Frosty had her calf yesterday!!!!

 Well, I have been thinking every day for two weeks now that Frosty was going to have her that day.  However, yesterday morning I got up and found she was actually in labor.  So I headed out to mow hay and stopped back in between fields to check on her.  I found her finishing cleaning up her new baby boy!  He is HUGE!!!  I am guessing him to be around 100-110#  Definitely bigger than her first calf last year and second only to Black Eye's calf in size this year.  I also love the fact that he has an awesome frame and stance.  He is also built like a linebacker in the fact that he has no neck!  I am excited to see how he grows.

His Momma is one of only two cows that I have that were from Artificial Insemination that we did here on the farm.  His grand father is Bexter.  He is a registered black Angus.

Sire: Charolais x Angus Dam: Shorthorn x Angus 

I weaned all the baby piglets last weekend and turned all the sows out with our boar Red Balls.  The cool thing is that the apple trees in the pasture are all starting to drop apples.  So yesterday as a treat while we were all checking out the new little guy above, I went over to the apple tree and called the pigs over.  I then shook one of the limbs and made it rain down apples for everyone.  Talk about a feeding frenzy!  They spent the next twenty minutes cleaning up the ones I knocked down plus all the others that were already there.

My buddy Willie also brought down a bunch of apples from his lawn at home for the piggies as well.  We dumped them in to the babies in the barn and they cleaned them right up.  So now they are already getting seasoned with apple juice!  They are growing very fast as well.  The smallest ones are around 40 lbs. and haven't taken of growing real fast yet because they are still going through the shock of weaning.  The ones that have been weaned for a couple weeks however are growing really fast with the biggest ones pushing 75 lbs. already.  I will keep them penned up for another week in the barn to be sure they are fully weaned before I turn them back out to the pasture.  Also by keeping them in the barn for another week they will get big enough to not be able to crawl under the fences without getting shocked!  I will keep them in the two hog lots for the first month and then when I pen up the boar I will turn the piglets out to the big pasture with the sows and use a height restriction to limit just them to the feeder.  That way they get the extra food they need to grow but they still get all the goodies from the pasture.  The height restriction also keeps the sows from eating non stop from the feeder.  I will give them the food they need but if left on unlimited food they will skyrocket in weight and get quite unhealthy.

The feeder piglets fighting over a piece of zucchini we threw into them.

To start last week the temps were in the upper 90's and we had our two hottest days of the year.  By Thursday it was 50 degrees and raining.  Today is supposed to be 75 and sunny....we will see!

The upside to the cooler temps is being able to cook on the fire without sweating my butt off.  So, last night my wife thin sliced a pork roast and seasoned it with some of the Hawaiian seasoning salts we got while on vacation.  I cooked it on the cherry wood fire.  It was so delicious.

I will let you all to enjoy your Sunday and the start of a new week.  I have to go bale some hay for dad.  We are winding down as far as hay goes for the year.  However, now the grain harvest is starting and I will be baling corn stubble for bedding now.  Before we know it we will be having sled riding parties!

Kenny