Category: Homesteading

Chickens!

Here are the chickens we want to order. I had put together a list based on research and talking to other people. Then I let Anya go through the hatchery’s website and pick the chickens she liked. Then I showed her where to find info about how many eggs they produce, if they are good in hot and cold weather, how friendly they are. We went through her list & eliminated birds that didn’t want to be in the cold, weren’t friendly, or only produce an egg a week. She really wants a white leghorn, but they say it’s not a good breed for cold weather. All but one of the ones I added were dropped because of lower egg production or less friendly personalities, so she was OK with removing some of her favorites from the list because sooooo many of mine got removed too.

Now we just have to wait until August for them to arrive! There’s evidently been a run on both chickens and seeds as people encounter runs on, well, everything at the grocery store.

Name Breed Eggs-Low Eggs-High Climate Personality Egg Size Eggs Baby Adult
Astra Austra White 208 260 Heat and Cold Hardy Quite, tame and docile Large Austra White Day Old Austra White Chicks For Sale at Meyer Hatchery, Your Premier Poultry Source
Sunshine Buff Orpington 200 280 Very Cold Hardy Docile, Quiet & Affectionate Large Buff Orpingtons lay large light brown eggs Day old baby Buff Orpington chicks Beautiful and fluffy Buff Orpington hen
Tilly Columbian Wyandotte 180 Very Robust, Cold Hardy Generally Docile Large Columbian Wyandottes lay lots of brown eggs every year. Shop Meyer Hatchery for your day old baby chicks! We ship nationwide year-round. Columbian Wyandotte Hens are a beautiful mix of mostly white with black accents.
Queenington Green Queen 208 260 extremely hearty in all climates Friendly, Docile, Good Pet Large Green Queen Green Queen
Soaring Eagle Black Jersey Giant 180 200 very cold hearty Calm & Easy Going Medium Black Jersey Giants are a sustainable heritage breed that lays brown eggs. Black Jersey Giant Hens have black feathers and willow or black legs and feet.

 

2020 Maple Syrup

Our taps are drying up — some of them were drilled on 03 February. The weather is getting warm; a few trees have leafed out. Our maple season is coming to a close. We’ve got more than five gallons of maple syrup canned:

18 Feb 2020 — 1st batch — ~3/4 gallon, a little scorched and used for cooking instead of canned
25 Feb 2020 — 2nd batch — 6 pints
10 Mar 2020 — 3rd batch — 24 pints
26 Mar 2020 — 4th batch — 10 pints
04 April 2020 — 5th batch — 2.75 pints

 

ORC Agricultural Exemption and Commerce

While at a recent Zoning Commission meeting, they discussed how a use was judged to be (or not to be) agriculture vis-à-vis Township not having a right to regulate agriculture per ORC 519.21. The example of a greenhouse used to grow flowers was given — not agriculture. Which got me thinking about the false association between ‘commerce’ and ‘agriculture’ — flowers are absolutely included in Ohio’s list of agriculture. ORC 303.01 reads:

agriculture" includes 
 farming; ranching; algaculture meaning the farming of algae; aquaculture; apiculture;
 horticulture; viticulture; animal husbandry, including, but not limited to, the care and raising 
    of livestock, equine, and fur-bearing animals;
 poultry husbandry and the production of poultry and poultry products;
 dairy production; the production of field crops,
 tobacco, fruits, vegetables, nursery stock,
 ornamental shrubs, ornamental trees, flowers,
 sod, or mushrooms; timber; pasturage;
 any combination of the foregoing; and the processing, drying, storage, and marketing
 of agricultural products when those activities are conducted in conjunction with,
 but are secondary to, such husbandry or production.

So why wouldn’t a greenhouse used to grow flowers count as an agricultural use? Wickard v. Filburn, 317 U.S. 111 (1942) — a fairly wide reaching case — found that Mr. Filburn producing wheat for his own use (i.e. not selling it) still counted as commerce because he would have otherwise bought the wheat on the open market. Which is to say his wheat production was commerce because it was grown to allow him to avoid commerce. While Mr. Filburn’s production was not substantial, the cumulative action of personal-use growers would have a substantial impact on the market. Which was enough commerce to grant the federal government power to regulate his wheat production.

Same holds true here — and I think flowers were used an an example because it’s easy enough to say “eh, it’s just flowers”. But my concern is that the Township is going to want to use the same logic to regulate other agricultural activities. The personal production of poultry products may not be substantial, but the cumulative production of everyone who has some egg layers in their yard would be substantial. Thus egg laying chickens that produce for personal use would still be considered commerce by the logic of WIckard v. Filburn. I think someone claiming agricultural use for flowers might have a bigger hurdle, but a sufficiently motivated individual may be able to use this argument to substantiate the agricultural exemption for their greenhouse.

Hopefully this is one of those situations where the government doesn’t try to have it both ways — if personal production is commerce in one case, it should be commerce in other (very similar) cases.

Notes on Pigs

We’ve been thinking about raising pigs. Most of what we raise is heirloom / endangered species, and animals won’t be any different. I like Gloucestershire Old Spots, but there aren’t any breeders nearby … and I don’t want to drive to Maine to pick up a couple of pigs. I found Tamworths — a heritage breed on the Livestock Conservancy list. And two different breeders in the area — one about an hour away (http://bindelfarms.com/livestock-for-sale.html) and the other near Columbus (https://pauleyrowdyacres.blogspot.com/p/livestock-sales.html).

In case there are too many piglets — the Kidron Auction sells pigs mid-day on Thursdays (although we’d need batteries for the truck to get there with a large pig or a bunch of piglets!)

Apiary Thoughts

We made mead from local honey, and it’s got me thinking about having our own hives. In Ohio, you have to register your apiary every year — something to remember if we do get a hive! We’d need to get a hive — and misc equipment. Harvesting the honey seems pretty labor intensive — I like the Flow hives, but a grand for a hive is a lot and I expect there’s a lot of honey that remains in the hive. Which may not be a bad thing — I’ve certainly read about people feeding their bees sugar water over the winter. And I assume that’s from over-harvesting the honey.

Quilt tops — a shallow box on the top of the hive, with a wire mesh on the bottom, which is filled with straw or wood chips. It’s insulation.

New Soap Molds

I’d seen some incredibly intricate soap molds online – the individual posting the pictures was wondering if anyone who had purchased some could verify the results were as beautiful as the product photos on the store site. No one knew. I don’t have any silicone molds that make a decent sized bar of soap. I’ve got a few that make really thin bars, and Anya loves the little bunnies and fairy. Scott has joked that I could improve some of my ‘cute’ crafts if I’d just put a dragon on it (I assume not a puffy baby dragon), and the seller has a number of dragon molds. So I bought a few molds and they were finally delivered!

Anya was so excited to see them – the soap was removed waaaaaay too soon and it hadn’t hardened. Unfortunately the intricate nature of the mold means your soap should be hard before unmolding. The upper right-hand corner broke off. But the soap is just as intricate looking and cool as the product picture.

Cold Whipped Shea Butter

We’ve evidently had a problem with our thermostat not properly reporting humidity, so our HVAC was not maintaining the desired humidity level. The installer replaced the thermostat last week, and we’ve gone from 60% to 49% relative humidity downstairs. We’re intentionally keeping the lower level cooler than the upper — there’s a lot of solar heating even with curtains drawn. And, well, relative humidity is relative to temperature. So our 60% was more like 50% upstairs … still high. Our 49%, though, is 39% upstairs. And for the first time since I started making my own soap, my skin is a little dry. So is Anya’s. We can just slather on some coconut oil — it melts in your hand and absorbs fairly well — but I wanted to try something a little fancier. And I happened across a good deal on shea butter a few weeks back, so whipping a combination of shea butter and coconut oil seems like a winner.

1 cup unrefined shea butter
1 cup coconut oil
2 tablespoons vegetable glycerin

  • Mash the room-temperature shea butter in the mixing bowl. Add essential oils if desired (or melt coconut oil and infuse with herbs).
  • Stir in the coconut oil. If the whole thing is a little melty, stick it in the refrigerator to solidify a bit
  • Whip with a stand mixer until it’s fluffed like whipped cream. Fin. Scoop it into jars (we have a bunch of wide mouth canning jars, so I’ll be using a few of those) and store in a cool room or the refrigerator.

Soap Fluff Explosion

I made our saboun al ghar inspired soap today. First attempt at hot processing soap, and I had a massive soap explosion. I’d read that your container should be at least three times the volume of soap you are processing. I went with five times in an attempt to stave off a big mess. Blended my pomace olive oil and lye/water/salt mixture to a light trace, and set it over medium heat. It thickened, just like it supposed to. It turned into a gloopy oily mess, just like it supposed to. For future reference — the gloopy oily mess stage is where you want to keep a close eye on it and don’t look away for a minute. I turned back around and saw odd foamy soap stuff pouring out of the pot. Oops!

I scooped the soap fluff off the side of the pot and back into the pot and stirred it down. The fluff quickly turned into a slick substance that did look exactly like petroleum jelly. I added the laurel berry oil, stirred well to incorporate, and let cook for a few more minutes until it looked like petroleum jelly again.

The whole mess was glopped into my large silicon lined wooden soap mold. Now it just needs to set for a while and harden.

Making Soap Molds – Material Research

Before trying to print my own soap molds, I need to identify what characteristics I like in a mold. I find flexible molds easier to work with than rigid ones – I’ve snapped a number of molds trying to remove the soap.

So I am trying to find a material that will withstand heat generated by saponification. It looks like saponification can yield temperatures up to 88° C. I don’t want to buy pounds of different filaments to test them out, but GlobalFSD offers “sample” size filament cuttings that are perfect for experimentation or small niche products (e.g. printing glow in the dark mailbox numbers).

One material included information about temps for printed objects, so I’ve contacted the other manufacturers to see if they provide any sort of guidance.

Material Max C Min C Notes URL
NinjaFlex 65.5 -30 https://www.globalfsdusa.com/ninjaflex-by-fenner-drives.html?category_id=20
CrystalFlex  – – Food safe https://www.globalfsdusa.com/crystalflex-tm-by-formfutura.html?category_id=20
FilaFlex https://www.globalfsdusa.com/filaflex-by-recreus-1-75mm.html?category_id=20
FlexFill 230 -40 https://www.globalfsdusa.com/flexfil-98a-by-fillamentum-1-75mm.html?category_id=20
F41 Flex 75 -20 https://www.globalfsdusa.com/f41-flex-tm-1-75mm-black-polyolefin-filament-by-forefront.html?category_id=20

Saboun Al Ghar Inspired Soap

Most old civilizations have traditional artisan production processes that are hard to sustain in the modern world. Some cheeses in Southern France were sustained through government grants until EU regulations considered such support unsporting. Su filindeu pasta now only made by three people in Italy. As war ravages a country, even well sustained traditional methods become endangered. The civil/proxy war in Syria has displaced most if not all producers of صابون الغار (‘Aleppo soap’). While we may not be able to faithfully reproduce the exact process to create what may be the world’s oldest hard soap, I think it is important to preserve the knowledge of the process. The ingredients and proportions. The time and temperature of processing, how the soap is poured onto floors to cool and set whilst being walked on with wooden boards to flatten it out. How it is cut and stacked to cure.

In addition to documenting and preserving the process, derivative processes are developed to preserve some facet of the original product. Fact is, a lot of products are not protected by AOC, PDO, or any of the other “X has to be made in Y using the historic technique Z” regulations. Like the unfortunate not-Cheddar cheese that I find in many American grocery stores, Aleppo soap could be made with coconut oil and dye. And maybe that’s where the objection to cultural appropriation comes from — not an objection to someone respectfully trying to reproduce a cultural artifact but of someone bastardizing the artifact for profit or fashion. Reproducing sacred items for frivolity.

After reading about the displaced soap masters, I want to make a soap inspired by the Aleppo process. I need more experience with hot processing soap to follow the traditional long cook method, but I want to hot process the soap to control which oils comprise the superfat. Fully saponify the olive oil, then add the laurel berry oil and saponify some of it.

Then comes the actual recipe – the challenge with traditional soap recipes is that the saponification factor of ash varies. Buying sodium hydroxide yields a consistent product useful in recipes with precise measurements. Ghar soap recipes have percentages of olive oil to laurel berry oil, but more or less call for enough ash. I’m debating between five and ten percent superfat. Five percent seems fairly standard for soap recipes, so I’m leaning in that direction. But I wanted to continue researching authentic recipes before finalizing my ingredients.