Livestock and Animals
Chickens – eggs, meat and a good source of entertainment.
A lady in town called us one day and said that she was moving out of the area in a few days and hadn’t found a home for her chickens, did we want them? We’d talked about getting chickens one day, so without hesitating we said yes, we’d be there in a day or so to pick them up.

At the time, we didn’t have much of a scrap materials pile, nor did we have any inclination to drive 60 miles to the hardware store. So we improvised. We went to a local dumping ground. We found an old, metal cistern, which, once we’d cut out a door and vent, became the coop. Scrap lumber, tin and chicken wire formed the walls of the pen, and for the roof we used sheep wire and sotol sticks. With a couple of days' labor and no money, we had a fully functional chicken set-up.

We now have 14 chickens and get between 8 and 10 eggs a day. The yolks are so yellow, you have to wonder what they do to those store-bought eggs (or chickens).

But apart from being a great source of protein, chickens also provide the household with entertainment. They wander around all day, pecking at the ground and making weird noises. They are vicious to outsiders, ruthless to prey (we’ve had a couple of hens catch mice and birds). They take dust baths, and when they find a good spot, they’ll often take turns in accordance with the pecking order. In springtime, when we’re putting compost in the garden, they hang around outside the fence. If we find a grub, we throw it over the fence. The rooster catches them and gives one to each of his hens in turn, before eating one himself.

People warned us that chickens wouldn’t survive long out here, but so far we’ve had no casualties, other than to the pot. They free range during the day and get put up at night. The dogs do a good job of keeping predators away. The only problem we’ve encountered is a couple of egg-sucking rattlesnakes, which have in turn ended up in the pot!

Goats – milk, cheese, meat
We plan to get goats one day, but until then we share a friend’s. Don is a genius and one of the purest souls you could ever hope to meet. He builds giant, concrete domes and cylinders on his own, with the use of a whole range of jigs and contraptions. The buildings are so strong, you can drive a front-end-loader, carrying dirt, on top of them and they will not even hint at cracking.

He doesn’t have any particular purpose for these buildings, other than to see if they can be done, so they usually end up being goat pens.

Goats are perfect for out here. They eat anything, so grazing is easy, and they are more intelligent and agile than cows, making survival more likely. Don has one nanny who follows him around everywhere. When we’re standing around visiting, she is usually one of the circle.

Goat’s milk is much richer than cow’s, and man is it good! When we make ice-cream, we do not use any additional cream, just milk.

One of our favorite summer treats is “liquado”. You take frozen bananas (or any other fruit) and milk, and put them in a blender. The result is a thick, cold, delicious milkshake-like piece of heaven.

Cream
Cream is very finely emulsified within goat’s milk, so it is hard to separate. One way to get around this (separators are expensive) is to make Devonshire cream.

• Put milk in heatproof pans for 12-24 hours, then warm slowly to 187ºF.
• When you see the surface start to crack and wrinkle, remove from heat.
• When cool, skim the crust off the surface.

Butter and buttermilk
If you allow the cream to ripen a little, the butter will be more flavorful and easier to churn. Do not let it ripen too much or the butter will be sour.

• Get the cream to about 60ºF.
• Churn (hand whisk works) for about 15 minutes until the cream feels heavy.
• Adding a couple of tablespoons of cow’s milk at this stage can make the process easier.
• After another 10 to 20 minutes of churning, the cream should separate into buttermilk and clumps of butter.
• Drain off the buttermilk (great for baking or milkshakes).
• Take the clumps of butter and beat them with a spoon until it’s all joined together.
• Add salt – ½ tsp per pound of butter (unsalted butter spoils faster).
• Wrap butter in wax paper and put it in the fridge.

Cream cheese

• Combine 2 cups heavy cream with 2 tbsp buttermilk.
• Suspend mixture in cloth over a bowl for 24 hours.
• Season with fresh herbs.

Basic hard cheese

• You need rennin to curdle milk. This is naturally present in the stomach of newborn kids, calves and lambs, but you can buy rennet, which contains rennin, from dairy suppliers and some pharmacies.
• Allow milk to stand for a few hours at room temperature.
• Mix in rennet (1/8 cheese rennet tablet per gallon of milk), and leave mixture undisturbed at about 86ºF.
• Wait until the white curd can be separated cleanly from the sides of the pot.
• Cut curds.
• Mix curds gently with hands to break up large pieces. Continue for 10 – 15 minutes to allow time for curds to release whey.
• Heat curds for about an hour gently up to 102ºF. Stir frequently.
• Leave curds in hot whey until they separate after being held in your hand.
• Strain through cheese cloth.
• Add salt, a little at a time.
• Leave curds in cloth and squeeze it into one mass.
• Weight lightly for about 2 hours, then increase the weight for another 12 hours.

Additional Resources:

• McMurray Hatchery - a great source for chickens and other poultry
• Hoffman Hatchery - Another good source for poultry and poultry products