Probiotics for penicillin tummies..

Yesterday I made kefir and yoghurt.  Kefir for me and yoghurt for Mia.  Yoghurts contain probiotics,  a probiotic is the opposite of an antibiotic.  And guess who has been shot full of antibiotics. 

Mia had some of her insides  literally dragged through some pretty unclean areas before being washed and tucked back in. We decided that she was at terrible risk for infection, so over the course of those first two days I gave her two shots of  broad spectrum penicillin, an antibiotic.  Note the broad spectrum. I know this is not organic but I believe absolutely that this was necessary.  However the antibiotic depletes the good and bad bacterias in the gut as it surges through.  Although it is useful to fight an extreme case of infection the penicillin is indiscriminate.  This is only a theory but it makes sense to me.  In our family we always follow penicillin with a probiotic.  Though I have not had an antibiotic in over twenty years.  I have been lucky.

So now to help her quickly build Mia’s little bacterial ecosystem  back up and tend to her gut health,  (probiotics are also widely used for bowel and vaginal health).  I shall feed her a small pot of home made yoghurt (garlic flavoured), every day, for a good while.   I will just mix this into her small corn and oats ration, along with a dash of real cider vinegar and feed her seperately.  I will only add a little initially so she gets used to the taste and build it up as we go. We need to do everything we can to help her fight for her own recovery. 

I collected some good fresh raw milk from the farmer down the road. Heated it to almost boiling point, cooled it, then added my sachet of yoghurt culture (or 1/4 cup of fresh plain Greek yoghurt- I use Danon)  For the next 6 batches I will use a pot of this yoghurt as a restarter, after that we will start afresh. Otherwise Lactobacilli (which is a bit more acidic) becomes too dominant.

This is just for Mia, I am not touching Mama’s diet at all as she is toddling along just nicely, and if it ain’t broke don’t fix it! Mama will get yoghurt after her lambs are born (knock on wood my friends!)

Incidently yoghurt is also good for the gut health of your chickens, just mix it into their grain. And your dogs and cats and yourself of course. 

For me I made a batch of Kefir.  Because drinking your probiotics in a smoothie is dellicious.  Kefir is a fermented milk. I use the starter sachets as I have not come across anyone with the granules yet. The grains are hard to find. (Certainly impossible to find around here where they think that Probiotics is the name of a transformer!) It will take about 24 hours to start working, then I will make  wonderful smoothies with the last of the frozen blueberries or my peach preserves. Or maybe I will get all outrageous and mix them all together! But only mix in your fruit when you are ready to drink the smoothie.  So all the good bacteria stay intact.

For my vegan friends you can make a water Kefir,  which  is tasty too, especially mixed with fruit. And your insides will thank you.

Good morning! Yesterday we had another day of dreadful wind, but a notch down.  Only a small notch though, it was so strong at one point that  it smashed another barn door open,  releasing the cows into the big wide world.  It seems the wind is determined to get them out.  I looked out the window and Daisy was out in the drive licking the newly returned Green Dodge ’53 truck. What can you do with a cow like that? She was encouraging the Bobby  to come over for a taste when The Matriarch and I went out with buckets and led them back in.  Of course Daisy was faster than me and got her big fat head right IN the bucket pushing it to the ground and I had to drag the bucket along  pulling the half ton of munching cow with me, but we managed in the end and now they really are locked into the barn.  Poor wee Queenie was a bit slow on the uptake and was still in the pen looking out the window!

It is raining this morning. I love the rain in little inch doses like this. After everyone’s breakfast,  I will go out with my tools and girlie arms and make some repairs so the cows can come back out into their playground. (Animals have to be outside especially in this lovely rain) Then on the weekend John will surreptitiously dismantle my pathetic repairs and do them again with the right stuff.  He will not say a word to me, I will just find them refixed correctly. And all will be good.

Everyone was well and happy at my 4am check, and so now Off We Go to start our day.

Good morning

celi