It’s my favorite time of year.  Leaves are falling, the air is crisp, root vegetables and greens are on the menu.  The Harvest is just about over, for those of you who farm/garden, and a much needed break is almost here.  But a lot of you will know that winter is not really a rest period for farmers, especially if you have livestock.  It is a time to catch up, if you can.

Even though this year has been tumultuous, to say the least, it has also brought great joy, love, and finally hope.  Taking a break from farming this first year of our daughter’s life has given us the chance to really be there for her and watch her grow.  We are starting to come out of the darkness and financial ruin of losing the farm and begin to plan for our future.

I’m just now comfortable with eating our Mutton from one of our first Rams, Calvin.  We were not able to sell much Mutton, not being part of a market this year, and we had reached the best if eaten by date.  I braised his leg, Julia Child pot roast style.  It was delicious, not gamey or musky, if not hard to eat at first-it being Calvin and all.

Tom has helped me move some of our container gardening inside.  He put up a shelf in our Kitchen, in front of one of the sunniest windows in the house.  We mostly have some fresh herbs and Aloe.  But it’s nice to have a little green.  Although many of our container plants outside are still kicking.

While we still have stuff for sale, we’ve been catching up with our Farm Bucks customers.  We are hopefully getting close to zeroing out with the folks who bought into farm bucks.  It worked out well, for everyone I hope, even with losing the farm.  This is a program I definitely want to offer in the future.  Far less stressful than a CSA, and without the risk for our customers-which turned out to be prolific.

We do still need to sell some of our farm stuff.  We have electric sheep netting, an old freezer, books on farming, Bee Boxes/Hive set up-everything but the bees, Honey extractor, Windows and Doors to make your own cold frame, and probably more than I can remember.  Get in touch if you are interested in what we’ve got.

So, sometime in the last two months we lost another chicken to a predator.  We now have only five, but still enough eggs for us to eat, as you can see in the above picture.  This loss came after a hearty chase with one of our neighbors dogs, in the daytime at least.  Although this time I don’t think this chicken was pinched by a dog.

Tom finally got on some medication that is helping with his condition.  And he is ready to start planning our future.  Still we are not financially able to progress.  And something that has become all too familiar is how a family of 3 cannot survive on a full time hourly wage job, even when it pays better than minimum wage.  It seems unreasonable in this modern age to have more people than not require financial assistance, multiple jobs, or be buried in debt just to afford shelter, food, and a means to get to work, lets not even get into being able to afford (or eligible for) healthcare.

What’s hard is to be faced with the truth that in the first few years of building up the farm we were worse off financially except for our savings, which were invested into the farm.  While one of Tom’s greatest disappointments in losing the farm this year was his thought that this would have been the year we turned a decent profit, I still wonder if it would have been enough to live on.  While I am not surprised what happened did, I just wish it could have happened a couple of years ago when Tom and I were in a better place financially and without an infant to care for and support.

We hope to see you more in the future.  Whatever it will be.  Let’s get ready for 2013.

Calvin, Fall 2011

Calvin’s leg is roasting in the oven.  We had him USDA processed in early March, he is past his “best-if-sold-by” date, and something needs to be done with his body parts.  I gave nearly 1/2 of him away recently as a wedding present.  But I am still not sure I can eat him.

Calvin was one of the first sheep we brought back to the farm.  And he was incredibly personable.  He loved to have his nose and chin rubbed, eat grain from our hands, and was always curious, but not fearful, about what we were doing.  Unfortunately, he was also dangerous.  And once breeding season started, he could not be contained and posed a threat to persons on the farm.  The old saying “never turn your back on a ram” is true.

It’s so hard to draw lines over what is acceptable and what isn’t.  Meat is meat.  Just because I didn’t know the animal I am eating doesn’t mean it wasn’t still an individual with it’s own life.  I am not a vegetarian.  But I do believe that animals deserve respect.  Animals deserve to live a natural life and die a humane death, particularly if they are being bred for the sole purpose of eating.  What makes any life any more or less significant than another?  How is eating meat not murder?

I tried to sell Calvin.  Foist the responsibility of his future on someone else’s shoulders.  I couldn’t eat Seamus, our little ram who died in the electric fence.  I cried when I cooked him.  But now here is Calvin roasting in the oven.  It’s beginning to smell like Mutton.

Well, it’s been 6 months since we were forced off the farm and we just can’t seem to move on.  Tom is now full time at his hourly wage job, but that is barely covering the bills.  We are just starting to catch up.  He is still emotionally wrought over the whole situation and doesn’t feel ready for anything more challenging.  He is getting help, but it is a long process.  It grieves me to watch Tom suffer so much.  I am still what is considered postpartum.  While I hope I’ve moved past what will be the worst of the depression, it’s a daily battle.  Some days are better than others.  But we both work hard to keep our dampened spirits from affecting our enjoyment of parenting.  Our beautiful baby is the light of our lives.

We have made the choice to abandon what was left on the farm for the sake of our sanity.  And as soon as we are financially able we will be moving from Finchville.

Our wonderful, farm trained, Great Pyrenees, Wendy has found a permanent home with friends of ours in Taylorsville.  If she is able to breed, we have a standing offer for one of her pups if we get to go back to farming in the near future.  We still have our 6 laying hens that provide enough eggs for us, and on a rare occasion an extra dozen to give away.  And some of our yard plantings have had moderate success.  Our potted herbs are doing brilliantly.  And Tom learned that all of our Ewes from 2011 had lambs this spring.  They are all still happily with the farmer we sold them to, just outside of Eminence.

For Sale:  USDA frozen Chicken and Mutton.  Egg Cartons.  Potted Herbs.  Electrical Sheep Netting.  Crafts.  Check out our Price List.

Three plus months have passed since we’ve had to give up our farm.  There really hasn’t been much forward movement of which to speak. Tom is still looking for a computer programming position preferably close by in Louisville or Lexington.  If that fails, we may be making a bigger move to where the jobs are.  If you know of anything, here is Tom’s resume to hand out.  Presently he’s working part-time at an hourly wage job to pay the bills.  So, until he finds a computer programming position, we can’t afford, and don’t know where to move.  For the time being, we are permitted to continue our housing agreement in Finchville.

We do still have frozen chicken and mutton, and potted herbs for sale.  We also still have 8 packs of 150 count Egg Cartons.  $37.50 each for anyone selling eggs.  Please help us sell out so we can raise enough money not just to pay the bills but to move when the time comes.

Tom’s been container gardening on our back porch, mostly herbs.  And he’s been planting what leftover seedlings from this Spring we have around the yard.  We’ve already got little green tomatoes, and more spring onions than we can eat.

We only have 6 laying hens left since a neighboring dog killed 8 about 3 weeks ago.  We are just now getting enough eggs for us to eat, but not anymore for us to sell or give away. Our new breed Araucana and Ameraucana, 3 left, are smart enough to roost in the trees overnight away from predators.  The other 3, Rhode Island Reds, we put to bed in a safe place.

We also still have Chicken Coops for Sale.

There is still plenty left on the farm that needs to be sold, broken down, and moved.  We are both still pretty rattled about the situation and avoid the old location.  If we have to, for the sake of our mental sanity, it may come down to abandoning what’s left.  We hate having to leave our things and leave the farm not in the condition in which we found it, but so be it.

Lastly, if you or someone you know wants to breed Great Pyrenees, Wendy is a 2 yr old female who will be in her 3rd heat sometime in the next 3-4 months.  She has never been bred.  She is currently residing with friends of ours in Spencer Co.

Hey all,

We’ve liquidated all the livestock and found a foster home for our Guardian Wendy.  The few remaining laying hens we have are relocated to our current backyard which means we still have eggs at least for ourselves and a few lucky recipients or customers.  Since Tom still holds an egg certificate we can bake our delicious Poundcakes and Challah for sale-by special order only.  We also still have frozen USDA chicken and mutton for sale as well as potted herbs and seedlings.  We can start flats of seedlings by special order as well.

Tom has found part-time work to pay the bills until he finds computer programming employment.  If you have a lead-here is Tom’s resume.  Once we have a good income we’ll be able to afford to move, and know where we’re going.  Until then, as far as we know, we’ll be able to stay in our current living situation, which is not on the farm.

As for the farm, we still have a few truckloads of stuff, but the last really important thing left is our bee colonies.  Tom still has to figure out how to move them, and hopefully can find some help.  For the most part he and I are not on the farm.  We are not available for farm visits-there’s nothing to see.  It is not our farm.  If you are interested in helping out mail tom@riversongfarm.com and he’ll let you know the next planned moving date and time.  Please do not just show up, we will not be there.  There is a resident on the farm and he would not be expecting visitors.

We’ve still got 4 large coops for sale.  They are 7′x12′ x4′ tall.  They are built to house 50 chickens each, but often the chickens will choose to settle in at 75 per house, and more will roost outside on the roof.  They are wired for electricity, so that you can plug them into an extension cord.  There is a single bulb lamp and outlets for brooder lamps or heated water pans.

The coops are all a few years old, and will need some repairs, but still have years of use in them.  They are built to be moved around on wheels.   If you buy them all, I’ll include the wheels.  You can build your own set for around $100.  The coops are $300 each.  You’ll need a trailer to drive them home.  They are still in the field, so you’ll also need to lend a hand getting them up and on your trailer.

With the changes at the farm, we’re really short on cash.  I’m putting myself back on the job market to get us the capitol to start over again on a new property.  I don’t anticipate having any summer produce for sale, but have hopes that we’ll be able to bring some cold weather crops for winter.

I am seeking 1 to 2 year full-time or contract position as a Linux Systems Administrator with an emphasis on automation. I am a jack of-all-trades, and I work and communicate well with others. A position interfacing several teams would be a good fit.  See my resume for more details.

Since we’ve been liquidating the farm, part of that means getting rid of the livestock. We had around 150 or more roosters we had planned to have USDA processed. Instead Tom is turning them into our own homemade sausage. With the help of several friends, we’ve ground about 80 lbs of meat, pure meat. Don’t be fooled by ground “meat” you get at the grocers. If you haven’t seen Jamie Oliver make chicken nuggets, take a look, because that’s the reason you can’t find ground chicken. Using the meat is just not economical for producers, and really it’s not for us either if we had plans to sell it.

See my previous post on chicken sausage for spice recipes.

1 lb Italian chicken sausage, browned

1 medium onion, diced

1 Tablespoon Olive oil

1 quart diced tomatoes, pureed

2 tsp. fresh oregano, minced

I sauteed the onion in the oil, then added the meat. When the meat had cooked, I poured in the tomatoes and oregano and let it simmer for an hour. It was the best sauce I’ve eaten in years. And everything but the oil came from our garden. The sausage and tomatoes were salty enough that I didn’t need to add salt.

Starting today, we’re making sausage.  We’ve got 80-100, 20 week old Cockerels that will either be sold or turned into sausage.  If you guess to the nearest .25 (quarter) of a pound, without going over, of the grand total of pounds, you’ll win a free pound of chicken sausage.  Just leave your guess in the comment section below.

If you haven’t heard, our farm and home lease has been canceled this week.  We’re still evaluating what our options are moving forward.  Right now we’re in a liquidation phase to release some of the cash we have tied up in the existing farm.  Once we have some funds loosened up, we’ll be in a better position to line up our next move.  I hope to be growing again in mid summer, but we may be more delayed than that.  We’ll roll with the punches.

As far as liquidation goes, we’re sold out of the RIRs.  Folks just need to pick them up now.  We’ve sold a couple of coops.  Several  Aracunas(50ish) and Buff Roos(75ish) are left.  Sheep are still up for grabs too, but they may end up moving with us if we can’t sell them in nice groups.

Thanks everyone that’s been keeping eyes open for new property.  We’ve been getting an incredible amount of response.  We haven’t found the right place yet, but we’ve got a long list of places we’re scoping out.  If you know of a 5-10 acre farm with house for lease or possibly for sale please let us know.

If you’ve contacted us, and we haven’t gotten back to you, we may have lost you in the shuffle.  Please try again.

Thanks again, and we can’t wait to start over.

Just thought I’d update folks who have been asking about what varieties we’re growing for the CSA.  We believe that information should be open, so here is our tentative 2012 planting schedule.  It will give you info on varieties, and dates to expect them to be ready.  You can use  the same dates to roughly plan you own garden.

You can always find the current version of that file on our calendar, as well as some of our other projects.

If you have the time and space, you can defrost things in your refrigerator.  It can take a day or more for a large turkey, and usually a day for a chicken.  This is better than defrosting on the counter top, because as the meat defrosts, the outside gets up into the danger zone of the temperature scale before the inside is defrosted.  This temperature range is where bacteria can thrive on the meat.  In the fridge, the outside of the meat stays in the safe temperature range.

Defrosting in cold water is faster than either fridge defrosting, and relatively safe.  We can defrost whole chickens in a couple of hours, so even if it isn’t in the safe temperature range, it is not out long enough to develop an unsafe bacteria load.

Here’s how:  Put your frozen item in a bowl, sink, or bathtub depending on size.  Fill up the container with cold water.  If your item floats, put something heavy on top to weight it down, or be prepared to turn the item every 20 minutes or so.  Leave the water running at a very low trickle, and make sure that it can drain, without overflowing your sink or tub.

The water is much better than air at taking heat away from the item, and since it is constantly being refreshed at a higher than freezing temperature, it is more effective than just soaking the item in one load of water.