Charging Beaver

 Something must have happened (probably babies) because our beaver is now angry and guarding the grate that allows the water to flow from our pond here in Woodbine, MD, into the stream below. We would not bother to clean the grate, if we did not know that it would flood the lower pasture and kill the trees along the pond. Beavers are nocturnal, but this one has been out since this morning and Marc found him out there again at noon.

 I told Marc to drop the pitchfork when the beaver came chasing us. Marc was afraid that he would chew the fork up, but he left it when we backed up.

 Above is Marc trying to keep the beaver from following us. I took some absolutely awesome videos of him charging us, but our bandwidth is not good enough for me to upload them.

 This picture and the one of the geese below were taken in between the excitement of the charging beaver. I loved the play of the ripples of water as the animals moved and the reflection of the tree in the water.

Collars, Chantilly and a Frozen Pond

 With the wind howling, a desire to keep my neck warm was the inspiration for a group of felted and knitted collars. The felted ones are fairly quick, but I enjoyed knitting up some of my own yarns. Usually I am so busy spinning to keep the pegs filled that I miss getting to design.
This scarf used 100 yards of fingering weight yarn and 2 yards of a thick and thin crocheted in a random manner as an embellishment.

 I was at the Dulles Expo Center for the Chantilly Sugarloaf show. Gives you an idea of my current colors.

The weather here is definitely winter. I walked the farm this morning to check on the beaver activity. The pond is frozen and animals have been walking across is. Another tree is down, but the grate was clear. It is dreary, so a good day to spend indoors. I decided to have Marc help me unload the truck when he gets home tonight. Don't want to slip and fall on the ice while hauling heavy racks!

Spinning Yarns and Gardening

I am bouncing all around in my color and fiber selections right now. The coiled one is going on my eshop, while the rest will go in the physical shop here in Woodbine, Maryland. I am alternating between listing on my own shop: http://www.uniquedesignsbykathyshop.com and my etsy shop: http://www.uniquedesignsbykathy.etsy.com.

I am not sure whether you can tell what is growing in Watusi's pasture, but it is ragweed. The goats, sheep and alpacas had all been eating around it. My neighbor finally informed me the other day that it is ragweed. Sure enough, I did an Internet search, so I could be sure, and then I was out there mowing it down. It really needs to be tilled under, but then I would not have the grass and other "weeds" that Watusi has been eating. It pulls up fairly easy, so I am weeding a little each time I go out.

This is my real garden. The sunflowers are over 5 feet tall. They tower above me now. My beans, cucumbers and tomatoes are growing in their shade and twining around their stalks -instant trellis. Where the wooden pegs are in the rear of the picture is the last bed that Marc helped me dig. I have peppers, stevia, catnip and corn with a few more sunflowers in that bed.

This is my first cucumber. I have not harvested it yet, since it is so small!

I have some really great neighbors, who started their gardens while I was moving in and doing kid and lamb deliveries. They have been keeping me supplied with different types of squash, peppers, zucchini. Ruth gave me basil and tomato plants. I cut 2.6 pounds of basil off and stripped the leaves this weekend. I dried a quart and used the rest to make and freeze pesto sauce. In two weeks, I will be cutting a bunch more. Gardening is occupying almost as much time as gardening. I am almost ready for chickens. Marc mentioned them when he got back from Tucson last week. Guess he misses them also. We need to figure out where we want to put them, since we don't want to lose them to the dogs.

Shearing in Maryland

I would have thought that there were lots of sheep and goat shearers in Maryland due to all of the farms. I was in for a surprise. There are only 3 listed on the Maryland shearing site and I managed to use all three.

David Todd, the first shearer only does sheep. He is more used to production shearing, where lots of sheep are run through in a hurry. We were expected to already have the next sheep ready, so we had to scramble to get the hooves and CD&T shots done as he sheared. Above, Columbian is being sheared. She did not have a very heavy fleece.

Anne, the second shearer, uses the pole-and-stretch out method of shearing, similar to how alpacas are usually shorn. Ruth, my friend on the left, helped Anne by holding down Ruby (the goat). This method is slower than the other methods, but the cuts are reduced. However, the biggest disadvantage for me was that I had to stay holding heads all day long while sitting on the ground.

Emily Chamberlain was the last shearer. She did a lovely efficient job of shearing the remaining goats. I am scheduling her again and she has me on her calendar for three days in October 26-28. I am doing an fiber festival on October 27 and you are all welcome to come watch her in action. I have already scheduled my spring shearing for the last weekend in March. It is Easter. What better time to do it? Right now she will not shear alpacas. I am trying to talk her into going to the alpacas shearing school and told her that I will give her a scholarship, if she decides to go. She has shorn alacas before. I hope she will again!

Marc is trimming the hooves on Hummer, our seven year old buck. Check out the awesome horns!