Dan L. e-mail?

[songbird]

hi,

tried to send you a message asking how cheese making was going since i was thinking of curds today.

so now that i've posted it here...

how's the cheese making going? :)

songbird

[Bill who putters]

Just got "Making Artisan Cheese" yesterday. Quick perusal inclines me not doing mold and bacteria type still lots to try.

I basically make just yogurt and pickle stuff. Charlie I heard was into sourdough breads. One issue I read about in the book was trying to get milk that is not pasteurized. Dan L having a cow circumvents this issue.

I buy cheese from these folks but it has new owners now on second year and who knows. Still my extended family says same order as last year.

[Dan L]

My emails will never work on a public forum.Nor will you find me on face book or any other social network :)

Jersey Bessy will not produce milk until around the end of March. Her calf will need milk for a few months after that. I am hoping to get some milk around April. She did escape from her pasture two days ago, but did not venture far away. How in the world she busted through triple welded wire and without a scratch is beyond me. Now I am considering an electric fence. My guess she almost weighs 800 pounds.

The book you bought, I do not have. It looks like a book for advanced cheese makers. I have not yet made any. I have three books planning for the future.

I am not positive, but I do not believe regular pasteurized milk prevents cheese making. Ultra High Pasteurization will prevent cheese making. I not sure, but I believe homogenized milk prevents some forms of cheese making. My knowledge is book only at this time. I think one can add cultures to pasteurized milk to make cheese, a step I will not need. One can buy milk that is not homogenized and a low heat pasteurization called "Cream-Line" milk. Raw milk is strictly illegal for sale in Michigan, however having your own cow is the only way to get raw milk.

My first attempts will be butter, yogurt and soft cream cheeses. Reading books states that soft cheeses is the easiest and cheapest way to go and can be made in days if not hours. Hard Cheeses is a whole new game. These are require expensive equipment, cheese presses, specialized refrigerators that control humidity and temperature for mold control. I will attempt hard cheeses someday, that maybe a year later. I must learn to walk before running. Being on the side of of caution, I will use slow low heat pasteurization for my personal milk consumption.

Now making you own sour dough breads. That is a real treat, low cost and easy! I have "Peter Reinhart's Artisan Breads Every Day [Hardcover]" ISBN-10: 1580089984 ISBN-13: 978-1580089982 Baguettes anyone, fresh out of the oven, the smell, the taste, Mmmmm... Gluten does bother me, but sometimes worth the discomfort later.

Have fun on the cheese making! My books are focused on the HOME making end.

The Home Creamery [Paperback] Kathy Farrell-Kingsley (Author) ISBN-10: 1603420312 ISBN-13: 978-1603420310

Home Cheese Making: Recipes for 75 Delicious Cheeses [Paperback] Ricki Carroll (Author) ISBN-10: 1580174647 ISBN-13: 978-1580174640

200 Easy Homemade Cheese Recipes: From Cheddar and Brie to Butter and Yogurt [Paperback] Debra Amrein-Boyes (Author) ISBN-10: 0778802183 ISBN-13: 978-0778802181

[phorbin]

My grandma had a lead cow that perfected the art of leaning on fences.

She'd lean until the fence broke and then took the herd through the gap with her.

They were never able to break her of the habit and being a farming family...

[Dan L]

I suspect that is how she did it. But how to prevent it again?

[phorbin]

I've no idea.

...There are times when I feel a little bit like the child of 'immigrants to the city' because all I have are their stories of the farm culture, the farm and farming but all I really know are some stories.

Their solution was quite practical and final.

You might find the following url useful.

[George Shirley]

We had a Holstein cow inside a two-wire electric fence. She ate the grass up to within one foot of the wire, no closer. Unfortunately she could tell, somehow, when the power went down. Once it did she was in the vegetable garden within seconds.

The pigs would get out of the sty once in awhile, they would go through the electric fence squealing like crazy, taking the fence down, into the garden would go the cow.

Being a farm family, both pigs and cow....

[Dan L]

I found the cause today. Surprisingly the fence failed at a week point where the fence ends meet with connector wires. After repair and made the fence stronger, put her back into the pasture. First thing she did is run straight to the week point and leaned into it, this time she failed. I have greatly under estimated the intelligence of cows. She must have been testing the fence looking for an escape.

[George Shirley]

You want smart animals get pigs. Darned things are escape artists and can run like greased lightning. Cows are dumb alongside a pig and both are stupid alongside a mule. I've had experiences with all of them where they figured things out. Had an old mule that learned to open the gate out of her enclosure. Was a simple thing, a loop of wire over a gate post and the fence post, never had a critter figure it out before but Kate did. She got out one time to many and Mom shot her with my .22 rifle while I was at school. Seems Kate got out and headed for the kitchen garden each time. Dad and I drug her out into the pasture with the FarmAll Cub tractor and burned her, too much trouble to bury a mule.

Friend has a Golden Retriever who can open the screen door, has the handle you have to push to open and the dog figured it out. Now they have to lock the door to keep him in.

OB: edible gardens, harvested enough broccoli crowns today for dinner tonight. Also need to harvest a bunch of sweet chiles and have about a six-quart bucket of hot chiles ready to pick. Okra has pretty much given up but the tomatoes are putting on fruit again. If we don't get a hard freeze this winter we might make it.

George, in USDA Zone 9b

[Dan L]

My dog is a yorke. He is always with me outside. My little dog comes and goes as he pleases though the doggie dog. Still alive and going on six years old.

My gardens have been put to rest for the winter. One small salad garden,

4x12 ft, just off my back deck. A canning garden, 20x20ft fenced in. A third raised bed garden under development, 50x100 ft, for cutting flowers and for small fruits, a five year project, soil all clay. Some day I would like a small greenhouse in that area. Money is tight now that I am retired... For the time being:)

I look at this way. Beyond fruit and vegetables, eggs and milk to me are useful food groups. Almost every recipe has milk or eggs. However, if funds get too tight, Bessy will be the first to go. She is expensive and takes allot of space, time and work. Chickens are super easy. Chickens are easier than removing weeds or taking care of a dog.

Will be starting some seed kits indoors in February. Also got my first seed catalog yesterday from pine tree.

[Doug Freyburger]

Time for some beef. Domesticated animals are supposed to be selectively bred for docility.

[David Hare-Scott]

We had a horse that would test electric fence. He would lean forward very slowly and caustiously until a whisker or nose hair would touch.

He also mastered the art of pulling out pig-tailed pickets with his teeth. The power would be on so he would lean over the wire and grasp the top of the insulated ring on the picket, pull it out of the ground and drop it. When the picket went down the wire went down and he stepped over.

He could also open a gate that was fastened with chain and hook if there was no safety ring on the hook by simply pulling the hook out of its staple and then jiggling the gate with his shoulder until the chain worked loose. He did this trick before dawn on a very frosty winter morning, we got a phone call from a neighbour saying "did you know all your horses are running up and down the road?".

David

[George Shirley]

Our old rat terrier had to be put down at age 11.5, she had cancer really bad. About broke our hearts. Less than a month later we got another rat terrier and now she has stolen our hearts. Both learned to use the dog door quickly. One goes through the back door into the garage and another is in the west wall of the garage. I've seen the terrier go through both doors so fast they seem to make the same sound at the same time. Usually they are after squirrels, a primary pest in our gardens.

We've been in this house for twenty years now. We have a veggie garden that is 17X24, a back fence garden that is 3X70 and a west side garden that is 3X75. Not to mention the odd flower beds, etc. In the backyard I have two plum trees, a peach tree, a Japanese persimmon, a St. John's quince, and two kumquat trees. Did have a nice pear tree and a nicer lemon tree. The winter of 2009/2010 did them both in, we had several hard freezes for the first time in our twenty years here. Luckily the pear and the lemon are self-propagating and we now have scions that have come up from the roots. I will replant them in better places come January.

No livestock of any kind in our small town, the only thing we can't do anything about are the grackles and the squirrels, the whole blamed town is a wildlife refuge.

germination rate on the seeds I had ordered. Since we are planning on moving back to East Texas next year we may not plant a spring garden. I'm hoping to find a place somewhere around Livingston, TX that has about a half to one acre that we can afford and then start my orchard and gardens all over again. Livingston is about an hour drive from where our descendants, all eighteen of them, live. Close enough to visit but not so close they will drop the great grands off for us to baby sit. Devious minds are old minds.

[Dan L]

I never ordered anything from pine tree, just the first seed catalog. I purchased seeds from Baker Street heirloom seed company. I too had a poor germination rate. I believe many of these seed companies buy seeds from a common source. I tend to have good rates with Johnny Seeds. Johnny Seeds does not have that wide variety of heirlooms. I still have not gotten into seed saving for veggies. I seed save for my annual flowers.

My little yorkie is great mouser, almost like a cat. The Ospreys do not seem to bother him.

Many communities now allow Hens to be raised. Especially in suburban areas. No roosters but most certainly egg laying hens. Chickens are really super easy to take care of. Convert a garden shed. Punch a hole in the garage. If you do no need to mow the back yard.