Pinterest Link-up: Small Scale Dairying!

  This week's link-up has a collection of handy links all concerning small scale dairying! Whether you own one goat and want to learn how to make yogurt, are thinking about getting a cow or two, or have a dream of turning your dairying hobby into a business, it's all here! Enjoy, friends.

1. Milk Safety Video {Courtesy of Vimeo and Jim Roberts} - This is part 1 of 3 of some videos that I have loved watching! This fellow, Jim Roberts runs a micro dairy and does a beautiful job of keeping the whole operation clean and safe. If you're wanting to take your dairying up a notch (no matter how big or small you are), then I'd highly recommend giving these a view.

2.The Cost of Building A Farmstead Creamery {Courtesy of gianacliscaldwell.com} This is an awesome, detailed blog post on what it costs to build a farmstead creamery of your own! Gianclis Caldwell is a great writer and did a very nice job on this write-up.

3.How To Build An Elevated Milking Stanchion {Courtesy of The Flip Flop Barnyard} If you have a cow (or more than one), then you need one of these. Period. End of story. I've experienced using one of these on cows, versus having them stand on the ground, and let me tell ya'... Those elevated stanchions are to die for. No kidding.

4. Four Secrets To Thick, Creamy Yogurt. {Courtesy of Passionate Homemaking} This is the recipe I started out with and loved the results!

5. The Cost of Producing Raw Milk {Courtesy of 'Well Fed Homestead'} Want the nitty gritty details of what it costs to keep a cow or two for milk production? Well here you go!

6.Classic Glass Milk Bottles! {Courtesy of 'Red Hill General Store} - I've never posted a link to something for sale, but I'm such a fan of these bottles that I had to share! These are great; the glass is thick, so they're hard to break, and they look cute! They can be a little challenging to wash due to that narrow neck (no dishwashers allowed on these!), but I've never had a problem as long as I have a good bottle brush.

Pinterest Link-Up: Natural Livestock Care

  This week's link-up is a fun collection of some natural livestock care tips! In the past, I've always stuck to using dried herbs, infusions, and tinctures on my stock, but I plan on using essential oils on a much more frequent basis this spring...

1. Farm Apothecary {Courtesy of 'Homestead Dreamer'} 

2. Essential Oils On A Farm {Courtesy of 'The Paleo Mama}

3. Essential Oils for Natural Chicken Care {Courtesy of 'Backyard Poultry Magazine'}

4. Preventing And Treating Frostbite Naturally {Courtesy of 'Fresh Eggs Daily'}

5. Herbal Remedies for Common Pet and Livestock Ailments {Courtesy of 'Frugally Sustainable'}

6. Natural Goat Care {Courtesy of -- Um, ME! Is that considered arrogant to share my own post?? Hmm, I'll have to think about that...}

Pinterest Link-up: Winter Beekeeping

Normally I try to do a variety of topics for my Pinterest Link-ups, but I'm trying something new here, and going with a theme this week! I found quite a few great posts on winter beekeeping, and really wanted to share them! Enjoy, my dear friends!

1. Preparing Beehives For Winter. {Courtesy of 'Runamuk Acres Farm & Apiary} - This is a detailed and informative link that gives an easy-to-understand list of what to do for your hives as winter approaches!

2. Tips For Helping Bees: Blackberry Winter {Courtesy of 'Herbal Academy of New England} - I had never heard of the term "Blackberry Winter", so I guess this counts as "my one new thing I learned today". The term refers to the awful time when we *think* winter has finally ended, and then boom! Right in the middle of March/April we get a severe cold snap again! This article has some handy tips on how to keep your bees alive and healthy if that happens.

3. Common Winter Beekeeping Problems {Courtesy of Mother Earth News} - A Mother Earth News link! I've always loved articles from here! A lot of them are on the same lines as link #1 above, but it's still a great read.

4. A Winter Beehive Candy Board {Courtesy of 'Tilly's Nest'} - This link is what got me started on the whole "winter beekeeping" theme idea! It's a total "Aha!" kind of idea! Maybe I just haven't been around the right kind of beekeepers, but I had NEVER heard of making a candy board for the bees. Shucks, this sounds so much easier than dealing with sugar water when it's 2 degrees Fahrenheit outside... I will definitely be trying this on my hives next winter!

5. Honey Bee Healthy Syrup {Courtesy of 'Eating Rules.com'} -  This idea is similar to the candy board idea, but it's a liquid syrup that's stored inside the hive, and has some herbal properties added to it to maintain the bee's health. The directions aren't super detailed, but there's enough there that an experimental person could figure it out. 

6. Beekeeping 101: Getting The Right Equipment {Courtesy of'The Elliot Homestead} - Okay, so this link isn't about "winter care"; it's the basic, starting out kind of stuff that every beginner needs to know. Which is why I'm sharing it! If you're thinking about getting bees when spring time rolls around, then here's a great list of what you'll need (with gorgeous pictures to further explain)!

Pinterest Link Up!

  After what -- almost two years? -- I'm finally bringing the Pinterest Link Ups back! This week's round is short, since I'm still trying to get the hang of it again; but I feel like I found some pretty good stuff this week. :) Enjoy!

1. DIY Fodder System! {Courtesy of Rina Marie Blog} - I REALLY like the looks of this system, and have a hankering to try it out!

2. Why You Should Consider Keeping Quail. {Courtesy of 'The 104 Homestead'}  - I've been thinking about trying quail out for YEARS, but have yet to do it. This article is making me think I should give it a go...

3. Growing Mushrooms In A Laundry Basket. {Courtesy of 'Milkwood'} - This article doesn't give specifics on getting your mushrooms started (great links to be found on Pinterest!), but I was so tickled by their pictures of growing mushrooms in a laundry basket that I had to share! I'm totally buying a spare laundry basket next time I go to Walmart!

4. Make Your Own Dog Food. {Courtesy of 'Home And Farm Sense'} - For those of you out there who are thinking about switching to real food for your dogs, this is a great starter recipe. Whenever I had dogs, they always got raw/real food diets and the difference in their health was amazing!

Pinterest Link Up! Week #9!

Woohoo! We're back to doing Pinterest Link Ups!! Score! :)

Here you go folks; this is what I found this week!

1. The Great Home Dairy Roundup (20 posts to get you milking). {Courtesy of The Prairie Homestead}

2. 16 Ways To Use Whey. {Courtesy of The Prairie Homestead}

3. Burts Bees Lip Balm Recipe! {Courtesy of Happy Money Saver}

4. How To Dry Herbs. {Courtesy of Happy Money Saver}

5. Educating The Harness Goat (book). {Found via SG Halters} (note: I don't have this book, but I think it looks great! When I get back into goats, I will definitely have to try this one out!)

6. Building a Chicken Nipple Bucket Watering System. {Courtesy of Happy Money Saver}

P.S.

No Pinterest Link Up this week as I have to leave for town in about 30 minutes and will be gone almost all day. Sorry!! Maybe I'll whip that post up tonight... We'll see.

Pinterest Link Up! Week #8!

Ta da! Here's this week's Pinterest Link Up! Lots of chicken stuff this week too! :)

1. The Chicken Manual. {Courtesy of Tilly's Nest}

2. How much you need to plant to feed your family. {Courtesy of New Life On A Homestead}

3. Physical signs of health in cattle. {Courtesy of Matron of Husbandry}

4. Flock Block Substitute Recipe. {Courtesy of The Chicken Chick}

5. Fermenting your chicken feed. {Courtesy of Blue Yurt Farms}

6. Breeds of goats. {Courtesey of Fias Co Farm}

Pinterest Link Up! Week #7!

I have to admit that I'm a little pleased with what I found on Pinterest this week. :) It's a pretty good scope of things, all in all. *tries not to look smug* So here you go, folks. Enjoy!

1. 20 Clever Homesteading Ideas. {Courtesy of Home Talk}

2. Homesteading Skills 101 - Raise Your Own Beef. {Courtesy of The Home Front}

3. Caring For Livestock In Winter. {Courtesy of Mother Earth News}

4. Pictures of Cow Problems - Good references (warning, many images are quite graphic!). {Courtesy of Cattle Today}

5. Natural Lice and Mite prevention for Chickens - Using Herbs in the Nest Box. {Courtesy of Natural Chicken Keeping}

6. Cornish Cross vs. Dual Purpose chicken. Detailed notes on differences/which is better. {Courtesy of The Home Front}

Pinterest Link Up! Week #6!

Whew, well after a crazy morning to start my day, here's this week's link up! Enjoy!

1. How To Make Your New Favorite Breakfast - Creamed Honey! {Courtesy of Honest Cooking}

2. Small Farm Tractors - How To Choose Wisely. {Courtesy of Garden and Farms}

3. Getting Goats 101. {Courtesy of From Scratch Magazine}

4. Free Seed Packet Patterns! {Courtesy of Content In A Cottage}

5. DIY Meat Smoker. {Courtesy of Instructables}

6. Herbs for Healthy Chickens. {Courtesy of Mudbrick Cottage}

7. 5 Steps to Writing A Farm Grant. {Courtesy of HobbyFarms.com}

Pinterest Link Up! Week #5!

Ta da! Here's this week's link up! I found some neat stuff this week! :)

1. How to make mozzarella cheese. {Courtesy of The Prairie Homestead}

2. DIY Cotton Faux Paper Towels. (I thought the snaps on these were kinda' cool...) {Courtesy of My Healthy Green Family}

3. Use buttermilk to take the "gamey" taste out of your meat. {Courtesy of The Backyard Pioneer}

4. Ten miniature cattle breeds for your small farm. {Courtesy of Big Picture Agriculture}

5. Creative and homemade hay feeders for goats! {Courtesy of the Homesteading Today forum}

6. 4 Reasons your hens aren't laying. {Courtesy of House. Barn. Farm.}

Pinterest Link Up! Week #4!

 Well the "Ask It" post might have been late, but this one isn't! So there. I feel slightly better about myself. ;)

  And what did I find this week on the grand auld website known as Pinterest? Take a looksee' and find out! (yes, it's huge. I'm still mentally arguing over whether or not I should upgrade on PicMonkey to get their super nice collages... So for now we get to deal with awkward sized collages that are free at least.)

1. The Cost of Producing Raw Milk. {Courtesy of The Well Fed Homestead}

2. Homemade Chicken Feed Recipes: Soy free, Corn free, Fermented, Sprouted. {Courtesy of Whistle Pig Hollow}

3. DIY Anti-Pick, Antibacterial, Blu-Kote Spray. {Courtesy of Fresh Eggs Daily}

4. In Defense of REAL Milk. {Courtesy of Body Unburdened}

5. A Simple Guide to Raising & Milking Goats. {Courtesy of Weed 'Em & Reap}

6. 12 Questions to Ask Before You Buy A Homestead Property. {Courtesy of The Prairie Homestead}

7. How to Raise Grass Fed Lamb Like A Boss. {Courtesy of Weed 'Em & Reap}

Pinterest Link Up! Week #3!

 I'm still tweaking this idea, and deciding what I/we like best. It seems that pictures are the key to this post series, so I set out to seeing what I could and couldn't do. What I've found thus far is that if an image is not watermarked, then you can create a collage with it, and link back to the original source; single images are apparently what is a no-no. So with that in mind, let's try this week's link up like this:

1. How Pervasive Are GMO's in Animal Feed? {Courtesy of GMO Inside}

2. A Smaller Beef Cow - Dexter Cattle. {Courtesy of Our Simple Farm}

3. Homemade Hay Manger! {Courtesy of Backyard Herds forum & Sawyer Family Farm}

4. DIY Heat Mat for Seedlings. {Courtesy of Vegetablegardener.com}

5. Sprouting Grains for Dairy Goats. {Courtesy of Little Seed Farm}

6. Keep A Family Dairy Cow. {Courtesy of Mother Earth News, and Karen Keb}

  
 Enjoy your Saturday!!

Pinterest Link Up! Week #2!

It seems I underestimated how popular this idea of sharing my Pinterest finds could be. For the last 6 months, my most popular post I've written on here was my tutorial on how to grow fodder. And then that one single post with the Pinterest link ups that I did last week threw my stats off the wall. Wow. I got more views on that post than I've ever gotten on the tutorial in a span of seven days! 

Seeing the numbers behind that post has shown me that this does indeed seem like a good thing to keep going. :) So with that in mind, here's the next Link Up for y'all!!

A few quick notes though... First, just a reminder that all highlighted, bold words are active links, and will take you to the original website that I found. And two, I'm trying something different this week and am omitting the images from Pinterest. *sad, sad face* I like having the images, but it's really hard trying to get permission from the owner of the image, asking if I can post it here. I'm still tweaking and modifying things here, so who knows, maybe I'll eventually be back to posting images with the links.

Okay, now we're good to go. Let's see what I found on Pinterest!!

1. A Plan For Meat. Reformation Acres, a conservative, family oriented blog, writes up a post on how they plan how much meat to raise for their family each year. They grow chicken, beef, pork, and rabbit, and give the math behind how they decide how much of each thing to raise so that they'll have enough until next year! I really liked this post for the numbers. It's detailed, well laid out, and gives you a good idea on how to scale up or scale down your own plans so that there will be enough in your own freezer. 

2. Working Dogs: How To Pick the Perfect Pooch for Your Pastures. This is a direct link to a Mother Earth News post, and it's a four-page article on how to choose the best dog for your situation. Not sure what you need? Herding dog? Livestock guardian dog? A terrier for rodent control? Something that will "do it all"? I felt like the article gave a well rounded idea of what the different dog groups have to offer, and was handy in helping one decide what would be best for them. I won't make the mention that the English Shepherd is spoken highly of in the article, because that might - uh - sound a little biased. ;) *cough, cough*

3. Sheep 201. I love this website!!! Sheep 201 is not a blog; just your ordinary website, but my goodness is it ever PACKED with information on all things sheep. 

4. How to Raise Pigs. This link goes to the Righteous Bacon blog, which I mentioned a couple days ago... And it would also be the post that I found her through (thank you Pinterest!), and I was really impressed by the detail she lays out in planning for raising a pair of hogs. She goes over fencing, feed, shelter, health, transporting, and gives little tips here and there. And the pictures are great. ;) 

5. Dairy Goat Linear Appraisal. The name of this blog made me laugh when I first saw it: "Better Hens and Gardens". Hehehe. That's one way to put an agricultural spin on modern day decorating. ;) Puns aside though, this looks like a neat blog that I want to spend a bit more time sifting through. What caught my attention at the start though was a cool post explaining linear appraisal in dairy goats, and what to look for, conformation-wise in your caprine friends. I tend to forget that not everyone knows what the dairy jargon of "EEEV 91" means (meanwhile I'm literally wigging out over a goat that has a score like that). I felt like this post explains it pretty well, and even gives a visual on what a goat should look like.

6. Raising Pastured Pigs On No Grain. That got your attention, didn't it? Got mine too. Pigs are a single stomached omnivore that can't live solely on grass; so how does one still manage to skip the grain? Check out the link! It leads to another Mother Earth News article (just a short one this time) that explains my favorite method of raising omnivorous meat animals: Feeding milk. But this post doesn't go saying that you need to buy a cow, or goat, or sheep (or camel). Instead it explains how to get the outdated milk from your local grocery store. I like this idea, I've spoken with farmers who do this, and I'm determined to start doing it someday!

7. Glass Milk Bottles! This isn't an article... But if you've ever wondered where to find those lovely looking glass milk bottles so that you can upgrade from 1/2 gallon mason jars, then check this website out! The Red Hill General Store carries a lot of high quality products at a good price, and I am totally in love with their 1/2 gallon milk jars. Love, love, love them. ^_^ And they're surprisingly competitive in price in comparison to the mason jars that I've been buying for my raw milk all these years. When I get started back up with dairy animals, I will definitely be investing in these bottles. 

Pinterest Link Up

Yes, this is new; no, you haven't been missing it for years and years without knowing it. This idea is a mix between wanting to justify my time on Pinterest a bit better (strange things happen when a farm girl doesn't have animals to keep her busy... Finding Pinterest would be one of those strange things), as well as just wanting to share some of the neat things I've found on there with y'all. :) Pinterest can be a treasure trove of information if used wisely (or 100% pure fun and wasted time if you let it be. Hehehe.).

So here we go folks, let's try this crazy idea and see how it pans out! And just a heads up, all the words in bold are active links that take you directly to the original website that will give you the information you're looking for.

1. Wintering pigs in a greenhouse! I enjoyed this link! A family raises a few pigs in the fall/winter each year, letting the pigs go hog wild (couldn't resist) in the fallow garden, and sheltering in the greenhouse (that has been strengthened to handle the porcine race). The writer also explains their fencing, feeding, and watering setup. Good read, and a clean website.

Wintering Pigs in a greenhouse. Photo courtesy of 'Our Little Farm'.

2. Choosing a Dairy Cow: Breeds. It seems that I'm a person who likes lists. I didn't think I did, but maybe I do a little bit... Anyway, this link was super handy since it lists the different dairy breeds and their pros/cons very neatly and seems pretty accurate! If you're wanting the black and white on each breed so you can compare which one would be better for you, then here you go. The website is a professional looking blog called 'The Well Fed Homestead' and so far I like the place... I'll have to spend some rainy afternoon poking around there a bit more, but so far so good. :)

Choosing a Dairy cow breed. Photo courtesy of 'The Well Fed Homestead'.

3. Homemade Chick Starter. I've had a lot of people ask me if I know of a good recipe for starting chicks, and while I haven't tried this exact recipe (I didn't have any millet at the time), I think this is the one I will go with next time I get to raise chicks. Link goes to a personal blog that's got clean content.

Homemade Chick Starter. Photo courtesy of  'A Homegrown Journal'.

3. Free printable milk records. The Prairie Homestead. Need I say more? Shucks, with almost 20,000 followers on her blog, I hardly feel like I have to introduce this place. LOL. But she's got a handy, yet simple, printable sheet so you can keep track of your dairy records. Because believe it or not, you WON'T remember how much your dairy animal gave you this morning in three months time. Trust me, I've got 6 years of milking behind me, and that means six years of saying "Oh, I'll remember how much they gave..." Yeah right. I can't even remember what I had for breakfast three days ago.

Free printable dairy records. Photo courtesy of The Prairie Homestead

4. Pallet Hay Manger. It's just cool. I like pallets. To me, they're like the lego of the construction world. That, and they seem pretty non-threatening to this farm girl who is typically wary of any type of building projects that don't call for PVC or duct tape. I can do pallets. The link this project leads to is a clean, simple farming blog, but the info on actually building this manger is precious little. You're basically going off the image. Looks like a solid bottom and 4 whole pallets to me... 

Pallet Hay manger. Photo courtesy of Homesteading Wife.

5. Disaster preparedness. The image says it all. I think this has got to be the greatest way ever to organize and label your outdoor working tools. Just think, this way even visitors will have a clear idea of what to do if zombies suddenly attack!! Or, if nothing else, it'll bring a laugh to those who pass by...

No link to this image. ;) It is what it is. (and yes, I posted it more as a spoof. But seriously... Zombie preparedness. It's a good thing.)

Photo courtesy of instructables.com

There you have it folks! Just a few neat things I've found online lately. What think ye'? Would you like to see the Pinterest Link Up become a weekly Saturday thing or not? I would really love your opinion on this. After all, if no one's interested then that means I can sleep in on my Saturday mornings after all. ;)