Filling Up

It has been a busy 6 weeks since my last post. My wife's blog has hit many of the high points over that time. Our first batch of broilers is getting pretty close to done. They will be processed on June 8th and will be ready for distribution the following week. We finally have a schedule for 2012 processing days and customer delivery days. I hope to have that information our to our customers and on our website by the end of the weekend.

In the past 6 weeks we got a dog, Solo,  to help protect our laying hens, again see my wife's blog. Although he has not prevented all predation incidents, he has greatly reduced them.


Our livestock continue to do well. The new brooder makes chores faster and our chicks are coming out of it much healthier. We have our second batch of broiler chickens out there (two weeks old) and 100 replacement hens for our flock (5 weeks old). We have placed an oder for turkeys to arrive in just over three weeks. Our mature layers are struggling to supply even our regular chickens, likely because many of them are over 2 years old and the simple fact that mortality and foxes have us down around 20 hens since February. The new hens should start laying in September, but until them egg production will be touch and go.

I am also working on selling two of my four year old ewes and one of their lambs to help pay the bills. The ewes have always twined and have always easily accepted their lambs. I just want to cut back my sheep heard even more and send these two and the lambs are ready to go. IF you have any interest in them, drop me an email.

Registered Katahdin Dorper ewes for sale

The big project that got worked on around here is dealing with the wet spot between our house and the outbuildings. We started by taking down fence, pulling some posts, locating utilities, and moving several bushes. Next we dug a lot of trench line. It is about 175 feet of 6" drainage tile and about 175 feet of  of 4' line connected to it. That got followed up by tearing apart the well pit, pulling the pump, having the county fill the well, and filling the rest of the whole with sand. I got a lot of help from Michael in Ames and Doug from work. Janice helped by watching Hazel and making several amazing meals using our grass-fed beef.

Tiling the 6" main line

Tiling the 4" lateral lines

After the trenches had been filled in and coarsely smoothed out

The well shaft waiting for the county to fill with gravel and bentonite

After the county filled the shaft, we brought in sand to fill the old pit

All that is left is to build a frame for the extra sand so Hazel can have a sandbox


It was a big project, but most of it was done in 3 and a half days of work. I am just glad to have it done and I hope no to have to worry about water issues in our yard so much.I will try to get information out to our customers soon now that this projects is off my chest. Check back again to stay up to date with all the crazy challenges and projects ahead.

Spring has Sprung

We are weeks ahead of what would be a typical spring. Right now we are experiencing a cold snap for several days that will slow things down a bit and will likely drastically reduce the number of peaches our trees will produce this year. This was our pasture a few weeks ago just as spring had "officially" started. We set the cattle to begin grazing last week and the sheep will start grazing in less than two weeks. They will be up the road on a new piece of pasture trying to repair it and control weeds. This new four acre pasture had horses on it for many years. Horses are very hards on pasture and when they are not managed very well on top of that, you get a mess.

Our pastures are never this green on March 24th

The other thing we have been getting ready for is the first of our 2012 chicks. We had 206 broiler chickens arrive yesterday and we have been racing to finish off their new accommodations. In the last three weeks, we have finished the dividing wall in the building, painted the brooder floor, covered the walls with a washable barrier, caulked the floor gap live and between the panels, trimmed the windows and door, built the brooder cell dividers, and cleaned the place up. We think this new set-up will make a big difference in helping us move past the health problems we have had in chicks for the last year and a half.

First Chicken Batch of 2012

 First Brooder Pen Running

Quick Brooder Tour

The next batch of birds will arrive in less than two weeks. The next batch will be 100 Buff Orphindgton female layers. They will take 6 months to reach maturity and start laying eggs. We will keep you posted as the first batch progresses. 

Hazel keeps getting bigger and more used to being outside. She moves very well over uneven ground and is used to being around sheep and chickens, but she is still kinda scared of the Great Horn Owls hooting near the house at dusk. The picture below has Hazel sporting a dress Janice made for her.

Hazel feeding the chickens popcorn after church on Easter

Stay tuned as we move into the production season. We have a customer newsletter to put out and we will be fully grazing soon. I will try to be more diligent with blog posts as I more forward this year. It has been hard to post every two weeks while working, but I will try to improve on that. Until next time, take care. 

Winter Slumber or as Close as we are Going to Get

This winter has continued as an unusually warm and dry winter. Despite the weather, I have basically taken a month off from most farm work, except for the usual day-to-day chores. That is not to say we have not accomplished anything this month. I sold off 7 sheep this month. I am now down to 10 ewes from a high of over thirty from last winter. We have culled down to our best animals and will take our breeding forward from here.

Sheep we had outside still, many of these got sold off

We have also been lambing and are now done. We have 13 lambs out in the building. Our survival rates were not all that impressive, but they are an improvement upon last year. Better facilities and tighter breeding windows will help lamb survival in the future.

A Young Ewe and Her Lamb

Hazel is really enjoying the lambs. She often asks to see the lambs simply by putting on her boots and stocking cap then banging on the front door or trying to turn the knob while repeating the word "babies" repeatedly. Rarely a day goes by that she does not go out and see them.

Hazel Petting One of the Young Lambs

We are beginning to get ready for the next production season. I have been frost seeding legumes with a hand seed spreader over 15 acres. We did attend the Living Green Fair at the Second Reformed Church in Pella. It worked out well for us as we not only sold a number of products, but we also made quite a few new customer contacts. I want to thank the event organizers for putting together a successful evening.

We are working on doing inventory of our remaining 2011 products. We are looking at doing a delivery cycle in mid-March. This will help customers to stock their freezers and allow them to get items for their Easter meals. The March delivery will help empty out the freezers and bring in some more cash to begin to buy chicks, bedding and feed. Our production troubles from last year have left us in a fragile spot to start a production season and we still have to buy around $1,000 in hay to get us to spring. It is our goal to have our production and delivery schedule up and available with a current order form up on the site in the next couple weeks. So stay tuned folks as we begin to pull together our 2012 production season.

A Quiet January, Just Kidding

Much of late December was focused on the development of our buisness plan over the next three years. This plan was focused on growing our beef enterprise, maintaining our poultry production at comparable levels to what we are producing and reducing the number of sheep we raise to a bare minimum, while continuing to bring infrastructure on line to make it easier to chore. Janice and I shared this plan at the Practical Farmers of Iowa Annual conference in early January.

Practical Farmers of Iowa Presentation

We picked up a grass-fed bull to breed our cattle, he is an Angus/Jersey cross. We also have had 5 lambs so far with three more ewes due in the near term. I think we will be selling off four more ewe lambs, bringing our herd down to 12 ewes. We have to sit down and finalize our poultry schedule for next year so we can get chick orders in early next month.

Our new bull, Carl (he is the all black one)

Two lambs just after birth, from one of our best ewes

The weather has been unusually warm and will continue to be unusually warm into the foreseeable future. Our usual daily high for this time of year is right around 30 degrees. The forecast below is for the last week of January and the first week of February, it is unheard of. I am not complaining, it is great when you live in the country not to have to fight snow all winter, especially considering that we have had some very rough winter over the past few years. I said I was not going to complain, but here it comes. The one problem with this nice weather is you can keep wanting to work outside. Normally winter is a lot of time not working (doing non-farming things, like hobbies), but not this year.

Mild weather continues

Around the farm, we have built some fence, been working on the chicken building, and burning off some of our many brush piles from last winter. The chicken building still needs some interior sheeting work, exterior metal sheeting around the tractor, ventilation system, eave work, roosting racks for the laying hens, and some finishing touches here and there, but it is getting much closer. 

Hazel outside on the snow

The weather has given me a few days here and there, where it is warm enough to take Hazel outside. I like having her outside and not cooped up in the house so much. She has proven to be very afraid of snow (she was afraid of grass too) and won't touch it and does not like to walk on it. I took the opportunity recently to try to get Hazel familiar with the snow (a word she loves to say). She has having a good time stepping on it and mashing it up with her boots, I suspect that is because it was making it go away. It is late and I too must go away (sleep), but stay tuned. 

Looking Back and Moving Forward

Well 2011 is now behind us. It has been a rough year for us both balancing family and working off farm for me, but also trying to keep the farm running despite considerable difficulties. The business had nearly 100% mortality on 3 chicken batches (of 5) this year brought about by illness, predator pressure, and a hatchery mistake. Our position was furthered weakened by having higher than desired mortality in turkeys and very low weights at processing time. On the up side, we processed our first beef and found to be the best grass-fed beef we have had yet, and we have almost finished constructing a massive new asset, the poultry building. Needless to say these challenges and the expense of building a structure have left us in a very tight financial position.

Started putting on trim this weekend with the help of Mark from Madison

Interior Sheeting is going up with the help of Jim and Mark

In 2012, things will get better. Our new brooder set-up should help us get past chick mortality problems, the new layer house will be much harder for predators to access the birds or their eggs, and we are going back to building fence so we can get much better at keeping our cattle on our farm. I have also just been told that my job with the Natural Resource Conservation Service will be coming to a close because the money for part-time federal employees is still not forthcoming from the United States Department of Agriculture. Next week will be my last week. I was looking at leaving in April of 2012, this just accelerates the timeline quite a bit. The time off will let me stay a home with Hazel more and will allow me to focus on my 2012 goals.

Janice reading to Hazel from one of her Christmas Presents

The 2012 master task list by month

I think we look forward to the possibilities in 2012, despite being concerned about our financial position and short on operating capital. Most of the 2012 task list is smaller items or projects that have been started but not completed. Happy 2012 people and wish us luck.

Rough landing

I could not live with the bright blue chicken building. Mostly because it was so far from what I was aiming for. So I painted it with the last reasonably warm day we have had.  Whenever I get to the trim, it will be white.

Green Chicken Building

Two weeks ago, we had a mini skid steer with a trencher attachment on the farm and I trenched out the buried wires that go under our farm gates along with the main power supply line to the new building.  Janice and I put the underground line in conduit. It was a tight fit and threading over 125 feet of fairly tight conduit was not fun, but we got through it together. Last weekend, Michael Carter, my stepfather-in law came out and we finished wiring the building, then we crossed our fingers and threw the switch. Everything works as intended. 

Power supply line cut for high tensile fence

Our average turkey size was only 8.2 pounds this year. Where our typical average is between 11 and 13 pounds. With the number of turkeys we raised this year, every pound off average represents about $1000 in sales. So we did between three and five grand less in sales than we were projecting, so things are extremely tight right now. We are selling animals that have given us the slightest reason to sell. Our goal is to avoid selling our cattle breeding stock in the process of righting the ship.

Two of our original ewes that we sold

We have still been trying to put weight on some of our small turkeys. We still have 24 birds out there. This is an older photo of them when they were smaller. I am not sure where the birds will end up, but I hope to have them either sold off live or butchered within the next week.

Small turkeys that did not make the Thanksgiving cut

Well this is where we are at this point in December. I hope that we pull up and flatten out by the end of the month. Stay tuned and wish us luck.

Foamed Blue Chicken House

Well it certainly has been a long time since I have scraped together enough time to create a blog post. Our effort has been focused on getting the chicken building sealed up before winter so we can focus on the inside as it gets colder. 

Since the last post, we have put in the windows and doors, framed and roofed the tractor shed,  and wired most of the building. Today we took major striders forward by having the side of the building spray foamed and then I began to paint it.

11/12/11 Framed Tractor Shed with Jim's help

11/12/11 The Whole Building

11/12/11 Wired Bank of Switches 

Michael Carter really took to wiring the building and spent part of three successive weekends working on the building until it was ready to be spray foamed. 

11/19/11 Building Interior Prior to Foam Insulation

11/19/11 Let the Foam Spraying Begin

River Bluffs Spray Foam Insulators is run by Larry Smith out of New Sharon, IA. They are very professional, reasonably priced, and great to work with. I was really impressed with how clean they left the building when it was done. I would gladly work with them again. 

11/19/11 Short Video of Larry Spraying Foam

11/19/11 The Foam is Done

11/19/11 Chicken House now in Technicolor

I might have picked out paint in a hurry, with a child, under the glare of indoor home improvement warehouse lighting. I swear it was not that blue on the swatch. These is some debate as to whether or not we will repaint it. I think it will look better when the trim is up and painted white. It might not be quite so blue then.  We will see what it ends up looking like, but for the time being it is bright blue. It might even help folks find us, "if you pass a bright blue chicken house, you have gone too far." We will see and share with you here, until next time.