SURPRISE!!!

Maggie turned out to be a great 'mother'- ing cow and unfortunately let Bindy's calf nurse this morning! EEK. So little Mr. Calf is no longer in with the milk cows but has his own buddy in a smaller pen. In the picture he is nursing Maggie (who's bag is much easier to get at) while Bindy licks him. Maggie would NOT leave him alone.

Papa got out of bed before me this morning and then came right back and told me I had to come see something. His voice was almost dull and so I got up right away and went and looked. He went to the kitchen window and I saw Chip in the sandbox and noted it.. nothing new there.. then he goes to the living room window.. and there is Bindy and Maggie.. and SURPRISE a little black calf. Maggie was licking him but I knew it was Bindys!! To back track a little bit Papa was not impressed for the same reason I was not. Bindy has a low bag, as you can see, and last week she stepped on her front left teat.. skinning the tip right off it. NASTY!! We've been quite worried that it would not heal in time for her calf.. and with her calf 3 weeks early (possibly our dates are off) it will really not be healed. In fact this morning it split open on the bottom and looks even worse! But it might be a better thing all in all as it can drain now.

Amazingly enough we think her teat will be fine for next year as the middle part where the milk ducts seems to be fine! But for now we will have a 3 teated cow to milk. Poor Papa has to milk her as I can NOT get that low.. he told me this morning that it made his belly sore to lean over that far to milk.. so there IS NO WAY I CAN!! Which means Papa will be getting up at 5ish to milk both cows until we get our milking buckets. They were suppose to be here 10 days ago but they sent the wrong ones so we are still waiting and still milking by hand. Papa says once we get them and he gets a mechanical milking system going I should be able to 'milk' mornings again which will be a great help to him.

SO now we are bucket feeding 2 calves, one we are babysitting for a neighbor who is going away for a month and our own little bull calf who as of yet has no name. He needs a B name and Bindy, Billy and Bobby are all taken.. any ideas??

Stubs Piglets!

Stub in her nest with her piglets and the kids and Papa looking on!

Well I wrote that last post in the morning and that early afternoon Stub started making a nest. She worked on it for hours and when Papa got home she had a large area sprinkled with straw and twigs so Papa brought her a load of straw and she made an even better nest. That night before bed I headed out to see if anything was happening yet and found her in labor with 2 piglets already born. I watched for a bit but nothing was happening so I went inside for 20 minutes and sure enough when I got back out there she'd had 2 more! So I found a semi comfortable place to sit and watched her give birth to the last 4!! Very cool. I'm totally amazed at how vigorous piglets are at birth! She would push one out and it would get up and start looking for a teat... and find it and drink and crawl all over her in the process. She didn't get up once the whole time. After watching for over an hour I realized there was something wrong with one of the piglets. He couldn't get up, wouldn't drink (I tried to get him too) and kept making a funny GAK GAK noise. The other piglets all had mini pig noises; grunts and squeals. I had not brought a flashlight or anything so I headed to the house and woke up Papa and he came out, with a flashlight, to take a look. Well we still don't know what was wrong with him but the flashlight showed a raw spot on his forehead that took up about half of it and was raw and bleeding. I think he got that after he was born from Stubs back feet.. Anyway Papa and I decided he was 'not quite right in the head' for whatever reason and so Papa took him away and took 'care' of him. It was really too bad as he was a nice sized piglet and it seemed a shame after all Stubs hard work. I found it very interesting that the other two Momma pigs came to 'talk' to Stub several times each while I was there. They didn't come close but came and grunted at her for a bit and then went back to their own babies. Sort of an encouragement party. The other 7 piglets are doing wonderful and she hasn't even noticed that the 8th is gone. She is VERY happy now and no longer lonely. Yesterday she left her nest only once and that was for a quick drink of water.

So to sum up. We bred 3 Berkshire gilts to a Berkshire boar, got 7, 8, and 8 piglets born. One piglet was born dead 24 hours after the rest which gave 6 pigger her 6, she had them early in the am (before 5:30). 8 pigger had 8 and they all lived and she had them at noon 5 days after 6 pigger. Stub had 8, lost 1, and had them between 9:30 and 10:30 pm 5 days after 8 pigger!! So we got 21 piglets total, 11 are females and 10 are males. If that last one would have lived we would have had even numbers males to females. I find it fascinating to see the patterns..

Poor Stub! Pig Update.

Here is the piglets 1st taste of grass.. This is 6 pigger and her babies with Stub in the background.
Poor Mrs. Stub still has not had her piglets yet. Her ground clearance is lower and lower every day and she looks super uncomfortable. Poor thing. She likes the other 2 Mommas piglets and she seems less content to eat and sleep these days. When ever we go in the pen she follows us around demanding attention.. I think she is lonely as she can't sleep with the other two anymore and so she's alone most of the time, which has never happened to her before.

Long tail 6 pigger (what we're calling the one who had 6 piglets) and long tailed 8 pigger are both doing really well. 6 pigger's piglets are 5 days older then 8 pigger's and we see them out and about quite a bit. She has moved them under Papa's IHC flatbed and seems very happy with the arrangements. She goes out and calls them to her and they all come running. They are SO CUTE!! Piglets play very much like puppies, running around, wrestling, jumping and tugging on ears. The other day I saw a piglet on top of his mom's head while she lay there. She lifted her head to smell him and off he flipped! Landed on his side and got up to go again!!

8 pigger's piglets are still in the pig hut she had them in but she does take them out for walks several times a day. The 2 batches of piglets have met several times and they seem to get sorted out on their own. The 1st time it happened Papa went out to referee but he thankfully wasn't needed. 6 pigger just walked away and called hers and they all came running leaving 8 pigger to count hers. Yes I'm convinced pigs can count. Since then they have met several times a day and manage to figure out who's is who's.

So far we have 7 males and 7 females and only one has lost it's tail. When we got our wieners last spring the people who bred them didn't know why some had tails and some did not. They thought it might be genetic, we'll have to see if Stubs babies have tails, but so far all of ours were born with tails. The only little one who lost a tail has half it it left and we think Momma may have stepped on the tail cutting it in half.

Oh and another interesting thing about pigs is that some are born whiners.. Really. 8 pigger has one little piglet, not even the smallest one, that is a true blue whiner.. and was born that way. The 1st day she had them we noticed him whining and he's still out there whining now. When she got up to eat one day Papa went to take a look at the piglets and count males and females for me and as he was in the hut petting them and making friends whiner started in and 8 pigger came RUNNING over. She stayed outside the hut and sniffed him thru the pallet then grunted at Papa as if to say.. 'yeah he's my whiner' and left!!

So far our experiment farrowing out pigs has been a HUGE success!! We never did separate the mothers and they have done wonderfully together. In fact I think it would have been more stressful for them to be apart as they would miss each other like Stub is missing the other two now. We did not clip their milk teeth and aren't going to. We have such a nice trusting relationship with the sows now that we don't want to jeopardise it in anyway. And only half of what we've read supports the cutting of milk teeth. In fact from what we've found people who farrow on acreages don't have problems with milk teeth or farrowing the way confinement farrowers do!!

Anyway IF Stub fallows the pattern she should have piglets tomorrow. That will be 10 days from 6 pigger and 5 days from 8 pigger! I'll keep you posted :)

Moving the Raspberry Plants...

What a chore!! LOL. But it's DONE!! Here is the line of holes for the raspberry plants. This is our west side fence line. The building you see is our neighbors shop. :) The line of raspberries goes about 200 feet down this fence line. There is a gap where the 'hill' is. SO the raspberries go from the end of the building here down the property line to the hill, skip the hill, and on the other side about 60 feet. Hopefully we will soon have a LOT of raspberries :) The last few years we've had to keep the kids out on days we want berries but now they'll probably have free range :)

Yes we know the line is not straight. The roots of trees long since gone got in the way of a straight line and we are ok with that.

The post hole digger we used to dig the holes on this side of the hill. The other side Papa dug by hand with a post hole clam shell digger.. this thing is MUCH faster and nicer!! And yes I held on to the other two handles.. 34 weeks pg and all. I was A BIT sore the next day and I'm not planning on doing it anytime again soon :)

Here they are all planted and fenced in. The black hose is a soaker hose so that we don't have to worry about getting a sprinkler there.

Here is the other side. Looking at the hill. We moved the raspberries out of the garden area so that we could convert the old garden to grass as the roof shades it too much for a garden spot. Besides that it makes a great hedge on the fence line :)

Gap tooth :)

J, who is 6, just lost his 5th tooth! I pulled it out as it was VERY ready to come out. It hardly bled and we can already see his adult tooth coming in where it was. He's lost 3 on the bottom and 2 on the top now and his mouth looks a little mismatched :)

Blueberries!!

Papa brought home a couple of blueberry bushes the other day and he planted them on the hill that surrounds the lagoon. One is Chippewa (top) and a Patriot (bottom pic) They will be right beside the lagoon fence when it is finished. We thought we'd start with 2 and see how they do before getting more. Both had flowers or berries or both on them when we got them and we are really looking forward to eating our own blueberries this year!!

More Pig Pictures :)

Grandma Griggs wanted to know if a pig looked pregnant.. Well does she?? The biggest thing we've found is they get a bag and their ground clearance gets lower and lower. This is Stub, the biggest of the 3 and the only pig left to farrow as Long Tail #2 farrowed today at noon.

Here is a picture of the 8 newest piglets on the farm!! They all look great and she is also a super good Momma!! She let Papa put more straw under the piglets then dug a hole with her nose and made them a nest right by her head. If anyone of them makes a peep she's checking them out to make sure she's not laying on them!! One had a really long cord and she let Papa pick him up and cut it short. The maternal instinct in these pigs is AMAZING!!!

Piglet and Kid Pictures!!

Momma Pig went to eat and have a mud wallow while we took some pictures of her babies and mine! She is a GREAT mother and we are so thankful. She is really careful with them and trusts us like piglet sitters whenever we go in there. The piglets were about 8 hours old here and she took off for the mud wallow just as soon as she could. We probably spent 30 or more minutes with them as she wallowed in the mud and ate! She only came back after we'd been gone for a while and then she gave them a little sniff and was satisfied we'd taken good care of them.

R petting a baby pig!

4 of the new born piglets. They are around 8 hours old in this picture.

E petting a piglet!

Jed petting a piglet.. probably the best shot of the bunch. The piglets seemed to enjoy all the petting and didn't even squeak.

L and a piglet eye to eye!!

L petting a piglet while the others look on.. he was the 1st one to pet one and they were all in awe! The straw area is the communal pig bed where she had them. The wood pile was stacked up and they shoved it over the 1st day in the pen and seem to like that area the best anyway!

Just watching them. They wandered here and there and the kids enjoyed watching them try and walk together.

Some faces :) Their ears are still pinned back from being crowded in the womb. It was supposed to rain that evening and so we moved them into a pig hut. They were nursing when we did it and she calmly accepted Papa taking two at a time until he'd taken the last two and then she looked a little heart broken but still didn't get up until I started to call her over to them. Thankfully Momma pig accepted the move and moved in as well as it rained almost half the night. This morning they all looked great, healthy and bright eyed!! :) Praise the Lord!!

PIGLETS!!!

Yup this morning at 5:40 I couldn't sleep so I stuck my head out the window and saw Momma pig with several little piglets wiggling around here!! She had 6!!! Great PIG!!! Needless to say Papa and I got up and went out to check it out!! Here she is nursing them. She did not have them in our little pig huts we made but in the communal pig bed. I guess she kicked the other 2 out as they were sleeping under the truck. In this picture Papa had just finished moving them all to her other side so they could nurse. She doesn't really mind him there which is wonderful!!

Here is a great picture of the piglets!! They have SO much color on them compared to ours that we got last year!! I told Papa we might consider keeping some of these just for the colors!! That way we could tell them apart. For instance this pig and the other one with a long tail do not have names yet as we can't tell them apart!! The 3rd gilt we have has no tail so she is Stub but these 2 are almost exactly the same!!

Here is Papa holding a little piglet, we think the 1st born, who was cuddled up to the little rubber feeder trying to stay warm! We think she had him 1st and then moved to the pig bed and he couldn't keep up! But Papa brought him over and she 'lectured' him and checked him out and now they are all together again and she loves him :)

OHHH they are SO CUTE!!! I'm sure E will want to hold one!! The kids are still sleeping but I will post their reaction!!

LIttle Girls On BIG Girls :) Pig Riding at the Griggs Farm!!

Papa was trying to teach the gilts ( a gilt in a pig is equal to a heifer in cattle) to drink out of the pig nipple and E really wanted to pet a pig so he helped her in. The pigs are very gentle and tame and the kids love them, but they are not allowed in the pen without us. E is small and she makes these 1 year old gilts look very big!! Of course as soon as E was in then pen then R wanted in to. She's too little to be set down inside the pen so Papa let her 'ride a pig'. R was NOT impressed!! She did smile after a minute but repeated "No Ride PIG!! No RIDE PIG" the whole time!! Then when Papa took her out of the pen she had to come tell me. "NO RIDE PIG!" several times. So I asked her if she rode a pig. YUP she says.. Was it fun? She kinda thought about it for a minute then says YUP!! Then there was no more 'No ride pigs' Just a few 'ride pigs!' She so funny!!

R, age 2 on a Berkshire gilt with E standing by for her turn, see the black horse?

E standing beside a Berkshire pig. The pig is 1 year old and about 300lbs and E is 3.5 years old and 25 lbs. You can see the teats on this gilt. These 3 pigs should farrow (have piglets) in the next ten days or so. This one we think will be first.

E riding a pig. She loved it!! Papa had to scratch the pigs the whole time they were 'riding.' Happy pigs. In the back ground you can see the 'pig huts' we made from pallets where we are hoping they will give birth in. Note the black plastic horse E is holding. Her FAVORITE toy that goes everywhere outside with her.

Papa's New Sign!!

As far as Papa's concerned.. that is all there is too it :) Oh and yes he displayed it very well. It sits right beside the front door!!

Chip Update!

Well Chipper is growing up! He's going to be a big dog but we knew that when we got him. He is still a very shy dog and several people who come in the yard say they never get to pet him as he won't come out from under the porch. He will normally bark at them but they never get to see him. He also has rivals.. hee hee. Papa and I think it's hilarious . Here he is with a few of them. The laying hens are free these days and love to pester him. He is very good about it and will chase them off 'his stuff' but knows that he can ONLY chase them off his 'stuff' not just 'play' with them. Did you know laying hens LOVE dog food :) Here are 4 laying hens 'begging' for dog food. We have 11 hens and this particular day I counted 7 hens 'begging' and poor Chip running in circles trying to keep them out of his bowl. Papa normally feeds Chip in the morning on the porch, which is much more protect-able, but this day L fed him on the ground as I was busy moving things around. Poor Chip really didn't know WHAT to do. Every time he turned around there was ANOTHER ONE!! LOL. We often see him laying on the grass chewing on something and keeping one eye out on any chicken that dares to come near him. The other day we even got to see a hen 'make like a rooster' and fluff up at him and challenge him. He was as shocked as we were and just stood there and stared her down.

We've recently started to try to teach Chip to 'go to Papa' or 'to J' but he really doesn't get it at all. Today I was telling Papa that as far as Chip is concerned we don't have names. Papa is MY #1 FAVORITE PERSON EVER. I'm THE #2 FAVORITE LADY PERSON and the kids are THE FAVORITE KIDS BUT ONLY IF #1 and #2 are not around. That sums up Chips loyalties perfectly!

"DON'T LEAVE IT ON THE DESK"

I don't normally pass these on but this one really touched me. I hope it touches you too.

"DON'T LEAVE IT ON THE DESK"

There was a certain Professor of Religion named Dr. Christianson, a studious man who taught at a small college in the western United States.

Dr. Christianson taught the required survey course in Christianity at this particular institution. Every student was required to take this course their freshman year, regardless of his or her major.

Although Dr. Christianson tried hard to communicate the essence of the gospel in his class, he found that most of his students looked upon the course as nothing but required drudgery. Despite his best efforts, most students refused to take Christianity seriously.

This year, Dr. Christianson had a special student named Steve. Steve was only a freshman, but was studying with the intent of going onto seminary for the ministry. Steve was popular, he was well liked, and he was an imposing physical specimen. He was now the starting center on the school football team, and was the best student in the professor's class.

One day, Dr. Christianson asked Steve to stay after class so he could talk with him.

"How many push-ups can you do?"

Steve said, "I do about 200 every night."

"200? That's pretty good, Steve," Dr. Christianson said. "Do you think you could do 300?"

Steve replied, "I don't know.... I've never done 300 at a time"

"Do you think you could?" again asked Dr. Christianson.

"Well, I can try," said Steve.

"Can you do 300 in sets of 10? I have a class project in mind and I need you to do about 300 push-ups in sets of ten for this to work. Can you do it? I need you to tell me you can do it," said the professor.

Steve said, "Well... I think I can...yeah, I can do it."

Dr. Christianson said, "Good! I need you to do this on

Friday.. Let me explain what I have in mind."

Friday came and Steve got to class early and sat in the front of the room. When class started, the professor pulled out a big box of donuts. No, these weren't the normal kinds of donuts, they were the extra fancy BIG kind, with cream centers and frosting swirls.

Everyone was pretty excited it was Friday, the last class of the day, and they were going to get an early start on the weekend with a party in Dr. Christianson's class.

Dr. Christianson went to the first girl in the first row and asked, "Cynthia, do you want to have one of these donuts?"

Cynthia said, "Yes."

Dr. Christianson then turned to Steve and asked, "Steve, would you do ten push-ups so that Cynthia can have a donut?"

"Sure!" Steve jumped down from his desk to do a quick ten. Then Steve again sat in his desk.. Dr. Christianson put a donut on Cynthia's desk.

Dr. Christianson then went to Joe, the next person, and asked, "Joe, do you want a donut?"

Joe said, "Yes." Dr. Christianson asked, "Steve would you do ten push-ups so Joe can have a donut?"

Steve did ten push-ups, Joe got a donut. And so it went, down the first aisle, Steve did ten push-ups for every person before they got their donut.

Walking down the second aisle, Dr. Christianson came to Scott. Scott was on the basketball team, and in as good condition as Steve. He was very popular and never lacking for female companionship..

When the professor asked, "Scott do you want a donut?"

Scott's reply was, "Well, can I do my own push-ups?"

Dr. Christianson said, "No, Steve has to do them."

Then Scott said, "Well, I don't want one then."

Dr. Christianson shrugged and then turned to Steve and asked, "Steve, would you do ten push-ups so Scott can have a donut he doesn't want?"

With perfect obedience Steve started to do ten push-ups.

Scott said, "HEY! I said I didn't want one!"

Dr.. Christianson said, "Look! This is my classroom, my class, my desks, and these are my donuts. Just leave it on the desk if you don't want it." And he put a donut on Scott's desk.

Now by this time, Steve had begun to slow down a little. He just stayed on the floor between sets because it took too much effort to be getting up and down. You could start to see a little perspiration coming out around his brow.

Dr. Christianson started down the third row. Now the students were beginning to get a little angry. Dr... Christianson asked Jenny, "Jenny, do you want a donut?"

Sternly, Jenny said, "No."

Then Dr. Christianson asked Steve, "Steve, would you do ten more push-ups so Jenny can have a donut that she doesn't want?"

Steve did ten....Jenny got a donut.

By now, a growing sense of uneasiness filled the room. The students were beginning to say, "No!" and there were all these uneaten donuts on the desks..

Steve also had to really put forth a lot of extra effort to get these push-ups done for each donut. There began to be a small pool of sweat on the floor beneath his face, his arms and brow were beginning to get red because of the physical effort involved.

Dr. Christianson asked Robert, who was the most vocal unbeliever in the class, to watch Steve do each push up to make sure he did the full ten push-ups in a set because he couldn't bear to watch all of Steve's work for all of those uneaten donuts. He sent Robert over to where Steve was so Robert count the set and watch Steve closely.

Dr. Christianson started down the fourth row. During his class, however, some students from other classes had wandered in and sat down on the steps along the radiators that ran down the sides of the room. When the professor realized this, he did a quick count and saw that now there were

34 students in the room. He started to worry if Steve would be able to make it.

Dr. Christianson went on to the next person and the next and the next. Near the end of that row, Steve was really having a rough time. He was taking a lot more time to complete each set.

Steve asked Dr. Christianson, "Do I have to make my nose touch on each one?"

Dr. Christianson thought for a moment, "Well, they're your push-ups. You are in charge now. You can do them any way that you want." And Dr. Christianson went on.

A few moments later, Jason, a recent transfer student, came to the room and was about to come in when all the students yelled in one voice, "NO! Don't come in! Stay out!"

Jason didn't know what was going on. Steve picked up his head and said, "No, let him come."

Professor Christianson said, "You realize that if Jason comes in you will have to do ten push-ups for him?"

Steve said, "Yes, let him come in. Give him a donut."

Dr. Christianson said, "Okay, Steve, I'll let you get Jason's out of the way right now. Jason, do you want a donut?"

Jason, new to the room, hardly knew what was going on. "Yes," he said, "give me a donut."

"Steve, will you do ten push-ups so that Jason can have a donut?"

Steve did ten push-ups very slowly and with great effort.. Jason, bewildered, was handed a donut and sat down.

Dr Christianson finished the fourth row, and then started on those visitors seated by the heaters. Steve's arms were now shaking with each push-up in a struggle to lift himself against the force of gravity. By this time sweat was profusely dropping off of his face, there was no sound except his heavy breathing; there was not a dry eye in the room..

The very last two students in the room were two young women, both cheerleaders, and very popular. Dr. Christianson went to Linda, the second to last, and asked, "Linda, do you want a doughnut?"

Linda said, very sadly, "No, thank you."

Professor Christianson quietly asked, "Steve, would you do ten push-ups so that Linda can have a donut she doesn't want?"

Grunting from the effort, Steve did ten very slow push-ups for Linda.

Then Dr. Christianson turned to the last girl, Susan. "Susan, do you want a donut?"

Susan, with tears flowing down her face, began to cry. "Dr. Christianson, why can't I help him?"

Dr Christianson, with tears of his own, said, "No, Steve has to do it alone; I have given him this task and he is in charge of seeing that everyone has an opportunity for a donut whether they want it or not.

When I decided to have a party this last day of class, I looked at my grade book. Steve here is the only student with a perfect grade.

Everyone else has failed a test, skipped class, or offered me inferior work. Steve told me that in football practice, when a player messes up he must do push-ups. I told Steve that none of you could come to my party unless he paid the price by doing your push-ups. He and I made a deal for your sakes."

"Steve, would you do ten push-ups so Susan can have a donut?"

As Steve very slowly finished his last push-up, with the understanding that he had accomplished all that was required of him, having done 350 push-ups, his arms buckled beneath him and he fell to the floor.

Dr. Christianson turned to the room and said, "And so it was, that our Savior, Jesus Christ, on the cross, plead to the Father, 'Into thy hands I commend my spirit.' With the understanding that He had done everything that was required of Him, He yielded up His life. And like some of those in this room, many of us leave the gift on the desk, uneaten."

Two students helped Steve up off the floor and to a seat, physically exhausted, but wearing a thin smile.

"Well done, good and faithful servant," said the professor, adding, "Not all sermons are preached in words."

Turning to his class, the professor said, "My wish is that you might understand and fully comprehend all the riches of grace and mercy that have been given to you through the sacrifice of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. He spared not His Only Begotten Son, but gave Him up for us all, for the whole Church, now and forever. Whether or not we choose to accept His gift to us, the price has been paid."

"Wouldn't you be foolish and ungrateful to leave it lying on the desk?"