and today it sprung a leak. It was monsoon season here today. I am used to seeing rain in the context of on my windshield, or draining down my umbrella walking to work. It is a completely different experience watching it blow and billow across the large pasture, while listening to it all fall on the barn's metal roof. It was a beautiful orchestration. For those of you who get the blues when this weather happens, I have found the cure for it! All you have to do is develop a dependency for it, and you will relax when it comes. Build a rain catchment for your garden or hot tub, or put a metal roof over your deck for coffee outside. You will extend your fresh air season immensely, and welcome the rain like I do. That being said the sun we had last week was friggin awesome. Burn on my back to prove it. I can’t believe how long it has been since I have posted a blog entry. It has been very busy here at Crying Rock. Patata’s litter is 4 weeks old and they are huge! Silly’s litter is two weeks old and growing steady. We have had another litter since them and two on the way in a week or so. After that we shouldn’t see any new ones for about 2.5- 3 months when the Mulefoot\Chinese are born. We added 3 more Chinese landrace to the fray by the way. The last one we added -Annabel, so enamored Kid Pig that he immediately decided to get fresh without even taking time to introduce himself (it’s kind of his MO). This royally freaked Annabel out and she decided to break out and run off into the sunset. Hours later, me with a rope and a bucket of feed, neighbor Ken with his zippy golf cart and wascally hounds could do nothing to out sprint this chubby little ball of speed. Finally I called cousin Donny with his livestock wrangling dogs and he had her caught within a few minutes. Annabel is small until you have to carry her, I was sore for a week. I gave her a couple weeks to acclimate across the fence from Kid Pig, and this time it went a little smoother integrating them. She has taught me well. In the next couple days we will be moving all the sows who are not nursing litters into the new pasture, and planting behind them in the old paddock the first seasonal forage pasture. This time around it will be yellow peas, sugar beets, clover, canola, and oats. And a little bit of whatever they didn’t eat before they moved. I have had allot of crazy ideas about raising pigs and now that our feet are getting wet, we see working out (and others not so much). Many of you are familiar with the industrial model and understand that it is expected when a piglet is born it will have its tail cut off, needle teeth broken out, castrated, ears clipped or tagged, iron injected, and who knows what else…
Well I am happy to report that despite not stealing their tails – they have not in turn had them bitten off by a tail hungry sibling. Castration, well the jury is out and we will hear back in 5 months, but some research is on my side (and so are all the male piglets). Despite failing to remove their teeth, mom and piglets are in great shape and growing fast. Despite not cutting strange triangle identifiers out of their ears, each piglet is born incredibly unique and we just identify it by its natural markings. Despite not injecting Iron, our piglets figured out how to eat grass and dirt on their second day of life and therefore are not iron deficient. They are just happy pigs, nursing and rooting, biting my gloves and squealing at their mom. If you firmly believe that some of these special mutilations imparts a special benefit or flavor, well that pork is available at Safeway for 2$ a lb. I am not in that business, this is a different product entirely. Before I get too proud, some of the things that didn’t work out: Farrowing on pasture - I just have too many predators and can’t pull it off at this time. Farrowing as a group – I just can’t do this until I live onsite and can monitor closer. That is all for now if I am going to get up in the morning. Be sure to check out the recent issue of PCC's Sound Consumer http://www.pccnaturalmarkets.com/sc/1004/sc1004-farmlandtrust.html
Well I am happy to report that despite not stealing their tails – they have not in turn had them bitten off by a tail hungry sibling. Castration, well the jury is out and we will hear back in 5 months, but some research is on my side (and so are all the male piglets). Despite failing to remove their teeth, mom and piglets are in great shape and growing fast. Despite not cutting strange triangle identifiers out of their ears, each piglet is born incredibly unique and we just identify it by its natural markings. Despite not injecting Iron, our piglets figured out how to eat grass and dirt on their second day of life and therefore are not iron deficient. They are just happy pigs, nursing and rooting, biting my gloves and squealing at their mom. If you firmly believe that some of these special mutilations imparts a special benefit or flavor, well that pork is available at Safeway for 2$ a lb. I am not in that business, this is a different product entirely. Before I get too proud, some of the things that didn’t work out: Farrowing on pasture - I just have too many predators and can’t pull it off at this time. Farrowing as a group – I just can’t do this until I live onsite and can monitor closer. That is all for now if I am going to get up in the morning. Be sure to check out the recent issue of PCC's Sound Consumer http://www.pccnaturalmarkets.com/sc/1004/sc1004-farmlandtrust.html
