I know that I am keeping the one female, the one in front, of course hiss is staying, still up in the air on the other two.. first I need to sex them, and second, I don’t know that I want more then two breeding females, I have been very pleased with how well they are overwintering
Girl (Full sized cow) on average eats 600 dollars worth of hay per year, she eats 360 worth of grain per year, and she uses 200 dollars worth of straw bedding per year, time wise, when in milk, she adds two hours per day to the farm chores, total hours 112, plus an average increase of 3 hours per week in barn chores, Hours in barn chore time this past year for her 144 hours.. Hard cash costs 1160, time costs 256 hours Equal to working a fulltime 8 hour job for 32 days of the year.
Vs
Milking sheep
It would be 300 for the year if they were like girl and are fence breakers and therefor have to be tied out, but they are not, a milking sheep would be able to go on pasture for six months of the year, so assuming good quality hay as a secondary treat for a milking sheep as well as pasture.. 200 for the sheep per year in hay.
Milking ration for the sheep- 120 per milking cycle, no increase in bedding, as the milking sheep or a milk goat would not require its own sleeping pen and therefor would get a equal share part of the bedding used for the sheep flock, which is typically 200 for the year, split ten ways.. 20 per year.
Time, I can milk my current milking sheep in about 15 min twice a day, for a total time of 30 minutues, or a total of 120 hours for the full milking time in a year. As for extra cleaning time, say two hours per month, because I like to scrub the milk stand down from top to bottom so often, otherwise no extra cleaning required.
Total money costs 340 and time costs 136 hours or Equal to working 17 full time eight hour as day job per year.
So extra cleaning time around 16 hours over the eight months.
Now the washing of dishes, straining of the milk and use the milk is not being figured out here..
I have figured out that our household does not require more then a liter of milk per day and that a gallon of milk per day is lots of making the amount of yogurt, cheese etc that my household requires, anything over that, is just going for critter food, I would rather only spend the time, effort and money to get the milk that is required for the household.
I think its pretty clear which one not only will save us money and time. Time which I can move over to other area’s of the farm and its needs.
Wow, I have to say that these would NOT have been the numbers I had come up with when I wrote it all out on paper in terms of what it would take, but there were factors that I didn’t expect, such as not being able to use the “cow pasture acre plus ” because the cow would not stop breaking though both a sheep and barb wire fence and therefor, needing to be either feed in her stall and or brought out and teathered, therefor while she did get to graze, she never properly got to use her own pasture which would have cut hay costs. Plus hay was cheaper as was straw when we made the plan, it went from 30 per large bale to currently at 50 per large round bale, straw went from 30 per large square bale to 50 per large square bale (delivery costs included in those prices)
There was no way to see the amazing rising cost of grains when I was making the plan three years before and was using those costs to figure It out, the weather, the floods and so forth has cause huge increases in feed costs for farmers across the board.
The other issue that must be shared but was included, we had to buy a truckload of water in the height of the dry spell, it worked fine, and it was split over all the animals but the cow added 60 plus gallons of water use per day when we were using the well, 60 to 80 gallons of water per day adds up, and can give drinking water to a lot of sheep.
I am not going to even add in the water hauling time in the summer because that is just my farm, feast or dry.. I either have more water then I can use or have to be super careful..
So while each farm will have its own costs and clearly if you have a auto milker or grow your own hay or grain, your costs are and time will be different.
However, I figured you guys might like the break down..
The Hens are starting to lay again! so excited to have more eggs starting to come in each day.. Wordless Weds, still warm eggs are a tiny moment of sweetness and light in my life.
Well lets see the hauler is booked, the Butcher is booked and Girl will be gone in a matter of days heading to freezer camp.
The feb letters are written, and ready to go in the mail
Some of the nails are done, some of the grooming is done, I also did some bathing and blowdrying! Some Pineapple is being done, the chickens are loving the trimmings
I found some awesome new soap molds at the dollar store, so cute..
Its been melting something so I am taking the extra time on cleanup duty..
My Turnips were starting to grow greens, and so I need to process some of them.
I cooked up a large pot of turnips and mashed them with butter, I have a good size bowl leftover.. so I made leftover Turnip Creamed Soup.
Use the oil in the bottom of a pan, add in a finely diced onion and garlic, cook until clear, then add in your leftover mashed, cooked Turnips, then add a few tbsp of water and get the first rush of heat in the turnips, stir it really well. Then add in your three cups of whole milk, bring to a simmer, (don’t boil), you can mash more, you can blend it for smooth, add you salt, pepper, and dill, make sure its heated though and serve.. Super simple to make, and very very tasty!
I am sure at least a few of you have noticed that Samwell Aka Sam has scaring on his face, at some point in the past, someone put a to small halter on him and let it cut right into his nose band, and also his cheek, they let it stay long enough to not just rub the hair off, but to become a wound in and of itself.
Now this had been clearly healed up by the time I got him but it was smooth bare skin when he arrived, and he has been crazy about his protein/vit/mineral lick, and something has been happening, so far, its only happening on his cheek scar and the left hand side of the nose scar, I have yet to see anything really happening to date on the right side of his nose scar..
Wish I was seeing this kind of improvement on the other side, I am hoping that it will start, it would be so wonderful if even part of these scars were to heal themselves, my research and reading shows that if the hair root is still there, that they can grow back if treated right, but if its been destroyed that I will never get it to fill in.. I think it will be very interesting to see where these are at in another year or two..
I have heard that keeping the skin soft and supple will help, and when it warms up, over 0 in temps, I will start a treatment on this, but I don’t think its a good idea in below 0 temps.
Hi Folks
I have a few things I want and need to get done this week, hoping that by getting them out here and ideally snapping some photos of the progress or finished projects, that I will get them done and quickly this week 🙂
1) Book the butcher and the hauler, the sooner the better, will be working on this on Monday.
2) Transform the 26 extra large fresh pineapples into 48 pints of canned pineapple
3) Trim all the hounds nails this week
4) Groom and do ground work training with both horse’s at least three times this week, if possible, ride on the road a time or two.
5)Sew a patch on my pair of pant that got a rip on my last ride.
6) Make my Jan batch of soap
7) Get the Feb Letters done for 12 months, 12 letters, it takes two to three weeks for letters to get from me to the girls, so they need to be mailed out next week.
8)Make the Valentine Soap, so that I can get it cured enough to be able to mail out by the end of the month to a few folks. (got super cute heart molds from the dollar store so each soap will be a big 4.5 oz bar.
9) Go though and redo both freezers, need to do a count and figure out what I want to pressure can over the next two weeks to make room for the incoming beef.
9a) Weight out a certain portion and get the poundage to a friend who is buying it.
10) Plan out, and buy the needed wood/fixings for a coming project for pudding and sweek.
11) butcher out a guinea fowl for a planned dinner this week, plus I need the feathers for a craft project
That it so far..
I started making these as horse cookies, but then the hounds begged and got some of the smaller ones, an they love them! Then I offered them to a few other critters this morning and everyone likes them, from sheep to pig to horse or cow, at that point I need to try them myself and yup, they are awesome, not really sweet but crunchy, full of flavour and just plain tasty..
I put around a cup of oats and a cup of bran in bowl, with a crabapple size lump of coconut oil, and then poured boiling water of it, till it was just level to the top of the grain/bran and let it sit, swell and oil melt, then I mixed it together with a pint of sweetened apples sauce, and about a tsp of salt, and then use whole grain flour till I had a thick firm non-sticky dough.
Floured the pans, pressed it out, cut marked it, baked, then took it apart, cut each stripe into four and baked again, then allowed to sit in the oven overnight to cool and dry..
Ok, I know that some of you will be unhappy or upset or just why? when I announce this..
So here goes, We are moving Girl off the farm.. a number of reason’s to be honest, way way to much milk for our personal needs, way to much feed costs, and the biggest reason of all..
Girl is to big! I know that my horse’s weigh just as much as her but they don’t use their strength the same way as she does, they might lean over and nibble the grass but she will just break the fence down, they respect the gates, Girl has broken two of them in a short while, now instead of easy gate, I have full chains on them..
I am not set up for a cow that wants to break fence, I am not set up for a cow that wants to be pushy, I need my animals to work with what I have.
No offence to Girl in any way. and we love raising our own beef on the farm, and we do well raising a bucket calf to a year old, they don’t get to full of themselves, and I raise them to have a lot more respect then I did with Girl..
Which leaves us stuck on how are we moving her off the farm, while I adore the cross that she is, its not a sellable cross as a typical family milk cow, while she produced far more milk then I could use, she can’t be used in a dairy, and cost on feed for her, makes her a very very hard sell as a family milk cow.
Which leave’s selling her into a beef herd, well first, again the cross is a good one for being a momma cow and she is proven but the only one locally that use’s that mix is Farmer R and he does not want her as he considers her a danger because she does not have the proper cow/owner flight bubble..
I won’t take her to the sales barn!
Which leave me with really one main choice.. freezer camp.. To say that I hate the idea of it is a understatement.. to say that it can reduce me to tears would be more right..
But when you can’t safely walk your own pastures without worry, when you can’t leave your farm without locking them up, because the cow once again broke the fence, broke the gate and lets not just herself out but the sheep and the horse’s..
What if last time, one the horse’s had been hit on the road, what if they have not gone next door where a friend lives and they could just be brought back home, if they had roamed, it could have been real! issues
We can’t turn our back on her, she is untrustworthy and when DH says.. she needs to go.. she needs to go!
Sometimes farming life sucks!
The turnips are thinking its spring, some type;s of squash are turning, my best keeper are the specetti squash and of course the butternut, my big main go to winter squash.
How’s the stuff in your root cellar holding? I figure I have around four hundred or so pounds in winter storage still available to me at this time, how about you?
Just another Day on the Farm 