Let me just climb up on my soapbox for a minute and remind folks that more people in the world drink goat milk than drink cow milk, and that goats are among the top seven intelligent animals (and that’s counting man!).  Goats can thrive where other milk producing animal can barely subsist, let alone produce milk.  Goat milk is viewed as medicine in many cultures.  There’s no such thing as “just a goat” and any one who believes that should just continue to support their local dairy and landscaping companies rather than take on stewardship of any goat.  *Climbs down off soapbox*

Whether a body is interested in purebred goats, just any crossbred doe to provide milk regardless of her heritage, a couple of goats to keep the weeds down in a horse pasture or even companion animals they have value and should be treated as such.  Purebred goats are usually registered, with their papers, through the breed registry of the breed they are.  Until recently, however, crossbred goats have just gone begging—to the detriment of all goats.

GoatRegistry.com has stepped up to address this.  Any goat can be registered through them, regardless of breed, breeding or purpose.  There are a number of advantages to registering your goats, as pointed out on their website:

• Increases the overall value of your goat(s).
• Quick identification via paper and Internet documentation helps verify proof of ownership.
• A voice for owners of goats as pets, helping to bolster the urban livestock movement.
• Creation of a searchable database which facilitates formation of local clubs and support groups.
• A low cost method to advertise specifically for proponents of pet goats.

In the registry example given at GoatRegistry.com you can see the sort of information requested.  However, if you look at Black Beauty’s registration page , you can also see that if you don’t have or don’t choose to share certain information you don’t have to.  Black Beauty and Checker’s people have chosen to enter their address and phone number; other folks using the registry do not.  Note, please, Black Beauty’s Tattoo, Identification, Marks, Tag Number information entry.  There’s nothing there that could tie that pretty Kinder doe to the questionable NAIS, while at the same time the likelihood of there being a lost or stolen goat of that sex, breed, colouration and with those documented attributes in the vicinity of where Black Beauty lives and the goat in question not being Black Beauty is vanishingly small.

Raising the value of goats in the public—as having a registered animal does—can only be a good thing.  The added benefit of an Internet page that you could link to for identification purposes is more than worth the initial $16.00 for a new registration.  I’d personally love to see every companion goat, crossbred pack goat and livestock auction rescue of questionable parentage have the ability to have their registration printed out and framed to hang on their steward’s wall….right next to whatever certifications their steward has proudly acquired.

Do you have a caprine friend who could benefit from this?  Will you sign them up?

A major advantage of renewable energy is that it’s usually sustainable; what is used is naturally regenerated or can be replaced, and will never run out. More importantly renewable energy produces little or no waste products that may pollute or have harmful effects on the environment.  Also, renewable energy sources are generally not trucked all over the country but rather used in the area were they occur.

A couple of long standing disadvantage of using renewable energy are that it is difficult to generate large quantities of electricity as has been done with the use of fossil fuels, and that most alternative electrical generation produces DC (direct current) instead of the AC (alternating current) that most consumer products are designed to use.  This is addressed by installing an inverter—another cost, and another component that can break down—or by replacing all AC devices with DC devices…not a cheap prospect. Another common problem among alternative energy sources is the reliability of the energy supply, necessitating some sort of electrical storage system. Since it is naturally generated, renewable energy supply tends to rely upon the weather and climate.  Another drawback of alternative energy sources is that it is relatively more expensive to set up the equipment necessary for generating the energy.

Here are the several advantages and disadvantages of alternative energy source by type.

• Solar energy  The sun is a great source of energy, both free and efficient.  With the advances in solar panel efficiency over the last couple of decades, It is possible to maximize the energy given by the sun to replace traditional electricity. But there are limitations, both by region and by specific site; areas at high latitude and places with frequent rains are usually not capable of producing efficient solar energy, nor are heavily wooded homes.
• Wind energy  Wind is also an efficient electricity source.  It is also a very environmentally friendly source of energy since there are no harmful byproducts produced in the process of converting the energy. Location is a very important factor in using wind energy; open areas, high latitudes and coast lines are good places to set up windmills…urban and suburban areas, not so much.  Buildings and trees create turbulence that has a very negative affect on the efficiency of wind turbines.  There are also concerns about birds flying into them.
• Hydroelectric and tidal energy  Both of these energy come from water. Hydroelectric energy can be sourced from dams, but there are also small scale Pelton wheels for domestic use. Tidal energy, on the other hand, uses the natural tides of the ocean.  There are several disadvantages. Putting in dams on any stream or river is not only very expensive, there are scads of reasons that damming is a bad idea, specifically for fish.  It’s been determined that there are only 9 places worldwide that are suitable for siting tidal energy plants. And tidal energy power plants are also said to provide negative effects on the migratory birds and the fishes.
• Biomass  Biomass consists of fermented animal waste, agricultural crops, grains and other natural products. It can be used to produce fuel alcohol to replace gasoline, and methane to replace natural gas.  It maximizes waste materials as an alternative energy source. One drawback is that it that it still produces greenhouse gas; another is the quantities required—and the size of the system to deal with such quantities—to produce sufficient energy products to make it a viable alternative on a small scale.

Choosing an alternative energy source to meet your energy usage needs and thereby getting free of the commercial power grid is a focus that is usually about neck-and-neck with developing food self reliance for people who are interested in becoming more self reliant.  Just about anyone can make some use of solar power, and some of us can go completely solar.  Most of us, if we chose to, could use some form of biomass to augment our energy consumption.  Some of us can utilize wind power, at least to some degree or another.  A few of us are lucky enough to have a year-round creek on our property with enough flow and head that we can put in a small hydroelectic plant—Pelton wheels, while not cheap, are very efficient.

Do you have any alternative energy sources in place now?  Are you looking to install one?  Which one, and why?  What did you take into consideration when you chose the alternative energy source that you did…or will?

Since then, I’ve found another recipe for making ginger beer, although the author refers to it as homemade ginger ale.  It may be fine distinction, and I’m too busy drinking it to worry which it is.  While the directions found at the link above will certainly produce a passable libation, I’ve messed around with it a bit myself and prefer the ingredients I currently use.  By all means, click through to Dr. Fankhauser’s page and use his procedure the first time around…but know that you can make some adustments.

When I make ginger beer, I start with two clean two litre plastic soda bottles.  Using a funnel, I put about 3/4 of a cup of sugar into the bottle.  I’ve been using regular old white sugar, but that’s mostly because I keep forgetting to pick up some demarrara sugar or other interesting sweetener when I’m out and about.  I’ve not yet tried honey with Dr. Fankhauser’s directions, but did so successfully with the ginger beer plant.

Next, I add 1/4 teaspoon champagne yeast.  This swap-out of bread yeast makes a huge difference; the bread yeast, while readily available, gives the ginger beer a very large yeasty taste that I don’t care for.  If you don’t have a home brewer’s shop in your vicinity, it’s readily available via mail order and completely worth the extra effort.  One envelope of champagne yeast will produce at least a half a dozen bottles of ginger beer.

Grated fresh ginger root goes in next…perhaps a quarter of a cup.  One needn’t be too precise, but do be aware that more ginger will increase the activity of the yeast.  I just dump it into the funnel and poke it through with a chop stick.

Lemon juice—two tablespoons from a bottle, or all the juice from one lemon—poured into the funnel helps get the last bits of the grated fresh ginger down the throat of the funnel.  It is optional, but we never leave it out.  I’ve been thinking about trying lime juice on a batch, just for interest’s sake.

Lastly, fill the bottle to within about an inch of the bottom of the neck.  I use bottled water rather than tap water, but I also don’t drink the tap water here…it’s nasty, and I’m hypersensitive to chlorine—which doesn’t do the yeast any favours anyway.

I grip the bottle kind of hard, making a bit of a dent in it with my thumb while I screw the cap on tightly.  Then I leave it in a fairly warm spot in the kitchen for about 24-36 hours.  I check it about every twelve hours to see if the dent is gone and the bottle is “hard” when I grip it; another hint is a little white collar of tiny bubble around the top of the liquid.  You don’t want it to have absolutely “give” when you grip the bottle, as it will continue to build pressure, although much more slowly, after you refrigerate it.

Once the bottle is “hard”, put it in the fridge and leave it there for about three days.  When you take it out, don’t toss it about at all or it will fountain when you open it.  Have something like a tea strainer on hand to pour it through for folks who don’t care for floaties in their drinkables.

It’s not difficult to make your own ginger beer and the result is refreshing and healthy.  Commercial soda pop is expensive and has all sorts of questionable ingredients, but home made soda pop can be good for you.  While ginger beer is a simple place to start, there are other tasty fermented drinks you can make at home that will make you self reliant for yummy summer cold drinks.

Do you know anyone who makes their own soda pop?  Have you ever made your own?  Got a recipe or procedure to share?

Do take this information with a grain of salt; just because the USDA says your zone has changed does not necessarily mean it has appreciably affected your microclimate.  That information is probably best available from your local extension agency; do check with them, they are very helpful folks.  Generally speaking, if there is something that has not performed well in your garden the few years the information on the new climate zone map is not likely to make much difference.

You might also want to take a look at The Old Farmer’s Almanac Outdoor Planting Table .  Don’t forget to select your location if you don’t live in Boston, MA which is the default table.  Ultimately, probably the best way to tell when to plant what is by soil temperature.  A soil thermometer is possibly one of the best garden tools you can pick up cheaply and easily.  I’m personally very fond of Territorial Seed Company , not only for their excellent seeds and seed selection but also because when you click on any given variety of seed you can scroll down, click on “More Information” and read just about every pertinent bit of basic information you could need for that type of vegetable—like this information:

BUSH BEAN CULTURE: Bush beans are one of the most trouble-free garden crops and mature just ahead of pole beans. Beans like warm soil and will not germinate if the soil temperature is below 60°F. Optimum soil temperature range is 65-85°F. You can expect emergence in 8-16 days depending on the variety. In a well worked bed, plant the seeds 2-3 inches apart and 1 inch deep in rows 18-36 inches apart. Thinning is rarely necessary. Beans are relatively light feeders. One cup of our complete fertilizer per 10 row feet will provide adequate nutrition. Excess nitrogen results in excess foliage with poor pod set and delayed maturity. Optimum pH is in the range of 5.5-6.5, mildly acidic. Beans are shallow rooted and can require up to 1/4 inch of water a day during hot weather. Mulch around the roots to help conserve moisture.
DISEASE: Beans are subject to numerous diseases. Avoid wetting the foliage, remove plants at the end of the year, and practice a 4-year crop rotation to prevent potential problems.
INSECTS: Mexican bean beetles and bean weevils can significantly damage young seedlings. To treat, dust them with Rotenone. Optimum soil conditions foster vigorous plants, which can help plant growth outpace insect damage.
HARVEST: Green beans are ready for harvest about 2 weeks after bloom. Pick when the pods are nearly full size and the seeds are still small. Pods at this stage have firm, crispy flesh and are low in fiber content. Keep plants well picked to extend harvest and increase yield. Plant short rows for fresh eating; plant longer rows to have additional beans for canning and freezing. A 20 foot row will feed the average family of 4, unless heavy canning is anticipated.
SEED SPECS: Minimum germination standard: 80%. Usual seed life: 2-3 years. One ounce plants 12-15 row feet, 1/2 pound for 100 row feet; 1/2 pound is 8 ounces. Seed counts are listed in the variety description.

Even a first time gardener can be confident of at least some production just with information like the above.  You can even guesstimate how much seed you need to plant how many feet of that vegetable.  A valuable resource!

I got some edible podded peas planted last week-end; I’ll be planting more peas (regular garden peas this time; Little Marvel) this week, if it will just not snow when I’ve planned to go out.  The new hardiness maps coming out notwithstanding, this feels like a very late spring to me.  Peas, fortunately, prefer cool weather and an early start, and make a great bellwether for the rest of your garden planting.

I’ve also been fondling my seed bank lately, and soon every available flat surface will I’m sure be pressed into service to hold real, honest seed flats—in addition to empty cottage cheese cartons, milk jugs cut into mini-greenhouses and deep styrofoam trays for presprouting.  I’m always hard pressed not to seed in an entire package of tomato seeds, but I know that’s crazy…especially in light of the fact that I have accumulated ten varieties and still only have the balcony space or guerilla gardening for planting options.  Growing tomatoes delights me, even though I don’t care to eat them.

I’m also seeding in my cole crops, specifically the brussel sprouts which need a long growing season.  Swiss chard “Bright Lights” will be pretty on the balcony and good to eat, too; I’ll also start my Pak Choi for early spring greens…takes up little space and is so tasty in stir fry!  In about another six weeks it’ll be time to direct seed the squashes, cucumbers and melons…and I know that time will just fly by.

Have started on your garden?  What do you have planted or planned?  Are you planting enough to put some by?  Are you planning on doing any guerilla gardening with any extra seeds or starts?

The attention drawn by movements like the 100 Mile Diet and Eat The View has been helpful to the cause of raising awareness of what you put in your mouth, making food a more attention-drawing topic worthy of newspaper column inches.  Our First Lady, Michelle Obama, has a focus here too and participated in breaking ground for a kitchen garden at the White House this past week. The Washington Post also ran an editorial on the event , though I think the piece was not necessarily supportive.  The New York Times piece entitled “Is a Food Revolution Now in Season?” is a great deal more in depth and covers many of the pertinent aspects.

While the media is bringing the importance of food to the forefront, some folks feel it is not covering all the important aspects.  The Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund recently put out a press release congratulating Mrs. Obama but also expressing concern for pending legislation.  Food is a complex issue, especially as it is currently handled.

If that seems like an odd statement, I highly recommend that you watch the Robert Kenner film “Food, Inc.” at your ealiest opportunity.

Setting some time aside to read Michal Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dilemma would also be time well spent.  I found it a pretty fast read, myself, and highly recommend it to anyone who is not clear on how the food they eat gets to their plate and what all the implications of that are.

What do you know about the food you eat—whether it’s that burger you picked up at the local fast food joint because were in a hurry, or the Sunday dinner roast you’ve just pulled out of the oven?  Do you think it matters where your food comes from, how it’s grown and how it gets to you…as long as it’s cheap, varied and plentiful?

This hasn’t stopped corporate interests from continuing to try to push the scheme through Congress…and they’re at it again.  There is a limited time for you to respond—please, do feel free to send this post to anyone you can think of!

The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) is seeking public comment on its proposed rule to amend its domestic livestock regulations.  These proposed changes would create greater standardization and uniformity of official numbering systems and eartags used in both animal disease programs and the National Animal Identification System (NAIS).  They would also mandate NAIS premises registration and animal identification for several key animal disease programs.

The proposed rule was published in the January 13, 2009, Federal Register, and can be viewed at http://edocket.access.gpo.gov/2009/E9-353.htm.

Consideration will be given to comments received on or before March 16.  If you wish to submit a comment using the Internet, go to the Federal eRulemaking portal at http://www.regulations.gov/fdmspublic/component/main?main=DocketDetail&d=APHIS-2007-0096.  (Click on the “Add Comments” icon at the far right end of the first line.)

Or, send two copies of postal mail or commercial delivery comments to Docket No. APHIS-2007-0096, Regulatory Analysis and Development, PPD, APHIS, Station 3A-03.8, 4700 River Road, Unit 118, Riverdale, MD 20737-1238.

Comments are posted on the Reglations.gov Web site and may also be reviewed at USDA, Room 1141, South Building, 14th St. and Independence Ave., S.W., Washington, D.C., between 8 a.m. and 4:30 p.m., Monday through Friday, excluding holidays.  To facilitate entry into the comment reading room, please call 202.690.2817.

Courtesy of The Kerr Center for Sustainable Agriculture

People, please….read and comment on OpenCongress, on blogs, on letters to the editor; contact your representatives on federal and state levels.  Print out fliers and put them everywhere—your library, your laudromat, your dentist’s office if you are still affording dental care.   Use this flier to hang at feed stores, food co-ops and farmer’s markets.  Here’s an 18″x24″ small poster which you can put in your window or have laminated and use as a sign.  Educate yourself and others, and do not let this legislation slide through.  There must be a way to meet the concerns without destroying the average citizen’s right to produce their own food.

This is important.

The baby goats are arriving!  Baby goats are rather like dividends of the investment of good animal husbandry.  If you treat your productive friends well and see to their needs, they’ll not only provide you with the best milk you’ll ever drink (or eggs, if your productive friends wear feathers) but also about once a year you’ll find yourself rewarded with a bundle of joy—or six.  Or twelve!

Out at my dearest friend’s place, where my goats are boarded with her goats, spring has definitely sprung.  The day before Christmas, a Nubian doe my friend had purchased in kid a few months ago had triplets; they are Nicholas, Holly and Noel.  On February 20th, my Nubian doe named Shasta had beautiful F1 Kinder triplets.  They’ve been named Adam, Rainer (Rainy, of course!) and Helen (are you seeing a theme here?  LOL!)  At 2:30 a.m. on March 2nd, my friend’s F2 Kinder doe named Cookie had one large single F3 doeling who has been dubbed ButterCookie…and the following evening, on March 3rd, one of my Kinder does had F2 triplets—all doelings!—who have been named Annie, Cassia and Lady.  The birth of ButterCookie is particularly exciting as she is the first kid who was kidded out by a doe that my friend raised from dripping wet, minutes old.  It’s quite a milestone for a goat owner—not terribly different from becoming a grandmother! 

Here’s ButterCookie, making her internet debut being held by my honey when she came to visit us.  She weighed four and a half pounds at birth which is a bit on the large side for a Kinder (you expect about two to four pound kids) but she was a single and single kids tend to be larger, as you might expect.  She is healthy and sprightly, very intelligent and observative, has a good appetite and is already trying to manipulate her environment just as all kids do…it’s their job, you know.

The Christmas kids are now in a moveable outdoor pen which we call The Boarding School, as they are big enough to take the weather.  The bitty ones are in the indoor rearing pen, mostly for the ease of access that situation affords for every two to four hours feedings.  That’s ’round the clock, by the way, for the first 72 hours for healthy kids; then you can start putting them on a schedule of three times a day feedings for the next couple of weeks, and finally just night and morning.  By this week-end, the little ones will be being offered good alfalfa and interesting grain mixtures that include Cheerios and dried fruits, with a bit of goat milk replacer formula dusted over it to entice them and encourage them to identify it as food.

There are still two does yet to kid this spring, within the next three weeks, then one more doe to kid later this summer.  They could have anywhere from one to four kids each…more is possible, but not highly likely.  We do seem to be having a run on triplets this year!  And lots of doelings, which is very nice.  Generally speaking we don’t make any decisions about placing kids until they are six months old, but at this point it’s looking like we’ll want to keep every single one of these doelings.  With three completely unrelated Kinder bucks we’ve a wide enough gene pool choice that we don’t have to worry about close inbreeding; no matter who is whose daddy, there are two other bucks to choose from.  We will grow these girls out for eighteen months before we look at who to breed them with.  Industry standard for breeding standard sized (Nubian, Saanen, Toggenburg, et al) goat does is eight months of age or when they weigh 80 pounds, whichever comes first, but since a doe grows until she is six years old (a buck grows until he’s four, but most of it in the first six to twelve months), we’re just not comfortable breeding them that young.  Yes, we essentially lose a year of breeding, but healthy, well-grown does have healthy babies and we have no reason at all to push it.

I’m glad the weather is finally getting a bit warmer, so the kids can come out and play most days.  Raising baby goats by hand takes quite a bit of attention and time, but it’s worth it.  Bottle raised babies are bonded to humans which makes them sooooo much easier to handle when they are adults.  We have some does that were not bottle raised, and every time we need to medicate them, trim their hooves, take them somewhere, it’s always a negotiation.  The bottle raised goats pretty much just want to know if you have a cookie for them when they’re done, LOL!

We’re quite pleased with the dividends we’ve gotten on our investment.  This “stock market” beats the Dow Jones hands down!

And here’s a gratuitous picture of ButterCookie, just because she’s a treasure.

Perhaps the easiest way to change the basic receipt, as presented last Tuesday, would be to make a sweet egg dough.  When you gather your tools and ingredients to start the bread, pull about a half a dozen eggs out of the fridge and set them on the counter to warm a bit.  Proof your yeast; set your sponge, and when you get to the third step where you turn it into dough, first add all the eggs.  Also add about a half a cup of sugar, honey…some sweetener.  You might throw in a bit more ginger; a tablespoon wouldn’t be too much.  Now, go ahead and mix in the fat and salt as directed before.  You’ll want a little less water as the eggs count towards liquid.  Mix it all up well with your hand, and start adding flour.  Proceed as the original directions indicate.  If you’ll be making small things, you can use the dough after the first rise; if you’ll be making things closer to the shape of a loaf then let it rise twice.  Use this dough to make;

• Cinnamon pull-apart.  Pull small bits of dough off (smaller than a teaspoon), dip in melted butter then in a cinnamon and sugar mixture.  Drop randomly into a well greased pan.  Let rise in pan, bake.  This is a messy procedure, but oh! so tasty!
• Cinnamon rolls.  Take a quantity of the dough (or, all of it if you want a lot of cinnamon rolls!) and roll it out on a clean, floured counter till it is about a quarter of an inch thick, evenly.  Butter the whole thing with soft butter.  Sprinkle heavily with half brown sugar and half white sugar.  Overlay it with cinnamon to taste.  Some folks like raisins in their cinnamon rolls.  Now comes the fun; starting at one long edge, begin rolling it up.  Try to sort of tuck it into itself as you roll, so you get it as tight as you can without stretching it; this helps keep all the goodies from falling to the bottom of the pan while they rise and bake.  Now slice the roll as thick as you want your cinnamon rolls high—remember they will rise, too.  Place cut sides up in a well greased pan with sides not quite touching each other.  Let rise in pan, bake.  Flip them out of the pan as soon as you can manage; if they cool in the pan, the sugars will solidify and you’ll have to prise them out in chunks.  You may drizzle something like honey or corn syrup over them once they are dumped out of the pan if you like yours extra sticky.
• Norwegian brown sugar rolls.  At least, I think that’s what they’re called.  My Dad always called the diapers, so we did too LOL!  Roll out your dough as for cinnamon rolls; butter it well with soft butter.  Cut the dough into approximately 4 inch by 4 inch square.  Put a good scoop of brown sugar in the center of each one…a heaping tablespoon full or so.  Works better if you pack it in some way, like squeezing it into a ball.  Flip the corners of each square into the center, making sure they all over lap each other.  Secure with a toothpick.  Place in greased pan, let rise and bake.  Butter the tops when they come out.  You’ll see why Dad called them diapers when you eat them (I know, that’s fully horrible….LOL!)
• Swedish tea ring.  Roll the dough out as before; butter well with soft butter.  Spread with half white sugar and half brown sugar, a bit less than you’d use for cinnamon rolls.  Spread spices on it—cinnamon, mace, cloves, nutmeg…anything you find good.  Now cover well with diced dried fruit…raisins, golden raisins, currants, diced dried apples, dried cranberries, dried apricots…whatever suites your fancy.  Add a kind of sparse layer of sliced almonds—I prefer sliced as they cook soft, but you may use slivered I suppose.  Lace with honey or corn syrup.  Roll up as for cinnamon rolls.  Now; cut the uneven ends off, and bring them together so you have a doughnut shape.  Pinch the edges on the inside of the doughnut shape together and smooth as well as you can.  Get the beast onto a greased flat baking pan; obviously, a pizza pan would work well here.  With sharp kitchen shears or a very sharp knife, slice the doughnut shape every inch or so—but not all the way through; leave the center intact. Carefully turn or slightly twist each still connected slice so that it lays a bit flat, and shows the tasty goodness in beautiful swirls inside.  Let rise and bake.  Butter well when it comes out of the oven, and sprinkle with white sugar.  Beautiful!  This is a standard feature at our Yule feast every year.

You can also replace a portion of the regular white flour with almost any other flour.  Until you are familiar with how the different flours react and interact with the bread baking process, I would recommend that you don’t replace more than half of the regular flour with some other flour.  Try whole wheat flour first, as it’s very similar to the finely ground regular flour you’re using.  Any time you use a different flour, add it when you make the sponge into dough.  Spelt flour would be another good flour to experiment with.  Spelt is a relative of wheat, but behaves differently in the dough.

One of my favorites is oatmeal bread.  You may be able to find oatmeal flour, but you can also use quick oats or even Gerber Oatmeal baby cereal—a whole box for one batch of bread.  Use nutmeg instead of ginger for a tasty twist.  When you grease the pans, grease them extra well and shake regular rolls oats all over in the pan before you put the loaf in to rise.  You can also add very finely minced hazelnuts for a marvelous tasting bread with a protein boost!

Check your local grocery’s baking aisle and see what flours they carry.  In my local, Bob’s Red Mill is the hot tip and the small bags of interesting flours are just about right for making one batch of bread that is different from plain old white bread.  Remember that gluten, the long chain protein molecule that gives your bread its texture, only comes from wheat.  The farther you get from wheat, the less yeast-bread-like texture you’re going to have…so, if you use bean flour, for instance, you may want to add some straight gluten.  You’re likely to find it in the same area of the baking aisle that you find different flours.

Humans have been baking bread in one form or another for millenia.  You can bet that it didn’t turn out the same every time, so if you create a batch of bread that isn’t what you expected it to be, remember that animals have less educated palates than we do and your dog, chickens and goats will probably love it.  If all else fails, take it down to a public park that has a pond and ducks and spend a contemplative half hour feeding it to them.  Developing self reliance skills like baking your own bread is definitely a learning curve—don’t be afraid to experiment!

The movement in diesel fuel prices has had a strong impact in a variety of industries that makes use of diesel not only in running machinery, but also in transporting goods.  The use of diesel in transportation and energy production underlie a huge number of functions in everyday life.  Nearly all delivery trucks, public transport vehicles like trains, buses, boats, ships and barges, in addition to heavy equipment used in construction and most farming equipment, use engines that run on diesel fuel.  This means that as the prices of diesel fuel soar, the costs for running these vehicles and equipment also increase. This leaves the operators with a choice between narrowing profit margins and passing those costs along to the consumer.  Which of those options they usually pick is left as an exercise for the class.

Anyone who has got a stake in the way diesel prices change or move should at least attempt to understand what drives these fuel prices—and if you drive a petrol-fueled vehicle, eat commercially grown or prepared food or make use of anything made of plastic…that’d be you.  By understanding what drives these movements and how the prices are determined, one is better able to foresee and interpret the various economic indicators that usually point to a time of increases in prices.  In order to determine how fuel prices are derived, it’s important to first look at the costs associated with its production for availability in the retail market.

The first cost to take into consideration is the initial cost of purchasing crude oil.  Crude oil is the primary ingredient required in the production of a variety of petroleum products, including diesel fuel, gasoline, and distillate heating oil.  Crude oil is traded in the international market, which subjects it to the dynamics of international supply and demand. The limited supply of available crude oil from oil-producing countries, and the growing perceived need or demand for energy worldwide is perhaps the most important factor driving crude oil prices.  Global politics are another major factor; although it would seem to make sense that any given country might at least attempt to function on whatever amount of crude it can itself produce and also develop alternative energy options, that’s not usually how it goes.

Next, crude oil enters the process of refining. This is the stage where crude oil is processed into the different forms of fuel and other products it will become, including plastics and, believe it or not, fertilizers. Gasoline and diesel fuel primarily differ in the refining process that is used for it. For some time, better-refined gasoline was more expensive than diesel fuel; however, the costs of processing gasoline were overrun by the price impact of excess demand for diesel fuel. Diesel fuel and distillate heating oil, on the other hand, are processed using much the same refining process. This is the reason the increase in prices in one affects and increases the prices of the other.

Costs of bringing the refined oil to the market—including marketing and distribution—also add material costs and other overhead to diesel fuel prices. Transportation of the various refined oil products, marketing and advertising operations of the oil firms, the manpower necessary to run all these operations in addition to contracting costs all impact the bottom line of the company in order to sell the final refined oil product to the market.  Your friendly local retail gas stations also incur costs for operations, a part of which is also levied on the retail prices of refined oil.

Over and above these production costs, various levels of government levy taxes on oil products; in many places the total of the taxes are equal to or greater than the cost of the actual product. The combination of these wildly variable cost contributors determine the dynamics of diesel fuel prices in the retail market.

So what’s the answer?  Curtailing usage of petroleum products—and I don’t just mean drive less—must be a foregone conclusion.  This doesn’t necessarily mean giving up whole chunks of your lifestyle; it does mean developing an ever increasing awareness of where what you use comes from.  Options that exclude petroleum products are becoming more common—take, for instance, single-use plastic containers which are now available made from corn instead of petrol.  Ultimately, arranging your life so that you don’t use such things at all is probably the best answer; but in the mean time, things like at least window shopping for a high efficiency electric car, asking your local deli if they have or plan to switch to biodegradable containers and choosing biodiesel at every opportunity instead of petroleum diesel is at least on the path of self reliance.

On a day to day basis, how much diesel do you think your lifestyle uses?  How much crude oil in its many forms passed through or took up residence in your life just this week?

Usually your choice is assorted standards or assorted bantams.  That will help some with sorting breeds, as there are some breeds that only come as bantams.  They are called true bantams, and have no standard sized chicken counterpart.  The most likely ones you’d find in a batch of mixed bantams would be silkies and Sebrights , but it’s not impossible that you could have a few Japanese bantams , depending upon which hatchery you ordered from.  I seriously doubt that you’d ever find any Vorwerk bantams , tho!

Assorted standards could be just about anybody.  You can start guess by looking at their heads; only certain breeds have an extra lump on top…mostly Polish, in various coulours though White Crested Black seems to be the most common.  Polish tend to be good layers, so if you have straight run, which means unsexed, chicks you may well want to keep them for the eggs.  The bantam WCB Polish I’ve had from Belt Hatchery were crazy laying machines.  They laid eggs that you would buy in the store as medium size, quite a feat for a bird that size!

Next you would look at their legs.  Are they fuzzy?  How fuzzy?  Brahma babies will have down down the outside of their legs and a bit on the outside toe.  Cochin babies will have furrier legs with the outside toe fairly furry plus some on the middle toe.

After that, you’re about down to the list of possible breeds that the hatchery carries and sorting by colour.  If you’re pretty sure you’ve figured it out, check here for chick photos of many, many breeds and see if the visual lines up.

Keep them warm, fed and watered, and clean and watch them grow!  If you possibly can, take lots of picture to start building your own chick breed photo reference for next year and to share.