Natural Harvest Farm

It is near lunch time and this mornings activities included a great deal of time breaking roads through the snow. It is impassable for the goats and tough for the beef cattle. The tractor is pushing snow, but that makes good livestock pathes. Moving feed just takes a long time in deep snow. We have been blading off around the layer house to afford them some ability to get outside. We also are putting straw in the floors to keep feet warm and the baby goats and pigs a warm dry nest.

 we had a maternity house started last fall. We had set the piers and intended to have it functional by January. It is a large warm building that we could put some heat in for sows farrowing or goats having young in extremely cold weather. This year we have had to make do with the old sheds, but as soon as the snow clears, we will put all the parts together and take our first shipments of layer and brioler chicks. We normally expect to have our first pastured broilers by May 1st, but this year will be at least mid-May if not the first of  June. We have a few old layers left, but our serious egg production will not arrive this year till mid-July.

We are expanding our milk and meat goat herd this year. We anticipate doing pasture rotation with the chickens in one field and turkeys in some others to do natural parasite control. We are adding sheep in mid-July as well. We have chosen the Gulf Coast breed of sheep. They are quite vigerous, yield a fine wool and require almost no worming in there lifetime. As many know that has been a major problem with sheep production. Many flocks have to be penned and wormed on a monthly basis. Gulf Coast sheep have a high degree of natural resistance to internal parasites. With their natural resistance and our cross species pasture programs, we hope to build the soil and not increase parsite problems.

We had intended to spread ashes on the fields during the winter as well, but the seasons have slowed that too. We are going to attempt to spread ashes with a manure spreader. These are available in great bulk from a local dry kiln that uses saw dust to heat with and the residue is available in semi-trailer loads. The nitrogen from our livestock manure, ashes. micro-nutrients and the use of legumes on pasture provide the plant food we need to grow everything that eats our grass. We are growing some sugar beets for the fall foliage and winter carbs to the pigs and chickens. We will also be doing a patch of squash completely for livestock food. We did some pumpkins in our sweet corn last year with pretty good success for our own needs and fall livestock feed. We feel that this area is not good for corn production and we cannot be truly sustainable without the ability to produce total winter foliage for our livestock. Therefore we are experimenting with anything to replace corn as our livestock wintering feed for chickens and the sows.

The geese are getting more aggressive each day, telling me they will soon be nesting. We hope to have a good hatch this year. We will be adding a pair of Cotton Patch geese this month as well and hope to have a good hatching year. One of our Blue Orpington hens is setting now, although I have little faith in this. We will be putting as many of their eggs as possible in the incubator April 1. They were devistated by a dog last year and if we are lucky, we may have extras to sell by late summer.

 we hope that spring breaks soon and the grass is abundant. We have adequate forage for the season even if it is late, but know that many of the farms around us are very short on hay. The goats don't each much if any hay as soon as the ground is bare again. We will soon be going to get an ox to power our cane mill this fall and to move some trees in rough places that are not to large. It is coming from the same gentleman in North Carolina from which we both the sorgum mill. We hope to also use him for some tillage this year for our garden crops. This is just another one of our adventures into knowing how our ancesters did the work we have used tillers for.as a child, we tilled with a pony and I think this will replace that gas powered tiller that always breaks down when you need it most. Again, I wish everyone a pleasant and early spring with all the possibilities that spring always brings.