January Update: A Frigid Weekend

Ordinary Time, deep freeze, dreaming of spring

When January started, we were ready to enjoy ordinary days at home. We turned the home office into a shared space for all of us to use. I have three webinars on the schedule as I try to get back into a robust writing routine. We spent a lot of time listening to stories on our daughter’s new Yoto Mini or playing with Calico Critters.

Then came the freeze. It probably froze where you are too, because much of the United States was covered in snow along with wind chills as low as -30°F. For us, the coldest it got was around midnight Monday the 15th, when the thermometer read -15°F.

As miserable as this weather can make a lot of creatures, alpacas are built for the cold at high altitudes. As long as they have a windbreak, they will be generally unphased. Still, there were extra chores that needed to be done to prepare for the freeze.

Keeping the Animals Warm

I spent much of Friday afternoon running errands and trying to beat the rush of other people doing the same. I started the year by tidying up the house and cleaning closets, and I had a stack of old blankets for a local animal sanctuary when they put out their next call for donations. Sure enough, this weekend the pigs needed blankets, so I drove those over. Next was picking our daughter up from school and going to the library to print activities for the long weekend. Then the farm store, to get beet pulp. (Turns out we already had some in Julio’s trunk.) Finally the grocery for essentials and snacks.

We make the beet pulp for the alpacas on frigid nights, to help them keep themselves warm. Generally, the barn is noticeably warmer than the outside because the alpacas’ body heat gets trapped in there. Alpacas are modified ruminants (they have three stomachs), so when we give them beet pulp, their systems take some time to digest it, and that increased metabolic activity from digesting helps them keep themselves warm. It’s also a bit of a treat. (Video: Preparing for a Freezing Night)

While we were at the farm store, we saw a lot of people buying stock tank warmers and heat bulbs for their chickens. We use a heated waterer for the hens in the winter and install a deicer in the alpacas’ water. We do not use a heat bulb in the chicken coop. Their use is somewhat controversial. Aside from chickens not really needing them, for us, the bigger factor is the risk of fire. Heat bulbs cause coop fires not infrequently. Our coop is right next to the barn, which provides a wind break but could also lead to catastrophe if the coop caught on fire. Other fire hazards include wet haybales and the deicer getting exposed or pulled from the tank, both of which I had to deal with this weekend.

Chickens are good at trapping their body heat by roosting up in the pitched roof area of the coop. What we do is provide big, sealed jugs of hot water to help them trap some extra heat. We also add extra bedding and seal their door overnight. Over the weekend, one of our hens, Angelica, got a bit of frostbite on her comb, but she also didn’t roost with the other birds. My current theory is that she’s grown too plump for the roosting bar.

On Monday, I went to feed everyone, top up the water trough, and shuck the barn (which was hard because the alpacas’ waste was frozen) and found that the chickens remained in the coop almost entirely. I made them some mid-day hot water bottles, but I was very worried about them when I saw the overnight lows. I decided to move them into one of the barn stalls so they could benefit from the alpacas’ warmth. (Video: Moving the Hens to the Barn) I put them in a stall with a feeding box they could “roost” on, which would also provide them extra windbreaks, and I filled a metal waterer with hot water. It was confusing for everyone, but by the next morning the cold spell was starting to lift and everyone was okay to go back to their separate areas no worse for the experience. I just wish I could ask the chickens if the barn was any warmer for them.

Keeping the Humans Entertained

It ended up being a four-day weekend for Martin Luther King, Jr. Day and a school cancellation on Tuesday. Inside, we enjoyed a family game night (Pretty Pretty Princess anyone?) and extra helpings of Smitten Kitchens’ Focaccia Onion Board and Tangy Braised Chickpeas, which I made while Julio went on his weekly long run, a half-marathon this time. It was a balmy 10°F, but he still came home with ice in his beard.

I have a preschool curriculum that we use at home for after-school activities, but even with that in hand, we were starting to run out of things to do. We had a movie party to watch Frozen II. Then, I broke out the Valentine’s Day supplies and we started some crafts. Our daughter also loves making and painting these “clay camations” and pretending that she is giving them to various characters. Julio had to break her heart by telling her that she could not drive to Monster’s Inc. to give them to Mike and Sully.

Dreaming of Spring

I could still hear the bees buzzing through the vent in their quilt box, and maybe that is what got me thinking about spring. At any rate, my daughter loves looking at the seed catalogs that arrive around this time each year, so we spent a morning looking at different flowers, planning our garden for the spring.

I have been trying to get perennial flowers to take over a gardenbed I built along the edge of the run outside the barn. Last year, my third year trying, I finally got some borage established in one section. Maybe this will be the year! I certainly ordered enough types of flowers to try.

We are also slowly planning to build a fence around the garden so that the chickens can free-range without destroying my work. I watched them digging in the raised beds enough this autumn that I do not want to chance it once I put seeds in the ground. I am dreaming of something like the fenced garden in Practical Magic, but, well…let’s see what we can actually achieve. It does have to be tall enough that the hens won’t just hop over.