Mushroom Hunting

     Emma and I went mushroom hunting on our property and this is what we found.  Now we have to try and identify them to see what, if any, are edible and which ones might be poisonous!  All together I think we found 17 different mushrooms.  It was a lot of fun!!

 Does pretty mean edible?

 

 The sun was setting and it really made the mushrooms look so pretty.

 Same as above, just a different angle.

  This one is kind of creepy looking, although maybe it's that the picture is a little blurry.  You know, I should really use my glasses when I take pictures!!

 You have to look closely when mushroom hunting because you might miss something. 

 These are the most beautiful orange mushrooms I've ever seen,

especially when the sun hits them just right.  (Really, these are the only orange mushrooms I've ever seen and they were amazing.)

 This one was about 3 - 4 inches in diameter.

 Interesting.

 I don't think this is a shriveled up version of what's just above.

 It's interesting how some mushrooms like to grow from dead logs and some grow in the ground.

 This one looks like popped pop corn.

 Interesting one.

 This one looks like it's hard, but it's not.  It feels like a mushroom.

 Maybe a button mushroom?

 Just a flat one.

 I don't think this is a morel, but who knows, we're new to this fungus stuff.

 These are pretty.

 I wonder how long these grow for the season because if these continue to grow, they might just take over the whole forest!

    This is a close up of the stump above.  Sorry it's blurry!  Glasses, I know, I know!

Well, that's our day hunting mushrooms.  Now we have some work to do.  If you can identify any of these fungi, please let us know!  

Thanks!

Sandy 

July 14

Making Hay

     

Baling 101 - Landon.

      The break in the weather finally gave our area the opportunity to cut and bale hay.  From what our neighbors have said, we (including everyone else), should have cut hay almost a month ago but the weather just wouldn't cooperate.  I can understand, at least a little now, why farmers are so interested in constantly watching the weather to see what the patterns will do because the timing of the weather has to be just right.   

     From what we've learned, you need at least 5 days in a row without any rain to cut and bale the hay.  One day to cut the hay and a day or two of hot, dry weather with, hopefully, a little breeze for it to dry.  Then a day to rake it and a day to bale it.  Then it needs to sit out in the field after it's been baled for at least a day or two so you can keep an eye on it in case it starts to heat up.  If it starts to heat up it could start on fire; not likely, but possible. 

     The reason it could start on fire is because of spontaneous combustion.   If the hay sits in the field for a day or two, you can check on the bale to see if it's heating up or not before taking it to the barn and stacking it.  

      

     Here's a great resource for spontaneous combustion from the Washington State University.

    Thanks so much to The Rancher and his wife for all of their help and taking the time to teach our boys how to cut, rake, and bale hay and especially for the use of their equipment.  It has been an incredible experience for all of us!!

     We took some picture to show you a snippet of what they did in the course of a few days.

 

This is what the hay rake looks like while it's being pulled to and from the field.  I don't know about you, but every once in a while I would see these strange things while out and about and I've always wondered what they were.  Now I know, and so do you!!

 This is the rake doing it's job.  How creative were our forefathers who came before us!!

 

 A view of the field after it's been cut and raked.  As you can see, it was a beautiful day!!

      Just another view of the field.  The rake makes these perfect looking windrows for the baler to come along and bale the hay.  

 

A bale that's been dropped off by the baler.  And that's the baler in the background working on cleaning up the field and making another bale of hay.

 

The finished product!! 

The grass is already growing since we've cut and baled the field so we'll see if we can get another cutting on it again this year. 

July 15, 2014

Sandy

Trying to Get Water out of an Old Well ~ Part 1

After we purchased this property, the boys found this well near the old homestead.  Thankfully it's been surrounded by barbed wire.  Can you see it back there?  

Can you see the barbed wire back there?

Cooper with the brush mower clearing a path to the well.

Landon and Barrett getting ready to try and pump water out of the well.

Barrett was trying to get the end of the hose into the water.  The hose didn't want to stay; it kept curling up.

The top of the water was about 6-8 feet from the top of the well.

The boys figured the water in the well was about 20 feet deep.

Still trying to get water out of the well with the pump.

After working for about 1/2 an hour to get the pump to pump water, Landon decided to take it apart to see why it wasn't working.  When he opened it, we could see why.  This pump came from a friend of ours who went to clean out a mans apartment who no one had seen for a while.  Unfortunately, he had died in his home. 

And here was the problem; at least a big part of it!!  The inside of the housing was coated with tar!

After cleaning out the housing, he was still trying to get the pump to work.  It's not sucking up water.

Shane came to offer his advice (a meeting of the minds).

Landon priming the pump.

Finally, we struck liquid GOLD!!

This bucket is stuck in the concrete and there is a hole in the bottom of bucket from corrosion.  Maybe this was a holding spot for the bucket that they used to get water out of the well?  Any ideas?

     This well hasn't been used in over 100 years and there is still water in it.  We wanted to try and pump water out so we could see if it filled up again.  And if it did, then we could use the water to water our garden that we would like to put in near the bottom of this hill.

     After working on this project for almost 2 hours we finally got the pump to work and when it worked, boy did it work.  We were all standing near the well when the pump finally kicked in and some of us got soaked because they didn't have the hose connected and, boy was it COLD!!

Sandy
July 11, 2014

    

Our New Muscovy Duck and Nesting House

    

New nesting  house near the main duck house.

     Shortly after we moved to the ranch, we moved our flock of Muscovy ducks to their new home.  It was just after winter and boy were they a mess.  Just coming out of winter, they didn't have a place to clean themselves off, so when they arrived here, one of the first things they did was to go and play in the creek and get cleaned off.  We couldn't believe how white they really were under all that "mess."    

     We have always fed our ducks a non-medicated feed but when we moved them to their new home they really didn't seem too interested in it.  They were more interested in all the bugs and things that crawled on the ground, so we stopped giving them the feed and they seemed to thrive. 

     Now, back in Chicago, our property was about 1/4 of an acre and we had plenty of mosquitoes.  Our ducks ate just about every one of those pesty little things that we had on our property.  I say our property, because if the kids went to the neighbors yards on either side of our house to play, the population of mosquitoes was unbelievable!!  They couldn't play outside over there unless they wore bug spray or continued to swat at mosquitoes all night. 

     This flock of ducks is almost a year old and a few of them have started to lay eggs.  And if you have never had an egg from a duck you are really missing out on something.  As much as I love fresh chicken eggs, I love duck eggs that much more.  They are really tasty!!  Every morning, I fry a little bacon in a cast iron skillet until just about done.  Then I put in 2 duck eggs (if I'm fortunate enough to get some that day) and let them cook until the whites are cooked and the yolk is still runny.  Boy, what a treat!!

        Well, after about a month or so of moving the ducks to the ranch, we stopped getting eggs from them.  I have a couple of reasons as to why I think that is.  First, I think it might be that some of them haven't started laying yet and the ones that have, they have already laid their first clutch of the year, so we'll need to wait until it's time for the next one.   

     A Muscovy duck only lays 3 clutches a year.  A clutch is a group of about 8-20 eggs that they will store up in a nest until they have enough, and then they will sit on the nest to hatch the ducklings.  So it might just be that we have to wait until it's time for the next clutch to see more eggs.

     The next reason might be that we stopped giving them their feed so there isn't enough protein in their diet.  But I'm not sure how true that might be because a "wild" duck doesn't get feed and they still lay eggs.

     Another reason might be that they are laying their eggs in a remote area that we can't seem to find.  Or, something is eating the eggs and we can't find any remains.  Even though I have tried to watch the ducks to see if they are going off by themselves to lay an egg and then coming back to the flock, I haven't noticed a single duck doing that.  If they were doing that that would be a sign that they have a nest somewhere and we need to find it because those eggs are too precious to be lost and not found!!

     So, I have come to believe, that at this point, they just aren't laying eggs right now.

     After visiting our friends farm, Vesterbrook Farm, I got an idea for a nesting house for our ducks.

     I drew up some plans for the nesting house and Shane built it for me using some old barn wood and some recycled tin that was left here on the farm.  And I love it!!

The new nesting box for the ducks.

   
     The roof is hinged so we can pick up the roof and get the eggs out from the top if we want them for breakfast or baking.  The opening in the bottom is the doorway.  The door hasn't been put in place yet because we don't have any hinges to do that right now.  Once we get the hinges and attach them,  we will also put on a latch to secure the door, so if a duck is sitting on a nest we can close her up, "lock" her in, and protect her for the night.   

     My hope is that the ducks will use it to lay their eggs and hatch out their ducklings once they start laying their eggs again.  Hopefully the nesting house will catch on and we will need to make more of them for more momma ducks!

     Thus far we haven't had a problem with predictors and I'm not naive enough to think that we won't at some point.  But for now, as far as the duck are concerned, they are safe.  Every night we put them in their house and lock them up until the morning.  

     The Cowboy said that we needed some color in our ducks so he gave us a boy to help us take care of that.  We'll let you know if and when we get some "color".   

     Here's a link to a post I wrote previously:  The Mother Duck and Her Baby Ducklings

The new boy on the ranch.

Waiting for the "new boy" to join the girls for a drink.

The ducks checking out their new nesting house.

Three Day old Kids

   

"Sven"

"Sven" and "Anna"

     We just picked up our "new babies" last night from our friend, Tasha, because the mother wasn't able to feed them.  And Tasha didn't want to bottle feed them, so we adopted them.

     On our way home from picking them up, we stopped at Barrett's baseball game at Judson College. And at about the 6th or 7th inning, some of our kids and our friends went to let the babies out of their basket in the car so they could feed them and let them prance around for a little bit.  

     Then all of a sudden, as we were watching the game and talking, I looked over to the left because I could hear the babies crying.  And here came two of our friends walking toward us holding the babies.  And, oh, I just wanted to crawl into a hole!!  They were so loud!  I couldn't believe that they came up by us and even though there were about 30 people in the bleachers, it was very quite; almost like a golf game - quiet.  And the cry of the babies just magnified in the silence.  I was almost sure the umpire was going to stop the game and have us thrown out of the park!  Thankfully, he didn't and the game went on as usual.     

      It's not every day that you see a goat at a baseball game in the suburbs of Chicago.  So it's kinda of hard to know what people were thinking, and at the time, I really didn't want to know.  So I told the kids to quickly take them down from the bleachers and they did.

     Sooooooo, where do you think they took them?  To the only other place that they shouldn't have which was just behind the dugout for the Addison Braves!!

     "Are those goats?" the guys on the team asked.  And, "What kind of crazy people would bring goats to to a baseball game?" they said.   Barrett told them they belonged to his family and they thought that was "cool".  Then one of the coaches said, "No, those aren't baby goats, those are lambs!"  Apparently it was pretty funny because the whole team started laughing.  It was funny to hear the laughter coming from the dugout and then the team trying to talk to the goats at the same time!  Looking back, it was probably a good thing because it helped turn a maybe stressful and boring game into something that the team will remember.   

     Since birth, Sven couldn't figure out how to drink from a bottle so he had to be force fed.  But Anna was eating just fine.  So today we decided to make the hole in the nipple a little bigger and then Sven was able to drink out of the bottle without having to force feed him, which was really nice. 

     Tasha wasn't sure if Sven was going to make it, but so far he's doing good.  We'll just do our best to keep taking care of him and pray that he makes it.  

     Today was the day that we were scheduled to be at the opening day of a new Farmer's Market in West Chicago, IL, that we will be participating in for the market season, and we had to take the babies with us.  At first, I was a little reluctant, but I didn't want anyone of us to have to leave the market to go and feed them so we brought them along. 

     It was fun to see the reaction on some of the people's faces at the market when the babies would start "crying".  Soon we had people coming over to see if what they heard was really what they thought the heard.  One of the gentlemen asked what we were going to bring to the market the next week and I told him that maybe we would bring some of our baby chicks that we just picked up from the hatchery.  What better place to have a little more interest in animals then at a Farmer's Market and for the "city" people to see where their food actually comes from!! 

     Tomorrow we will head back to the ranch with our new kids in their basket and introduce them to the place where they will spend their growing up days.
  
June 4, 2014.
Sandy

Boys Will Be "Boys"

   

     Landon was looking for a Jeep and Cooper found this Samurai on Craigslist.  And somehow Landon got it in his head that he "needed" it.  So yesterday, in order to pick this thing up, we had to drive north of Springfield, MO, about 60 miles.  Please don't ask me how many miles that was from our ranch because it's almost embarrassing (for me at least) not to mention, expensive.

     Now, never mind that the day before we were halfway to the Samurai when we were visiting Cody Holmes' Ranch on Saturday!!  And with the price of fuel, Landon could have saved a whole lot of money and our time if we would have driven there yesterday before we went to Cody's!!  So, why didn't we just go to pick up the Samurai while we were that far west, you ask??  Well, because we had to borrow "The Cowboy's" trailer to haul this "awesomeness" back home and we couldn't catch him until the morning we were getting ready to and hoping to leave.  

     Anyway, the scenery on this trip was beautiful!  It rained a good part of our trip, so the sky was totally cover in clouds until the time the sun set.  And just before sunset, those clouds broke just enough to let the sun shine through..............and............you - would - not - believe it unless you saw it!  The sun was the most amazingly beautiful, blood orange red, that any of us have ever seen!  It was so unbelievable!!  We tried to capture a quick picture with my iPhone, but the photo wouldn't do justice to the beauty that we saw.      

     One thing that made the trip exciting for me, and the boys also, was that we were able to stop at Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds and spend some time there.    It wasn't enough time to capture all that they have there, so we will surely be back!!

     My first reaction when I saw this Samurai was that it needed to go right to the dump.  I told Landon, "To keep his money in his pocket and take it home with him.  He didn't need this!!  We'll find another one!  Who cares! that we drove so many miles to get here!" 

     Shortly after we arrived, the uncle of the boy that sold the Samurai to Landon said, "I know you came a long way so if you would like to use the restroom, I can show you where it is."  So I looked at Elizabeth and asked her if she need to go and she said, "Yes" so we went.  Never again will I fall for that one because when I came walking back the boy was counting out the money and handing Landon the title!!

     It's funny that I didn't notice until we were on our way home, how apropos my picture was that I had taken!

     Anyway, the boys think it's the coolest thing so we'll see what they can do with it.  At this point it doesn't run, so they have some work to do.

     With all of the traveling we have been doing lately, I told the kids that we are not eating fast food anymore!!!!  I'm so tired of it.  From now on, when we travel we will be preparing our food ahead of time and bringing it with us.  But unfortunately, I didn't do that for this trip so we I told the kids that they had to come up with something else other than fast food.  And what do you think Landon came up with?!

     Next to McDonald's, Walmart's selection of food is right up there at the top of the list as one of the most unhealthy and disgusting foods ever!!  And especially when you eat it, cold and right out of the can.............woo hoo!!    And as much as I don't want to admit it, I guess, in "an emergency" this works, but the boys will have to make something small and portable to warm it up next time!  Such as.....................this portable Wood Gas Stove!  But then again, I will try and be prepared.

Until next time.
June 9, 2014
Sandy

The Auction - Part 1

Just before the animals came out, the electric fence posts did.

     On Friday night we went to a small animal auction in a town about 60 miles straight west of us.   Now, if we could drive as the crow flies, the distance is probably about 25 miles, but because we can't do that, the distance was close to 60 miles.  And what a ride we had!!  

     Our guide and mentors for the evening were *The Cowboy and his family.  We planned ahead of time to meet downtown at 5:00pm so we could follow The Cowboy to the auction and little did we know what that really meant.  He told us a few days ago that he was going to take us to places that we have never been before and boy did he ever.  

     Now coming from the Chicago area, we're used to driving on familiar roads that are for the most part as straight and flat as they come.  We're used to them, just like anyone would be used to the roads that they grew up with.  And usually when someone says to follow me, they usually take it a little slower to make sure that they don't lose you.  Well, not in this case.  When The Cowboy said, "Follow me.", he meant it.  He took off in that diesel truck and cattle trailer like you can't even begin to imagine.  

     It was the most wild ride that the kids and I have EVER been on.  Who needs to go to the amusement park when you have a road like this!!  I tried to take a video of the ride, but the video just didn't do the ride justice.  We tried to keep from laughing but it wasn't easy.  Is he really expecting us to follow him this way?  I think I remember him putting his brakes on at least twice in the hour that we were in the van.  And I seriously think it was just to check up on us to make sure that were were still behind him!! 

     As we were driving, I was trying to point out the beautiful things along the way and at the same time trying to keep my eyes on the road as the co-pilot, and............trying to make sure that Shane wasn't trying to look at the scenery because he had to keep his eyes on the road.    

     The road, Hwy 106 which takes you through the Ozark National Scenic Riverways, was a gently rolling, gently curvy road with a wide shoulder, but trying to keep up with The Cowboy was crazy!!  It wasn't as if we were in any real danger because the road was a good road, but not ever having driven on this road before, we never knew what to expect.  At one point we thought we were going over a jump because as you came to the top of the hill, we could not see the other side going down!!

     Thankfully and by God's grace, we made it safely and with only one of the girls getting car sick.  The Cowboy says that it will take some time to get used to the roads so don't worry, it will come.

     Sometime we're going to have to drive Hwy 106 again when we we're not in such a hurry because words cannot express how beautiful it really was despite how fast the scenes were moving past us.  The reds, the purples, and the white blossoms set against the newly greening trees and forest was breathtaking.  And overlooking the valleys.......well..........the next time, we will just have to stop and take in the splendor.   


*Names outside of our family will be changed to protect the privacy of the new characters that we meet along the way in this next chapter of our lives journey.

Baby Goats