Happy New Year Egg Report

"Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it."
Confucius

"A person who wonders discovers that this in itself is wonder."
M.C.Escher


What a season of beauty and wonder we are going through now! The sunrises are glorious, the snow and ice scintillating, the animals harmonious and the hope of new possibilities everywhere. The hens are laying beautifully this past month or so. About a month after the time change at the end of October, I finally switched on an automatically-timed light bulb in the too dark chicken coop. As soon as the light increaased, the hens switched on their egg-laying units, and we have been reveling in two to two and a half daily dozens of their glorious golden orbed eggies! You go, girls! This is out of about thirty-five hens total. They are wondrously lovely to look at, too - as there are about 11-12 blonde Buff Orpingtons from last year and 25 Silver Wyandottes from this year. The latter have beautiful black and white feathers with the bright red wattles, and they make an interesting contrast with the yellow Buffs.

Golden Boy is still with us - he is the sweetest rooster of the past three years. This means he has not gone after me even once. A new rooster came with the silver wyandottes, but when he reached adolescence, he began pestering every hen in the flock. All of whom squawked indignantly at his every and frequent advance. He just was too inharmonious and so was dispatched in October with some of the oldest hens. Tom the Turkey spends his days happily with his six geese and seven duck friends. We sadly lost one female duck in October to a particularly aggressive hawk. The wonder is that this flock has only suffered this one loss.

It took an amazingly long time for the geese and ducks to discover and enjoy the pond. For at least a month or two, they would get close enough to look at the water, then suddenly they would all turn around and run back home to their night pen area. Then they began lingering at water's edge, drinking and sometimes wading a bit. After a few more weeks of this cautious behaviour, we saw them actually swimming but still staying very close to the shore. Finally, one day, they all swam across the pond en masse. That was a big day - must have been mid-to late October. After that, they spent all their waking hours swimming all over the pond. It was wonderful for everyone - everyone, that is, except Tom - who, I think we have mentioned before, isn't all that fond of swimming. In fact, I don't even think he gets his lovely big toes wet. He just hangs around the shore waiting for his buddies to get done with their silly swimming. In November, we noticed a new resident in the pond - a muskrat! We weren't totally sure the first time or two we saw him (or her), but one day I had a great view of its very long tail. That confirmed that it must be a muskrat. We are wondering if he (or she) eats trout. That would not be such a good thing. A google search on muskrat habits also revealed they are as prolific reproductively as rabbits. That is also not a good thing. At the moment he (or she) seems to be hibernating. We'll have to see what happens in the spring....

The sheep are well, but are on a diet this winter - because they got way too fat last winter. The problem was that they baaaed every time they saw me, and almost every time they baaaed, I fed them. This year, I am being strong and just ignoring the in-between mealtime baaing. When I finally had some time in October and November, I naturally died all their fleeces (except the gray one), and now I have almost twenty pounds of beautiful rainbow colors of fleecy roving wool. Some of the dyes I used are brazilwood, madder root, fustic, onion skins, indigo and cochineal. I will sell the wool gradually through the coming year and hopefully make enough to cover the cost of feeding the sheep through the long winter.

My newest addition to the farm "products" are all organic/biodynamic herbal salves and lip balms. I love working with the herbs and hope to do much more with them in the coming years. 2005 was a fine year for us here at New Elm Farm. We are grateful for the enormous blessings of family, friends, animals, plants and all the friendly nature spirits who make it all happen. May the beauty and wonder of our world be in the hearts and minds of every person.

HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ONE AND ALL!