The year in review.

Once again, we enter that season of waiting, anticipation, dreams.  In this region, we are blessed with actual seasons, seasons that are usually of such stark differentiation that we either find ourselves coming to a stark awareness, as in "I don't think it is summer anymore", or a long-awaited relief, as in "wow, the air doesn't bite my lungs anymore!" While, at times, we may be tempted to curse the extremes that accompany either winter or summer here in the upper Great Plains, we also seem to develop just enough amnesia each year to allow us the courage and resolve to stay.

This is the season of remembering.  It is the season of beginnings, as well, of hopes and dreams and plans for the future.  A local television channel posed a question recently:  What was your best Christmas present ever?  Oddly, that question didn't so much bring a particular gift to mind as it brought recollections of Christmases passed, memories of good times and hard times.  I have narrowed my answers regarding the gifts to either that magnificent black plastic horse, complete with saddle and bridle, that I received from my grandparents before I was allowed the real thing, or that stand mixer that my husband was so proud of cleverly sneaking past me back about twenty-five years ago.

This past year has been full of excitement and adventures for us.  It has also held its share of sadness, too.  We were blessed with an "open winter" last year, so we didn't have to cope with the terrors of blizzards and closed roads as much as we do in "normal" winters.  We have finally carved in stone that we DO NOT LAMB TILL SPRING.  We were also able to successfully contain those new young bucks long enough to make this a reality.  Our lambs hit the ground running, for the most part, with only three little waifs that needed our assistance.  Our younger goat doe, Daisy, gifted us with triplets this year!  She is an amazing little mother and had no problems keeping all three little bucklings well-fed and still having milk to share with us.  We left them with her full-time and made sure that she didn't become stressed.  It was a very sad day, however, when we had to release our dear Petal from the pain of birth complications.  She taught us so much and gave us so much joy.  She will be remembered by many.

In the very depths of winter, we hovered over our seed catalogues, knowing which seeds were necessaries and which would just be "fun".  We finally placed our order and realized that this was going to be the Year of the Bean.  We tried seven different varieties of dry beans this year and were very pleased with most of them.  We also have learned that posting our tomato plants is the most successful method yet.  We put steel posts between the tomato plants and then wove twine around them as they grew, supporting the plants and keeping most of the fruit from touching the ground at all.  It certainly alleviated the callisthenics we used to endure as we tried to harvest the tomatoes without stomping on the vines.  Edith planted a squash bed in a separate area to avoid the usual take-over of vined plants.  It worked beautifully!  She, of course, immediately made plans to enlarge that bed and get it thoroughly fertilized for Spring 2013! Oddly, settling on a maximum size of planting bed about five years ago has become a rather fuzzy, dim memory.

As spring moved into summer, we became frighteningly aware that rain was perhaps NOT going to come for us.  In our gardens, we plan for watering by burying seeper hoses as we plant.  The farmers around us do not have that option.  The corn was well past knee-high by the Fourth of July, but no one was sure how long that would progress.  By August, each day of hot, dry winds made the corn stalks whiter.  Beautiful lush fields lost their deep green and didn't even look as if they would produce cattle feed for winter.  The pastures dried and dwindled everywhere, the short grass and weeds crunching beneath one's feet.  Hay for the winter looked to be a tough and expensive prospect.  I gave away six horses.

Edith's mum, Jenny, had cataract surgery last winter and didn't feel that the process would be fully completed in time for her to make a spring visit as she has done the two prior years.  It meant, we said, that she would be able to experience the harvest part of the season, rather than the planting part.  She arrived in early September, in time to join Mom's and my birthday celebration.  In fact, since we hadn't been able to help celebrate Jenny's 80th, we included her in the party in that way, as well.  Shortly after her arrival, my youngest son, Jon, his wife Nancy, and their 4 year old daughter, Addison came from Denver to take part in the fun.  Addie had great fun getting re-acquainted with her old friends, the dogs and cats.  She also helped with milking Daisy and was able to take a ride on Lady, too.  She and her Daddy were pleased to see the hollyhocks they had planted two years ago and decided to help plant some more for next year.  After their return to Denver, Jenny was with us until almost the end of the month.  She was able to join us at a real barn dance at the home of Vikki Kingslien.  She was able to see some of the work Edith and I had done there five years ago. She also joined in the toe-tapping that went on in the haymow where at least fifty friends and neighbors had joined for the fun.

On October 11th, my eldest son, Michael, married his lovely bride Veronica.  It was a simple ceremony in Watertown with his grandmothers and Veronica's aunt, Theresa in attendance.  I had talked with my new daughter-in-law on the phone several times, but this was my first opportunity to meet her in person. She is delightful! They live in Chicago and find that their work schedules at Ford and Greyhound don't always allow travel for holidays. Michael's cousin Kelly was his witness, so that gave them a brief opportunity to reunite.  Those two were quite a handful as kids and nothing much has changed!  They weren't with us very long, but it was long enough for us to find that we have been blessed with a lovely addition to our family.  Only a few weeks later, all three brothers, including Brian from South Carolina, were again here in South Dakota to attend the funeral of their birth father.  A sad time of sharing, but they always love a chance to see each other.  These are rare and precious times.

The little chicks we ordered from Murray McMurray last May have grown into big girls now and are producing ever more eggs each day.  We are happy to have a few 'clients' that we supply with eggs each week.  They and we are thrilled to have such large eggs with the beautiful yellow yolks.  We had ordered straight-run chicks, so a point came where the boys were left in the brooder in the barn and the girls were transported to the hen house.  Mom came out to help us butcher some of the roosters.  I wonder if she will think twice before commenting on how much fun it is when we decide to do this another year! They aren't broiler-type birds, they are considered heavy layers, though.  We are finding them to be very tasty, with plenty of meat and much longer legs than broilers.

This will be the first year that none of my boys will be able to be with us for the Christmas holiday.  They each have pretty solid reasons, though, as Veronica's work with Greyhound Bus Lines is especially busy over holidays, Jon and Nancy are awaiting the birth of a new daughter shortly before New Year, and Brian decided not to risk getting snowed in in Watertown again!  They all hope to come see us in the spring and we have to agree that it will be much more pleasant not to have the stress of hazardous weather.  We, on the other hand, have to finish all our gift preparations earlier so that they can be shipped and arrive at a decent time for the holiday!  This challenge has been the bain of my existence for as long as I can remember. When a gift actually does arrive in time, the recipient usually is shocked enough to need resuscitation before he or she even sees what it is.

For now, a light covering of snow has obliterated all the evidence of the past summer's drought.  It holds a taste of the long-sought moisture the soil so craves. The geese have headed south, fattened by all the feeding on corn stubble.  Edith has plowed up yet another garden where we hope to see flourishing vegetables that perhaps will be the start of a local farmers' market. The freezers are full.  The hay is in the yard for the horses, sheep, and goats. Wood cutting goes on and on.  There are quilts begging to be sewn.

We live in the hush that waits new birth.

Why did the Chicken cross the road?

According to the National Chicken Council, more than 1.25 Billion Chicken wing portions (more than 100 million pounds) were consumed on Super Bowl weekend in 2012. That being said, this may well be called 'Beef Country' but I know for a fact, folks like their chickens; if not we wouldn't still be receiving phone calls asking if we have chickens for sale, four years after we raised our last batch of 700 broilers.

So you like your chicken to eat and many of you will enjoy raising a few for eggs. So lets see how you fare with chicken trivia!

When a chicken starts to eat her eggs, what is deficient in her diet?

a) vitamin b

b) attention

c) food

d) calcium

Calcium!  And what many hobbyists may not know is that a layer hen’s calcium needs actually go up in hot weather and as she gets older!  Common calcium deficiency symptoms in layer chickens include thin, weak eggshells and even eggs laid without a shell. Sources of calcium are limestone and/or ground oyster shell both available at your local farm store. If you recycle your egg shells and feed them back to the chickens as a source of calcium, remember to crush them up, you don't want to provoke the hens into free feeding on freshly laid eggs.

What do chickens store in their gizzard to help them chew?

a) small teeth

b) acid

c) husks and shells

d) grit

Grit! It may surprise you, or not, that chickens do not have teeth, the function of the gizzard is to grind up their food. While it is a tough muscular structure, that alone cannot achieve the powerful action needed to break down their food. They need grit to accomplish the grinding action. Free ranging birds will generally find their own, ours head to the gravel driveway, but if you lock your birds up for the winter (or any other time) you will need to feed them grit to aid their digestion. It can be bought at your local feed or farm store.

Which of these is NOT a breed of chicken?

a) Wyandotte

b) Toulouse

c) Old English

d) Hamburgh

Toulouse is a breed of goose. While next year we may well raise ducks, we will not be raising geese, we have dogs that will guard us we don't need geese.

What is the most common fowl on Earth?

a) White Leghorn

b) Rhode Island Red

c) Foghorn Leghorn

d) Old English Game

White leghorn! Beautiful bird that lays white eggs. We have a similar looking bird, the White giant, that is larger and lays brown eggs.

What colour are all of the Australian Breeds?

a) Black

b) white

c) orange

d) grey

Interestingly, they are all Black, the most famous here being the Australorp. The other Australian breeds are the Australian Langshaan, Australian Pit Game and Australian Game.

Australorp.

If you think this love of chickens is strange, then you have never walked into a chicken house after dark and heard the wonderful soothing noise chickens make as they sleep. If you wonder at so many people wanting to keep a few hens, then you have never experienced the wonder of finding a warm egg laid just for you. If, for some reason, you cannot keep your own chickens, we encourage you to find someone local to supply you with farm fresh eggs from pasture fed chickens, you will never enjoy a supermarket egg again. 

I leave you with some last facts for today:

With 25 billion chickens in the world, there are more of them than any other bird species.

Roosters perform a little dance called ‘tidbitting’ in which they make sounds (food calls) and move their head up and down, picking up and dropping a bit of food. Researchers have found that females prefer males that often perform tidbitting and have larger, brighter combs on top of their heads. Why roosters have wattles

Sad day in Small town America

Today is a very sad day in our little town with a population of 1,150. The Hometown Variety Store will be closing its doors after selling off the last of its inventory at 75%. Opened 4 years ago using local peoples' investments it sold all the things you might expect to find and then more. It was a local store, staffed and managed by local people that also sold many locally made products.  It sold our goatmilk soap, sold locally made jewelry, handbags, candles and ornaments. They had the best selection of quilting fabric for many miles and at half the price of most quilting shops within a 100 mile radius.The ladies that managed the store saw a need and  started a section for children's consignment clothing. If you wanted something not found on the shelves, they did their best to find it for you. Those ladies poured their heart and soul into making the store a success and they are the last people this town should blame for the store's demise.

We still have a few locally owned businesses - a hardware store, a florist, a butcher, a store with handmade goods, a few bars, restaurants and hairdressers. They all try to serve this small community in a way that allows them to remain a financially viable business. I am sure that as each owner looks at the Hometown Variety Store the thought must pass through their heads "There but for the grace of the locals....".

If anyone is to blame for the demise of the Variety store it is the locals. We all buy Office supplies, we all buy soap, we all buy small gifts for friends and family but we chose not to buy them locally. We can complain that they cost a few cents more locally but the closest Walmart/ Target, Big Box Store is 45 miles away and saving those few cents didn't make up for the gas we used getting there. The local stores don't expect us to spend thousands in their stores, they don't ask us to give up our monthly/weekly shop in the large stores. They just needed our support.....sadly this particular store didn't get it.

I doubt this story is unique to our little town, I am sure it is being repeated all around the country. It is something those of us living in small towns can do something about by choosing to buy some of our goods locally. They may not be able to compete with the prices in Big Box Stores but they win hands down with Customer Service. These small stores change lives, keep communities alive....they make a difference. Look around and see if you can make a difference by supporting them.