chores

Another important part of fall is moving animals around to their winter quarters.

Our watering systems, for the most part are just hoses strung across the ground all over the place.They already are freezing at night and not thawing until mid afternoon.  So we need to make sure that everything is either close enough to the barn to make watering easier, or somewhere we can haul water to with the tractor.

We also need to fence new spots or mend fence that’s in disrepair. Fencing seems to never end around here.

We also have to separate our beef cattle. The bred cows (which should give us calves in the spring) are separated from the animals that need to get a lot more feed. Those are animals that are growing or being fattened to be butchered. Their feed is all natural with no antibiotics, hormones, animal by-products, or synthetic proteins - just corn and soybeans and some vitamins and minerals. They are in a pasture with grass and they are also eating good hay.

We have finished our late summer farrowing -that’s when mama hogs (sows) have their babies (pigs).  We will keep some to feed out to butcher weight, sell a few to a neighbor who wants to raise his own pigs, and bring any extras to the sale barn.  We have to plan where all the pigs (sows, boar, and hogs) are going to spend the winter.  That means we need to move shelters, feeders, and fences around.

This all needs to get done before Deer Season starts.

I don’t know about your family, but my family has 3 hunters and between deer hunting and making firewood, weekends in November are spoken for.

It's Fall.

Night comes earlier every day, and the mornings are nippier and come more slowly.  It's time to button things up around here.

We are wrapping up chicken season.  I have made a date with the Nelson family so the birds will get processed right on schedule.  After a few days, I go back to Brainerd and collect the lovely frozen chickens. All of them were pre-ordered, so shortly I’ll call these folks and make arrangements for pick ups or delivery.

This will mark the end of chickens until April when we’ll start again with chicks. Those chickens will be ready for purchase the end of June or beginning of July. (Last year, I had a waiting list for the first batch. So interested customers probably should call or email us anytime to get on the list. I have already started it!)

Frankly, I am glad to see chicken season come to an end, but I know I’ll be really excited to see it start again next spring.

I am also putting together the cutting instructions and delivery schedule for our customers who ordered half and whole hogs for fall.  I always enjoy this chance to talk with our customers. Fraboni’s in Hibbing will be doing nearly everyone’s smoking this year. They always do such a nice job, and they have been a pleasure to work with.

So much of the time we are working away here on the farm alone, and sometimes the work or the weather is unpleasant. But when we deliver the meat to our customers, and visit with them for a few moments, it sort of recharges us.

 You know what I mean?

It especially is great for Shannon, because generally I am the one who talks to folks on the phone and at the Farmers’ Markets. I get to hear the enthusiastic feedback from customers. Delivery days are when Shannon gets to shake customers’ hands and hear, first hand, the nice things our customers say.

  Frankly, it’ll also be nice to ease up the work load for a little while and really nice to cut down the feed bill –as these animals get closer to butcher weights, they eat and drink….alot!!

There are lots of other fall tasks. I'll write about that in a couple days in Part 2.

The last couple of  months we had the pleasure of delivering our pork three times and beef once.  We really enjoy meat delivery days. Our customers are such friendly people and seem genuinely excited when we show up. We have such nice little visits at each stop  - sometimes it's at a customer's home or workplace, sometimes it's a central meeting place, sometimes it's right at our farm.  We have lots of old customers who reorder, along with new customers who either saw our name somewhere or were referred to us by satisfied customers. Our customers range from the Grand Rapids area to Ely and the North Shore as well as everywhere in between ! What a diverse group of people! They come from all walks of life and all of them have different reasons for buying meat from a small farmer. 

Most just like the taste of old fashion pork (and beef, and chicken) better, others are concerned about supporting the local economy and want to stick it to Big Agri-Business. Some try to avoid food that travels thousands of miles to reach us. Still others are practical folks who want to fill their freezer once when they have a few extra dollars. Lots are concerned about the safety of conventional food.  Many believe in a combination of the above reasons.  We are thankful for each of the folks who buy our meat. I try very hard to follow up each sale with a call to make sure that they are pleased with the meat and the processing . This also gives me a chance to answer any questions they may have been hesitant to call and ask.

             The fun thing about having a diversified little farm is that you are never bored and  everything changes from season to season.  Custom Extempt pork and beef sales are done until fall -although we are collecting names for our order list  so be sure to call 984-3235 if you are interested in meat for the fall.

And now...let Chicken Season begin!