porkpal said:Escargot! Many consider it a delicacy!

I think it is proof that everything is better with garlic

No eating snails for me!

OldGardener said:

I think it is proof that everything is better with garlic

So true! Garlic makes lots of things taste better! but not milk!

Oldgardener, your goats are sooo cute. Is Rick right, you named them Cute and Cuter!?

I'm a bit late to the party, but am really enjoying the discussion on goats and the great pics of the nice nubians. A quite a few year ago, at least 20, I had several. A couple of Alpines, Nubians, and my best milker was a Nubian/Saanen cross. I used the milk for drinking, and I also fed it to my chickens. Boy talk about great tasting chicken! Dito to the comments about the effects of different foods on the milk, but that's also true of cattle. We used to always know when the cows got into some wild onions. I thought the goats milk was much like cows milk if chilled quickly, and used within 24 hours. After that time it started to have a bit of goaty flavor. If you ever smelled the breath of a cow eating grass, you'd know where the taste of milk came from. The biggest problem I had with them was that it was so hard to find a market for the male kids. I just couldn't butcher them, although I don't think I'd have a problem with eating chevon if the opportunity arrose. There seems to be a lot of people raising Boer goats, and other types of meat goats, as I see lots of adds on Craigs List for them. I just got too attached to the fun kids to ever eat them.

I can understand getting attacked. But I could eat something I raised if I knew that was it's purpose in life. Don't know how to butcher anything so at least I would never have to deal with that.

Don't know how to do chickens either but could learn. And as much as I love chickens I would have no problems putting any roosters I might raise in the freezer for chicken dinner.

I'm OK butchering Chickens, ducks, turkeys, and Geese, but Those cute kids, they just became too much of a pet, and pest at times. lol

They are awefully cute!

That's all so interesting, Tom. I can see where it would be hard to turn a pet goat into food. Goats are so cute and cuddly I'm sure I would have physical contact, petting them and such, so there becomes more of an attachment. Chickens on the other hand, although they are cute and entertaining to watch, I don't cuddle them or anything like that so they best watch their P's and Q's or they could end up on the dinner table! Well, maybe not Feisty, she is so sweet I want to pick her up and cuddle her...

Now Feisty, why are you making such a mess! Oh, never mind you little cutie you!

Feisty is looking for treats!

I've read that any kind of mustard, and even some pretty mild greens like Brassica rapa Bok Choy or Chinese cabbage gives cow's milk an awful "mustard" flavor.

But 'Tyfon' (Holland Greens) was bred from a cross between stubble turnips
& Chinese cabbage to have NO "mustard oil" at all. It was first bred to be a forage crop / cover crop, but they are also OK as very bland, very very productive salad greens.

They're cut-and-come-again every 35 days, 60 DTM, or tender-when-young. They are very cold-hardy, allegedly down to 10F.

Never heard of them before but that would be a good garden crop to grow for feeding chickens or goats then.

That's what I was thinking ... plus maybe a filler for the salad bowl in very cold weather.

When I find room, like next time I'm creating a new bed and want to out-compete the weeds, I thought I would try it as a cover crop, taste it when young, and then feed it to my compost heap.

I've never heard of them either but they look worthy of a try in the garden.

Not to get too far off topic but, I'm just starting to get some winter crop seeds planted. Actually, a couple of your seeds, Rick some Ching Chang, I think a mustard and some of the baby bok that I didn't get to grow this spring.

I should look into some winter crops that might grow here for the chickens to forge. Nothing is green here in the winter!

Zone 7b would probably freeze even Tyfon if you didn't cover it with plastic or Remay.

>> Not to get too far off topic

Mea culpa!

I grow crimson clover and hairy vetch which are both cover crops. More for attracting bees and not feeding animals. But I bet there is lots you could grow for winter feeding of chickens. Suggestions anyone?

Years ago farmers used to grow rutabaga and mangle beets for cattle feed. They had these huge hand cranked shredding machines that they used to cut them up to feed cattle. I still remember seeing one of these shredders at auctions when I was a kid. My neighbor had one and they used to feed rutabega to their cattle all the time in the fall.

>> hand cranked shredding machines

Hmm! That sounds like what I want for shredding pine bark into small chunks and fibers.

It's hard to discribe, but if you know what a hand grater looks like to grate cheese or cabbage for slaw, this was a big round wheel that had these sharp protrusions that would cut chunks out of the rutabaga. Bite size for cows. The crank would turn the big wheel, and there was a bin on top to hold them. A small spout on the bottom to direct them into the pail. A little bit like the shredding attachment to a food processer, only about 3 ft. in diameter. Wish I could draw on here, I'd make a diagram.

That's what I was hoping for, a great big hand grater. Hopefully a way to hold bark chunks with the fibers parallel to the motion of the gougers.

>> Bite size for cows.

Bigger bites than I was hoping! I would like to be able to make bark shreds or long thin chips around
1-2 mm thick
X 2-5 mm wide
X as long as possible.