Feeding Winter Hay

Pig Process Dates

The dates are set! Pigs are to go: 5 on February 25 and 4 on March 3. I will be contacting buyers soon. We will need to get paperwork completed. Thanks to all, there is a waiting list for pork and pigs in next batch, get your name on it today.

Also check us out on Facebook, search for: Concord Meadows Farm.

Snow!

Jay is loving the snow! We went sledding yesterday for about 30 minutes. We currenlty have about 5" of snow on pic nic table this morning. 1-3 " more snow coming tomorrow.

Firewood supply used approx 1/2 (actually a little less) but doing well. Maybe this year we'll get ahead?

Snow doesnt seem to phase the pigs much. They are growing, ready in Beginning of February.

Anyone interested my neighbor has for sale: 1984 Ford f250, 4x4, Cab/ chasis. 302. 4spd. Runs good, 4x4 works. Will need gas tank (current one works, rusted on top). Using for farm/ firewood truck- began to build flatbed. Willing to part out. $450 obo. Email me.

Note: Prayers please, for Grandma P she was diagnosed with stomach cancer yesterday. Thanks.

October Update

October is going well, after a week of cold/ flu sickness everyone is up and back to normal. We have been cutting and splitting more firewood, we are actively using the wood stove nearly 24/7. Below is a view of cows in pasture during fall color.
The hogs are doing very well, growing well. Below is a photo me building their new hog house which is on skids so it can be pulled by a tractor to rotation graze.

Here is a photo of the new house in the pig pen (1/2 of our garden) where the pigs are harvesting the garden leftovers. And turning the soil. Below Jay watching his pigs (they're names are "Bacon"- that what he calls them).

Here is one of the calves which are being weaned in the barn and is currently for sale.

Tractor

Our son, covered in a dust of corn and soybean meal that he was supposed to feed to the pigs (not throw, LOL!) But he had fun, as you can see above. Below is a photo of our tractor. Concord Mommy took this picture or she would be in it too. It has worked well so far, and will be a great asset to the farm.

This week we almost finished up hay season. The picture below is Concord Son and I traveling home from raking hay. He came over to the fields to bring Dad some water and begged to ride back with me. We have also been working on putting more firewood inside the wood shed and cleaning out the other half of teh shed for the tractor (to be parked out of weather). Monday morning was first of many firewood cutting parties to be had through the winter. The parties usal consist of myself, Matt and Andrew. We cut, split and load all 3 of our trucks with wood; many hands make the work go fast.

The pigs are growing. I am hoping to expand there pen this week to enclose our entire garden which is almost done producing for this year.

Sugar Mountain Farm - Vermont

The Jeffries family has a great blog that I regularly follow. They raise pastured, naturally grown pork and sell locally in Vermont. Please follow this link to check out their Blog: http://sugarmtnfarm.com/blog/ .. As you may know we too raise pork and are striving for pastured, naturally and humanely raised also. In the near future I will be posting links to other blogs and sites that participate and promote local agriculture.

Goals for 2009

Goals in 2008: Cows, Barn, Clear fence rows, Wood Stove, Larger garden, More canning. As you may know from my posts some of these were completed and others went by the way side. Farm Goals for 2009 Include:

1. Have fun, enjoy family and seasons more!- I want to spend more time with Cayla and Jay enjoying our farm the outdoors (camping, fishing, bon fires, hiking) and mother natures seasons. I will hopefully be back down to one job; one or the other, 2 is too much, as working two at between 64 and 90 hours per week is alot to be gone: 3 out of 6 nights; even if some of those hours are night time with a chance at sleep; I'm still away from home.

2. Firewood Shed & Firewood- Tarps over firewood suck, they leak, they're a hassle, not to mention the wood shed will be multi-purpose, used for storing misc. including our lawn mower which will make more room in the garage. The shed will be 20 feet wide and 12 feet deep, a lean to off the back of our current garage. We have the lumber and metal to complete the shed when the weather breaks. We had to buy some firewood this year, we learned our lesson and will be more prepared for next winter, HAHAHA!

3. Cow Shed on Barn- The shed we currently use, was not intended for cows but instead hay. Our "Barn"- originally a 24ft x 6ft corn crib, now with a 12 ft deep x 24 ft long lean-to off the North West side making it 24 ft x 18 ft, and soon to be a South East facing- south sloping shed- intended for cows, size to be figured out still.

4. Expand Cow Herd- We want to buy at least a single registered Dexter cow to breed to our bull so we can possibly sell registered calves.

5. Fence- We have cleared most of the pasture and fence rows of brush and old debris, we have also started our permanent fencing. This fencing needs to be completed, some is barbed wire- 4 strand at perimeter and 3 strand in the woods, rest is woven wire. Hopefully electric fence wont have to be moved as much to rotational graze our cows this year with some permanent fence in place.

6. Pig House & Pens- I want to set up a movable pig pen, with a permanent shelter on skids that can be moved with a tractor.

7. Chickens- Keep a small flock for eggs, hopefully the raccoons wont get this flock we are better guarded now, with a closing and locking coop. We just got a dozen or so Rhode Island Red laying hens last month, they lay great brown eggs. Picture of one above.

8. Flooring for sun room- As my wife would tell you we need a solution, some type of easy clean flooring for our sun room, which for now has carpet. It is constantly dirty, being our main entrance into the house, this is where we hang our coats and take boots off. The dogs also stay in here when were gone, so dog hair is also a problem but only secondary to mud.

9. Garage Door- Our garage door was damaged prior to our ownership then fixed, a horrible wind storm then re damaged it beyond fixing. It is functional but only by hand, and its a timely process. I would like for Cayla to be able to park inside during in climate weather.

10. Garden & Canning- Larger than last year and hopefully better tended, as last year we had a moderate production garden due to ground conditions, mainly ground not prepared we enough, this ground had not been garden before and our tiller was no match, it will be bottom plowed then tilled this year. We want to can alot more off this garden, to store for winter, as we canned very little last year.

Have fun. Please leave comments or ideas, thanks.