Hello from Southwest Michigan!

Hello, everyone!

I and my boyfriend own Happy Farm, in Battle Creek, Michigan. We have a one and a half acre property in a semi-rural neighborhood. Battle Creek has a lot of farmland, some of it even right in town, and many of the farms are well over 100 years old...so it seems that no one really minds us having livestock in an odd place. We've got an 80 year old stucco cottage and a pretty little piece of woodland on which we keep our herd. We have 4 dairy goat does currently: April (LaMancha), Roxy (Nigerian), Gem (LaMancha), and Ashley (LaMancha); one buckling, Boulder (Nigerian), 30-ish chickens (White Plymouth Rock and Old English Game Bantam), and 8 cats.

We're still kind of building and getting everything set up. We plan to build three small pastures for the animals, as well as breeding pens for the chickens. We're looking to buy a nice LaMancha buck for our herd, as well as maybe a meat doe or two, a few sheep, more chickens, and some other birds--geese, maybe ducks or turkeys, pheasant, pigeons. It's going to be a lot of stuff on a small farm, but we're trying to get as much use out of the land as we can. We are also going to plant a large garden, fruit trees/vines/plants, and build a greenhouse. The goal is to produce as much of our own food as we can.

I'm trying to add photos, but the computer isn't cooperating...I'll keep trying!