Update

I have been working everyday with some crazy long hours getting ready for farm day. I do my regular days work then I work on my intern project afterward. Let's start with farm day. We do two farm days a year with one in the spring and one in the fall. Basically we do tours, there's a petting zoo, booths that people sell stuff at, etc. My job was the petting zoo of course. I just needed to make sure kids didn't kill animals. I also did a milking demo every hour. I talked for two hay ride tours. It was a fun day but a lot of work went into it. Now I'm vegging out for two days doing a Dexter marathon. I watch an episode then I go do some work.

My ducks are doing well. They are a week and five days old now. They are getting bigger and bigger. I just changed all their bedding and they are super happy quackers.

Now for the very exciting part of the farm for me. I started an intern project that is completely my own with the help of a man named Jeff Sharpe. I got connected with this guy through Neil Miller, the executive director of the farm. Jeff is a mushroom grower and is looking to start a fish farm. I am really interested in aquaculture farming so Neil had me come to a meeting with Jeff and since then we now have a complete system set up outside the dorm. Jeff and I built it all besides the tank itself.

So as you can see, there's the tank below that holds the fish and then on top is my plant bed that hold water. So, water is pumped from the tank up into the top tub that is a filter. It goes through lava rock and into the next filter and then travels down that white pvc pipe into the plant bed and the water falls through four tubes back into the tank. Fish wast is ammonia and when it goes through the lava rock, by some chemical reaction, turns it into nitrate which is plant food. The plants clean the water for the fish. I planted it today. It has cilantro, dill, basil, red basil, lettuce, salad burnet, swiss chard, celery lettuce and a few leaks. It is going to be really awesome. We should have tilapia in it by the end of the week. 

I had twin girl baby goats born on Monday. I had to take them from their mom right away because she has CAE and I can't even let her lick her babies. They ended up becoming really sick. I gave them two shots each of vitamin B and vitamin A & D. Then I gave them probios and sulmet orally. I've been giving the probios and sulmet every day for five days. They are doing really well now. They are both eating a healthy amount now and no more dirty squirties. Makes me feel great that they are doing so well.

My family was here last weekend and it was a blast. They got here Saturday. We went to the Dr. Pepper museum in town then to a restaurant called Buzzard Billies. It is built hanging over the river and when you go on the deck there are 50 or so turtles swimming around and the biggest catfish I've ever seen in my life.

Then we sat around for a cook out at the farm. Grandpa played some of his songs and played guitar with another guy on the farm. We had a pretty long day on Sunday. I made breakfast for the kids of our fresh eggs and goat sausage. They really liked the goat. I went up to check on the goats because I got a phone call about a sick baby goat. I went up and Olive was laying in the pen and looked like she was in a lot of pain and in respiratory distress. Her stomach was sloshy to the touch and she couldn't move her limbs or control her head. She died in my arms with the family watching. It was awful. Come to find out she had floppy kid syndrome. After that traumatic experience we all went to church together.

We ate at the famous Whataburger after that and then me and the kids hung out on the farm. Later me and my family did the afternoon milking chore. It was awesome to watch the kids be so excited about learning and to watch my grandparents milk goats. At one point Noah was doing the udder wash and the goat grunted at him and he said, "This is uncomfortable for me too." HAHA! Even Taylor jumped right in. All three of them did really well at milking and all gained a rhythm by the time they were finished. They loved it! It felt great to share something with my family that I'm so passionate about. I love farm life and to see Taylor, Noah, and Jenna be excited about it was so phenomenal.

Then we went to a birthday party for a girl on the farm. Lots of junk food! They left the next morning after the kids helped with morning bottle feeding and milking again. They couldn't get enough. The whole family even tasted fresh warm goat's milk, even Grandma! She is hard to convince to try new things.  I said goodbye to them very quickly and had tears streaming down my face as the drove away. I miss them all so much already. I do however get to see a face from home on Wednesday. Olivia will be here and I'm super excited to see a familiar face.

Another thing I did last week that was new for me. I butchered a goat. Matt held it and I just cut its neck and blood sprayed everywhere. It was really quick. Then we hung it up and skinned it and removed the guts, keeping some of the organs. Jonathon took the skins to make stuff with. We could have also kept the fat to make soap but no one had time to do it. It was a really hard experience and I can't believe I killed a goat. I learned a lot. The picture is of Matt Hess, education director, sawing through bone on the first goat that was killed.

 Well, It will be another exciting week. I'm going with the boys to pick up the pigs for the farm on Wednesday. I should have the fish in the tank before next week. Lots to do and work on. I've got a long list of things to get done. Did I mention we had camels at farm day? I had to give a few nice pics so I don't leave you with that gross one. Until next time.