Coyote Ridge FarmsWelcome To Our Rural Blog

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!”

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.

The morning started as many mornings prior – with a walk around the pastures, checking fences.  The weed-load (weeds touching the “hot” wires) is extensive.  I was determined to get SOME spark through the entire fence – from beginning to end.  The problem was not weed-load this time.  Those rotten goats had tangled the hot wire onto the barbed… easy fix.  While walking the fence line, near the creek, I notice our Highlander cattle following me on the other side.  When I walked east… they walked east.  When I walked west, they did as well.  OK… I know what that means.  These furry cattle think they need fresh pasture.

I gave the cattle a little “come bossy,” just to let them know the needed to keep track of me as I was going to open a gate for them.  I’m not sure I needed to give them a call our not, but they seemed to get a little excited after I gave them shout.  When I arrived to the crossing gate for the creek, I already had some of the red cows in the water heading my way.  I no sooner got the gate open before LaVerne (one of our big red cows) was looking around me, trying to get to the fresh pasture grass.  Following her were the other Highlanders… all but Sadie.  Sadie, our dun colored heifer, and her boyfriend Donkey (a donkey) stayed north of the creek, with Farmer Mike’s Ayrshire heifers.  They wanted nothing to with crossing the creek.  So be it.  By now, the other cattle we running and kicking like spring calves in the fresh grass.  And for those who stayed behind, there is way more grass over there than they can eat down.

Hoping Farmer Mike and his son would find their way over here for some combining AND knowing the weekend was quick approaching, I figured I better make plans for storing wheat… at least until Monday.  The solution was sitting over at my grandparents old farm.  It was a 2500 bu. grain bin, tucked away in the trees.  It was last used about 20-25 years ago.  For all I know, I could still have grain in it.  I hope not.  I called my sister, who takes up residence on the old place and told her my situation and my idea.  She thought it all sounded good.  With the nod, I told her I had to get my chainsaw and a bite to eat and I would be there in about an hour.  When I arrived, she had already gotten a good start on the clean-up.  Using the skid-loader, she was able to push a small pile of rotted boards and such.  It was time to get the saw fired-up.  I cut limbs and she pulled them away.  After about an hour, we had widened the small road past the granary.  It was truly hot and heavy work, but the results proved to be worth every drop of sweat.  There should now be more than enough room to put the auger in-place and still be able to drive past it with a tractor or truck.  Besides being functional, the results were also aesthetically pleasing.  The removal of 25 years of neglect… accomplished!

With the granary area cleared and looking so much better, it was time to see what was in the structure.  Spider-webs and oats was the running theme of the bin’s interior.  The oats felt mushy under foot – weird.  When I tarted scooping the oats out the door, I discovered why it felt soft.  It was rotten – looking more like black, muddy compost than anything else.  It was nasty!

After the task of cleaning the bin, we headed to the grove to retrieve an old auger.  I would need to guess, but I doubt it was ever used by anyone in our family.  It was probably purchased at an auction prior to my dad’s bought with cancer, brought home and sat.  When I looked at it, most of the parts seemed to move.  I was hoping it was in good working order.  My sister and I chained it to the draw-bar of the tractor and pulled it from the jungle of overgrowth.  We got it moved and into place in-front of the bin.  Since the PTO shaft was rusted solid, I poured some wast oil on it, hoping it would loosen by morning, when I might need it.

Back on the homestead, Farmer Mike’s son was done with the harvesting of the oats and was well under way with the wheat.  His dad had picked up a portable moisture tester from another friend and the wheat was testing lower than 13% moisture… perfect for storage conditions.  And as long as wheat prices keep showing a bullish trend, the newly harvested grain will remain storage.

We now have oats in a flare-box and in a truck at Mikes.  We also have a truck and a gravity box full of wheat.  I’m hoping for no over-night rain.  Night-fall was upon us… time to pull the plug.  I’ll unload the wheat in the morning.

… and inspected.

For the most part, I had the fencing project [north of the creek] done yesterday.  But today I added the finishing touches by installing temporary gates to the paddock entrances.   Just before that, I called my local Natural Resource and Conservation Service (NRCS) official and asked him if we could schedule an inspection time/date.  He said, “How about 1:00 PM today?”  My response was, “Um, OK.”  That’s when I put the temp. gates in place and connected the fencer unit.  And right on time, the NRCS guy pulled into the drive.

On an aerial map, I showed him what fences I built/completed and how to get out to the newly installed paddocks.  Roughly a half an hour later, he and his assistant were gone.  I’m hoping everything met government specifications.  That’s how I built the stuff.  I even built it better than what was called for.  While I was fixing the fencing for the goats and sheep (on the south side of the creek) I could see that the inspectors were photographing my fencing – and admiring it, I’m sure.  Once they were gone, the rains came… again.   So far this month, we have had 13 days with precipitation and only 2 day without.  What a change from last year.

Here’s hoping the fencing passed inspection.  Whatever the case, the Scottish Highlander cattle are in some tall grass now.  In some areas of the paddocks, I could only see horns and tail.  I’m assuming all the other parts, in between, are there as well.

After helping the neighbors with chores this morning, I was in the mood to do a little fencing… why not!?  I’m awake already and it looked as though rain was on its way.  “Gitter-done.”

I quick loaded 4 cattle panels onto an old hay-rack.   Recently, I have been using this type of cattle panel as semi-permanent gates.  Today would be no exception.  Once loaded and hooked up to the pick-up, I headed to the new pasture area, north of the creek.  Within 45 minutes, all 4 gates were in place and the new 10 acre pasture was now secure and could be used for grazing.

With only a few odds-n-ends to take care of, the Highlanders will be able to cross the creek to enjoy the waiting pasture grasses in an hour or two.  The main task to take care of was the transitioning of the old fence with the new and to make sure the fence wires that crossed the creek were still intact.  The time it took to do this was much less than I thought – easy-shmeezy.  It was now time to let the cattle out (or in, depending on your perspective)… or at least let them know they were able to access the crossing area of the creek.

Once I located most of the cattle, it was time to call them.  Within seconds I have a half dozen, long-horned, cows and heifers running and bucking in my direction.  They know that when I call them it is time to move to new grass… and they were more than a little excited.  Horns were flailing and mud was flying.  Once they got to me, they settled down a little, but when I heard the pounding of hooves, I was quick to turn around to see if they were gunning for me or not.

The cattle waited for me to walk though the gate opening near the crossing before approaching the creek bank themselves.  As they started to eat the grass, I could hear a faint “moooo.”  I looked to the east but couldn’t see anything in the old pasture… then I heard another call.  It was LaVerne and she was running towards me like a big red locomotive.  Apparently, she saw the others eating the grass and she wanted some of that action as well.  Within seconds, she approached the crossing and was ripping the tall dark green grass from the bank, with her mouth.

As the highlander cows and heifers devoured the grassy bank, it started to rain.  I had hoped the girls would cross the creek while I was standing there.  Instead, I simply got wet.  It seemed they were quite content where they were.  Hopefully, they will find their way across the waterway before too long… and w/o incident.  Once out on the north side of the creek, I feel confident they will stay there… it’s the crossing area that concerns me.  Winter was not kind to this portion of the fence line and it was/is a bit entangled and full of duck weed and old cat-tails.   Soaking wet, I headed to the house with fingers crossed.

Carol, the girls and I headed south to the Granite Falls, MN area.  Our mission was to look at a Scottish Highlander bull that we’re interested in leasing for the summer.  We heard of this bull (name Curly) from Farmer Mike, who called me last week.  He asked if we’d found a sire for our four cows.  When I regretfully told him no, he mentioned he had gotten a phone call from a fellow farmer and among other things, this farmer asked if we had gotten a bull for the summer.  It seems the guy’s aunt had a Highlander that she may be willing to lease… and that’s how we got to this point.

The ranch we visited belonged to a gal named Terry (of Red Tail Valley Beef), who raises grass fed Angus/Highlander beef for direct marketing to [I believe] restaurants in the Metro area.  She was a lovely human being with a real passion for what she was doing on her ranch.  Her small spread was nestled in a river valley, with grass as far as the eye could see.  It was a wonderful site… like a mini version of the ranch on the old TV show Bonanza.  As we drove onto the place, Carol mentioned to me that she recognized Terry from an Organic Seminar we attended a year or two ago.  Anyway, after some light chit-chat, she escorted us to the pasture to “meet” Curly.  We first walked past some of her beef cows… a few with calves and then there was Curly.  WOW!  What a handsome little bull.  Immediately, we could tell how he came upon his name.  His forelocks were more curls than long hair.  He was dun in color.  I say he was a “little bull” only because when one thinks of bulls, we think of massive, almost monstrous creatures, but Curly was not that.  He’s a Highlander and as Highlanders should be… he was smaller in size, especially compared to Terry’s cows.

The size of Curly impressed me.  As most folks, who know me, know that I’m not a real big fan of large animals.  Big cattle are less efficient, harder to maintain if things get tough and they don’t dress-out as well as smaller cattle.  Large cattle have a higher ratio of bone and gut (waste) to meat than do smaller creatures.  Personally, I believe it’s easier to sell a small amount of beef than it is to sell lots.  If you want a half of beef, I think one can find room in the deep freeze for 300 lbs of meat much easier than 450 lbs.  Smaller is better. And Curly was small… just right for our cows.

After leaving the pasture, we talked about what she wanted from us for leasing her bull.  I asked if she still thought $25/cow was enough.  She thought it was fair… but after a few seconds of thought, she changed her mind.  She asked if we raised turkey… we said we did.  She mentioned how she would be interested in one of our free-range, heritage turkeys for Thanksgiving (instead of a store-bought bird).  She also thought some lamb-chops would be good too.  It seems as though $$$ is over-rated, but we all need food.  Score another point for team barter.  One could say we are trading beef for turkey and lamb.

After we got back from or little road trip, I headed north of the creek to do a few more hours of fencing.  I know have the wires on the east side of the paddock up… not all the insulators are on the posts yet, but the wires are there.  I also had time to finish all my H-post assemblies on the north side of the paddock.  I have more work to do on this side… like measure and mark the positions of the T-posts, install the insulators and then run my wires.  It sure is exciting to see this phase of fencing draw nearer to the end.  Once the perimeter is fenced in, I think I will let the cattle start grazing this area as I subdivide it into 3 smaller paddocks.  The grass right now is quite tall.  A little grazing over the entire pasture will do it some good.

I think it was our first hot day of the summer.

Knowing it was going to be a tad-bit warm today, I headed to the pasture early, to do some more fencing… I really wanted to get this first long run, north of the creek, done.  I realize it was a Sunday – the day of rest, but I like fencing and haying on Sundays.  It’s so relaxing… usually.  Today was a little like work, but I enjoyed it none-the-less.

Earlier this spring, I tore out some of last year’s temporary, pasture fencing to make way for permanent, high-tensile fencing.  I had all the posts and the bottom wire in place, so running 3 more wires was about all I needed to do yet… that and add a few more insulators on one end.  I did so w/o problem.  By noon, all the posts had the needed insulators and I had another wire in place.  The temp was already in the 80′sF.  When I arrived at the house, I was so thirsty.  I… needed… something… cool… to… drink.  With hydration the only thing on my mind, I barely noticed how warm it was in the house.  Once I recovered my senses, looked at the thermostat on the wall… HUH?  87°F.  And Carol was standing in the thick of it, creating even more heat – she was canning chicken and chicken broth… while doing dishes.  I could also see clothes n the line outside.  Sheesh!

I drank some more Kool-Aid and grabbed a snack before heading back out to the pastures.  I finally finished for the day around 4PM.  I would have finished earlier, but along the creek, 30% of my posts are 4″ wooded posts.   Each wood posts receives 2 staples… so that took awhile.

Why wood posts?  The soil along the creek is much softer than the soil farther in.  I guess I feel the 8′ wood posts, being longer and wider than an average T-post, holds better.  I realize that the untreated, cedar posts will eventually rot, but the security of knowing they won’t be easily moved has some value.  And… not all of the wood posts will fail at the same time, so replacing on or two each year, after 20 years, won’t be such a big deal.

Anyway, that run of fencing is done.  Approx. 2400 ft of 4 strand, high-tensile, fencing was completed and another 2800 ft to go.  I was hot and exhausted… my T-shirt was soaked with sweat… and I had about 3 dozen wood-tics crawling on me and another dozen or so chewing on my flesh.  It was time for a nice cool shower… and some more Kool-Aid.  Carol was still chugging away with her canning, dishes, laundry and now… cheese making.  It seems she also found time to make a strawberry pie (with home-made pie crust).  By this time, the house was hitting 90°+F… It was hot.

As Carol started her last batch of chicken broth, we had some farm visitors.  A local gal and her husband were looking to purchase a few chickens.  I think the wanted them more for aesthetics, but thought a few fresh eggs would be good too.  It turns out, they are raw milk drinkers as well.  They asked if we would be willing to supply them with milk.  Carol let them know that we would be more than willing to do so.  It seems they travel more than 50 miles for their goat milk and would like to buy from a farm nearer to them – we would be about 30 miles closer.

All-in-all, it was a very HOT and productive day.  I’m glad it’s over.

Here it is… finally installed and ready for years and years of trouble free service.  If it can make it through our harsh winter just setting on gravel, it should have no problem providing years of dependable service, being installed correctly on a concrete pad.  The model we have is short enough for goats and sheep to drink from… and yet it’s tall enough for cattle.

Here is our recently installed remote automatic winter waterer

This waterer is located approx. 850 ft from the homestead.  I ran out of time last year to get it installed as I should have, but used it for the cattle anyway.  Because I did not have it on a cement pad I was not able to get paid for it with our NRCS grant money, but the funds should come through this year once the waterer and pad get inspected and approved.

Right now the cattle are locked out of the area where this waterer sets.  They are in a paddock down the lane that boarders the eastern property line.  There I have another remote watering station, consisting of a 60 gal. stock tank.  Currently, they are being fed grass hay in that same paddock.  Next week the pasture grasses will be long enough for me to turn them out.  I wish I could do it now, but timing is very important when practicing managed grazing techniques.

With Earth Day due the following day, we experienced ‘green’ today.

Carol came in the house after haying some of the critters in the morning.  She was pretty proud about something.  She asked a couple basic questions about hay… then showed me a $2 bill.  She found it baled into the hay bale.  Who says producing your own hay doesn’t pay?

Another sign of green -  as I was walking the pasture’s fence lines, keeping an eye on the growth of our pasture grasses, I noticed that our wheat has germinated.  Looking across the paddock fence, I could see a slight hue of green in the field that Farmer Mike planted for us last week.  It was exciting to see.  Even though this is our second year of farming I can still appreciate the new growth of the spring growing season.

Our alfalfa/grass field, across the creek, is growing well too.  Today, I decide to get the remaining [last year's] round bales from the edges of the fields, before the new hay growth gets too high.  I wanted to test the farm’s “new” loader to see if it could lift a round bale or not.  I borrowed a bale spear, hooked it to the loader and headed out.  With high hopes, I speared the first bale.  I pulled back the loader control lever and tah-dah… the loader lifted the bale.  I was then able to load bales onto a hay-rack and in no time, I had nearly 20 bales in from the fields and stacked nicely near the barn.  In the time it would normally take to bring 4-5 bales back to the farm I was able to haul them all.  I can see the savings of time and fuel already.  Happy Earth Day to me!  I guess it’s time for me to talk with Farmer Mike about buying one of his custom-made bale spears.  I know I will be able to put it to good use.

On a minor note – I put in a couple posts near the barn yard.  With the pastures growing and looking better every day, I decided to work on a new lane for the goats and sheep.  We have a small, 2 acre paddock that they will need to get to in the next week or so… and as of today, there is no way for the animals to get to it.  The posts I installed will be part of a gate system for the corner of the paddock… and part of the short lane leading to it.

The last week has been a blur.  If we weren’t doing one thing we were doing another… added to the confusion, we did the taxes.

The last few days were filled with lots of field-work.  First working the soil, readying it for planting, then the planting.  Farmer Mike and I have been teaming up for the small-grain planting season.  I got to prepping a 40 acre field for planting… as well as another 9 acres.  Then Mike got to planting it for me.  The 40 acres now has non-GMO (genetically modified organism ) wheat and the 9 acres has oats. Then, yesterday, it was over to Mike’s acreage where we quickly dug and planted the same day… no break-downs – it went smoothly.

I decided to plant more wheat this year since we saw the potential of planting small grains last year.  There is something to the saying, “Do the opposite of what everyone else is doing.“  With most of the area’s big acreage farmers practicing the ‘scratch and spray’ method of farming with corn and soybeans, small grains on a minimal-input style of farming like what we do, makes sense.  Small grains like wheat & oats help crowd-out weeds, so there is really little need to spray chemical herbicides.  Small grains are also relatively cheap to buy seed for, thus reducing input costs even further.  This year we may have gotten lucky or just discovered a different way of doing things (aka… minimal-input farming).  This is what we did this year… we first used the disc to chop up the stalks on last year’s corn ground before the plowing this spring and then simply went over that with the digger once before planting.  Now that the oats & wheat are in, we won’t have to touch it until harvest.  My new belief is that one doesn’t always need the big return cash-crops if your inputs are low enough.  That’s kind of what we learned last year with the 20 acres of wheat and 20 of oats.  We made the same amount from those two crops as we did on 80+ acres of corn, the year before.  Those who farm “conventionally” may argue that it can’t be done that way… it if could, they’d be doing it… but when using a simple, multi-crop, crop rotation and planting of the correct grains, one can eliminate the need for high priced chemical herbicides, pesticides and fertilizers (inputs).  Lower inputs MAY mean lower yields, but it doesn’t necessarily mean lower profits.  And if you need another reason to try minimal-input farming… how about this:  It’s better for the environment.  We will most likely attempt spring plowing again next year as it helps to reduce winter wind erosion and conserves soil moisture.

In between the field-work, I have been doing more fencing north of the creek.  I now have all the primary fence-posts in along the creek as well as the H-post support assemblies.  As soon as I buy a few rolls of high-tensile wire, I’ll be able to string it.    The grass is growing and I think the cattle are anxious to get to it.  I hesitate to let them into the pastures to early as I know it can cost more to do so, down the road.  I read somewhere that for every bale of hay you feed before the pasture is ready, you save up to 5X that amount of pasture grass tonnage.  So it really does pay to feed up that aging hay before letting your critters out on pasture.

Oh Yeah!  Here’s some good news.  We did qualify for the federal high-tunnel grant.  I signed the papers last week at our local NRCS office.  We originally applied for the grant but was turned down (like most folks ). But then we applied under the organic initiative… and was approved.  We already have it ordered and it should be arriving May 3rd.  We purchased it as local as we could.  There is a company in Castle Rock, MN, called Poly-Tex that sells high-tunnel structures at a very competitive price.  Our high-tunnel grant was approx. $4,900 and the cost of the high-tunnel itself is a tad over $5,000… but if I pay by check or cash, we get a 2% discount.  This particular hoop-house is 30′x72′ (2,160 sq ft) and 12’4″ high.

This is what our high-tunnel should look like.

We’re pretty excited. 

More good news.  Our laying hens are in full production after taking a break over winter… and just in time… our egg customers are starting to visit us again.  Dozens of eggs have been leaving the farm in the hand of very pleased customers.  It’s nice to see them all again.  Speaking of egg customers, Carol has been selling as many turkey eggs as the hens will allow.  Some of the farm’s hens went broody before the egg orders arrived, so we’re allowing those girls to set, hopefully giving us some farm raised turkey poults soon.

After helping Farmer Mike with some spring plowing on his newly rented land on Monday, he came over to help me with mine.  We worked the fields on this farm for a little while Mon. night, but finished on Tuesday.  It was fun to be doing the field-work in tandem like we did.  For a few hours we [kinda] felt like bigshots.  Total, we had 10 bottoms in the ground.  In just 2 short working days, we had approx. 70 acres of crop land worked.  It was fun.

As a new farmer I was worried about this spring plowing thing.  I had once heard, “Poor fall plowing is better than good spring plowing.“  I don’t remember who said it, but it was an old timer I talked to at the farmers elevator last fall.  Since then, I’ve worried about my spring plowing project… I think Mike was worried about his as well.  Mike, as with most experienced farmers, has some real horror stories associated with spring plowing.  In normal soil, spring plowing can cause clumping.  Instead of breaking apart over winter, these chunks of dirt seem to get harder and harder.  Crops usually fail.  The soil on this farm (and the land that Farmer Mike is renting) is concidered sandy-loam.  It really doesn’t clump up, due to the lighter, well drained composition of the soil.  Anyway, after we got done with the field work, the spring plowed soil looked very much like the dirt that was worked last fall.  Mike ran across his acreage with a disc… I’m going to leave ours until we’re ready to plant.  I’ll then work it with a digger (or field cultivator), just before planting.  Now we need rain.

I nearly forgot.  After plowing on Monday night Mike’s son informed me that he had talked with someone who said our cattle were out of the fence.  Crap, crap, crap!  I took off up the road looking for the rascals.  The girls (Madison & Carol) jumped in the car and headed east of the place.  They called me saying they found a heifer and Donkey.  That means we are missing 8 head.  I drove around the fields and the girls checked the roadways.  Heading back to the farm, I found them in our alfalfa field.  Needless to say, I’m glad I had the BB gun.  With Carol and Madison’s help, we got the cattle into one of last year’s paddocks.  From there, we chased them accross the creek and into another paddock.  After driving home, I headed out on foot.  With my trusty Red Ryder BB gun in hand, I drove the cattle from paddock to paddock ontil they were penned east of the farm.  I closed the gate and called it a night.  Tomorrow I’ll get them a bail of hay.  It turns out the fencer was grounding out in the goat pen… there was absolutely no spark where the cattle got out.  It’s fixed now!

I was able to dig a new post in where needed- by the gate.  When I first attepted to install the post (a few days ago), I hit frost.  Well, today I used the hand-powered post hole digger.  Although I still hit frost, I was able to dig past it.  Once the hole was dug and the post was in, I finished running our used woven fencing along the parameter of the old barn yard.  I’m hoping the woven wire will keep the goats & sheep in.  I have learned in the past that hot-wires and barbed-wire fencing will eventually get figured out and the critters will escape.  I want those days behind me.

After the “new” fencing was stapled to the posts, I let the goats and sheep out into the new, bigger yard.  Quickly they went to the edges of the new area.  As an extra pracation, I decided to re-install the 2 strands of hot-wires that were once there, before starting this little project.  I no sooner had it up and the charger turned on when I heard a little goat scream.  Just that quick the little goat found its mother to get a couple sucks from her udder.  Whenever the goat babies seemed stressed, they are able to find comfort in a few seconds of nursing on mama.  Ah!  The miracle of milk.

I few more goats got zapped by the fencer before day’s end, but now seem to know their boundries.

With the satisfaction of the goat fencing, I thought I’d tackle the nagging problem I had with the ‘new’ high-tensile fencing.  Ever sence it was installed, there as been a short in it… it’s grounding out somewhere, but I could never seem to locate the problem.  I decided to take another look.  Without the need to get shocked, I had Carol unplug the fence charger.  Wouldn’t you know… within 5 minutes of the fencer being off, I watched some of the cattle break out of the paddock they were in.  Oh Crap!  I quick ran back to the barn and got the fencer plugged in, hopefully I can keep some of the remaining cattle from getting out.  It seemed to work.

Trying to lure the escapees back in, I rolled a grass bale into the paddock.  Just that quick, the cattle that were out, broke back in.  With the fencer on, I carefully repaired the fence.  I then moved to discovering where the pesky short was.  Walking the fenceline, I stopped at each and every fence post.  I was sure to inspect every possible area that was likely to be the cause of my problem.  From time to time, I set my fencing pliers against the steel post and touching each hot wire.  As I moved down the fence, the spark seemed to get weaker and weaker – I must be getting close.

Towards the end of my hike, I decide to touch the pliers to a lower, non-electrict wire… it sparked.  HUH?  But that’s impossible.  There is no leads connecting it to a hot wire.  I walk back-and-forth trying to locate the problem – nothing.  OK.  I thought it must be a plant touching a hot wire to the other wire, making it now hot.  I cut bush after bucs until all were gone.  Still… there was juice in the one wire.  Crap, crap, crap!  It’s got to be grass or something.  With that notion, I started removing any and all dried grass. Eureka!  It turns out that what looks like grass isn’t always grass.  A piece of rusty wire was making contact to both the hot wire and the neutral.  After its removal, I then tried touching my piers to the fence post and wire… SNAP!  Sure enough, I had found the problem.  Finally.

After helping Farmer Mike install some brand spanking new high-tensile fencing I decided to do a little here on the place.  We still have a little ice and snow in places so I’m mot going to attempt to put in post just yet, but I can do a some fence repair.  Last year when I dug-in the water lines for the remote watering stations, I had to remove some of the fence.  I guess now is as good as anytime to put them back up.

The air was chilly, but I decided to start a fencing project anyway.  I went out to the south east corner of the property to look at the old line fencing.  It had been there been there forever.  For the most part, the posts are still there, but the old barbed-wire is partially gone or broken.  Because I need to tear-down the fence north of the creek to make way for the new pasture projects, I thought I would reuse that for this SE line fencing.  Reduce, reuse and recycle right? I easily and quickly was able to tear out the top-wire of the one fence, which seems to be high-tensile barbed.  Once rolled, I put it on the ATV and I hauled the wire back to the place… then out to the SE field.  To be honest, that was all I was in the mood to do.  Out in the wind, the temp was a little more chilly than I cared to be in.  Maybe tomorrow, I’ll find myself out there again.

After returning back to the farm site, I decided to work on one of the farm’s tractors.  I knew it needed work because last winter when I was plowing, I had antifreeze/coolant spraying on the windshield of the cab… the thought had been bothering me all winter.  I first thing i did was to fill the radiator with fluid to see if I could locate the leak.  Sure enough coolant came dripping out.  I added some ‘Stop-Leak’ type stuff but I think the hole was too large for the cheap fix to work.  It looks like I’ll have to remove the radiator and have it professionally repaired. I’m guessing that’ll be $100-200+ I’ll never see again.  The thing is, I really need the tractor to be in good operating condition for field work, once the ground dries out.  It’s got to be ready.  Because of the late harvest and the limited time we had for fall tillage, much of the work was left for this spring. Without the ‘big’ tractor, I’m screwed.  I have 40 acres of corn ground that needs to be worked.  I guess the radiator repair bill, whatever it may be, will be cheaper than renting a tractor.

Last night, Carol started to make what she called ‘Farm House Cheddar‘ cheese. Made from some of the farm’s excess goat milk, Carol took a ‘use it or loose it‘ approach to recent cheese making. If we don’t make something out of the milk we will be throwing it out (or feeding it to the pig, poultry or cats). With aspirations of becoming real cheese makers, we thought it best to experiment with some simple cheddar cheese recipes with the milk we’ve been blessed with… Especially since we have some folks interested in our cheese… should we make a few batches.  Madison’s raw-milk science fair project helped get the work out.

Some fresh 'Farmhouse Cheddar' cheese

We left the cheese in the cheese mould, under 48lbs of weight (6 one gallon jugs filled with tap water).  It needs to be there for approx. 12 hrs.  After that, it will need to be exposed to the open air so that it develops a rine.  Then we will seal it (either in cheese wax or a vacuum sealed ‘seal-a-meal’ package).  It will then be aged.

I got lucky.  When I went to remove the radiator of the tractor (the next morning), there was still coolant in the system.  OK.  I then started the tractor to see if it would leak with system pressurized.  To my delight, it didn’t leak.  The next test was to hook-up the disk and see if the radiator will spring a leak with the engine at operating temp.  After 10-15 minutes of discing, everything was still dry – no leaks, no spills, no nothin.  I’m going to leave it for now… hopefully, it will remain ‘repaired’ for spring tillage.