twenty eighth - tom

So you guys have met our new sheep, our new kitten and now it's time for me to introduce you to our new Maremma pup, Tom. Tom is four months old and the son of a Maremma who was born here on our farm.

Tom lives with and looks after our chooks.

He also lives with his best buddy Bingo the Maremma.

And our four sheep, Mittens, Beanie, Socks and Cardigan.

He doesn't live with Miss Pepper but she certainly does spend a lot of time with him and with the sheep trying to get them to eat a cucumber or grain out of her hands.

Tom loves to run up and down his fence and bark like crazy if anyone he doesn't know comes by.

He's not too sure about the game where Pepper pretends to ride him.

And his favourite thing in the whole world, apart from dinner time, is a big tickle on the tummy.

Welcome Tom and thanks for doing such an awesome job.

And thank you guys for doing an awesome job of reassuring me that we'll be OK in the next stage of our family's life. Your messages were filled with such kindness and understanding and they mean the world to me. Your suggestions of talking books and podcasts and conversations will definitely be taken on board. And your personal stories of how your lives have changed, what's worked for you and what hasn't and your opinions on how best to tackle long commutes have made me feel like we are not alone in this and that it is definitely worthwhile. A little part of me is even getting excited.

I'd love to think that I'll get back to each of you either on my blog or in the message you sent to me, but realistically I may not so please consider this a massive THANK YOU!! You are wonderful and you never fail to hold my hand and walk with me down the track and I appreciate it beyond words. I have a whole blog post in my head about how important my blog and your feedback is to my life and this is a perfect example of how and why. So thank you again.

And goodnight from me and Tom and the rest of the crew here at Daylesford Organics.

We hope you have the sweetest dreams.


xoxox

these two

You'll have to excuse this post that is heavy on photos and light on words, but we are half way through the winter school holidays and all sense has flown out of the windows and all that is left behind is silliness and chatter. And song and stories and descriptions and instructions. So many words and yet none left to use here.


There was this day last week where Jazzy stayed inside and stripped her room for painting, my farmer boy and I walked up and down the hill doing the farm chores, and these two played together in the forest for hours. Climbing and laughing and sliding and telling funny stories.

There certainly are times when I wonder about living on a farm, when I worry about country kids and I hope that we are giving them enough. But at times like these I feel confident that this farm fresh world is the best world for us. It is more than enough.


I don't know if they know it yet.
But I do.


I love the way these two play and love each other fiercely.

I'm so glad I had my camera to capture them and their muddy knees.

Happy days friends. Happy days!

May the chatter that fills your head be kind and funny.

Bye!

xx

The day I thought I killed a rooster.

Last Friday my farmer boy and I spent a few hours in the bush with the chickens.

We moved the boundary electric fences, shifted their houses, collected the eggs, fixed their waterers, fed them and spent a while watching them enjoying their fresh ground.

Watching the chooks fly out of their houses onto a new patch of farm is such a joy, so exciting, I took heaps of photos and will share them with you one day soon.

But the story I want to tell you today is about a rooster. A big, white, intimidating, beautiful rooster.

To be honest, I am always intimidated and wary of our roosters. I have more than a few scars up and down my legs to explain why.

But biodiversity is incredibly important to us here at Daylesford Organics and we don't believe that it's right to keep 200 females with no males.

Also we feel that it is our responsibility to provide a good life for our hens, a life that is as close to their natural life as we can facilitate while protecting them from predators and the elements.

So we must keep a few roosters. And I must always, always be on the look out for their attacks.

But let's get back to last Friday...

We'd just finished all the jobs and were getting ready to head back up to the shed, when I decided to snap a few shots of the chooks on the bright green grass before we left.

The chooks were calmly exploring and feeding, the dogs and alpacas looked happy in their new surroundings and even the roosters seemed preoccupied and content.

So I let my guard down and got lost in the beautiful moment.

Until that big, white rooster came at me, all puffed up and ready to attack.

I jumped up and screamed and kicked my leg in his general direction a few times. Generally this is enough to put a rooster off his attack, but not this time. This rooster was insistent and came at me over and over again, standing as tall as he could, with his feathers on end, trying to get me with his sharp spurs.

Each time I'd kick at him he'd jump back and then forward at me again. And again. And again.

I couldn't see any way out and was terrified, of him and of the thought that another rooster might attack me from behind while I wasn't watching.

I needed a new plan and looked around desperately for help. A stick! Slowly I bent down to get one at my feet and he tried to jump at my arm, but I was quicker and struck at him with the stick. I think I meant to hit his body and scare him away but somehow the stick connected with his head and the rooster fell down and didn't get up. He just lay there, still.

I waited a few seconds and when he didn't move I screamed and I lost it. I thought I'd killed or injured him. I could not stop crying. Bren reached me, my face wet with tears, thinking I had been attacked.

But I was distraught. That poor creature lying there dead or in terrible pain and there I stood, huge, with a stick, the attacker. I cried and cried and cried.

Eventually Bren went and got the rooster back up on his feet. He stood there in the same spot for a while visibly shaken but OK and then after a while he walked slowly away.

I couldn't shake that terrible feeling for the rest of the day. It felt ghastly.

And ever since then I've been trying to reconcile the feelings I have for an animal that I don't particularly like, with the awful, awful feelings of hurting another creature, a creature that is so much smaller than me and who is reliant on me.

It feels big. I feel more wary than ever while collecting the eggs these past few days. And I feel more in awe of Mother Nature, and life cycles, and food chains, and our role as animal keepers and protectors than ever before.


Phew, I feel a bit better now that's out.
Thanks so much for reading.
I hope you have a gorgeous new week.

xx

moving the chooks along

This Friday the Blackwood flock of chickens, above, will leave our farm and make their home on another organic farm a couple of hours away.

I'm guessing that apart from the drive, the Blackwoods wont notice much of a difference between their old and their new homes at all. They'll travel along as usual dust bathing, eating, drinking, scratching for bugs, laying eggs, hanging out with their hen buddies and when dark comes, they'll even go to roost in the same houses they have since they came to live with us a year ago when they were one day old.

Our lives on the other hand will be very different indeed. 

The Blackwoods are the last flock to leave our farm and for the first time in years we will be down from 2,000 chooks to just 200. From 10 Maremma dogs to two. From two wonderful farmer boys to none.

This Friday marks the next stage in our organic farming adventure.

We're excited (and a little bit scared), we're happy (and a little bit sad), but we're really ready.

Hopefully our extra time will be spent trying to find a bit more of a self sufficient balance. Making, growing and doing more, and buying less. Hopefully scaling down the business will mean we'll have more time for other plans. And hopefully someday soon, the places we deliver to will stop calling us the egg man and lady.

So it is with much happiness for them and for ourselves that we farewell the Blackwoods.

Stay tuned for the next adventures.

xx

sunshine & sisters

And then the sun came out from behind the clouds and changed everything.

For the first time in weeks we left the house without a gazillion layers of clothing. For the first time in weeks all three girls came with us to collect the eggs. And for the first time in weeks, with no real threat of rain, I took the real camera out with us.

The light was so bright, the colours were so clear and we all just stood there in a pocket of sunshine for a while soaking it in. Feeling it on our skin. Feeling happy.

The girls played and laughed and sang and wrestled. Their joy was contagious.

Even the wood piles looked pretty and decorative, rather than the usual desperately necessary.

And we realised that there's only one more week until spring. Thank goodness.

And even though we didn't get to see our feature in today's Herald Sun magazine because it doesn't come to the country, we received loads of gorgeous messages and we feel very full and grateful and lucky. Thank you!!

I hope your day was filled with sunshine and happiness.
Did you get up to anything special?
Did you see our feature? Did you run? Did you take photos? Did you play fight with your sister?

Loads of love to you peeps.
The countdown to spring is on.

xx

seasonal - sustainable - wonderful

At the start of the cycle, last spring, we planted tomato seeds in trays in the hot house. We nurtured the seeds and watched them grow. When they were large enough to cope, we moved them outside or into the poly tunnels to give them space. We tried to provide ideal growing conditions by planting according to the moon's phases, weeding out some of the competition, feeding and irrigating and staking. And then over the last few months we enjoyed the harvest.

We had a wonderful, bountiful tomato season this year.

We picked colanders and baskets and buckets and crates full.

We ate them straight off the bush and in salads and sandwiches and cooked them in absolutely everything. And we preserved enough sauce and semi drieds to hopefully last us through out the year.

And then along came the first frost of the season. Just like that the outside tomato season was over. The frost burnt the foliage and damaged the remaining, as yet unripe fruit.

Following the first frost the chooks went in to clean up. They gobbled up the fleshy fruit, they ate the bugs and scratched up the dirt. And they pooed. Our chooks are really the hardest workers on our farm.

In the next few days, after they are done, my farmer boy will plow the tomato scraps and the chook poo into the soil adding much needed organic matter and fertiliser to the land that has grown our beautiful and delicious fruit.

After the plowing up we'll probably plant a winter pea crop or a broad bean crop to add nitrogen. We have to do everything we can to look after the health and balance of our hardworking soil. Everything that comes out with the growing, needs to go back in and more.

The tomato journey comes to an end.

And then next spring we'll start all over again.

As much as I dislike the cold and wet and grey, I love the seasons. I love that everything has it's time.

My farmer boy asked me the other day if I could commit to seasonal eating completely this year and cut out fresh tomatoes until they grow here again next summer. That is a big one for this thinly sliced tomato with salt on crackers loving girl. It even makes me panic a bit. But I think I'm going to try. It makes sense I think.

I'll be enjoying every single precious tomato I pick in the poly tunnels for the next week or so, that's for sure.

Are you a seasonal eater?
Could you do without?
Thinking about how far away the tomatoes are grown and how they travel to get to me over the depths of winter certainly helps.

Happy week my friends.
Keep cozy.

xx