I had three deer given to me a few years ago and used most of the ground meat in chili but the rest is so gamy tasting that we don’t much like it. Will canning it change the flavor. I have only canned chicken and I love it that way. So easy to use and never any loss due to power outage.

Nancy Foster

No, canning meat will not remove off flavors. I’m guessing that your “gamy” taste in your three year old venison (probably frozen?) is freezer burn. I’ve been told that if you soak the meat in milk it will remove the taste/smell. I haven’t tried it because I don’t freeze meat any more, I can it all. Let me say here that I have hunted for a whole lot of years and have never had a deer that provided us with “gamy” tasting meat. If you take care of the meat like you should, bone and de-fat it, it should be very good.

The next time you have abundant venison, why don’t you go ahead and can a bunch up. Everyone that tries mine says how good it is. Even people who “don’t like venison”. — Jackie

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Dear Jackie

Monica Blaney
Ottawa, Ontario

I’m so excited for you!  Wow are you in for adventure.  I love it.  I really prefer a root cellar in the basement for cold climates.  First of all, it’s really hard to keep a separate root cellar from freezing when the temperature gets below zero for a week or more.  And secondly, it’s sometimes brutal running back and forth to one when it’s snowing and blowing.  In the basement, you can pick the coldest corner, usually a north corner, partition it off from the rest of the basement, which is heated at least to some extent.  If it is a warm basement, you can just insulate the walls of the root cellar to keep it cooler.  Then if it gets really cold, you can simply open the door to circulate some warm air into you storage area.

Right now we heat our house with a combination of propane wall heaters and our wood burning kitchen range.  Next spring, we’re continuing our new greenhouse around the southeast corner of the house and running it along the east end.  Then in the southeast corner, I’m putting in a wood burning stove.

Eventually, we want to put in a masonary chimney from the basement up to the peak of the roof and we’ll install a wood stove down there.  Or maybe we’ll opt for the outside boiler.

I do like these; they are totally safe, no wood mess in the house and you can burn some big stumps, etc.  You get free hot water and can also heat a workshop, garage or whatever.  My son, Bill, has one down at his place and likes it a lot.  We need to figure out a way to operate it via battery bank, as they do need a pump to circulate the water.  Now you’ve got ME excited!

As for make/model of wood kitchen range, I really don’t have a favorite, although Monarch is a tried and true brand.  I have one now and like it just fine.  There are sure some nice ones on the market, new now, but I don’t have that kind of money.  Only in my dreams!  Try to find one with warming ovens and a large fire box so you can keep a fire longer on a fill.  And if you buy a used one, make sure the grates aren’t burned out.  This sometimes happens when folks either burn coal in a wood grate or burn a lot of hardwood.

Have fun!  And keep us posted on your new homestead. — Jackie

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I really enjoy your column and this immediate gratfication blog! Can you talk more about your goats. Do you have a buck? I have one and need to separate him from the does, but don’t know how far away to prevent him from getting their milk stinky. Also, how do you milk? And how often? I figure you built a milk stand for “the girls” but I’d like to see how you did it. So many of the stand plans I have seen are for dehorned goats- I have left the horns on mine so they have half a chance against predators. Will you eventually allow yours to graze your land? Is that why you have the donkeys – as goat guardians?? My plan is to make some cheese for home use – which from your past columns I should be able to can – and to use some of the milk to continue making my goat milk soap. Any suggestions would be really appreciated! One other question, I have heard goats will not cross water – I find that hard to beleive but have never tested it myself for fear of losing a goat. Any thoughts or experience on that topic??? Thanks a million!
Lyn Ankelman
Thorsby, AL

I’ll try to answer your questions. Yes, I have a buck. Actually three, counting two of his buck kids from last year, which I have for sale. My bucks are all Boer crosses from good producing does. I love Nubians with their floppy ears and bright surprising colors, but they tend to be “racehorse” built so I’m putting more body on them and it’s working. I still get the milk but have a stronger body. Mine are all disbudded.

I keep my bucks across the aisle from the does when they’re stinky (breeding season). When the does are bred, I often let the buck run with them and haven’t had any problem with buck smell in the milk. Bedding with shavings helps absorb the urine, which does smell bucky. You don’t want your doe laying in that with her udder! Of course, you always wash and rinse her udder before you milk and milk a couple of squirts out. This removes any odors from manure or urine and also any bacteria wedged in the ends of her teats.

Yes, I will be putting them on the pasture. A fenced pasture. And the donkeys will be run with them, both for possible protection and just because they’ll like it. I already put one doe in with them and worried about them “playing” too hard with her. But she ruled the roost, kicking them out of their feed pan!

But even without the donkeys, I’ve never lost a dehorned goat to a predator. In fact once my old brown doe chased a coyote all across our three acre goat pasture. And she had been dehorned. The only time I’ve known goats to be harmed by predators, it was when they were chained up and couldn’t defend themselves or when a pack of neighborhood dogs tore into a friends kid pasture. We’ve lived with coyotes, wolves, cougars and eagles and haven’t lost one yet or had one injured. BUT we DO bring them in each and every night. I think that is the key. Night belongs to the predators; leave tasty meals out and you may loose it.

I milk by hand, twice a day. My current stand came from the dump! It’s basically a short table with two upright 2″x4″ posts with a 1″x4″ across on each side of the top, making a slot. Another 2″x4″ upright pivots from a bolt drilled through the bottom two 1″x4″s, letting it slide to the side, making a big V. When the doe hops onto the stand she dives her head through the V to get the feed in a pan on the other side. I slip the V closed on her neck and slide a bolt through the holes that line up on top, pinnng the V closed comfortably. This will work for a horned doe. She quickly learns to tilt her head to snake her horns through the V. You can always make the V wider, if necessary.

I’ve never saw the goat that would willingly cross water, as in swimming or wading a creek or pond. Horses and cattle, yes. Goats, no. In fact, when it rains, they come yelling and running for their shed. They don’t like water. Mine will take a huge running jump to get through a big, shallow puddle while I have them out for a walk. But they do not like it one bit.

It’s tough, having horns on goats. They can’t be fenced with the handiest fencing, stock panels, because they can get their heads through the fence (don’t ask me how!), but can’t get back out and can strangle. They can also strangle on their own collars, their pasture mates’ collars, break their own kids’ legs (by getting them in the narrow V where they meet), poke you in the face accidently, or mash your fingers when you try to lead them (on purpose!). I’ve had goats for 45 years and am totally in favor of disbudding all kids soon after birth. I hate it but they forgive you in five minutes and it’s done for life.

I suppose if I was running a herd of 500 goats out in the brush country of south Texas or in the mountains of Montana, I’d probally leave the horns on. But I don’t. My goats are in pens and handled every day. I like to make it a pleasant experience for all of us, including our goats. — Jackie

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I was hoping you knew of a good seed exchange/ seed swap either over the net, through a mail service or seed company. If not Backwoods home should start one.

David Kleis
Kennwick, WA

If you type in “seed exchange” on your browser, you’ll find a bounty of different groups that swap seeds at no cost. I don’t do this, but exchange seeds with friends and neighbors. I really don’t have time for much mail exchange.

Running a seed swap is a tedious business; some folks don’t send their seeds, don’t pack them well enough or complain about the seed they get. It’s probably more than anyone at BHM could handle; we have all we can do on our individual homesteads and with the magazine! — Jackie

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Brrrrrr!  All of a sudden it’s winter.  Real Minnesota winter.  Last night it got down to -9 degrees and the HIGH today was a windy 9 above!  To top it off, we have a winter storm warning out for tomorrow afternoon, evening and Sunday.  Sigh.

Did I tell you we were behind in getting our winter’s wood on the porch because we were behind in getting the greenhouse done?????

Suddenly, it’s a must to get a good chunk of our huge wood pile in, under cover before it gets buried in two feet of blowing, drifting snow.  And being that David was in school today, I was elected to get done what I could.  After he gets back, there’s only an hour before it’s dark, so we’re limited in what outdoor activities we can do.

Our chainsaw chain was getting dull and I didn’t want to take the time to sharpen it, partly because I knew there was a new loop of chain in a box on the shelf.  I knew that I could just throw that on and get to work.  So I got out a wrench and took the sprocket cover off and pulled the bar slack to remove the chain.  Of course there’s always a huge amount of oily sawdust packed in everything, so I took a few minutes and cleaned it away.  Too much sawdust can plug the oiler, bind the sprocket and affect the performance of the saw.

Once clean, I set the saw on top of our woodbox in the kitchen and got the new chain out of the box, hoping that for once, the right chain got into the right box at the factory!  Yep.  Looked right.  Then I carefully turned the chain so the cutting edges were forward on top of the bar.  Don’t laugh.  Once I was in a hurry and slipped the chain on.  Backwards!  Was that embarrassing!  And it’s easy to do, too!

I had to loosen the tension on the chain to engage the tightener into the bar.  But once the cover was loosely bolted in place, I could adjust the chain tighter so that it just lifted clear of the bar.  Then, tightening the nuts, I was in business.

I cut, split and hauled two wheelbarrow loads of wood, then cut up and stacked a bunch of lengths so when David got home we could get at it hard.  And we did.  We hauled in five wheelbarrow loads more and put it in our pile on the back porch, split a bushel basket full of kindling, then pulled out more lengths to cut tomorrow morning.  The storm should give us tomorrow morning to work.  I hope…..

By then it was dark and we went to work in the donkey pen in the barn to make it more air-tight. You see our cute donkeys thought it was fun to rip the tarp off their gable end of the barn….back when the poop was two feet deep in there.  And boy did the wind blow in bad during our last little storm.  I had wanted to get that end sealed with nice tongue and groove lumber like the south end, but we ran out of nice weather real quick.  So we stapled the tarp back up, nice and tight and packed hay into cracks at the eaves.  I’m going to nail a blanket over the door opening so they can come and go.  I wonder if they’ll leave it up????  If I lock them inside, they get bored and chew the wood.  Not a good habit.

I gave them rubber tubs to play with and they have a round bale of hay to nibble on any time they want.  It has pretty much stopped the cribbing (chewing wood).  I don’t want to have them start up again.  But I don’t want wind whipping snow into the cozy barn, either!

When we were done, I threw a bale of grass hay into the donkey pen and goat pen so they had a cozy place to lay down when it was cold and stormy.  The stars were out bright and the wind had died down when we walked to the house.  I went in, but David went out and fired up his snowmobile and gave it a warm-up run.  If it snows like it’s supposed to, he’ll be out enjoying all our backwoods trails!  Brrrr.  I’ll throw another log on the fire.

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My sister called me tonight to remind me that we are under a winter storm warning, the first of the season. We’ve had a couple of inches of snow before this, but it all melted.  Now it’s snowing and blowing big time.  It’s gorgeous; big flakes, all sparkly and fluffy, whirling here and there, piling up.  We’re supposed to get six inches with wind.

But, luckily, yesterday and the day before were on the weekend and David was home.  So the two of us got busy and did a lot of our pre-winter winter getting ready stuff.  Friday he hauled 100 square bales of hay with the help of our good friend Jim Bonnette.  And they stacked and tarped them nicely.  We also cut firewood.

Saturday, we backed the pickup to the pile and started splitting wood.  We split a load, then David drives it around back of the house, backs up to the walk-out of the basement, then tosses the wood up onto the porch, to me, and I throw it in a pile next to the house logs.  Of course, the floor and logs are protected by old sheets of plywood and OSB.

We did that most of yesterday, watching the pile grow.  Then toward dark, we grabbed some steel T posts and went to pound posts in the new pheasant pen and where the donkey corral will be enlarged to twice its present size.  I’d been putting it off, but the temperatures have suddenly dropped drastically.  Like the HIGH for the next week will be something like 9 degrees.  You don’t want to know what the LOW is going to be!  That equals FROST in the ground.  And when that happens it is nearly impossible to pound steel posts.

Oops.  We waited a couple days too long.  It was a brutal job.  We got seven in and both of us ran out of steam.  David is fighting a long lasting cold and just ran out of energy.  We quit and tonight in the snow, finished the last two posts.  Luckily, we found a grassy spot where they pounded down fairly well.  Except the rocks they hit.  Oh well, it’s done.

So by flashlight, we gathered tools we might lose in the snow (like for all winter), picked up coiled garden hoses and went in the house with snow swirling around us.  Four inches, already.

I went out onto the porch and grabbed an armload of our split firewood, all nice and dry.  After poking up the fire,I added a couple of sticks and watched it catch.  Oh, how nice it is that we got that wood up!

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