Plugging Logs

So Saturday I headed down to Louisa, Virginia to the home of Dan Boone (7th Generation from the original guy) who hosted a blacksmithing Hammer In at his home. A Hammer In is a get together for blacksmiths. It's kind of like a meeting of beekeepers except that instead of thousands of stinging insects you play with red-hot metal and shape it with a hammer. I could explain more but if you don't understand the allure of it nothing I can write is probably going to make a difference.

After leaving there I headed over to Cismont, Va to Sharondale Farm. Sharondale is run by mycologist Mark Jones who, among other things, propogates various types of mushrooms and inoculates sterilized sawdust that can be used to grow mushrooms at home. The process is quite simple. I bought several bags of spawn from Mark for shiitake mushrooms. The 'spawn' is nothing more than sterilized sawdust on which the mycelium for a specific strain of mushroom has been started.

Starting with freshly cut (though aged several weeks) hardwood log/branch sections, numerous holes are drilled into the logs with an angle grinder that has been fitted with a special drill bit. Once the hole is drilled, a plunger is 'loaded' with spawn by repeatedly stabbing it into the sawdust until the plunger tube is full. The plunger is positioned over the newly drilled hole and the handle is pressed down firmly ejecting the spawn plug into the hole. The hole is then capped with warm cheese wax to prevent dehydration and then the log begins to sit. It will take the logs 6-9 months to become fully colonized with the filaments of shiitake fungus before the log begins to 'fruit'. The fruit I speak of is what we recognize as a mushroom. Ninety percent of a fungal colony is hidden inside a substrate of some kind. The ground, trees, etc. It's only the fruiting body, the mushroom, that we see. Mushrooms exist to release the billions of spores produced so that the whole process can begin anew at some other location.

The 'Y' strain I purchased from Mark comes with a hearty recommendation. It supposedly produces abundant flushes of delicious mushrooms and is a reliable producer in our area. Time will tell.

Mike

More Projects

As spring begins to ramp up I have eagerly bit off more than I can chew, as usual. On Friday I drove out to visit the forge of my new friend, and world-class blacksmith Nol Putnam. He graciously allowed me to watch as he split a piece of iron bar stock for a project he's working on.

Back at the house I'm working slowly, but steadily on a small forge setup of my own. I've decided to locate the forge in a small shed away from what will be the garage/shop/barn for reasons of fire safety. It also means it will be ready more quickly and that I can get going on a few things. I'd like to see if the boys would be interested in hammering a little iron themselves. I know it sounds a little quaint but I think it's important for young men to have 'manly' things to do. We live in a society where opportunities for adolescents to prove themselves evoke images of stupid stunts ending in injury, property damage, or tragedy. Put in a little time in the forge and you might build some muscles, get some energy out, and make something useful.

I checked on the bees on Friday and was pleased to see that to this point we've lost only about 3 over the winter. It's to be expected that you will lose colonies over the winter for a number of reasons. Sometimes you lose them and never know the reason. Check back soon and I'll be posting some pictures of the projects in progress.

M

Barn Building

I finally secured a dozen old utility poles to use in the building of a small barn here. I bought plans about 5 years ago for a 20x30 barn but I think we'll actually build it 20x32 to make the best use of plywood dimensions, etc. The utility poles are all at least 16' feet long and VERY heavy. Tentative plans for the barn include parking for the cars and tractor, a small workshop, and a FORGE. My good friend and blacksmith Jeff Dunkelberger has piqued my interest in giving it a try. Jeff does some very nice work in his shop and we have several of his pieces here at the house, including an iron cross and a candle holder.

I've warned Jeff repeatedly that my wife is gonna give him an earful if he gets me hooked on another money-losing hobby. Jeff has assured me that there's big money in blacksmithing and that the profits just keep rolling in! Wink!

Check out his blacksmithing shop at www.blackforestironworks.blogspot.com

Almost time to plant veggies! Stay tuned.

Michael

Battling Elk

A great video of bull elk bugling and battling during the rut. My father and I took a float trip on the Madison River a few years ago but we didn't witness anything like this. We did see and hear a large number of elk in Yellowstone. Very impressive.

M

Pretty Good Group

I found this family group on one of the blogs I follow. Regardless of your religious affiliation you have to appreciate talent. The guy playing the dobro (the guitar played on its back) is really good.

My youngest Jake commented that no one is smiling in the video. I responded that the father (the man playing the guitar in the background) is smiling and Jake asked why. I told him it's a smile of satisfaction....that everything is functioning the way it should all at the same time. It's a rare moment in my life when that happens and would make me smile too!

Enjoy.
M

Smart Dog

This is a video that Donielle took of our puppy, Champ. His ball rolled under the bed and Donielle told him to go get it. Very funny.

Michael

Raising Chickens (and flies?)

Early in the fall Donielle and I ordered a flock of Freedom Ranger chickens to raise for the freezer. These chickens are able to forage for more of their own food than the traditional meat bird, the Cornish Cross. They grow more slowly and their feed/weight conversion isn't nearly as rapid but we decided to give them a try. Here are the newly arrived chickens in our stock tank. The stock tank stayed on the front porch where we could keep an eye on things yet keep the 'stinky' chickens out of the house. They got new food, fresh water, and a nice heating pad to sleep on. We actually split the order with some friends down the road so we ended up with about 15 birds of our own.













This next photo shows the collection tub of our BioPod. One of the blogs I follow regularly is called Blacksoldierflyblog.com. The larvae of black soldier flies are actually wonderful composters. What takes weeks or months in a traditional compost pile takes just days with BSF. The adults are attracted to decomposing food scraps in the pod and lay their eggs in the 'egg disc' in the lid of the pod. When the eggs hatch, the larvae drop into the food scraps and begin to eat. They consume the scraps and molt several times until they're ready to pupate. Their instinct is to go 'to ground' and they seek a way out of the pod to burrow into the earth. Immediately prior to pupating they 'poop' and molt one last time. The larvae are able to negotiate an incline of up to 45 deg which is something the pod is designed to exploit. The larvae climb the 'exit' ramps and drop into the collection bucket below. What you end up with is a totally clean, self-harvesting supply of grubs that are very high in fat and protein. Take it from me, the chickens (both chicks and adults) love them.












Look for more about Black Soldier Flies and BioPod in the future. Compost for the garden, grubs for the chickens. What's not to love?

Michael

Homestead Butchering

Should have posted this one earlier. Several months ago our 'main' tom turkey Albuquerque got tangled up in the electronet fencing during a duel with one of his sons. Actually both turkeys got tangled but we were able to free the younger bird in time. Albuquerque, sadly, didn't survive. We don't regard our turkeys as pets; rather we see them as breeding livestock. When we lost the tom I immediately dropped what I was doing to dress him out for the freezer. We got some nice turkey breasts, legs, and quite a lot of turkey stock. I learned how to butcher my own poultry from my good friend Harvey Ussery in Hume. You can check out Harvey's site at www.themodernhomestead.us.

The first photo shows the turkey mostly plucked of feathers. This was all done by hand as my homemade chicken plucker won't handle a bird as large as this. The larger (primary) wing feathers were plucked first and set aside to be made into quill pens. Seriously, I've wanted to try this for a long time and found that it's not difficult at all to do.






The second photo shows the plucked bird in my processing sink about to be eviscerated. The evisceration or 'gutting' process is actually pretty straightforward. You are removing the entrails and separating them into the edibles (liver, heart, etc) and inedibles (intestines, lungs, etc). My youngest boy Jake watched with great interest and was especially interested in what the heart and lungs looked like. It may sound gruesome at first but it's actually quite interesting. We, as carnivores, are too far removed from how our
food is produced.

The next photo shows what young, healthy turkey livers look like. Chicken livers, though smaller are the same, rich, dark color. The light, anemic-looking livers you find at the store tell a story about the lives those birds lived.















It isn't my intention to gross anyone out with these photos. The photos on Harvey's website are much more detailed, in fact one could learn how to butcher their own poultry just from studying the photos on his site. One phrase from his site sticks with me. It's a rhetorical questions he asks playing the part of the shocked observer seeing a chicken butchered for the first time. "How can you kill and eat a bird that you've known since it was first hatched?" Harvey's response is, to paraphrase, 'How can you eat a bird that's unknown to you?' Literally Food for Thought.

Michael

Deer Hunting

So I got up early last Thursday and walked out into the woods, in the dark, and climbed into my treestand. I sat absolutely still for about an hour until I could hear footsteps in the dark. I closed the bolt on my rifle and waited. In about a minute I could make out a small buck and a smaller doe in the small clearing beneath the stand. I watched both but could tell that both deer were very small and decided to give these deer a pass in the hope of getting something larger. I climbed down about 8:15 and walked to the top of a nearby hill. I sat down at the base of a small tree to see what might come along. I immediately noticed a very small squirrel coming down the log in front of me. The squirrel came closer and closer until I wondered if he'd come all the way down the log to where I was sitting. At the last moment he seemed to notice that something was wrong and froze. It was at that moment that I looked beyond the squirrel and noticed a herd of deer on a hillside about 100yds from where I was sitting. I found a large doe in my scope and steadied my rifle to take the shot. The rifle discharge caught me by surprise and I looked up to see a good-sized herd of deer bounding out of sight into the woods. I watched to see if one looked like it might be struggling to keep up with the others. After they were out of sight I walked over to the spot where the doe had stood and looked for signs that she might be wounded. Nope. It was a clean miss. No deer today.

I truly am thankful for the meat provided by any deer I kill. I don't have a preference for bucks over does since I'm not in it for trophies. I'll be out again next week hoping for something to put in the freezer.

Michael

New Direction

I've decided to take the blog in a new direction. I used to use the blog to document the going's on of Fern Hill Apiary, the name of our hobby beekeeping business. The business has taken on a life of its own and now has its own site. www.fernhillapiary.com. There we feature the products and prices for the bee-related things we produce. I'll continue to feature beekeeping photos, etc on the blog so you can see what's going on here but the 'new' blog is going to have a more general focus on our family, homestead, projects, etc. We hope you enjoy.