Random Update Sept 1st

Well it's September. Where did the summer go? It was so dry it didn't feel much like our normal green haven here on the homestead. It was yellow grass season for quite a while and it's sure is nice to see green again! 

Now that a few of the farm projects are done, or mostly done, I feel like I've got some breathing space! 

The last few weeks have been filled with moving meat birds, feeding meat birds, watching for piglets, feeding pigs so we can move meat birds, getting ready for butchering, getting ready for school, butchering meat birds, cleaning up after butchering meat birds, getting ready for house stuff, watching for piglets, moving meat birds, getting ready for butchering, and on and on and on. I finally got R's school extras, a stress point as we have a new teacher and I was unsure as to the work load, and sighed a HUGE sigh of relief when most of the package was books! Yay! Before that I snapped a little and talked to the older 3 kids teacher about ways to stream line their extras so I don't have to do 3 programs in everything. She give me some great information I didn't have and made my life a lot simpler! Thank you Michelle! We are really finding it hard to fit all the school timelines into our un timelined building and farm! That all being said we are actually starting school on the 3rd. Papa has the 2nd off. We aren't jumping in full time as we only have 9 Papa working days to school in this month. We are going to work on extras and math and see how many things we can get crossed off the list in a couple hours a day. 

The kids have had a great summer, the weather was so nice there have been lots of water fights, pool (ok so it's a big watering trough!) days and tons of out door days. It only started raining in the last little bit and while it's a relief to have some cooler temps the kids are not outside as much which makes the trailer seem even smaller. We've been to the beach, several parks, out for ice cream and slushies, to the fall fair and the airshow. We even went camping for a weekend! We kept up with school on Wednesdays and they all finished 1/12th of their math for the year. Actually R has finished 2/12ths :) They've all grown like crazy! E had to get new pants, R needs to move into E's old size, S needs a new box of clothes out and G is close! J3 is peddling up and down the driveway like someone's after him on 4 wheels (training wheels) but I think the only reason he still has them is because he just hasn't considered that he might not need them. S loves the trampoline and spends hours playing and walking around yelling happily at laying hens, dogs, kids or whatever walks by. J and L spend hours 'making things' or roll playing games of survival with E and R. Sometimes J3 and G play too and they all happily hunt dinosaurs or sabors together. 

Meat birds are in the freezer, their 'stuff' cleaned up and fences down. If you didn't notice some lingering signs and the full freezers you may have thought they never happened. It's nice to have them done and most stuff cleaned up. The plucker is still here and the tables are set up but all in good time. 

The piglets are all born now, 23 in all survived. Big Girl had 7 but only 3 lived. We have no idea why. They were alive the night they were born, I saw them, and the next morning they were dead and she wasn't on them so we aren't sure what happened. It works out well though as we had orders for 7 piglets already and that is the max we would sell with only 23 so we don't have to worry about selling anymore. That leaves 16 for us to raise, I already have one sold as a butcher pig for 2015! We ended up with 16 from last year and I beleive I have 8 or 9 sold as butcher pigs which leaves us with 7 or 8 for ourselves. Last year we butchered 6, I think, for ourselves and we've had to ration it so 7 or 8, especially since we won't have a beef this year!, should give us a bit more wiggle room. I think we should sausage Big Girl as this is our second problem year with her but Papa is unsure. The piglets are starting to run races in their pen and today's job is to surround them with the electric netting so they stay in their pen and off the road! 

The cows are unhappy with the lack of grass but have had to make due with a bale of hay now and then. They are both still milking and all the extra milk that was going to the meat birds will now go to the butcher pigs until the piglets are ready for creep feeding and then the piglets will get it. The calves are still grazing in the lease and coming up for water everyday and looking mighty fine. Even Patch, the scrawny Holstein calf we bought from the dairy is filling out a little. Ugly as he is he might just make some beef yet! 

After the great laying hen weed out we are still getting as many, sometimes more, eggs then we did before the great laying hen weed out which means we did a great job at keeping the layers and getting rid of the slackers. We do have more untouched cow patties then ever before though which is the downside to getting rid of hens. Laying hens, while roaming loose, do a great work of spreading cow patties as they look for bugs. The cow patty can then soak into the ground and fertilize much faster. We rarely had old cow patties until this year. Might have to get some more hens next spring. 

September is going to be busy too. Two weeks of day shift for Papa and then 2 weeks off. School and finishing up some small house projects the first two weeks and serious building plans for the second. Hay, firewood and gravel should all arrive soon. Winter is coming and it's good to be prepared :) Have a great day all. 

The Chicken Whisperer

Those hens know who feeds them :) 

We call L 'The Chicken Whisperer' 

And a random picture of Milton and some hens.. 

OHHH Those Hens!!

The pictures really do say it all... and now you know why we started 

'The Great Hen Roundup!' 

a bit early this year but we also got about 50 new laying hens that need to be trained to the chicken house.. so it worked out well. Most of the hens are staying in. We need to go catch a few that have escaped and clip a wing and put them back in. 

Chicks At 7.5 Weeks.

Polly is a nice movable shelter :) 

Looking GREAT!! 

Early Morning Visitors Part 2. Unwanted Visitors.

The unwanted visitors, there is something dead type, are a pair of ravens that attacked the chicks their first morning out on grass. Papa and I woke up to 10 dead chicks in the pen, chicks everywhere; under the porch, in the bushes, everywhere, and Tucker laying beside the trampoline watching the ravens eat the dead chicks. Yeah it turns out Tucker has to be loose to be 'on duty' for ravens anyway. He does fine with coyotes while tied or crated, but apparently must be loose to bark at ravens. He does chase them off, we've seen him, but not while tied... strange mutt. 

Papa and the kids and I spent 45 minutes rounding up chicks, found 4 more that had been squished in the panic, and got them all back in the pen and fed. Over the next few days we lost several, I think 4 or 5, more... probably from too much stress. It's a terrible way to wake up on a beautiful Sunday morning. 

We had to re-plan our day as we'd planned on going to church and out for lunch and then to a car show that afternoon. We'd already told the kids we were going to the car show so Papa packed up the kids and took them to see the old cars and I grabbed my book and went out to sit on the lawn.. and it was good that I did. Those brave ravens came back again and again and again!! I moved myself around the yard and that kept them from landing. 

We've had troubles with ravens before but not in several years. We found that if we tied a black garbage bag on to a movable fence post and moved it around in the pen when we did chores the ravens wouldn't land. We also move our chicks every day or every second day and the ravens really don't like change so they will not attack. 

We've never ever had raven troubles the first night the chicks are out until now.

So we made this guy known as Scare Steve. He's a scare crow but he looks like and is tall like our friend Steve and the kids named him :) Tucker DID NOT like him and barked for ages until Papa brought Tucker into the chick pen and 'introduced' them. 

So far, it's been 10 days now, we are keeping the ravens away with a couple of proactive activities. We are moving the scare Steve every couple of days, we are moving the feeders/waterers/ wheelbarrow in the pen every feeding or almost every feeding.. so two or three times a day! We are spending a LOT of time outside which they don't like and we are hunting them. Well Papa is :) We are still having raven scares every day. In fact the kids and I moved the chicks across the driveway today into a new pen and within an hour the ravens were checking them out. The scare Steve is not yet in the new pen but it will be tonight. The kids are outside doing P.E. and that should throw the ravens off until Papa can get the scare Steve and the feed trailer into the pen. I'm also seriously wondering if I should get a couple of Papa's old shirts and change scare Steve's shirt every day or two. Papa and I also sleep with our window cracked so we can hear the chicks in the middle of the night. 

 Papa figures the chicks would dress out about 3 lbs right now so it shouldn't be too long before they are too big for the ravens but until then we will be doing everything in our power to keep them safe. The ravens will not go after my laying hens so at least we know there is a size where the chicks should be safe. 

Early Morning Visitors. Part 1!

There are two kinds of early morning visitors when you live on a farm. The painful 'there is something dead' kind and the 'oh look aren't they beautiful kind.' This last week on the farm we've had both kinds of visitors.

These two beautiful does showed up as Papa was finishing up chores one morning. He came into our room and pointed them out to me :) The kids were all asleep so I took some quick shots. They stayed for almost 20 minutes until the dogs noticed them and Tucker chased them off. He vibrates when he gets that excited :) 

The unwanted kind of visitors will be coming in a post soon.. 

I was going post them together but the beauty of the deer shouldn't be sullied with the horror of the other. 

The Chicks On Grass :)

It's a family affair :) 

J, L and E caught almost all the chicks and put them in the crates in the barn. Papa and I put the crates on the trailer and we drove them over to the yard. This worked MUCH better then any other year and we are very glad we got the crates. This and this is how we've done it in the past both have proven to be more trouble then anything and I think we've finally got this figured!! 

Filling up waterers before letting chicks out. 

Their protected area.. which they aren't even using as it's warm enough! 

Note: the wheel barrow is how we mix feed with milk to be able to feed it to the chicks.

They love this feed mix! 

Oldest and Youngest helping :) She loves them. 

Chickens chickens everywhere!! Oh and kids :) A friend stopped by and his little girl helped unpack the chicks. 

I love this picture. If you squint you can see the cows in the back behind the house, the laying hens loose on the yard, the calves in their pen in the left and Tucker by the trampoline. If there was a cat and a pig we'd have one of each critter in this picture. 

E took this picture of  holding a chick. It's a great picture!! 

Happy chicks on grass!! 

G and Papa having a quick cuddle. 

Happy happy happy chicks.

A great picture of Tucker.. he really didn't care about any of this chick mess.. still doesn't.

We bought those crates last winter for this very thing and they worked GREAT!! 

Chip LOVES chicks. He worries over them, walks around the pen constantly and just totally enjoys every minute of them. If one gets out he worries about it until it goes back in. He loves all babies but really chicks and Papa are his too favorite things. 

Lazy dogs, chicks checking out the fence :) 

Papa and I sat in the pen and watched chicks for about half an hour after we let them out. Relaxing. 

This little chick kept getting into trouble with the fence so Papa picked it up and told it to behave and put it on his lap. I snapped this picture quickly and was glad I did as she did NOT stay long!! She had attitude!! 

We are much happier with the chicks this year. We bought unsexed Cornish Giants and we have big cocks, a bit smaller hens and only a few road runners *those little throw backs to the plymouth rocks... normally these are about 3% of the flock and take longer to grow into a good size if they ever do. 

Just one more note :) Cornish Giants are a cross breed of a Cornish game bird and a Plymouth rock. 

The same way a Mule is a cross between a horse and a donkey :) 

Spring On The Farm!!

Laying hens got let loose, for the days, last week! They are doing their job of spring clean up and loving every minute of it!! 

G was having a blast playing with this toy. Big brother L was helping and hiding behind the stroller. 

The sandbox emptied itself this spring (water washed the sand out?? We think?) and the kids turn black if they play in the empty tire so they are playing beside it in some leftover sand. J3 loves the hat the girls got from our neighbor! 

Green leaves :) E wanted me to take a picture of 'all the pretty leaves!' 

So nice to see Green again after all that White!!

Nice to see you Spring :)

Or did we miss Spring and just hit summer?? With temps higher then we often see in July it felt a lot like August around here last week!! 

Chicks Are Here!! May 3/13

Papa's home with the chicks!! 

Trek to the chick barn! 

Waiting for chicks :) 

Empty brooder.

The new watering system! 

Hard boiled eggs, milk and Willards water. Good first foods for chicks!! 

Grit.. also know as stucco sand :) 

This years feed has CORN in it :) First time ever!!! 

G's first look!! Love at first sight!! 

Awww!!!! 

She was so excited she was clapping and squealing! 

They are EVERYWHERE!!! 

J had the job of keeping G sitting and helping her pet chicks.. not pick them up by the heads! 

My job was to pick up all the more lethargic ones and make sure they got a good drink. Man they are smart! Caught onto those waterers super fast!! 

Papa taking chicks out of boxes!! 

Figured that out right quick!! 

Happy kids holding chicks!! I love J3's face.

Chick jungle J!! The chicks loved his boots! 

R is in LOVE!! 

L loves the chicks too.. but as he mentioned.. 'they are so cute now, but one day we'll have to butcher them.. I don't like that part!' Such a soft hearted boy. 

G is surrounded!! 

Ok numbers, we ordered 400 unsexed Cornish giants and we received 416 chicks!! All were alive when they got here!! Only one looks a bit down and has a weird wing.. so we'll see how it does. They are also all pretty much the same size!! Maybe two or three that are a bit smaller. 

Thankful Thursday. May 2nd

Today's post is being written while I lay on my side in bed, the only mostly comfy position I can find. My back is protesting the lifting I did last week and I'm no longer lifting at all. Even lifting little G is hard. I'm not complaining, just explaining. Stretching and massage help quite a bit as does walking, but sitting upright is out and leaning back while sitting is better but still painful. My chiropractor helped quite a bit yesterday but I think mostly it will just take time.

Poor Papa is now doing all the milking; morning and evening, but I'm thankful that his shift allows for him to have the time to do the morning milking. It takes him about 35 minutes to milk alone and feed calves,  so he has to get up at 6:30 am to milk before work. (Those of you who know Papa know he is NOT a morning person and this a big sacrifice for him!)   I used to  wash milk stuff as he brought it inside and help that way but the sink is too low and its super painful now. When we were able to working together it only took about 20 minutes, and I'm hoping my back will get better enough that I can at least wash again.

I'm thankful for the training I've been able to do with the kids all winter as they are able to keep up on the house work with very little help from me. They also are amazing help with the lifting the littles, dishes, laundry and yard work! A lot of our fun training; things they wanted to learn and still enjoy, is really coming in handy too..like putting cookies on pans, slicing bread, putting mayo or jam on bread, picking out G or J3 clothes, washing baby hair in the tub, organizing the book shelves and more that aren't coming to my mind.

Papa has also taken the opportunity to start teaching J how to get Isabel on the milk machine and said both the boy and the cow did really well! I'm constantly amazed at how strong J is and what he can do! The other day he carried a box of school work that Papa said was heavy and it barely even fazed J.  Having a 9 year old boy sure is a handy thing!  J and L together took a small piece of our 'new to us' kitchen cabinets from the truck to the house the other day with no help from Papa or I at all. They are both fairly good with the wheel barrow and bring firewood, bedding and totes and things where ever they need to be. J's even learned how to take stuff out of the oven recently.. Quite a big deal for him as he's very leery of hot stuff. Yesterday he lit the fire pile in the yard all by himself. (Yes I asked him too and was supervising.)

So it is now several hours later and I'm sitting at the computer to finish this post. Papa is outside getting the chick barn ready for the 400 little yellow peepers that are in transit right now and will be arriving here tomorrow morning. Papa has taken the day off tomorrow to get chicks home and help me get every body fed, warm and happy in the barn.

My back has done much better this afternoon and I've barely had to rest it at all. PTL!! Maybe I will get somewhat back to normal yet :)

Anyway if your the praying sort and think of us; please pray that my back gets better, and that we find time to do all that we need to do; hopefully without stress :) Thanks :)

Oh and don't worry I will for sure take LOTS of pictures of the kids with the chicks tomorrow.... :) ;) and hopefully get around to posting them soon!!

General Farm Update.. January 2013

It's been a while since I did a update so here you go.

Maggie is home now and her and Isabel seem quite happy together again. We have not yet had her preg checked but the fact that she's not gone into heat since she's been home and the waddle in her walk makes us think we should have a calf arriving in the next several months. Isabel has also not gone into heat since we had her AI'd and we are hoping she too is bred!! IF Maggie was bred the month she went to the Bull's place we should have a calf in March. If Isabel is bred she should calve in August. Isabel is still giving about 5 or 6 gallons a day. Lucky pigs and chickens.. I just wish I had the energy to make cheese!!! Maybe soon :)

Chip is getting less exercise now that Tucker seems to leave him alone more and is no longer loosing weight.. Papa thinks he is about 120lbs. One bonus from bringing the ski doo home to give the kids rides is that Chip follows it around, Papa is ON IT!!, and gets some exercise. He has made himself a new bed under the floor of the new house and seems to revert to puppy hood with numerous naps and unawareness. He's only 3 so I'm not sure why or even if he's changed or if Tucker is just so much more active that I've actually noticed how inactive Chipper really is.

Waiting for Papa's return one snowy day! 

Tucker has a annoying habit of chewing on bike helmets, gloves, baseball gloves, odd shoes and whatever he can get his mouth on. Other then that he seems to be fitting right in. He's about 5 months old now and quite large. I barely have to bend to pet him. He has learned to stay off the porches and to sit if he wants attention but he still has a ways to go. He tried to follow us out the driveway the other day and Papa had to chase him back a couple of times. He is very bright though and that works in his favor.

Laying hens are laying eggs again!! YAY!! Some days we get a dozen other days only 1 or 2. I'm sure I have an egg eater in there somewhere but finding them is the thing. We've lost a few older hens, as we do every year, which is life. We haven't got a hen under almost 3 so it's no wonder we loose one here and there. Most of them are between 3 and 5.

Pigs.. Well we finally butchered the last two butcher hogs 10 days ago (and had bacon for breakfast YUM!!) and got the sausage done 2 days ago and Papa smoked a side of bacon yesterday to see how it was. It was YUMMY!! Anyway that means we have 8 growers (5 months old) to butcher next year left, two proven sows and one gilt. Papa picked the friendliest gilt and kept her to breed. She is not purebred and is multicolored so it will be neat to see what her babies look like. The pigs just got a new large straw bale in their pen and Papa forked a bunch of it into their barn so they are happy pigs these days with the warm weather and something to play with.

Papa slicing bacon for breakfast! Check out that pan behind him!! 

As for the rest of the place it is surviving winter well. Papa has mornings to clear snow with the bobcat and he's made great big piles of snow every where for the kids. The kids have tunnels and caves and trails and all sorts of fun stuff out there in the snow. The snow on the entrance side of the roof has not come off in almost 2 months.. it's been too cold for it to move. The other side gets more sun and has come off once in the last month. Right now there is A LOT of snow up there and we are awaiting the BOOMING THUNDER OF FALLING SNOW!!! Papa has taken the bobcat and cleaned out the snow on the ground on the entrance side so it won't pile up and make a mess this spring. We thought the snow would fall today as it is 4C/40F here today, I even kept the kids inside because I was that sure, and so far nothing, but it is overcast and normally the snow goes on sunny days. It's already cooling off here so I think if it is still warm tomorrow it might fall then. If not it will wait until our next beautiful sunny day.

The snow by the front door... this actually fell this morning but only the part hanging down. 

Some of this fell but not all of it. Every warm meltly day on the farm we have red patches... butchering spots that show up as the snow melts.. looks terrible but you get used to it. Isabel was waiting to be milked and she was watching me with interest as I took the pictures. 

 As for a house building update.. there isn't really one. Between butchering, holidays, sickness, and work we've not had much time. Papa is waiting on a few quotes for trusses/i beams for the floors between the two additions. 

I almost forgot the cats! They are spoilt as per normal. The two kittens we got this summer have learned how to get up on Midnight's perch above the back porch. There is a bit of a ledge up there and they all 3 fit nicely and make good use of the heat coming through there. Hunter, the orange male, is still giving Tucker a hard time which is good for Tucker. I have no idea where he sleeps but I would guess in the large addition in the spare bales there. His brother showed up 2 nights ago after having been MIA for almost a year. They look a lot more alike then I remembered. The brother (what did we name him? I'll have to look on old blog posts.) is a bit more rough and tumble then Hunter and Papa says his eyes are goopy. If he sticks around we'll have to do something about that. I've only seen him once, that I know of they do look a LOT alike!, and I'll be surprised if he stays. Here is the original post on the two orange cats.. whom we were told were females but both were males. The one that stayed was renamed Hunter.. I wonder if the other just left before we knew they were males?? Anyway the 4 regulars are very friendly to each other and we often see them all 4 on the Travel-all's hood when it's warm. I hope the return of the other male doesn't mess that up! Anyway that's the farm update. Hope you enjoyed hearing about life on our place :)