Harvest 2013

Harvest 2013

Nothing new here, just a copy for my records before I wipe out the little side bar.  My record keeping was bad last year, especially at butcher time.  We butchered one female calf and two smallish pigs.  Our neighbour also dropped off a bit of venison, since he had more than he needed.  This is what I tracked though, so here it is.

• Dairy- Butter- pounds- 46 lbs
• Dairy- Milk- 750L (approximate)
• Eggs (approximate)- 70
• Fat- Tallow- Quarts- 6
• Fruit- Blueberries- Meals- 8
• Fruit- Nectarines- quarts- 6
• Fruit- Rhubarb- frozen pulp- 6
• Jam- Strawberry- pints- 13
• Juice- Rhubarb- 12L
• Meat- Beef- Ground-
• Meat- Beef- Jerky-
• Meat- Beef- Roasts- 4
• Meat- Beef- Steaks- 33
• Meat- Beef- Stew- 1
• Meat- Chickens- butchered- 6
• Meat- Fish- meals- 12
• Meat- Partridge- 5
• Pickles- Dill- Quarts- 12
• Seeds- Sunflowers- Quarts- 3
• Veg.- Beans- frozen, meals- 7
• Veg.- Cucumbers- fresh- 44
• Veg.- Onions- 6
• Veg.- Peas- 3 handfuls
• Veg.- Peppers- fresh- 17
• Veg.- Potatoes- pounds- 10
• Veg.- Tomatoes- fresh- 10 gallons
• Wine- Apple- bottles- 21
• Wine- Elderberry- bottles- 6

Medicine Chest

I'm not wiping the medicine chest off the side bar, just continuing to add to it as I create/harvest/prepare additions.  I'm just posting it here in case I should wonder when I added something at some point in the future.

• Salve- Plantain-Comfrey
• Tea- mint leaves- quarts- 2
• Tea- raspberry leaves- quart- 1
• Tea- Yarrow- quart 1
• Tincture- Pennyroyal
• Tincture- Speedwell
• Tincture- Thyme
• Tincture- Yarrow

Chickens in the Basement

When the chickens started started dieing, we built a temporary home for them in the basement. 

Temporary chicken coop

 It's just the space under the stairs, about three feet wide and 10 feet long.  There was a pole conveniently located from ceiling to floor in the corner, which made sectioning the space off very simple.  We put in a little door way and wrapped the whole thing in plastic.  Plastic of course, is not the best for ventilation, however it does protect the birds from the smoke that escapes the fire box.

Normally this space is reserved for overnighters- large pieces of firewood that we don't split, used to keep the fire from going out over night.  They had to be moved before we could bring the chickens in. 

The plastic is held in place by firewood at the bottom, and stapled to the top of the stairs and wall at the top.

Rooster with three remaining hens

Surprisingly, with just the four of them, it really doesn't smell.  I give them a coffee can of fresh shavings every two or three days, and that seems to be plenty to keep the smell down.

They made an escape a couple of times, the door wasn't closed properly and they were roaming loose in the morning.  That was messy.  They seem to have gotten into everything.

They don't currently have proper nesting boxes, just a cardboard box on the floor.

They'll stay inside now until the grass starts growing in the spring, or the temps at least stabilize over night.

Furry Critters

As I mentioned in the comments the other day, Tori, coming from the south, took two years living in the north to grow a proper winter coat. We were lucky that those winters were milder than this one.

Knightmare, Tori, Shiloh, winter 2014

It's hard to see, but her fur is just as thick and long now as Knightmare and Shiloh's, who were born and raised in the north. 

Toothless, summer 2013

 Toothless, lean and sleek through the summer, becomes a furry beast in the winter.

Toothless, winter 2014

He's a holstein cross, bottle baby from the auction.  Again, we were lucky.  His first winter was much milder.  Last winter was harsh, but not as bad as this year.  He has adjusted to life outside in the great white north.

Nelly was born furry, and keeps a fairly thick coat even through the summer.

Nelly, winter 2014

And then there's Dorie.  She's another furry beast, although she loses her thick fur coat in the spring. 

Dorie, winter 2013

The funny thing about Dorie- we don't really know what she is.  We know she's a beef cow, a crossbreed, probably Limousin, but those horns just don't match up with any of the common beef breeds in the neighbourhood.

Scottish highland cows (picture stolen from facebook friend)

Cranberry, my sister-in-law, has a cousin who lives in my area, and they raise Scottish Highlands.  When I added her to facebook, she looked through my pictures and commented about Dorie being part highland.  Hmmm...  Well, then...  If the horn fits...

Highland cows are well suited to northern winters and poor pastures.  They eat more scruff and browse than typical cattle.  So you'd think I'd want to jump in with both feet, right?

Their meat also has a taste of it's own.  I can't really explain it.  Some people say it's more gamey.  It doesn't taste like any deer or moose I've ever eaten though.  Slightly lamby?  Maybe goat-like?  I've never eaten goat myself.  At any rate, not my preference.

Mind you- the most delicious beef I've ever tasted, was Dorie's calf, Casper.  His Daddy was angus.

Majesty, winter 2014

This furry little beast is the future.  She looks little in the picture, but Nelly's a good 50 feet or so behind her.  She's a big little girl.  Her fur is long and thick.  She's at least 1/4 holstein and 1/2 beef. (Toothless' and Dorie's daughter). 

Sheila, winter 2014

My only explanation for Sheila surviving this winter is her age.  Her fur is a little thicker, but not very long.  She looks great, just about ready to kid.

Winter Sucks

Winter sucks on a good year. This year, winter really, really sucks.

The cold came early, most of November and December ran in the -40°C range.  Weeks and weeks of freezing bloody cold with rarely a day in the tolerable -30°C range.  January was worse to start, then got a little better, then worse again.  More of the same for February, until this week.  We're at a balmy -9°C now.

You'd think with all the cold, we'd at least get a break from the snow.  But no, no luck there either.  More snow this year than we've had since we moved up north.  Many of the old timers say there hasn't been this much snow in 20 years.

The cold and snow and wild life took it's toll on the livestock.  When two of the calves disappeared, coupled with numerous prints, I assumed wolves.  The next two calves froze to death, no doubt about it.  We found their bodies.  We'll see if we find the bodies from the first two when things melt in the spring.  That's all my bottle babies and Mugsy, Mindy's calf.  The only survivor (touch wood) is Majesty, Dorie's calf.

We found Mildred lying in the middle of the barn.  No signs of trauma.  Just dead.  Again, I assume it was the cold. 

Mama took sick and died.  Max froze to death.  Mary Jane broke one horn, then the other about a month later.  She died a few days after that.  I think one of the bigger critters may be responsible for injuring her.  Sheila is the lone surviving goat.

We moved the three surviving meat hens and 1 rooster to the basement in December.  All of my other hens and the chicks I hatched last year died.  One goose and 2 roosters remain outside.

Wonder suffered severe frost bite and we put her down.

Winter depresses me on a good year.  This year, it's been over the top.

#4 got freezer burn- a form of frost bite that's like a third degree burn.  The picture is three days after it happened, with the swelling down to about half the size it was.  He had to go to the hospital everyday for treatments with flamazine for almost two weeks.  We got lucky and he didn't get infected.  He's looking pretty good now, ears back to normal size, but he'll remain highly susceptible to frost bite for the rest of this winter, and still increased likely hood for the rest of his life after that.


Loggers have been working the bush behind us, and decided to pile the snow from the end of the logging trail down our trail, blocking it off.

Snow banks on the sides of the road have been pushed back again and again and still look huge.  Flooding is expected in the spring.

The one good thing this year was that #2 and #3 made the biathlon team with cadets.

They've been practicing skiing and shooting regularly.  I've been volunteering more with cadets and may become an officer.  I got to go to the regional competition with them in Sault Ste Marie.  It was too cold to ski.  Seriously.  They had to do an indoor range competition, and a physical fitness competition instead.  My boys didn't do well this year (first timers), but our girls won gold for the relay team, and one of the other boys one gold individually.  The provincials went better weather wise, and one of our girls is going to nationals in March in Nova Scotia!

#2 is totally hooked on skiing, and continues practicing for next year.  He's cut his time in half.  #4 is getting a head start learning how to ski now.  I decided to give it a try too, and despite the fact that it's an outside winter sport, I kind of like it.  I'm really, really bad at it, but still, I kind of like it.

We're almost out of firewood and will probably need to start cutting in March to get us through the rest of the winter. 

Spring will probably be late.  I haven't started any seedlings- not even tomatoes.  No ambition.  Greenhouse 1 is going to need new plastic.  The back side is pretty much shredded.

Thanks to everyone who has popped in and said hello.  I haven't been in the mood to write much.  Winter sucks.

Beef and Pork

Still snowing. Every ding-dong day!  Night, actually.  It snows every night, and I wake to 2-3 inches of heavy wet snow.  The days warm enough to clear most of it away.

I go for a load of firewood in the afternoons.  I'm trying not to panic.  We still need three more rows in the basement.  Three more rows and it's already snowing!  The forecast claims I still have some better weather coming.  I don't know whether to believe it or not.

My chainsaw broke.  It won't switch gears, so it's in for repairs.  I started using #1's saw.  He forgot to tighten the nuts after tightening the chain.  One went flying.  Now I'm using #2's saw.  It's much heavier than mine.  Oh crappy week.

Things in the butcher shop are coming together.

***  Graphic Images will follow! ***

Inside the smoker- we filled both racks with seasoned strips of beef.

So far we've got about 8 pounds of jerky on the go.  Both the oven and the smoker.  Husband set the smoker up on top of the woodstove in the garage.  We aren't burning (smoking) it, just using it as an oven with the heat from the wood stove.  It works pretty well.  We're using the first recipe from the two I made last year.  I have another 6 pounds or so cut for the next batch.  I think I'll try something new, rather than the second recipe- they didn't like it as well.

Ground beef is coming along nicely.  30 pounds so far.  Husband had to fiddle with the grinder again.  Did I mention last year what a crappy design this meat saw is?  Dad spent a whole day fixing it last year, and Husband still had to make adjustments again this year.  It's just so flimsy!

I was just starting the last quarter yesterday when Husband and the boys went out to dispatch the pigs.

For the first time ever we were actually sad to do the deed.  These were the sweetest pigs we've ever had, so friendly.  More like puppies that piglets.  When we got our first pigs years ago, I thought I might fall in love with 'Wilbur'.  Charlotte's web was my favourite book as a child.  Those pigs were wild and nasty.Mean!  Just mean!  No love lost there.  But this year, our fourth round of pigs, we were all sad to see them go.  They didn't do a great job ripping out the raspberry bushes, but were doing well in the garden.  I opened the gate between the garden and the turkey pen through the day, to let them dig and explore.  The chickens were always hopping in with them, following them around, stealing their food- and they didn't care.

Husband and #2 each dispatched one.  The female would get a little antsy when she lost sight of the male, and we didn't want to stress them out.  Two guns, two shooters, and both were out at the same time.

#2 did the teaching this time, as #1 gutted for the first time by himself.  They brought them back to the garage, hung them up, and skinned them.

According to the weight formula I found online...
heart girth X heart girth X length /400

...they were both under 100 pounds.  I find that hard to believe, especially since they were supposedly 90 pounds when we bought them.  I wonder though, if I'm supposed to include the head in the length.  That would put them over 100.  I think I'll weigh the meat as I butcher.

We're supposed to stay below freezing for a couple of days before it starts to warm up again.  I have a bit of trimming left to do on the beef, and then I'll be starting on the pigs right away.

Hydro Free, But Not By Choice

First snow was Saturday, October 19th.  Husband was out all night plowing/salting/sanding.  He came home at 7am.  We woke to three inches of heavy packing snow, but sunny and reasonably warm.  The snow was already melting, and mostly gone by Sunday night.

I had three loads of laundry done- one had been on the line a couple of days already but kept getting rained on, and two more to hang out.  I bought better rubber gloves this year- last year's cheap latex didn't help much.  The new gloves fit much better and don't get stuck in the clothespins, and keeping my fingers dry while hanging out laundry goes a long way toward keeping me motivated in using the clothesline in the winter.

We did chores and a few odd jobs and were planning to get a load of firewood before returning to the butcher shop, when the hydro went out.

This was not a planned hydro free weekend.  Actually, we've already quit 'hydro free weekends' for the time being.  We've played with it enough to know that our battery bank is too small to use if the sun isn't shining.  On sunny days we can run the stereo/satellite all day, and still have enough storage to run the tv/satellite for 3-4 hours at night- so that's what we do.  We have one extension cord running around the edge of the sunroom/kitchen/livingroom that we plug the tv power bar into.  I don't know if it's saving us much money at this point, but it makes me feel better.  At least we're doing something.  Something, which could be very important if the predictions are true about what is going to happen to our hydro bills in the next few years!

So the power went out.  Not too big of a deal.  I kind of figured a tree had hit a line with the extra weight of the snow.  Mom called to make sure it wasn't just out at her place. 

We went and got our load of firewood.  No hydro required.  Back home a couple of hours later- still no hydro.  I decided to call it in- occasionally nobody bothers to let them know that the power is out, so they don't bother to fix it.  I get this guy on the phone and he informs me it was a "planned power outage" for repairs.  Well, gee, thanks for letting us know!  He claims hydro's automated messaging system told everyone last week.  Funny how neither us nor Mom got this message, eh? 

So I'm annoyed.  The power won't be back on until 6pm.  It's cold outside.  No furnace fan.  I have a batch of eggs in the incubator and their temperature is plummeting. And I really want to get back to butchering my beef.  But no power- no meat saw.

Husband got up about 2pm.  No coffee.  Not functional, lol.  Not funny at the time.  He's such a crank without coffee.  Time to try out my new stove top percolator (new to me, bought at the flea market).  The stove did not want to cooperate.  Husband spent almost two hours trying to get it burning well enough to percolate the coffee.  I went and cut another tree.

The power came on just as the coffee started percolating.  Kind of funny, really.

Not so funny- none of my eggs hatched.  I'm still debating on whether to try one more batch or leave it until February. 

The laundry didn't dry completely, but took much less time in the dryer to finish it off.  Yeah. 

No butchering got done, which led to a busy week last week and an even busier weekend this weekend.  Need more solar panels!

The Boy Gets Messy

 **Graphic images will follow.**

Plans changed again.  We will have beef this winter.  Perhaps a lot of it.

Sharlotte is making her way to the freezer.

We had initially planned to keep her for future breeding stalk.  She was, after all, the first girl born here on our farm.  However, if you recall, there was some confusion about her birth.  We really don't know who her mother was, Mindy or Dorie.

So, we had a long summer filled with fence repair after fence repair, and we nearly put Mindy in the freezer, because we just could not keep her contained.  And then she calved, buying herself a reprieve.  She still gets out from time to time, though not nearly as often as she used to.  We debated making Mugsy a bottle baby, and butchering Mindy anyway.

But here's the thing- When we got Dorie, she escaped a couple of times.  She went looking for a bull.  She got out a couple of times in the spring when the grass was still short.  We had to trailer her home from a far neighbour's place twice.  And then she calved.  And then she pretty much stayed put.  She was out once, with Majesty and the whole herd this summer, but mostly, so long as she has her calf, her bull, and plenty to eat, she's a good girl.

We bought Mindy and Maddy as yearlings.  They escaped with Dorie a couple of times.  Once they got separated in the woods and Mindy came home on her own.  Maddy went to northern neighbour's with Dorie and spent the summer there.  We ended up trading her for stud fees and summer boarding.  It turned out to be an excellent trade for us.  Dorie came home and delivered Casper the following summer.  Maddy stayed there and stopped growing, and never calved.  Northern neighbour sent her to butcher two years later.

Maddy and Mindy almost definitely came from the same farm.  We waited years for Mindy to calve, breaking fences repeatedly along the way.  If we were real farmers, she would have been out of here long ago.

So, there is a possibility that Sharlotte was Mindy's calf.  Sharlotte is small in stature.  Of course it doesn't help that her daddy (Steaks) was kind of a runt either.  Sharlotte was breaking through the fence all the time.  Our fences do not hold goats or calves- uneven ground, so many weak points- so we were playing a waiting game.  Waiting for her to get too big to squeeze through the bad spots.  However, every time she squeezed through the bad spots, she made the weak points weaker.  She made the small holes bigger.  She stretched the wire looser.  And then Mindy or Nelly would follow her out.  She never really went anywhere on her own, just around the non fenced portion of our land, and in the ditch.  But once Mindy got loose, they'd be off to southern neighbour's causing trouble.

We'd patch the fence.  She'd find a new escape route.  Then she'd be on the wrong side of the fence, calling to the rest of the herd, come out and play with me!

We have five calves this year.  Five little calves who could easily duck under the fence or through one of those bad spots and run around causing trouble.  They choose not to.  They choose to stay with their mamas, their daddy- the herd.  Even Mugsy stays put when Mindy's out gallivanting around.

But what about next spring?  What will happen when the calves are bigger, their mamas are tired of nursing, new calves are arriving, and Sharlotte is still breaking through the fence?  If they followed her, that would be half my herd running loose in the neighbourhood.

Add to that her small stature- how long do we keep her, waiting for her to get big enough to breed?  If she does get pregnant, will she survive? 

We decided that Sharlotte is not the type of cow we want to keep, and we'd rather deal with her now before she leads the new calves off into the woods.

Now if you're squeamish, you should probably stop reading here.

**Graphic images will follow.**






 Husband dispatched her.

#2 took the lead this year, while I stood back and guided him through the process.


The gutting was uneventful.  Things went rather smoothly.

Weight Formula:
heart girth X heart girth X length  / 300
67" X 67" X 61" / 300 = 912.7 pounds

She was apparently slightly heavier than Steaks (830 lbs). 

We hung her in the garage last Monday, and I worked on removing fat and making tallow through the week.  She had more fat by far than any of our previous kills.  Saturday we started butchering.  It's a bit early yet, but the weather was a bit warmer than we'd like it (dropping fast now), and we still have two pigs to butcher, so we're in a bit of a hurry.

 
 We trimmed some of the flanks for jerky and stewing beef.  Most was cut for ground.  Blurry pictures courtesy of #4, who I believe may have been shivering a bit.

#2 got this brilliant idea to toss a bit of flank onto the wood stove.  It smelled really good, so I tossed a piece on too.  Husband, #1, and #4 thought that was disgusting.  No pan!!  lol.  They ate mine.
 
 After that little snack though, we decided to toss 5 freshly cut t-bones on.  (#3 was at a friend's).  I melted some of the fat on the stove top, then put the steaks on with just a bit of salt and pepper.  Delicious- and no dishes.

Still lots to do- ribs and more steaks today.