A powerful sound.

Bottle feeding baby lambs or working in the greenhouse will never become uninteresting to me, but now that I am getting more accustomed to these everyday tasks I finally have some room to discover the smaller details of the farm.

With new babies being born every day, the farm is brimming with animals. But with so much attention on them, I realize it is not often that I stop to think about the many other animals that also share the farm. I came to this realization over the weekend as I was strolling through the orchard and heard the most beautiful of sounds. Between a gurgling and a whistling, the magical noises this bird made were unlike anything I could ever hope to imitate. The noise moved me so much that it made me question why I had never heard it before. With this new enlightenment, I've developed a greater awareness of the birds around me:

On my many short trips down Highway 16, from one side of the farm to the other, I am now beginning to notice the many hawks -- such a rarity in Berkeley -- perching casually by the side of the road.

Also in the past week I’ve been encountering a flock of the most beautiful and vibrant blue birds. They don’t ever stay long enough for me to get a good enough look at them but the flash of bright blue wings which offset a beautiful rusty chest are enough to dazzle anyone.

On my run after work today I passed a juniper tree and upset a flock of doves that were settling in for the night. As I ran by, the tree suddenly seemed to tremble and a dozen white doves burst from the tree in a flutter, making me stop in awe as the tree came to life.

If only animals could talk

O'Magnum Mysterium! Oh Great Mystery! Today two ewes stopped walking. Just  like that! In the morning, they ran out to pasture but then early this evening when we were moving the sheep out of the rain into the barn we noticed two moms lying in the straw, completely listless. With four people we managed to drag them both in to the barn where we were able to look them over closely, again, and again, and again, and again....But with each check our hopes dwindled. There were no obvious problems. It wasn't milk fever, mastitis, poisoning, a snake bite, an infection, not even a calcium deficiency. They simply lay there like limp dolls, breathing shallowly, with temperatures of 104. Even Dru who has been around sheep for years and years had never seen anything like it. It was the most terrible feeling, not knowing what was going on and just feeling totally helpless. I sat with them for a few hours, stroking their heads and singing to them. I thought, if they die, at least they'll die a bit happier.

 

farm talk

I've come to the conclusion that the most commonly used phrase at Full Belly is definitely: "six of one, half a dozen of the other". Gotta say, I've never heard used so many times in one day. Another favorite phrase: "a couple three".

Babies, babies, babies!

Lots of changes happening around here! First and foremost, Poppy isn’t living with me anymore. After there were two more lamb orphans I realized she might be happier living over in lamb nursery school with them. I also realized I might be a bit happier with the extra hours of sleep. It’s with mixed emotions that I bring this news because while I am glad for the relaxation, I am sad to pass up on the close friendship that I could feel budding. My worries are eased a bit because I still get to bottle feed her and after work I’m going to start taking her out on walks. So far, she still seems to recognize my voice so I am feeling better about our separation. The two new friends she has are about three times her size but they seem content together. The trio is so close we even went super corny and named them PB and J -- Poppy, Beatrice and Jake. (Dru joked that if we get more we’ll have to name them BLT. Haha)

Then, even when we thought it wasn’t possible to have any more babies around this place, BOTH goats gave birth today. One had triplets and the other had twins! Five new babies in one day, exhausting but wonderful. And everyone has made up their minds, of all the babies kids are definitely the cutest farm animals, hands down.

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Oh, and once again, my lunch efforts were thwarted. This time by Cheryl. Now I’m actually starting to get curious about what it would be like to get to cook….Indian food next week, I promise!

Bon Apetit!

The day has finally arrived! Tomorrow Rawley and I are in charge of making lunch for everyone. We had planned on discussing our dishes carefully at market but since market was pretty busy today we never really had time to sort it all out. Luckily I came up with a theme and persuaded him to let the menu be Indian-inspired which I am very excited about. I plan on making naan and I think we will also brew a lot of chai. Then for our main meal we will make some curry, rice, a lentil dish, and then either a potato and spinach dish or a chickpea dish. Dessert is still in question…chocolate chip cookies are totally Indian, right? J

On a totally separate note, Judith asked me to write an article for the Beet yesterday. It's pretty intimidating, I have no idea what to write about because there is so much I want to say (obviously, since I have a whole blog dedicated to it). I'm excited, but at the same time nervous.