A Million Hens but No Eggs?

This very late cousin of "The Bishop" dahlia sneaks a few
flowers out before the first frost.

As I put out the 'Sold Out' sign on the egg Honesty Box again, I rue the bad timing that had me starting those sales just as, it seemed to me, the egg production dried up. I go round each morning and collect 2 or 3 duck eggs from the ever-reliable Khaki Campbells and then, at the moment, pick up the very sporadic 1-3 hen eggs through the day from the various hidey holes.

An unidentified fungus from the front lawn. 

We are knee deep in young chickens at present. We must have around 30 chickens total but regular readers will know that 26 of these are still deciding whether to shout cock-a-doodle-doo or to lay an egg. The old guard are currently on go-slow, presumably due to the weather.

Egg production stats.

It is not, in fact, as bad as it seems. Way back when we first came over, I used to haunt various Internet discussion groups on the subject of keeping chickens (Fowl.IE was one) and someone on there suggested we all keep score on our egg laying. I have done so ever since. I can see from these data that the current situation is by no means unprecedented and the current year is probably the best yet.

These things go in peaks and troughs. The total eggs produced in 2015 was 1639, 2016 was only 926 and this year we have 1563 so far and every chance of topping 2015's total by Dec 31st. Last year the hens laid fewer than 100 eggs per month from May right round to October even before half were wiped out by our fox attack in November. This year no months have seen hen eggs below 100 and we had 199 in May and 200 in August. Do not despair you poultry-watchers.

The late 'Oveja', bought-in ewe lamb.

Obviously we hope for a smart pick-up around Christmas as these new birds come of age and we are also upping the ante soon with our addition of 2 female Guinea Fowl. Also today, we have decided to increase the number of ducks so we have contacted friends Sue and Rob to arrange to bring them over half a dozen eggs to put in their incubator. These will be Khaki Campbell again though we may, at some point, look at a few more meaty birds - Muscovies for example.

Talking of 'meat' I noted in the previous post that our bought-in ewe lamb, 'Oveja' had come up ready, so we had booked her in for her final journey on Monday. I still hate these days - they feel like such a betrayal - but we have now done them enough that I am more confident that all the feared things that might go wrong, no longer scare me so much - Will we be able to catch the lambs? Will the trailer break? Will the car break down? Will the butcher reject them? Will the paperwork be OK? Will we be able to kiss them goodbye?

First 'fruits' - the offal, which you collect on D+1. Left to right
 here, kidneys still in their (suet) jackets, liver, heart and lungs.
The carcass hangs a week and will be collected next Monday.

We are now almost casual about it. I was determined this time not to drive Liz the usual amount of crazy with my pacing, worrying and drumming my fingers on the table. We shared a leisured tea/coffee, ran the sheep across to the race, separated and loaded our required 'cargo' (just Oveja), drove to Castlerea, unloaded and processed paperwork, swapped instructions with the butcher-guys and adjourned to nearby Benny's Deli for a croissant-based breakfast. Pride in a job well done.

We even 'got away with' that risk of having to drop your one sheep into the lonely empty 'lairage' pen where she would 'baa' piteously at you as you drove away - the pen had 6 ewe lambs already in it, so Oveja sprinted in there to be with her new 'friends'. Safety in numbers... for a while anyway. Today I picked up the offal but I did not see Joe, the slaughterman. I had asked him to check for me whether the lass was pregnant. When ewe lambs are run with their brothers past 5-6 months this can often happen and in our case it might give us an early indication that Oveja's brother 'Pedro' who we plan to keep as our breeding ram, is able for this job. Not very "nice", but one of those hard facts of life.

Village Calendar 2018

Meanwhile, Liz has created the next year's Village Calendar again based upon pictures from the 2016/7 "Lisacul 365" project, our photographic portrait of the 18 townlands as a 'Year in the Life'. Liz decided this time to mainly choose 'nature' pictures, so they are, I am proud to say, mainly mine. The calendar is a lovely thing and, this year, they are selling at only €5 (it was €10 last year) and going like hot cakes. Liz is looking at a 2nd print-run as the supply dwindles. If you want one (or more - they would be great stocking fillers) go to the village website - LisaculInfo.ie .

Hard to beat a good 'Cosyglo' fire. 

Liz's other main project at the moment, the Village Play, is also progressing. The group have been reading through various plays proposed by the 'boss' (Tom C) but have only had print-outs of olde-font play-scripts in PDF format to work with, so Liz has started typing these into her laptop so that they have a live version they can mess with as desired. The first (Her Step Husband by Larry Johnson) was over 30,000 words so it took her a while. To no avail, as it turned out - the players have now settled on 'Anyone Could Rob a Bank' by Tom Coffey (1960) and all the actors have now been cast, so Liz is going to have to get the laptop out again and fiddle another 20,000+ words into it. Ah well. Life is never easy for an Assistant Producer.

While we are on creative writing, I have just completed another week (my 3rd) as curator of the @SmallHolderIRL Twitter account, the 'voice of Irish small holders', if you like. I seem to go down OK on there and it suits my style of chattering and wittering. My Dad would have used the words "Happy" and "Garrulous", I expect, but hey, it works for me. I always get good feedback and also I get asked back to do it again so it can't all be bad.

This is not my picture, but may well have been 'my' buzzard.
Pic is by Michael Bell, who goes on Twitter as @learnnature
and was taken in Ballyleague (Co Roscommon). 

Finally I am in between, currently, the various wild-life recording events to which I contribute, on the (Irish) National Bio-Diversity database. The bumblebee survey finishes at the end of October and we don't start the big bird-watch till the end of November. What I do in the meantime is input any sightings I see of anything note-worthy including roadkill. Exciting, then, to see my first buzzard since I've been here. I am not even sure it was a buzzard (though I thought so) - it was soaring in the blue sky with its wings held in a rather high 'V', so more like a harrier but it was against the sun, so I could only see the black silhouette. It was nice later that day to get a post by Liz re-sharing a pic taken by a guy (Michael Bell, who Tweets under the name @LearnNature ) who had photo'd 2 buzzards soaring over Ballyleague. That town is a good 50 minutes drive east from here, right over by the River Shannon, but I'd seen my buzzard at 10 am and he was making good speed over the ground, so it might just have been the same bird.

....And that is enough for now. Good Luck.

AB's 6 from 6

AB 'schmoozing' up some bullocks with a bag of feed as bribery

We are now well into our 3rd week with Help-X volunteer, 'AB' and it's all going brilliantly. This week he has managed to add 2 species of domestic livestock to his 'list' of animals of which he has had experience, and two new species of weed to his 'bashed' list. The animals are sheep and cattle and the weeds are rushes and thistles.

A whole shoulder and front leg of venison, Fallow Doe in this
case. Slow roasted in a buttery foil parcel. Delicious.

The sheep were ours. One of our ewes, Lily, had gone lame favouring her front left. We think this was perhaps where she had trodden on a bit of blackthorn bush in the area AB and I had recently cleared of old prunings, tree branches and stinging nettles. Nettles are now known in these parts by the French name "Ortie", usually preceded by a rude epithet. We needed to get hold of Lily so that I could clean, check and trim her feet, giving the soft parts a good explore with my thumb to make sure there were no blackthorn spikes in there; a bit like getting a splinter in your finger.

It was AB's day off but he happily piled in with the shepherding back and forth to the Cattle Race  and moving gates about. I was worried that moving the 6 animals might be complicated by the presence of the 2 new lambs and, particularly, Pedro the Ram. I needn't have worried. It all went like clockwork and we probably could have done it without AB, but it was good to have the extra man-power shutting off the 'side-roads' and keeping the sheep on course.

That venison again. Couldn't resist another pic.

The cattle thing is just AB getting involved with the daily feeding job I am currently doing for a friend; 8 bullocks all coming up to 'end' weight. They are big animals, as you can imagine, maybe 600-800 kg (live weight) but AB, City boy with no experience of any kind of farming takes them all in his stride and moves confidently among them under my supervision, staying the right amount of quiet, calm and quiet-voiced. My 8 "boys" just accept him and seem to know he is no danger, especially when he is rustling a feed sack.

AB's 6 from 6 at 20 feet in Week 3

He's also made a good impression in the Archery Club - I have been taking him along on Sunday afternoons for a taster as the club's Coach, (Con) is currently running beginner training. Our club is a very welcoming group of people, happy to accommodate new members and enthusiastic in our encouragement of their early successes. The training happens on the right hand side of the hall, on the short-range targets (20 and the 40 feet) while we experienced regulars shoot down the left hand side to the full range butts.

This means that we each have to be very aware of where the 'other lot' are at and all stay in the safe areas till someone shouts "Collect" to the whole range. Quite often, therefore, we 'old hands' have finished shooting and can keep a quiet eye on the beginners as they go through their paces. We see when they get a bull's eye and, if appropriate (and allowed by Con), cheer, clap, whoop with joy etc. That's where we all were on AB's Week 3 when we all spotted that AB, who had been told to shoot off all 6 arrows, had got 2 bulls from his first 2 arrows.

We cheered his 3rd but were shushed by Con and held our breaths while AB focused on his 4th arrow. He knew we were all watching but you could have heard a pin drop as he planted his 4th, 5th and then amazingly his 6th right into the gold. Good shooting, AB. The lot of us went mad cheering and whooping and Con called for the photographer(s). He was as pleased as Punch, as you can imagine. His reward, of course, was to get moved on to the 40' butts, so he was back to square one but he will not forget that moment for a while. Because he is with us till 20th Oct, I have booked him in for a 4th session and he thinks he will keep with the archery when he gets back to Paris, trying to find a local club over there.

My only other news is that the Honesty Box for eggs is steaming along and spends a lot of its time sold out. I had to make a 'Sold Out' sign to fix across the main sign to save people fruitlessly getting out of their cars and checking the box. OK, we are never going to make our first €million as we still only have 3 ducks and about 7 hens in lay, but it is still a good feeling to know that local people like our eggs and our prices. We even made a couple of new friends when I spotted a couple of strangers rooting in the box and asked them in for tea and a look round the place. They are from nearby village Kilmovee. Welcome aboard.

As Easy as AB, See?

Venison on the menu.

The cupboard is bare! The sales of eggs from the 'Honesty Box' have just this week started to motor and when I looked in this morning there was not an egg to be seen. Instead, of course, a good handful of coins in the Tupperware box. We were sold out. I have had to re-stock with the reserves indoors. It is a good feeling but I might have to go have a word with the girls to see if we can up the production a wee bit. The hens, of course. The poor ducks are already going at 100%, putting the chooks to shame. 3 eggs from 3 ducks EVERY DAY.

Augustin gets an archery 'taster' session. His hand is on his
first ever bull's eye. 

Welcome aboard the Blog, though, our new Help-X lad. Augustin, 18 from the Eastern suburbs of Paris, joined us on Friday 22nd. A lovely bloke - big and strong (handy around here!) he is also very happy and relaxed, always ready with a witticism, very easy to get along with and very appreciative of our food and hospitality. No farming experience but very willing to try anything and already ticking off the new skills. He is settling in well. He is enjoying trying to improve his English (with added Irish expressions)  and Liz is enjoying being able to use her French again.

Taster session at the archery.

For the purposes of this blog, Augustin is actually "AB". It's a bit complicated. I had just about got the hang of nailing the correct pronunciation (too many options on all 3 syllables! Ow/Awww/Agg followed by Gus or Goose (or one in between) and then tan/tin/teen. I kept 'landing' the feminine versions (tin/teen).

Our man tried to put me out of my misery by suggesting "Call me Gus" but we can't use Gus at the moment - a TV series we are glued to in boxed set (Breaking Bad) has the worst bad guy named Gus. So we've gone with 'AB' (Augustin's initials) and he is delighted. Our other options from his long list of childhood nick-names are 'Doctor' (for his regular clever witticisms "like a Professor") or 'Ancien' (the old guy, after his love of wearing old fashion hats (flat caps, berets) and having a beard. Anyway, AB it is.

AB winds some pressure onto the cider press
while K-Dub holds it all down.

AB, then, was straight into things even though his first days were weekend. Archery coach, Con, had put out a call for volunteers to come and dismantle the club's big marquee / party tent. It was a bit windy to be messing with canvas but AB and I are 'substantial' lads and did not think we'd get blown away. Con was very grateful for our efforts and invited AB to come and have a taster session at the archery the next day (Sunday), where he was already due to start the latest Beginners' course. It all went well and AB even signed up for the next few Sundays. 

Home made cider press. 

The Monday saw us at the cider making. K-Dub announced that the cider press was now ready and we should bring all the apples over, so we raced round the orchard picking all we could see. When we got to K-Dub's place we also found that he had built a home made shredder - a wooden hopper with a plastic pipe slotted in at the bottom into which had been part-screwed, dozens of screws and into the end of which slotted a handle to turn this 'drum'.

I take a turn at the winding. We later graduated
to fitting a steel tube to the handle to give us
more leverage. It worked well. 

The apples fall to the bottom of the hopper where the exposed screw-heads rip them to bits. The shredded apple then goes in a 'pillowcase' assembled in minutes by Carolyn (she of the mini-horses) from a tea towel and some muslin-like fabric and gets pressed by the mighty press. K-Dub was well impressed by his own welding, with the new welder.

AB turns pig farmer as we train the pigs
to climb, fearlessly, into the trailer. 

The top of the press is a 12 mm thick chunk of sheet steel but the winding action was able to slightly bow this; a considerable pressure exerted on the apple pulp but nothing broke. Long story short, we extracted 3 and a half litres of juice from our (not many) apples but K-Dub tells me today that they have since sourced more apples and extracted another 7 litres. The juice is with Carolyn for the next stage. She knows a bit about brewing! Hopes are high for some delicious scrumpy.

All loaded. 

Our other main activity with the Help-X assistance has been that the pigs have 'come ready' and needed taking on their final journey today (Tuesday). AB helped me over the Sunday/Monday to train them to the trailer. Even though he has no experience of farming, he happily joined me among them, in the pen, with the pigs snuffling around this 'new' person, sniffing his legs and boots, nudging him out of the way. He stayed relaxed and calm (as instructed) so that Empress and Pride quickly climbed the ramp and we were sure we'd have a problem free 'loading day'.

Sunrise through the trees

I am happy to say that that worst-of-all small-holdering days is now done. We all managed to get up early, the pigs loaded as if they couldn't wait to get at their breakfasts (thin portion sizes today - they need to go to the butcher "fasted") , we had problem free haulage and drop off. Obviously we all hate to have to do this and we wish we didn't but that is a discussion for elsewhere. The pigs are, presumably by now, 'late' and the carcasses get 48 hours to cool and 'set'. We collect them on Thursday and AB can then see the next stage in the process. He likes his pork, we are told. It will have been an interesting experience for him. And he has not yet run away screaming!

The Best Cheese Ever?

Nicest cheese so far, by a long way. 

Here pictured is, we are sure, 'our' nicest cheese ever. All Liz's work, this one and a first try at a new recipe. Both of us had been plugging away last season at the soft cheeses and Feta style semi-soft ones using the very generous gifts of 9 litre batches of goat's milk coming from Sue and Rob. These are all a case of gentle warmth, waiting for curds, slicing curds into dice, lifting with a slotted spoon and straining in a colander with or without gentle pressing to help drive out the whey. This followed by a short wait, and no real 'maturing' time.

More 'Gubbeen' style cheese at the salt-cure stage. 

This year Liz went with a recipe from the Gubbeen book (Gubbeen (The story of a working farm and its foods) by Giana Ferguson, pub Kyle 2014, ISBN 978 0 85783 240 5 page 98+) which added an extra stage. This was "scalding" - reheating the separated cheese/whey to 39ºC and then breaking up the curds into tiny pieces (the size of unburst pop-corn) with your hands, followed by quickly scooping them out and into the final mould, where they will quickly set into one lump; your embryonic round of cheese.

An impressive hail storm turned us white
on Wednesday.

This 'lump' is drained some more, then cured with sprinkled salt all round (including turning to get at top and bottom) and washed now and then with saline while it matures for 10 days and develops a rind. To be honest, we could hardly wait. It looked so promising but today was the day. Patience was key. Well, dear reader, we are delighted. It is, as I said, the best ever - I'm saying "our best ever" though I wasn't involved at all, because it way 'out-cheeses' anything I have done.

It is a firm cheese with a definite rind. The flavour has the lovely delicate level of acidity and salty savouriness that it needs without overpowering the gentle goat-milk tang. It is dry-crumbly without a hint of the 'sweat' or greasiness you'd get in plastic-wrapped, shop Cheddar. We are delighted and Liz is re-living those Greek Island lunches where cheese just like this (She and Diane called them "Not-Feta") came with tomatoes, basil, olive oil and other sun-soaked accompaniments.

Roll up! Roll up! Git yer iggs frum 'appy
'ens 'ere. Fresh laid!

Meanwhile, while we are on 'produce' we are having our first venture into selling eggs at the farm gate via an 'honesty box'. We have no idea how this will go. Various friends and contacts have had some good success with the method.

The 'Manus', hatched when we had the Help-X lads here are
5 weeks old and will soon be leaving Mum. 

Our main contact (no names etc) reports only one problem when a neighbouring farm had some Herberts camping in one of the fields who took to roaming around on mopeds and stopped one day for an egg fight up and down the road. Our friends were out that day and came home to an empty box, no money, obviously, and eggs smashed all over the tarmac. Ah well. We put ours out yesterday and we know it has been spotted and the word will have gone round. Maybe the weekend will see a few first customers

The wine gets racked off and 'stabilized' (= killed)

The batch of 5 gallons of red wine completed its first ferment and comes due for racking off, 'killing' with stabilizer and fining. These are all words which would have tripped off the tongue back in the 70s. My brothers and I had 30 gallons of different wines on the go back then and all that terminology was 2nd nature. Now, I must confess, this is a bit of a rusty re-visit and  the 'fining' etc is just a case of following the instruction sheet from the kit-box and adding, at the right time, the contents of sachet D, E and F. Ah well. It'll surely taste OK.

At least 2 babies for Bobtail. Bottom left. 

Our current 'first' broody hen comes up to the crucial day, #21. This is 'Bobtail', a Buff Orpington with all her tail and bum feathers long since pulled out. "No better than she should be" (as they say here) she used to have a perfectly good tail, but she seems to love the attentions of the Rooster rather too much (!) Never mind, she went broody and thus gets a few weeks break from Gandalf's amorous attentions.

Bits of Cider Press in the paint shop.

We love that you can play a trick on a broody hen on due-day to see whether she has hatched. If you drop some food under her chin inside the nest she will either quietly peck away and eat it, or she will start that low-pitched bass-y clucking hens use to tell babies they have found food for them. If the latter, then if you stand a while and watch, any hatched, dried off and mobile chicks will surely start to appear from under her 'skirts' to see what Mum is talking about. I did this at lunchtime today with Bobtail and was pleased to see at least 3 youngsters emerge. Her colleague, 'Stumpy' 3 boxes along is not due for another 2 weeks. She is sitting on 7 eggs at the moment. More on this when we have progress. I'm off to see if I can blag some more of that cheese.....