Well, over the weekend my kids spent some time at grandma's house, which is the farm I grew up on. I help my dad plant all the trees there accept for one. It is a very very old dogwood at the back of the house. It is the same size as it was when I was a kid and was the only tree I had to play in as a kid. My kids were playing in that same tree. However, my son, who is a little more daring than me decided to swing on a limb that he thought would hold his weight, but he was wrong.
After limb broke, he fell and it hit him square in the eye. He put on a good show for a few minutes but shortly after was laughing about it. He was quite proud of his first black eye yesterday morning. What a goof! He is going to be a handful very soon.
Now, on to the large EPRI project I have going on with the Soil and Water Conservation District. My final deadline is rolling up fast and I am working hard to get caught up after losing my entire July to health problems and broken bones.
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| New line fence for east edge of Buffer Strip |
I spent all day today setting fence posts and stringing new fences. I had to fence in the buffer strip. This is a strip of vegetation that will catch any nutrient runoff from the existing barn and shed area as well as the new heavy use feeding pad. This will be extremely helpful when we get heavy downpours in catching runoff before it gets to the stream. That way the plants capture the nutrients and as soon as they are big enough I get to graze the cows on it.
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| The south side (downhill side) of the barn and feeding pads. |
Below is a picture showing the exit to the pad. If you look you can see the new fence for the sow lot to the right and the new fence for the buffer strip to the left. I still need to get a new 14' gate for here but that is not a priority right now. To many other things that have to be done first.
I also got my cattle waterer installed last weekend. I did not have time to post about then so I am putting it in with this post. It is made by Cobett and was designed by farmers for farmers to be frost free even to -40 degrees. It uses ground heat to warm the water and keep it from freezing. The water lines here are all buried to 36" to guarantee them to keep from freezing even in the hardest winter here in northeast ohio.
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| Exit to the new heavy use pad with new waterer in the corner. |
The way it works is the top is about 4' tall and fully insulated and is hollow inside with air space between the tub holding the water and the outside insulation. The top section sits on top of another hollow, uninsulated, pipe that is about 3' tall. How it works is when the water gets cold in the tub it cools the air inside around the tub. This air then naturally falls down and the warmer air in the tube at the bottom rises and gives off heat to the water keeping it warm enough not to freeze. This process is also helped out each time a cow drinks from it and new water enters from the pipe buried underground.
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| Cobett cattle waterer installed. |
It is setting a little high out of the ground right now. Finished height after concrete will be around 16"-18". This is high enough to keep debris out but low enough that even the calves can use in the winter.
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| Cobett waterer installed |
Here is a view from above. This is supposed to be able to handle up to three full grown cattle at a time. I have seen them use it already in mass and it works awesome. There is a float valve that uses a ball and a rope, very similar to a toilet valve, to keep the water level where you set it. If it gets dirty, you can simply unscrew the four bolts around the top and, after baling the water out with a small bucket, lift the tub out to clean. There is also a ball valve underneath to shut it off while you have it out to clean if you want.
If you would like to learn more about these waterers please check out the Cobett website! I found them at the Farm Science review a few years back and immediately knew this is what I wanted here at home!
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| Cobett waterer installed in the heavy use pad. |
Here is another picture showing the corner of the pad. When I am done I will have the wood boards built over the waterer to keep the cows in or out but still leaving access for them to drink.
Here is a closer pic of where the pigs will be entering the sow lot. I think you are able to see what I am working toward now that the fence, and some of the boards are installed. I will finish the railing boards once the concrete is complete. I wanted to give the guys as little to work around as possible. We are going to roll all the edges of the concrete on this side to keep the pigs from wanting to root under it. I one area where we rolled the edges and another where we used a form board. Where we rolled the edges the pigs have never rooted around the concrete. Where it was formed and has a vertical edge they keep trying to dig underneath it.
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| exit from walkway for sows to get to the sow lot. |
I also threw in a picture of the new fence that will stay along the edge of the walk. The boar lot is now about 40% bigger and this will also keep the sows from walking in the bottom of the swale in the mud during the wet times and messing it up.
My last picture is looking toward the pig waterer through what will be a future gate in the big hole and a height restriction for the pigs to use between the two poles on the left. I am going to mount the gate on the barn so when open it is completely out of the way. This will allow me to clean the pig barn from this side and keep all the manure on the concrete and out of my driveway. In the past I had to enter from the driveway side and also load spreader on that side. Now, I will be entering this way and putting the manure on the pile in the corner to compost it. From now on I will be applying composted manure in the fall instead of fresh manure all winter and spring. This will greatly reduce runoff and increase uptake by the plants and greatly boost production in the spring!!
If you would like to know more about Electric Power Research Institute you can visit their site at www.epri.com. I am part of a trial nutrient trading program, that if it works well, may be rolled out large scale. This will allow for a much farther reaching and greater impact form of pollution control that will benefit everyone down the road. I will discuss all of this in much more detail in another post. I want to dedicate the time and space to it that I need to explain it well.
Lastly I want to discuss our last calf of the 2014 season. Frosty had her little baby while we were away for five days on vacation. Unfortunately, due to the wet and humid weather, the flies found her before we did. She was in pretty bad shape when I found her and at one point about two weeks ago I though for sure she would not make it through the night. I had to tube feed her for a week twice a day and we had to wash her and give her some antibiotics and pain/fever reducers as well. Then, the morning I though for sure I would find her passed away she was sitting up waiting to be fed, and then, as I entered the pen, she even stood up on her own!!!
I was elated. I quickly went to the neighbors and got a bottle and she started eating like she had already been doing it this way!
That was two weeks ago and each day she is getting better. Since we have no mothers milk to feed her we are using milk replacer from the neighbors farm till she is strong enough to head back out to pasture. My wife has been helping a lot during this process and here she is feeding her over the weekend.
I knew that she needed more exercise to get used to walking again so I cleaned a portion of the barn out and bedded it down for her and for the first time I am using one of the box stalls for exactly what I intended them for!
In an effort to get her some more exercise I also started letting her out to walk with me. Her, Daisy, and I all walk up to the house each night for her to get her dinner. She has even started to run a little now.
I have not settled on a name for her yet. I call her baby girl most of the time so it may just stick!
If this is an indication I think the bad times are passing and we are on the upswing again. She has brightened my spirits so much seeing her turn around. I have not had a calf come back from being this sick since I was a kid. It helped me to know that you always have to try cause you never know when that last little push will get you past the worst of it all and put you on the road back to the good times!
Have a great week everyone,
Kenny
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