Rodent-run Power

Read about a farm and home being powered with...
guinea pig poo (!) here...

Agents Milk Tray and Gingerbread reporting

Helloooooo ladies! I have chosen the alias Agent Milk Tray because all the ladies love Milk Tray *winks* and my lovely chocolate fur.
I live with my brother who will be introducing himself shortly. Our human is best friends with Mopsy, slave of Dido, Agent Lettuce. I like sitting with my brother on my Mummy or Daddy and eating my favourite treats such as sweetcorn, spinach and the odd bit of carrot.
My actual name is the same as a well known fictional bear and I share his love of pic-a-nic baskets.

Misfits Thanks Giving

In the United States, Thanksgiving is on the fourth Thursday of November. On this holiday, a Thanksgiving meal is prepared with all the trimmings; families gather together and talk,laugh, eat, while others watch a game or a parade filled with pilgrims, Indians and other colonial figures. Some families may even have their own yearly Thanksgiving traditions.

What is the history of Thanksgiving in United States? The initial "Thanksgiving" feast, held in 1621, was really a traditional English harvest celebration. The Pilgrims shared it with the Native Americans because they had taught the colonists to plant crops and hunt wild game. Without the Native Americans, the Pilgrims may not have survived the harsh winter and been able to celebrate their first harvest of plentiful crops in the New World. The colonists' first harvest feast lasted for three days. Food was served all at once, instead of in courses, so people ate whatever they pleased in the order that they desired. The more important members at the feast were given the best pieces of meat, while the rest of the diners ate whatever was closest to them. The history of Thanksgiving demonstrates that feasts like the one at Plymouth were held throughout the colonies after fall harvests. However, all thirteen colonies did not celebrate Thanksgiving at the same time. In 1789, George Washington became the first president to declare Thanksgiving a holiday. By the mid-1800s, many states observed the Thanksgiving holiday. Meanwhile, the poet and editor, Sarah J. Hale, had begun lobbying for a national Thanksgiving holiday. During the Civil War President Abraham Lincoln looking for ways to unite the nation, discussed the subject with Hale. In 1863 he gave his Thanksgiving Proclamation declaring the last Thursday in November a day of Thanksgiving.

In 1939, 1940, and 1941 Franklin D. Roosevelt, seeking to lengthen the Christmas shopping season, proclaimed Thanksgiving the third Thursday in November. Controversy ensued, and Congress passed a joint resolution in 1941 decreeing that Thanksgiving should fall on the fourth Thursday of November, where it remains. What is Thanksgiving today? At its heart, it's a holiday where family and friends congregate to catch up, reminisce, tell jokes, share scrumptious food and generally give thanks for all the good things in life-exactly what they did at the very first Thanksgiving.

Happy Thanksgiving All!

Misfits (Patches our spokespig)

Thanksgiving Report from Agent Butterloaf

Agent Butterloaf reporting in about Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving is a day where human beans get together with family, relax, and eat a lot (I'm an expert in relaxing and eating.) It originated back in 1691, when the Pilgrims set a day to celebrate harvest bounty after a successful growing season. The harvest was helped by advice from Native Americans, who taught the settlers how to grow crops in the new land.

Turkey is the main meat at the Thanksgiving dinner. Other common foodstuffs include: gravy for the turkey, green beans, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, stuffing, sweet potatoes, and pumpkin pie. One of my human beans bought a butternut squash for Thanksgiving and said it looked like me (not true, I'm much more pleasing.)

Happy Thanksgiving to all agents and their human beans!

It worked: Endive feast!!

Hi there,

The recipe for endive our aunts Yaya and Janneke posted worked!
Daddy slave didn't want to eat endive for another day,
so we got the leftovers:

Yummie!

P.S. Can you see how big Lily'explorer (top right) and Lil'wheeker (top left) have gotten?

Interviewing Caplin Rous using Twitter

Hi All,

We asked Caplin Rous the Capybara the first questions that were asked on the blog.

Below a copy of our Questions and Caplin's answers send using twitter.

We are @Guinygirlz (it means caplin said something to us), and @caplinrous (is us talking to caplin) is our friend Caplin.

We, Guinygirlz, said:
@caplinrous Okay first questions for the interview came in on our blog. http://bit.ly/b235ip
@caplinrous The piggyfriends, little piggy sanctuary in the UK, say they love you and wish they had a capybara friend! 9:44 AM Oct 11th via Echofon  
@caplinrous The piggyfriends adore the video that shows your cousins being tickled and falling over. (Do we have link of that?) 9:45 AM Oct 11th via Echofon

Caplin answers:
@Guinygirlz Here's the link to best capybara video EVER: http://youtu.be/3A2s70Z_LTg


Guinygirlz:
@caplinrous First question from Ghost, a piggy living with the Hamster in UK: What is the weirdest website you have found about capybaras? 9:46 AM Oct 11th via Echofon

Caplin:
@Guinygirlz: Gosh, I don't think I've ever found a weird capybara website! There aren't that many of them.
 

Guinygirlz:
@caplinrous Surrey squeakers, UK, think they eat a lot, they want to know what sort of quantity of food you munch your way through in a day? 9:48 AM Oct 11th via Echofon

Caplin:
@Guinygirlz I don't know how much I eat since mostly graze. Reports say 5 lbs of grass per day but I don't know. Plus 4 popsicles, 4 yogurts

Guinygirlz:
@caplinrous Last one now, Ghost again: Mummy is making us new bedding tomorrow so we would like to know what sort of bedding a capybara has? 9:49 AM Oct 11th via Echofon

Caplin:
@Guinygirlz I don't use bedding. I have dog beds around the house and on the porches. I urinate/defecate in a bowl of water in the bathroom 





If you have more questions for Caplin, please comment here.

Endive; the Recipe

Hi all,

Since the veggie of the week is endive, I thought I'd write down a recipe for endive, so here we go:

Ingredients:

- (Broad-leafed) Endive

Directions

As soon as the endive is dropped into your cage, it is important to start slicing and dicing right away since endive is at it's best while it is still crunchy. Endive is always a tasty veggie, but at it's best when fresh.
Eat whatever is left after you're done slicing and dicing.

Enjoy!
Yaya

The Leftovers

A crop of endive is kinda big, so it is okay to share a bit with your humans for the following traditional Dutch recipe:

Andijvie Stamppot
(endive 'mash pot')

Ingredients (serves 4 humans)
- 400 gr. broad-leafed endive
- 1200 gr. potatoes (preferably floury)
- 80 gr. butter
- 4 cups of water (500 ml)
- pepper, salt and nutmeg
- warm milk
- Rookworst (Dutch smoked sausage)
- mustard
Variation tip: stir little pieces of bacon and Dutch cheese into the stamppot. My human likes old dutch cheese, but it has a strong taste so if you're not sure a young dutch cheese might be better.

Directions
Put the potatoes into the water and boil them until they are soft (about 30 minutes). Cut up the endive into small strips. Boil the rookworst. Drain the water from the potatoes. Mash the potatoes with a bit of warm milk, butter, a pinch of salt, pepper and nutmeg. Stir in the raw endive and serve with the rookworst and a bit of mustard.

For the non-dutchies: rookworst and dutch cheese (e.g. Old Amsterdam)