Introductions are in Order

In three days, it will have been 10 years since we first started this blog.  Where does the time go?  A good friend of our daughter suggested it might be a good idea to introduce the animals on Our Maker's Acres Family Farm.  What a great idea!  Over time, we've talked about each one, but it is a stellar idea to introduce each of them with a short bio.  

We live on a five acre piece of land with 3 acres in pasture.  As we introduce the animal family, you'll have two revelations: #1 That's a lot of animals on a little bit of land, and #2 These are some truly strange people!

Here.  We.  Go...

Here is Ginger, also known as "Gingivitis" or "Fat Cat."  She is an outdoor cat who loves to hunt.  We'll find the remnants of birds, mice, rats, moles, squirrels and various and sundry varmints that she occasionally leave us on the door mat.  Experience has taught us to look before we take that first step.  I'm not a 'cat person,' but Ginger is allowed from time to time to come inside.  

This is Belle, or affectionately known as "Bellie".  She is a Great Pyrenees Livestock Guardian Dog.  The name sounds helpful, but Bellie is a work in progress.  As it turns out, she eats live chickens.  Guarding them is a lofty goal as she's turned out to be the "fox" in the henhouse.  Literally.  She loves to roam and dig gargantuan holes wherever she goes.  She is a sweet dog, though, and we are trying to teach her, patiently, and overlook her shortcomings in hopes that she can be rehabilitated from her wayward proclivities.

This is Rosie, or Rose Ethel, as we sometimes formally address her.  She is a Jersey cow.  She's getting up there in age - about 13 years old.  She's given us many calves and given us gallons and gallons of fresh milk.  She does not like hot weather.  In the summer, she can be found lying in the shade, panting.  Like a pig, if she finds a muddy spot, she's not above lying in it and getting herself filthy.  She's gentle, as most Jersey's are.  

This lady is Clarabelle, or Clarice, for short.  She's also a Jersey cow who is about 10 years old.  She's a sweetheart.  We have been milking her everyday for the last year and four months.  We just dried her off.  She gives A2/A2 milk which is highly sought after.

May we also introduce you to Elsie.  Elsie is Clarabelle's heifer.  She's quarantined in a separate pasture as we're weaning her.  If allowed to be with Clarabelle, she'd nurse her, so she stays by herself.  That's why she looks forlorn.  The rest of the animals are just on the other side of the fence and we do put the goats in with her to keep her company from time to time, although she and the goats aren't fluent in the same language.

This little lady is LuLu.  LuLu is Rosie's heifer.  You may be wondering about the contraption in her nose.  It is a weaning plate.  The plate keeps her from nursing on Rosie while we dry Rosie off.  The plate doesn't hurt her (other than her feelings, perhaps).  She is industrious and figured out the first day how to continue to eat grass with it.  In a month, we'll loosen the wing nut and pull it out.  

We are watching the cycles of Rosie and Clarabelle.  When they go in heat, we'll mark the calendar and bring them down the road to be bred by a registered Jersey bull.  Late this fall or early winter, we'll bring Elsie and LuLu down to be bred by the same bull as they'll be of breeding age by then.

Meet Annie, the Nubian goat.  She's a dairy goat, originally from Africa.  Despite being black in color, the heat doesn't bother her.  She's the oldest goat on the farm and has given us many kids.  Her momma was Nellie, our first Nubian we ever got.  Goats multiply almost like rabbits since they lots of times have twins or triplets.

Here's Matilda.  We call her the "opportunistic one," because she'll always find a way to sneak stealthily into the barn and clean up any sweet feed the cows left behind.  She's fast.  Poor girl just lost both of her kids during kidding.  They were her first kids.  

This fellow is named Buckwheat, or Buckster, for short.  He's our Nubian buck and is quite a prolific gentleman who has fathered more animals than we can count.  He uses his head as a battering ram.  He also stinks something terrible!  We try to keep our distance from him.  He has an impressive beard.

This doeling is named Kaleidoscope.  We call her Callie, for short.  She's named appropriately for her multicolored face.  She's Annie's kid and was a bottle baby, since Annie had mastitis.  She cries incessantly for a bottle whenever we see her and like to jump up on you and get right in front of you when you're walking.   

May we introduce you to Mocha.  She's named for her light coffee latte colored spots that cover her body.  She's Agnes' daughter.  She and Callie are besties and they run around all day getting into all sorts of mischief.  If I had that energy, I tell you what...

Here is Popcorn, or Poppy, as we call him lots of times.  He's named that because when he was just a little guy, he'd jump around just like popcorn in a hot skillet.  He is the only other male ruminant on the pasture other than Buckwheat.  

And the last member of the goat family, Agnes, or "Horned One."  She was picked on mercilessly by the other goats when she was just a kid.  We did not de-horn her.  Now, despite her small stature, her horns have enabled her to gain prominence and now she's the de facto boss, exerting her will, by ramming the others with her horns.  The others have paid a steep price for their earlier bullying of her.  Agnes has never forgiven them.  She can be a mean little momma, for sure.

We have more chickens that we can name, so we call all the hens, Sally, after Sally Henny penny from Beatrix Potter stories we read to the kids when they were young.

And finally, here is Sally and Sally putting in a hard day's work at the office, laying fresh eggs for us.  Happy hens, to be sure.  It's a good life.

And there you have it, the animal family that make up the menagerie at Our Maker's Acres Family Farm!