Jackson Bradley

paul wheaton wrote:I love this graphic



In the end, if you care, you do the things you can do.  

This reminds me of something I read a while back.  

The positive statement is that change happens first with the individual, then the family, then the community, etc.

The (or one of many) negative statement(s) would be that if anyone or any entity seeks to diminish the individual, then/or the family, then/or the community, etc. then they confirm the positive statement.

Not necessarily to exclude the attempt to change things through government whether local or larger scale. That is all well and fine if the positive statement is met or if you're seeking to support it being met by those avenues.

When I interact with a person, entity, group, party etc. I ask myself if they are promoting the individual, the family, the community, etc. or if they are diminishing the individual, the family, the community, etc.

Usually, if I have answered that question, I know what I need to know about that person or thing.

Seems to fit in with this graphic, to me anyway.

There are a couple areas in our life where this is very challenging.

Kids, we have 6. The default is for folks to buy or gift us endless plastic junk toys. We have sat everyone who does this down and explained our thoughts on this topic and that we would like to avoid that stuff. If played with outside, it is ruined (I guess from sunlight) in about 60 days. We have to repeat this conversation about every 2 years because a holiday or birthday will come around and it is like we never said anything about the plastic junk toys. We understand why this is the case and we try to be lighthearted about it.

Starting a homestead or adding a new category of animal, equipment, food preservation method, etc. The amount of things you need will be highly subjective to so many factors such as time and ready cash available. Buying used normally does not involve the original plastic packaging, shrink wrap, packing material, etc. Other than that, we don't have a say in how folks ship us products we need if we cannot find them local or used. If local, they probably received them in the same packaging and just unboxed them to some extent.

Like John mentions above, seeking out higher quality products that will last longer and are made of other materials is a good idea. Usually those products are more expensive because they are higher quality and do last longer. Over time, it is more economical but sometimes you may not have the budget for a quality item early on.

If recycling is analogous to repurposing, that can be a lot of fun.

I am still collecting all of the neighbors' carboard boxes. It's been a little over a year now since I started the post.

I shred about half and keep the other half broken down. I am very selective of the boxes to keep and shred. There have been a few uses for the cardboard that I did not expect. A few of the many uses:

1-Areas that have been previously mulched with wood chips and started to have more weeds and grass coming up than usual. I rake the mulch back and layer down some of the broken down cardboard boxes.

2-Chicken/Quail brooder material. I mix the shredded cardboard in with some wood chips or shavings. Reduces my cost of brooding if I would otherwise have to buy shavings from the store.

3-Quail poop stink fighter. I keep some of our quail in suspended wire cages in the coop. Mostly the breeders/egg layers I am keeping. Since the cages are stacked, I have shallow trays to catch the poop. That stuff stinks! I add a thin layer of shredded cardboard into the tray each time I empty them and this has helped eliminate the stink.

I'd say that I have recovered the cost of the shredder from using the material for the brooder alone. I lubricate the shredder with olive oil and it has performed very well. I do have to trim the boxes to size but I do that while the kids feed the pieces through. It is amazing how quickly you can fill a 10 cubic foot wheelbarrow.

Other than that, we receive all of the stuff they are throwing away. We just take all they give us and end up finding uses for about half of it. My wife did draw the line with me using some toilet bowls and tanks as planters after one neighbor remodeled the inside of his house....

Abigail M Johnson wrote:Yes, there is certainly the possibility of that. She never has pulled any fur. I was expecting the babies and had her a nest box with hay but she did not do anything with it at all, had babies out on the floor of cage. But she is first time. I suppose at least one more try would be warranted. I am keeping kits warm and I tried to get her to nurse them in the nest. She was thrashing around so I had to hold her in my lap, which she was very calm about. I put the kits to her to nurse and found them some nipples on her. It seems like they nursed, they are super young so I have no idea how much they eat less than a day old. Probably not a lot I'm guessing, maybe just colostrum. Just giving them a chance. I wiped them and put them back in the nest which I am keeping inside since the others all died outside in her cage. I fully realize they likely won't make it. Will try again this evening as they will be 24 hrs then. Maybe more milk will come in. Maybe some instincts will kick in at some point. I dunno.

I can relate to your sentiment and trying to do what you can.

In the thread I linked, I gave the doe 3 chances if memory serves. Some early replies were that they would cull after the first bad momma indications but I wanted to give it another try or two.

Since we have more animals now and we have a couple years experience with the rabbits, I would cull right away. But that is just because I went through the experience of trying some alternatives to culling.

Your current doe/kit situation may end up sadder than it already is but follow your instincts, do what your conscience is telling you that you ought to do and you'll get some great experience from this time if nothing else. Time + Experience = Wisdom.

Please keep us updated.

Abigail M Johnson wrote:Thank yall for the replies. Right now only 2 of her kits have lived. This is her first litter and she did not pull any fur or make any sort of nest in or out of the nest box. She had them on the cage floor. I saw them right away and made them a nest in the box. I checkes on them numerous times and made some adjustments. The doe is very comfortable with me, and I was worried she was not going to make a nest since it seemed that way. Anyhow, as early as possible this morning I went out, knowing it may not be a good scene with this being her first little and all. I have warmed the 2 that are left inside. When it gets daylight I will try to bring them back out and see if she will feed them I suppose. It seems like there's not much to lose intervening at this point. I raise ducks and chickens and have learned far more through bad experiences than not, unfortunately, so I understand how it goes. Not holding out too much hope for these but if she can figure out how to care for them, who knows.

I fill the nest box about half full of hay and the doe shifts it around and pulls fur. I had 2 does pull fur a week early this year and put the box in sooner than I normally would.

Unfortunately, you may not have a good mamma. See the thread here of my experience with one. It appears to be passed on and cannot be corrected in my experience and others commenting in this thread.

https://permies.com/t/272650/Meat-rabbit-kindling

If I move a doe away from her kits, and she doesn't have access to them, she will get "huffy". I like to keep them all together until I see the kits out of the nest box a lot.

Nowadays, I keep the breeders on wire so the doe and kits are always together until I separate the grow outs around 6 weeks old. I breed the doe back at 4 weeks and so she ends up with around 2 weeks to herself before kindling. They get a break from May-September because it gets very hot and humid.

I couldn't locate an exact category to place this delicious food. It may not quite fit in charcuterie but it is close.

First, do you know what parisa is, and have you tried it or made it?

We spent a month in Hondo, TX during our travels and first saw it there. It is a local favorite even rivaling Whataburger and HEB. We first saw it at silver creek specialty meats in Hondo and also tried some from dziuks in Castroville. Dziuks has a dried sausage that is out of this world but difficult to replicate at home.

Since then, we've made it regularly. It is a meat spread for crackers or eaten by itself. It is also called "cowboy ceviche", the go to party dish of Medina county TX.

Keep reading if you happen to be the type of person who will butcher a deer at home, have a little fleck of meat land on you hand and you go ahead and eat it raw.

If that gave you the willies, you probably won't like the cowboy ceviche.

You want very, very lean red meat, preferably an animal you have seen through raising and butchering. We use lean deer parts for this recipe.

1# lean red meat, hand chopped to a fine ground beef consistency
1/2# grated cheddar or american cheese
1 small-medium onion, minced (depends on strength of flavor)
4 serrano or 2 jalapeno peppers finely chopped (more if you like spicy and the peppers can be pickled)
Salt and pepper
Juice of 1 lime of lemon (we prefer lime)
1 or 2 garlic cloves, minced (optional)

Refrigerate for at least an hour. I like it to "get happy" for at least a day or two, personally.

Spread on a cracker and enjoy. We prefer club crackers over ritz or saltines. The favorite is to make crisp quesadillas and cut into wedges.

Emily Smith wrote:

Jackson Bradley wrote:
Emily, it depends on which end is open. Our coop/run is 24'x36' with 12'x24' under roof and a 12'x12' area with 3 walls almost all the way to the top.

Here the cold weather comes in on winds out of the N, NW, NE. The open side of the 3 sided area is to the south and we've never had an issue with chickens dying from the cold. If your open side is the direction of the prevailing wind bringing in the cold weather, that could be a problem, and I would make sure that is one of the 3 sides that is covered.

The southern side is open.  And the cold air is coming from the north. Precip usually comes from the west/southwest.

I, personally, wouldn't worry about covering that side then. You can if you want peace of mind but you do want some ventilation even in cold temps so you could leave a crack at the upper end of that south side.

We've had and are expected to have some cold weather here too. Last year, we had a 4 day period with lows in the low teens and single digits and day highs not above freezing. Everyone survived. Watering is a pain and I used metal bowls I heated on the wood stove to melt the ice and a couple rubber bowls that I used heated water in. I visited the coop several times a day to check on the water with the Quail/Chickens/Rabbits and refreshed it with warm water.

I have come to the conclusion that they are designed to be more capable then we are in cold weather, hence the feathers or fur. Especially the rabbits. I had a doe kindle during that previous cold snap and there were no issues.

Emily Smith wrote:I have a hoop coop covered with hardware cloth and a heavy duty tarp, but the front portion is totally open.  Is that too much ventilation?

Emily, it depends on which end is open. Our coop/run is 24'x36' with 12'x24' under roof and a 12'x12' area with 3 walls almost all the way to the top.

Here the cold weather comes in on winds out of the N, NW, NE. The open side of the 3 sided area is to the south and we've never had an issue with chickens dying from the cold. If your open side is the direction of the prevailing wind bringing in the cold weather, that could be a problem, and I would make sure that is one of the 3 sides that is covered.

E Nordlie wrote: It is actually a bit difficult to crack them (for frying, for example) without just squashing the whole egg.  

Quail egg scissors are only a few bucks and they solve this issue completely. They cleanly cut the top off of the eggshell and you turn the egg over and it comes right out without any shell mess.