Garden Update

I finally got around to taking pictures of the garden, and now that I uploaded them I realize how old they are!  

These are the 4 squash and pumpkin mounds.  I was trying out a few different trellises for the squash, but I think they are too much trouble.  The squash are producing wonderfully, but are now coming down with a fungus.

The flower edging has turned out quite well.  Needs to be weeded a bit, but flowered nicely.

This is one of the root vegetable mixed rows.  Onions at the top, radishes at the bottom.  There are now carrots and beets growing in between.

The cucumbers started out very strong, producing 20-30 every few days.  Unfortunately they came down with mildew and are all but dead now.

The tomatoes still appear to be doing well.  There is a bit of fungus, and for some reason they've gotten blossom end rot.  I just ordered some calcium, hopefully that will help.

This is the first of the mixed root vegetable rows.  It has now been completely picked, even the carrots turned out well.

The broccoli produced well enough, but got eaten pretty quick by something (I suspect groundhogs again).

Last but not least, the potatoes.  They are mostly dead on top now, and my husband has harvested a few plants already.

I'll take more updated pics after the state fair!

Quarantine...The Why and How

I'm happy to announce that May has finally made it home!  It has been 8.5 years since I've seen her, and it is almost surreal that she is back with me.  And of course she is the inspiration for this post!

I'll admit, for the first several years that we had llamas (ok, almost the whole time we've had llamas), we were terrible about quarantining new arrivals!  We always had a small herd, and not a lot of extra space, so any newcomer or someone returning from a show went right in with the herd.  The thought of that makes me cringe now!  Luckily when I set up the new farm I made sure to set up a quarantine area.  Any time a new llama comes to the farm they will go in there for at least 3 weeks.  My show string also goes in the quarantine pen for 3 weeks after each show.  When we build a new barn I plan on building yet another quarantine pen so that I have a place to put females when they come for outside breedings.

The edge between the quarantine pen and the main pasture (with the gate open).

For the past few years, it has seemed like parasites are on the rise.  I believe that is due to reporting bias...with the advent of online forums more people are discussing the issues they are having in their herds.  But the good news is that owners are becoming more proactive when it comes to preventing parasite issues on their farms.  And one of the easiest ways to do that is quarantine!

By quarantining a new llama (or one coming back from a show or other farm), you lessen the risk of spreading internal and external parasites to the rest of your herd.  Parasites are easily picked up at shows and other farms, and even during transport!  And of course the stress of being at the show/other farm/transport is enough to make an insignificant parasite load bloom into something dangerous!

Ralph and Kara at a show.

Quarantining is pretty simple...pick a well-behaved companion from your herd (if you only have one newcomer) and stick them in a secluded pen for a specified period of time.

Ralph and Duque make great quarantine companions!

I like my quarantine pen to be relatively small.  I want it to be a dry lot (aka no grass) so that parasites are more easily contained.  And of course I don't want to risk contaminating a large pasture!  My main quarantine pen is about 40' x 50', with a 10' x 20' pen in the barn.  It is big enough for my entire herd (now a whopping 6 animals!) to live in during the winter/early spring.  April and May are in this area now.  The new quarantine pen I finished building today is much smaller, but still usable.  The outside area is about 15' x 30', with a 10' x 10' pen in the barn.  I probably wouldn't use it for more than 3 animals at a time (Kara and Ralph are in there now).

The herd in the quarantine area.

The length of time that you quarantine is a bit of a grey area.  For me, it comes down to how bad I perceive the risk to be.  If I suspected that the animal would come in with a huge parasite load, I might quarantine for a month or two (and run lots of fecals during that time).  If I had a healthy animal coming from a reputable farm, I might quarantine for just a few weeks.  I quarantined Lily for 3 weeks this past spring, and plan to do the same with May.

While the animal is in quarantine, it is important to monitor their progress.  It is a good idea to run an initial fecal (I wish I had done this with Lily), so that you have an idea of what you are working with. It takes parasites awhile to increase (if they picked something up from the transport or stress caused a bloom), so you should run another fecal in 1-3 weeks.  When you run the follow-up fecal, don't forget to test the companion animal as well...they could have picked something up from the newcomer.  If you need to treat for parasites, don't forget to run another fecal 10-14 days after treatment.  Yes this will prolong the quarantine period, but you need to make sure that the treatment worked (and not introduce resistant parasites to the rest of your herd!).

A fecal slide as viewed through the microscope.

During quarantine, be sure to offer the best nutrition possible.  Nice leafy second cut hay is good, and I like to add electrolytes to their water.  You can add grain/pellets if they aren't overweight, just be sure to introduce them slowly (mixing with the feed they got at their previous farm is best).  And don't forget the minerals!  May has been snarfing them down today!  Something new that I tried with Lily was an immune booster herbal supplement.  Being a young, recently weaned cria, I wanted to help her immune system deal with the stress as much as I could.  I bought an herbal supplement from Smart Pak Equine online.  I also plan on using this supplement when we go to shows.  I think for May I'm going to offer specific herbs instead of the supplement, since she is older and can deal with the stress better.

Beet pulp, alfalfa pellets, and calf-manna are great supplements if you need to put weight on your newcomer.

Once the newcomer has been in quarantine for a few weeks, and has a clean fecal (and no external parasites), they are free to join the herd!  It is always fun to see how the rest of the herd reacts to a new animal!

It's Almost Farmer's Market Time!

It's hard to believe that summer is almost over...seems like the year is flying by!  Now that I'm out of school, the end of summer isn't such a letdown.  Now that I'm a "big girl", it means cooler weather, llama shows, and of course the beginning of *my* farmer's market season!  (I specify *my* farmer's market season, because the market has actually been running since May, but I only sign up for the second half, since I figure it would be hard to sell wool hats in 80* weather!)

I've really begun to enjoy going to the farmer's market.  I wake up nice and early every Saturday, drive to Hamilton (a college town about 30 minutes north of where I live), set up, and then spin and talk to people (and hopefully sell a few things!) for 5-6 hours!  What fiber enthusiast could wish for much more?  Of course on the days when the weather is iffy it is a bit less fun, but the gorgeous fall days make up for it.

All winter my mom and I have slowly been building up my inventory of knit items to sell at the market.  I take other things like handspun yarn and insoles, but the knit accessories really steal the show.  I think I've got a great selection this year, and hopefully my future customers agree!

The market starts for me in just under 2 weeks...August 8!  Hopefully I'll have my new llama by then.  (Long story short, the original transporter changed her route so she couldn't pick up May.  I'm still searching for a new one, but I do have a promising lead!)  Can't wait!

May is Coming Home!!!

I'm pretty surprised that I haven't posted about this sooner, because I've been over the moon for the last week or so...  After almost 10 years of being away, May (aka Little May Flowers) is coming back to the farm!

May, Spring 2005.

To make a long story short (but you can read the long version here), May was the very first cria to be born on our farm, over 15 years ago!  Her mom April (Alder Crest April Showers) has always been one of my favorite llamas, but I was stupid enough to sell all of her crias!  May was part of our breeding herd for a few years, giving us 3 gorgeous crias.  She was certainly one of the few select llamas that I've regretted selling over the years.

April, Spring 2004.

Baby May, Summer 2000.

May's first cria, Autumn Hill's Blazing Starr, Fall 2003.

May's second cria, Autumn Hill's Trillium, Fall 2005.

About a month ago I got an email from May's owner, asking if I'd be interested in taking her back.  Even with her age, I knew I had to have her!  I'd already been searching for a new guard llama, and May is one of the best.

Everything is now set for May's transport to NY...she should get here the last week of July.  She'll be quarantined for a few weeks as a precaution, and then has a busy fall scheduled!  She's going to be joining Ralph, Kara, and Lily at the NY State Fair at the end of August, and then will be visiting Dakota Ridge Farm in Albany for a "date" with one of their breeding males!  Even with her advanced age (and the fact that she hasn't had a cria in almost 8 years!) I'm hopeful that she can be bred one last time.  I'd love for April's legacy to live on in my herd!

May and I at one of our last shows together, Summer 2003.

Garden 2015!

It is really disappointing how little "free" time I have at home now that I'm working full time.  So much less time for the fun outdoor stuff like gardening, and even less time to blog about it!  But I finally managed to take some pictures of my expanded garden, and thought I would share them.

The garden is at least twice as big as it was last year.  It was supposed to be bigger, but 2 broken rototillers later my husband gave up and I settled for what was done.  The plants are the same as last year though, just more of most of them!

These are the "hills" of squash and pumpkin.  I'm trying out a few different trellising methods, we'll see which one wins in the end.  Still battling the dreaded cucumber beetle, just like last year!

I finally got my permanent flower edges planted.  Hopefully I remember to mark them at the end of the growing season so that they don't get tilled under next year!

This is the second planting of spinach, onions, beets, carrots, radishes, and lettuce.  I have gotten a TON of radishes out of this wide row, and picked a good amount of lettuce and spinach today.  

This is the row of cucumbers.  I hid them under a floating row cover for several weeks after planting, but they started to bloom so I freed them.  Darn cucumber beetles still found them!

Can't forget the tomatoes!  I planted almost twice as many as last year (not by choice!), so I hope they do well.  I did get some fungicide to hopefully thwart the blight.

My first planting of onions, spinach, beets, carrots, radishes, and lettuce.  I've picked almost all of the spinach, lettuce, and radishes, and most of the beets.  I noticed today that something is eating the carrot tops, but hopefully they'll still live.

Good old broccoli, if only everything were this easy to grow!  I've already harvested 3 big heads so far this week.

And last but not least, the potatoes.  I definitely planted the rows too close together, and I'm worried they aren't hilled enough.  But the plants look gorgeous!

Busy Spring!

I'll warn you, the blog is going to be sparse for awhile.  I started a full-time job last fall, so my blogging time is greatly diminished.  While I'm still doing lots of things around the farm, I just can't seem to remember to take pictures and upload them!

Anyway, here's a bit of what's been going on the past month or so.  Some of this will get expanded on in the future, so stay tuned!

My first spring project was cleaning and organizing the "garden shed".  It has been a mess since I moved in, and I finally had enough!  This is what I started with...

This is as far as I got the first day...hanging all the tools and wire edging/trellises.  The rest is done now, just need to get pictures to prove it!

The biggest spring project was cleaning up outside the barn.  Usually over the winter I try my hardest to take the manure down to the garden compost pile every time I clean, but after we got 2' of snow overnight it became impossible!  And that 2' never melted until March, just grew and grew!  So I resorted to dumping the manure outside the barn, and had a huge mess to clean up!  I used the tractor for awhile, but once I realized it was making huge ruts in the pasture I resorted to a wheel barrow.

This is just a fraction of what I started with!  Once again, I need to get "after" pictures now that it is clean!

And last but not least, the garden.  My husband tilled it a couple weeks ago, and parts of it look great!

Other parts don't look so great (they didn't get tilled deep enough to kill the sod underneath).

There is lots of lovely llama poop mixed in for fertilizer though!

The part that was planted last year really looks nice.  A few more years of sorting out rocks and we'll have amazing soil!

I built a cool little tool for seeding the root vegetables...a dibble!

It has nails in the bottom at various intervals.

When pressed into the soil, the nails leave depressions in which to plant the seeds.

After spreading the seeds I covered the area with a sprinkling of soil and watered well.  The radishes are already coming up!

The end of my first day in the garden...3 rows of potatoes planted (4 varieties), a raised row ready for broccoli (a few plants are now planted), and another raised row half-planted with root vegetables (onions, carrots, radishes, beets) and leafy vegetables (spinach and lettuce).  The other half will be planted in a few weeks.