hogs

I'm sorry I haven't been updating for a couple weeks. Thanks for keeping an eye on our blog. Spring has been sooooo busy! But it's been good busy...you know what I mean?

Here's what's been happening. I plan to blog about all of it in the days and weeks to come.

First, I'd like to thank everyone for the great feedback on the profile in Hometown Focus as well as the mozzeralla cheese article I wrote. It's been fun hearing from you! If you missed it, you can find it here. Lots of people have tried and succeeded! I acutally havent' heard from a failure yet.

We have just finished selling about 50 half hogs. They are all (but one) safely tucked away in their owner's freezers ( and tummies!).

Calving has started! Here's a photo....blogs are boring without at least one photo.

We took a bunch of hogs to McDonald's Meats in Clear Lake MN for USDA processing. That meat can (and will) be sold at Natural Harvest in Virginia, MN, Tower and Ely Farmers Markets, and right here off the farm!

 The first batch of baby chicks is in the brooder!

A winter's worth of manure needs to be scooped up and spread on the fields.

The fields need to be disced and planted.

We picked up the USDA meat in Clear Lake, delivered to Natural Harvest, and filled our freezers here at the farm!

On a personal note, we have our oldest graduating this year and are racing to finish an addition on our house.

We have a couple Head Start groups coming to visit again. This year, I swear I'll get photos!

Shannon still has to squeeze in a little firewood making....our wood shed in running low a bit too quick.

And we are still milking twice a day and dealing with all that milk.

Keep checking in...I'll fill you in on all the stuff I mentioned.

These are the hogs we'll be butchering in March and April. Don't they look happy? They have lots of room to run and play. They love the spring sunshine.

You'll notice there are two pretty distinct sizes. They were born about 6 weeks apart, I think.

Once the first batch has been butchered and weighed, we'll be able to figure out when the second batch should be ready. Someday we'll have a scale so we can be more exact about our butcher weights, but for now it's all by eye.

It's that time of year!

We'll be butchering in March and April. I'll start calling by the folks who have  already told us that they wanted to get pork from our next butchering. If you are interested, please call 218-984-3235.

 Hogs are available by the half or whole. We have more information on our pork page on the website, but don't be afraid to call or email me for more information. We are always happy to answer questions - especially for people who are new to ordering meat directly from a farmer.   

After April, we won't  have pork by the whole or half until fall (2010) !!

Mostly in the summer they turn over up some fresh dirt and plop down either in the sun or shade, but when they want some shelter  they head for these little gizmos called Port-a-Huts. Toss some straw in , and the pigs love them. Shannon moves them about using the bucket on our tractor. You can put on doors that cover 1/2 the front, but as you can see our hogs tend to blow them right off. One down....three to go .

Recently Shannon single handedly moved the hogs from a pasture on the far side of the barn to a fresh pasture. It involved rounding them up,  closing them into a pen,  and convincing about 20 hogs that it's in their best interest to run up a narrow chute and hop into a trailer. Finally, he pulled the stock  trailer over to their new digs. Wish I had photos of Shannon in his overalls and straw hat red-faced and chasing hogs, but I have to leave it to your imagination. If I'd been here to take photos, he wouldn't have had to chase and run because I would have helped him -  and the photos would like be rather dull.

So, you'll have to settle for Happy Hogs in nice fresh dirt. 

If you have an area that's full of brush that you want gone, for say ...a garden, then you need hogs. Hogs like nothing better than to keep busy rooting up every stump and rock while they eat the grass and it's roots. They don't eat the alder but they make it easier for us to clean it up. Once hogs have been on a piece of land long enough they turn it into a moonscape. It's tilled dirt with nothing but rocks laying on top.

A couple years ago this pen was cleared by some hogs, then the following year we planted some corn and clover in it , expanded it and turned cows into it so the cattle could eat it down. Now this years hogs have work to do in the expanded area. This makes for Happy Hogs.

About two weeks ago, Shannon, our son Jack, our friend Joe, and I went on a 3 ½ hour drive into Wisconsin to buy for me a …….dairy cow!

We have been buying my milk – raw – from a local dairy farmer, but the farm is a long way away from us. So for a while, I have been toying with the idea of a family cow. You can read a lot about the concept of a family cow on this forum: http://familycow.proboards32.com/index.cgi

Shannon and Joe have both been nudging me along in this idea, and when the opportunity came up – I jumped in.

Roo comes from a certified organic dairy farm. She is a Jersey Shorthorn cross. Roo is in her second lactation and is expected to freshen (have a calf) in August. She gives us about 2 gallons of milk a day. The dairy no longer wanted her because she has one quarter ( an udder is divided into four quarters each with it’s own teat) that is bad and one that doesn’t make enough milk. For us – she’s perfect.

We don’t need all the milk she can make so our pigs get the extras. Pigs love milk! Her owner told us that after she freshens she’ll give 6 gallons a day!

 You can't see it, but there's a bowl of milk under all these noses and ears...

 Really!

A sure sign that Spring is coming is the birth of babies on our farm. Last week we had 3 sows farrow (have baby pigs) in the barn .

There aren't many things cuter than a pile of pigs. We are especially partial to pigs that  are multicolored.

You may have heard stories about mean sows and how scary they are. But our girls are watchful and protective,  and never vicious.

Well, actually there was one big girl who was ...but there's no room around here for mean animals so she's gone now.

Is there anything cuter than a pile of pigs?

I think not....