Critters Staying Warm

“Thank goodness for shelter!” Mom exclaimed half breathless as we hurried into the basement door. A brisk wind had picked up as we walked back from Farmstead to our house, and the day was still waking up from having been -30 degrees overnight.

“My face!” I winced. “Do I still have a face?” I whipped my hands from my fleece gloves and held my warm palms to my chilled cheeks. “I’m going to have to warm up a little before heading back out to chores.”

When I do head back out, I’m completely bundled such that only my nose is peeking out. The animals are working their own bundling magic, with birds fluffing their feathers they grew fresh from their fall molt, sheep enjoying the long wool they’ve grown all summer and fall, and the pigs being as bristly as ever and snuggling into their piles of straw. While I have to pile on the layers, animals amazingly grow their own each year!

When it gets this cold, Kara gives Blue the horse her insulated jacket for extra warmth. Blue has grown her bushy winter coat, but she greatly appreciates the extra warmth of the quilted jacket. Our guard donkeys, on the other hand, are not fans of wearing clothing. It truly demonstrates how domestication changes attitude and need. Standing next to Blue, Daisy our current guard donkey looks like a total fluff ball!

As Belle, our original guard donkey grew older and frailer, she eventually accepted wearing a coat in the deep cold. She had a hard time maintaining weight and growing enough fur in her senior years, and the warmth of the coat eventually outweighed her stubbornness. Daisy, who is a wild rescue, so far has had other opinions.

Kara worked with Daisy to see if she would accept Belle’s old coat, now that Belle has passed on. Daisy sniffed the garment, her eyes growing sad for a bit remembering her friend. Finally, Kara got the coat on, and Daisy just froze, which is her response when there is something new that she doesn’t like. Blue the horse came over to convince her to keep walking to stay warm, and it seemed that the coat was going to fit well and stay on.

But by morning, there was Daisy without a coat, and there was the coat on the ground, still fully buckled. She’d made her Houdini statement that the coat wasn’t necessary—fur and fat was just fine, thank you very much.

Another way the animals stay warm is to consume more calories, so they can produce more heat. This year, we’ve been utilizing the cold weather to facilitate a major freezer reorganization, which sometimes yields strange buried treasure that you haven’t seen in years because it was tucked in the bottom or the back! This included quite a stash of old product to give to the chickens. They might as well enjoy it and turn it into heat and eggs!

One such treasure was a very large package of lamb livers saved from the butcher, especially for feeding to the chickens in the winter. It was frozen in one solid brick, almost heavier than I could carry, so while I may have wanted to give them this vitamin-rich treat a few at a time, there was no getting the livers apart. So, I slit the plastic and gave them the whole sheet. It’s so cold, I thought, they’ll have to work at this a bit.

But by morning, every last liver was gone, and the hens were looking at me as if to say, “Please, miss, we want some more!” Just as Daisy had give her opinion that she didn’t want the coat, the chickens had given their opinion that they could chomp down any volume of goodies I wanted to bring their way.

The not-so-furry humans on the farm, however, cradle our warm cups of tea, pile on the wool sweaters, and warm up next to the wood stove. Compared with the furry and feathered friends, we’re wimpy! Mom was right, thank goodness for shelter.

Be sure to keep your frosty cheeks and toes warm out there. See you down on the farm sometime.