Twin Oaks Farm - Dec 20, 2009

Monday Dec. 14, 2009 - Today was warmer but still cool, overcast and gray all day. The big activity for today is to move the square where the chicken and duck coups are located. That means we have to leave the birds in their coups while we take down the portable electric fence, set up the fence posts in the new locations then disconnect all the automatic watering devices to all the coups and move the coups and all the watering hoses. Then we reconnect everything and run the wire around the new fence and then let the birds out. Like a lot of things on the farm it's a simple enough task but it takes the two of us about two hours to complete. I should take some pictures of the old squares so you can see how the chicken fertilizer helps the pasture. There are 8' x 12' rectangles of green, green grass in the pasture of brown winter grass, and in the summer when the grass is growing so much faster it will be about a foot tall, so it's definitely worth it. The next task for the day is to pick mandarin. There is some kind of wild critter visiting the mandarin trees, probably at night and eating too much of the fruit, so Renee has decided to pick the crop clean. Today we will pick two of the four trees complete of their fruit for preserves, the other two trees will wait until later in the week and that fruit will be sold at the market. After picking the two trees clean we spend the rest of the day in the commercial kitchen peeling and cooking the fruit, this is the priority for the day and so today's eggs and those from the weekend have to wait. In the late morning we notice the walk-in fridge is acting up again and make the call to the AC repairman. Renee tells them she wants to process chicken this Thursday and she really needs the thing to be reliable. This time it's a different technician, the company is actually two brothers that took over from the father and this one is the namesake of the company. He dives into it and takes the freezer door off the hinge so he can get in and out easily while he is isolating the refrigerant leak. It takes him a couple of hours and he even takes the time to clean the door hinge so it works better, noticing also that the nylon bushing in the bottom hinge is mushroomed and probably needs to be replaced to get the door to close with less effort. Hopefully this is the permanent fix for the thing.

Tuesday Dec. 15, 2009 - This morning is warmer and it's raining. All day long we get a on and off drizzling, just enough to keep things wet and slippery. During the morning feeding we move all the coups forward by one length to new grass, the coups will remain there for a day or two and then we'll move them again. For the rest of the day Renee has to go to Panama City to get canning and labeling supplies and a new propane bottle from Home Depot. There's a boat load of eggs in the walk-in fridge so the mp3 player is a must. Before starting I get it all loaded up with the usual news and interviews to get me through the day. From around 10:00 to 5:00 I'm in the kitchen looking out the window at the chickens, an incredible seven hours at the sink in the commercial kitchen cleaning three buckets of duck and four buckets of chicken eggs, taking a break every two hours or so for lunch or a cup of tea. I can feel it in my back but the aches are getting smaller and you'll be happy to know that the pounds are dropping off. Two weeks ago I went to the storage unit and dug out some old pants that were down a size and now they're already starting to feel loose. That's the real good news.

Wednesday Dec. 16, - 2009 In the morning the weather is slightly overcast and cold, but the sun comes out mid morning and it turns into a really nice day. Today we have to get ready for processing 61 broiler hens tomorrow. Step one is to move the broilers from the pasture up to the side yard next to the commercial kitchen. In preparation I clean the tarp we use beneath the coup and Renee uses the riding lawnmower to move a small coup into position. Then she spreads the tarp out inside the coup and I pick up the corners so she can get it into final position. This is one of the really small coups, no laying house or stooping rail, it's really light weight, in fact in a high wind it could be a kite. The chickens aren't fed after 6:00 pm the night before and the tarp is to prevent them from scratching the grass and feeding on insects, this insures an empty gizzard. With the coup ready the task now is to move the hens around ten at a time using the modified plastic storage container. It's just a plastic box with a snap on lid, but the lid has two large square holes cut out of it. We place the hens into the box and then put a perforated cloth over the top so they can't see out and get all worked into a panic, then put the lid on top and snap it into place. Place the box in the trailer behind the riding lawnmower and transport the hens from the pasture to the side yard and make sure they have adequate water for the next 24 hours. Next is to get out all the processing equipment from the barn and set it up on the sidewalk next to the commercial kitchen. If you want more details about this you can read a older post from day 5 describing the various workstations for this process. All the equipment is out from the barn and set up, we have a partial bottle of propane and the new full one, the only thing left is to move the stainless steel tables from the kitchen to the sidewalk and then setup the 10' x 10' tent over them. We use two tables this time because we will have a total of five people working which is one more than the first time. Next is to clean some organic lemons and oranges that Renee bought by the pound for her preserves but is going to sell at a markup. Each piece of fruit has to be cleaned with a small plastic brush the size of a large toothbrush, like the size for a cow or horse. The bristles of the brush get into the pores of the fruit and clean out all the dust and dirt which makes for a very cosmetically appealing piece of fruit, then they are hand dried and placed in plastic containers for display. Item last for the day is the evening feeding and then clean the chicken eggs to keep ahead of things.

Thursday Dec. 17, 2009 - Cold morning and gray all day with the threat of rain but no rain. Today will be a record setting day, we will process 61 chickens with the help of five people. Paula and Renee will take the hens from the coup and slay them in the cones, then dip them in the hot water pot one at a time until four of them are ready to be placed in the de-feathering machine. Then Paula will cut off the heads and feet and place them under running water in the outdoor sink on the deck near the kitchen. The three eviscerators, Tony, Mary and Ann will then take the birds one at a time and remove the hearts, livers and gizzards and then put the remaining guts in a single bucket so they can be spread over the compost pile later. The third person doing eviscerating makes a big difference, it really speeds things along and we finish up the last bird around 1:30, then break for lunch. It's only appropriate that we should have chicken for lunch today, with black beans over white rice and more boiled vegetables. Before lunch Mary tells us she is getting the last of her processing equipment from the shipper this week and will be ready to process her first group of birds on Sunday and asks if we can help her out. Both Renee and I agree to meet her at her farm in Tallahassee on Sunday morning at 9:00. After lunch the cleanup effort starts, everything has to be cleaned with warm soapy water and then sanitized with chlorine solution, then put away in the garage or barn. This takes the rest of the day and I'm happy to say that it's easy to put away the processing equipment in the new streamlined barn, CONTROL is slowly overtaking KAOS. After the evening feeding I clean the days chicken eggs because tomorrow will be spent getting ready for the farmers market on Saturday and we need to stay ahead of the game as much as we can. Dinner is leftovers from lunch.

Friday Dec. 18, 2009 - Today the weather is still cold but with a drizzling rain added just to make things exciting in a boring kind of way. I take care of the morning feeding while Renee gets more preserves ready. The next task for me is to pick about half the remaining mandarin crop and clean them for the market. Now we have to start getting the van ready but there are two garbage cans of compost from the Hilton. Renee picked these up on Tuesday when she was in Panama City to get supplies and they have been in the van since then, getting very ripe if you know what I mean. So I get the riding lawnmower w/ trailer, a pitchfork and a shovel, then load the compost into the trailer and head out to the compost pile in a light drizzling rain. Yuck, this weather is terrible, I mean it really sucks and it's cold to boot! Spreading the compost doesn't take hardly any time at all but then cleaning the garbage cans thoroughly well in the rain is a really choice activity but it has to be done because the restaurant wants their cans back and we want more composting material ... oh how the world turns. I feel like the postman, delivery come rain or shine but in my case it's "must be cleaned". The clean cans are loaded into the van first, up near the front behind the drivers seat so the tent/awning can go in next and then two portable tables behind the passenger seat towards the rear. Directly behind the passenger seat, through the side doors will be all the preserves and fresh fruit. From the rear doors all the igloo coolers go in one at a time on top of the two tables. When it's finished the van is just about filled to capacity and it's packed nice and tight so nothing really moves around in transit. With that done I'm just about ready to leave for Tallahassee and then I remember I have to pack my things since I'm going to be off for Christmas for the next two weeks. Back in my room I start to look around at all the stuff I have brought out to the farm, two bags of clothes, a full book bag that I haven't had time to even think about and my laptop with all it's accessories. Ok I think, about a half hour to pack and then I remember Renee asked me to clean my bathroom because she will have company over the holiday. So there's another 45 minutes. Finally around 7:00 I'm on the road.

Sunday Dec. 20, 2009 - This morning is very cold, when I get to my truck the dew from last night has frozen on the windshield ... burrr ... this brings back memories of cold Indiana winters when I was in high school. But those memories include snow on the ground and I'm glad I don't have to deal with any of that! Mary of OrchardPond Organics (here's the link http://www.orchardpondorganics.com )is processing her first batch of chickens and I agreed to come out at 9:00 to help out. Her farm is on the outskirts of Tallahassee and it takes about fifteen minutes to get there. On arrival I see that Renee is already there, her and Mary are setting up a large hot water heating tub to dunk the chickens prior to being de-feathered. This tub is about 30 inches square and about 24 inches tall which is a lot larger than the 5 gallon pot we used at Renee's, plus it has a monitoring system built in to keep the water temperature at 150 degrees and it comes with an accessory that allows us to dunk four hens at a time which just happens to be the number the de-feathering machine will hold, and guess what, they are made by the same company. Hmmm, note to self, this looks like a good combination. Other than that one piece of equipment the setup is the same. Also, Mary has a large three compartment sink in the middle of the yard that she uses to clean veggies and there are two stainless steel tables set up, one off of each side, for the evicserating and then behind the sink are five pails with ice water and a table for labeling the birds once they have been bagged and weighed. A nice orderly setup, things should go pretty smooth. After another half hour the water temperature is ready and more volunteers have shown up to help. There's Mary and Renee, myself, Mina and Lydia who work for Mary, Jenny, an intern from Minnesota and Dick who is a friend. This is quite a work force except for one thing, no one else except Mary, Renee and myself have any experience, so first there has to be some quick training. The first batch of four birds come out of the defeathering drum and Renee does a demo on each of them. She explains what she is going to do and then starts the process and before finishing hands the bird off to one of the volunteers who then ask questions while they finish it up. After the second batch of four the wheels are rolling. In a few short hours we are finished with all the birds. After a short break for coffee and bread we start the cleanup phase and I jump straight to one of the nastiest jobs because I know I'm going to end up there in the end anyway so why not just start there and skip all the little stuff. The slaying station, or throat cutting station is the messiest if the messy. It consists of the eight stainless steel cones, their stand and the plastic three segment bucket below that catches all the blood. One of the other volunteers had cleaned all the cones while we were having coffee but then had to leave for another engagement, so only the stand and the bucket are left. I think the girls won't want to deal with this so I just go for it. I round up some warm soapy water from Jenny the intern and use an abrasive backed sponge to get it all spic-n-span clean, it takes about 30 minutes for both items. Then Mina shows up in an electric golf cart and we load up the equipment and take it all to the storage area. At this point all the big stuff is put away and I see that only Mary and Mina are left and they are putting hoses away and other odd chores. I offer to stay if they have other heavy work and Mary says that's ok and thanks me for helping out, then offers me my choice of the birds in the fridge. I comment something about one of my sacred tenets in life being to never turn down free food and that something in the four pound area would work just great for me. While I'm selecting my future dinner we have a short conversation about how to keep in touch through her website so if I'm able to I can help her out the next time she's ready to process. Ten minutes later my boots are in the back of my truck, tomorrow's dinner is on the passenger seat and I'm on the way home.

I'm taking a Christmas break from interning but I'll be back after the New Year. Soon after Jan. 1 Renee is going to order new broiler chicks so this will bring the entire chicken experience full circle, I don't want to miss that!

Merry Christmas everyone!

Twin Oaks Farm - Dec 12, 2009

Thursday Dec. 10, 2009 - This morning is cold and gray but the heavy weather has cleared out, around mid morning the clouds break up and the rest of the day is nice, cool and sunny. The first new task after breakfast is to spread another layer of compost material. Since last weeks processing we have been storing the chicken remains and the veggie clippings from the kitchen have been accumulating, plus we have the peelings from all the mandarin and about two gallons of chicken guano. All need to be added to the compost pile. I pile everything into the trailer of the riding lawnmower, grab two pitch forks and a shovel (just one shovel Richard) and we head out to the compost piles. Since we don't have that much material to add we will just work with the larger of the piles. When we arrive I notice that the pile has shrunk, the decomposition has resulted in the pile shrinking a good 6 inches ... where does it all go I think to myself? We remove the plastic cover and uncover what looks like just a pile of wet leaves which I think is normal since we have been getting so much rain lately. A closer look reveals some mold in one area and a hole with a small burrow next to it. Some small creature has been visiting the pile for some reason, perhaps to eat or to keep warm down within the pile, but they are long gone at this point. We spread out all the various material over the pile, again we don't have that much and it doesn't take long, then replace the cover and move on.
I fill out the remainder of the morning by cleaning eggs, then the noon feeding and we are ready for lunch. All morning Renee has been thawing out large amounts of frozen fruit to make preserves, peach, blueberries, fig, pear and of course we have the mandarin. For the rest of the afternoon she will be busy working inside while I clean out all the buckets and pails that had been holding the chicken remains and other compost material. All the containers need to be cleaned thoroughly with warm soapy water and then sanitized with a 2% chlorine solution, yuck I think, more cleaning, but at least the sun is out to keep me somewhat warm. After a couple of hours everything is cleaned and put away. Now it's 3:00 and time for the afternoon feeding. We had been feeding in the evening at 5:00 but this is right at sunset and the birds stop eating when the sun goes down, so we have moved up the afternoon feeding from 5:00 to 3:00 in an attempt to give them more daylight to eat. Hopefully this will result in heavier broilers and more eggs from the layers. I also collect the chicken eggs for the day and clean them when I get back to the kitchen, we want to get ahead of the game as much as possible because Friday is usually rushed to get everything done and get the van set up for the market on Saturday. Around 5:30 Renee notices that the commercial fridge in the garage isn't keeping temperature so I go outside and stand near the compressor to see what is happening. Sure enough the compressor comes on for about ten seconds and then goes off for about 20 seconds and keeps repeating this cycle continuously. She calls the AC repair company and they are tied up on some emergency for the night and agree to come by in the morning to take a look. Renee moves all the chicken from that fridge to other freezers in the house. I'm thinking this is a big deal but she doesn't seem very worried. I ask her why she even uses the big one since we only have about half of it full at any given time and a couple of good energy star domestic fridges would result in a huge savings in electricity. She agrees but says the problem is a domestic fridge won't hold a temperature down to 34 degrees, that they are only good for around 40 degrees and the difference is very important when keeping the chickens fresh without actually freezing them. I'm scratching my head thinking I should look into this but she assures me she has considered it in depth and if it was possible she would have done it already. Dinner is vegetable soup and a frittata with left over veggies from the other night and duck eggs.

Friday Dec. 11, 2009 - Overnight I peek out the window and see there's not a cloud in the sky, stars everywhere, but when I wake up in the morning the clouds have returned and again it's overall gray and very cold. Like, is this Florida? I feel somewhat closer to the arctic circle than I need to be but I can see all the green trees, so apparently the arctic circle has come to Florida. After breakfast we do the morning feeding and then move each of the coups to their new positions on fresh pasture which will be good until Monday when we move the square. The rest of the day is easy and indoors. Renee has canned an incredible amount of preserves and is behind on the labels, plus she has a special feature for the holidays. She has a simple folded gift tag with the Twin Oaks Farm logo and inside it shows Santa pulling a little sleigh. A cute little extra that she hopes her clients will love. My job is to cut out the printed tags with a cutting knife, fold and then punch a hole in the upper left corner so she can tie each one to a jar of preserves. So that's how I fill my morning and afternoon on top of the feedings. Around 10:00 the AC repairman shows up and takes a quick look at the cooler. It turns out this is a recurring problem in the refrigerant lines connecting the compressor to the evaporator, there's a small pinhole size leak or crack or something .. somewhere .. and ultimately the copper lines will have to be replaced, but that will take down the refrigerator for a day or so which requires the stars to align in a certain way which is yet to happen. The work around is to recharge the system with refrigerant and get it back in service for a couple more weeks or months and work on getting those stars to align. Ten minutes later the fridge is back in service. After lunch I just have to load the van with all the stuff needed for the farmers market so in the morning all Renee has to do is load up the coolers and head out. Short day. After everything is set I'm loaded up and on my way to Tallahassee.

Twin Oaks Farm - Dec 9, 2009

Tuesday Dec. 8, 2009 - The same modified routine this morning, straight away get up and take care of the morning feeding and then clean the duck eggs and then have breakfast. After a shower and playing on the internet for a while I finish off cleaning last nights chicken eggs and settle in on some reading material about organic gardening, a magazine of that title to be specific. The weather was nice in the morning, blue skies and temperature right on the border, too cool to be called warm and too warm to be called cool, just very nice. But around noon the clouds roll in and it starts raining a light drizzle, just enough to keep everything wet and turn off outdoor activities for a while. So I go through and clean up both kitchens, nothing major just organizing, except the domestic kitchen which had a big pile of dishes accumulating on the counter, which I had added to by the way. Renee gets back around 3:00 and her Explorer is filled to the brim with supplies and new kitchen utensils, etc, etc. The rain has stopped but could return any minute so we get everything unloaded while we have the chance and then I take care of the evening feeding and chicken egg collection. See what I mean about the egg work being "never done". Renee tells me about her weekend while we are having our dinner of assorted vegetables in a mild curry sauce over brown rice, which is very good. The usual cleanup and I'm off to bed by 7:30.

Wednesday Dec. 9, 2009 - This morning the weather situation has made a considerable change, the temperature is much warmer, so warm that it feels like a spring day and the wind has picked up. Renee gets a phone call from her friend Mary who had helped us with the chicken processing a few weeks back, a Tornado touched down a couple of miles from her farm near Tallahassee and we hear from the tv morning news there is a tornado watch for our area. During the morning feeding it starts to rain, but not anything heavy, just a drizzling. It breaks up after about an hour and I move on to my next task which is to clean 8 coolers that Renee uses to transport the various products to the market. She has five large igloos that have a hinged top and then three normal size that have a removable top. They all need to be scrubbed with warm soapy water, especially the large ones since they are white overall and are starting to show signs of wear. I take my time and do a thorough job which takes about fifteen minutes per cooler, what the plastic scrub brush doesn't get I use a kitchen scrub pad and then rinse with the hose .... they all look brand new to me! After finishing I'm completely soaked from the tops of my boots to my neck and my fingers are all wrinkled. Luckily it's time for the noon feeding and then I change into some clean, dry clothes before sitting down for lunch. Renee is busy in the commercial kitchen all day making preserves and apparently doesn't need any help, or isn't asking for any, so I move on to the barn to make some more progress on the reorganization. I want to move all the plastic fencing material out and re-stack a pile of cardboard that is in the way of the riding lawnmower. There isn't enough room to keep things semi organized and keep the plastic fencing in the barn so we have decided to use another storage shed which is behind the barn. So, the first new sub-task to my new barn-organizing-task is to clean out the small storage shed. I open the large double doors and I'm greeted with the same cluttered mess that used to live in the barn. Crap everywhere. Particle board signs that have been left in the rain, painted trim boards, unpainted trim boards, hardibacker pieces that are too small to have a function, a small piece of greenboard, some of this and that and all of it just thrown in a big pile just far enough inside the shed to allow the doors to close. Everything must come out so I can put it all back in a more organized way. About a third of the way into it I start to move the particle board signs, there are five or six of them and they are about four feet square and piled one on top of another. I pick up the first one and roaches go running in every direction, then the next board and it's the same thing. Under each board is a little village and all together the roaches have themselves a megatropolis going. Where are those chickens when you need them anyway? After everything is back in I have about 50% of the floor area freed up for the plastic fencing, which isn't going to take nearly that much room. The plastic fencing comes in pieces about four feet high by about six feet long and each one has been zip tied to one of the plastic posts for the portable electric fence, some of them three or four segments long. Then they were rolled up and set aside. So, one by one I carry them to the small storage shed and finally get things opened up so I can re-arrange the pile of cardboard against the wall and out of the way of the riding lawnmower. I look at the final arrangement and I think that it was a lot of work for a small reward, but it does open up more floor space and it will make things easier when we are moving the processing equipment in and out next Thursday. I guess I can count that as a gain. I see the sun is getting low on the horizon but I have about an hour to kill before it will be time for the evening feeding so I get my camera and take some pictures of the property. I haven't figured out how to post pictures on this blog so I'll post them on my facebook page with the others. Tonight's dinner is veggies and then chicken gizzards cooked in a burgandy wine sauce, Mmmmm. Then the usual after dinner clean up and I'm off to bed.

Twin Oaks Farm - Dec 8, 2009

Is there anyone out there? If you want to see a picture then post a comment and tell me what you want to see.

Twin Oaks Farm - Dec 7, 2009

Sunday Dec 6, 2009 - I arrive back at the farm around noon, Renee had fed the chickens before leaving that morning but she didn't let them out of their coups so my first order of business is the noon feeding of the broilers and then let the ducks and the layers out. Then catch up on the egg cleaning and before I know it the time has slipped by and it's time for the evening feeding and collection of the chicken eggs, boy time flies when you're listening to financial interviews and reports on your mp3 player while cleaning duck eggs, lol . Everytime I pass by the jars in the family room I wonder how long it's going to take to get them all upstairs. I'm thinking I should jump in and get a batch done tonight, make a dent in the whole process and ..... naaaahhh, it's 6:30 and I'm headed upstairs to play on the internet. I get upstairs and sign on to facebook and what do you know, I find a friend from Cali online to chat with, I end up squirreling away three hours or so chatting with bjh about financial stuff and organics etc, while writing the blog for the previous two days. It's freezing cold outside and Renee doesn't like to use the heating system so I grab an extra comforter off the bed in the guest room and hit the sack at 10:30.
Monday Dec 7, 2009 - I wake up very rested, the light outside is diffused through the overcast and is a neutral overall gray. I had reset my alarm from the usual 6:15 to 7:00 but looking at the cloud cover I can't determine an approximate time .... and since the cat is away the mice will play so I roll over and fade back out. I make it back to REM but the alarm pulls me back, it couldn't have been too long but it was worth it anyway. Since Renee is not here to fix breakfast I decide to change my morning routine slightly, skip the shower and go directly to the morning feeding and get it out of the way, then back to the house for breakfast. Afterwards I make a big dent in the jar mission. I use a large plastic storage bin to carry 13 boxes at a time up the stairs and down the hall into the storage room. This goes on for about an hour, I'm dripping with sweat and can feel my back starting to ache in a new way so I start to think about ending this first phase and then whamo, I stumble on the stairs at the landing near the second floor level, no damage to the jars and no pulled muscles or anything like that but that decides it, break time. I think it's justifiable, I've moved about 40% of the boxes and there's really no rush as long as it's done by the time she returns. I go to the kitchen and decide to fix a cup of tea, then go upstairs to cool down and check emails before heading off for the morning shower. Ahhh, that's better, after the shower I feel like a new man as I head off to the commercial kitchen to the oldest activity ever discovered by modern or ancient farming .... cleaning eggs. I have this mornings and yesterdays duck egg plus two buckets of chicken eggs from the last two days. I finish the duck egg and then proceed down to the pasture for the noon feeding, then back to it and finish up the two buckets of chicken eggs. After I had left on Friday night to go back to Tallahassee, Renee had kept working late to finish canning and labeling the preserves for Saturdays farmers market, then got up early to load up and get to that market, then picked up the compost material from the Hilton on her way back, then did the evening feeding and egg collection and then packed for her trip to Miami on Sunday. She is getting stretched six ways to Sunday to keep on top of it all and naturally there's no time for clean up, all over the house and commercial kitchen there are little work stations set up where she did this part over here and the labels over there and the boxing over here, etc, etc. Her event horizon is about as long as her right arm. So after cleaning the eggs I straighten up the commercial kitchen and make it presentable. Renee did mention that the commercial kitchen is due for inspection by the USDA, so we need to keep things tidy. A peek out the window and it looks like dusk in about another hour so I head out for the evening feeding and chicken egg collection, then back inside to knock out the remaining jars. An hour later it's around 7:45 and the jar mission is finished, my back is fine but feels a little stiff in a new kind of way .... call it cross training. I have another cup of cold tea and raid the fridge of leftovers for dinner and then I'm off for my evening shower.

Twin Oaks Farm - Dec 6, 2009

Thursday Dec 3, 2009 - We processed the 22 hens that got a reprieve the last time. It was a lot easier this time, we set up quicker and once things got rolling everyone knew what to do, we started around 8:00 and were finished around 12:00 but the cleanup took another couple of hours. Even that was easier since I already know where everything goes and since the barn has been about halfway cleaned out it's easier to get the equipment stored again. The extra time was worth it, all the hens were larger than usual in size. After all that excitement it was back to usual, cleaning eggs in the commercial kitchen. On top of that, we are all geared up for making preserves, Renee has frozen fruit for the fig and blueberry and we picked and peeled a ton of Mandarin, we just need the jars from New Jersey. We were expecting them to be ready next week but one phone call later and we learn they are ready at the freight forwarding service in Dothan. We finish up the day and then over dinner Renee asks if I can come back on Sunday to watch the place until Tuesday because she has some business in Miami on Monday. No big deal, so I agree.
Friday Dec 4, 2009 - Since the rain earlier in the week it has been getting and staying colder, like in the 30s cold. So today I add to my usual attire and put on a long sleeve shirt over my two tee shirts and head down for breakfast. I make another change in my usual routine by putting on my old tennis shoes and wear them while working in the commercial kitchen. Then I forget to change to my rubber boots when I go down for the morning feeding. Today must be bad Karma day or something, while I'm finishing up the feeding in the layer hens coup I notice that I'm holding the blue bucket, this is the broiler feed bucket. My head starts to spin like some kind of spherical motorized Abacus, whirrrrr as I look at the feed in all three feeders and I contemplate putting the feed back into the bucket and then going over to the broilers coup and doing the same thing so I can fix my mistake. The little mephisto pops up on my right shoulder and tells me to forget about it, one feeding isn't going to do anything and since I'm down here by myself no one but me (and the chickens maybe) is going to know. The little angel dude doesn't even show up for this one. As I'm exiting the chicken coup Renee is right there and the first words out of her mouth are "Why are you coming out of the layer coup with a blue feed bucket", so I explain to her how I made all these changes to my daily routine and point to my now dirty tennis shoes and then explain how my brain only works on the "management by plan" method and the changes just screwed up my whole mental process, then I assure her that I know how to feed the chickens and this was just a funky screwup in a chain of funky screwups. She rolls her eyes and starts to move on to the next task while saying something about maybe I should take notes or something, as if the whole feed thing is too much for me. I kind of like the idea of taking notes, it takes the work out of remembering things but no way am I going to let her know I'm thinking that way. We walk over to move the coups and then I grab the bucket of duck eggs and walk back to the commercial kitchen to make preparations for putting the preserves in the jars. I guess this is called canning, even though it's a different kind of container and it's a commercial operation rather than home style. After cleaning the eggs I open up the van and remove the large trash cans used to transport the compost material from the Hilton resort. I load up the two five gallon gas cans for the lawnmower and place some cinder blocks around them to keep them from rolling around while driving and I'm off to Dothan, Alabama. I'm all smiles as I go down the driveway, another drive through BBQ heaven. I'm not even three miles away, not even to Esto, not even to the Alabama state line and I notice a little place on a corner lot, DJ's BBQ and I scratch my head and wonder, "How did I miss this place the last time?". Must have been focusing too much on the drive and not enough on the scenery, I make a mental note to get some cash from the ATM machine when I fill up at the BP station on the way back. The drive is nice as usual and it seems to take less time, the routine is starting to settle in. There are 4704 jars on the pallet, they are boxed 12 to a box in 392 boxes and piled up 87 inches tall on the pallet. The guys at the freight service are great as usual, I get some help and we remove about 1/3 of them before the forklift driver can load the remaining jars and pallet through the rear doors. Sign the paperwork and I'm off and running. On the way back I stop at DJ's and order a BBQ beef sandwhich and while I'm at the counter a real cutie about my age comes out from the kitchen and I catch a glimpse of her tanned flat tummy as she is turning to approach the cash register. She notices my glance and smiles and then I look her in the eye and we have a little conversation about being from here and there .... well, this is the family hour so I'll just end that and let you know I'm thinking this really is heaven. I get back to the farm and unload all 392 frikin boxes from the driveway to the family room for the time being, knowing they have to go upstairs and into a storage room above the commercial kitchen. The final destination couldn't be further from where they will be used, but that's not my concern right now, I just want to get them unloaded so I can take a shower and get on the road to Tallahassee.

Twin Oaks Farm - Dec 2, 2009

On Monday around noon the weather changed from blue skies to cold, overcast and gray, then it started to rain around 3:00. Tuesday morning the weather is clear but it is chillingly cold, below 30 degrees. After the morning feeding we spend most of the day indoors peeling Mandarin and preparing to make preserves and in the middle of the day Renee decides that since we are all set up it is a good idea to capitalize on this oppurtunity and she picks another 54 pounds of Mandarin. She makes other preserves such as Blueberry and Peach but she has to buy the fruit from an organic grower and that cuts into her profit margin, so it makes perfect sense to me to maximize the take on the Mandarin. The jar issue is all cleared up and they are on the way from New Jersey and on top of that Renee shopped around for the shipping and reduced the cost from around $500 to $285 and we still get to pick it up from her freight forwarding agent in Dothan, Alabama. That will be next week and I'm already looking forward to it. All day in the commercial kitchen it's the same routine over and over. We peel the outer paper thin layer off the fruit and set it aside in plastic bowls. Then by hand we finish peeling off the white middle layer of the peel and pull off as much of the white stuff as possible, does that stuff have a name? Then Renee slices the fruit in half to let the juice out and puts it all in a large pot over the stove. At first I thought she was going to cook it down, but no, she just warms it to "almost too hot to touch" and then gives me the pot. I'm set up next to the stove at a stainless steel table with a hand operated rotary device that is a combination press and strainer. As I turn the handle a archimedes disk pushes the juice and pulp through a strainer built into the bottom of the bowl. I load it up with 9 one cup ladles worth and then start turning the handle, immediately the mix starts reducing down and down until I have to stop and use a spatula to push everything to the bottom of the bowl and then press it again and again. It's surprising to me how much pulp we can get out of the stuff, at the end the useless white stuff is very dry and easy to remove from the bowl. Each pot has 5 or 6 batches for the strainer and there's three pots, plus another two cartons of Mandarin just in from the orchard .... gonna be here for a while. In the afternoon it starts to rain again, this time heavier than the previous day. By the time I finish the evening feeding it's turning into a torrential downpour, when I get back to the house we're back to peeling for another couple of hours. Around 7:00 we stop for dinner of veggie soup, then brown rice and turnips with greens fried in olive oil and akula (sp) salad greens. Afterwords we clean out a freezer to make room for the days production and do a mild clean up in the commercial kitchen just to the utensils directly involved in the pulp removal so it will be easier in the morning to do the complete clean up. Off to bed around 9:00 pm. The weather at this point has turned up another notch or two, there is high wind and rain and the temperature has come up some. The cable tv and the internet connection are through a satellite connection and both are down so I read for about an hour and then give in to the seductions from the pillows. All night there are thunderstorms, high wind and a driving rain. There's a small tree outside my bedroom window always brushing the vinyl siding on the outer wall and sometimes the window itself, it's annoying and keeps me from falling into a deep sleep and then at some point the power goes down for a few seconds, just enough to notice that it happens. Around 2:00 am the wind dies down and I'm off to blessed slumber.
On Wednesday morning it's still raining and windy but the wind is somewhat calmer. The first order of business for the day is to give the commercial kitchen a thorough cleaning, from the top down and then mop the floor. A secondary benefit is to give the weather a chance to clear up before we head down for the morning feeding. Around nine o’clock we head down and after getting through the gate notice some hens clustered together around 15 feet from the back of the large broiler coup. My first thought is that somehow they got out, like a door came open or something like that. But then I notice that the grass next to the coup is dry and then we see a dead chicken directly next to the coup and another stuck under the rail and not moving, but I can see that she is still breathing. A gust of wind had come up and lifted and pushed the coup a good 5 feet or so and trapped the poor hen like the wicked witch of the east under the rail of the coup. The dry grass is a give away that this had happened just a few minutes before we arrived and when Renee picks up the dead bird it is still warm so she takes it up to the house and processes it right away. One by one I round up the others, chasing chickens in the rain with my new yellow rain jacket that feels more like a plastic bag than anything else. After all the escapees are rounded up I get on with the normal feeding. In all of the coups the chicken feeders are hanging from the roof with a thin cord which is tied to the metal handle on the top of the feeder, like a bucket handle. The driving rain has gotten under the tarps and then water ran down the cord and into the feed, turning the feed into a wet oatmeal type solution. This has kept the feeder from working properly, and the result is the birds had nothing to eat this morning. Plus, all the birds look a little wet, so the driving rain has gotten into their little apartment complex. When I get to the large layer hen coup, the one where the majority of the hens prefer to hang out I notice the feeders are bone dry, working properly and completely empty. The ground and the hens are also dry and comfortable looking. No wonder the hens like this place, this is the luxury townhouse of chicken coups. By the time I finish the feeding I'm soaked through and when I get back to the house I notice the power is out. Renee sticks her head out the door and tells me to not open the door of the commercial refrigerator or any of the other appliances. A friend in a neighboring town is opening a bed and breakfast and Renee is preparing to leave the house so we go over a few details about where there are some buckets with rainwater and so on and such and such. Without power there is nothing to do, the house doesn't even have water pressure. After she leaves I go upstairs to change into some dry clothes and start writing today’s blog. After an hour and a half the power returns so I go downstairs and fix my lunch of leftovers, do the house kitchen dishes and the proceed to that usual of all activities, clean eggs in the commercial kitchen, I have the mp3 player all loaded up and ready to go. Most of my body aches are gone except for my back and it’s screaming. I don’t like the idea of covering up the pain with some advil but if the pain isn’t gone by Friday then I’m going to pick some up this weekend. I know the real reason is I’m just out of shape and overweight and since those two things aren’t going to change anytime real soon then …… I clean all the duck eggs from the last two days and then Renee returns from the opening. She has good things to say about the place, it has 16 rooms and the decorations of each room are based on a single country. The whole event went well and she is glad to have made possible connections for future sales. Now we need to start getting set up for chicken processing, the broiler hens that were too small on the last processing day are now nice and plump and she has already arranged some sales via her email chain letters so she has decided to process the remaining 22 hens and sell the remaining ones between now and the next processing date which is Dec 13. The first task is to bring the hens up to the coup next to the commercial kitchen. We do this with the trailer on the riding lawnmower and the special plastic storage bin that has been modified for this purpose. There are only 22 hens so this only takes two trips, nice and easy. While she starts getting the processing gear set up I go down to the pasture for the evening feeding. The weather is breaking up and the sunset is real nice, bright orange with scattered clouds, it would make a good picture and yes I’m working on the whole pictures thing. With all the outdoor activity complete it’s back to the commercial kitchen for more egg cleaning, but my trusty mp3 player will save me once more. Dinner is around 7:00, leftover whole grain rice and the not so lucky fresh broiler chicken that was killed by the flying chicken coup. Renee cooks it with just a sprinkle of salt and pepper and puts some broth in a gravy bowl which I put on the rice. Mmmm, very tasty. After dinner we do the dishes and I’m off to a shower at 8:20. Twelve hour days are turning into a standard event on the farm.

Twin Oaks Farm - Day 9

Another long day on the farm. I left Tallahassee this morning at 6:00 am and drove the 99 miles to the farm arriving at 7:00, allowing for a 1 hour time change. We start right in with the usual morning feeding and duck egg collection and directly afterwords I go straight to egg cleaning. Renee went to the market on Saturday so there are the eggs from Saturday and Sunday in the refrigerator and this mornings duck eggs. Starting at 9:30 am it takes right up to noon to get them all clean, then we sit down for a brief lunch. The new activity for the day is going to be making preserves. A couple of days ago Renee picked three bushels of Mandarin Oranges from the trees on the property and today we are going to peel them and prepare for making preserves. All day today she is back and forth on the phone between the jar sales people and some Florida state official, since she is operating a farm and making food for sale she is exempt from the sales tax on the jars but she has to get this through to both the jar sales person and the state official. While waiting for her to finish up that conversation I decide to start peeling the fruit. When she is finally off the phone and walks into the commercial kitchen she see's what I'm doing and tells me I have it all wrong. She picks up a veggie peeler and shows me how she just wants the very outside skin of the orange peel, not the white part, just a paper thin layer of the outer skin of the orange. This is where the oil is that will somehow be used to make the preserves. So we peel about 75% of the oranges and then set aside the peelings. She runs them through a food processor and turns them into a wet paste and places it all in ziploc baggies for storage in the fridge until we need them later. Then we proceed to remove the remaining peel from the meat of the oranges and put them in buckets for use later on the compost pile. The meat of the oranges then get sliced in half so they start to drain the juice and then placed in two large pots over the stove to be cooked down. The commercial kitchen smells like one giant mandarin orange and while I'm cleaning up I find two oranges that escaped the peeling process, so I quickly peel and consume, mmmmm they taste great after those few hours of being tempted by all the odor. Finally at 7:00 pm we stop for the day and Renee prepares a dinner of leftover mashed potatoes from her Thanksgiving dinner and some chicken with mushroom sauce gravy but sans the mushrooms. The dinner is great and afterwards she moves on to the office to finish up some important paperwork and I put the table dishes in the dishwasher and then wash the big pots and pans by hand. At 8:30 I'm heading up the stairs for a shower, another long day on the farm.

Twin Oaks Farm - Day 7 & 8

Tuesday, Nov 24, Day 7 - Same old morning routine, breakfast of three scrambled duck eggs, toast and some tea, I dumped the coffee idea due to the acid reflux reaction which by the way is completely gone except when I drink coffee .... did I mention that? Today we have more clean up to complete from Sundays processing. The heavy pieces of equipment are still in the yard next to the commercial kitchen and we have to get them back in the barn for storage. First we take care of the feeding which is rapidly turning into dull routine, but is also taking less and less time and collect the duck eggs which is showing some improvement. For the last two mornings we have been getting 25 eggs from the 26 female ducks, up from 24. Hopefully this will keep improving to 26/26 which will mean 100% efficiency out of the ducks and maybe that good karma will manifest into their neighbors the chickens. Recently we had 42 eggs out of the 100 or so laying hens, which is not a good showing .... gotta figure out what the problem is with that light coup!! Too bad there isn't a way to monitor each hen to see how things are going, some kind of implantable chip or something ... hey I know, the government could send out a record keeper that can follow the chickens, one man for each chicken to see what the hens are up to all day! Bingo, the unemployment problem would be fixed, just convince the Chinese to loan us the money to pay the guys ....
After the feeding is finished Renee has to go in town to the post office and assures me she will be right back, then we can proceed with putting the heavy stuff away in the barn. A recent image of the barn pops into my head, as barns go I imagine this one is on the small size, about the size of a skinny two car garage with a large double door on the front, but size isn't the problem. I remember taking a brief look inside when I first arrived and then each morning when I get the riding lawnmower to carry all the feed down to the pastures, but it's like my memory isn't working properly. I can remember the lawnmower at the front, but then the rest of the image fades into black, like the rest of the barn just fades away into some kind of black hole, but I do remember thinking in my head that it needs to be cleaned out. Since Renee hasn't returned from the post office I decide to jump right in, but first I go to the bed of my truck and retrieve my special tool, my large push broom from my storage unit, yeah, compared to that whimpy kitchen broom this will make short work of the sweeping part of this task. The joys of life I suppose. I proceed to the barn where the doors have partially closed, open them up wide and look around near the door for a lite switch and shazaam, there is light. The place is totally cluttered, not a super mess but every square foot of the floor is covered with empty cardboard boxes, old plastic fences probably from some old chicken fencing idea, lumber and pvc piping laid out on the floor in the way, a pallet just laying there in the way, another pallet with a single bag of mulch, a bag of wood chips used for the chicken house where they lay their eggs, a little bit of this and some of that but all pilled in together, and it looks like she forgot it's all here. The poor woman is overloaded like you can not imagine .... Ok I think, this won't be too bad, I don't have to clean out the whole thing, I just want to make life a little easier to get the heavy equipment in and out. The first thing I decide is that a big, awkward, loose pile of cardboard boxes is going to stay where it is, and since I've made that decision then lots of other stuff can go on top of it. About half way into it Renee appears and explains that she arrived at the post office before they were open and decided to just wait it out, she is pleased with my undertaking and asks me, "There is lite out here? Where is the lite switch" ........ 30 minutes later I have perhaps 40% of the total floor area uncluttered and all the stuff piled into semi organized groups, cool, now I can sweep the floor and get on with storing the processing equipment. After everything is put away it's time to move on to the compost piles. When she went to the seaside farmers market on Saturday she stopped at the restaurant in the Hilton resort and picked up 5 large trash cans of compost material, which consists of leftover fruits and veggies, the peelings, the part of the pineapple nobody wants, etc etc. This stuff is gold to an organic gardener/farmer and it's free if you take the time and effort to pick it up, kind of like biodiesel which is always in the back of my mind. So we gather up the required handtools, two pitchforks, two shovels, a yardbroom for raking leaves and take them to the compost pile area at the back of the property behind the barn, then one at a time I drive the riding lawnmower over to the van and Renee dumps the cans into the trailer. Back at the compost pile Renee comments that the pile we started building last week has "decomposed" and has shrunk in size about 4 - 6 inches, my untrained eye roams over the pile and I come up with "if you say so" as I can really not tell a difference. We remove the cardboard over the top and set it all aside and then take the pitchforks and start spreading the "veggie mix" over the entire length of the 7' pile then move to the adjacent dysfunctional smaller compost pile which smells just terrible and is infested with bugs and ants, and spread that material over the top of the fresh veggies. We do this with all the material from the resort and alternating with the bad compost then she sprinkles some lime and we top it off with one more layer. Renee decides she doesn't like using the cardboard, it holds in too much moisture and asks me what I think we should use. I recommend some material I came across in the barn, it's built like a tarp but is woven in an open manner to allow it too breath, so she marches off to retrieve it while I finish using the flat nose shovel to scoop out the last of the veggie mix fluid from the bottom of the trailer. We get that pile covered and she decides to do the same to a large compost pile that was started some time before I arrived. This pile is enclosed in a funky white plastic fence which is meant to keep the chickens out and is covered in cardboard that has been decomposing in the sunlight and rain etc. She hands me the cardboard one piece at time and as we get down to the second layer we see ants roaming around, little red ants that look to me just like little black ants, just red instead. She warns me about their presence while handing me the cardboard and I have to lift it up and over the fence and while doing that the ants roam down my arm to beneath my tee shirt. I'm thinking this is not a big deal you know, little ants that are red instead of black, what's the difference?? Well, the difference is how the little things BITE, so now I'm throwing the cardboard down and trying to sweep all of them off of me and considering ripping of my shirts to make sure, but alas I get them all. Now I have about a dozen of these little bumps, like a mosquito bite but smaller, harder and redder and I think they are going to be with me for a while. So we get the composting work finished and now I have to clean up all these white trash cans really nice because they are going to be near a kitchen at a Hilton resort and Renee has had complaints before because her interns didn't get them clean enough, so I'm sure to do a good job. After that all the plastic bowls, pails and buckets used to store the guts, feathers, the blood and whatever else need to be cleaned once and then a second time with a chlorine solution to get them sanitized and then stored for the next run. While I'm doing that Renee is in the yard working in the chicken coup that we had placed the tarp under, she is scooping up all the chicken guano and putting it in a large bucket about 30 inches in diameter, very smelly but this is another form of gold at an organic farm, chicken poop is actually something that can be sold to gardeners/farmers because it is a natural heavenly fertilizer. Instantly in my head I start thinking about a way to make a coup with a floor that would make it easy to collect the poop .... I'll have to put some time into this when possible, there has to be an easy way to come up with a workable solution, so I'm thinking. It's about 3:00 in the afternoon and all the outdoor activity for the day, other than the evening feeding which is done just before sunset, is complete, now it's time to go inside and can you guess the activity waiting for me .... you got it, clean eggs. The mp3 player is making a big difference, the time goes by much smoother and I don't feel the ache in my back as badly, more on that later. I finish up all the mornings duck eggs, this evenings chicken eggs and two small buckets of duck eggs that were being stored in the commercial refrigerator in the garage. Talk about an energy pig, this industrial fridge is mounted directly on the concrete floor and when I put my hand on the outside surface it feels like 40 degrees or so .... can you imagine the energy needed to keep that thing cold in the heat of the summer? Yikes, now I'm curious to see the electric bill for the entire operation but not sure I want that kind of shock, after all I'm still dealing with the physical shock to my legs, arms, back etc. Eggs are finished, it's around 6:30 and time for dinner. Tonight is a delicious mushroom pie and some tea from this morning. If you're thinking about the recipe for the mushroom pie then make a mental note, I'll post it as soon as I can ask her after the Thanksgiving break. Off to a long hot shower and some blissful sleep by 10:30.

Wednesday, Nov 25, Day 8 - Half day today, so we just feed the birds and ducks without letting them out since Renee goes into Tallahassee for a farmers market held in the backyard of the Foreign Legion post at Lake Ella Park. The park and lake are an old camping ground with old brick cabins that have been converted into business's such as a bike shop, kite sales, that kind of thing. It's a pretty nice setting, sort of perfect for a farmers market. Bobbie and Fred Golden of Golden Acres Ranch also sell their lamb and goat meat here and Mary who helped with the processing on Sunday sells her organic produce as well. I first met Renee when I was helping Bobbie take some livestock to the processor in Esto, a small town north of where Renee lives. We stopped by and visited on the way back out of town and Renee mentioned an organization called WWOOF, which stands for worldwide opportunities in organic farming, their website is http://wwww.wwoofusa.org , then we met again when she came to the Lake Ella event at the beginning of the month. After reading all the wwoof entries for Florida and seeing that most farms expect about 30-35 hours per week from an intern I thought I had an idea what I was getting into and then at Lake Ella I asked her what she expected and she said 15 hours per day 8 days per week, so I thought she was joking ..... and technically she was because it's been around 10 - 12 hours per day for 5 days a week, so now we can all have a good laugh, hahaha. Anyway, I'm learning left and right and getting in shape plus I see the effort she is putting into making this place work and I want to help her get it all off the ground if I can and of course she is grateful for the help. The other night we talked about the Christmas schedule and she's cool with me taking whatever I need to get up to North Carolina and back so I kind of made a commitment to be there into the new year. By then I should be in better shape and down more pounds ... right now I'm sure I'm feeling better, I'm just not feeling it yet, my poor body aches everywhere ... let's take a survey from the bottom up, the ball of my left foot feels tender as if I bruised it, both achilles tendons are aching, my calve muscles squeek a little, the tops of the fronts of my thighs scream when I squat like on the throne or to pick up something off the floor, knees seem ok and lower back seems ok but my shoulder tops and middle and upper back between the shoulder blades have been screaming since I unloaded all the feed, and get this, cleaning the eggs is pretty simple, you just stand there and place egg in left hand, sprinkle with baking soda and then spray with white vinegar then roll the egg around in the palm of your hand until clean, but my back is on fire at times when I do this. In all everything is ok, but I'm being cautious and on the lookout for trouble when it comes to my lower back, being very careful there and taking no chances. I feel like I've been moving constantly for a week and a half and boy am I glad for the four day break for Thanksgiving.


Happy Thanksgiving Everyone

Twin Oaks Farm - Day 6

Today was move day. Since the debacle with the hay guy has been resolved and the hay has been bailed we have access to the rest of the pastures at long last. Renee uses a portable electric fence that uses plastic posts that have a large metal stake molded into the bottom, you just put it where you want it and push it in with your foot and then there are clips along the side that hold the wire. Long story short tonight because I'm dead tired. We moved the fence and then moved the chicken and duck coups, get this, if you let the chickens and the ducks out of their coups and then move the coup, then that night they will go back to the old position looking for their home even though the coup is only 100 feet from the old location, so we have to move the coups with the animals inside which was kind of tricky. Then move all the hoses for the automatic watering in each coup and set up the new fence. It doesn't sound like much but it took us a couple of hours to get it done. Then we do the old standby activity, the activity that you just finished but need to do again today and then again tomorrow, we clean the eggs. Eggs from the weekend, from last week when we were busy getting ready for the weekend, eggs from who knows when ...... eggs out my butt. If you haven't noticed, I get tired of this part of farm life. Today around noon Renee leaves to deliver eggs and broilers to people and restaurants on her email list, while she is gone I get to do whaaaaaaat??? You guessed it. I get my mp3 player out of the truck and download some financial news interviews and reports and listen to them while cleaning eggs, it works pretty good .... gives my mind something to do other than feel the aching in my back and legs. Around dusk I do the evening feeding and collect the chicken eggs that have been laid today and then back to you know what ....
I don't know what time it was when Renee gets back (see how well that mp3 player idea is working?) but she cooks up some dinner including a really nice broccoli and couliflower dish with some kind of white sauce, all in a large casserole dish and then baked. I compliment her 2 or 3 times during dinner and she is very gracious, but then when we are finished she asks me to do the dishes because she has a lot to do before Thanksgiving. See how much I compliment her cooking next time .... if it's that good then yes yes yes on the compliments and I'll be glad to do the dishes. Maybe I should get a copy of "The Joy of Cooking", then I could just point to the page and ask her, "can you make that?" ..... I'll clean your eggs really really good if you make it!!

Think it will work?

Twin Oaks Farm - Day 5

After a brief break on Saturday I make it back to the farm on Sunday morning at 8:00 am, right on schedule. The other helpers are Mary from the Lake Ella farmers market crowd and Paula who helps out now and then and is part of the "invisible work force", out of all of us, including Renee, Paula probably has forgotten more about chickens than we all will ever know. I take my stuff upstairs to my room and then change into my "expendable clothing" which are a pair of black jeans that already have a hole forming near the left pocket in front, a tee shirt and then over that an old, old tee shirt that should have been recycled into a shop rag a year ago ... I new I'd find a better use for it. Also I brought my new rubber boots so I can walk through any mess mother nature throws at me, as long as it's not deeper than 18". Today, mother nature is going to have a field day. The goal is to process approximately 50 broiler chickens. There are two types of chicken here at the farm, hens that lay eggs which are called "layers" and then there's hens and roosters that are called broilers which are raised for the meat. There are about 100 layers which are kept in two large coups, and for some unexplainable reason these chickens gather together 30 in one coup and 70 in the other. The coups are nearly identical, it's baffling in an interesting kind of way, I wonder why they do that. Anyway, then there are about 100 broilers, 50 of which are 11 weeks old and are ready for processing, the other 50 are younger and will be ready on December 13. There are also 26 ducks which are kept in a large coup. All the specialized equipment is set up in the back yard off the rear door to the commercial kitchen in a kinda, sorta assembly line. There are basically four stations set up with an operation specific for each. First the chickens come out of the coup and each into a canister which is held on a rack that will hold 8, but at first we are going to work in batches of 4 until we all get comfortable with our specific tasks. Each canister is a skinny cone made of stainless steel with a bevel on each end, the large end is around 8 inches in diameter and the small end is around 2 inches in diameter, they hang on the rack small side down. Paula grabs the first chicken by the feet and places her headfirst into the canister so her head is sticking out of the small end, then takes three more and places them likewise in the other canisters. Directly below the canisters is a large black plastic bucket about four feet in diameter and separated into three compartments. Renee kills the chickens in what she calls the "kosher method", she takes the hen by the neck in a pinching fashion, holding by the muscles and bone in the neck with one hand and then pulls the throat and main artery away from the muscle and bone with the other hand, then takes a sharp knife and slits the hens throat. Instantly blood starts dripping down the remaining part of the neck and head and then into one of the compartments in the black bucket. Naturally the hen is startled and starts kicking and squawking madly, but the large end of the canister contains all the jerky movement and prevents the meat from getting bruised or damaged. The next station is a two step process, the first is a large 5 gallon pot of water with a little bit of soap over a single portable propane burner which we have to keep at precisely 150 degrees F, Renee takes the hen by the feet and fully dunks her 25 times until the feathers are completely soaked. The hot water and soap solution heats the skin and makes it softer so the feathers are easier to pull out. Then the hen goes into a machine that will "de-feather" the entire bird. This machine looks like a shallow drum and has a matrix of plastic fingers around the wall and on a round platform on the floor of the drum. The drum revolves around the platform and they turn in opposite directions while a sprinkler system keeps everything nice and wet. After all four hens of our trial batch are in the drum Renee turns on the water for the sprinkler and then throws the main power switch ... there is an instant shit storm as all four hens start tumbling and bouncing around like acrobats in a circus and while they are doing that the little plastic fingers are removing all the feathers which the sprinkler system washes down under the round platform to an exit door on the side of the base under the drum, right into one of those square plastic milk boxes, all nice and neat. After less than 30 seconds all four hens are stripped down to the skin except for a half dozen tail feathers and a few on the ends of each wing. I am completely amazed, my eyes are jumping out of their sockets and I keep mumbling for all to hear, "no way", "no way" but the smile on my face is a mile wide. Plucking feathers from a chicken was something I thought you did while watching all 4 episodes of the Star Wars movies back to back, like a pain in the ass extraordinaire, but this machine gets the job done painlessly in 30 seconds, four hens at a time no less. Somewhere on the face of this earth there's an engineer kicking back in the captains chair of a mega yacht, contemplating all the thoughts that led to the design that led to the manufacturing of the "de-feathering drum" that led to the mega yacht. My faith in humanity is restored and all those comments about "the best thing since sliced bread" can now be replaced by the new standard, "the best thing since an automatic defeathering drum". I'm starting to think that this whole chicken processing thing is going to be easy. Well, back to reality. After the drum comes to a stop Renee picks up all four hens by the feet and takes them to Paula who is at the sink on the wood deck near the door to the commercial kitchen. Paula removes any feathers that the machine missed (our engineer is working on a new version) and cuts off the heads and the feet and then rinses away all the feather particles. Enter Tony and Mary who have the role of "eviscerators". On the sidewalk that leads to the rear door of the commercial kitchen there is a stainless steel table set up under a large 10'x10' collapsible awning. Renee takes the first hen and demonstrates to us how to cut the hen open and separate the guts from the cavity of the body, I won't bother you with the details. Of all the organs from the bird we just want the livers, the heart and the gizzard which is another name for the stomach. As we process (what a nice word) the birds these organs go into separate bowls which are each within another larger bowl that is holding ice water. Renee is going to use the livers for a patee over Thanksgiving and I ask her to keep a small amount so I can sample it and she kind of giggles and explains that her guests who are coming up from Miami for the holiday are coming for the patee and fat chance on any being left over. I totally understand and instantly remember that we are going to be processing more chickens on Dec 13th, yeah that's right baby, a second chance on some fresh organic chicken liver patee, french style ... I'll keep you posted. Note to self, get the recipe and preparation directions for Jason. I'm gonna have to break down and buy some kitchen utensils, they have operating instructions don't they? After processing the birds are rinsed a final time and then placed in one of three large buckets of ice water directly inside the door to the commercial kitchen, Renee will pick them up from here, weigh and package each one and then store them in the refrigerator in the garage. Six hours later we are finished and have some hens leftover that Renee didn't feel are large enough to process, they can wait until the next time when they will be larger and will get more $$. After lunch we start to clean up and put each piece of equipment back in the barn and I volunteer to take the remaining broilers back down to the pasture. Renee says yes, good and tells me to do the afternoon feeding first and to pick up the eggs. Back in the feed cage I'm getting everything ready, she has a color coded system that matches the color of the feed bucket with the color of the label on the specific type of feed, there's broiler feed with a blue label and it goes in a oval blue bucket and there's layer feed with a red label that goes in a oval red bucket and the ducks eat layer feed that goes in a green bucket and when the new broiler chicks arrive they get a special mix of young broiler feed that go in two small round red buckets. It's a good system that must be intern proof but it's got my head spinning like a top at the moment, I've been gone for one day and I have to stop and think about what I'm going put where and how much because we just processed some hens so naturally they don't need to be fed anymore and now the young broilers aren't so young anymore and there's the ducks ..... shit, this can get complicated, I have to stop what I'm doing, come to a complete stop and scratch my head to get it all figured out, then I grab a bucket for the eggs and head out. After I get it all into the trailer of the riding lawnmower and I'm on the way down to the pasture I realize that today is Sunday and that Renee was gone all day on Saturday to the farmers market in Panama City and we have been busy all day today, which means the ducks have not been out of their coup for two days .... that's about 24 eggs per day .... plus the chickens as well have been laying eggs for the last two days without any collection ..... shit, I only grabbed one bucket. STOP, Oooops, turn around and go back for another bucket. I finally get down to the pasture and my head is still foggy from the feed bucket feed type equation so I decide to feed the ducks first because that feed is in the green bucket and there is only one of them, so it's impossible to screw it up, I think. I walk over to the duck coup and the ducks are going nuts because they hear me coming, they must be hungry or they want the hell out of that coup, or both. I open the door and I'm shocked, there are eggs everywhere, all over the floor of the coup and some of them are buried about half way in an ocean of duck poop and all their feed containers are bone dry empty, there's not a single blade of grass standing, it's all been matted down under a solid layer about an inch thick of you know what ..... I am so glad I'm not wearing those old tennis shoes anymore. But now I realize the gravity of the situation for the poor ducks, they must be beside themselves after being couped up (no pun intended there) for these two days and frankly, I bet they are just plain pissed about having to live on top of this ocean of fertilizer. I think they are having a really bad day and then a twisted smile comes to my face, they are actually having a great day, it's the broilers that had a bad day. Keeping things in perspective sure can help. There's nothing I can do, I can't let them out until tomorrow morning so I feed them and then go back to the trailer for the egg bucket. The image of 48 eggs buried in duck shit has been burned into the receptor of my eyeballs and the image of me standing at the sink in the commercial kitchen cleaning those eggs tomorrow is starting to take shape in my minds eye ..... didn't I just clean a bazillion eggs the other day??? Ah, but wait a minute, these eggs have to be initially field cleaned right now to get this loose layer of crap (another un-intended pun) off them, otherwise it might dry and be that much more difficult to clean tomorrow. And I have to collect two days worth of chicken eggs. After I get it all finished and the feed buckets are back in the feed cage I take the lucky small broilers back to their small coup, they will live to see another day, for a while that is. All done, I'm on the mower on the way to put it away in the barn and I realize that a farm is always open, there are no holidays, no days off, no vacations etc. and this leads me to contemplate the seriousness of the term "everyday" .... I ask myself, do you realize how often e-v-e-r-y-d-a-y is? It has such a ring of permanence to it, and I think in a very simple kind of way that I am so glad to just be a part of it all, e-v-e-r-y-d-a-y.

Twin Oaks Farm - Day 4

Another killer day today. Up at 6:30, slept great getting up only once around 3:00 am and then right back down no problem and then had to get up to the alarm. Friday is the big day, preparation for the Farmers Market in Panama City on Saturday plus preparation for processing around 50 chickens on Sunday. Breakfast is the usual 3 duck eggs scrambled, toast with Twin Oaks jam and no coffee today, but Renee does prepare a hot lemon water that she recommends I have about a half hour before I eat to clean my system, I add honey to that and then have it with breakfast. We start with the usual feeding and duck egg collection and then move one of the spare chicken coups over near the door to the commercial kitchen and place two tarps under the coup to contain the chicken poop from the yard, I guess because it is too close to the commercial kitchen to let it lay on the grass like in the pasture. Then Renee starts cleaning all the material used in the processing while I finish cleaning out the garage and the feed storage, I have to sweep it all out with a small kitchen broom. I ask her if she has a push broom and she says, "A what?". Note to self, pick up push broom from my stuff in the storage unit when I'm in Tallahassee over the weekend. With the garage all swept out I can put all the "stuff" back in a neat orderly manner, not that it will make any difference since the two car garage doesn't have a door, a small detail the original home owner left out, so the dirt and leaves will soon retake the garage. So, yeah I can risk using my own push broom, after all it's my back that will be saved. Around 11:00 Renee calls the freight service in Dothan, Alabama to double check that her feed has arrived, sure enough it's ready so she gets a copy of her insurance paperwork to satisfy any interested uniform type that may disagree with my driving technique and another small piece of paper with the name and addresss of the freight service. Then she gives me a single page of notebook paper that is filled out from top to bottom with written directions to get there and back ....... an alarm and a blaring red warning light go off in the back of my head. Warning, warning, I am about to go 26 some odd miles from the back country of Florida into the back country of Alabama, a place I have never been before, hell, I don't even speak the language and I'm going to go there based on written directions from a little 94.5 pound , no offense to Renee, Swiss woman who, don't get me wrong is a very nice woman who is determined as hell to make this organic farm work ... BUT I barely know her and just the general idea of all these forces, the new area, the written directions which are NOT equal to a map, the van I've never driven .... all this coming into play at one time, one wrong turn and I could totally fuck up my day. So I tell her I want to go upstairs to my laptop and check the directions on Google maps, she assures me that the directions are good and with the look on my face I assure her that I'm not going anywhere until I check the computer map. There's just no comparison between looking at a map to get an idea of the general lay out of the streets and just going into it blind because trust is a good thing. Trust yes, buy also verify. Beyond a few small spelling errors the directions are good so I'm off to get the 2600 or so pounds of feed. I move the "Biohazard free area" sign from the driveway so I can move the van, replace the sign and then settle in for a long drive. First thing is to put the seat all the way back instead of all the way forward and then I reach for the seatbelt and pull it around to buckle in, but the belt seems jammed up like they sometimes get so I pull and tug and nothing changes. I look down next to the seat and I can see where someone had cut the seatbelt where it came out of the spool and then tied the remaining portion in a knot and now the damn thing is way too short for me to use. Ok, no problem I just get out of the seat and buckle it up and sit on the safety device that may save my life under certain situations, but could also prevent me from saving my own life under other certain situations. I'm finally on the way. The drive is really nice, it reminds me of the drive we used to take when we were kids to get to our grand parents house from Indianapolis to Elnora, but this is all two lane county roads, twisting and turning, once your going east then north then east again, but I know I'm ok because the journey is unfolding just the way the map said it would, in my minds eye I can see a little red dot that is the van moving down the road on the map making all the correct turns, I'm so glad I looked at the map. Somewhere along the way I smell a BBQ and images of the perfect BBQ sandwich go through my mind. I'm in Alabama and I'm sure this is BBQ heaven, so I start looking for a place to stop and get a bite ... but I don't come across anything so it will have to wait for some other time. Note to self, the next time I'm in Alabama be sure to take the time for a good BBQ meal. The guys at the freight office are super friendly, I'm in and out in a matter of minutes and on my way back in no time. In my mind the return trip seems to take less time and it reminds me of when we were kids and the ride seemed to take forever and this makes me contemplate how time passes faster as you age, is that actually true or does it just seem that way because the older you get the more stuff you have on your mind and it just feels like time is passing faster. Pretty soon I can no longer ponder these questions of time and space because I'm back at the farm and there's 2600 pounds of feed that I have to carry through that little door into the feed cage one bag at a time .... who designed this damn thing anyway? Note to self, if I ever have to design and build a feed cage lets be sure to put in a frickin huge pair of doors that are machine accessible, i.e. you can back the delivery truck right up to the cage .... and put the feed storage area close to the animals that will be eating it .... seems like common sense to me but I'm just in intern, what do I know. I get most of the feed unloaded and then have to stop so we can move the 50 or so broilers from the pasture to the coup in the yard near the commercial kitchen. Renee has a special large plastic storage container that she has modified for this task, the lid has two large square holes cut out and we use it to put around ten hens at a time and then transport them with the riding lawnmower up to the yard. This takes five trips but it seems like a long time. Then we move the younger broiler hens from their small coup to the larger one and feed all the chickens and ducks before heading back to the house where I finish unloading the feed while Renee prepares the finished eggs for the market. The unloading is finished and I'm pooped but there is one more bucket of chicken eggs and two more small ones of duck eggs that need to be cleaned. We are finally finished and have dinner around 7:45. I know she is processing the chickens this Sunday so I ask if she needs any additional help and sure enough someone has said they can't come so I volunteer to come back early Sunday to help out. Processing 50 chickens, that is going to be a new experience, wear expendable clothing she says ...... shit, this has been one long ass day. I head off to a shower and Renee heads off to the office where she still has some labels to print.

Twin Oaks Farm - Day 3

What a long day today was. Up at the usual time and breakfast of the usual three scrambled duck eggs, bread with TwinOaks own jam and coffee then off to feed the chickens and ducks. The ducks are cool to watch sometimes, they do everything together and sometimes follow one another around in single file like a happy small marching band ... quack quack quack. The property has a pool with a disabled pump and the ducks have reclaimed it as their communal bathtub, every morning they dive in together, dip their heads and shake to distribute the water over their backs, pluck this and that out of their feathers and then climb out and meander over beneath a large oak tree and finish cleaning and grooming themselves to get ready for the day, all together , their sense of community just struck me. Every night all 26 of them go together into their coup and they build a nest out of grass, in the morning there will be around 24 eggs in a single group .... everyday.
My next task is to round up all the empty feed bags and cut off the bottom and then cut them open and lay them out flat. Renee is somehow going to use them in the raised garden. There are lots and lots of bags, I think the last intern was here many months ago and Renee has been overloaded since then trying to drive her one woman show. The two car garage is used as the feed storage and food storage, inside is a commercial walk in refrigerator and then next to that is a small feed storage cage made of chain link fence with a locking small Renee size door that I can barely squeeze myself through, inside is a large pile of empty bags and an ever diminishing pile of full ones. Tomorrow I take the van to Dolton, Alabama to pick up more feed from a freight forwarding center, the special organic feed comes all the way from Virginia. The rest of the garage is used as storage for various "stuff" and the "stuff" has been accumulating for a while, with the bag chore complete my next task is to remove all the "stuff" out onto the driveway for sorting and then stored in it's proper place when Renee returns from the dentist's office. She has been complaining on and off about a tooth ache, made and appointment and then broke it after the pain went away and then called this morning to see if she could go in after all, long story short she came back less one tooth. While she was away I started the next task which is to clean chicken and duck eggs, one stinking egg at a time and there is about a weeks worth of eggs in the commercial fridge, not to mention that the duck eggs are laid on the ground, in the mud and they are a pain in ass to clean. Well, to be honest it's not a pain to clean just one, but it is to clean 24 per day times 3 or 4 days worth .... and that's just the duck eggs. But this has to be done to get ready for the farmers market in Panama City on Saturday. I get one bucket finished before Renee returned from the dentist and then while we are discussing her tooth adventure two farm tractors come up the driveway, it's already very late in the afternoon so these guys must be on overtime. Finally the 20 or so acres of hay are going to be bundled. About a week or so before I came a local farmer was hired to bail the hay, so he first cut it all down and then disappeared to do some other task. Renee has been trying to get this guy to call her back or something to let her know what is up, then yesterday he called and said pretty soon. Finally we will be able to move the portable chicken coups to a new pasture area, the hangup with the hay was forcing us to keep reusing the same square and frankly that area was getting pretty shitty, literally with chicken crap everywhere .... there will be some very green grass in that area in another month or so. After a brief discussion with the two drivers we return to finish the eggs and then have dinner at about 7:40 .... frickin long day.

Twin Oaks Farm - Day 2

Day two on the farm:

Didn't sleep too good last night, got up around 3:45 am and didn't really get back into a deep sleep after that, my head was spinning with ideas about how to make the ultimate perfect portable chicken coup .... spin, spin, spin and then I was in and out of sleep. Got up around 6:00 before the alarm clock went off and eased my sore body out of bed and into the shower, I can't wait until this part gets easier, waking up these tired old muscles is kinda slow and achy. More duck eggs this morning, this time scrambled with toast and more of Renee's great coffee. She has read the blood type diet book and is a firm believer and she is also a type A, this is going to be really good for my diet. When I put creamer in my coffe yesterday she gave me a scolding look and said that I shouldn't have any dairy, so this morning I had my coffee black with some real sugar and the usual acid reflux reaction was much reduced, according to my MD I shouldn't have coffee either, when I come into Tallahassee this weekend I'll be sure to get some goats milk from NewLeaf. As usual we start the day by feeding the chickens and ducks, with two of us this now takes much less time and then we moved on to building an additional compost bin from the pvc pipe we salvaged yesterday. Renee described to me what she was looking for and went inside to work in the commercial kitchen. After a couple of hours the bin is complete, about 4 feet wide and maybe 7 feet long. It's next to another one that is only 4 feet square and the compost in that one wasn't started correctly so the idea is to get this new one started with about four inches of leaves and then sprayed with some organic compost starter fluid that she has prepared in the kitchen, then spread out the existing partially composted pile on top of the leaves. This was ok until we removed the top couple of inches of the existing pile. Ohhhhh, wheeeeww, uhhhhhh an undescribable odor comes out of this compost pile and my appetite is killed for the next week, inside is veggie and fruit remainder cuttings from a restaurant kitchen that have been decomposing slowly and improperly for the last two weeks, what a stinking mess. So we spread that out in the new compost bin and then cover it with a thin layer of dirt, a sprinkling of lime and then more leaves, maybe not in that order. Renee sprinkles the whole thing down on the top of each layer of leaves. Then we go to the back of her van and there are two large white plastic trash cans, each full of more cuttings from the restaurant. These have been in the back of the van for two days wating for the new compost bin to be built, turning into a smelly V8 concoction. I back up the riding mower with a small trailer to the back doors of the van and Renee dumps it all into the trailer and then we are off to spread it on the next layer in the pile, then more leaves and finally we top off the new pile with some cardboard. Glad that's over, kinda messy and smelly but an essential thing to get down, these compost piles should be ready for the garden this spring. We spend the next hour or so cleaning up and putting away tools and organizing the rest of the material we salvaged from the old prototype chicken coup, that part of the garden/yard looks a lot nicer now. Of course we finish the day with a feeding of the chickens and ducks and egg collection. The ducks seem to lay one egg per day per duck pretty consistenly but the chickens are not so consistent. Not only that but the two coups of equal size for the laying hens have 31 in one coup and over 70 in the other ???? I didn't count the chicken eggs but I would estimate the take at around 35 total and about the same for both days.

Tomorrow we will clean eggs in preparation for Saturdays market in Panama City and learn about "double digging" an organic garden bed, specifically the part about the shovel and the boot on my foot coming into harmonious matrimony.

1st day at Twin Oaks Farm

I got out here about 7:30 on Monday night and after getting most of my stuff out of the truck and set up in the bedroom we had dinner, meat loaf from your mothers goat meat, brown rice and salad of fresh veggies that Renee buys at the Lake Ella farmers market ... there might be some trading going on there and then sat around and talked about organic foods and how factory farm raised crops and/or livestock are raised/grown with the aid of modern chemistry and steroids etc and then after they leave the farm what happens on the way to the supermarket, how they are processed and various treatments on the assembly line and into a box/bag and then off to the shelf of the supermarket.
 Went to bed around 10:00 and read for a while, turned in around 11:30.

Renee supplied an alarm clock that receives a radio signal from Fort Collins, Colorado to keep very accurate time, how thoughtful of her, LOL but I just couldn't figure out how to set it up etc. So I set the alarm on my cell phone for 6:30. This morning I woke up to the morning light coming through the bedroom window at 6:10, showered and had breakfast of three duck eggs over easy, toast and some of the best coffee I've ever had. We talked for a while, mostly a continuation of last nights
converstion and then went out to feed the chickens and ducks, moved the coups around with the riding lawn mower. This all took say 2 hours on the outside and then it started to rain so we finished up and put stuff away and went inside for a cup of tea and a short break, some apple pie and more discussion. Then around 2:00 we rounded up some hand tools and proceeded to dis-assemble some of her first prototype chicken coups that were constructed out of pvc pipe, she wants to recover the pipe to make a frame for more compost piles. With the addition of a circular saw the demo work proceeded at quite the accelerated pace, got all the dis-assembly done at around 3:50, put all the tools away and then a short break with some tea. The last activity of the day was to feed the chickens and duck their evening portions and then get them all into their coups for the night. Dinner was white rice, veggies (carrots, turnips?) and black beans with water. Clean up the kitchen and sit down
to watch a movie ..... Friday on the Farm.

More later

Welcome to Tonys Farm Daze blog about my intern experiences

Hey Everyone, Ken showed me how to set up this blog which I'm hoping will make it easier than sending emails and you can write back or ask questions. I can also include photos, so it all sounds pretty exciting and something new.