Tractor pull fun, Barn Project pictures, and Berky is Pregnant and ready to pop!

Friday night I had some hay to mow for one of my customers and on the way back I got a call from my other neighbor asking if I could help with the antique tractor pull.  I said yes and had Steven get my other tractor and we helped out for the night.  As a kid I remember helping my Grandpa with the scales for the tractor pulls at our local homecoming festival.  It was awesome to get to use my own tractor for the pullback tractor for the sled.  We also used my 706 for the scraper that levels the track after each pull.  My kids also got to do something that I never got a chance to do at their age, they rode in the tractor with me for a while and got to see the pull from a totally different perspective.

Pullback tractor for tractor pull sled.

We started Saturday morning off by ripping all the old siding off the original barn.  What a mess, nails and splintered wood everywhere.  However, my buddy Willie had an awesome time doing it and took out some frustrations while doing so.  

Original barn with all the old siding removed

Next up was installing all the header boards and rafters while there was plenty of help.  We decided to use my trailer as a mobile work platform.  It was perfect, no ladders needed for the majority of the rafter and header work.  I just moved it back and forth a couple of times as we needed.  

Scott, Josh, Steven, and Willie helping install rafters for new cow shed.

 Here is a picture of our work from day one.  Headers done, Rafters done, and ready to move on to something else.

Headers and Rafters installed on new cow shed.  

My wife cooked a simple yet delicious meal to feed the army of help I had here on Saturday.  There was one bun and less than a cup of sloppy joe sauce left afterward.

Sunday the army of help was delayed in arrival so after some book keeping work in the house while Scott was completing his barn chores, he and I started on siding the original barn.  We started with the easiest side, the short one height wise, as we were both worn out from the previous day of heavy lifting and such.  

New Poplar siding being installed on old barn

Right around lunch Steven and Willie arrived to help out and a little while later another friend of ours, Hideki, showed up as well.  Hideki came on Saturday as well but it was just as we had finished for the day so there wasn't anything to really do at that time. 

New Poplar siding being installed on old barn

 Steven and Willie were helping line up the siding and Scott was doing all the cutting.  I finally got smart and had Willie bring the fan out to create our own breeze since mother nature was refusing to provide one for us.  

Steven and Willie helping hang siding boards on the old barn

 Next came the careful task of cutting the Power Poles that I used for the cow shed down to the finished height.  These poles are basically entire trees that are debarked and treated to resist rotting and insects and used to hold the power lines that supply electric to everyone.   Once they are damaged, lets say by being hit by a car or lighting, or they simply are too old to do their job safely, the power company replaces them.  I was lucking enough to find a source for them at a huge cost savings to me.  They are also hundreds of time stronger than any post I can readily find at the lumber yard without having something custom cut.  

Now, I have had many many people ask why I didn't cut them before standing them up, or cut them before building everything else.  Here is why.  First of all it is very difficult to get them the correct height before final grade is established.  Secondly, and most importantly, I wanted to fasten any rafter or any other board that contacted them from the top down to the posts.   This strengthens the structure enormously.  To safely cut the tops off, which were extremely heavy, I simply used the fork on the tractor to cradle the portion being cut off and then chained that portion to the frame of the forks as well.  As Steven made the cut I kept tension on the chain and as he finished the cut I lifted the post up and away from everyone involved.  

Willie and Steven attaching post to forks, Hideki being second set of eyes and keeping everyone else out of harms way!

 Here is the finished project.  That was our last task on Sunday.  Everyone was sitting down for a cool drink and a break before feeding the animals and getting some supper!

New cow shed after poles were trimmed down.

New cow shed after poles were trimmed down

 I have a couple of pics of the finished barn siding on the old barn. 

Old barn with new siding installed

The one below shows the cow shed after trimming the posts and ready for siding. 

Old barn with new siding installed

Berky spent most of her day today making a nest to have her babies in.  This time, for a little more privacy, she went all the way down in the bottom ground to make her nest.  Hopefully she moves the babies to a shadier spot after they are born tonight so they don't get too hot in the summer sun.  If not we may have to intervene but I trying not to.  I want to see how they do on their own! 

Berkshire pig nesting in the pasture to have babies.  

Today it was just Steven and I working on the barn as most everyone else had other things to attend to.   We were able to complete the siding for the cow shed and we got 70% of the nailers on the top of the rafters in preparation for the installation of the metal roofing.  I should have plenty of help tomorrow for the roofing so we should be completely done with everything accept for the small area of siding over the double doors for the old barn and some misc. wiring and lighting items.  If I get a chance later in the week I will work on those, if not, they will have to wait till later in the month.  We are hoping to mow second cutting on Wednesday if the forecast holds true for almost a week of sunny weather.  So, I need to complete the roofing tomorrow so we can work on the hay and the balance of the party preparations.  

On another exciting note, I will be picking up my new disc mower tomorrow.  I will have pictures to post. 

Goodnight everyone and I will post more tomorrow.

Kenny

New baby calf and gearing up to get the barn done!

I went out as soon as I got home from work to check the cows and feed the pigs and quickly realized that Princess was not with everyone else.  So I headed out to find her.  I was happy to see she had a very alert and healthy baby calf that jumped up and ran as soon as I took this picture. 

Dam: Angus x Hereford x Charolais  Sire: Angus

After about ten minutes of following them around I was finally able to get close enough to see that it was indeed a heifer.  I was pumped.  This is another of Fifty's granddaughters.  So far, every daughter of Fifty has had a heifer for their first calf.  Also, to date, her granddaughters have also had heifers for their first calf.  Also, to be noted, Princess is the heifer that I let my daughter pic out.  So today she just doubled her herd size!!!!  Unfortunately, she and her brother were so tired from swimming lessons that they fell asleep on the way home and will not get to see her till tomorrow night.  But, I am sure they will both be super excited!!!

Dam: Angus x Hereford x Charolais  Sire: Angus

 I scheduled a week of vacation leading up to the customer party to finish some projects up that need completed, start some new ones, and possibly make some second cutting.  In preparation, after getting rained out yesterday at work, I headed to pick up the lumber to finish the barn.  

It is all rough sawed green lumber to match what I have already used on the barn.  Steven and I will be starting first thing Saturday morning to get it done as quickly as possible.  When we are done I will not only have the cow shed completed but I will also have the old barn resided and finish all the odds and ends stuff that is has not been completed on the pig shed that I started four years ago!

I was fortunate enough that my last fat steer for the year covered the price of the lumber and the fuel to get it.  I still have a little left over to cover the beer to pay the help and hopefully a bucket or two of screws!

I wanted to through in a picture of another project at work.  I spent the day today installing some sandstone steps that will lead down from a patio that I will be installing after vacation.  Very difficult project due to site limitations as well as space.  Unbelievably tight space to work in and a six foot wide path down the hill to access it.  But, nonetheless the steps turned out pretty sweet.  Will be much happier after we are wrapping it up and it is behind me.  A cool project, just unrealistically challenging!

Custom made sandstone steps

 I am also hoping to pick up a much wanted, and mostly needed upgrade to one of my three main pieces of equipment tomorrow.  I will post pics if I do.  Hints are it matches my tractor and it is wider than the model I have now!

Have a great day everyone!

Kenny

Pearls baby girl and some pruning projects around the house.

I was happy to receive a couple of pictures of Pearl and her baby girl from my buddy David in Montana.

Dam; Charolais x Angus  Sire; Longhorn

She is a frickin cutey!!!  Not sure what I am going to name her yet.  I am just really pumped that she is a heifer!!!

Dam; Charolais x Angus  Sire; Longhorn

Because I have been so busy I haven't had time to take care of any of the landscaping here at home.  Well, after getting done with work yesterday I came home and decided to go out and try to do some cleaning and mowing before the rain hit again.  I managed to get all the string trimming and mowing down and decided to start pruning.  

One of my specialties is pruning.  I started learning from my father right after I was old enough to walk.  I helped him as a child to plant all the trees we had at our house growing up and we also pruned them as well.  After going to college and learning all the specialty trees I decided to make a few of my own specimens instead of buying them.  

First up is my Coralburst Crabapple.  I have seen many sizes and shapes of these and this one was removed from a landscape because it was looking like it was not going to make it.  It was about 4' tall to the graft point and total diameter of the head was about 18".  I nursed it back to health and I decided to see if I could shape it to be about 3' thick from top to bottom and I am hoping to have it 30-40' in diameter some day.  I love the color of its flowers in the spring and the fruit later in the summer.  Having it spread way out makes a much larger color impact and also allows us to see the birds and other animals that use/live it in every day. 

Coralburst Crabapple Specimen

Above you can see that it was very thick and overgrown.  In training it over the last 9 years I have been selecting every shoot for a certain direction of growth and for how I want the branches to look.  Below you can see the finished product.  I am at somewhere between 10-12' or approx. 3 meters across now.  You can also see some of my wife's hosta collection around the base of it.  Every time I see a new kind of hosta I get a cutting and bring it home for her.  This is only part of them.    

Coralburst Crabapple Specimen

A view from the other side.  

 Coralburst Crabapple Specimen

Another tree that I have been training for about 8 years is a weeping cherry.   It is hard to tell in the picture below but it is getting quite big now and it is actually above a stone boulder wall.  

Weeping Cherry Specimen.

Here is anther angle.

Weeping Cherry Specimen

Here is the finished product.  I had my wife int he picture for a frame of reference to the size.  The rocks underneath are about 3' tall.  I am trying to train this one to keep going up and out to make it like an arch so I can someday put a bench or small table and chairs under it and use it for shade.

Another very cool thing I have gotten this one to do is to make a ground cover for the bed it is growing in.  It is pretty cool to walk in the bed and realize that the tree is covering the ground and actually keeping the weeds out and keeping the soil cool.  The other neat thing is seeing it in full bloom in the spring.  It creates a mat of white flowers all over the ground. 

Weeping Cherry Specimen

Well, it looks like my prediction of a very wet summer is turning out to be a reality.  We have had almost 8" of rain this month and there is another 2" in the forecast for the week.  Second cutting is going to have to wait as I have a lot of customers counting on high quality dry hay this year and I am not going to risk it getting rained on or baling to beat the rain and it getting moldy.   Let's hope for a break in the rain long enough to make a good cutting.  After that I will fertilize again and it can rain some more if it wants to!

I also want to remind everyone that our customer party is going to be July 5th.  We are doing another whole hog roast as well as about 8 beef briskets and a bunch of sides.  Please contact me and let me know you are coming.  If you are not currently a customer but would like to come to check us out just email me at ken.r.merrick@gmail.com, or call or text at 330-771-3978 and I will let you know how to get here.

I will be sending out the RSVP email tonight to everyone I have an address for.  

Kenny

New calf in Montana!!!!

Pearl had her baby yesterday.   Fifty's legacy is growing, its a girl!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Dam: Angus x Charolais  Sire: Longhorn

My buddy David was able to get a pic late yesterday afternoon of her and her calf and send to me.  I am super excited.  Pearl is Fifty's second heifer and every one of her heifers has had a heifer for their first calf so far.  This one is also from a longhorn bull.  She looks a little different frame wise but still matches her momma's look almost exactly. 

So, at this point I have two cows left to freshen.  Princess, another of Fifty's daughters, and Frosty, Sally shorthorn's first calf.  The calf count at this point is 13 born.  I have had 5 bulls, one died from mistery illness, and 8 heifers.  It is definitely the year of the female.  

New baby calf Saturday!

I have some good news and some bad news today.   I lost a calf this past week.  We tried really hard to keep him alive but 50's little bull passed away this week.  Not sure what caused it but he fought really hard till the end.  Fifty took it a little hard over the weekend because this is the first calf she has ever lost.  

The good news is that in his passing another life came to be here on the farm.  This is one of my Maine Anjou cattle that I purchased early last year.  She had a bull last year.  This year she had a beautiful and large heifer.  I found her very shortly after she was born.  

Not sure who the father is to this one.  I am just happy it is a heifer.  I need bulls for steers for meat sales, but I want heifers to grow the herd.  As you can see in the picture she is number 23.  I actually have three more females that are not tagged as well as one in Montana, and Fifty got her number because that was just the right thing to do.  SO, when you total it all up I actually, right now have 28 females.  If I keep them all that means in 2016 I will have 26 calves every year.  However, I am trying to decide if I want to keep them all or sell some off to pay off some debt and set myself up in a different position moving forward into 2015.  I will discuss this more later on.  

I had to get my last steer from 2012 in the barn to take him to the Butcher shop on Sunday morning.  He was the last one to come to the barn for the special treat I was saving for everyone.   While I was calling him into the barn I had a chance to take a picture of a large number of the calves in the barn area watching their mothers eat their treats.  The treats, if you are wondering, where the last of the third cutting bales from last year that I was saving and giving in small amounts to the herd to get them to come to me when I needed to sort someone out.

The last picture for this post is of the new to me 706.  I am picking up a lot more custom work this year and in doing so I need to move more equipment in one pass than I used to.  This time I needed to get the hay rake, Dad's bale wagon, the baler, and Dad's wrapper, all 13 miles down the road with two tractors and one truck.  We were thinking at first we would need more than one trip, then I remembered the hitch on the back of the bale wagon.  Talk about a long convoy!  It all worked out thought.  We baled and wrapped 134 bales in about 6 hours.   Got it all done and customer was really happy so I want to say thank you to everyone who helped make it happen.

I am looking forward to the customer party on July 5th!!!  It is going to be a blast.  I hope to see everyone I have invited here and get a chance to catch up with everyone.  If you read this and know that you are coming, or want to come, please email, text, message me on facebook, or send a homing pigeon.  I want to be sure to have enough food ready for everyone.  If you need contact info just leave a message with your email or send me an emial through the link on the side.  I have scheduled time off work to finish the barn and prepare for the party this year.  I also will be celebrating my birthday early this year since it is on the 7th.

Have an awesome week everyone and I will talk to you again soon!!!

Kenny

New Tedder, New baby calf, and New PIGS!!!

With all of the hay that I am doing now and the fact that I think we are going to have a summer filled with short weather windows for making hay I thought it was time to upgrade the tedder.  I sold my smaller 9' tedder and found an older 16' tedder to replace it with.  

706 farmall with a kuhn 4 basket tedder. 

It is a Kuhn and is a manual fold and has some age to it but does a nice job fluffing and spreading the hay.  I can literally cut my time in half or better since this one will do two full rows instead of most of one.  I will decide by winter whether I want to keep it and fix the few little worn items or trade this one in and get a new one that is hydraulic fold and a little wider yet.  Or, if I can find a second one that is similar in price range I will get a second one.  Not sure yet, will know when the time comes what I am going to do.  Right now I am just in "get it done" mode!

706 farmall with a kuhn 4 basket tedder

So I headed out to the pasture to check the cows on Friday night and found this stellar looking dude!  Because I have been glued to the tractor seat when I am not at work for the last 4 weeks straight I haven't been able to check the herd as frequently as I was before hay season started.  So I am finding them a day or two after they were born.  

My red angus x shorthorn cow with her new bull calf.  

We are thinking that his daddy is Thunder.  Unless we DNA test him thought there is no way to know.  I was able to get a great picture of him by himself tonight.  I followed him for around the pasture for about 30 minutes trying to tag him.  

I was finally successful and after almost getting my butt kicked by him, his mother, and fifty I managed to tag him.  Here is a picture of them together after the tagging.  Neither of them was in the mood to talk to me afterward.  

Now, on to the big news of the week.  Steven and I have spent the last week trying to decide what route to take in the absence of our boar Redballs.  After many discussions and a lot of looking for new pigs we finally made a decision.  Steven found a young woman a little over an hour north of here that raises heritage breed pigs for sale and shows some of the best ones at various shows around the state and country.  He was only home for one day this weekend so we headed up to check out the pigs and see what we could find.  

My wife has always been partial to the Berkshire breed of pigs.  The sows that we currently have are very tame and I like the Berkshires as well.  So we decided to switch it up a little bit and get a Berkshire boar and two Berkshire gilts to add to the herd.  We are planning on keeping a few of our best gilts out of this summers litters that will be the last from Redballs, to also raise for sows.  I want to see how the purebred Berkshires will compare to the Tamworth crossed with the Berkshires.  The other cool side benefit to this purchase is that because the girl we got them from uses high end boars for breeding, these pigs have great genetics.  So, they will not just be great for the farm herd in general, but, they will also have really nice piglets for fair pigs.  Plus, we will now be able to offer purebred Berkshire piglets which, as Steven and I both know, are hard to find!

Purebred Berkshire boar and two guilts

This is one of the two gilts we got.  I liked this one, not sure why but she just caught my eye and I said I would take her.  

The one looking outside in the photo below is the gilt that Steven picked out.  She looks really really nice and should produce some stunner fair pigs in the future.  

The pictures above and below were taken after we had unloaded them and they had been in the barn for approximately 2.5 hrs.  Steven's gilt was the first one to finally step outside.  My wife and I spent 30 minutes trying to get them to explore.  

The new Berkshire pigs checking out the yard for the first time. 

 We were finally successful and the boar followed shortly after.  However, this success was to be short lived as right after I took the last photo the new boar touched the electric fence while checking out Lady on the other side.  They immediately ran right back into the barn and wouldn't come back out.  I guess that is much better than what has happened in the past where the pigs freaked out and ran through the fence and we chased them all over the yard!

The picture below is of our new boar.  His name is Doublestuffed.  As you all know our previous boar was named Redballs after his most profitable and most prominent assets.  Well, anyone who visits will quickly realize that from the back Doublestuffed has a striking similarity to a doublestuffed oreo cookie!

Our new Berkshire boar "Doublestuffed"

Well, with every twist and turn this year we seem to be headed in the right direction.  What looks like a setback is usually an opportunity to make a change and get better.  I am hoping this change pays off well in the coming years and sets us on the right course for where we want to go.  

Now, off to bed.

Kenny

Our beloved Boar "Redballs" has passed.

Well, it has been another very busy and unfortunately difficult week/weekend here on the farm.  I have a friends sow here to breed to our boar and she was not in the mood yet and he was.  During their first encounter he cut her a couple of times with his overly large tusks.

Tamworth boars 4" tusks

 So, instead of keeping him separated I spoke with the vet and was told that with a simple procedure we could trim them back and he would be fine again.  He has never been aggressive or mean.  It is just that his teeth were so sharp that by simply rubbing them against another pig, cow, or even one of us he would slice skin like a razor blade.  So I gave him a good scratching and he laid down and took a nap and after some medicine to keep him sleeping for a little while we trimmed his teeth.  He woke up later and other than an upset stomach, he seemed to be fine.

My last picture of our Tamworth boar

 We all headed out to do our respective tasks and a few hours later my buddy Steven stopped to check on him and he had passed away.  No signs of struggle or stress.  He apparently just laid down and went to sleep.  No one will ever know what happened for sure but I know he knows we cared because he had the best back scratching he ever had just before he passed!  I will be sure that any future boars we have here on the farm have their Tusks removed or dealt with while they are babies so we never have to do this again.   Our hardest struggle is yet to come with the fact that it takes a year to raise a breeding age boar and we will need to breed sows in about 3 months.  This will not be easy to fix.


In the mean time, while I was super busy mowing and baling hay we had a couple more additions to the cattle herd.   One of our two Maine Anjou's, "Anjou", had a beautiful baby girl. Anjou lost her little boy last summer to a very fast acting meningitis.  She adopted one of the previous years steers for the rest of the summer till he left over winter.  She has been lonely ever since and helping with the other calves till this little girl was born.  She is a great looking calf and our first cross of the Maine Anjou breed with our charolais x angus bull.

Dam: Main Anjou  Sire: Charolais x Angus

 Our other new calf is a tiny little thing.  She is a heifer and was born about a month early.  Normally when they are born this early they do not survive.  However, she is very lucky to have a terrific mother and she is a strong little calf!  She is also definitely Legacy's girl.

Dam: Black Hereford  Sire: Charolais x Angus

 To give you an idea of just how small she I took a picture of my wife petting her when we saw her the first time.  Daisy was actually bigger than her when we first saw her.  However, she is growing so fast that she has gone from an estimated 35# at birth to around 50# already, and it has only been about 6 days!  If she is anything like her momma she is gonna be a great momma herself some day!

Here is a picture of Anjou's calf the Saturday morning when I tagged them both.

In some other notes.  I picked up some more custom work for hay as well as a little more hay ground for myself.  I am getting closer to my goals every day with where we want to go with the farm.  The herd is starting to grow very quickly as is my hay business.  As I have said many times this year I am very excited to see where we finish the year and where this journey is leading us.  

We are greatly looking forward to the customer party on July 5th.  It is gonna be a great time!  Hopefully we have plenty of baby piglets for everyone to see that day!  Second cutting is coming on quickly and we are hoping to finish the cow shed project at the end of this month and possibly start another that I hope to have mostly completed before the party.   More to come on both of these soon!

Kenny