Farm News April 7th, 2010

Boy this has been a busy month! And what happened to our Globally Warmed early Spring? I guess we're getting payback now because of all the great weather we had while the rest of the nation was still in a deep freeze. We had to stop cultivating for a few days because the soil actually froze at night. Well, down to business with the news:

CSA Update:

Boy did we get a surprise! Soon as we went public with the two programs the response was just great! We now have 37 applicants for the Produce/Eggs CSA. As soon as a few remaining Members from last year, who indicated they'll be renewing, send in their renewals we'll be full up this season.

The new Meat - CSA offering I was worried about is also full up. It looks like this year we'll be busier than ever. Thank You All so much for your support!!! Knowing someone really wants your production and appreciates it makes such a tremendous difference to us and our outlook towards the farming work!

Wanna Be Cowboy Stuff:

I have been loving the evening and morning walks in the pasture to check on the potential new mother cows and was surprised last week by four calves born the same day. As I went out that morning I found two, then later that evening had to do a double take before I realized there we're two more of them, albeit completely different. All of them did great so I guess the coyotes were busy stalking the chickens.

Curly, the pet orphan calf from last year is still penned up as "SO" is wanting to supervise her delivery personally. It would be the end of the world around here if anything bad happened to this heifer who is practically a family member. She still thinks she's supposed to eat organic veggies from the garden with her hay and she has been getting our cull storage veggies all Winter from "SO's" daily visits. This critter actually comes running from far away when her name is called by my wife.

Good News and Tribulations with the Pig Operation:

Another Sow we call "Scrappy" had her second litter two days ago. This is the
second litter this month, and one of her sisters is sure to follow soon. The only big disaster happened the other day while I was cleaning and re-bedding a farrowing pen in the barn, which can be quite a chore in itself, and I made a big mistake. My wife came running into the house the next morning in a panic telling me there had been a flood and all the little pigs were drowning. Oh No!

My heart sank as I knew I must have left the water on all night. I rushed to the barn and found the indignant Sow standing in water over a foot deep and letting me know in some pretty distinctive grunts and desperate squeals that I was in big trouble! I couldn't see her little piglets anywhere so I sloshed thru the water looking and feeling everywhere for them with the Sow's continued scolding. The pen has a little raised platform in a warming box for when the piglets are first born during cold weather.. These piglets were much older but they had all crammed into the creep box for safety from the rising water. Happily they were all alive though a little wet.

I think they all learned to swim that night. They wouldn't leave the box and the Sow wouldn't leave them. I finally had to pick up each one individually and take them to safety with the mother scolding and threatening me each time till all eight were rescued. By that time I was more soaking wet than the pigs. The water had turned into some kind of pig soup slurry similar to sewage scum. I was cold and "So" wouldn't let me in the house until I took off all the scummy wet clothes leaving them outside . I was pretty cold by then but I guess I deserved it. That Sow is still scorning me and protesting every time she sees me.

Other Farm News and more Tribulations:

As you all know the weather has been a real challenge with a lot of extremes lately. Last week following a blast of heavy rain we had high winds also blast us. As I was walking back past the garden from feeding chickens a mini tornado came whipping-swirling buy and it hit two mini hoop houses (16 ft long by 4 ft high) and picked them up right beside me like kites and they flew about 50 feet before they dropped to the ground crashing to pieces. One of them just barely missed the new hoop house we built last year to help with the CSA. Amazing, but we lucked out except for two mini hoop house structures shattered into pieces. Freaky!

As I mentioned last time, my wife has potted plants growing everywhere around here by all the windows. When my Grandson and I finished building her a heated potting shed she just added more. In the bunkhouse, that we now use for a multipurpose building, she set up a couple tables for plants next to a large window facing the yard and morning sun. Well, following one of those rain storms my Grandson went inside to dry off with his border collie pup companion. Later when I called him out he left the dog inside to dry off and the next thing we knew the pup had jumped up onto the tables barking at us through the window as to not leave him. He jumped up and down on all the started plants and crushed all the jiffy peat pots scattering the potting soil all over the place. A real potted plants disaster!

When "SO" saw the mess she almost cried and I thought we were going to be enduring her wrath any minute. Well lucky for us my wife loves border collie dogs and they can do no harm! However we were scolded severely for not taking better care of the poor lonely puppy!

With that I better move on till next time. All this didn't happen on April Fool's Day but it should have! Pray for me!