County Fair 2014

Early this month was our county fair.

I usually don't get super excited about county or state fair.  I was in 4-H growing up, and I would go to fair just long enough to take my projects, participate in the pet show, and take part in the pie baking contest. One year I did the broiler project - having to raise and process 50 broilers.  One year was enough for that.

I rarely walked through any parts of the fair besides where I needed to go.  I really prefer to stay away from big crowds (unless it's a gathering of people I know or will get to know), and if I have to dodge piles of manure and smell animals, I would rather do that on a farm.

Even so, over the last number of years we have taken a handful of trips to the county fair and almost yearly trips to the state fair. State fair was something Ethan grew up doing with his dad each year, and he dreamed of being a fair kid hanging out with his livestock in the livestock barn.  They made a full day of their trip, checking out all the fair had to offer - minus the food stands as they would retreat for an afternoon lunch at the car. Once we started our family, Ethan became excited about taking our kids. And although I really was not that interested in the fair experience, I did really like spending a day Ethan and the kids.

Now that our oldest has finished 4th grade, however, fair has taken on a new twist since he is also in 4-H.  If you've listened to Ethan's podcast that includes Caleb as a guest, you might have caught that we spent more or less an entire week at the county fair mid July as Caleb took took in his projects and showed sheep, chickens, and rabbits, adding in the daily chores at the fair too. Even though we have made sure that what Caleb takes and shows reflects his work, Ethan can now be a "fair dad" in those barns even though he didn't get to be a "fair kid".

I do have to say, that fair is much more enjoyable when you have someone you know showing things there - especially when it is your kid. And I will admit that I really didn't mind hanging out at fair so much this year, and I did spend quite a bit of time in the livestock barns too.

And to also add a bit more draw for me, I discovered that there is a building previously hidden from me on the fair grounds for open class entries - a place where you can take various homemaking items to be judged for awards. I found out about this last minute, but I was able to dig through my closets and pantry to grab a few things to enter that I had worked on over the year, many of which received placings.

I didn't take a ton of things since I didn't know if my jars would be opened (and unable to be consumed after fair), and I didn't want to spend the money on ingredients for baked goods that we wouldn't get to eat either. Now I know though that jars aren't opened, that garden produce does not have to be fully ripe, and that you also get to take home 3/4 of each baked good once they have been judged. (And that pies go in 2 days after canned goods . . . something good to know so your crust stays nice!)

So here I am, just weeks after the fair, and I'm thinking about what all I can set aside to take to fair next year.  Part of it is because it adds a little excitement to the mundane tasks of my day/year (I would have taken so many more canned goods if I knew they would have remained sealed.), and some of it is that it is fun to get a little bit of premium money which I have picked a purpose for (although there are lots of ways to save money at home, it's a bit harder to generate money.).

Still, I think the best part of county fair is the time spent with my family, and now also seeing our kids enjoy taking part in fair with their interests.

Caleb's Livestock Awards for Sheep, Poultry, and Rabbits

Caleb's Projects and Awards

Hannah's 4-H Clover Kids (K-3rd grade) Projects and Recognitions

Follow The Beginning Farmer's Wife on Facebook for additional personal peeks at building a family farm.

Guinea Keets are Hatched!

These past few days my first batch of guinea keets have been hatching.  It has been a rather strange hatch, since one hatched on Monday, Tuesday the majority hatched, Wednesday a few more, and this afternoon (Thursday) I found another egg that has just started pipping. Considering I set them all the same day in the same incubator, I have been a bit confused at the spread of the hatch, but I'll take it.

Tonight I pulled the eggs from the incubator that did not show any signs of development, using a flashlight shining through to illuminate the egg. Normally, I would have done this before I put them into the hatcher (a few days before the hatch), but because there were eggs starting to pip through early, I just wanted to get them in the hatcher.

So for my counting and math - I set 150 eggs, 45 did not show signs of development, and only a handful of the unhatched eggs left did show development to some degree. These appeared to have stopped developing partway through though. I had 92 chicks hatch, giving me a hatch rate of 87%.  (If you are observant, you may have caught that 2 of the keets are a different color too.)

I'm pretty happy with the hatch rate, a little disappointed with the number of undeveloped eggs.  We keep a rooster to hen ratio of about 1:5.  Considering these guineas are not enclosed by any means, maybe that ratio needs to change a bit.  I also held onto the eggs approximately 5 weeks before putting them into the incubator, which could have been a bit long to collect and hold onto them.

If you remember in my previous post, I was unsure of if my guineas would continue laying after I set this batch, as I was having trouble finding more eggs.

Well, they hadn't.  They just changed locations. 

While I was in the garden one afternoon, I heard a few guineas across the road and in some trees by the ditch.  I had heard them here a few times so I decided to take a little walk. 

A wonderful thing happens when the grass gets taller.  You can see the guinea highways. It is hard to tell from this picture, but they trample down a path through the tall grasses on their most frequently traveled routes.  If you look carefully, you should be able to find this route by the grass seed heads that cannot be seen, as they have been laid down.

I hopped on this guinea freeway, and it quickly led me to a new stash of eggs, which held over 60.  It didn't take me long to have a new batch of over 150 eggs collected to put into the incubator, which were all under 3 weeks old when I put them in.  (If I wasn't so far behind this spring, I would search to see if I could find another nest, but this one will do for now.)

I asked Ethan just how many guineas he wanted me to hatch this year, and it looks like I will continue collecting eggs!

Follow The Beginning Farmer's Wife on Facebook for additional personal peeks at building a family farm.  (Be sure to click both the "like" and "follow" buttons.)

Gobs of Guineas

This is our third year with guineas on the farm.  Last fall someone described their “buck-wheat” call as a rusty gate continuously swinging.

I think they were fairly accurate.  

Even with this continuous clatter, we now have over 100 guineas on the farm. Hopefully that will soon turn into over 200.

The reason I even sought after guineas in the first place was because of their reputation for destroying tick populations. When we bought our property, our 23ish acres of pasture had been in a CRP planting of prairie grasses for well over 10 years.  As we soon found out, the ticks had used every opportunity they could to reproduce in these tall grasses.

Just before a trip into the doctor, to get a large rash checked out where my young daughter had just had one of her many tick bites of the year, I posted a quick post on Facebook searching for someone who might have some guineas.

As the Lord’s provision would have it, on our way back from the doctor’s office, I noticed someone on the way home had some guineas wandering in his yard, which I had never noticed before. I immediately pulled into his driveway and asked if he had any for sale.

He didn’t, but he did have a pile of eggs he told me I could just have to try to hatch out.  While visiting, I also learned that he was the gentleman who had sold us our land, and that he would be more than happy to buy it back from us as land prices shot up shortly after we bought it. Although I didn’t offer him the land, I did thank him for the guinea eggs.

 As I incubated the eggs for my anticipated tick control, I did a bit of research on guineas and found they are also wonderful to have in gardens, as they are high protein feeders ravaging insects.  They also do not scratch like chickens or  dine on the produce – a perfect pest control companion for the home garden.

Later that fall, after the keets had hatched and grown a bit, we were asked if we were raising them for meat. We had never considered it, but with a little more research I found out that guinea fowl is actually a specialty meat – often used in high end restaurants as their game bird. 

It just so happened that the guinea keets we were raising were a jumbo version, and the jumbo version that naturally reproduce vs. the jumbo version that needed to be artificially inseminated.  Perfect for tick control, garden pest control, and another meat enterprise.

 Which leads us back to the 200 guineas we hope to have later this year.  Last year we raised around 75 of these birds, keeping back a breeding flock of 25.  And although we did order some keets in that “may” reproduce on their own to get some early guinea meat, we hope to hatch out many of our own.

The thing about guinea fowl is that they do not lay in nest boxes like chickens do.  Instead, they take great pleasure in hiding their eggs in tall grasses.  Along with that, they are awful caretakers of their keets.  The “gather the young under their wings” does not apply to guineas, and many of their keets are often overcome by the elements or just plain lost. Because of this, I have been busy collecting/searching out guinea nests to incubate and hatch more of our own flock. 

Thankfully, guineas do like to cluster together to hide their nests.  Most of the year they run around in one big pack scaring up insects into the air to gobble them up. During spring, however, I have found they break apart into groups of about 6 or so with a male to accompany them.  This group will lay their eggs in one spot, making a large cluster of eggs in a couple days. 

Before they started laying, I set up a trap nesting spot with hay bales stacked to make a little cave.  When I found an egg in this nest, my search began. This spot has also by far been my most productive nest, and I should have made more in various locations around the farm.

So this spring, when it was just too wet to garden or when I needed to get outside but didn't feel quite well enough to garden, I took some walks to look for guinea eggs.

I found one of these nests on the far corner of the farm while checking on the electric fence. I just happened to scare a guinea up off the nest or I may have missed this one.

Another nest I went searching for, as I knew that there was a group of birds hanging out in this area. This nest was made in a tent like structure of weeds, and I’m sure I would not have found it if I wasn’t intently searching for it.

A third nest was found again in an area where I had seen guineas gather, but I didn’t have to search as hard as I came across it when a guinea was on it, scaring her up again. This nest seemed to be popular as there was a trail of eggs around the next from guineas most likely waiting their turn!

It didn’t take me long to get 150 eggs to set in our incubator, and I have another 50 or so waiting to go in when these hatch, not because I am waiting on the room but so that we can space out our available meat.

Unfortunately, my guinea nests have dried up this last week or so. I know a predator found the location of one nest as evidenced by some egg shells, but I’m wondering if they have just slowed down on laying since my trap nest has even slowly dwindled down. Or they are just getting smart, and I need to do some more searching for nests, although I have gone on a couple morning walks and have not scared up any guineas in the ditches lately.

In a couple of weeks, however, we’ll see just how well these guinea eggs were fertilized this year, and we’ll see how this year of focused guinea raising goes. We have a few kinks to work out, such as corralling these flighty birds to keep them where we would like them and catching them during processing time. We do have some different plans of attacks for the year including sending off the year old guineas who have taken to wandering a bit more than we would like and roosting in the rafters, setting up a roosting area where we can shut the door and actually catch them, as well as some ideas to keep them in the pasture area more.

I’m not sure if guineas will be a permanent part of our farm or a “It was fun while it lasted” part of the farm. Even with the challenges of these skiddish wandering foragers and the times of unwanted, not-stop rusty gate noise, they do provide wonderful pest control, a unique meat, and quite a great deal of entertainment as they charge though the pasture in mass, scaring an array of insects into the air, and darting around to gobble them up.

Do you have any experience with guinea fowl? If so, I'd love to have you share!


Follow The Beginning Farmer's Wife on Facebook for additional personal peeks at building a family farm.  (Be sure to click both the "like" and "follow" buttons.)

New Babies and A Breath of Fresh Air

Last week we had much new life show itself on our farm.

Much anticipated 2014 baby pigs were born, pigs which will be raised by our 9 year old to hopefully show at fair for 4-H this summer.

A wobbly legged bull calf awaited our discovery while being licked clean by it's mom after just being delivered.

A set of twin lambs appeared in our bedded lean-to, just a day after Ethan and I literally spent hours trying to convince our herd of ewes that the lean to was a cozy place for them to stay for awhile.

In the early afternoon, when our youngest ones lay down for a nap and our older ones work on independent activities, I try to accomplish tasks that I am not able to do with lots of little ones running around.

Almost always during the growing season this time is spent in the garden, with livestock, or doing other farm work. On a rainy day I might be inside catching up on canning produce that has been waiting for my attention.

The winter months, however, look a little different.  Although the pressure gauge on the canner might still be wobbling, filling emptied produce jars with meats, broths, and seasoned dried beans, I do spend quite a bit of extra time inside.

Some of this time is used for checking, planning, and preparing school lessons.  Some of it is for taking care of construction projects that have been patiently waiting around the house (yes, after 5 years in our house there are still some projects that need to be finished) or even working on the fix-up projects that come from the general wear and tear of living in a house.  There are also those projects that have been put off and put off during the seasons where work outdoors was calling my name: paper work, filing, deep cleaning, reorganizing, purging . . .

While I do still join Ethan outside many mornings and evenings throughout the week to help when he needs a helping hand, and I still do go out on my own some afternoons to take care of projects that might need a bit extra attention, it is nowhere near like the summer . . . until weeks like last week come around - when the baby animals start appearing. 

Part of the reason that I go out is to check on all of the little ones to make sure they are doing well, or even to see if more little ones have joined them. 

Although that is just an excuse, I think one of the bigger reasons is to just be outside by myself again.

Don't get me wrong, I love being outside with my family.  I love working on the farm with my husband. I love having our 4 kids tag along beside me - learning, enjoying, and playing.

But I also love being outside on my own.  It's a time to step away from the pressures, lists, and worries that too often confine me.  A time to remember the truths and promises given to me through God's Word as I soak in the wonders of the work of our Creator, weather it be freshly falling flakes of snow swirling in the crisp air (or the power of a surprise blizzard!), the stillness of a resting garden echoing the hand fulls of seeds hidden by tender young hands - seeds that produced a bounty to nourish us through these cold months, or the new born farm babies who are discovering their legs as well as the world around them.

Yes, when new babies join the farm my days are added to, but what is added is increasing fullness. A fulness of time, but also a fulness of heart as I take in the beauty and wonder of our Maker.

Follow The Beginning Farmer's Wife on Facebook for additional personal peeks at building a family farm.

A 3 Day Old Calf and a Blizzard

Earlier this week we had beautiful weather.  It was the perfect time for new babies on the farm: a calf, pigs, and lambs - all born within about 24 hours of each other. 

Unfortunately, this was also a week when a 2nd virus came through our house.  The first one hit just as we got back from Christmas parties, knocking everyone down but myself and our almost 3 year old Jonathan (who might have had a touch of it since he slept talked an entire night when the others were sick). This new virus first got a hold of our 5 year old (who is now better), and then Ethan and our 9 year old went down with coughs and high fevers. 

Yesterday afternoon I went outside to check on the new baby animals. and all was well and the day was beautiful. I came inside and took a short breather at the computer, only to hear that a blizzard was coming.  And just like that the snow started falling and the wind started howling to white out conditions. 

While supper was warming, I headed outside to check on the animals.  Ethan wasn't home from the office yet, and I knew that he would not want to be fighting through the blizzard with his temperature. Although the cattle were caked with snow, they seemed fairly content at the hay bales or behind wind breaks, and everyone else was warm and dry.

I fed the kids their supper, cleaned up while they played some games in the living room, and waited for bed time when I could sneak back out to check on the animals again, especially the 3 day old calf. 

Blizzards like this are hard on animals, especially the young ones.  A warm day which produces wet, heavy snow coats their hair.  As the temperature drops and the wind picks up, the snow turns to ice on their bodies, significantly changing the insulating properties of their hair. Imagine the difference of wearing a dry fluffy down coat vs. a fluffy down coat that has first been dipped in water and then frozen before you put it on. I think you can get the picture.

Once supper was done and the kids were tucked in, I crawled into my coveralls and coat, grabbed the spot light, and went in search of the calf.  Sure enough, he was covered in bits of ice.  It wasn't the worse ice coating we have had on our animals, but it was enough to make me want to dry off this young one. 

Thankfully I had purchased Ethan a lariat for Christmas and this calf was close to the fence.  I prefer not to go chasing and grabbing new born calves away from momma cows with horns.  Especially when I am out by myself. As you can see, I need to work on my lassoing skills a little, but I did get the poor, icy fella. (You can really see the ice worked into his coat by enlarging the picture.)

Much to the momma cow's dismay, I carried the calf inside, placed him in our bath tub, and went to work on him with a hair dryer and an old towel. 

After awhile, and after some wide eyes of a little one wandering from bed to use the restroom, the calf was fluffed so dry you could see the brown in his undercoat. By this time, the temps had dropped away from the heavy, wet snow so I felt comfortable taking him out. As you will notice in the background, momma cow was quite anxious to get him back as well.

After a few more checks on other animals, I worked my way back inside, worked out of my farmer attire and back into my mommy attire, just in time to come to the aid of my under the weather boy in the house.

Follow The Beginning Farmer's Wife on Facebook for additional personal peeks at building a family farm.

Tools of My Trade

We spent 5 years without a lariat. After much chasing, cornering, tackling, etc, I decided it was time for Ethan to receive one for Christmas.  Although we definitely aren't cowboys yet, we have been able to get hold of many animals with much less effort this first month of owning one. This is one of those items that should have been a must when we started working with livestock!

Hoops for a Hoop House!

Today a couple of our farming neighbors/friends came over to help us get the hoops fitted in place for the hoop house we have been working on.  Their helping hands and tractor with the loader were such a help.  We have a bit of straightening to do, and then we will be pulling the tarp over - one of the last steps before the pigs can move in. 

Once the first phase of this project is done, Ethan hopes to share a more detailed overview on his blog.  Until then, I will leave you with some snapshots of the day. (You can click on the photos to see them enlarged.)

 

Running Cable and Placing Pipe Joints 

Moving Right Along

 Finishing the End Hoop

A Closer View 

Hooking Up the Tension Cable

Hoops are Up!

And one of my favorite pictures . . . our 5 year old spent quite a bit of the afternoon in the tractor cab with our neighbor. At the end of the day, he was even allowed to do some of the driving.  It is such a blessing to be part of a community where others not only lend helping hands, but also where friendships are built - including with our children.

Follow The Beginning Farmer's Wife on Facebook for additional personal peeks at building a family farm.

The Quest for Yard Trees

Way back when, I wanted to go into horticulture, but the Lord led me into the education field instead. (Which I have also grown to love.)  From early on, however, I loved working with plants, dreaming up landscapes, and looking forward to the time when I would have my own property that I could dabble with.  I always thought that this landscaping would be worked around tall, graceful trees on the property, or at least some kind of trees.

7 years into our marriage, the time came for us to purchase our first property. We bought our farm . . . A blank slate . . . Literally.

When we purchased our farm, it was 23 acres of prairie grasses on a hill with a 17 acre woodland bottom.

We built our house on the hill- the bare, treeless hill. 

The wise thing to do when you purchase a treeless piece of land is to plant some trees and get them growing.  After all, trees take time. We were very blessed that first spring to have been gifted an orchard, but much to my disappointment come fall, those were the only trees which had roots in the ground.

Okay, so one year won't make that much of a difference in establishing trees, right? Over the winter I began planning my landscaping layout so I would be ready to go once I could start planting.

The following spring I tried some saplings from our local NRCS spring tree order. The livestock tried those too.  The next year I thought that I should just purchase some taller trees that the livestock couldn't destroy.  After shopping around, I realized that idea would destroy our budget.  Although I did snatch up a couple $7 end of the season close out trees, I never thought that 5 years down the road I would still be dreaming of establishing trees on our property.

So this year, I changed my plan of attack. I managed to find a couple oaks and maples in the woods to dig up and move to the house. Two of them pulled through.  I was also given a gift to purchase some trees, so I placed an order for some smaller trees from the National Arbor Day Foundation and have tried to fence around them well for protection from livestock on the wrong side of the fence.

Even so, we are pretty treeless and a long way off from any sort of shade, as I don't foresee us purchasing any larger trees to plant.  Most likely, our children will probably be taller than the majority of the trees on our property for their growing up years.

The longer we are on the farm, however, the more Ethan and I both realize that this farm might be less for us and more for the generations that follow (if we continue to feel called here, are able to continue on that long, and here is where they wish to be).

So I am now planting my trees with, and for the next generation.

I found a wonderful source of seeds online at the DA Tree Store.  They are very reasonable and have a great selection.  I have ordered seeds for various evergreens from them, many of which will be for a windbreak. The kids and I learned about stratifying seeds (a cold treatment to mimic nature and break down the seed coat to allow the embryo to germinate) and started these seeds both indoors and outdoors this way. 





Last fall we brought home a bucket of walnuts from my parents, dumped them in the garden, covered them with mulch, and waited for spring.  The walnut trees that grew were then moved into various places in our woods, which is pretty void of walnuts.  Hopefully they will take off for the livestock and wildlife to enjoy down the road.



Since our walnut experiment went so well last fall, we have been collecting various nuts throughout the year this year.  The kids have helped me plant hickory seeds, buckeye seeds, various maple and oak seeds. and many other types of seeds and nuts we have collected.  We have even kept back some hardy fruit seeds from our area to stratify inside or start along the fence line of the garden.

To be perfectly honest, I would love to have trees to cast a cooling shade during the hot summer days.  I'd love to have a tree swing to sit on and overlook the pasture, song birds perched close by serenading our family, leaves for the kids to make nests in during the colorful crispness of fall, bare outstretched branches to collect the contrasting flakes of newly fallen snow.

Right now, however, our budget allows for some seeds. Some purchased, most collected. So I am trading my dream of tall, graceful trees for our family to enjoy for a dream of trees for the next generation to enjoy.

While doing this though, I am gaining.  I have gained precious and enjoyable times with our children as we have gone through the summer collecting seeds at the zoo, on walks with grandparents, visiting my home church, friends houses, parks . . .

Each of these nuts and seeds holds a story, and each of them are carefully marked as they are placed in the ground by little hands that are learning. Learning about stratification, learning about transplanting home grown saplings, learning about nuts and seed identification . . . about time together, about patience, and about investing in the future of others.

Follow The Beginning Farmer's Wife on Facebook for additional personal peeks at building a family farm.

Tools of My Trade
This is a great resource with wonderful illustrations.  If you are interested in starting your own plants with seeds, divisions, cuttings, layering, grafting, cultures, or more, this will be your go to book. When I first started propagating plants, I found much of my information on the internet.  I got a good start this way, but having this book on hand helped fill in the gaps for me.  Copies of this book can be found used or you can purchase a new copy from the link provided.

Happy Easter 2013!

We are patiently awaiting spring here. It is almost the end of March, and we still have snow on the ground - the last batch coming just this past Sunday.  Today Ethan had to take another trip to the woods for more wood (an important thing when you don't have a furnace!)

Even though it doesn't feel like spring, the animals know it's coming though.  Our chickens have kicked into Easter Egg mode, hiding their eggs all across the farm in an effort to steal a nest and hatch some chicks.  It is fun for awhile.  The key word, awhile.  I will admit that it is also kind of fun too when I don't find a nest, and momma hen proudly appears later with a batch full of trailing chicks. 

Since Easter is this Sunday, I thought I would share spring's Easter Egg hunt at Crooked Gap Farm. :)

Behind the roll of wire

On top of the feed wagon

Between some tin

Over the sow, on a straw bale

In the hay stack

In the feed trough

Outside, between a board and our brooding building

And all washed up!