Homemade Sourdough Starter - Capturing Wild Yeasties

my sourdough starter on day two, bubbling awaySomething my city self had imagined my country self doing every week once we moved here was baking fresh, delicious, crusty, bread. Ha - yeah, right! As people say, "life happens", and lately, it has really been happening. Despite the best of plans and intentions, there's always an unexpected event that sucks up a good chunk of the day and just having the time and energy to clean up after dinner can seem like a stretch. It started to look like bread making might be joining the more obscure "to-do wishes" on my list (like making a hat band from our guinea feathers and painting a Dutch hex on our well house... maybe next year??). 

I'm beginning to realize that sometimes, you just have to make time, even if it means putting off cleaning the coop until tomorrow (or the day after...ehm). Yesterday morning, after cleaning up from milking, I decided it was prime time to take a step towards having good bread. It was a baby step that I only needed about 5 minutes to accomplish - perfect!

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Getting Started With the Goats and Dogs on Pasture


Happy goats in a fresh paddock. Dogs go explore, goats find nearest rose bush and devour it

Over the past week we finally worked it out to where the goats can be out on pasture nearly 100% of the time. Day and night, night and day. Goats like to graze and browse at night and we want them to be able to. We've read that they can spend up to 6 hours per night grazing. Talk about party animals. I guess when you nap and chew cud throughout the day you don't need a sound night of sleep. Besides, it's a lot cooler at night and the dogs are awake then too. Who can sleep with all that barking?

That wasn't the situation for the first few weeks though. When we originally started with the goats we only had Sophie, and while she has proven to be a great guard dog at a young age (at least so far), we couldn't trust only one dog (and a puppy at that) to defend the goats. She wouldn't stand a chance against a pack of dogs or coyotes. So we had to wait for the big girls before we could leave the goats far away from home all day and all night. Once we got the big girls, however, we needed to acquaint them with the goats and our farm. We didn't want to put them out alone with the goats in the middle of the field right away. We couldn't trust them yet and they weren't accustomed to us and their new home. So we had to wait longer. 

 

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