Animal Farm

Ohhhhh my gosh, so we have started taking care of the animals....

Animals = deliciousness

Ok so: the farm has 10 acres of organic vegetable production, and we also keep pigs, chickens, and sheep.  Traditionally, the interns have only been associated with the veggie side of the farm, but in the last two weeks, we have started to handle all the livestock chores as well.  This means that every morning someone has to go feed, water, and generally check on the critters, every afternoon we collect eggs, and somewhere in there we move fencing around so that the animals are on fresh grass.

Farm Vision: Creatures!

A few notes on the basic infrastructural of the farm: The livestock were brought in at the get go because of the owner's vision of having a commercially viable small scale animal and produce farm.  Having said that, there were no fenced paddocks or irrigation systems in place for animals.  There's plenty of land, however, so with traditional visionary zeal, the farm decided to just do it and figure it out as they went.

(The fact that I live on the farm right now demonstrates that I am also susceptible to visionary zeal, and just-do-it decision making.  Nike, if you are reading, you should probably hire me.)

We drag the big water tank around on a trailer,
and put a hose into a teeny tiny water pump,
into another hose, into the smaller tank
with the chickens or pigs or whatever.
This is Dumb. 

So in place of pipes and faucets, we have water tanks that take 45 minutes to fill and 45 minutes to empty.  In place of wood-and-nail fencing, we have wires attached to rebar and hooked up to a car battery, and these funny bendy waist high nets made out of soccer netting and good intentions.  They work...ok.

Rouge chicken escapes tiny, bendy, cloth fence.
Story at 11: How Did The Fence Go Wrong?!

Then we got cows, who laugh at our pithy fencing and go where they darn well please.

Well, the cows are moving off the farm and we are actually in process of setting up real irrigation and fencing, but in the mean time, let me tell you what I have learned about farm creatures:

1. Cows are greedy bastards.
Just look at this!  Stealing all the chicken feed, upsetting the hens...Not sorry at all!  Whoever coined the phrase "placid as a cow" never worked on a farm with crappy infrastructure.

Do not assault me!

2. Pigs are the most adorable creatures ever.
When you pull up in the truck they race each other across their pens to come say hi.  They get in wrestling matches.  Like, 2 boy pigs go at it shoulder to shoulder while the next two watch and cheer them on.  And, true story, they sound just like the pigs in Angry Birds. (Side note: pigs don't seem to be into raiding other livestock pens like the dastardly cows, but they do eat eggs.  Ahh, Angry Birds, you must have a maverick research and due diligence team!)   They are also huge, and curious, and playful.  Like, if you drop something on the ground they will take it and back away like a dog begging to be chased.  One girl was refilling the water trough and a pig pulled her pants down.

So maybe playful with an edge of "sex offender," but I think it was all in good fun.

3. I am the chicken whisperer.
Thiiiiiiiiis might not be entirely true, but I was very proud of myself when I went to close the chicken roosts up tonight and coaxed all the hens out of their warm comfy nests.  We keep the roosts closed at night to deter them from pooping all over their eggs, and open them first thing in the morning to encourage laying.  They are not entirely 100% keen on this plan, but they also have brains the size of a pea, so we're not super worried.

The roosts are in movable trailers that we
 spent an hour hitching to the truck
 and dragging 15 feet this morning,
 so that the chickens don't have to live
 in their poop and get sick and die.
We're pretty much doctors.

The roosts are wacky because there are about 60 or 80 for about 250 birds, and each day certain roosts will just be empty and others will have 5-10 eggs in them.  I sort of feel like they're equivalent to public rest rooms, but the birds are pooping out eggs (which I then collect and, as often as possible, eat...so, yeah, I get that it's gross logic, Reader.  I know.).  So they're not really like public restrooms, they're like public birthing rooms.  And the chickens go for the ones with the heaviest traffic.  (Also gross- you're welcome, Reader).

BECAUSE I AM THE ROOSTER!!!

We have one rooster for all these fine ladies.  He thinks he's a big deal both because, as a rooster, that's just in his nature, and also because he has a harem bigger than a sultan.

The pecking order really exists and there are some beat up looking chickens, but I guess that's the natural order or something.  I don't think any of my anti-bullying curriculum would work.

Speaking of "pecking order," all kinds of phrases I've heard my whole life take on a whole new meaning on the farm.  Like calling someone a chicken no longer means they're a coward, but it might mean they're reeeeeally dumb.  The birds barely get out of the way of the car, and they tend to just hunker down when scared, or try and crawl in a hole, or cluck.  On the other hand, saying a group of talkative, gossipy, perhaps naggy women is like a gaggle of hens is spot on.  You gotta coax them out of the roost, gentle as can be, but then they sit around for 10 minutes telling each other, "Did you see what just happened?! She just MOVED me-- I can't believe it!  Who raised her? Did you SEE what she did?!?"

We also have teeny tiny baby adorable
 chickens (that one day we will batter and
 fry and they will be DELICIOUS!)

One did get a little "mother hen and her chicks" with me when I was getting her out of the roost, and tried to peck me.  It was mostly hilarious.  She went in for like, 4 or 5 solid pecks, and even grabbed my sleeve and tried to worry it like a dog, and none of it was painful or effective in the slightest.  Turns out, little lady, you're a chicken-- not exactly nature's perfect killing machine.

*I* am nature's perfect killing machine.

4. Caterpillars are gross.
Ok, caterpillars, aren't gross, but caterpillar infestations where I'm in charge of killing them all ARE gross.  You just reach out and squish them, and they POP (Gross!) and SPRAY THEIR GROSS INNARDS ALL OVER EVERYTHING.  I did a little research on insect blood and why it's green, something to do with chlorophyll, and I don't care at all, it's disgusting.  One or two, fine, but the other day I had to go into the tomato tunnel and it was like the Killing Fields.

This is what I am up against.

There are a variety of caterpillars in residence on our tomatoes, each bigger and grosser than the next, but one in particular is worth mentioning.  He was longer and thicker than any finger on my body, and had a vicious looking spike on his butt.  He looked like he was going to make a cocoon and a hawk was going to come out.  I had to wrestle him to the ground and curb stomp him and when he went POP I decided I was done for the day and was heading home.
G. R. O. S. S.

5. Sheep...?
 I don't really have anything to say about the sheep yet, except that they all stick together and when they run around and jump over things in herds it really looks like counting sheep to go to sleep.

That's all for me, I have to go wash animal off of me.  Bye, Reader!