Monday, February 28, 2011

The Weekend Report...........

The weather was kind of yucky here this weekend, so we took the opportunity to make "The Guilt Trip" over to visit The Man's grandma.  There is a wonderful antique store in the town she lives in, so after our visit, we stopped in and I found these treasures........


I just love old cooking utensils.  I don't like plastic and I don't like made in China, so I try to buy all my kitchen stuff from thrift stores or antique stores. 

On Sunday, my folks came down so I could do their taxes, then we went to town to the farm store.  We needed some insulators to finish Ed Earl and Luanne's pen and we also found this.......


I can't wait to play with this new toy when we plant garden.  We've wanted one for a while now, and since we got our tax refund on Friday, The Man decided to go ahead and get it.  In case you don't know, it's a seeder and it is going to make planting carrots and other teeny tiny seeds much easier and less wasteful.  Necessary??  Prolly not, but we bought it anyway.  ;0)

We also bought two buckets of this...........


Ya know what that means?  That means as soon as the weather allows I'm gonna have some shiny red barns!  Whoo hooo!

The weather is kinda yucky again today, but it's all good.  Today is the last day of February and that means here in Illinois, Spring is just 'round the corner!


God Bless...............


Friday, February 25, 2011

Spring Dreamin'........and the Conclusion of Pig Week........

Even though this is what I saw out my bedroom window this morning.........


And my back door.............


I can't stop myself from Spring Dreamin'............it'll be here soon ya know!

Soon we'll be doin' this.........


And this.............


Soon we'll be seeing this...........


And this................


Soon the girls will be doin' this..........


And then I'll have a mess of these to play with..........


As well as these to play with........


Giving me lots of this to play with........


Soon I'll be heading to the post office to pick up these.........


And then in about 5 months, I'll have these again...........


Ok, ok, that's enough dreamin' of spring!  It can't get here fast enough!  We've got some plans for the upper garden, and if my blueberry bushes are still alive I'm gonna move them.  I may order a cherry tree and a couple apple trees to join the peach trees, but I may wait another year on those.  My chicks will be here the beginning of May, and the gal I'm buying ducks from just sent me an email, the eggs are going in the incubator today!  Star is due to kid mid May and Tulip 3 weeks later!  I'm ready baby! 

I also have to once again praise God in His infinite Wisdom in keeping us here on our place.........what were we thinking to entertain ideas of selling??

K.......on to the conclusion of Pig Week here at Goodwife Farm.  I know I've been singing the praises of the Old Spot hog and I'm still in love with them.  How could you not love this face?


That said........pigs can be dangerous critters.  As my hero Mama Harper said once......."Tell 'em I went to spit and the hogs ate me!"  She said that for a reason, and lets just say if you ever have the need to murder your neighbor, feeding the body to the hogs is a good way to dispose of the evidence! 

Pigs can and do kill people every year, but so do stud horses, rogue goats, rams, dogs, heck even a goose or rooster can mess you up if you aren't careful, just ask me, I know!  My point is, as with all large animals, you must show them respect, as well as let them know at all times you are in charge.  Dominance is the word of the day when dealing with any livestock.  Does that mean bullying or mean-ness?  Of course not, it just means that you, as Head Boss Goat 'round your place must keep everybody else in check and in their place!  Don't send your 5 year old out to feed the hogs (or anybody else with the exception of possibly the chickens, but remember that rogue rooster) 'cuz you're just too darned tired to do it!

On that note, I'll leave you with one last picture of my very happy pig........and say Ah Dew for now!




God Bless...................




Thursday, February 24, 2011

Pure Bred Critters.........Line Bred, or In Bred, It's All the Same Thing.........

This is a topic that's been swirlin' round in my little pea brain for a few weeks now.  It's finally reached the percolation stage and I gotta get it down so it will go away!  Once again, these are my opinions and mine alone.  What you decide to do with your animals is your business and blahdeblahblah......

In any purebred animal, be it horse, goat, dog, cat, pig, chicken, whatever, if you go back far enough you will find a rather spectacular amount of line breeding.  In animals we call it line breeding as opposed to in breeding, but it means the same thing.

Take the dog for instance.  If you have a pure bred dog, at one time in it's ancestry it was just your basic garden variety cur.  Folks picked out dogs with traits they liked and they bred them together.  Then they bred fathers to daughters, mothers to sons, grandparents to grandchildren and so on to "fix" the genes.  Then they would start to outcross a little bit to see if the genes would pass on true, all the while crossing back on the original stock to re-"fix" the genes.  This is true of every single purebred critter out there.  Of course this is a very simplistic view of things, and if you want to know more you can do the research and get into it a bit deeper.  I just want to say again, if you go back far enough in your purebred animals pedigree you WILL find a rather spectacular amount of line breeding.  It's just the way it is.  You cannot create a new breed without it. 

Now that that's out of the way, here comes the important part that you HAVE to listen to......

When you line breed, you are not only concentrating the desirable characteristics, you are also concentrating the un-desirable ones.  You must ONLY breed the best.  When you are building up a herd, you have to cull and cull hard.  Take my Kinders for instance.  Kinders are a sort of rare as well as new breed of goat.  If I go back 6 generations (sometimes less) my Kinders are related to almost every other Kinder out there.  This isn't a bad thing, and only becomes a real problem when people breed just to be breeding and don't worry about quality.  For instance, if Tulip were to throw a kid with a split teat, or a double teat, even if it were a buck kid, I wouldn't sell (to the general public) ANY kids from that breeding.  Nada, none, zilch.  The kids would go to the meat sale or would be butchered here at home with no exception and I wouldn't repeat the breeding.  Next breeding I would use a different buck and if she again threw a kid with a split teat, or an extra teat, I would once again butcher all the kids and I would know that the defect was in Tulip's lineage.  I would keep Tulip, because she is an excellent milker, but I would NEVER sell kids, they would all go to meat.  It would be unethical for me to sell kids from a goat that I know possesses a defective gene. 

Star is Tulip's daughter as well as her half sister.  Star is the product of Tulip being bred back to her father, and Star is an amazing goat.  She has a gorgeous udder and no problems.  She also throws beautiful correct kids.  Through the careful breeding program of my friend Rhonda, this line breeding produced an excellent animal, because she only breeds animals that are completely correct!  Now say you've got a goat that is a gallon a day milker, but her attachments aren't the greatest.  Should you line breed this goat?  Well it depends.  Does her father's mother have nice attachment, really nice attachment?  If she does, then you could try breeding her back to her father to see if that would improve the attachment on her doelings.  If her father's mother doesn't have good attachment then you wouldn't want to even try it, because you would be concentrating the gene that caused the poor attachment. 

Another note about line breeding is that you should take care to breed vertically (up and down the pedigree, ie mother to son, father to daughter, grandfather to great granddaughter) as opposed to horizontally (side to side in the pedigree, ie brother to sister, half brother to half sister).  You run much less risk of problems when you do things this way.  Although breeding half siblings can do wonderful things, it is also a really quick way to bring any genetic problems to the forefront.

I should also say, that when you are developing a new line or bringing back a line from the brink of extinction, you sometimes must breed imperfect animals and deal with the consequences.  You still want to pick the best of what you've got and breed them together.  This is called "breeding up" and it's a long road to perfection.  You are much better off if you can find and buy, or breed to, extremely correct animals, but sometimes this just isn't possible.

Of course in a well established breed such as Nubians or Alpines in goats, or Labs or Boxers in dogs, or Quarter Horses or Hereford cattle you have a broad enough gene pool that you shouldn't have to mess with any of this.  But in Heritage animals this is a big deal, and that's what's got me thinking......

In 2009 the Gloucestershire Old Spot breed of hog had less than 1000 animals in Great Britain and fewer than 200 breeding animals in the US.  It is that way or worse with a great deal of heritage animals.  If an animal's numbers are allowed to fall to that few, you MUST line breed.  There is no way around it because there simply aren't enough animals to cross breed them out without losing the "fixed" genes that make the breed what it is.  If you are responsible with your breeding program, this doesn't have to be a problem, but you have to cull, cull, cull.  You have to be prepared to eat lots of your culls, which is why this is less of a problem in livestock, than it is in dogs or cats!  Unless you want to eat bbq'd Fido and that's your business.......... 

 That said, Ed Earl isn't registered.  One of his litter mates was born without a tail, so his breeder didn't want to register him in case that popped back up in later generations.  Should he have even sold Ed Earl to me? As long as I breed responsibly and am aware of the possibilities of this defect cropping up, it shouldn't be a problem. If problems continue to arise the breeding should be re-evaluated.  As for my boar being not registered, I could care less.  I'm not much for playing with others, and don't particularly like the politics that oftentimes come with breed registries.  Most breed registries (with the exception of rabbits) don't guarantee good animals.  Most registries, if the parents are registered, well then the offspring can be registered and it doesn't matter a whit the quality of the animal.  It is in the hands of the breeder, and their choice to register the offspring or not.  The breeder of Ed Earl is a good example.  He was correct in not registering Ed Earl since he came from a litter with a cosmetic defect.  A note about registered rabbits;  Rabbits can only be registered after being examined and passed by a registrar, therefore a subpar animal is not going to be registered, no matter it's parentage. 

Should I breed Ed Earl?  Well there's that question again.  Here's the thing..........I am breeding solely to get pork for my table.  I have NO intention of selling Ed Earl's offspring as breeding stock.  Every boar piglet will be castrated before leaving here and buyers of the gilts will know about the tail issue and that they are buying FEEDER pigs,  not breeding stock.

One thing is for sure and certain, Ed Earl shouldn't be line bred, because the defect that caused the no tail in his brother could be masking an even deeper problem, or it could be nothing.  I won't know until I've bred him and even then I may not know because I'll only be breeding him to one sow and genes cross differently in different animals.  It isn't near the problem for someone like me, who is breeding solely for meat, as it would be for someone who was breeding to sell breeding stock to others.  But again, when you have heritage animals with a limited gene pool you sometimes must do things you wouldn't do in a more optimal situation, but you still have to be honest and ethical in all you do.  You should be honest and ethical in every aspect of your life, but that's not the topic for today.....hehehe!

I didn't get Old Spot pigs because I want to become a famous breeder and save the breed.  I don't have the land, nor the money for that.  What I want is to produce my own meat for my own freezer and sell the surplus, probably at the livestock auction.  In that case, having a pig with the genetic codes to produce tail-less pigs is pretty much a non issue, but I will still be very careful in my breeding, even though I'm just breeding for the table. 

In closing I'd just like to say that line breeding is a very good tool in the hands of a responsible breeder..............

Wednesday, February 23, 2011

Pig Week Continues.......What Does a Happy Pig Look Like?

Watch this video to find out..........



If you are wondering about the panel laying on the ground in this video, it is there to prevent my piggies from rooting in that area.  The creek runs through there, and we laid the panel down and wired it to the fence so they won't excavate in the creek bed right there and get it deep enough to get out.......


Ed Earl is a slave to belly rubs........while he was exploring his new home, he'd come over to one of us once in awhile to get a nice scratch........

Watch this video to see if Ed Earl prefers belly rubs or eating best.......WARNING.........this video depicts the innate viciousness of the Old Spot Hog.....don't say I didn't warn you.....



If you want to raise pigs, get an Old Spot!  ♥



God Bless................


Tuesday, February 22, 2011

Hog House 101.....Building Ed Earl and Luanne's Abode......

God blessed us with the most gorgeous weather this past weekend.  Sunshine and temps in the high 60's low 70's.....just glorious!  It felt soo good to be outside, working next to my man!

We got the fence all done on Saturday, so Sunday was devoted to building a house for Ed Earl and Lu Lu....

We had to buy four 2x4's and 4 sheets of OSB, then we went "shoppin" in our used wood pile in the hay barn.......

After findin' what we needed in our pile, we loaded it all up in the truck and headed to the home site......


First we laid out the foundation in a rough square.  The 6x6's are from the old hunk of rust barn that we tore down a couple years ago.  The 2x8's are leftovers from building the rafters in my horse/goat barn.....


After screwing the base together, we put the panels on.  We each got on one side, and with some big ole steeples, secured that sucker to the 6x6 posts at the bottom.....


Where we joined the two panels together, we made sure to secure them both with one steeple......


Then we baling wired both panels together, all the way up.  We made sure to have the wire ends INSIDE so that when we put the tarp roof on, the wire won't poke holes in the tarp......


Since this is for pigs, we didn't want just a tarp down at the bottom, and I also wanted to stiffen it up.  We decided to put OSB board on the bottom of the panels.  We could have used treated plywood, but cost was a factor.  I held a 2x4 on the inside while The Man screwed the OSB to the 2x4 from the outside.  Then I went around and broke the screws off so as not to leave anything for the pigs to get snagged on, or for wasps to build nests on.  Then The Man screwed a 1x6 to the 2x4 with the panel in between, making a sandwich.  This will prevent the OSB from popping away from the screw heads......


We did the same thing at the bottom.....


Here it is so far.........


Then we put the back on, screwing it to the bottom board.........


Then The Man cut off the excess..........circular saw you say?  My baby don't need no stinkin' circular saw.  That's what chainsaws are for!  Everything we had to cut for this building we used the chainsaw, that's just the way we roll............


Then we put these boards in, on the top, in the middle, and one that would go between the top and bottom sheet of OSB...... 

Then we held the next sheet of OSB up there, I went inside with a pencil and marked the arch..........and The Man got out his precision cutting utensil and made the cut......


Then we screwed it up..........


And here ya go!


By this time, it was pretty stiff, but I decided since we had OSB leftover we should put some up in the front, to further stiffen it.....


And now it's ready for paint.........


So I got to work!  This is the kind of painting I don't mind, no worry about making a mess!  I painted with a brush, then The Man went behind me with the roller.


Ain't it purty?


At this point, we went in for a quick bite and when we came back out, we put a second coat on, then put the tarp roof on it.  We bought a contractor grade 8x10' tarp in brown.....


And stretched it over........using a staple gun to secure it down.....


Then we took furring strips and screwed them on, putting a screw through the furring strip and into each of the metal grommets.......this will help make the tarp more secure and it looks nice too!


It has the approval of the dogs..........


I filled it up with dry, waste hay from Champ and the goats, and here it is, all done and ready for occupation!   

Please tune in tomorrow for the continuation of Pig Week here at Goodwife Farm........you'll get to see if Ed Earl and Luanne approve of their new home and land.......


God Bless................

Monday, February 21, 2011

The Weekend Report...........Constructing a Pig Pasture....

Since coming home to Goodwife Farm, Ed Earl and Luanne have been renting this quaint little duplex with a small yard.....this is usually the home of the chickens on the left side, and the buck goats on the right side.  The building you glimpse on the left side is the hay barn, the building on the right side is the goat/horse barn.


Friday night we went to TSC and got this big load of supplies, except for the roll of fencing, we already had that in the garage.

The Man is a pro at digging post holes......we only had three to dig, so between the two of us, we got them dug in no time.  There was no frost left in the ground.....


Now we are bracing the corner posts......


And here we are unrolling the fence in preparation for stretching......


We tend to have more help than we need......Tommy is looking for his hammer I guess....


Wrapping the wire tightly around the post.  You wrap it 'round the post, then you steeple it real good so when you stretch it, it won't come loose.....


Now we are hookin' up the stretcher to the chain and the truck.  You can do this with two 2x4's screwed together with the fence sandwiched in between, but this stretcher makes things lots faster and easier.....


Now we've got the east side stretched and clipped to the posts.  We steepled it to this post well on both sides, then continued down the north side and put a gate in.  I forgot to get a picture of this.........whoops!

Over there on the south side we share a fence with Good Time Charlie.  He's an ancient old man who owns a very old house and barn over there.  He doesn't live there, he lives about 1/2 mile away in town, but he takes excellent care of this old place that shares our fence line.  We didn't want to risk Ed Earl and Luanne tunnelling to freedom and running amok on Charlie's lovely land, so we put a hot wire along the bottom up there.  We will eventually put hot wire around the bottom edge all the way 'round.

Tune in tomorrow to read about the building of Ed Earl and Luanne's house...........



God Bless..................