Just another Day on the Farm

It really is.. winter I mean, its still very much fall to a point at the farm in the sense of above average temps, its still below 0 but not by that much, and its all brown with hidden spots of green, in certain spots on the farm, there are still a number of plants that are still slowly growing.

The pigs and rabbits all want deeper bedding, give the pigs a choice and they would perfer to sleep in a pile of bedding to the point that you can’t even see them and then when they come out, their whole bodies will steam, its kinda cool really..

Little miss Tooties is so fat that her belly almost drags on the ground and she had her first heat, she is so not having babies.. not going to happen.. but she is driving my boar a little crazy, might have to re-think her placement in the big barn, because that’s just not fair to my big guy..

The mob appears to be doing just fine with having been split from their momma, who does appear to be drying up some, and who is eating very well but more important, does not appear to be losing weight anymore, I would certainly not call her thin but she got alot more lean then she normally looks and I would like to get her back to peak condition to head into the depth of the cold winter.

The piglets are being brats when it comes to figuing out how to “break out” of their pen, not that they are going anywhere at this time, just roaming the main area of the barn, and they are always back in their bedding sleeping when I go in and then when they hear me, they come popping out and then follow me back in for their food and water, I have fixed it twice and both of my fixes have to date failed.. hmmm

The expecting sheep are looking really good, and boy do I have some healthy looking momma sheep with a goodly amount of lambs on board, sigh, I just can’t get there yet, I need to get the older lambs out and I just seem to have one or another hold up.. it will happen, I know this, it always does..

My hugelculture and getting my shed done are both on the back burner, which I am not sure is a good thing but you have to flexable on figuring out the to do list, that is for sure part of farming..

so tell me, has winter (snow/cold) hit your neck of the woods, are you ready for winter? or are you still having fall in your area as well? and if so, what are you doing around the homestead while you can still see the lay of the land?

* please note that I am not saying any of this is legal and kiddo’s if you are going to hunt and or use/own rifles, DO IT RIGHT! never be this dork- don’t try this at home.

Ok, so yesterday was one of those wonderful busy days on the farm that allowed me to slip off for a afternoon horseback ride and a work visit..

Car drives slowly by on our road.. hmmm, lost? shortly there after car, slowly drives by the other way, pull’s into what the local’s call the running road and stops, needless to say the local farmer that I was visiting headed down the road to see if they were lost.

We think the kindly think first, bet they are lost, it happens a lot in our neck of the woods, but the visit takes longer then I think it should for a “looking for z or just want to watch the geese” so I take a little walk of my own and I can hear the tone in the french, but can’t understand a word.. hmmmm

Back comes the farmer, and wow, family in the car, dad has bullet belt straped to him, with a wife and child in the car along with rifle (uncased) YIKES!

Asked if looking to hunt, guys says just looking, farmer says, got permission to hunt on any of the local land (which we know the answer to considering farmer 1 owns most of the land and Farmer R owns the rest locally) so the guy, says yes, farmer XY gave me permission, which again just shows how dumb some folks really can be, given that that gentleman owns his land in a different village area, he is in the same township but not even within 20 plus driving to where we live. – So EEEH.. wrong..

So then the guy gets rude.. and starts asking Farmer, well what land do you own then, and do you own the road, and he was not scooping out hunting, he suddenly had a flat tire (which was not flat).

Finally guy says, well just thinking I might get a few goose, ya know.. first in our county, there are rules on what you can use in regards to hunting this or that, second, you need written permission from the land owner, and third, its deer hunting season right now, not duck/goose

I have huge respect for the local’s that live in my area that hunt, I have found them to be excellent, careful and respectful of  the land and those of us who live here but last night was a eye opener on just how easy it is to have someone with no respect drive up and show up in your neck of the woods.

I truly hope that you don’t have to deal with weekend warrior type hunters, they be wild and weird and give the good guys a bad rap!

You see one of my duck hens was decided to go broody and she didn’t have many eggs under her and it was not one of the good sitting/broody area’s and so I figured, ah, not going to fight her on this well, darned if we didn’t hear peep-peep-peep yesterday so we closed her off with food and water and safety from the other birds and last nights check, I got a report of at least one yellow duckling, ok.. and to bed we went..

Only thing is this morning, momma duck is still sitting tight, she at least does not thing its time to come off the nest, but when I raised her wing to see this lovely duckling.. instead I was greeted by a very cute yellow chick…

yup, looks like momma duck hatched out at least one sweet little chick, I was unable to take any more beak hits to see if there was anything on the other side of momma duck, I will give her today to relax and consider getting off the nest to see what is there..

None the less I have a new chick, and I need to figure out where that little tike is going to be raised, choices include, in a rabbit hutch with duck momma, in a big pen with a heat lamp on one end with topping with duck momma or in the house, with no duck momma..

I guess it will depend alot on if more hatch or not..

Yesterday was a very busy day at the end of a very busy long weekend, it was a rock solid work morning/afternoon, and yet another freezer camp day but it was also beautiful, it was plus 18, with a warm wind and given that it was in the first part of Nov, you had better take advantage and find time to go riding..

So here is my story of yesterday’s journey with Brandy, she was as willing as I in terms of wanting to get out an spend some time together, they took off the corn from the big farm fields around us and that means we now have many, many acres of rideable land accessable from our back pasture gate, which means that we can go riding without needing to go on the road to get there off-farm.

So we tacked her up and it went very well, then I went to mount her and I couldn’t, I was so sore from having a very hard working weekend, she stood for the first mount and if I had been able to finish it, I know that it would have gone well but I could not get the proper lift and the next was even more unforgiving to me then the first, at which point, I decided that the only way I was getting on her was if I did the slide on from the big front step, instead of using the mounting block, so of we went to it..

Do you think she would come in and stand proper for Dh, No! she was bringing in her front but swinging out her rear to the point that I could not mount, so we walked her around and gave her the choice a few more times, I would get her in postion and as soon as I went up the steps she would swing on her butt, and Dh would ask her to step over and she would refuse him, she would do it for me but swing out when I walked up the steps.

Frack, Frig and Fig It… this went on longer then it should and up and down the stairs and around we went, and then I had it.. and I back Dh off and Brandy and I had a little tussel.. we did some hard and fast ground work, and I brought her back to the spot and she went in and I asked her to over, and her answer was a high head pop, to which she got the smallest little rein pop on her flank ( I swear this was a very light pop, I can tap her just as hard with her training stick) and just flipped that switch and in went the rear right where I wanted it, reward, and then she did something that made me smile and just shake me head, after she did what I asked, she lowered her head and did the lip touch, it was as close to her version of “sorry” as you can get..

But at that point, I knew that I was to sore to get up and try and ride so Dh got up and off we went to the back field, the walk felt really good to me and Dh rode her across the farm, out the gate and around the big field, they road most of the way across the field, and then then did some exercises, they looked great together and she was so good with him and he is really starting to find his seat and he did so well with the reins, since we got the chin strap and did the last bridle adjustments, she responds to just a light and soft touch it was wonderful to see how well they rode together, our saddle is starting to break in well and fit her so much better.

I found myself crying as I watched my horse and my man riding out there, it was happy tears for sure but still they flowed and I had to laugh as when he rode up to me, before he saw that I was crying, he said to me, “Best Horse I ever owned” with a laugh..

As we figured we would not be the only ones that were out riding in this amazing warm day, we headed back onto the farm, where Dh played round up the sheep and move them around the pastures before we headed back to end the ride as I didn’t want him on Brandy if or when the girls rode past the farm, as I don’t know how well she would behave under saddle when she saw the other horses, but as it happens the girls saw we were riding and so they doubled back and went back though the bush, such sweethearts.

After they got back and untacked, A (who is 11) came over to chat and see how our ride went, I had unsaddled brandy but still had her bridle on and after visiting a bit, I asked her if she wanted to go for a bit of ride on Brandy, she said yes, and up she went on to her bareback, and we went up and down the lane and around the road a bit, she did well and really enjoyed the ride, Brandy was basicly trailing me but it was still fun and A was grinning from ear to ear, and said she was so smooth for such a big horse and seemed to really enjoy seeing the world from that high up point.

A wonderful way to end a great ride on a high note is to see your horse be so well-behaved and gentle with both your man and a young child, after that ride, she was standing with me, eye’s half closed, and gave me a head lean and soft sigh.. it was a moment, where she seemed just as happy to be with us as we were to be with her..

I said to Dh, I really feel that we are getting to the point that we know each other, now don’t get me wrong here, she is a big and powerful animal an you should never truly trust any animal that can hurt you without trying a 100 percent but having said that, I felt very comfortable putting A up there bareback, a) because I know my horse and can read her body lang pretty good at this point b) she has proven herself time and time again to look out for her rider c) A can really ride well and is very much a natural little horse gal..

While the walk pretty much did me in for the rest of the day, it was so worth it.. and once again I was reminded why I am trying to lose another 50 pds or more to be able to improve my overall quality of life, I want to be able to get back to being able to go for 12 plus hours a day again and feel great at the end of it..

I want to put in a solid eight hour work day on the farm and then still be able to saddle up and for a ride at the end of it!