Coyote Ridge FarmsWelcome To Our Rural Blog

We will try to explain what this site is about, but we would like to send-out this notice before we lose your interest with our small-time, homesteader ramblings.

The forecast suggested it would be a windy day today – perfect for drying hay.  As soon as the dew left the downed hay, I began to rake some of the road side windrows.  After an hour or so, the breeze that was available, disappeared.  It became calm.  Not wanting to ruin my hay by having it rained on.  I ceased my raking.  Hours later, I checked the hay that I had turned over.  The hay was still damp.  Without a drying wind, I knew it would not be dry enough to bale on Sunday… it’s suppose to rain on Monday (40%).  I’m glad I didn’t rake all of it.

If I can’t bale, I might as well do some fencing.  A couple days ago I started a small fencing project, allowing the cattle to access the Ritchie brand automatic waterer on the other side of the fence.  What I had done so far was create an eight foot opening in an already established fence line.  I had installed two 6″ cedar posts on each side of the waterer.  The problem was that when I stretched the barbed wire back onto the posts, the posts pulled in the direction of the wire.  If I wanted the fence to last, the newly installed posts needed to be supported with a brace.  Since discovering the New Zealand style support post design, I use it whenever I can.

This is the waterer I installed last year. The New Zealand style post assembly on each side was completed today.

After installing the posts, I took a 16′ cattle panel and “wrapped” it around the waterer and it’s 4′x5′ cement pad.  It fit perfectly and the farm’s Highlanders have not had a problem using it… even with their long horns.

The reason for doing this little project was simple.  The cattle [somehow] kept shutting off the hydrant that filled their stock tank… and I was getting tired of it.  Last night, when I mentioned to Farmer Mike what I was working on and why I was doing it, he asked me why I didn’t simply remove the handle f the hydrant.  I really didn’t have a reply… but I was thinking, “Duh!”

If you are…

We invite you to join the Facebook Group ‘ Small Farm & Sustainability‘.  This group is intended to be a clearing house of information and ideas for the small land holder, homesteader & diverse family farmer. We invite the beginner and the experienced. It is, however, open to all.

Carol and I are the group’s administrators and we try to focus on topics of sustainability, organic practices and tapping into government agencies for funding, technical assistance and information.  From time to time, we will post topics that we feel is important news to all – these topics include genetically modified foods, food recalls and once in a great while, political news that does or could effect the small landholder/farmer/homesteader.

Carol and I are going out with friend and mentor, Farmer Mike and his wife Karen.  Their wedding anniversary was yesterday and ours is today.

25 years ago, this morning, Carol and I were married at The Chapel Of Love, in Las Vegas, Nevada.  At the time, both of us were students at the Willmar Area Vo-Tech.  Carol was studying to be a nurse and I was going to school for Parts & Merchandising.  Our classes had not yet started for the year when we took off for the City Of Lights – Las Vegas.

With a borrowed car secured just days before and $600 in my pocket that was loaned to me by my dad, Carol and I headed west, out of our town of Willmar, MN.  Thinking back to other road trips, the food and snacks that we brought was most likely a loaf of bread and a package of bologna, corn nuts, corn chips, a large bag of pretzel rods and of course pop/soda.  The car we were using was a green, 1975 Datsun B-210, hatchback.  It was powered by a little 4 cylinder that we later found out was not built for the mountains of Colorado.  It looked like the Datsun in the photo below.

This is nearly the identical car that brought Carol and I to Las Vegas, where we married.

The one and only major break-down was in the rain, outside of Vale, Colorado – the water pump went out.  After limping the car to a nearby town, we were towed to a Chevron station in Glenwood Springs, CO.  It was there where we spent 2½ days, waiting for a new water pump.  It seems one of the station attendants knew the part’s store owner and only after we paid him more than we should have, he gave his buddy a call and got the part.  Thinking Carol & I would run short on cash, I “rented” some tools from the station and installed the pump myself.  We slept in the car behind the station over the Labor Day weekend.

It was very early in the morning when we rolled into Vegas on Sept. 2nd.  Not knowing where to go or where to stay, at 3 am we rang the door bell of a small motel.  A short, older gentleman unlocked the door and checked us in.  He was kind enough to take interest in us and asked why we were in town.  We told him we were here to get married and gave him the short version of our trip’s follies.  He told us that he would take care of everything.  He simply asked what time we wanted to get married and what time we wanted to wake up… that was it.

Sometime after our wake-up call we received another call from the front office.  The limo service had a car waiting for us.  When we walked around to the motel office, there waiting for us was a white, stretched limo.  The driver was in the lobby waiting for us.  From that point forward, neither Carol nor myself touched another door until we were back again at the motel.  Our driver brought us to the marriage license bureau where he held the door for us, sat us down, and sought and retrieved all the paperwork we need to get hitched.  When everything was in order, he wisked us off to get married.  The drive to the wedding chapel was where we got to know our driver better.  He asked us where we were from.  We told him we hailed from a small town in Minnesota.  He then asked what town.  When we told him “Willmar,” he stated he too was originally from the Land of 10,000 lakes.  In fact, he once was an Old Dutch Potato Chip truck driver out of the Metro… and Willmar was his main stop.  We chatted a bit more, mentioning the rotten luck we experience on the road.  He must have felt sorry for us as he gave us some money-saving advice when it came to the chapel where we were to get married.

Carol & I got married here at the Chapel Of Love in 1985

At the Chapel Of Love, we chose the basic, no frills, wedding package.  Our limo driver was our witness.  After the short ceremony, we were handed an envelope with a large dollar amount written on the outside of it.  Our driver told us about this envelope… it was for us to tip the minister guy.  We put a $5 bill into it and walked to the car with our newly signed marriage certificate in hand.

On our way back to the motel, I asked our driver [and witness] how he makes money driving limo.  He stated he owned his car and he made his living on tips only.  Since he saved us $$$ with the advice he gave us about the goings-on of the chapel, I asked him what his normal tip was.  He would not tell us and would not take our money.  He just told us that he wanted to give us our first wedding present and the use of his limo service was it.  We thanked him as he dropped us off back at the hotel.

Shortly there after, Carol and I headed back home, via Hoover Dam.  We visited the Grand Canyon and Yellowstone Park before arriving back home.  We got home late, but in time for a few hours of sleep, just to head to our first day of class at the Vo-Tech the next day.  To say the least, our friends and classmates were surprised to hear we were married just a few day before.

Carol graduated from the LPN program and I graduated from the program I was enrolled in.  Carol is still in the medical field.  I on the other hand went to college and graduated.  From that point on I have several vocations.  I became a counselor for an are boys group home, became a DJ for an AM country music radio station.  I striped parking lots and later cleaned restaurant vent hoods.  I also owned a cleaning company and if you consider race care driving a job, I did that too.  All the while, Carol retained her nursing license through the years.  Even now, while we both embark on our farming endeavor, Carol remains a medical professional. I on the other hand am just a farmer.

I guess if you’ve read this post to the end… just be thankful this is the short version. 

WOW!  Last night it looks like we got some more crazy strong winds.  According to our personal weather station, we received winds in excess of 67 mph at around 3:15 am. 

As with most of the summer, we have had plenty of rain.   In the last 2 days we’ve received approx. 4 inches of precipitation… enough is enough already.  And with the heavy dew of each morning, it’s getting tough to do things around here.  I was able to get a few miles of the road ditches mowed, but that was about it.  Usually, I am able to mow the entire ditch, but nowadays, the bottoms remain.  Most of the ditches either have water in them or they are so soft with mud only a fool would attempt to cut it.

It looked as if some of the forecasted rain was going to miss us last night, but Carol mentioned that we got some heavy showers last night.  As things we drying of toady, it rained again for 45 minutes or so.  Wonderful.  No mowing hay today.

Tomorrow it is suppose to be windy and sunny.  I’m hoping the wet downed hay will dry a little so I can rake and bale it during the next day or two.  I’d like to get some of our hay field cut as well.  Anticipating the chance to do some baling this week, Carol picked up some baling twine… so we’re ready.

This morning, when I was checking fences of the paddocks that were located south of the creek, panic rushed over me.  At that moment I realized that the pasture, north of the creek, still had 2 of the 4 gates open.  And the butt-kicker of it was that I had turned Farmer Mike’s 5 Ayrshire heifers out  there 2 days ago.  If ever I had an ‘Oh Crap’ moment, this ranked high on the top 100.  I remembered seeing his cattle napping on the hillside yesterday, but not this morning.

As quick as I could, I headed north of the creek with the 4 wheeler.  When I got to the far corner of the NE paddock I saw the heifers.  They were resting in the grass, near the open gates… which were standing wide open.  I looked into the sky and assembled a quick 5 second prayer of thanks before closing the gates and wiring them in place.  After doing so, I also tightened some of the wires in the fences, since that’s what I was doing on the other side of the creek and I had neglected to set down the fencing tool before heading to this side of the creek.

Yesterday was Madison’s show day for her bunny at the Minnesota State Fair.  Carol and I left the farm early in the morning to get to the show ring early enough to watch her.  As it turns out, Madison’s class of rabbits (mini-lops) were the last class of rabbits shown that day.  They finally got to the show ring at 11:00 am or so – 3 hrs later than we thought.

Afraid of disease or her top rabbits becoming ill from being potentially exposed to 100′s or 1000′s of other bunnies from around the state, Madison didn’t bring her 1st choice rabbit… or even her 2nd best rabbit… she brought her 3rd choice.  The bunny she brought didn’t even have a name yet.  The animal she took was so far down the county fair line up, Madison had mentally prepared herself for a poor showing at the state fair level… after all, it was what we all considered a ‘scrub’ – nothing more than an “OK” rabbit… good enough for the first-timer being at the fair.

Madison at the judging table with her mini-lop rabbit

Here you can see Madison in the middle, watching the judge.  The class she participated in was the Mini-lop Jr Buck.  Carol and I were somewhat surprised when the judge explained that all the animals on the table were good quality rabbits and most of them would do fine at any ARBA sanctioned rabbit show.  Yeah, yeah… blah, blah.  Then when he announced that Madison and the gal in red would receive a purple ribbon AND that they should come back for the Best of Breed competition,  Carol and I couldn’t believe it.  This little rabbit, with no name prior to the fair, was a champion grade, Mini-lop Jr buck. This was not a purchased rabbit.  It was a rabbit that was born and bred on the farm.  In fact, this Jr Buck rabbit is a 3rd generation animal, coming from a breeding program that Madison is mostly in-charge of.  Simply put – Madison knows her rabbits.

Madison with her champion Mini-lop Jr Buck.

It turned out that Madison was the only rabbit exhibitor from our county that received a purple ribbon.  When Madison competed in Best of Breed, we thought she might have trophied.  Every time the judge handled her rabbit, he looked back at the other top rabbits as if trying to decide if this was the top rabbit or 2nd or 3rd.  As it turned out, Madison did not win champion or reserve champion.  But of all the rabbits up on the table to be judged Best of Breed, you could tell her’s was one of those that stood out as having the right to be there.

You could see it on Madison’s face that she was a happy camper… and why shouldn’t she be?  This was the first time competing at the Minnesota State Fair level and her 3rd string rabbit was one of the best there.  Now we wonder how well would she have done if she would have brought one of her better animals.  Oh well… maybe next year.

Madison participating in showmanship, after winning a purple ribbon just a few minute earlier.

BTW:  The rabbit’s name is now Chip.  Chip’s sire, Moses, was a Best Of Breed winner at a State rabbit show this past spring.  (see Carol’s blog entry: Sherburne Rabbit Show)

As most of us Minnesotans know, the State Fair is a big deal, attracting nearly 2 million folks each year.  I guess that’s why the call it the “Great Minnesota Get-together.”  It’s one of the few fairs that does not allow guests from other states to enter the gate… (I’m kidding of course).  For those of you who have never been to our fair, I took this pic.

Let me explain the photo.  This was taken of a side-street… not a main traffic area.  The arch you see at the end of the street is not a gate that is used by the general public, it is merely an arch with a few dorms in it for the exhibitors.  It also doubles as a shaded staging area for the livestock exhibitors waiting to enter to show their animals.  The building to the left is the livestock show arena.  Out of view, to the right of the show area, is the dairy barn. Our State Fair is 12 days long, with 4 days dedicated to each type of livestock exhibitor – 4-H, FFA & open-class.  Carol and I attended the fair to watch Madison show her rabbit… more about that in another post.

When I was driving out of the field this afternoon, with the rake behind the Farmall H, I noticed a small, old SUV driving very slowly on the highway.  I mean it was going between 5-10mph… very slow.  At first I thought it may have been someone I knew, thinking they would stop near the field approach and wait for me to get there.  But when the vehicle kept going I thought it to be unusually odd.

When I was headed back to the place, on the highway, I could see why the SUV was driving so slow.  North of the creek, approx. ¼ mile from the farm, there was a mama turkey and her 5 small poults.  My guess it that if I hadn’t come along, the turkey hen and/or the chicks would have been poultry-napped.  I gave Carol a quick call to let her know what was going on.  When I got to the farm we both headed down to where I last saw the hen… then chase her back south of the creek, into the pasture.  The task took but 15 minutes.  The chicks and the mama did a great job keeping track of each other until finding their way to familiar ground.

Today is the day we send our 4H’er off to the Minnesota State Fair for 4 days.  At the County Fair level daughter Madison won several State Fair trips.

This morning she will start her first trip with a bus ride, with other 4H’ers, to the Metro.  She will be showing her mini lop bunny on 8am, Saturday… as well as giving her State Fair quality demonstration on Friday.  She will hanging with other kids that will also be showing rabbits.  There is quite a little group going.

Madison waiting for the state fair charter bus

Carol and I will be heading out to the fair on Sat. to watch the rabbit show.  After Sunday, Madison will have a few days off before going back to the State Fair for her 3rd project – an information display on how to make Mozzarella cheese from raw milk.

This morning, after dropping Madison off at the County Fairgrounds, Carol and I had an appointment with the loan officer at the Concord Bank, in Willmar.  We’re trying to secure a loan, in order to purchase a used house for the farm.  After speaking with the Farm Management Program instructor from the Willmar Community College, we were told that the Concord is a small, independently owned bank that is farmer friendly… more so than the larger area banks.  Carol and I have spoken with 2 other banks, but because the farm is in a non-revocable trust, it’s been tough going.  We’re hoping Concord is not afraid of the trust.  The other banks mentioned that since the farm is in the trust that it is in, nobody really owns the farm – thus… technically, no “person” is responsible for the loan.

After the bank meeting, Carol and I walked away from it with a less than optimistic feeling.  It seems that the bank has never given a loan to a trust… I think it is fair to mention, the bank president also stated that the bank had never had the opportunity to do such.  With that said, one might preclude from saying that there is no chance that we can get a loan from this bank.  I just don’t get the feeling our chances are much better than with the other banks.    I guess we’ll see.

Carol received a call on her cell phone this morning.  It was from a past customer of ours.  Some time back, the caller purchased a little billy goat from us – the goat’s name was Bam-Bam.  This is not the first call we got from these nice folks and hopefully it will not be the last.

Anywho -  this call was to let us know that Bam-Bam is a new papa goat.  His first offspring were twin doelings.  The caller also wanted to let us know that Mr. Bam-Bam is quite large now but remains a favorite animals on their farm.  I guess he’s a real sweetheart.  The call we got some time ago was not so posative… maybe a little worrisome.  It seems, shortly after bringing Bam-Bam to his new home, he was a little mean-ish.  During that call, they described to Carol the situation.  Carol told these folks that it sounded like Bam-Bam was in rut.  What they were experiencing was pretty normal for a new buck who now found himself in the alpha male role on the farm.  They only needed to watch him and let nature run its course.  With time, it should be fine… It was.

Bam-Bam is now quite gentle and is putting out some gorgeous kids.  Thanks for the call.

It was nearly too hot to relax.  With a temp of 94°+F, there was not much more to do than work.  I chose work I could on the tractor… of course.  We still had straw bales sitting in the field that needed to be brought in.  For approx. 4 hrs I was hauling round bales out of the field.  I think I could have gotten done tonight, but with the Vikings playing at 7:00pm CST I called it quits at 6:45.

For a Sunday, I am happy to say I got a little work done that needed to get done.

Are we truly a turkey rescue now? Well, no. But this is turkey country here in west-central Minnesota and some local folks who work at one of the area turkey hatcheries saved 2 poults (turkey chicks) from certain death. Now we have them.

This morning we had guests – a young couple.  When they drove into the yard, we were prepared to tell them we were sold out of eggs.  With the nationwide contaminated egg recall, small farm eggs are in high demand and selling out of eggs is now the common theme.  We were somewhat relieved they weren’t here for eggs.  When they walked to the rear of their vehicle, Carol thought they were here to drop-off an unwanted rabbit (we get that a lot).  That too was not the case.  Carol said that when she walked around to the back of the truck, there was a shoe box with two small turkey heads sticking out of the holes in it.  Cool!

It seems that our guests had friends employed at one of the hatcheries and couldn’t bare to see these perfectly healthy poults destroyed.  One might be asking themselves “Why destroy these birds?”  It seems that non-white  birds have no value in the commercial world.  The pin feathers of white birds do not show up on the skin after butchering… black feathers do.  Most colored chicks are destroyed (usually drowned) before they are 24 hrs old.  Believe it or not, if these hatcheries have enough birds that are killed, they are dehydrate/dried, where they are sold to feed mills and put back into poultry feed.  In this part of the country, that means turkeys are being fed dead turkeys.  Does anybody remember mad-cow disease? Look it up, then scroll down to “Epidemic in British cattle”.

The turkey poults seem to be doing fine.

It was a pretty nice day for baling.  Although we had some light rain last night, by noon things were drying up nicely.  After lunch I did some raking, hoping to speed the drying process for the straw.  After a couple of hours, Austin got to sit in the driver’s seat while did some baling.  He looked a little anxious as he had never done this type of work before.  He’s a townie and darn proud of it.  Secretly, I think he likes doing the farm thing when nothing goes wrong.

Austin raking straw with the Farmall H

Austin raked about 15 acres of straw.  It was a big help.

Or is it?

After baling for Farmer Mike on some rented land he controls, it was time to do a little baling here on this farm. We have about 3 straw bales remaining for the goats and then we’re out… completely.  The straw we have been using for bedding has been from the stockpile we set aside 2 years ago (2008).  It’s a wonder it’s lasted this long.

A few days ago, Farmer Mike offered his John Deere, small square baler for us to use.  Well, I thought we should take him up on his kind offer.  We have approx. 300+ bales to bale and rain has been in the forecast for days now.  Normally, I would use the the neighbor’s JD 24T baler, but with time being a luxury we did not have, I needed to get our season straw baling done ASAP.

After driving the tractor to Mike’s, I hooked up to his baler, with hay basket behind that.  The drive, on a tractor, takes some time.  All the while I was thinking I should just use the neighbor’s baler… it would have be quicker.  Well, well, well, I couldn’t have been more wrong.  Mike’s baler is a little bigger than the neighbor’s and has more teeth on the pickup.  I was able to bale in 2nd gear, with no problems.  Before picking the baler up I had raked 2 windrows straw into one larger on.  Needless to say. I was glad I went the extra mile for this more modern baler.  And with the hay basket catching the bales as I bale, was a true time saver.  This device is wonderful.  One can easily bale about 70-75 bales and haul them with you.  There is no going back to get the bales, putting them on rack and bringing them back to the place.

Here I am using a bale basket while baling our wheat straw.

The first day, we had nearly all the straw bales baled.  Not put away, but baled.  The bales we did get put away, Madison helped with.  The next day, we put most of the baled oats straw in the loft. When Carol was busy with Chas, Madison would be in the loft, helping me pile bales until I could get in the loft to stack them.  We had a few issues with the bale conveyor,  but after some minor repairs, we were back in business.  Later, I went out to the field and made a few rounds in the wheat field for 70-80 bales of wheat straw.  It was smooth going. I really liked Mike’s baler.  Gotta get me one of those.

As I was finishing up with the baling of the wheat straw, it started to drizzle.  No biggy, I was headed home anyway.  Oh crap! We need to put this stuff away.  After pulling into the yard, I helped Carol stack the rest of the load of oat straw (on the ground) into the barn.  When we got done with those bales, we still had the hay basket still full of bales.  I was quick to drop the load off near the barn – that’s when the work really started. Austin (just back from work), Carol and myself high-tailed the wheat straw into the barn.  We already had some straw in the loft, but we like putting bales along the outer walls of the barn.  By doing this it helps hold the heat of the animals during the cold winter months.  It makes a huge difference.

The last couple of days reminded me of when I was growing up, helping my dad and grandpa do the baling, in the 1970′s.  It seemed we always baled straw on some of the hottest, most miserably days of the year.  It was just the way it was done back then I guess.  Today, we started the day with temps in the 90′s°F with high humidity.  Later in the day, Carol mentioned to me that our weather station alarm went off – I had it set to sound off at 95°F.

Again, using Farmer Mike’s baling equipment was a Godsend.  I’m sure grateful for his help and so glad I never p*ssed him off when was younger.  I don’t think we could be doing nearly as well as we are without his help and guidance.