Here is a little pictorial of the llama shearing event last weekend. Above is the “before” nappy hair shot. She was definitely long overdue for a shear! Continue reading “Llama Shearing”
Author: fourfarmdogs
Beginnings of a Fenceline; and One Stolen Roasted Chicken!
I’ve gotten quite a few fence posts in, just in the last week and a half. I need to do the cross-braces, and then I’ll have two sections ready to stretch; maybe by next weekend! Continue reading “Beginnings of a Fenceline; and One Stolen Roasted Chicken!”
Corn Starts
We had a corn patch all rototilled and ready to go late May, when the soil was warming up. But then we had the excavators come; and ended up deciding to put a driveway there. So, corn planting was up in the air for a while. Continue reading “Corn Starts”
Planning More Fencing
I have finally started on fencing the second pasture. Really, I started a few months ago, with the planning, but that takes a lot of time, so only just this last week was I able to start putting in posts. I have a master plan of the fencing layout of the whole property, which I have drawn up in Visio. It shows the high-level workflow of gates, tractor drive areas, ditches, culverts and bridges. It looks like this:
But when I’m ready to fence a particular rectangle, I need second drawing to help me figure out the materials list. Continue reading “Planning More Fencing”
The Llama’s New ‘Do
A local feed store and some alpaca farmers organized a shearing event for today, held in the parking lot of the feed store. It was a great deal- $16 per llama or alpaca, much less expensive than hiring a shearer to come out to the farm to do one animal. I had been wanting to shear Dolly Llama soon, and was dreading trying to do it myself, she was one shaggy monster. So I was thrilled to see a flyer for this event last week. Continue reading “The Llama’s New ‘Do”
Garden Produce
We are starting to get some nice garden produce already. Our lettuce is bountiful, and tonight we enjoyed both English peas and sugar snap peas. Fresh off the vine, they were delicious Continue reading “Garden Produce”
‘Neath the Tractor Woes
We’ve lost, and bent, quite a few things that reside under our New Holland TC30 tractor. You see, this tractor has a lot of exposed stuff on its underbelly. And that’s not good, because when you have a farm, and an old farm no less, you run over things. To start with, there is 10 foot tall reed canary grass, and then there are even taller blackberry vines, and big things can hide in there. Things that have been found hiding in our weeds, from past farm denizens and flood deposits: logs and lumber, boulders, whole trees, a truck bed, broken or bent-over fence posts (with barbed wire still attached) a clawfoot bathtub, hundreds of feet of 6″ aluminum pipe and fittings, steel barrels, huge bent gates, culvert pipes, refrigerators, a couch, an RV door, and old broken tractor implements. Those are just the few that immediately come to mind- there were many more! Our neighbors have an entire collapsed garage, plus all its contents, under there somewhere, just waiting for the next owner of the property to say, “honey, I was thinking I’d mow that patch of blackberries over there in the back pasture today.” Continue reading “‘Neath the Tractor Woes”
Bent Power Steering Shaft
Quite some time ago, we bent the hydraulic power steering shaft on the tractor- a New Holland TC30. I’m not sure how or when. But, it compromised the seal, so the thing has been leaking power steering fluid like crazy. We’ve been procrastinating on fixing it (we never want to stop using the tractor!), and were just topping off the fluid all the time. Continue reading “Bent Power Steering Shaft”
Septic Repairs
A week or so after our excavation work was done, we had a break manifest in our septic tite line, near where the new drainage ditch had been dug. They had actually hit the line while they were digging, and repaired it at that point. But, what we didn’t know was that it pulled, like a thread out of a seam, through the soil and broke at a second point up near the tank. Continue reading “Septic Repairs”
Tiniest Baby Tree Frog
At least the tiniest I’ve ever seen!