No till tilling

While we did decide to till the garden last year, we are not going to do it ever again.

There are things one can do to avoid tilling, and the long term effects of tilling are actually quite detrimental to the soil. Most people will tell you that they till to avoid weeds and enrich the soil.  The first year you till your land, it will produce an incredibly rich and bountiful crop.  In subsequent years, however, things won't be so great without a lot of amendments -- tilling exposes the precious topsoil resulting in topsoil loss and nutrient depletion.  As far as weeds go, there are lots of dormant weed seeds in the soil, and tilling simply brings them to to surface giving them the sun and air they need to grow.  They should thank us!

I'm not implying that tilling is some evil empire of agricultural practices, but for us, it isn't something we want to do.  For larger scale operations, it may be unavoidable, but on our scale, we're trying to avoid it. As I mentioned before, if you till, you'll need to add amendments to maintain fertile land, so why not skip the extra step and simply build soil from the ground up.

Many people claim that no-dig practices don't work and you end up with compacted soil.  This parsnip grew at a friend's house in Maine -- clearly there's no compaction there!  She's been building the soil without digging or tilling for years, and look at this bounty!  Credit: Lisa Fernandes.

Our plan is to use permaculture techniques to build soil that will get better every year.  Why simply go for sustainable (status quo) when you can make something better than how you found it?

One of the techniques we're using to improve our soil involves letting our chickens to the "tilling" work. :)  The jury is still out for us on whether or not we are going to get organic certified, so we can still do this.  If we go the organic certification route, we can't put our chickens directly on our veggie bed, but for now we're happy to have them eat weed seeds, spread manure, and generally stir things around.

In order for them to do this, they need a temporary and mobile home -- enter the chicken tractor.  It's a mobile home that we built for them that we'll move around the field.  And now, a photo montage…

Cheapo bike tires that are going to make our tractor mobile.  We ended up replacing the tubes and tires because they didn't hold air for crap.  

The bottom frame -- we struggled with how to attach the tires, but you'll see below that we figured it out quite nicely.

Oliver is always on hand for scale. :)  Bike tires need two points of attachment or they wobble all over the place.  With this setup, they are pretty secure and sturdy.

Dr. Trafton thinks it is a really good idea to ride the frame down the hill into our field.  I made her wear the helmet.

Dr. Knapp, however, thinks this is a supremely bad idea since there are no breaks and no ability to steer.  Here's what happened...

We have a floor, people.  Olive and Oliver were clearly more interested in a squirrel than being scale models.

Wall frames are up!  

…and we have a chicken door!  

We started building this in the fall, and this was our beautiful view.  Not too shabby!

Walls, big door, and more.  All we need now is a roof!

Here's the inside -- roosts and the nest boxes will go on the top ledge there.  Clearly, we built this entire thing from scrap wood we had lying around.

I heard a lot of flapping coming from the chicken yard, and this is what I found.  Wing clipping followed shortly thereafter.  Don't worry, it is just like cutting a fingernail, there is no pain involved.

Fast forward to now -- we got a corrugated plastic roof, and Dr. Trafton put it on.  Add some temporary fencing with a solar powered electric charger to keep dogs and other animals out, and the ladies are enjoying their first days on the veggie bed.  Naturally, we had to observe them for a little bit to make sure they weren't going to jump out or the dogs weren't going to try to get in.  The only dog to attempt getting in thus far is Baxter….shocker.  He learned his lesson and won't be trying it again any time soon.  Oliver is, obviously, on hand for supervising and keeping everyone in line.

Here's a better view of everything from our deck.  They worked the bed like champs, and we have since moved them to the perimeter of the bed where they're eating weed seeds.  We're going to swap out chickens for ducks once the seedlings are in the ground so they can work slug patrol.  

This is what was happening during our supervising.  This guy is such a snuggler, it is borderline ridiculous.  Please note his little smile. :)

…and then we attempted a family portrait...

So, we're really pleased with how quickly the chickens can work things over.  We're hoping to try to keep moving them around the field, especially where we've planted fruit trees.  It is our hope that we won't have to mow these areas, and we can keep to only mowing the very lower part of the field where we have no trees around which we'd have to navigate.

Stay tuned for how it works...

The bridge to somewhere - part 1

Trail maintenance and creation is one of the many things on our winter list of projects (and general all season to do list).  The winter is when we do the most walking, skiing, snowshoeing, etc., so we notice when the trails need some help.

The Grouse Trail (named so because we almost always flush a grouse on the trail) is a short 20 minute loop that starts and ends at our house.  We commonly use it for a quick 'get the dogs outside' walk if we're in a hurry or feeling particularly lazy.  It is also just a nice way to start or end the day.  The one problem with the trail is that it gets really wet and swampy near the field, regardless of the season.  So we decided we should build a bridge over the small 'ravine' to circumvent the muddy area.

When we moved into our house, there were several telephone poles between the house and the river as a small building down by the dock used to have power (for oyster farming).  The poles have long since been disconnected from any power source, but they were still dotting the landscape (and our view).  I looked quickly, but I couldn't find a photo of our field with them still in it.  The short of it is that we spent a day cutting down the poles and removing all the old cables.  We then realized that we had the perfect bridge material -- they're straight, sturdy, and they sure won't rot any time soon.

The difficulty with building a bridge here is that it requires the tractor since the poles are heavy….but….the reason for the bridge is that it is always wet and muddy.  Using the tractor in this location is very much less than ideal because it makes huge ruts in the mud that just don't go away on their own.

Enter polar vortex.

This super cold, snowy winter has provided us with the perfect conditions for driving our tractor through what is normally a muddy mess.

Charlotte's booty in the late winter sun….I mean, the stream bed across which we're building our bridge.  The goal was to use the winch to pull the poles across the bed and let them rest there until the snow melts and we can get them into their final locations.

Two poles chained up and ready to be pulled across.

In the interest of full disclosure, it didn't go as smoothly as this leads you to believe.  We were thwarted first by the tree just to Anna's right of the pole and had to drive the tractor back to the field, pull the poles back a bit, drive the tractor back to where it is in the picture above, and re-pull the pole across.  It pretty much landed right where we want it, though.  We only finagled it a little bit with the peavey.  Also, Baxter is trying REALLY hard to get Oliver to play with him.  Oliver is nonplussed.

Both poles in!  We're going to let them stay there until the snow melts and they settle down -- and, NO, there is no chance they're going to settle into the stream bed….none whatsoever.  Really….ok, I'll admit there's an EXTREMELY small chance.

Even though it's all blurry, there is something I really like about this photo so I'm including it.  Maybe it's the juxtaposition of the dogs, the tools, the light….I don't know.  I just like it.

The plan for after the snow melts is to get the poles secured using stones so they don't settle into the stream bed with shifting seasons.  After that, we'll cut and secure boards all along the top to make a mighty fine bridge.  We'll save that part for part deux of the bridge building endeavor.

Clearly, we made some ruts, but it was MUCH less than it would have been if it wasn't cold and snowy.  And apparently, Baxter really enjoys mud.

Charge every drop.

Today was a truly epic day.  We accomplished something we first said we would never even attempt by ourselves, and we learned a ton in the process.

Our surfing friends recently enlightened us on a phrase thrown around in the surfing world; "charge every drop." While surfing, this means to paddle hard at great waves, no matter how big and intimidating they might be. Give it your all and drop into the wave and the ride of your life. Today we took that phrase to a different level and tackled a hung up tree that scared us. We decided to take on a challenge, learn from the process, and hope for the best. So, charge every drop!

On Thanksgiving, we had fairly high winds in our area.  We had been inside cooking all day, but when our guests arrived, everyone kept commenting on the big tree that was hung up at the top of our road.  A big maple had been uprooted by the wind, but it didn't fall all the way to the ground.  It was hung up on a bunch of smaller trees.  For foresters, they call trees like this 'widow makers' because they are pretty tough and dangerous to bring down.  The lean of the tree changes all the dynamics of how it will fall, and there is a lot of tension in the tree making it easy for the tree to go very quickly without any warning.  Today, we successfully tackled our first widow maker, and here's how it went:

We've been calling her mega maple.  It isn't as horizontal as many hung up trees, and the fact that it is uprooted as opposed to broken off makes it a challenge as well.  The root ball was fairly secure still, so that changed the dynamic as well.  We were anticipating the the root ball would fall back down, but that didn't end up being the case. Hindsight is 20/20, and we would have cut it differently had we known what was going to happen.

Dr. Trafton -- ready to tackle the tree.  Actually we were both pretty nervous.  Anna was going to take the first stab at it, but I wasn't going anywhere.  This is definitely a task requiring supervision (as are all chainsaw activities in our book).

First task -- clear the area.  You always want to make sure you have an escape route.  We cut and cleared all the small trees to Anna's right and a few on the other side of mega maple.  

The first cut -- the plan was to cut a wedge in the top, then cut up the bottom side to meet the wedge.  This creates a hinge in the tree, and the root ball falls back while the bottom of the tree falls down.  Again, things didn't go as planned.  The root didn't fall back into place, and so the tree just got stuck where it was.  There was nowhere for it to go.  More on that later.

More work on the wedge -- the final wedge was much larger than what it looks like here.

The final wedge.  It's not perfect, but our skills are getting better.    

The next move is to cut into the side of the tree opposite the wedge in a straight line to the point of the wedge.  I apparently was too nervous to take any pictures of this, but let's just say Anna did a great job. The problem was that the root ball didn't want to go anywhere, but the tree wanted to fall down.  So, the bottom edge of the tree was being stopped by the stump.  Ugh.  What are we going to do?  Naturally, we called upon the strongest member of our farm team…Charlotte. 

Sorry it's sideways!

Oh hell's yeah!  You can see the root ball in the background -- that thing didn't move!  We later cut it down to the stump as there's no reason to leave perfectly good firewood just sitting there.

After this, we limbed the tree and cut it into logs that we could drag down to our drying pile.  They'll stay there until we buck and split them in the warm spring sun.  Then, they'll sit there a long time longer drying so they're ready for burning 2 winters from now -- hopefully we can have enough wood to start actually being a year in advance.

And now, it's cocktail hour. :D

I built a toilet today.

***Warning*** -- this post is about poop.

One of the items on our winter projects list is to start using a composting toilet.  Today, I built that toilet. :) Why would we want a composting toilet when we have a perfectly good septic system? Good question.

First, flushing a conventional toilet is a total waste of potable water -- yes, the water that you flush in your toilet is drinkable (thank goodness for Fido's sake!).  You're also flushing away a perfectly good resource.

Second, what are the most common ingredients found in compost people put on their gardens?  Animal manure is a biggie!  Our plan isn't to use our humanure on our veggie garden (though you could, and it would be perfectly safe if you compost correctly).  Rather, we're planning to grow some food for our livestock (chickens, and eventually other things), feed them that food, then compost their manure for the veggie garden.  It's a way of expanding the loop so our humanure is still contributing to our veggie growth, indirectly.

Third, septic systems don't provide a good environment for 'waste' composting, and are, thus, inefficient at redirecting organic matter to the soil.

Fourth, why not?  It's a good conversation piece.

So, now for a quick rundown of how it all works.  Here's our super sweet toilet.

Yeah, I built it.  Yeah, it's just a box on legs.

So, basically, you treat it like a normal toilet, and you 'flush' with a handful (or two) or organic matter.  People use all different types of things for this -- sawdust, leaves, grass clippings, etc.  Our original plan was to use leaf litter from the forest -- it's a renewable resource, it's free, and it is already teeming with good organisms for composting.  While we still may do this, we're also going to use sawdust.  Lucky for us, our future brother-in-law owns a wood distribution company and also does carpentry.  In short, he produces bags and bags of sawdust.

For flushing -- much better than sending perfectly good water down the drain. :)

The immediate thing that people think when you talk about a composting toilet is that it is really stinky. Think: contemporary outhouses with water, chemicals, and nastiness. The same holds true for many commercially made composting toilets.  This is NOT what we're going to have.  I have visited many composting toilets that employ the system we're putting in place, and not a single one of them smells at all. The key to a not smelly toilet is the correct ratio of 'waste' to sawdust (or whatever dry, organic matter you're using).  The reason commercial outhouses and some composting toilets are smelly (and may require a lot of fans to keep it under control) is because they are decidedly lacking in the dry matter.  The whole system becomes anaerobic, and anaerobic = staaaaaaaaaaanky!  It's like a trash can with a lid vs. a trash can without a lid -- lidless cans aren't as stinky because air can get in there.

Anyway, I digress -- we're using a bucket system.  For a family of 4, having 4 buckets in rotation means emptying the buckets once a week.  This doesn't seem to bad, but we don't know what our system will be just yet, or how many buckets we'll go through.

The bucket system -- when it gets full-ish, then we swap it out for a new one.  Don't worry, that's just sawdust in there -- this is the newly installed bucket. 

Today is day 1 of the composting toilet system, we'll see how it goes.

End of poop discussion. :)

One last thing…

Yeah, we did.

Winter projects

Throughout the summer, there were many times when I said, "I am actually looking forward to winter when I can do all these things I want to do but can't because we're in the throws of the growing season."  Talk about not living in the now, but that's another topic…

So, I started writing down all the projects I hoped to get to during the winter (as well as all the books I wanted to read), and what has resulted from that is our giant winter projects list.  Some things are easy (make a wood box), some things are not so easy (business master plan), but I'm hoping we can make a significant dent in the list if not finish it. As I'm writing this, I'm realizing it is now January, so we better get cracking! Nothing like a massive to-do list to kick off your year, right? :)

Here is the list in it's entirety:

• Office organization -- we have a little room that doubles as our 'theater' and office (we are without a TV, so we watch movies on our computer), and it has been the catch-all for the 'I don't know what to do with this' stuff since we moved.  I'm going to organize those things and build some shelving to help organize the place a little more.
• Fire poker -- Anna's dad has this amazing fire poker, and I was going to try to make one.  Turns out, they're manufactured right in here in New England. Considering my metal-working skills are about nil, we're going with purchasing this one.
• Under-counter shelving/cabinet -- our kitchen has no cabinet uppers (I actually really like this about it), which means limited storage.  We have a breakfast bar that we don't intend to use as such, so I'm going to build some sort of cabinet to put under the bar that will serve as a liquor cabinet/glassware storage.
• Over stove shelving/plate rack -- again, limited storage in the kitchen.  We are going to install some shelving and a plate rack (think vertical plate storage) to free up some of our cabinet space.  This will be an 'upper' of sorts, but open shelving.  We're not building this one, but the plate rack does require us to finally make a decision on plates since they're size dependent.
• Wood cover -- we don't have a dedicated wood shed, so we want to make/get a cover for our wood that is stacked outside.  This can be as simple as leftover metal roofing that we put on top of the pile.
• Book shelf bonanza -- we have amassed a number of books over the years, but we don't have a lot of book shelves here.  I'm going to build a bunch.
• Sourdough perfection -- we have a sourdough started that is a few hundred years old.  We haven't quite mastered the art of gluten free sourdough, but we're working on it.
• Organize/clean 45s -- we were lucky to get my dad's turntable and record collection, which includes a fair number of 45s.  They aren't in any order (except for the ones in boxes -- and those have a card catalog -- glad my dad's so organized!), and they could use a cleaning.  I'm hoping to develop a system for them so we know what's where.
• Drying screens -- we need to be able to successfully dry some of our crops -- herbs, beans, etc.  Last year, we just sort of hung them around or laid them out on the deck.  They really need air from all sides, and we lost a number of beans because of this.  I'm going to make some framed screens and a shelving unit to hold them.
• Composting toilet -- we'd like to be able to start making humanure -- yep, humanure.  This involves composting our waste.  It is perfectly safe, we just need to get the system in place.
• Develop a master plan -- this is a biggie, and it will probably be ever evolving.  We need to put down in writing our plan for this farm.  To whom are we going to sell our products?  On what things do we want to put most of our energy?  Where are we going to sell -- farmers' markets, CSAs, wholesale, farm stand, all of the above? Like I said -- this is a biggie.
• Finish caulking -- we had an energy audit a while back, and I'm slowly making my way through sealing a lot of the cracks in our house.  It's a tedious, slow process, but it makes us warmer and more efficient. :)
• Smoking room woodbox -- now that the smoking room looks so beautiful, we need a place to store wood by the fireplace.  I made a super sweet woodbox for our tiny stove upstairs, and I'd like to make one for the smoking room fireplace.  
• Maple syrup plan -- we tapped about 8 trees last year, and we want to really expand our maple syrup production. We need to make a plan for sap collection, storage, and where the heck we're going to put our sugar shack!
• Black trumpet dogs -- this is more of a research project.  We have lots of black trumpets on our property, and we'd like to teach our dogs to find them for us.  I mean, they have truffle dogs, why not trumpet dogs?  I'm confident we can do this.
• Chicken tractor/bachelor pad -- our male ducks are beating the crap out of each other.  This is due to the fact that we have too many males and not enough females.  Since we're vegetarians, we're not too keen on killing our males.  So -- we're building a bachelor pad for them.  It is basically already completed, we just need to order the roofing and put it on.  It is mobile, and we'll be able to rotate the ducks/chickens around the garden when we want.
• Root cellar plan -- obviously, we can't put in a root cellar until the ground thaws, but we WILL have one next year. We must!  So, we need to figure out where it's going to go, and what it's going to look like.
• Yoga room -- we have a temporary yoga space right now, but I'd love to make our permanent yoga room plan a reality.  Some of this is out of our control, but once the opportunity presents itself, we're on it!
• Squash storage -- we're growing a TON of winter squash this year as it is something we're hoping to sell sooner than later.  Squash doesn't go well in the root cellar because it is too humid in there.  Right now, we have boxes of squash under our bed (actually a pretty common storage method), but we'd like a more organized setup.  I'm going to build some shelving specifically for storing winter squash on the other side of our bedroom -- it's a really long room, and it's cold, which is good for squash storage.
• Firewood -- we have an entirely separate list for places in the woods that we want to cut firewood, but I'll spare you the boring details.  Suffice to say, we want to put up enough wood for next year and the year after.  The winter part of this is just felling the trees, we can buck and split it in the spring/summer/fall sun. :)

Maybe we'll revisit this list in the spring -- I'm going to say that the winter projects list deadline is the day we plant seeds.  At that point, it is most definitely no longer winter….we hope!

Why we do what we do

This is actually a post that I've been meaning to write for a long time, but I just kept putting it off or couldn't find the right way to express my thoughts.  Since we moved here and started this life, the most common questions I get are, "You just finished your PhD, and you're farming? Why on earth would you do that?  Don't you want to use your degree? What about research, won't you miss it?"  I could go on.  Anna gets these questions as well, so it goes both ways.

The short answer is -- yes, I just spent 10 years (yes, 10 years!) in graduate school, and now I'm farming. We couldn't be happier with our decision.  One of the things we find to be the hardest about this decision is explaining it to other people, and for me, feeling like I have to justify our choice.

The short of it is this -- we wanted a slower paced life, a simpler life, a life where we could provide for ourselves as opposed to going to work all day to make money to pay people to do the things we couldn't do for ourselves because we were at work.  We fully recognize that we are totally fortunate to be able to let go of our full time jobs in order to make this life for ourselves. We are working towards being able to make enough income from our farm to stop relying on savings.

Our goal for the first year was to get some infrastructure in place -- build a chicken coop, make a garden, get some beehives, install a greenhouse, etc.  We've gotten a lot accomplished this year, but we still have so many basic infrastructure things on our horizon -- finishing the greenhouse (that is an entire blog post itself -- maybe more than one), building a root cellar, establishing a business plan (this is a biggie -- we have no business experience)….the list goes on.  

Gratuitous picture of Oliver being adorable.

As far as using our degrees, missing research, etc. -- I really don't feel like my time in graduate school was for not.  There are a lot of basic biological principles that we apply to our lives here daily.  Having Anna's vet degree comes in handy at least once a day.  She's acutely aware of things that I wouldn't even notice -- a puffy eye on a chicken, the way an animal's gait changes when they're in pain, etc.  We have some pretty big plans to expand our animals here in the next couple years (stand by for more info), and I know that her skills will be invaluable when that time comes.  And as far as research is concerned -- there are, indeed, agricultural journals, and I have a couple friends who have published in them regarding some experimental techniques, etc.  We aren't looking to do that in the near future, but I'm certain it will be something we do in time. Additionally, all the time we both spent in school instilled a great desire to always be learning.  While I believe that one can always be learning no matter what your profession, I feel this is especially true in what we've decided to do.  Neither of us grew up farming -- Anna has always had a garden, but so much of this is new to us.  The learning curve is steep…and sometimes unforgiving. The amount we've learned in the past year is mind boggling, and I know we have more to learn yet…and always.

…and gratuitous Olive to break up the long flow of text with her cuteness.

Going back to the why of it all -- I really love living more in tune with nature and the seasons. It just seems the more natural way to be. In the summer, we're full of energy and life -- things are growing, the days are long and warm, and we are just more energized.  In the winter, things have settled -- the growing has stopped (or at least slowed), the days are short, dark, and cold, and we find ourselves wanting more sleep and less chaos. You can easily see these trends in nature -- both plants and animals are more active in the summer and spend a lot of that time preparing for winter when things are slower and less abundant. Obviously, not all plants/animals fit into this mold, but you get the idea (the biologist in me required that caveat).

This aspect of our decision was a big one for me.  I truly believe that this cyclical pattern to life is essential instead of the go-go-go to which we've all become so accustomed. Clearly, you don't have to change your entire life to do this, but for us, it was the right thing.  We wanted a life that was more centered on living.  Ironically, or maybe not, it is just this thing that has been the hardest for me lately.  I have become totally unable to happily have a slower winter.  It's like I have ants in my pants.  We have quite the winter projects list, and yet, I feel like I'm not doing anything….and it is driving me CRAZY!

This is something I've really been working on since moving up here -- learning how to chill out.  I blame my 10 years of graduate school for this one. Even after we've spent the day doing a ton of stuff around here, I often have the feeling that I didn't do any 'work' that day.  It is hard for me to grasp that what we used to do on the weekends is now what we do all the time….and on a grander scale.

One of the things that a lot of people who ask us the 'why' question think is that we're not doing anything with ourselves, that we've basically stopped working just because we haven't followed the traditional paths after graduate school. I find, for me, that even I'm struggling with the valuation of the work that we're doing here, so I have to understand when other people think we've lost it.  In my heart, I know we're doing a lot of work, and we're doing good work. I'm still working on getting my mind to agree, and that's ok.

So, in short (or not so short), this is why we do what we do.  And with that….

…gratuitous Baxter, looking adorable as always.

Our newest addition.

If you've been following our blog, then you know that our family seems to be ever expanding as of late.  We started with 2 dogs, 1 tortoise, and 1 axolotl.  We soon expanded to include 8 ducks, 9 chickens, and 1 more tortoise. Well, we've expanded once again…

Welcome, Baxter!  

We weren't even thinking of getting another dog, but Baxter just seemed to seamlessly fall into our family.  A coworker of Anna's from the clinic in Kittery sent Anna a picture of this guy with the caption, "Look who we have as a stray, available for adoption TODAY!"  Anna said when she saw the picture of him, her immediate thought was, "This could work and could be really good for our family." This is not the gut reaction one would expect her to have as we already have two dogs including one who doesn't get along very well with other dogs.  That being said, when she sent me the picture, I responded with, "OMG! It's our new family member!"  In all fairness, I was half joking, but I had a sneaking suspicion she wasn't.

I happened to be passing through Kittery the very next day (See?  Seamless.), so I stopped in to check him out.  It was my job to report back if he was family material or not.  Well, he won me over instantly.  He is a pretty typical 1-ish yr old Australian Cattle Dog -- in other words, he's kind of a crazy man.  In his defense, however, he had been in a kennel for the past 10 days.  Even Oliver would be wound after that much time in a kennel! Baxter had obviously been worked with before because he knows some basic commands.  His biggest challenge is keeping himself under control.  He has a LOT of energy and very little body awareness (read: bull in a china shop).

At any rate, he's been home with us since Thursday evening, and he has made some SERIOUS strides since his arrival.  Simply taking him for long walks (a couple hours in the morning and about an hour in the evening) is enough to keep his energy at a reasonable level. One of the main reasons we decided to adopt him was that we know we have the time and space, right now, to really give him what he needs.  Cattle dogs (and most herding breeds) need a TON of exercise and they need structure and someone to really commit to working with them.  Our guess is that his previous owners thought he was a cute puppy but didn't know what they were getting into with an adult cattle dog.  Breed research is SO important, but it is a step people often skip.  We know what we're getting into, we are ready for it, and working with him is so rewarding.

And now -- a photo montage of our walk today.

Oliver -- a.k.a., Farm Manager, Yard Boss, Teddy.  I'm pretty sure that he's enjoying the new addition as much as anyone because he gets a LOT more treats with all this training going on.  Baxter really wants to play with Teddy, and they have played some fetch together, but Teddy's not really down for the wrestling that Baxter's interested in doing.

Olive -- a.k.a. Weetus, Farm Manager. We are really hoping that Baxter and Olive can become good friends and that Baxter will become a good playmate for her.  Olive doesn't like change in her routine, so the addition of a high energy young dog is going to take some time.  So far, their interactions have been really positive.  Olive has been off leash on walks while Baxter is on leash because we want it to be her choice when they interact.  So far, so good, and there have been some good butt sniffs in both directions. We've been keeping them separate in the house, but this morning Olive voluntarily came downstairs to hang out for a while.  Baxter was on leash, but the entire interaction was good, and we made sure to end it on a positive note. 

On day 1, walking on a leash was REALLY hard! Three days later, he's walking right next to us, loose leash, and focused.  He still has a lot to learn, but the progress we've made in the past three days is pretty amazing.  Even though he would be totally worn out by a lot of running, trying to walk like a gentleman is really mentally exhausting. We're alternating between heeling and free time, and he really seems to be getting it. :)

We're also working on focusing on us and looking to us for instruction.  Olive and Oliver already have this down, but it is good practice for everyone and provides positive close encounters for all dogs. 

Staying with me can be REALLY hard when your siblings are running around like crazy people!  Positive interactions all around!

When he's not walking with us, he has 'free time' on the leash.  He's allowed to roam and sniff all he wants.  What usually ends up happening at some point is free time turns into snuggle time.  This guy is a serious love bug, and all he wants to do is snuggle.  We do need to work on petting him and giving him affection without it turning into crazy dog time.  And now, a snuggle-fest montage in which Teddy is totally positive that Baxter missed a treat somewhere…..

YAY! You're petting me!

This is my best day EVER! 

I can get closer to you, I know I can!

YAY! I love this SO much!

I'm gonna do it, I'm gonna kiss ya!

Look out!

And if a two hour walk through the forest wasn't enough, our morning walks end with some long line fetch and working on recall. :)

He's fast!  And, again, Teddy is looking for dropped treats.

We're working on getting the ball back.  We've made some progress, but there's always more to do. 

So, there you have it.  We couldn't be happier with his progress, and we're positive he'll fit in perfectly to our family.  It is possible that the cumulative days of exercise are starting to catch up with him.  After our morning walk, he is lying quietly in his crate (which he has taken to like a CHAMP!) and struggling to keep his eyes open.