Well, it’s been a pretty long time since I wrote on my blog. But, don’t think I haven’t been writing! Since I posted last, in April, we have been very busy here on the farm and I have been very busy as an author!
First, the authoring news! In May, My Name is Odin was released! If you aren’t familiar with Odin, he is our 28-month-old Great Pyrenees livestock guardian dog. He is an amazing creature and my love and respect for him grows daily. He has been “off lead” and in “full guardian mode” since he turned two years old in April and he has literally OWNED the pasture and the protection of the animals who live there!
He has learned NOT to chase the Merlin and his hens (well, he remembers that MOST of the time!). Then in July, we introduced him to our 50 three-week-old broiler meat chicks. Oh boy! Did he love having them in the pasture! He layed by them, circled the chicken tractors and left his mark multiple times a day! I think he was energized by the fact that when he was investigating and making his rounds around the chicken tractor, the chicks would squawk and scatter. But, he is STILL a puppy, right? He has his routine in patrolling the entire pasture, which I think is more than cool!
Mocha and Jersey have learned (again, for the most part!) to put up with him. He loves to “tail” them (literally following under their tails) when they are going from pasture to barn and back again. Sometimes Jersey’s dislike for him is displayed by turning around quickly and giving him “the look” as if to say “keep your distance, buddy, or I’m gonna kick you right in the nose!” And, amazingly enough, he seems to read her, because most of the time he will back off.
His speed amazes me. One day when we were out doing chores, I noticed he was laying over in the side pasture with something between his paws…the typical pose for when he is eating a bone, etc….but I hadn’t given him a bone. So, I slowly approached, talking softly and sweetly to him so he didn’t feel threatened…and he picked his treasure up and headed to the back pasture with it. I am not totally sure what it was, but I am almost positive it was a bunny. It was the right size and the right shape. The thoughts of that boy being fast enough to catch and eat a bunny totally astounds me! However, I know HE IS FAST! When he is running up behind me and passes me, the wind he brings with him is amazing and the speed with which he passes me is impressive! I don’t hear him until he is just a few paces behind me and then it’s breathtaking…hoping one day he doesn’t knock me over. Once, he didn’t steer clear enough and some part of him hit the back of my knee. I don’t know how I kept from falling! Thankfully, I stayed upright with a new appreciation of all of his attributes that make him such a good livestock guardian.
He is SMART! AND, he is motivated by the duck jerky treats I found at our local pet supply store. When preparing to let him off the lead for good, I had to find something that would motivate him to obey. The beef jerky treats did NOTHING! The chicken treats did nothing! So I tried the “European raised duck jerky” and oh my! It’s almost funny because even when he knows he is going to get tied up (to keep him out of the barn when it has to be opened, because he causes havoc in the barn…cats…chicks…etc.) you can see his dilemma. He WANTS the treat but you see the struggle in his behavior as he has to deny himself freedom for the treat! Jeff won’t even attempt to tie him up because he doesn’t take treats out with him and Odin stays far from him and watches because he knows Jeff will tie him up if he gets too close…and he won’t even get a treat for his trouble!
So, on to the next book: my fifth book in the de Good Life Farm book series, The Mysterious Midnight Visitor at de Good Life Farm is waiting for the final edits to be made by my publisher and hopefully will be released in the next couple of weeks! But, the most exciting thing perhaps, is that I have completed my first children’s fiction picture book, Carmella’s Camel, and have begun my first fiction chapter book (name being withheld for now).
Besides the writing I am doing, I have one children’t book being illustrated, with another to follow soon after. And, I am working on some counting books (if you know me, you know that not only do I LOVE words…I LOVE numbers!) Writing is such a joy to me. The marketing…well, not so much! Guess I will just have to continue writing and getting books published because I love it and I have a lot of things to write about..and not because I am making money at it.
The COVID-19 pandemic has blown out the fire in my book sales because the schools have been where I have sold the most, which makes sense because children are my audience! Not being able to do author visits makes me sad. Not only do I appreciate the sales, but I absolutely LOVE interacting with the children, watching them interact and respond to the books as I read them and answer their questions (or hear their stories and comments as well). I hope that someday soon, those visits can continue.
So, back to the meat chickens – yesterday completed the good life we gave our first batch of meat birds and we loaded them up in the truck early in the morning. Of course, we tied Odin up…can’t even imagine how much harder they would have been to catch had he been loose to rile them up! Anyway, he watched intently as we caught and put each one in crates and loaded them onto the truck. Then, he watched as we went to the second chicken tractor and did the same. The look on his face was perplexed concern. He strategically placed himself in front of the chicken tractor where his new charges are (the four-week-old meat chickens) as if to say, “You can’t take these!”
Micah drove the truck loaded with chickens out of the pasture and Jeff closed the gate. I let Odin off the lead and immediately he headed over to the empty chicken tractors to check them out. I headed to the house to grab what I needed to take with me to the processor and then as we pulled out, I realized Odin had run all the way to the front pasture so he could see what was happening with the chickens. It was as if he felt responsible for their well-being and he was reluctant to turn over his duty of protection to anyone else. It was so adorable and admirable!
Now we have the second batch of broiler chicks in both of the big chicken tractors in the pasture and the cycle starts again. As soon as they were all safely moved into their new homes…Odin began making his rounds, keeping his watchful on them…and of course, making them noisily scatter when he came near.
Besides broilers, we are raising thirty layer chicks. Our layers’ production has dwindled and in this family, 3-4 eggs per day will NEVER do…so we will eagerly anticipate the day in late fall that we will begin getting eggs again and have enough to share. This time, when ordering, I opted for a higher percentage of the good egg producers and fewer of the “pretty variety egg” producing hens. After skimping on eggs for weeks now, I want the majority of my hens to be all about laying eggs. I did get a few Americana’s for their pretty blue eggs, but just a few!
And gardening…this year I have grown the most amazing garden I have probably ever grown. My zucchini plants are monstrous (as are some of the zucchini that hide under those amazingly large leaves) and I have frozen tons of zucchini spirals for use instead of pasta and shredded zucchini for breads and muffins. YUM! Now my tomatoes are starting to come on and I made my husband’s day when I put fresh tomatoes on his turkey sandwich and salads.
My sweet red peppers are nearly ready to harvest and I have banana peppers ready to freeze. JalapeƱos are already in the freezer, so when my Roma tomatoes are ready, it’s salsa time! I will also be sharing my Roma tomatoes with my mom for canning, since I seem to use a lot of the tomatoes she cans. This year it will be a joint effort.
But the “funnest” thing about my garden is growing pumpkins. I don’t ever remember growing pumpkins before but I have wanted to for some time. The pumpkins started off as something fun for whatever grandkids can be here when they are ready to harvest…but they have turned into something FAR more than that! (I am going to be slyly evasive about this for now).
We have had a pretty difficult last four weeks — the first weekend, we lost our air conditioning on one of the hottest days of the season. We couldn’t keep the house cool enough and we are so sad that even with fans and water, Beau, our not-even-five-year-old male golden retriever died from heat stroke. Our hearts are broken.
The next weekend, the air conditioning went out AGAIN…a different issue…however it wasn’t AS HOT as the previous weekend and we took our female golden, Lacey, to our son’s house to hang out for awhile. Thankfully, the problem with the air conditioner was discovered and the fixed!
The following weekend our other son got sick with some stomach/intestinal bug (oh, this is AFTER a week and a half before that when my husband got sick with the same symptoms!) and he was pretty sick for a week! Then, he had to get a COVID test in order to return to work. We are still waiting on those results even though he has been well for several days.
Then, this past weekend, (YES! another weekend!), we blew a fuse in the barn when going out to do milking and evening chores. Our sweet neighbor, Dave, came and tried to fix it (he can fix anything!), but no luck. We put together more than 240 feet of extension cords and plugged them in on the deck so that our 3 week old layer chicks wouldn’t die. We have done the milking with no light and no fans…until I got fed up and found another extension cord for those luxuries during chores! Today, we finally got electric restored…it was a BIG ticket…issues that should have been caught when we bought the house, but unfortunately, weren’t.
Well, I just wanted to catch you all up on what we’ve been up to here at de Good Life Farm. It has been an eventful few months, but what can you do but be thankful to the good Lord for the blessings and keep plowing ahead?
Hope you enjoyed this update and will subscribe to my blog. Watch for the announcement that my new website is up and running (hopefully soon) http://www.dianeorrauthor.com. You will also be able to access my blog there as well purchase books and eventually other items!
If you are interested in checking out my books, here is the link: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=diane+orr&crid=3NYF4KYLALEVW&sprefix=diane+Orr%2Caps%2C172&ref=nb_sb_ss_ts-a-p_1_9
You can also access them at http://www.bn.com as well as http://www.penitpublications.com.
Enjoy what remains of your summer! Thanks for stopping by! Will hope to talk to you again soon!
