I thought it was about time I did another Down on the Farm Update, as it has been quite a while since the last one.
It is summer here and the land has really browned off. We have had some rain this past week (over an inch) and there is some green pick starting to show up in the paddocks.
We have our piglets in a feed lot in our cattle yards, and they are growing really well. There are some with names such as “sausage”, “prosciutto”, “smokey” and our favourite “spit”.
We have sold a few and another couple are sold awaiting collection, but there will be plenty left to butcher for us. The last sausages we made were such a success we will probably do these again.
We keep our big pigs, 3 sows and a boar out in the crop paddock and they are enjoying being out there. When they are big they don’t crawl through fences, so they are content where they are. Two of the sows are due to have piglets any day now.
Here is my husband with one of our milking cows. We are feeding them a mixture of oaten and wheat hay and this really keeps them milking well. We milk once a day and each cow is averaging about 10 litres a milking. We then let them out for the day for them to feed their calves and then lock them up again at night with the calf still in the paddock.
My husband really enjoys milking them and he always gets more milk when he does it. Most of the milk goes to the piglets, we use some for our cheese making and for use in the house and the cats get a little bit as well.
We are wanting to put in more fruit trees this Autumn and the picture below shows the area where they are going to go. The pigs and dairy cows have been in there and have eaten it right down so it is almost time to plough it up before the green growth starts coming back.
We had planted fruit trees the first year we moved in but didn’t realize how wet it was, so we did lose a few. This new area is right next to the old area and we will join them up and hopefully have nice mowed grass between the rows. We want to put in berries as well this year and will have them in this area so they will be fenced off and protected from wandering stock.
We have a couple of different plum trees and they are both laden with fruit. I am looking forward to them being my next preserving project.
That’s my update for now – more to come later.
We have lots of plans and ideas and we are excited to see how it all plays out.
Hope your farm/homestead is going well and you are enjoying the fruits of your labour.
Blessings
All sounds very exciting!
Thanks Jayne, it is great when plans start to come to fruition and you can see the farm developing. Blessings
You’re killing me! You didn’t say what kind of fruit trees. I’ve gotta know. We added to our orchard about 5 years ago, but it is all but impossible to keep all the deer and moose off them for the first two years–they seem to leave them alone after that. We’re going to try to put more in this year. I want to add cherries, apricots, serviceberries, pears. The food storage starts to run low on everything but apples by early spring so I’d like to get a few more of these.
We really want more nut trees too.
Your plums look beautiful. We have 25+ plum trees, but the season is so short here we hardly ever get them to ripen.
Excited for your green house! Can’t wait for another update–I’m digging through my seeds and dreaming for the snow to melt…
Blessings,
Hmmm you aren’t complaining about the cold are you?? (ha ha). 25 plum trees, that’s awesome, how many fruit trees do you have all up??? We are going to put in around 20 apple trees. There is a pack we can get that has them fruiting over a long period, like one variety fruits in March, one in April and so on. Then after our apricot tree produced well this year my husband wants more apricots, some nectarines would be nice, maybe some cherries. I suppose it all depends on the finances and how much we can afford. I do have some pears on our pear tree – about 10 so that’s exciting. I still can’t get over having moose in your garden, would love to see a picture. What are serviceberries?? Yes by the end of the season I only have apples left too, but they are so handy in so many ways. We aren’t very keen on nuts but would love to know what ones you are going to plant?
I am very excited about the hot house too, can’t wait. Hope the snow melts soon. Blessings
Not quite sure what you mean by “how many fruit trees do you have all up?” If you mean mature, then I honestly couldn’t tell you. I know we have 11 apple trees. We get enough applesauce, apple pie filling, dried apples, canned apples, etc. for at least an entire year off of 4 of them. We can sell the rest. We get the red varieties every year, and 75% of the time the green ones don’t make it before they freeze. Considering we rotate pruning them every third year (and thus usually don’t get apples off those ones the next year), I’d say we harvest off 7 or 8 every year. I think with 20 trees, you will be set and have a good financial cushion.
I can’t count all the chokecherry trees. Way too many and we like it that way. We are in the mountains at 6000 ft, so we let any tree grow that wants to to cut down on the wind. I wish they were sweet cherries though, all we use these ones for are juice.
Serviceberries: http://www.growinginhisgrace.com/all-about-serviceberries/
I’m way too scared of those massive moose to get a picture. All the ones that come to our house seem to always have babies–so…no pictures. I don have pictures of a mountain lion on my back porch if I could figure out how to send it to you…
Waiting for your next gardening update…
Blessings,
Hi Deborah, it sounds like a wonderful place where you live. Your apples sound great, and I am now looking forward to ours fruiting, will have to wait a while now. At the moment we pick our apples off the trees on the side of the road and we get heaps of them. I usually just bottle them but I have put in an order for a bigger dehydrator for my birthday next month, so hopefully they can find a good one. I suppose I was wondering if you have a huge orchard. We have about 7 fruit trees in ours at the moment and they are doing well, so it is exciting to be putting more in this year. I definitely understand about the moose, I hear they are massive animals. You can send me a photo via my email account tmpresser@gmail.com I would love to see a picture of this mountain lion, actually that sounds pretty scary too. Thanks for getting back to me. Gardening update later this week. Blessings xxxx
Your piggies are so cute! I would love to have a cow but I don’t know if I have the dedication to milk every day.
Thanks for linking up with Green Thumb Thursday last week. I hope you ‘ll stop by and link up again this week!
Lisa M
Thanks for stopping by, yes the pigs are cute. We only milk our cows once a day and leave the calves on them at night, so there is some leeway. Blessings