Fresh Pasture

Since I started using the solar electric charger this year I slowly moved the fence to the side yard, out behind the house into the backyard, along the second driveway beside the garden, between the garden and the raspberry patch, and to the far side of the garden.  We've only had one escape- right down the road to Mom's place- when they were in the second driveway section.  There were some awkward corners in there, and somebody knocked out a post. 

They're averaging 4-7 days per section, based partly on the condition of the grass, and partly on the weather.  I've left them an extra day, or moved them a day or two early because rain was forecast.

I haven't gotten brave enough to cut them off from the pasture yet.  They have a walkway back at all times, and then we close the gate overnight to lock them in- except once.  One night #4 forgot to close the gate when he put them away, but still shut off the electric fence.  They were out grazing in the morning, and may have been out all night.  Amazingly, no escapes!

We still haven't got the second solar charger repaired, so the pasture is still not divided.  It's obviously not as stressed as it usually is though.  The grass is growing slowly, about 3" high.  Normally it's cropped off just above the roots in the open sections by this time of year.

Friday I moved the fence to the first clearing behind the house.  It's a bigger section than they've had to date, and the grass is longer, though thinner.  The cows are all looking lovely.

The calves like to duck under the fence and munch ahead of everyone else, or just stop to nap.  I've kept the fence well back from the trees, keeping a cleaner fence line.  The cows will duck their heads under the fence to get most of the edges, and there's less risk of the fence grounding out.

This is the trampoline section.  The trampoline doesn't get used much because the bugs get kind of wild in the long grass.  #4 is happy to have company out back, and soon the cows will have the grass eaten and trampled down, reducing the bug population.

The cows like to be let out of the pasture early in the mornings to graze, then return to the barn to chew their cud, hide from the sun, and nap in the afternoon.  Around supper time they head out again, and graze until nearly dusk.  They usually put themselves to bed then, but occasionally need some prompting.

I have one more section that I can fence off and maintain the pathway to the pasture without buying more supplies. 

The horses come out to graze from time to time, though they're a bit skittish through the pathways where the fence is narrower, and seem to prefer the openness of the pasture.  They're also adverse to change.  They tend to leap before they look, and skid to a stop when they see the fence line has been moved. 

The last time we tried using electric fence out back was just for horses, and it was a total fail.  They always wanted the grass on the other side of the fence, would knock it down or ground it out, and escaped regularly.  Now that I see the behavior differences I'd really like to separate the pasture to keep them in at all times.

To Make A Short Story Long...

I think it was two years ago this fall, that a group of Mennonites started buying up land in our area.  Lots of land, mostly between our town and high school town.  How the early arrivals survived that first winter I don't know.  They were hard at work early last spring though, plowing acres and acres of former pasture and hay fields.  More of their kin arrived.  Huge barns were built here there and everywhere, almost over night it seemed.  Buggies became almost commonplace on the highway.

Rumour has it, these Mennonites might be from Kitchener-Waterloo area (where my granny's people lived), or from Aylmer.  I haven't asked, so I don't for sure.

Last summer they opened the Railside Country Store.  I would drive by it on the way to high school town, on one of the back roads, and I would think to myself I really need to go check that out.  Alas, my timing was never good, and I never went in.  Then the township decided to close an old bridge on that road, making it shorter for me to take the highway around, and I stopped passing by the store.  Out of sight, out of mind I guess.

Last weekend we decided to take the plunge and return to solar electric fencing.  We used solar electric when we lived down south.  Despite all of our fence repairs and construction last year, I looked around this spring and see myself in the exact same position this year.  Broken posts that need to be replaced, Fencelines still waiting to be installed to divide the pasture.  Pasture grass way too short.

The thing that pushed me over the edge though was the yard fence.  Few of the posts remain standing now.  The grass was getting really long- long enough that the goat became invisible when lying down.  Long grass is a safe haven for bugs, and the mosquitoes were atrocious.

I needed to get that cut.  But I don't cut.  I am philosophically opposed to cutting grass when I have hungry cattle who would love to take care of it for me.

I pulled the solar chargers out of the workshop and stuck them on posts to see if they would charge.  Husband fiddled with one and got it working- fine except the wire ends were corroded and had to be replaced.  The other is more complicated, but will probably be fixable.  The old wire we had saved was a tangled mess and had been spliced together so many times it wouldn't run a good current.  We had some posts and insulators, but needed a few more.

So off we went to the flea market (also our feed store) but they didn't have what we needed.  So we thought we'd go and see what that Country Store had to offer.  Alas, it was closed.  We went to Southern City, an hour and a half to the closest TSC.  We got what we needed, and even managed to hit a sale.  Sunday afternoon the lawnmowers were hard at work.

But that Mennonite store was still on my mind, they're much closer, but I'd never been in, so didn't know what they had for sale.  We decided to drive over and browse.

It's wonderful.  And funny.  They sell natural honey (but not local), huge cheese blocks, eggs, and grass fed beef.  Salves and creams, sewing and quilting supplies, quilts, aprons, bonnets, hats and boots.  Chicken feeders, waterers, horse dewormers, cattle meds, and all your basic farm store supplies.  Hardware, knicknacks, fencing, seeds, and so, so much more.

And they sell these.

These gate post holders were on the fence when we moved in.  They work great-big and solid, and they allow the gate to swing in either direction.  From our first winter here, 7 years ago, I have been looking for another set.

 I wanted to lift the gate higher through the winter.  Even with plowing, the snow pack builds up and we get to the point that the gate can no longer be opened or closed, and eventually ends up just leaning there, chained to the post.

Now we've got dual settings for the main gate.  Little things make me happy.

I'll definitely be going back to browse again.  It's nice having the Mennonites in the area.  Feels more like home. 

Fencing, Firewood, and Clean Up

The south roadside corner of the pasture has had this little thicket growing since before we moved in.

It was mostly alders, with a couple of pine trees and a poplar or two.  The critters made their own pathways through the tangled mess, munching and scratching and enjoying the shade.

We cut a couple of the pine trees down for fence posts, and I noticed in amongst the alders, a mess of baby pine trees.  From about 8 inches to three feet high, there's a little forest trying to take root in this corner.  The bigger pines have sprouted up substantially as well in the past 6 years.  There should be enough fence posts right there to finish the repairs on section 3, and start on the following section.

I'm cutting back the alders, making space for the new little pines to take over.  Without having to fight for sunlight and nutrients they should sprout up much quicker, straighter, and stronger.

Alders are a bushy little tree with a common root.  They sprout up and overtake clearings in the woods in no time, it seems.  They never get more than three inches thick, and then the stems start to rot.  There's always new growth though, so it's a constant battle to keep them cleared from trails and clearings.  They also tend to wind their way through the fence wire, stretching and breaking it as they grow.  I'm cutting them out of this area, taking a few small pieces of firewood from the larger stems, leaving the tops to decompose amongst the pines.

The Littles load the firewood in the trailer while the Bigs dig post holes and work on the fence.

Pasture Outline

To answer Linda's questions yesterday, I walked the pasture and wrote down all the measurements in paces. Converted to feet the pasture is a little over 12 acres. I've always guessed it at closer to 25 acres, so that was a bit shocking.

I drew a new map closer to scale. It's a little off because the graph paper only gives you so much area to work with. The pasture is nearly 750 feet square- a little shorter on the east (road) side, a little longer on the west side.

Black is the existing fence. Blue is what I would like to finish this year. Orange is what I would like to finish next year. The little notches are gates.

Most of the sections are a little shy of an acre, at 36000 square feet.  Some are a little bigger, up to 50400 square feet.

The outside fence is 4' high woven wire, with 12"x6" holes. About half of it is on wooden fence posts, the road side and around the barn, and the other half is on metal t-posts. It's about ten years old. There's at least one strand of barbed wire at the top all the way around and two or three strands in problem areas. There are cross poles in problem areas as well.

The problems with this fence vary from post to post. In one spot there's almost 20 feet between posts, because I live on the Canadian shield. There's a rock between the posts, just below the surface, that's over 10 feet long. There are lots of big rocks in lots of places, which makes spacing fence posts rather irregular.

Where there aren't big rocks, the east (road) side of the pasture is on sandy soil, while the middle is on clay, and the back is sand again. 

We also get a lot of snow. Some years you can barely see the fence posts over the top of the snow. That's not really a problem, since the animals don't want to wade through it anyway, except around the barn where they pack it down all winter long. All of our replacement posts around the barn are at least eight feet high, with extra barbed wire strung as needed.

Being under snow so much of the year weakens the wire and causes it to rust. It makes the fence posts rot much faster too.



Section 2 and 3 inside fences are both three strands of barbed wire. Section 2 also has the beginnings of cross poles between posts. We're working on adding additional posts and poles now.

As we move on to new sections they'll be wood posts and cross poles, with a strand of barbed wire on top.

The over all plan will allow one acre per cow/horse (not counting Mildred, who will only over winter with the herd).  I have no idea if that is above or below the recommended number of animal units/acre for our area.  Quite frankly, most people around here just feed hay year round.  I don't plan to try squeezing in any additional cattle- with a minimum of 6 months of winter- that's a lot of hay to buy, regardless of how much grass I have to rotate them through in the summer.  I would just like to not have to start feeding hay in August.

View from the south west corner of the pasture towards the barn.  It's a long walk.

The Great Escape

It was no surprise to see Sharlotte out of the newly repaired pen.  Behind her though- that's Toothless.  Apparently he's still small enough to squeeze through barbed wire.


All is not lost, however.  The trouble maker is still trapped.

The Herd and Pasture

#2 is back from camp.  We gave him a nice easy job to get him readjusted to farm life- go out and wrangle those calves.  I have to say, Dorie's calf, Majesty, (in honour of the royal baby, lol) is one tough little cookie.  She fought him tooth and nail, dragged him across the yard, kicking the whole way.  To his credit- he never let go.  To his detriment- he took a few scrapes and I'm sure he'll be bruised and sore for a few days.

Round two went better, with Mindy's calf being much smaller and younger.  They're both tagged now.  Then it was time to flip and castrate.  Um...  er...  I don't think we'll be castrating that!  The little one is a girl.  Her working name is Mugsy, for the moment.  I don't love it, but she doesn't seem to mind.

We worked on the fence again yesterday afternoon.  The little 'cow proof' zone, a bad spot in the corner where the alders have been growing through, and the section beside the chicken pen where Toothless broke through in early spring to get to Mildred.  Guess what happened while we were working.

Mindy and Sharlotte escaped!

Seriously- I need to shoot that cow.  They didn't wander far, and were back fairly quickly.  Mindy fed Mugsy, then we drove the lot of them into the cow proof section.


This morning, everyone but Sharlotte is still in there.  That doesn't really surprise me though.  There's still a bit of the inside fence line with only three strands of barbed wire, and Sharlotte is still small enough to walk through it.

So, we now have four cows- Dorie, Mildred, Mindy and Nelly, and four heifers- Sharlotte, Maureen, Majesty and Mugsy.  I still want to keep a heifer from Mildred, but otherwise, I think we're at our limit.  Unless, of course, I do shoot that cow.  That'll give us 10 full grown cattle to overwinter, including the bull.  That will at least double our hay consumption starting winter 2014.  Which means, by fall of 2015, these girls have to start paying for their keep.  Up til now, we've just been a hobby farm, raising our own meat, growing our herd.  We are about to embark on the journey of becoming 'real' farmers.

Next fencing job will be to repair and cow proof the next section, to move them into in a couple of weeks after the grass has had a chance to grow a bit. 

A little sketch of the pasture as is.  Section 2 is where the cows are now.  Section 3 is the next section to repair.

I messed up from the chicken pen.  Ignore the lower line.  The barn side really shouldn't be as wide as the open side either.

And here's a sketch of the eventual plan for the pasture.

Section 3 will be split into two sections, and I forgot to draw in the gate between them.  That probably won't happen this year though.  I'd like to get the dividing fences between section 5/6/7 and 12/11/8, and then the fenceline between 12/11/8 and 13/10/9 done this year, along with the far side of section 1.  That would give me 6 sections to start next spring.  Of course, I've had this planned for two or three years now, and it never seems to happen.  Still, the dream of being able to rotate the cows through grazing areas lives on.

More Fencing

The back field is a bit overgrown this year. All those dry beans I threw out here last year must have done some good, despite not producing for us.  Several attempts to convince Mildred to graze back here have led her to go visiting the neighbours.

A gate across the trail to Mom's place was the first order of business.  Of course, that merely slows her down.  As she wiggles through the trees munching away.

We started nailing poles to the trees, creating a crooked little fence around the clearing.

Meanwhile, Mildred, the calves, and the kids are munching away.  The grass is pretty high here- three calves and two kids in this picture.  If they haven't eaten it all by the time we're done construction, I may bring the horses down for a few days as well. 

And, of course, we're still collecting firewood from the tree tops and dead fall as we work.

Trails and Travels

The trails were looking more like a hay fields than trails, so Husband ran the Bush hog around last weekend.

The trails are looking much better now, and Mildred is appreciating the fresh hay delivery that the boys are raking up for her.

The 'culvert' roadway over the ravine has been eroding away over the years.  It wasn't bad enough to warrant a complete makeover just yet, but it was getting a little too narrow for our liking.  The boys, Mom, and I, cut down a few trees, filling the washed out side with tree tops and branches.  We laid logs across the road, extending over the washed out end, then Husband covered them with a few buckets of composted manure.  It's a work in progress, that will need to be repeated over the years- somewhat of a continuous hugelkultur mound.  The logs allow the water from the spring run off to seep through, without completely washing out the roadway on top.

I ended up making two batches of strawberry jam, using some of last year's homemade crabapple pectin.  I had to cut the sugar down- actually, I added more strawberries after adding the sugar- because it was so incredibly sweet.  Fresh, ripe, pick-your-own strawberries make a world of difference!

And we're back to fencing.  Dorie and her crew were missing yesterday morning.  They casually came sauntering up the driveway around 11am, like it was perfectly natural to let themselves out for an early morning stroll.  She had Mindy, Nelly, and Sharlotte with her.  Toothless was alone with the horses in the pasture.  She took her new calf along too, but she didn't come back at the same time.  Dorie called her back an hour or so later, and the boys managed to get the skittish wee thing through the gate.

#1 replaced a couple of rotting fence posts.

The Littles helped nail the fence back in place.  I unfolded the sections wrapped up accordion style.  We only got the road side done yesterday, so we'll probably be working on it for the rest of the week.

Meanwhile, Mildred and her crew broke into the garden and all but demolished my peas!  The boys get the blame for that one though- when the gate is not latched securely she just pushes it open.  Previously it only had to keep out goats, who haven't been as determined to gain entry.

The blueberries are just starting to ripen.  Raspberries look a couple of weeks behind schedule this year.  I'll soon be busy picking, canning, making wine and jam.

Checking In

I haven't been posting much, because spring has finally arrived. Or summer. Or winter? In the past three weeks it went from warm spring like temps, to hot, hot, hot! The snow melted quickly, and we sweltered away. Yesterday the temps took a nose dive, with a high of 1°C for the day. I swear it felt like -20°C, since we aren't used to it anymore. Snow is in the forecast for the weekend, but I'm hoping that will pass by. Really? Winter wasn't long enough? Geesh...

At any rate, here's the update.  Nelly is fine.  #1 has been milking her- she has very sensitive teats and can be pretty kicky.  I went to the auction and bought her a calf.

Well, four calves, actually.  I figured she could take her pick of the lot.  She chose 'piss off and leave me alone'.  They all tried to nurse at first, but she kicked them off quite violently.  Mildred, on the other hand, is not fussy at all, and allowed all of them to nurse as they pleased.  We're bottle feeding as well- I don't think even Mildred has enough milk for everyone- and slowly trying to convince Nelly to take a calf.

This little brown calf- Limousin- got sick.  Probably pneumonia, definitely chest congestion.  Even with penicillin injections we couldn't save him.

This black one- Holstein- is Mortimer.  He'll probably be our new stud.  He's doing really well.

These two are Holstein crosses, and were Murphy and Morris.  Morris is now Maurine.  It seems that a certain boy still can not be trusted to make the ID.  He thought the Limousin was the girl.  Oops.

Maurine will probably stay and join the herd.  If I could convince Nelly to keep her, I'd let the two of them go out to pasture with everyone else.  So far Mortimer is having the best luck with nursing though.  We have to tie Nelly and coax the calves to come over to nurse.  After lots of bag balm and gentle coaxing, she has finally stopped kicking them constantly.  I think Monsoon (the original calf) may have gotten a hold of Nelly before she calved, causing the soreness and sensitivity.

The birds arrived on Wednesday.  21 new Bronze Orlopp turkeys (the dark ones), and 12 Muscovy ducklings are sharing one brooder,

while 115 new chicks are in the other.  These are Frey's Special Dual Purpose, a slower growing meat bird.  The second set of four chicks that we hatched are in here as well.  They're just a little bigger than the new ones, and I had to steal their heat lamp from the basement to get this mob to spread out.

The first four chicks we hatched have been moved to a cage without heat.  They're fully feathered now, and could probably join the chicken coop, however they're still small enough to get through the fence, so I'm going to try to keep them caged for a bit longer.

The geese have been moved to the turkey pen, alone, in the hopes that they might decide to try hatching their own eggs.  No luck with the geese eggs in the incubator.  I cracked them all open, and none had started developing.  I don't think we have a mating pair.  Maybe they'll surprise me.

The incubator will be starting round three today.  In addition to the dozen or so eggs I have from our hens, I bought a dozen eggs from a neighbour that I'm going to incubate as well.

Firewood season has begun- slowly working myself into it.  I am so out of shape after such a long winter!  But we're gotten a few loads done, which is always nice to get early in the year before the bugs come out and the underbrush grows in.

#1 has tilled a few feet of garden so I can get the peas planted this weekend.  Husband hasn't plowed yet, as the ground is still frozen in spots.  I could probably start the greenhouses, but with this temperature drop, I think I'll hold off for a bit yet.

We're hauling water for the critters.  It seems the water pipe has burst underground, probably between the chicken coop and the barn.  Turning the water on in the basement drains the well in a matter of minutes, and won't fill a single water dish.  That will be a major repair this spring, first fencing off the area to keep the critters out, then digging down to the pipe to find the leak. 

The pasture is finally greening up, so hopefully we'll only need a couple more weeks of hay. 

Yard clean up, garden prepping, plants to start, firewood to gather, repairs to be made...  it's going to be a busy summer!

My Awesome Work Crew

#1 digging a post hole. #3 holding the fence back out of the way. #4 wiring in barbed wire. #2 trimming a tree to make a new post.

We've got three strands of barbed wire up on this side now. At this rate we'll have a solid barbed wire fence in place by the time the field fence rots off. Just a little at a time.

A Walk in the Pasture

From the back of the pasture, facing the barn. It's looking pretty good. The boys did a good job spreading hay last fall, and we have a nice spread of manure, with a bit of waste hay.

The last of the snow, along the fence line.

Grass.  And it's green!  In March!?