On May 10th the local Organic Certifier did their usual very thorough

inspection of the  farm and dairy and all the registers, documents and

spreadsheets involved in maintaining organic certification.

Pupils from two schools visited in April. Firstly, 28 Primary schoolchildren

came from Artzentales, a very small school from a nearby parish, in

which children of several ages share classes, something which became

apparent in the way they all helped each other.

Secondly 45 Secondary school students from Romo, Getxo, visited the

farm and dairy on the 16^th.

On the 19^th we went to the Lauaxeta School in Zornotza to spend an

hour with 26 eleven year olds, explaining how our farm has changed

over the years and what dairy products we make, we did a cheese

tasting session and finished with a questions and answers session

on all the information available on our small yoghurt label. This sort

of class is part of a Basque Government initiative for 10-12 year olds

known as “Nekazariak Eskolan” (Farmers into Schools) to complement

their programme of visits by Secondary School students to farms.

A group of seven friends, retired health workers visited the

dairy on the 29^th in the afternoon.

The weather was quite mixed throughout the month. Although the

temperatures were higher given the season of the year, we had several

quite cool mornings at the start of the month with temperatures dropping

to 4-6ºC. Daytime temperatures rose to a high of 25ºC although the first

two weeks of the month the thermometer rarely reached twenty. Rainy

days were mixed with warm drier days, with thunderstorms at the end

of the month (fortunately, once again, when we had managed to get

another load of silage done and slurry spread). We collected a total of

98 litres in the rain gauge, which means that the grass is now nicely

growing again ready for second and third cuts.

What did the cows eat? The cows were able to graze most

days and the few they could not was due to the rain (which softens

the earth which would then become muddy and compacted should

the cows graze) we gave them some dried alfalfa or grass silage.

The heifers have been out and about grazing the outlying fields for

some time.

we may get a bit of a hay crop, if the weather permits.

Hawthorn bushes/trees appear in quite a few hedges on the farm.

Funnily enough the flower of the hawthorn, known as mayflower in

England, does actually flower in May. This is an achievement given

the adoption of the Gregorian calendar in 1752 which meant every-

thing happened “later” on in the year. It also flowers in May here

in the Basque Country. Whilst the hawthorn gets its name from

the old English for hedge “haw” in England, in the Castillian lan-

guage (Spanish) the name “espino” refers to its thorny nature.

Hawthorns appear in numerous cultures and traditional medicines

and it’s fruit, young leaves and flower buds may be eaten.  The

species is also very important for many mammals, birds and

insects both for shelter and food. Cows may also be seen to chew

a few leaves very occasionally, although the hawthorn is not,

obviously, a main source of food for them.

Recipe of the month: Vanilla ice cream. As the weather is

warming up we have decided to include a recipe for ice cream.

There are loads of recipes for ice cream… with or without con-

densed milk, with or without flavours, with full cream milk, or

skimmed milk….. The recipe we have used is a very simple one,

and does not need such things as ice cream makers. It does,

however, need some time in the freezer, so you need to plan

ahead if you want to eat the ice cream at a particular time of

day.

Serves 8.

480ml milk

120g sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla essence

Mix together the milk, sugar and vanilla essence in a medium sized bowl,

stirring until all the sugar has completely dissolved. Pour the mixture into

a shallow, freezer-safe dish and place in the freezer. Once the first ice

crystals have formed, remove the bowl from the freezer every three

hours and stir the mixture thoroughly and then replace in the freezer.

The ice cream should be ready in about eight hours.

On May 9th, a bod from one of the local dairy breed associations

came to “assess” our cows. Basically the cows are rated according

to parameters such as height, shape, leg shape, udder shape, shape

and placement of teats, etc, the idea being to identify those cows

that best fulfill those criteria considered to be of interest for a good

milker, thus identify from which bull semen was used and promote

the bull/semen for future inseminations. Clearly, however, there is not

always agreement amongst different dairy farming models about which

criteria are “appropriate”. For example, a small, compact (stocky) cow

is given a lower rating than a big cow, whilst on our farm we are

actually actively looking for semen from more rustic Friesian cattle

which we consider are better adapted to our farm conditions. An

example of such a heifer from our herd appears in the photo below

and is obviously quite small and stocky. This cow would receive a

low rating under the current assessment criteria, whereas we consider

her to be much better for our farm.

The damp but warm conditions have favoured wildlife. We have already

spotted two species of snakes round and about the farm: a viperine

snake (Natrix maura) and a grass snake (Natrix natrix). The viperine

snake is not venomous but was given its name due to its obvious like-

ness to vipers… apart from appearance it is also known to rear up

and strike although without actually biting. Adults can reach a length

of 85cm although the one we spotted was more like 20-30 cm.

Grass snakes, also known as ringed or water snakes are native to Europe

and feed almost exclusively on amphibians but may also eat larva and

ants. They can live exclusively on dry land, which must be the case of

the snakes we see on the farm given that there is virtually no surface

water (in the form of ponds, or streams) in our fields or nearby. Adults

can reach 2 meters in length, although they are normally about 120cm

in length. This one was quite young (and only about 30cm long).

Although the reptile in the next photo looks like a snake it is actually a

slow worm (Anguis fragilis) and thus a type of lizard. As in the case of

other lizards, when trapped the slowworm can loose part of its tail to

escape and it looks as if this one has had to do so.

We also spotted this little toad (Bufo bufo).

In April two livestock farmers visited the dairy, Asier a dairy farmer

from near Santillana del Mar (Cantabria) and Carlos, a goatherd from

Talavera de la Reina (Toledo). They are both trying to change their

farm/marketing model inorder to deintensify, produce less milk and

instead of selling the milk to the big dairies, make and sell their

own dairy products. The visits to our farm and dairy were part of

a series of visits each is making to farms that have change produc-

tion and marketing models and direct interaction between farmers

is a practice actively promoted by Via Campesina as it permits

farmers to gather information without the sometimes “distorting”

influence of third parties.

On the 19^th we took part in a visit organized by the local Famers’

Union, EHNE for twenty-five people on a food sovereignty course.

The visit centered on different socio-economic aspects of livestock

farming projects in Karrantza and evidently spent sometime of land

tenancy issues. Following a summary of changes in access to land

by a local biologist, LuisMa de la Peña, we explained the situation

on the farm regards access to land, how this affects the possibility

of undertaken long term organic projects, etc.

We went to the weekly fair in Bilbao and also the annual “Enkarterri

Fest” held in Zalla on the 26^th and 27^th of May and to Barakaldo,

also on the 26^th and 27^th, to a small fair organized to coincidence with a cider festival.