Today's Joke

Oh by the way, here is one that might help y’all have a chuckle. In the coming Year, 2012, both Groundhog Day and the State of the Union address will occur on the same day. This is an ironic juxtaposition of events. One involves a meaningless ritual in which we look to an insignificant creature of little intelligence for prognostication. The other involves a groundhog.

The cost of butter.

Bella,our jersey milk cow.

   As a former dairy producer I've always known that dairy farmers get ripped off terribly at the price they are paid for the milk they produce. It has really been demonstrated to me recently. Our little Jersey cow is not a high producing cow. In all honesty, we have had goats that milked almost as much as she does. She has one great saving grace however, her milk is very high in butterfat. We do not "push" our cow to produce more milk or butterfat. She gets a very reasonable diet of pasture in season or good well made hay along with a small amount of grain at this time of year. From this modest feed she gives us around two and a half gallons of milk per day. This is about a fourth of what cows in most commercial dairies are expected to produce but as I said her milk is very rich and creamy.
   Each day Ann places Bella's milk in wide mouth gallon jars. From a day's production we will use about a half gallon after skimming the cream off as whole milk and the cream from it for our coffee,etc. This leaves two gallons which we skim the cream off of and make butter from it. It will produce about a pound and a half of butter. The skim milk is then used to make mozzarella cheese and those two gallons produce about 1 3/4 pounds of fresh cheese. From the whey produced making the mozzarella a whey cheese called mysost can be made which will yield about another 1-1 1/2 pounds.SO.... lets add this up.

   1/2 gallon whole milk.....$2.00                                    Feed for Bella per day
  pint cream......................$1.50                                     hay...............................$2.50
  1 1/2 pounds butter........$5.00                                     grain.............................$1.50
  1 3/4 p. mozzarella.........$5.00                                         total..........................$4.00
 1 1/2 p. mysost...............$5.00
   Total..........................$18.50
 This is from about 20-22 pounds of milk, 2 1/2 gallons. Farmers are currently getting about $17-$18 per one hundred pounds or about twelve gallons of milk.  Convert that using the figures I did for our production and the farmers 100 pounds of milk will yield about $88.00 worth of product. This explains why I no longer farm for a living!
  Please note that I have never seen mysost in a store here so I'm guessing on that price. The other prices are what we have paid though not recently as we don't need to buy any dairy products!

Clothes Drying Rack

Here is a handy easy to make clothes drying rack. It is real handy for drying gloves, mittens, and socks. As you can see from the pic is simply a bicycle rim with every thing removed and then has some type of line strung through the spoke holes. Add a wooden clothes pin on the end of each string. Three strings go to a ring or tie a loop for hanging. We have it along side our wood stove.
  I have seen some made by local Amish craftsman that have a smaller rim inside the large rim to increase the capacity. They also used chain to attach the clothes pins but I thought that was much heavier duty than we needed. It is nice to have dry gloves when you need them and it is a quick,easy, and effective recycling project. 

Foraging 2011

 

      2011 was a good year for us foraging wise. Our year started out with maple syrup season. We cooked syrup from March 15th  till April 15th. We ended up with 9 gallons of syrup so have plenty for ourselves plus some to trade. We have made sugar some years but didn't this year. In mid  May we gathered ostrich fern fiddle heads and Ann canned 56 pints of them. We use them as you would use asparagus. We also dug wild ginger the same day. We enjoy the taste of wild ginger in our Labrador tea. It adds that extra zing. By the end of May we were eating nettle greens which I like better than spinach. It is very good steamed with a little bacon grease and some rice vinegar.
  June  was productive also with our first mushroom find of the year when we got 5 pounds of oyster mushrooms on the 22nd. Wild strawberries were abundant this year but they take so long to pick that we quit after we had a pint and a half. Ramps are easy to find early in the year before a lot of under growth gets going and we picked a couple of quarts on the 20th.
   The foraging year kicked into high gear in July , I had 14 entries in my foraging journal for the month. More ramps and nettle greens start off the list followed by lambs quarter greens, cattail pollen, elder flowers, june berries, wild blueberries, and wild raspberries. I counted up 57 pounds of wild berries in July and the first week of August. We picked some hazelnuts the last weekend of July but sad to say that was jumping the gun and they were not mature yet.
   August started out with 11 quarts of black cherries found when we were scouting wild rice. There was very nice rice on one of the flowages we checked this year although it was tipped in every direction by strong winds early in the season. It made harvesting the rice a little tricky but we are happy with our harvest of170 pounds of dry rice. We still have to thresh much of that but that is another post.
   September turned out to be our best month for mushrooms. We found more oysters, hen of the woods, pig snouts, hedge hog and honey fungus.  All together we found about 12 pounds of mushrooms in September. We also picked about 20 pounds of nanny berries which yielded 25 pints of puree when Ann was done.
   42 pounds of bur oak acorns topped the list for October but the four gallons of hazel nuts , dehusked but in the shell, was a close second. We picked a cup of wild cranberries at our boat landing which got us enthused to go hunting for more the 5th. of November.
   We considered the hunt a success when we brought home 7 quarts of cranberries. We found some creeping snow berry so had to try a tea made with the vine and berries. It was not as good as we had heard it might be. The coup de gras of the season was Ann's. She brought home 8 bushels of black walnuts gleaned  from a neighbors lawn. I just finished a piece of chocolate fudge with black walnuts.

Trailing Arbutus

Epigaearepens L.,Trailing Arbutus is one of the first plants to bloom in our area in north central Wisconsin. This pic does not show it but the blossoms are often a pale pink and they have a beautiful scent. It is a trailing perenial with oval leathery leaves. The tubular five lobed flowers are in clusters. This member of the Heath family contains arbutin which is a urinary antiseptic but it hydrolyzes to hydroquinone which is toxic.

American Indians used leaf tea for kidney disorders as do some folk remedies. It is a plant I always look for as a sign of spring but I have never used it medicinaly and do not recommend it.

Living Simple

Living Simple
  This is a link to one of my former blogs. Same sort of topics. Got busy and didn't update . Started Forest House Farm blog to promote our CSA and I enjoy sharing a little info now and then.

Labrador Tea

We pick Labrador Tea year round if we are out but usually try to pick our years supply in the winter. It is easier since labrador tea,  Ledum groenlandicum, grows in bogs and swamps and it's easier when the swamp is froze over. The leaves stay on year round. It often grows on sphagnum moss humps in association with leather leaf and wild blueberry. The leathery leaves have edges that roll under and the bottom of the leaf is cover with much white to rusty or gold hairs. The shrub is up to 3 feet tall and has very fragrant flowers between May and July. It makes a nice tea with a citrusy, piney, sort of flavor. We like to add wild ginger and either chaga or turkey tail mushroom. Since we heat with wood a pot of it can sit on the stove all day to stay warm. Don't let it brew too long as it will get very bitter. This is a fairly common plant in our area.