Smiles

No explaining needed.... ice cream cone in hand!

After some yummy tea!

With chocolate on her cheeks!

Can't help but share these smiles

UFO on Branch Farm..

After entering the gate at the farm on Friday this is what quickly appeared over the hill as I was heading toward the chickens.

Can anyone tell me what they think this may be? 

Coop take over

Little Miss E and I ventured to the barn before lunch to hang out with all the animals and this is what we saw as we pulled up. The sheep had taken over one of the chicken coops and made their very own shade area with it. It was quite a sight to see. We were not expecting sheep to be hanging out inside a chicken coop.
 The sheep and cow had been moved into the chickens area last week to help mowed down some of the tall grass and weeds. It seems as though they don't have enough day time shade. Or at least that is what I think they are telling us in the attempted take over of a chicken coop.

Dapper Dan has meet his match...

One of our Dominique roosters has finally meet his match. That match just so happens to be Farmer D. After a short weekend getaway we discovered that this here rooster had beau-ed up at our niece and attempted to jump on her while they were helping tend to the animals. This comes after many attempts to spur Little Miss E and myself. This rooster is super protective of his flock and doesn't like intruders of any kind.... even those who feed him it seems. We understand that he is doing his job but with two other rooster around who mind their own business is quite easy to see who the trouble maker is. I have been begging Farmer D to give him the ax but he has been reluctant till tonight that is....
This afternoon Farmer D and miss E and I were all at the farm making our rounds. Dapper Dan was as usual making lots of noise crowing and such. This used to be music to Farmer D's ears but be was very annoyed tonight by it and quickly tried to quiet him. After many attempts by Farmer D to scare Dapper Dan away he finally fought back. It was quite funny to see Farmer D with miss E in hand running after Dapper Dan trying to kick him and yelling at him all at the same time.
Not shortly after Farmer D pulled a knife from his truck and when for Dapper Dan. All it took was one attempt to challenge Farmer D and he had had enough. I have endured weeks of attempted attacks and got only a "well you gotta watch them Rooster you know".
Dapper Dan was probably the prettiest rooster in our bunch but by far the meanest so he's gotta go!

In transition...

With our Summer CSA coming to a close and the beginning Fall season right around the corner we are in a transition with the garden. We currently have tomatoes, bell peppers, and okra in large supply, as well as egg plant. Unfortunately, we don't have enough variety coming in for baskets each week but if you are interested in any of the items listed above please let me know. katiebranch@att.net, Once our fall crops start producing we will open up the CSA groups again and I will be sure to let everyone know how to be apart of that.

We've got Eggs

Don't forget; we've got Eggs! Place your order by calling me or emailing me. I can deliver to you most any day of the week. Our chickens are free range pastured raised. This makes for a delicious deep golden rich egg. If you haven't had home grown eggs before you are really missing out. Contact me if you want to try some. Our eggs are $4.00 a dozen. Eggs are hand picked each day by little miss E

With the extra supply on hand we are currently offering them at half price. This special will end on Wednesday so be sure to place your order today!

Meet our "Doggie"

Little Miss E took it upon herself to introduce our new "doggie" as she calls it to the farm. Here are some pics below of her showing him where to go.... or is he showing her where to go, LOL?

Our newest addition is an anatolian shepard. He is quite the dog. At 5 months old this guy is already large and incharge. He was bred to live and protect farm animals. And that is what he loves to do. Beware, he looks cute but he means business. If anything comes inside his fence where "his animals" are it won't get out alive. Toby knows what his job is and loves doing it. We are very happy to have him to protect our animals.

No laughing matter

This sheep was trying to get to our chickens food the other day and go her head stuff inside the top cone of it. We couldn't resist taking a picture and stopping our chores to laugh. It was quite a sight. We get many a good laughs from these farm animals. I'm sure this sheep was not laughing at the moment she discovered she was stuck inside a cone and unable to get herself out.

Proud of me :)

This past week well this past month I should say Farmer D has been extra busy. He always has things to do but it just seems that his list is getting bigger and bigger. So in an effort to help out I took it upon myself to make some of the CSA baskets this past week. Once I has completed them I have to say that I was quite proud of myself. I think this vegetable basket looks beautiful!

More Branch Farm Babies

There is never a dull moment around here it seems. Little Miss E and I ventured down to the farm today to collect chicken eggs and were excited to find some new baby chicks. They are too cute. Miss E had a fit over them and cried when I made her return them to their momma. We have a total of five that hatched out today. Our broody hen is still siting on two eggs that I believe will hatch tonight or some time in the morning. The new chicks are a cross-bred of our hens and our Dominque roosters.

          The joy from new babies never gets old around here it is always fun to see and be apart of. Momma hen is very proud and protective of her young this is great to see since the "broody" nature that hens usually are born with is being breed out of them due to the fact that most people use incubators to hatch eggs now days. We are hoping to produce more "broody" hens in the coming years it sure makes our job easier. Or at least I think so, these baby chick won't have to spend the first few weeks inside our laundry room like all the others did since they have a momma hen to keep them warm.

Our new Ewes

We are very excited to show you our new Ewes; sheep Ewes that is. These girls just got to the farm this past weekend and we are so glad they are here. Farmer D and I have wanted sheep for well over a year now but wanted to be careful about what breed we would get and where out starter herd would come from. About a week ago I began to pray about it and ask God to direct our path so that we would choose the sheep that He had for us and that the price would be what we had budgeted for. This was after several months of calling local listings and looking around on the internet for sheep. Each time nothing panned out and we were disappointed. When I finally thought about it and Farmer D and I agreed that God knew our desire and that it would be best to ask Him where to find them. So that is what I did. Within hours I was able to locate a very large number of sheep to look at and that were a lower price than we had seen in many online listings. I was so excited and called Farmer D right away with the news. Within hours of calling the farm Farmer D was in route to see the sheep. It just so happened that he was less than 30 minutes from the man who had them for sale when I called to him I had located some. This is quite a setup God had planned since normally it would have taken Farmer D about a week to get something like this to fit into his schedule. What a true blessing it was to get the call from him after he had viewed the sheep and decided we would purchase them. We both were so excited have finally found what we wanted and at a better price too! The power of prayer is amazing.

These sheep are Khatadian Dorper crosses. We choose this breed because they produce a hair like wool that does not have to be sheered they actually shed their coat. We have a total of 20 females and one ram (male sheep). They range in age from six months to four months old . The man we purchases them from said it would be safe to call them 2012 models. I thought that was funny.