Farming 2.0

We are still living in town but are still planning to farm someday.  For that reason, we never got rid of a couple heifers but kept them at a different farms and bred two of them.  They should drop their calves any day now.  We bought a few other animals too.  Pigs worked out pretty well for us last time around so that was a no-brainer.  First came a young boar, next a dozen mixed gender little piglets.  We will butcher about half the smaller ones, when they reach market size, and keep a handful of females to breed with the boar.  Micah even had enough money of his own to purchase one of the little females.  Her name is Lucy and he is excited for her to grow up and have lots of piglets! We explained it to him like this, if he spends his $50 on a remote control car he will have one item that will quickly break then his money will be gone.  If he used it to buy a piglet, he can sell her piglets some day and increase the money he had to begin with. He liked the sound of that. 

The boar is very friendly and maybe a little lonely, he is in a solitary pen because he is so much bigger than the other pigs.  He loves to have his back and head scratched and will rattle his pen until someone comes and pays attention to him. Eric is also getting the little ones used to having people in the pen and has even gotten a couple to eat from his hand. 

Our farm will also have a flock of laying hens!  It finally worked out for me to get a batch of chicks. I chose Buff Orpingtons because my mother had a flock of them and had nothing but good to say about their temperament and ability to lay eggs.  They started out in a kiddie pool in our garage where the kids went out and looked at them several times a day. 

Now they are moved out to the barn where we have the swine.  Eric and I covered what used to be a cow maternity stall with chicken wire and put them in there.  It works well for them and they are growing bigger every day. All of them have a few real feathers now and some have lost almost all the chick fuzz.  I love the soft brown feathers, they look so cuddly!  They don't love to be picked up and are very quick if we try to grab any of them.  I do try to hold one or two every time I go out there so they get used to being handled.  Grandpa D is my chicken/egg expert and he said they will probably start to lay eggs around the first of November.  Looking forward to collecting fresh eggs from my own chickens!

 

Bonus material!

Barns should have cats and the barn where we keep the pigs and chicks is no exception.  There are a couple mama cats around but it is that time of year when kittens start to appear.  We have seen a few bigger kittens around this summer.  Last week we saw two little ones up in the hayloft.  They were so cute! The little calico one was crying and crying and let us catch her, the grey one was a lot more skeptical of our advances and quickly ran away when we came up the steps.  I hope they stay around.