Of Cows and Solar Cookers

Here's Emma feeding our two new calves-- Daisy and Kit Kat. Yup... the Hurlburts of Colfax are officially cow-owners.

People who know me realize that I do not dote on animals, as many do. So the fact that we went from two pets (one cat, one dog) to nine pets (add four chickens, a horse, and two cows) in the course of one summer may seem puzzling to some.

However, I find that I do not mind these outdoor animals. The calves and horse are at our neighbor's farm, just a short walk away. Emma and Jon feed the calves three times a day (which only needs to be done for the first month).

As far as the chickens go... perhaps I have found my "animal match". For reasons that I don't quite get, I like the chickens.

At right: Leila watches Dot and Pumpkin forage for bugs.

One factor, no doubt, is that the chickens don't require much effort on my part. They wander about our yard and woods, but never stray far from their coop. So we don't have to keep a close eye on them or worry they'll wander to a neighbor's.

They tuck themselves into the coop at night; we need only lock the door. They eat corn, table scraps and stray insects.

They don't need petting. They like people, and the rooster in particular seems friendly. But their little lives are complete and busy without me making a fuss over them. They are happy without any input from me-- much less complex and needy than a certain dog and cat I know.

When I hang clothes outside, garden, or walk around the yard with Leila, they are there for company and entertainment. But they are not much more demanding than flowers... or fish.

As you see: the perfect pets.

Of course, they do leave "poo" around the yard. But the rain washes it away eventually, and their range here is large enough that it doesn't accumulate in any one spot too badly.

Other news: Jon is home again. He went to North Dakota for a week, but the new job didn't pan out.

So he's back-- without too many regrets. This life that we've been building for ourselves in the country is a whole different pace than we had in the city... and much different than Jon's lonely life on the road building power lines.

Earlier this week friends from Eau Claire-- Becky and her daughter, Avala-- came for a visit. Michael and Emma used to have regular play dates with Avala when we lived in Eau Claire, so the kids had lots of catching up to do.

We had a simple but satisfying lunch of quiche and salmon patties, baked in the solar cooker that Becky had brought along to show me. She bought the cooker at a local energy fair and was so impressed with it that she's now selling them (if anyone's interested, let me know and I'll give you her contact information).

We set the solar cooker up on the front porch. Aluminum panels reflect sunlight onto each other and then down into the clear-covered cooking chamber. A thermostat let us know when 350 degrees was reached (and it didn't take much longer to preheat than a conventional oven would). Our food was cooked using nothing but the sun... and it took only slightly longer than it would have otherwise.

After cooking you open the clear lid, to let the inner box cool down for awhile, before folding everything up for transport. The cooker has a carrying handle and is completely portable. It really is impressive.

The quiche we ate while Becky and Avala were over had spinach in it. But the next day I tried a quiche that our farming neighbor, Johnne, made with Lamb's Quarter-- a humble weed that I've pulled from our garden plenty of times.

Picked young and eaten raw, it tastes like other garden greens... and rather like spinach. Cooked in the quiche, I thought it tasted exactly like spinach. I was amazed to hear that it wasn't.

Johnne is a big fan of Lamb's Quarter not only because it's free and abundant on her farm, but also because it's healthful and a good source of calcium-- important for her because she has trouble digesting milk.

I'll close with a peek inside our robin's nest, hidden in the hedge outside our front door. Yesterday we had three tiny blue eggs; today there are two... and this newly hatched baby bird. You can see it here with it's mouth open wide, waiting for a meal. Pretty cool, huh?