Woke up to rain this morning, but still headed out with friend Judy to the Bartlett Farm in Traunik, MI. for the "Spring on the Farm" Open House. They shared their family business to the public for three hours. It was very interesting and the lambs were all so cute, adorable and playful. It was a self-guided tour where you learned how lambs are born, what they eat, that new mom and baby lamb share a special bond, that they are able to tell each other apart by smell, and that some baby lambs are "orphaned" too. That was sad. Sometimes too many babies are born and the mother can't produce enough milk or the mother just won't take care of the baby.
Things I learned I didn't know: sheep give birth standing up which helps empty fluid from the lambs lungs and that the big shrink wrapped hay bails seen out in the country are wrapped for a reason-to ferment the hay, apparently it is better to eat that way.
I did ask a member of the family "What happens to adult lambs?" Unfortunately they are sold for meat. I personally have never had veal or mutton and never will. I'm not going to go any further on this but I think more people should go meatless more often.
If your interested in visiting the farm sometime here is the contact info: Log Cabin Livestock, N 4632 Traunik, MI, 906-439-5210, email bndbartlett@tds.net.
Last year at this time of year I didn't have a feeder out. I didn't put one out until July or August so I am very excited to see new birds at my feeder. Word is spreading to the woodland critters because my feeder is becoming quite the hang out place. I've seen goldfinches, three gray squirrells, some sort of sparrow, and I think an imateur pine grosbeak. Obviously, I need to break out the binocs and work on my bird i.d. skills. This is fun!
Hopefully sometime tomorrow I will get out to the garden and do some planting and seeding. Fingers crossed for no rain please!
If you're looking for compassion in the animal agriculture world, you will not find much of it. Anyone who uses animals is doing just that- using them. It's very rare to find someone who keeps them as companions only. If you have to buy wool, it is good to buy local where you can see the conditions though, because it's a pretty brutal product http://www.veganpeace.com/animal_cruelty/wool.htm even companies like smartwool that claim to have amazing care of their sheep still ship them off to factory farms to be slaughtered when they aren't as productive anymore.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad the birds are flocking to your feeder now! We had a really hard time getting birds in that area of town. It's important to have tree cover near by, not only so they feel safe, but so you're not luring them into the open where they become an easy target for birds of prey. You're lucky there aren't fox squirrels- they are huge and will stop at nothing to consume all your birdseed so we've been battling with them all this time! Can't wait to get back up north where there are only gray and red squirrels!