We have several breedings completed in the last couple weeks with the rabbits. Among them:

1/18 CB4 bred to Bargain(Giant Chinchilla litter)

CB2 bred to Half Time (Giant Chinchilla litter)

1/25 CB1 to Half Time (3/4 Giant Chinchilla X 1/4 American Chinchilla litter)

Princess to Half Time (Giant Chinchilla)

1/26 Victoria to Crosby (Champagne D’Argent litter – Connor’s national litter)

1/27 CB5  to Bargain

CB1 is the mother of CB2, CB4 and CB5. She’s an older doe who’s been very good to us, and has more than paid her way. Princess is our Top 10 doe – very much looking forward to this Half Time litter – only bucks would be available, and those probably delivered to Wichita this fall. I can’t be more happy with that litter, although small litter of three it held a 6th place doe, and 5th (Bargain) and 4th (Dio) place bucks. Half Time was purchased with breeding her in mind.

Yes all of the rabbits are individuals and yes they have names as well as tattoo identification!The three Silver Fox will, at this point, be bred to Champagne and Giant Chinchilla bucks due to, at this point, lack of a Silver Fox buck. They will not meet the standard probably for either breed – but the does can expand our meat lines.

Along with the rabbits, we’re still offering our farm shares and packages. It’s not too late but we do need to get moving (literally and figuratively). We have a long ways to go to get the land still, and a lot of people out there interested in good food. With more potential than room, it’s important to get signed up as soon as possible!

We’ll also have started plants for sale this year. All proceeds will go towards the land – tomatoes, peppers and more. If you’re local or in Nashville and looking for started plants, we’ll have quite a few available from $1-5, depending on container size. Raising your own makes a difference. We’ll also have some rosa rugosa starts available on a first come first serve basis.

As last year, we’ll also have started pullets for sale. If you’re in Nashville, you know the council recently allowed backyard hens, and our young ladies are definitely young hens. You’ll see them grow and they won’t crow. We’ve seen them with prices all over the place…ours are $5-8 each for feathered pullets ready to go outside – we deal with the brooders, heat and starting them.

We appreciate the support from valued customers. We’re your home grown food source – whether we grow it or you do.

Many will spend thousands of dollars on show stock. There are show horses for which $100,000 is but a drop in the bucket. There are bulls worth the same. There are also livestock at the local sale barn worth considerably less.

When we put something up for sale we don’t want to hide who is selling it. If we can’t put our name on it we’ll put a fork in it. Sounds harsh, but both poultry and rabbits, like larger livestock, exist to provide food. While we are very proud of our Top Ten show animals, we’re no less pleased with the hard working ones at home producing them and providing meat for our freezer and others.

We have some packages for sale and have seen all types of dishonest action. It’s a short term gain…we prefer to have a longer term outlook. We want repeat customers, with people coming back to purchase again later. That won’t happen with poor doing animals.

When we sell six young pullets and a trio of rabbits in our homestead package, they aren’t cull stock. We have a market for the inferior stock with incorrect teeth, structure issues, health issues and attitudes…they all taste wonderful in curry with rice. There is little more disappointing than paying good money for pullets and getting roosters. There is much frustration in buying good foundation stock and they don’t breed.

With the mild weather here, the rabbits are thinking it’s spring. We have several February litters on the way, and a promising year for show stock. Our ideal…be it rabbits, poultry, sheep, hogs or cattle…is good looking, healthy animals that produce well.Don’t take short cuts on a quality foundation.

Some years ago I had goats and had an extra doe I was going to sell. A man looked at her, said she was priced too high…he just wanted something for food. We all have our limits, so I took her home. The man called a few days later, willing to pay the asking price after seeing the ‘competition.’ We price our stock the same.

What is your ideal?

Although sometimes it’s easy to think reading minds would be a good thing…I don’t know that I want to know every thought that every person around me has. It would come down to the same thing as now – some are less kind than others.

Then there’s immortality…who wouldn’t want that? I think of my great aunt, who used to say everyone she knew was gone…she was the last of her loved ones. And just because we could live forever, others don’t…and as it is youngsters don’t want to hang out with old people. Furthermore, what good is being alive if health doesn’t allow a normal lifestyle?

Sometimes a gift, no matter how good it looks, isn’t a gift at all. Be thankful for each day. We will all leave this earth someday. In the mean time, leave one little part of it better than you found it. That is success.

One of the girls.

Our Muscovies are a basis of meat for those buying the farm shares and special packages. We like the all white, but the black and white color, along with our chocolate and white duck, adds a little more to the pen!

“Be though diligent to know the state of thy flocks and look well to thy herds.

For riches are not forever; and doth the crown endure to every generation? Proverbs 27:23-24

Our rabbit herd is a carefully built herd with a handful of bucks used as a cornerstone. Last fall we lost Star City, and today her littermate brother, Mark, was found dead in his cage at feeding time tonight. He was fine this morning – but none of us are guaranteed another tomorrow. Still, he’s provided some nice animals for the next generation. We have a buck that didn’t sell yet that is now off the sale list, with some very big paws to fill.

Many of the young does we kept are his daughters, so going forward he will contribute heavily in the future as well. They’ll be bred to Half Time, Bargain, Wine & Dine and a new buck, to be added this year.

For just a minute we’ll remember a solid cornerstone. He’ll be missed.Our regular viewers remember his escape, and he ‘starred’ in our five minute break grazing in the crate in front. He was an incredible buck.

All of our rabbits are individuals! They get essentially the same feed – right now that’s a 16% protein pellet. They get hay as well and we’re working into constantly upgrading. We look at each doe, evaluate her pedigree, decide what our goal is in breeding her, choose the right buck to go with her, and hope that it works out. We’ll keep the best bucks and does, or sometimes sell to others.

This is a group of October bunnies – the orange tag was assigned to them at weaning. These are daughters of Mark X Holly (the sons received a separate tag and are in another cage!). Each of these young ladies will receive an individual tattoo, one that is unique to her from all of our other rabbits.

We’re working on using cage tags to make it easier. Even larger rabbits are too small to tag like cattle or sheep, so the tattoo is their identification. To make it easier we assign cage tags, as well as recording the information in a notebook inside with our regular records. This identifies the doe, CB2; the buck she’s bred to (Half Time) and the date she was bred. We then note when she needs a nest box, to insure we move her with plenty of time to settle in.

Completing the circle, these little ones are Connor’s first litter of Champagne D’Argents. They are born all black and will get lighter colored, like their mom, as they get older. Very soon they will get an orange tag put on the cage, and when they’re weaned that tag goes with them. As they’re tattooed and separated each will get their own tag.

We’re also working on a second number tag system so each cage has a number. This is a second line of information so rather than just “the chinchilla doe by the water” we can say “cage #42″ and there’s no mistake which one needs attention.

We evaluate each baby starting the size of Connor’s little ones. We look for correct teeth, naturally straight legs, fast growing and blocky bodies. Those that have dental issues (not normally a problem here but it can happen) will go into the meat bunny pen. The second and third string bucks also go there. Then we sort the best bucks, and as we’re building the herd have kept most does. These will get individual tattoo numbers. Some may be offered for sale, some we’ll keep to show. This insures the best quality traits are passed along to breed, and provides those wanting rabbit meat nice, healthy animals with a function.

So it’s with some amazement I read Terence Loose’s “Most Useless Degrees” article which included not just one but three agriculture related degrees in the top five! These are, in his opinion, #1 most useless degree as agriculture. Of it he says: “Just don’t expect farms and ranches to be calling you, says Laurence Shatkin, Ph.D., and author of “The 10 Best College Majors for Your Personality.” “It’s true that farms are becoming more efficient now and so there is less of a need for farm managers,” he says. That means less jobs.”  Apparently Mr. Loose doesn’t understand many farmers work for himself. With more than ever a call for more farms and more food choices, he sees the only solution to work as working for someone else.

His #4 most useless degree was animal science. So those people looking for ways to do more with less in agriculture, who find ways to raise animals efficiently *and* with animal welfare concerns, who find solutions to animal illnesses…that is useless work? I think not!

Following in his list at #5 most useless degree is horticulture.

Clearly Mr. Loose isn’t too concerned with food, be it animals or plants. If your animal gets sick, hope the answer isn’t depending on treatment from those who think it’s a “useless” degree! How about the diversity of agriculture…from people who seldom step onto a farm but hold agriculture degrees? Who do we depend on to determine what is safe and what isn’t? Agriculture science is important. Agriculture degrees allow us to be able to tend to a wide range of issues and tactics.

Recently there was a blackout of some online sites to protest censorship. What if there was an agriculture blackout? From landscaper professionals (with those horticulture degrees!) to animal scientists to farm managers…if everyone took a black out week to be unavailable, along with all their products. Do you even know how deep that reaches?

Perhaps Mr. Terence Loose, and those who believe the same, should consider and stop buying those useless products that are made possible by agriculture, animal science and horticulture jobs.

It’s true not all need a degree to work in agriculture, but it sure helps. If all you want to do is punch in, put in your time, go home then agriculture probably isn’t a career for you.

I get to work with incredible animals, people and see sunsets that are more beautiful than any painting. Agriculture needs more people involve, not less. When American consumers and those around the world stop eating then those jobs are useless. Until then they’re not only not useless…they’re critical.

On January 17, 1987 – 25 years ago – a house fire did that for me. It led to an article of Five Ways to Prevent House Fires article, among others. It results in an uneasy – some say paranoid – sense of (not) calm especially in mid January, whether looking at the day or not.

The details are memorable because it was a Friday night – after a long week. It was a 3 day weekend due to Martin Luther King holiday – so meant staying in a hotel room, provided by the Red Cross. It resulted in the loss of collectibles that have never been replaced and much that cannot be replaced. Awards won in the 4-H dairy project and by Jerry, the border collie who was a 4-H project. Letters and pictures, the high school yearbooks and things that aren’t life changing as it’s just things.

Teaser, my Fox Terrier, and two cats also died in the fire. The cats were never found, Teaser was in the bathroom. Quick thinking on the part of my neighbors got my border collies away from the fire, and for the rest of her live Ina would panic at even a small fire. They didn’t know Teaser was in the bathroom or would have broken a window to get to her.

I learned what good neighbors really mean in the months following the fire. I learned that the Red Cross and Salvation Army and United Way are blessings beyond measure when you have nothing but the clothes you’re wearing, a couple dogs and  a pickup. I learned to not be so proud to not ask for help when needed. I learned to not trust what people say…trust but verify perhaps.

And I learned compassion in a way that perhaps is different – from the other side of it. Hardships truly are life learning lessons. Seeing people stand up and say something is wrong when they didn’t have to stand up makes a difference. They not only stood up but were willing to go to court and testify on my behalf. Twice. The fire department gained new respect, as well as the chief, who went above and beyond.

Every time I hear a fire truck go out I picture someone else in the same situation. Even with that, some remain hateful but negative never wins.

As Garth sang “…I do this so this world will know…that it will not change me.”

Make a difference for someone.

Tucker’s story is more unknown. Five years ago New Year’s Eve we were attending a show with Montgomery Gentry, Gary Allen, Styx and Rodney Atkins in Lexington, Kentucky. A rescue friend asked if we might pick up and foster a dog near there who was running out of time. All we knew was that he was a black male, said to be about a year old, and he needed some time. We picked him up and on the way home dubbed him Tucker (KenTUCKy).

Now the intention was that, like the labs, Tucker was to be fostered, get some training, get neutered and go on to a home. He was a test – he wanted to roam, which is probably how he got where he was. This is not a trait diminished or eliminated by neutering!

Tucker is an almost ideal example of acceptance. It was his expression of it that meant he stayed here. He’d been here several months and we made a trip to a TSC pet days with another dog. All morning both dogs attracted much interest, hugs, and attention but more wanted the younger dog. We determined that Tucker was not one but more like 3-4 years old, and his quiet demeanor wasn’t as flashy. As I turned down the last road to home he put his big head between the seats and let out a loud sigh, as if glad to be home. I called the folks I was fostering for and said he found his home – right here. It was clear he loved the attention, but it was because it was asked of him.

How often are we asked to do something we don’t really want to do but do it anyway? Since that day, Tucker has fit in around the house. He’s good with the chickens, curls up with the cats, accepting of the rabbits (even if he does try to steal their food!) and a good alarm to let us know if something’s amiss. He is an ordinary big black dog – the last chosen to get homes as they just aren’t flashy enough and are so many that seem alike.

There are so many that seem the same – that could also be said about Christians. What makes Tucker different is his actions…his wag of the tail combined with the guard dog bark who is eager to see the UPS truck because he knows the driver has (dog) cookies! Of course this is cause for bewilderment when we get a FedEx delivery because HE should have cookies too!

What made Tucker stay was finding a place to fit in. His acceptance and willingness to find his own ‘place’. There are thousands of big black dogs but one uniquely Tucker. There are thousands of Christians but how many make a difference in their own unique way?

Do you genuinely welcome others and accept them as they are, or growl dislike while offering a ‘welcome’ tail wag?

Many dislike working for Christian bosses, as the boss takes off and goes to church while workers must toil every day, without a full day off. What about the worker’s family time? What about if one must choose between a job and no job, or a job and family? Sometimes it seems Christians are the least forgiving, or the most to be “do as I say not as I do.” Is this what is intended to be projected? And if it is, then isn’t it a wonder many reject His word?

Treatment of others being consistent, or striving for that, is something that dogs, horses, many of the animals on the farm, have down. Can we learn from them?