirloom peas. I looked around a bit and chose Mammoth Melting Sugar Peas, an heirloom variety I acquired online, the link is to the right. http://www.burpee.com/ Burpee has a large variety of heirloom seeds and ships very quickly. Anyways, I planted them about mid August. The heat, in theory would help them germinate and when the time came it would be cool enough to grow, flower, and fruit to its prime ability. Luckily my theory was right. They are providing bountiful fruit. This particular pea plant climbs to about 4 feet, thus some sort of support system is necessary. I didn't use a support system and just grew them like hybrid peas and I think it for sure has affected my yields, but live and learn...right?? Anyways with the right amount amount of sun water and rich soil, the rest is self explanatory. My heirloom peas are the next best thing for your garden! Good luck!