Unity Farm Journal - The 5th Week of May 2014

The Memorial Day weekend included shearing day on the farm.   Every year in May, we trim 15 pounds of fiber from each alpaca, removing a body size “down jacket” just in time for Summer.  The animals are transformed from teddy bears to Dr. Seuss animals.  We gently halter the animals and reassure them with ear and chin massages.   Then we lead them to a foam pad and use a soft rope to restrain their legs so that they cannot move while the sharp clippers are shaving their fiber.   We also use the opportunity to trim their teeth and nails.   In two hours, the work was done and the newly sheared animals were back in their pastures.   Here are before and after pictures which suggest that alpacas are more fiber than body.This weekend we worked on more mushroom totems, adding 36 stacks of logs to a new mushroom area underneath the shade of a 100 foot pine tree.   We added 6 different subtypes of oyster and bagged the logs, keeping them warm and moist for a 3 month spawn run.  This Fall, we will see some fruiting.  Now that we have 144 Oyster logs in production, we should achieve commercial quantities over the next 12 months.Now that Spring mud season has dried up a bit, we’ve begun to maintain all our trails, using the Terex front loader to haul chips.  I placed and raked a bed of poplar chips 4 inches deep and 4 feet wide over the entire 1000 foot length of the Orchard trail.  Next weekend I’ll do the 1000 foot Old...
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