For those of you raising small farm animals for food I offer this weekends disaster prevention tip. I had recently spent a number of hours converting a part of our pole barn to a chicken coop. I used two sides of the barn and erected timber and chicken wire for the other two sides. The two sides I built withstood varments vary well. I laid a foot of chicken wire out from the bottom of the two sides I put up and covered this with dirt.

Friday night a critter pulled a board away from the outside of the pole barn and chewed a hole thru the underlying fiberboard. All but one chicken was killed but only several were eaten. Last night I put the surviving chicken in the coop for bait and set a number one trap at the opening made on friday night. A critter was caught but pulled out of the trap and got the last chicken. My guess is it was a coon or a bobcat. We live in wild critter rich country with lots of cats including cougar.

In a Y2K survival situation you simply can't afford this kind of disaster. Double check housing for chickens, rabbits, sheep and goats. If you even suspect a weak spot in animal housing foolproof it ASAP.

Yesterday we drove down to the nearest larger town and purchased three peach trees which I have to get into the ground today. This gives us apples, pears, cherries, plum and peach trees in our orchard. We have planted five grape vines which I understand if correctly trained will produce thirty pounds of fruit per tree.

If you live rural get a book on wild plants which can be eaten. There are many and learning to identify those that you have on your property will add food to your table.

We had a one thousand gallon propane tank installed and topped off recently. It will be topped off again this fall. With the 24K propane space heater recently purchased we will have heat for two years or more. The newer space heaters are 99 percent effecient and require no electricity.

We now have six rechargeable lanterns. Four have a six volt battery and two use eight D cell batteries. The Coleman D cell lantern has a D.C. jack for recharging so could be used as an extra way to charge D cell batteries. With a run time of eighteen hours with both six watt bulbs on and a Wal Mart price of $17 they seem like quite a deal.

Due to budget constraints my solar ambitions have been scaled back to having one to ten watt solar panels for charging lanterns and batteries.

As much as possible we prepare based upon the rule of backup upon backup. This applies to light, heat, water and food. We have a creek and two ponds but also 55 gallon food grade drums for a cistren using barn roof runoff. We have food from Walton's but also lots of canned food which is added to as time goes on. Canned tomatoes will be stockpiled mostly later in the year due to shelflife.

Have to go for now and plant fruit trees and do some critter proofing. Hope that I may have saved some future grief with the chicken disaster story.

-- Ed (ed@lizzardranch.com), May 23, 1999

Answers

Ed...I have fought "critters" trying (and succeeding) getting my chickens all of my life. I can hardly believe that it pulled a board off. I am more inclined to think it might be a large coon rather than a cougar. A cougar would have to chew a pretty good size hole, I would think. coons are very smart and have lots of dexterity with those little hands. Tho its always been my experience that a coon will drag one off and kill and eat it some distance away from the hen house. I have never had anything but a neighbor's dog kill and not eat. Even the coyotes will snatch and run with one. But a dog will kill them off for the fun of it. Your best bet for keeping any critters, 4 or 2 legged, out is a guard dog. And I don't mean Rottwieler. I mean Anatolian Shepard, Maremma, or Great Pyrenes. They will guard anything that is "theirs". That means anything on your property. Theyare so possessive of the animals that when you bring new animals on the property you need to keep them separate from the ones you have and put the newbies and the dogs together until they claim them. Usually about 4 or 5 days. These dogs, if there are two, can and will bring down a cougar, bear or wolf. My personal preference is the Maremma, but its all in what you are used to. A friend that is running about 500 cashmere goats is using Great Pyres. If you are in a flea and tick area, make sure you have plenty of Advantage for the dogs.

Taz

-- Taz (Tassie @aol.com), May 23, 1999.

Ed, you should have planted peach trees about 4 years ago. You're not going to see many peaches until about 2003.

-- smitty (smitty@sandiego.com), May 23, 1999.

Ed's experience, along with the multiples of pounds of food (that you will probably have to store) are perfect reasons IMHO why I decided long ago to advise people to just stockpile long-term storage food for their families and skip the animal husbandry idea.

website: http://y2ksafeminnesota.hypermart.net OR www.y2ksafeminnesota.com

-- MinnesotaSmith (y2ksafeminnesota@hotmail.com), May 23, 1999.

Speaking of livestock- I had picked up two geese to use for weeder geese. Well they haven't cooperated in that venture, but I had kept them anyway in hopes of eventual success.

Then- they broke the neck of one of my layers one night. So- I threw them out of the hen house. That night, they broke the neck of one of my lambs-who was where the dog couldn't get to it as the dog(Grt. Pyrenese) is recovering from broken bones caused by being hit by a car....).

Then, the lovely darlings bit holes in my row cover and demolished almost an entire bed of lettuce nearly ready for the market. Today, they went off with a neighbor all set to roast them!

The simple life isn't!!

-- anita (hillsidefarm@drbs.com), May 23, 1999.

Ed,this is in response to Tazs suggestion about white flock guardian dogs...Anatolians,Maremmas,etc..we have had several over 15 years..one of the most stable tempered we have owned was a Polish Tatra..they are very rare,and there is usually a waiting list..plus,most of these dogs run anywhere from $800 to $1500.. We had 2 Kuvaszs,from Hungary,which bonded only to me,they are notorious for choosing one family member..not suitable if you have a lot of kids that also want your attention.. We know a few of the breeders that work in Anatolians,Akbashes,and Kangal dogs...lots of politics,personal fighting between each other,and not always the best dogs.. Great Pyrenees in some instances have been overbred,they also tend to wander..you need to buy from a breeder that has true working dogs,that have retained instincts.. We have owned Kuvasz,Akbash,Tatra,and a very rare Czech Tchouvatch..all are basically the same physically,long haired white flock guardian dogs...temperments vary greatly,these are very large animals,and require considerable socialization early on...they are large and strong enough to kill coyotes,and even wolves..but they are expensive,and a big responsibility if you plan to have any non family members around..they are extremely territorial..if this is something you might be considering,email me if you like,this is my real address.. Taz,do you have a maremma? I love all these big white dogs,never knew anyone on the Forum had one,or even knew what they were...Cynthia

-- Cynthia Yanicko (yanicko@infonline.net), May 23, 1999.

We have coyote/dog problems with our local sheep. One solution is to get a lama. Just one. (Two will for their own social unit.) One will adopt the flock and protect it. Has worked in heavily coyote infested areas.

We also have cougar problems, since the "wisdom" of our urban initiative process decided to protect them. Just had another one take down a 250 lb. steer 100 feet from a house last week. (Kids were sleeping outside on the trampoline.) Only way to track them is with dogs (verbotin unless official) - otherwise you have to bait with a carcass and wait. It has gotten so bad that the fish and game automatically issues a depredation permit after the fact. Otherwise, it was "shoot, shovel and shutup" and they never get a good count on the problem. (This is not, BTW, "new development" into cougar territory. These ranches were established in the 1850s and 60s.)

-- marsh (siskfarm@snowcrest.net), May 24, 1999.

Much ado about nothing....

7th generation farmer, camper, hunter....from one of the 13 Original Colonies. People survived much worse things previous to now. REAL threats. Why you folks think computers will be worse than that is beyond me. (Oh, I graduated college twice too...not just some yokel)

-- Chicken Little (panic@forthebirds.net), May 24, 1999.

Cynthia- we currently have a Great pyrenese. Our Marema died early this spring. They are all terrific dogs- several people on this forum have these types.

-- anita (hillsidefarm@drbs.com), May 24, 1999.

We have a male Kommodore(spelling?) He is a great watch dog/guard dog. We also had coyote problems before we got him.These dogs will actively chase a pack of coyotes. Right now he has his summer hair cut---looks like a giant poodle; just has regular long hair on his tail and head now. About the end of sept I start letting his hair grow back for the winter. NOTE to all dog owners: get stocked up on your flea and tick remedies NOW. Our tick problem was horrible in the past...we now use the Frontline product that is squeezed on the back of their neck...works like a charm, but is regretably expensive (if you have 5 dogs like we do!)

-- jeanne (jeanne@hurry.now), May 25, 1999.