Killer Clyde

There's a new critter on the farm! His name is Clyde and he's a homicidal maniac. Here he is, hunting in the high grass, one of his favorite pastimes.

Clyde, like Farmer Fin, is originally from Brooklyn. In fact, we used to be roommates. Born eleven years ago on the mean streets down by the Navy Yard, a very cute teenage Clyde followed roommate Rachel home one day and begged to come in. He never left, and when we moved into a different apartment, he came with us. Clyde belonged to all of us, but he ended up with Clara, the last to leave that apartment. 

They lived together for four years or so; the studio they shared is spacious by New York standards, but apparently not enough for Clyde, who amped up his destructive habits in some kind of feline campaign to drive his generous caretaker out of her mind. Desperate, Clara appealed to us, the countriest of her country friends, and a month ago I picked up her and Clyde at the Albany Amtrak station and we installed Clyde in his new home, the barn.

Clyde, like Farmer Fin, is a natural! He has adjusted very well to farm life. Within a few days he had figured out the ladder to the hayloft, and we have been finding a variety of rodent parts around the barn. He seems to enjoy the feeling of grass under his paws and the warm sun on his fur. I think he's enjoying his new station in life.

Farmiversary

Last weekend marked the five-year anniversary of our move here from Brooklyn. We came with a five-year plan and a vague knowledge of the learning curve ahead of us. We jumped right in to the Farmie Life (to quote the title of a PowerPoint slide show we put together in order to convince our families we were not insane to leave the city for these pastoral environs), and although I sometimes wish we had acted with more forethought, five years later we are actually, surprisingly, pretty much on track with the original plan.

It seems natural to reflect on everything we've learned and experienced here on the farm since we got here, but it's a little overwhelming, which goes with the general feeling I've been having since the end of the summer. Between teaching again and trying to keep up with the goats and the barn and the garden and the kitchen, I've been feeling swamped. Something had to give. At first not blogging was kind of a relief. I was starting to feel redundant: natural beauty, human error, barn updates, repeat...

But the relief soon festered into a full-on case of writer's block. And the writer's block, as it always does, got all snarled up in a litany of personal insecurities: I have nothing to say because I'm boring, lazy, incompetent, a dilettante, etc. The thing about living here though, is that it's hard to stay entirely focused on oneself, because there's so much demanding attention. 

Like sometimes you wake up and milk goats by the light of stars and headlamp (who knew Orion is in the center of the 6:00 AM sky at this time of year), and then you finish and the sun is just rising and the sky looks like this:

Which is what happened to me this morning, and I just felt so fortunate. Maybe I'm a disorganized loser and all that other stuff, but I guess I've made a few good choices. Life is completely out of my control, but those choices resonate throughout it. The Farmie Life is exhausting and scary and confusing and so beautiful that it nearly knocks me down sometimes, and I love it. I loved it this rosy morning and again in the silvery evening, looking at the leaves changing colors just like they did the first week we lived here.

Apple Antics

Used to be, when we moved the goat pasture, Farmer Fin drove the truck that pulls the sheds while I ran behind shouting encouragements, tried to manage the livestock, and hooked and unhooked the sheds to and from the truck. We recently discovered, though, that it all goes more smoothly if I just take the goats down the hill and distract them while Fin does all the other stuff. Naturally, this arrangement works for me! And what better way to distract a herd of goats than hanging out under the apple trees. 

Jasmine Looks Apple-Crazed

Bluebell Gets a Little Help From her Mom

Jas and Jade Need No Help

Even the Littles Are Big Enough to Reach Some Apples

Pansy Is in Apple Ecstasy

YUM!

The apples are getting ripe. It's a good time to be a goatherd.

Cucumbrance

In June, I planted cucumbers, as I always do. Shortly after the plants came up, they were eaten by rabbits. I cursed the bunnies and replanted, certain that there would be no cukes in my garden this year. Boy, was I wrong. I ended up with nine pickling cucumber plants and four slicers. Now I am harvesting every day, and even still, there's always a cuke that hides beneath the leaves and grows to be a big fat monster.

Granted, my hands are small, but still!

Today I pickled at least eight pounds of cucumbers. I like them garlicky and dilly, fermented or fresh.

Today's Batch

Here's my pickle inventory so far, minus the jar of sour dills in the fridge. In the foreground, today's fresh garlic dills. In the background, a crock of sour dills ferments, to be canned in a week or two. And on the right, two quarts of spears ready to start fermenting.

After this, I think I'll have to get creative. Luckily, this year, the monster cukes won't go to waste. The pigs love them almost as much as they love watermelon.

Watermelon Smile

Higher Ground

The goats have made it to the top - the highest pasture on the hill, "where the air is fresh and clean," as the Tom Waits song goes, and where the big rusty old farm implement is, for Bluebell's enjoyment.

Barn Progress Report

The building is coming along. Behold our prodigious temporary work station, complete with genuine electricity. It's awfully nice to be off the floor, and the power tools are much more powerful now that they are not plugged into 250 feet of extension cord. Besides that, here's how it's coming along.

This picture is from last week - now you can't see through that wall.

 The wiring is all finished. We are working on interior walls.

The milking parlor is an actual room now.

That is probably where the milking stand will be.

There are two walls in the milk room so far.

And the hayloft is the perfect place to cure garlic. Rest assured, we will not fall victim to vampires before we finish building this barn.

There are over 200 heads of garlic hanging there!

One Shiny Step Closer

Cotton Hill Creamery just got a little closer to legitimacy, i.e. New York State Licensing. This little beauty right here is our new pasteurizer and cheese making vat!

Frank and Mary carefully roll the vat into the barn

Our cheese room setup cost as much as my car, but unlike my car, it was delivered by the people who designed and manufactured it. Frank Kipe and his wife Mary, of MicroDairy designs, installed the equipment and then spent the entire day here teaching us how to use it and sharing their wonderful wealth of information, ideas, and stories.

Frank and Farmer Fin move the chiller in

Pasteurization is the process of heating a liquid to a specific temperature for a specific amount of time in order to kill pathogens (in case you were out of school that day, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pasteurization), and it is very important to the Department of Agriculture and Markets. Personally, I have more of a from-the-teat-to-the-mouth attitude, but I can see the benefits of pasteurization from a public health standpoint. So we'll be pasteurizing milk for any product the creamery will sell. We practiced with a batch of water.

Thermometers! Agitators! Little motors! Bells & Whistles!

All the components are gorgeous. Using this equipment makes me feel like a scientist, and feeling like a scientist is one of my favorite feelings! 

145° is the magic number

We learned so much from Frank and Mary. By the end of the day, we were exhausted! I can't wait to make cheese with my beautiful shiny machines. It won't be long now...