Spring Brings New Life...

"Any glimpse into the life of an animal quickens our own and makes it so much the larger and better in every way."

-John Muir

 



Okay, so it isn't spring... Just pretend it is. It might as well be, all of the new life around here is so exciting!

 

 It's been awhile since the last Rabbit Report, so let me catch all of you up. We bred our Rex doe Tauriel on the 27th of December

 

To our mini Rex buck Presley

 



And she is due on the 26th of January.

 

 

Next up, our Californian doe Eden

was, as you know, bred to our Silver Fox buck Spartan

 

on the 7th of December...

 



 She kindled between 9pm on the 6th of January (which is when she was due) and 6am on the 7th of January. She gave birth to seven healthy, sassy, FAT baby bunnies!

 

 

 



They are all black, like Spartan, but one of them seems to be lighter than the rest. They were just counted today due to the cold and we were delighted to find seven very healthy babies in the nest.

 

 



 

Eden is a stupendous mother, and she is definitely a permanent addition to our Rabbit Project!

 



Tauriel, on the other hand, has become rude now that she has been bred (she bites and squeaks when one of us tries to pet her) and she may be sold once her babies are old enough to no longer be on her. The Goodwife said that some rabbits do this, and she had a Blue Rex doe who did the same thing. It is a shame, but we do not want to pass on these traits to our livestock.

 

 Once she is sold I may begin a new project... Which is for another day, and another post... ;)

 

 

 



Tauriel's babies can already be seen rolling around in her tummy...

 



New life is so exciting! Stay tuned for another Rabbit Report!

The Quail Report, Using Quail Eggs and Growing Quail!

So the baby quail are now about 10 days old.  They are growing SO fast it's just amazing.  

Here is a picture of them the day they hatched....

And here they are at about a week.....

They are so funny the way they lay all stretched out.  They truly look like a person laying on their stomach!

And here they are at 10 days old, this morning!  Totally different!

I'm in here catching up on my baking, but The Man is outside building them a quail paradise of their own.  That is where they'll live until we butcher them in about 6 weeks or so.  

In the meantime, as ya'll know we are really enjoying eating the quail eggs. 

This morning we wanted scrambled quail eggs, so I got to try out my new kitchen toy....... 

Quail egg scissors!  These things are so awesome!  

This is a gratuitous picture of my delicious breakfast, scrambled quail eggs, homemade bread with homemade mint jelly and a strip of bacon from our home raised piggies!

But this is a video of how these quail egg scissors work, and they are a blessing and a boon to quail egg users everywhere!

Disclaimer............YES that is really what I sound like...........good grief.....

Till next time....

God Bless!

Pressure Cooker Ribs - Goodwife Style!

Tonight's supper was BBQ spare ribs (from our home raised pigs), parsley potatoes, leftover corn, and deviled quail eggs.  So here we go!

First, season your ribs up your favorite way.  I just used a bit of seasoned salt....

Then heat a dab of lard (home rendered of course) or oil in your pressure cooker pan.....

Then brown your ribs just a dab, not a big deal how much you brown them.  I sometimes even skip this part....

Now add some water to your pan, about half way full....

Now put your lid on your cooker, and turn your burner up until you see steam coming out the top.  Once you've got steam coming out, put your jiggler on.  Then when your jiggler is dancing around, start timing.  You are gonna cook these for 35 minutes....

Meanwhile take you some lovely red potatoes (or any kind of potato will do) wash them off and cut them into chunks...

Add a little salt and cover them with water, and put on the stove to boil until nice and tender..I always add salt when boiling potatoes.  It just doesn't work to add the salt after, as it just sort of sits on top and doesn't bring out the flavor of the potato...

All is cooking away.  Now The Man and I took this opportunity to hop in the shower, while The Youngun kept an eye on things...

After your ribs have been cooking for 35 minutes, you can force cool your cooker by putting it in the sink and running cold water over it.  If you aren't in a hurry you can just take it off the heat and wait for it to cool down on it's own.  WHATEVER you do, DO NOT take the jiggler off until the little "pin thingy" goes down.  If you take it off before it goes down, you'll have an "explosion" of steam come out!

Now you are going to lift your ribs out and put them in a baking dish.  Be careful because they will be so tender they'll fall right apart....

While I was getting stuff all set, The Man wandered into the kitchen with this....

It's very precious and sexy to watch a big strong man cuddle a tiny little quail.....just sayin'...

Ok, back to supper....

Now top those cooked ribs with some sliced onion.  We eat onion in everything, so if you don't like onions, this is for sure optional...

Now slather your favorite bbq sauce over top.  I make my own out of ketchup, Sweet Baby Rays, brown sugar, and chipotle pepper....and stick this in the oven under the broiler.  This will sort of caramelize your sauce and make it nice and sticky on your ribs....

While they are getting nice and sticky in the oven, drain your 'taters, and put in some real butter and dump some parsley in there.  I used dried parsley....and then put a lid on the pan so the butter will melt....

And here is our pan of hard boiled quail eggs.  We need to get those peeled while the ribs are in the oven and the butter is melting in the 'taters.....

Then we'll devil (some folks call these dressed eggs) the eggs.....

And now our ribs are done, all sticky and gooey....

And our butter has melted, so we stirred them all up good....

And now we are ready to eat!!  Yummy, yummy, yummy! 

For every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused if it be received with thanksgiving.  For it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer.

1st Timothy 4:4-5

Until next time.....God Bless!

Did She or Didn't She??

Is this it?  Did it happen?  Did Eden kindle?

 As some of you know, we have baby quail and they are too stinking cute!

(Not so cute I won't relish eating them in 6 or 8 weeks but cute nonetheless).  

We were also waiting on baby rabbits.....

And baby goats.......We are still waiting on baby goats.....

But no longer on baby rabbits!

(disclaimer, that actually isn't true as Tauriel is bred and due to kindle the end of January, but we aren't waiting on EDEN to kindle anymore so for the purposes of this post we aren't waiting any longer, remember the Goodwife is a compulsive confessor and must clarify every...single....detail.... or she feels like she's lying.)

As you may remember from The Youngun's post about getting Eden bred, we weren't sure it would be successful.  Then after we brought Spartan home and he let it be known he knew just how to woo her, we still weren't sure she'd be a good Mama. She is a flighty rabbit, sort of wild eyed, and doesn't like to be fussed with, and in my experience sometimes those does don't do so well their first time.

We put her nest box liner in her drop down sani - nest on day 28 and kept waiting to see what she'd do.  She made a nice little nest of hay and then pulled a little bit of fur on day 29.  Then it began to get cold here in Kentucky!  The Man checked on her last night (7th) when he went out for the final time to check on his quail and she hadn't done anything, but when I went out this morning into the 2* temperatures, I saw more tufts of fur under her cage and knew she'd kindled.  

I have no pictures of the little newborns for this reason.....

It's ENTIRELY too cold for me to uncover them.  I felt in the nest and could feel at least 4 bodies, possibly 6 or more.  They all felt warm, and they were squeaking as newborn baby bunnies do.  That's good enough for me right  now until it warms up a little.

I considered bringing the entire nest into the house to check them, but that is a bit of a different prospect with the sani nests.  She's got a really nice nest built that is slam full of hay and in order to slide the liner and thus the nest out, I'd have to remove some of it.  I'm not willing to do that, so for now, I'll just leave things alone.  I will check them at least twice each day by putting my hand in and checking for warm wiggly bodies.  If I feel a cold lump, I'll pull it out and see what's what.  

Underneath that fur and hay is a pile of baby bunnies!

Will this litter survive these cold temps?  Not sure.  I hope so, and the fact that she made such a nice nest, had them all in it, and then snugged them all up in her warm fur makes me think that most will.  Rabbits can handle the cold quite well, however there is always a risk of loss to any livestock when it's this cold!

Here's hoping you and your critters are snug and warm!  We'll have pictures of the little stinkers soon, as it is supposed to warm up to the 30's by the weekend.

Until next time....

God Bless!

We've Got Babies! On the Quail Report....

This morning before work we had two eggs with disturbances in the shell.  The tiniest of little "earthquake plates" where the baby quail are using their egg tooth to break out of their snug homes.  I have no pictures of this as it was before work, and I had no time.

However, we came home from work to this....

How stinkin' cute is this little pooper??!!  

Oh wow, they are just precious!  So far we've got 5 hatched and out, and so many more working on it.

I'll leave you with a baby quail video.........this guy had already hatched out and then gotten himself into a bit of a pickle!

New life never ceases to amaze me!  The grand design of our Creator is simply amazing!!

Till next time............God Bless!