Dolan Creek Farm

  As anyone living in the Northwest knows, this has been a long and hard winter. For the farm it meant a lot of extra work and getting snowed in over Christmas. We ended up having about two feet of snow. It was so cold that we had to move ALL the animals into the barn and work hard keeping everyone fed, water flowing and keeping the pipes from freezing. It was also the first time in the forty years we've been farming here that we've had to get up on the barn roofs and shovel off the snow for fear of them collapsing. As things did start to melt we had a few fences collapse under falling snow. Needless to say it's been a very busy winter.

In early January we had a suprise new addition to our farm. A friend called saying he had a rescue momma goat with her week old kid. Of course we welcomed them with open arms and a warm stall. The momma goat (Sunshine) is slowly putting on weight and gaining some shine to her coat. The kid (Snowflake) is adorable and bouncy. Sometimes I think the name Rocket would be more fitting. She loves it when the sun shines and she can run all over outside. On these colder, wet days she just wants to stay in the barn and climb all over her Mom. Such a cute personality and loves to be scratched.

It's exciting to be (hopefully) on the other side of things this Valentine's Day. I say that hesitantly as we had snow falling earlier today but it seems to be all done. The last couple of days have been busy moving the chickens out of the turkey portion of the barn and into there new home. The movable coop has had some upgrades made to the laying boxes. Also made some improvements to how we feed the chickens and reinforced the wheels to make rolling the pin around easier when we rotate pasture sites. The chickens have also just started producing there first little eggs. Has been a very exciting time for the visiting grandkids.

It is hard to believe, while working in the falling snow, I have started seed in the cold frame: peppers, celery and eggplants. I sure hope spring is right around the corner.