Technical Editor/Adviser Wanted

[estragon]

Knowledgeable/experienced (or both) at subsistence farming, specifically milking cows and raising chickens for eggs. Some specifics: How do you clean cows' stalls? How do you keep a chicken coop clean? Can you compost animal waste? What is minimum amount of milk to sell to a farmers' marketing cooperative? Story plot is woman, wife of laborer, does some farming for food for her family while husband works for cash. She has baby at home. I've got the technical adviser for home birth of person. I don't have IM, so if interested, please contact me via contact link on my author's page. Many thanks.

 

[AsylumSeeker]

Knowledgeable/experienced (or both) at subsistence farming, specifically milking cows and raising chickens for eggs. Some specifics: How do you clean cows' stalls? How do you keep a chicken coop clean? Can you compost animal waste? What is minimum amount of milk to sell to a farmers' marketing cooperative? Story plot is woman, wife of laborer, does some farming for food for her family while husband works for cash. She has baby at home. I've got the technical adviser for home birth of person. I don't have IM, so if interested, please contact me via contact link on my author's page. Many thanks.

It's great that you are researching before writing. I know a guy who has some land and, instead of mowing, he keeps a few cows. I'll see if I can track him down, maybe I can answer one or more of your questions. Or not. I'll do what I can do and get back to you if I can help in any way.

Best of luck!

 

[estragon]

Asylum, many thanks. My great fear in writing about anything I don't know well or haven't done myself is that someone who does know and has done will read my story, and, after reading the second sentence, fire off what JK Rowling called a howler, blasting my laziness, ignorance and presumption. And I'll have no defense.

I was scared about my Master and Commander series; while it got poor reviews as to the writing, at least no one called me on the technicals. But I don't want to try to sneak by again.

 

[bronzeage]

Knowledgeable/experienced (or both) at subsistence farming, specifically milking cows and raising chickens for eggs. Some specifics: How do you clean cows' stalls? How do you keep a chicken coop clean? Can you compost animal waste? What is minimum amount of milk to sell to a farmers' marketing cooperative? Story plot is woman, wife of laborer, does some farming for food for her family while husband works for cash. She has baby at home. I've got the technical adviser for home birth of person. I don't have IM, so if interested, please contact me via contact link on my author's page. Many thanks.

Cow milking stalls are are cleaned with a water hose. The dirt and manure should be flushed into a septic system. A healthy dairy cow can produce about 5 or 6 gallons a day. A dairy coop will probably accept a minimum of of one cow's production. The farm would have to meet the coop's sanitary and refrigeration standards.

You don't keep a chicken coop clean. It's not possible. If chickens are allowed to roam free in a fenced yards and roost on rails, everything is covered in chicken shit. They will not foul their nest.

The manure of any herbivorous animal can be composted and used for fertilizer.

 

[estragon]

Thanks, Bronze. Do you want credit as a technical adviser? If so, terms are you get to see all drafts. If you don't like the final pre-publication draft, your sole right is to withdraw your name as technical adviser. As author, it's my story, but you need not have your name credited on anything you disapprove. And no derogatory public remarks by either author or adviser. Communication by private e-mails.

 

[AsylumSeeker]

Thanks, Bronze. Do you want credit as a technical adviser? If so, terms are you get to see all drafts. If you don't like the final pre-publication draft, your sole right is to withdraw your name as technical adviser. As author, it's my story, but you need not have your name credited on anything you disapprove. And no derogatory public remarks by either author or adviser. Communication by private e-mails.

There you go. To be honest I did not have contact with the person who owns the cows, was bus working. But I think you might have your answer/

 

[ishtat]

Knowledgeable/experienced (or both) at subsistence farming, specifically milking cows and raising chickens for eggs. Some specifics: How do you clean cows' stalls? How do you keep a chicken coop clean? Can you compost animal waste? What is minimum amount of milk to sell to a farmers' marketing cooperative? Story plot is woman, wife of laborer, does some farming for food for her family while husband works for cash. She has baby at home. I've got the technical adviser for home birth of person. I don't have IM, so if interested, please contact me via contact link on my author's page. Many thanks.

No Co-op is likely to accept less than 50 gallons milk daily. Facilities would have to meet a bunch of regulations for refrigeration, cleaning procedures etc. Milk will be tested daily, for bacteria, types and levels, plus butterfat (BF) and SNF content. Hand milking will not be allowed. My guess is that it would cost a minimum of $50 000 to set up the smallest milking unit, which would pass all the health regulations.

I suggest she buy an old butter churn, convert the excess milk into butter and feed the skim milk to a pig which she can keep in the back yard somewhere.

My Dad and grand dad were dairy farmers. Cows produce serious amounts of muck and can crap up to 20 times a day especially in Spring when the grass is fresh. A 100 cow herd would need a slurry pit about the size of 2-3 Olympic swimming pools just to store the muck produced by the cows when they are indoors in winter!. My Dad described his work as the management of grass and muck with milk as a minor by product!

Final suggestion: make the cow a Jersey rather than a Holstein because the Jersey is much smaller, needs less food, produces less crap, and has a higher BF milk which is better for butter.

 

[estragon]

Ishtat, many thanks. Do you want TA credit? Terms as above stated.

 

[AsylumSeeker]

Ishtat, many thanks. Do you want TA credit? Terms as above stated.

Write your story my friend. You've done your homework

 

[estragon]

Write your story my friend. You've done your homework

Oh, Asylum if only it were that easy! Thanks to all who contributed their knowledge. At least the technicals won't be utterly absurd.