New Years Eve on the farm!

Well, some people spend their new years eve planning and prepping for parties or taking down decorations and such.  Here on the farm the weather is still unbelievably mild so our new years eve was spent trying to get some last minute details and projects buttoned up before the weather turns bad.

A couple of months ago, I think mid September, I made a list of "Things that need done before the snow flies".  On this list some big things that I didn't think there was any way I would get them done as winter usually sets in good by mid December.   Things like mount the pig shed doors (done),  install water line and pig waterer(done), clean up slab wood/log pile, cut split and stack it, and move the fence over to edge of round bales(done).  And lastly install posts for fence on south side of the creek.  This year has been very different in it is new years eve and we haven't even had frozen ground yet.  We are also about 18-24 inches over our normal annual rainfall so everything is unrealistically muddy!  So I was able to extend the season of getting things done a little longer this year. 

Yesterday Steven and I changed around some gate posts outside the pig barn and then took on the task of setting posts across the creek.  I was able to borrow an auger attachment from work so I set to digging holes and Steven and his brother Josh took to setting the posts.  We got 30+ in yesterday.  Today my son and I put the auger on the tractor and headed out to drill the rest of the holes with the intent of Steven and I installing the posts tomorrow. 

Well my son and I got the holes all drilled and it went quicker than expected.  He even managed to sneak in a good nap while I was drilling and seamed quite comfortable!

We still had daylight left so, after a quick daiper change, we decided to go see if we could set some posts.  I found a good rhythm and manage to get 22 posts set.  I have six left but ran out of daylight.  So The first day of 2012 will be spent setting our last six posts, grinding pig feed, and cutting the little boars to make them barrows!

I hope everyone has a prosperous and happy new year!!!  2011 has been a year of hard hard labor, copious amounts of rain, good times and bad times, and some big changes.  We went from a single income family to a dual income family.  Saw the growth of the pig portion of our farm grow rapidly.  Added a round baler and custom baling to the farm.  Purchased our first registered black angus cow.  I was finally able to commence work on the barn and now have wonderful birthing pens for the sows and sleeping quarters for all the pigs.  The addition of a donkey to the farm!!  And many many other little wins throughout the year to be thankful for!!

Being a time for reflection I have to look back on where we started the year and how far we have come since then.  It was easy to get depressed this year with all the rain and setbacks but we have made some very great strides and are well on our way to being where we want to be!  I cannot wait to see what 2012 holds and where life will lead us next!

Happy New Year everyone!!

See you next year!

Kenny

Christmas, new barn design, and piggy update!

 Another Christmas has passed here on the farm and everyone enjoyed their gifts and we all enjoyed some really good food!  It was nice to get to spend time with family and I am now partially off work till the third of January.

We had all the usual Christmas dinner foods this year but we added a new one to the table.  We have several beef briskets in the freezer so this year my wife wanted to have one for dinner.  She used a recipe she found on the food network page called "Beer, Ginger, and Garlic Braised Brisket".  It was phenomenal! Melted in your mouth. 

 

Here is the link to the recipe.  Well worth the prep time.

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/aarti-sequeira/beer-ginger-and-garlic-braised-brisket-recipe/index.html

 Next to enjoy his gift was our Donkey, Mario!  He got a new halter for Christmas.  His old one was getting pretty rough and my wife wanted to get him a new one and I put it on him Christmas eve.  He is finally starting to warm up to the pigs and hopefully in a few more weeks they will get along a lot better.  It took the cows almost three months before they would get along with the pigs and almost a year before they quit caring when the pigs were near.

Next a present from my wife to me.  She found a scale model of the Japanese version of my tractor here on the farm.  The numbering system is much different there as well as the fact they are called Kingwel.  They are still a Kubota but the high luxury package carries this name.  I haven't glued the mirrors on yet but the detail is pretty cool.  We found a few online when looking for some for the kids.  The detail on them is unbelievable and so is the price.  Unlike common american tractor brands, Kubota doesn't make many toys, they just make the real thing so you don't really find them very often.

 My wife has been wanting a small piano keyboard for years.  I was finally able to get her the one she wanted this year and she is thrilled!  She played it for quite a while after I got it all put together on its stand.  She need a little practice as she hasn't played in a long time but it was wonderful to hear some music even if it was rough!

Next, after my visit to the pig farm down south I had some big changes in mind for the future cow shed.  I wanted to get it on paper so last weekend I took a couple of hours and figured out the design and got it all drawn to scale and I am much much happier with this setup than the previous and light years better than the current!

 If you look at the full size picture you will notice the addition of a chute ally between the pig shed and cow shed.  This allows for me to use the gating setup like a crowding chute when doing herd checks, vaccinations, dewormings, and other needed herd maintenance on the pig of the cattle. The chute also doubles as a loading and unloading chute for the pigs or cattle.  Later on down the road I want to add a scale in this area to check weights on the animals to get better numbers on rate of gain and finish weights.
I also moved the feeder back to where it is currently located to allow for the addition of future manure storage strait south of the barn for quick cleaning even when the weather is bad!.  There is also an additional heavy use pad outside the pig barn that will eventually encompass the waterer to cut down on the soil disturbances and mud during the wet seasons like we have been having this year. 

I am so excited about this design I cannot contain it!  I have all the wood I need but that that is just a small portion of it.  I still need several truck loads of concrete, several buckets of screws, lot of help, and about 8 more gates!

Next we have a couple of pics of Mallory's piglets.  They are growing faster than any of the others previous litters we have had and I am really impressed.  If you go back to the post of them the day after they were born you will find a pic of my hand next to them for a size reference. 

I did the same thing again today and the change is amazing!  They are about 7-8 lbs. already and growing very well.  Very strong and well shaped pigs. 

 

We will be having three new litters in February.  One of these litters will be from Daisy pig.  It will be her first and I am anxious to see what they look like and how they perform as she is more Duroc than Hampshire. Mallory is more Hampshire and less Duroc.  We will also be breeding our new Berkshire late in the year and I am really pumped about that!

Well, I need to head back out to the barn.  The vet is due in soon and I need to get the gates setup and ready to go for when he gets here.  Lets hope for 100% pregnancy for everyone.  

Have a great day!

Kenny

New Piggie and Barn doors finally mounted

Well, another hectic weekend here on the farm!  I have been looking around for a purebred Berkshire hog for a little while now and finally found some for sale in Chillicothe Ohio.  My wife wanted to do a little shopping at the world market in Columbus for the holidays and Columbus is between here and where we got the new pig so we made a big trip out of it!

This is my two year old son Saturday morning before we left getting ready to go spend the day at grandma and grandpa's farm.  He kept pointing at the Carhartt patch and saying Carhartt!! 

I was planning on doing this last weekend, however, due to a change in my work schedule I had to cancel and found out Friday that I was able to still get my new pig so we headed out early yesterday morning.  We made several stops and finally made it to the pig farm around 2pm.

The farm had quite a few and my wife and I were walking through the shed looking at them when the perfect looking little girl came walking up!  We immediately made our choice and loaded her up!

Our plan is to have a Berkshire x Tamworth cross.  Both are heritage breeds from across the seas and both are excellent for a natural raised pasture based farm.  Berkshires, as I found out from my wife, are considered the best tasting pig hands down in Japan due to their excellent flavor.  By crossing the two we should end up with very vigorous growing pigs that will excel on our grass based feed system!

Moving on, we finished up our trip when we arrived at home at 9pm, thirteen hours and 450 miles later than we departed.  I immediately found out that I needed to go out to salt at 2 am.  So I quickly got the pig and the truck unloaded and fed everything and headed in to take a nap.  After three hours of sleep I was headed out again for salting.  Nothing major just some touch up where things froze over during the night.  Then back home for a 30 minute nap before the kids got up and kept me awake.

After a quick breakfast and much needed coffee I drew up the revised plans for the cow shed incorporating in a neat feature I saw at the farm we had just visited.

This is their chute they use to load and unload pigs and also to vaccinate and treat the animals.  I decided to add something like this to my new barn plans!  Should work awesome!

Everyone here is battling a pretty bad cold/chest cold so I headed out by myself to the barn.  Steven brought the grinder over to make another batch of feed as we were out.  Before making feed we first had to mount the barn doors I had built for the pig shed as they were blocking access to where the hay is for the pig feed.  I built these doors the two days my truck was broken down as I had downtime to do so. 

We managed to get both mounted and they are looking great.  I simply need to add my rubber flaps to the bottoms and they are finished other than paint.  The rubber flaps are my idea.  I needed a way to accommodate the slope of the ground as well as the build up of bedding over the winter without freezing in or getting stuck.  This short one is on the pasture side.  I need to lower the gate two inches so the door will clear it and the flaps will hang down to stop the wind while still allowing the pigs to come and go as needed.  I will be painting everything next summer after all construction is completed so it matches.

  We got the feed ground and everyone fed and cleaned up and closed up.  All I have left is to get our donkey, who's name is officially Mario, a hay rack and train him to use the pig waterer and
we are ready for winter!


Almost forgot to put in a pic of the new pig box I built in the evenings this week.  It is 4'x4'x30" and is light enough to lift by hand yet heavy enough that it doesn't move around in the bed of the truck.  I am planning on painting it this winter.

  I was worried all the way home that it would be too cold for the pig in the box.  The temps were down around 27 degrees and we were on the highway so I was sure it would be cold in their.  I was very pleasantly surprised when I opened the door and reached in to get the new pig and found it to be quite warm.  She was all snuggled up in the straw and sound asleep and very warm.

Lastly, while Steven and I were working on bagging pig feed my wife came to the barn to check out the doors and look at the baby pigs and the new girl we got. Daisy was also their and has been dieing to get to sniff and lick the little ones so she didn't miss the chance to do so!  They are only 11 days old and they are already 2-3 lbs. 

Well, I am going to head to bed, I am exhausted and tomorrow is the start of my final work week for the year.  I always take from Christmas to January 3rd off to spend with the family and get unfinished business taken care of for winter.  This year I am also taking off from snow for this time so it will actually be a vacation!!

Talk to everyone tomorrow!

Kenny

Couple of Piggie pics and a small project I just finished at work!

 Tonight my two year old son said he wanted to help feed the animals so we headed out after dinner to take care of everyone.  We fed Mario, our new Donkey, gave the cows a bale, fed the feeder pigs, and Mallory.

After feeding Mallory my son wanted to get in and pet the babies.  Mallory has been a lot more protective of her little ones than the Pig and Pig Pig were so I got in and checked first.  She has relaxed a lot now and didn't mind us being there so I got a few pics and he got to pet her and her little ones. 

 This is a new way to think of pigs in a blanket!  With the deep straw bedding the bottom straw is moist and compacted so after a short time it starts to decompose.  This creates a great deal of heat.  To stay warm the babies, and the momma, will root down under the fluffy stuff on top and lay just above the warm layer at the bottom.  Even on a zero degree day this system can maintain a temp of around 80 degrees under the fluffy straw keeping everyone nice and toasty warm. 

Next I wanted to post a couple pics of a the entrance to our new Youngstown branch location.  I have been helping the guys up there for a little over a week to get everything cleaned up, get a new parking lot installed, and get the sign up and landscaped around.  The place looks pretty darn good and made an pretty amazing transformation in just a couple weeks!  The guys working out of that location will finally have a great base to work out of and a place to be proud to call their own!

 There is going to be a flagpole installed at a later date between the sign and the stone on the left of the picture above and below.  Other than that it is all done.  You will notice that the grass is very green and lush even though it is December 14th.  That is because it is not real grass.  We installed Foreverlawn here like we did at the Giant Eagle project in Alliance over the summer. 

This will give us a very crisp clean look all year round with no maintenance other than to blow the dirt off along the road after snow season is over!  If you look closely you will also notice that I was able to tuck the grass into all the crevices of the rocks.  If this were real grass this would be a maintenance nightmare but with this product it just looks sweet!

 

The dealer, Doran Wengerd, who helped me with this install is the #1 installer in the country.  He is based out of Hartville Ohio and does an awesome job.  He has fully trained me on the installation so we can do it on our own whenever possible.  It took almost a full day to get it cut in as trimming around the rocks is quite difficult.  However, the results make it worth all the effort!  

Kenny

Mallory had her piglets overnight!!!!

Well, we have a new first time mother here at Conser Run Farms!! When I got up at 5:30 this morning for work Steven was already checking on her. She already had all 11 piglets and everyone was dry and eating like crazy!!


The above pic is from this morning when I got up and headed out to see them.

Below is from when I got home tonight. Mallory is way more protective of her little ones than Pig and Pig Pig so I had to wait for her to lay down to get in the pen to check them out.
They are all different in color except two. Two are solid red like their daddy. The rest are a mix of red and white or red and white with black spots!!
Below is a pic of my hand and then my glove next to the babies for a size reference.




Hope everyone has a good night. I will try to get some better pics of everyone over the weekend provided it is not raining! It is like living in a rain forest, only without the forest or the heat or the sunny days ... just the rain, and cold.

Kenny

Mallory is in labor!

We noticed she looked like she was getting close the last few days so we have been watching her closely.  Today after Steven and I got the part on the truck we checked he and noticed she was starting to nest.  By the time we got home from town she was nesting heavily.  Even grabbing large mouthfuls of bedding from other parts of the barn and strategically  placing them exactly where she needed them.

She is currently getting up and down and is in labor pretty good.  

We r watching closely to make sure she has a safe and hopefully quick labor!

When a good turbo goes bad and our new farm worker!!

Well, it was another interesting weekend here at the farm. New guests, broken machines, more rain, and lots of other things to keep us busy.

Let's start with the broken equipment. I don't know if I have mentioned before but I have a 2005 Ford F-350 with a 6.0L turbo diesel in it. Stock these engines are notorious for breaking down due to faulty parts. The EGR cooler has a tendency to clog which overheats the oil cooler for the injection system which takes out the injectors, injector pump, turbo, etc. Well this all happened to this truck just before the warranties went out. So all damage was repaired.

Since then I have taken the time and money to upgrade the power plant to eliminate most of these problems. I changed the exhaust from the stock 3" exhaust to a full turbo back 4" exhaust. I completely removed the EGR system. The EGR system recirculates hot exhaust gases back into the engine to reduce nitrates in the exhaust emissions. In turn the truck burns double the fuel and puts out a lot less power. By removing I use far less fuel, the truck runs a lot cooler, and best of all, a LOT more power!

I also put an on the go adjustable engine programmer on it to control horsepower output and transmission shifting. It also monitors 40 different parameters that were available to monitor on this engine on the go.

Now, I was hauling a pretty heavy load of hay for my parents from Medina to here at home. I was not hitting the throttle hard but I was working the engine good. I was attempting to switch from one highway to another and half way up the on ramp I heard the turbocharger pop followed by a lot of rattling and a lot of smoke coming from the exhaust. UGH!! We coasted to a stop as I immediately shut the truck down. We had the neighbor come get the trailer and my wife and I waited two hours for the tow truck.

The instant I heard the sound I knew what happened. Under full load the turbine and compressor wheels in a turbocharger can reach rotational speeds nearing MACH 1. If there is a weakness it will be found under full load.



This is the turbo split in half after I got it out of the truck. As you can see the shaft connecting the compressor wheel and the drive turbine together has broken. The turbine wheel, spinning at about 10,000 rmp was then free to grind around inside the housing till it came to a stop. In the process it lost a couple vanes and a lot of metal and destroying everything around it.

I ordered a new one yesterday and it is supposed to be here today. The new one is a OEM upgrade that supports the extra heat and power that my engine is putting out. All in all the repair is gonna total about $1500. That is just the cost of the new turbo. My labor is free because I am installing myself.

Ok, that is enough talk about broken stuff. Lets discuss our new guest.

My wife has always wanted a donkey but would never let me get her one because she didn't want to worry about having to take care of it. Well now the kids are getting old enough to know about horses and ponies, especially my daughter. I found out from my business partner, Steven, that another neighbor had a miniature donkey he was selling. It is only a couple of years old. So I went up and brought it home yesterday.

He is a little cutie! very gentle and seams to be easy going. He will be a farm worker though! Donkey's are very good at protecting the livestock from predators such as coyotes which we now have a lot of here. He may be small but he has a very powerful kick and is not afraid to use it when needed. The cows were once again very interested in the new guest and followed him around for a while and he and the bull even had a little standoff. However, Donkey quickly settled the argument with a quick jab to the nose and the contest was over! By the time my wife got home from work everyone was getting along just great and everyone was laying in the shed to get out of the never ending rain!

The other duty he will have is with the wife and kids. My wife wants to train him to pull a small cart for her and the kids. So I am now looking in to someone to train him or teach me how to train him.


Since I didn't have transportation I was not able to go to work yesterday or today. So I have been working on some unfinished projects here at home. I took some pine logs to get sawed on Friday for use as barn siding and to build the pig shed doors. I built the doors Sunday night and moved them down to the barn. In between raindrops yesterday I worked on finishing off all the little detail stuff on the pig shed and finishing the doorways to prepare to mount the new doors.

I will take some pics today as I could not yesterday due to the rain. It is coming along nice!

Lastly, we are going to pen up Mallory today as she is very close to having her first litter of piglets.

Hope everyone has a great day and I need everyone to do their sunshine dance today. We have just finished another 48 hour rain event and need some sun light to cheer me up!!!

Kenny