Day 0: Managed to get out of the house Friday afternoon, picking the kids up at the bus-stop and leaving directly for the farm. Made it to Kirksville about 8pm and hit all of our regular stops: MFA for gas, Orscheln for salt blocks for the cattle, 24D, and other farm stuff (thank goodness for farm sales tax exemptions), Walmart for a new audio cable (just to discover my iPhone restore did NOT restore my music!), HiVee for groceries. 2 hours later we were at the farm, kids were asleep, all was good.
Saturday was spent surveying the erosion control work we have our neighbor, Donnie Yantis, doing. Donnie has 2 full time jobs: Raising >100 head of cattle and doing earth movement. He has spent some time this spring building some structure to reduce erosion in our fields, we hope. We need a good drenching rain to test them, but have not had one of those yet this spring. In fact, things are getting pretty desperate rain wise out there. Normally folks start haying in June – this year they barely have enough grass to feed their cattle, much less haying extra. We need rain!
Last weekend I made a first pass at spot spraying my south field. Was very happy to discover I hit about 90% of what I needed. Went back with another tank of 2-4D and got the ones I missed. Also spent an hour or so with my neighbor, Sonny Darr, and spot sprayed one of his fields. 2-4D is incredibly cheap – about $0.30 a gallon made up – spent maybe $3 worth to do all of Sonny’s field. Will have to go back and hit the ones I missed next trip – but that is ok. I’m sure I’ll find more to spray on my fields as well. In fact, I know I will. I went to our north field, that we typically use as a grass stockpile, and was surprised at the amount of multi-flora rose and other brush popping up in it. Left the wild blackberries (great eating!), but went through about 45 gallons of spray getting the worst in that field cleaned up. Finally finished spraying with a tank of Roundup on my driveway.
Needed to till some of the earthwork Donnie had done to prep it for seeding (presuming we get some rain) and took the tractor back to that north field about 8pm – with perhaps 30 minutes of light left. Was pleased to see that Dawn had given birth that evening. The photo above is of a very wet calf, perhaps an hour or less old.
Actually ate three meals today – almost rare, but it got hot in the late afternoon, so took time out to make brats for lunch (with beer of course!). Relaxed until about 6pm and then went back our for another couple of hours of work (and caught that newborn on my phone camera!) Went back and cooked what was marked “boneless country style pork ribs”, We had noticed in the store a bone fragment or two, which we laughed about. While preparing and cooking the meat, it was apparent the meat was fully boned! Wrote the store manager about that. Reading the Hormel label it clearly indicated this was “bone in” Pork, despite what the store label (with the weight, price/lb, total price, etc.) said. Also discovered when reading the Hormel label that up to 12% (meaning 11.99999%) of the weight was a “Patented Solution injected into the meat to increase tenderness and juiciness” – e.g. to increase its water weight. Not happy on either count and swapped several messages with the store manager over the weekend. They offered a refund, I requested they stop redefining “boneless”. Gave him a pretty hard time around the 12% water add too, especially since the “Patented Solution**” was defined anywhere (hate it when something is asterisked and then not defined). Anyhow, that was meal #3 around 9pm.
Saturday was spent surveying the erosion control work we have our neighbor, Donnie Yantis, doing. Donnie has 2 full time jobs: Raising >100 head of cattle and doing earth movement. He has spent some time this spring building some structure to reduce erosion in our fields, we hope. We need a good drenching rain to test them, but have not had one of those yet this spring. In fact, things are getting pretty desperate rain wise out there. Normally folks start haying in June – this year they barely have enough grass to feed their cattle, much less haying extra. We need rain!
Last weekend I made a first pass at spot spraying my south field. Was very happy to discover I hit about 90% of what I needed. Went back with another tank of 2-4D and got the ones I missed. Also spent an hour or so with my neighbor, Sonny Darr, and spot sprayed one of his fields. 2-4D is incredibly cheap – about $0.30 a gallon made up – spent maybe $3 worth to do all of Sonny’s field. Will have to go back and hit the ones I missed next trip – but that is ok. I’m sure I’ll find more to spray on my fields as well. In fact, I know I will. I went to our north field, that we typically use as a grass stockpile, and was surprised at the amount of multi-flora rose and other brush popping up in it. Left the wild blackberries (great eating!), but went through about 45 gallons of spray getting the worst in that field cleaned up. Finally finished spraying with a tank of Roundup on my driveway.
Needed to till some of the earthwork Donnie had done to prep it for seeding (presuming we get some rain) and took the tractor back to that north field about 8pm – with perhaps 30 minutes of light left. Was pleased to see that Dawn had given birth that evening. The photo above is of a very wet calf, perhaps an hour or less old.
Actually ate three meals today – almost rare, but it got hot in the late afternoon, so took time out to make brats for lunch (with beer of course!). Relaxed until about 6pm and then went back our for another couple of hours of work (and caught that newborn on my phone camera!) Went back and cooked what was marked “boneless country style pork ribs”, We had noticed in the store a bone fragment or two, which we laughed about. While preparing and cooking the meat, it was apparent the meat was fully boned! Wrote the store manager about that. Reading the Hormel label it clearly indicated this was “bone in” Pork, despite what the store label (with the weight, price/lb, total price, etc.) said. Also discovered when reading the Hormel label that up to 12% (meaning 11.99999%) of the weight was a “Patented Solution injected into the meat to increase tenderness and juiciness” – e.g. to increase its water weight. Not happy on either count and swapped several messages with the store manager over the weekend. They offered a refund, I requested they stop redefining “boneless”. Gave him a pretty hard time around the 12% water add too, especially since the “Patented Solution**” was defined anywhere (hate it when something is asterisked and then not defined). Anyhow, that was meal #3 around 9pm.