The Piglets Are Fine

Well it was extremely disappointing to only have a litter of 2 piglets this time around. That is extremely rare and I am attributing it to the fact that I had a boar that was quite old at the time. I have since replaced him and will breed Penny to the new boar in the next month or so. If she doesn't have a good litter, then I will know that it is time to replace her. She is a nice pig to have around the farm so I hope that this was the boars' fault. The two piglets, a boar and a gilt, are doing very well. They are growing quickly and spend a good amount of time exploring the pens now. It is interesting to watch them learn from mom about rooting and eating foods other than milk. They spend a lot of time with their noses in the dirt and this is what gives them the vitamins and minerals that they require to grow strong and healthy. In a barn setting, these pigs would have to be given injections of synthetic vitamins, minerals and other goodies that I am not even sure about. Anti-biotics and other drugs are necessary just to keep the majority of them alive in those horrible conditions. I feel very good about seeing my pigs out doing what pigs are supposed to do! The plan now is to keep the gilt to add to the herd and to sell the boar. It is too bad that there weren't other littermates to choose from for both breeding and meat production, but the next litter from Prudence will be better.

Building A Corral

We need a way to better handle our animals when we are transporting. It is always a mission to try to coerce an animal into a trailer when it is clear that they do not want to be in there! I took some ideas from some plans on-line and fitted them to our needs. I spent a good amount of time this past weekend building this fence and working on the loading chute. With some strategically placed gates we will now be able to lure the cows or pigs or whatever into the corral and then hustle them up the chute into the trailer. The first to test the facilities will be our cow "Henny" and her calf "T-Bone". Henny is set to go visit her new boyfriend sometime soon and since T-Bone isn't weaned yet, he will have to go along for the ride. We are contemplating sheep for next year, the market is strong and sheep have always interested us. As you can see in the picture, it has hardly stopped raining for the past month and the corral is a mess. For the most part animals will not be in this area except to graze from time to time. I will seed this in grass next spring and we will try to keep it looking nice.

The Allis Is Apart

It turned out that I needed to re-core the tractor radiator. I broke the solder on the fittings while I was changing the hoses. I took the radiator into the shop and he said that the whole thing needed replacing or fixing. After all it is a 50 year old radiator. While I have the tractor apart, I decided to clean, sand and paint as much of it as I could. It is starting to look really good. I also changed the engine oil, replaced the hydraulic fluid and tightened some bolts and stopped some fluid leaks. I need some fittings replaced on the hyrdaulic pump before I can thoroughly test its power. I am thinking that it will likely need to be rebuilt, but have my fingers crossed. Tonight, I can pick up the new radiator and start putting the tractor back together. Over the winter, I will continue to fix the tractor up in my spare time. By spring, I will have a fully functioning WD45 for all my farm work.

Pastured Chickens

It occurred to me that I have not taken any pictures of the chicken pens. There are about 100 chickens left in our fields in three separate pens. Next year the plan is to make the pens much much larger and try to cut down on the work load of looking after so many pens. Feeding and watering takes a long time as it is and the more pens there are the harder it is. We would like to produce up to 1000 broilers next season. We will have to see how the construction of the pens goes this winter...that will determine to a large extent how many birds we order. Right now, the remaining birds are penned in a small field of Fall Rye. I planted the Rye in August and it is still extremely green even though we have had several hard frosts so far this fall. On a daily basis I drag the pens to new patches of grass and make sure the water is clean and full along with the food troughs. These birds are scheduled for processing on November 3rd. This was our longest broiler season so far...we started brooding chicks in early April!

The New Tractor

Over the weekend I picked up the newest addition to the "fleet" of Gold Forest Farm implements and vehicles. It is a 1954 Allis Chalmers WD45. It came with the original Freeman front end loader, a snap couple 3 bottom plow, a snap couple tiller and a rear blade. It was only $1000 and I grabbed it quickly before someone else did. I thought it was a good deal and certainly worth more than what I paid. It looks to be in half decent condition although right now it is fairly ugly with bad paint and quite a few oil leaks here and there. I need to do a tune up on the engine and I will replace some of the leaking seals and gaskets over time. This is the tractor that I will regularly use for farm work so even though it is killing me to have it look so terrible, I will probably wait for quite some time before I paint it. I would also like to use it for before I spend a whole lot of time and money fixing it up. If it is a lemon, I would like to know that now and focus energy elsewhere. The most pressing thing to do with it now is to hook up the missing alternator and fan belt and then trouble-shoot the slow/weak loader. I will need the loader this winter for handling snow. From there, I will give the engine a tune up and re-build the carb or whatever is causing it to 'pop' and backfire.

I am excited about this tractor. My Grandfather owned several Allis Chalmers tractors and the WD45 is the tractor that I first learned to drive. I can remember sitting between my Dads legs and steering while we plowed. I was probably 8 or 9 years old. From time to time he would yell over the engine noise to "keep it straight"!

For its size, the WD45 is a poweful tractor and easily handles a 3 bottom plow. I will use it for most of the field work since the Ford N is less than half the horsepower. Almost all of my existing implements are 3pt. hitch; so, I will need to fabricate some sort of 3pt. hitch for the Allis as it is equipped with a "snap couple" type of implement hook up system. I have an idea in my head to use the existing snap-couple hook up and some manufactured lift arms to connect to the original lift arms of the Allis. We'll see how far I get with that idea in the coming months of winter. The shop will be busy this winter!

My Friends' Combine

This is a friend who lives along the coast of BC. He operates a small diversified farm and uses this old Massey 35 combine each year to harvest small fields of oats and other grains. It looks like the old combine works really well although I can feel the "itch" just looking at the picture! I get itchy with grain dust while I am inside the cab of my 503 let alone the open station of the 35 being so close to the table. It is a neat old combine and the perfect size for a small, diversified farm.

Inside the 8550

The AC 8550 is a fairly easy tractor to drive. The controls are well thought out and handy. I was pulling a relatively small cultivator, but I was breaking pasture/hay land that hadn't been dirt for years. The roots were thick and the ground was compact. The goal for the day was to simply create some 'scratches' in the soil to allow the tiller to come along next and really get things worked up. I would say that overall, I accomplished more than just scratching the surface. There were some spots with thick grass where the shovels would dig in and we just skidded along the surface, but those were isolated spots. This is what I saw each time I looked back.

The Allis Chalmers 8550

Time for Fall field work. I have been busy over the past while cultivating fields in preparation for next years' seeding. First, I was helping with Vince's field work. He acquired a new piece of property and I spent a day going over it with the cultivator. One of Vince's tractors is an early 80's Allis Chalmers 8550. I believe that this was the largest tractor that AC produced. It is big!

Piglets Have Arrived!

Last night 'Penelope' was in her hut and wouldn't come out to eat. This is somewhat unusual for her and when I checked her udder, she had lots of milk! I went back to the house and mentioned to Cindy that I thought she was close. Sure enough, this morning as I was walking past her hut to feed the chickens out in the field, I heard some squeaking from within. I checked quickly and there were two that I could see. I am unsure if she was still in the middle of labour, but I hope she has more than 2! When I get home from work I will check again and see what is up and report more. In the meantime, I had a chance to take a quick picture before I left her for the day.

Another Picture of Digging Potatoes

Here is another shot of the potato digger in action. As I mentioned earlier, the tractor wouldn't go slow enough. In a perfect situation, the slower travel of the digger would result in less soil going up the chain conveyor and allow more soil to fall through...this would leave the potatoes more visible on the surface. As it was, I had the N in first gear and about half throttle...this was still too fast and any less throttle would bog the little tractor down. We had to dig through the dirt a little to find the potatoes, but still, it was a lot better than digging them all by hand! I do have plans to try to find another tractor this winter. I need a 30-50 hp tractor with more gears to choose from. I am planning to farm more land next season and have struck a deal with a neighbor for an additional field of about 5 acres. I know this is a small chunk, but it is a start and I hope this will lead to some networking whereby I can obtain some more fields.

Time for a little hunting...

Garreth and I took a few days off to go Antelope hunting last week. It was fun to be out of the house together and I had been successful in a draw for a trophy Antelope in southern Alberta. I have never hunted with a rifle before, but being a bowhunter, and very familiar with the area we were to hunt, I suspected that our hunt would not last very long. I was correct. We drove for 5 hours to the zone we were allowed to hunt. We then sought the landowner to give us permission to hunt and found him in his truck overlooking a vast prairie landscape with a small herd of Antelope visible in the distance. After a brief conversation, Garreth and I snuck a couple hundred yards to the crest of a hill where we could be at least a little closer. I steadied the rifle and began searching through the scope for the buck. At first I couldn't see him, but soon spotted the tips of his horns bouncing towards us from behind a distant hill. Garreth and I became very still as he approached to within 150 yards and stood perfectly broadside. I whispered if Garreth was ready and he nodded "yes". I have to admit that the crosshairs of the rifle scope were vibrating a little with excitement, but it was nothing compared to the panic of being within 20 yards of your prey with a bow in your hands. I pulled the trigger and the buck went down instantly. Our hunt was over. We spent the rest of the evening, cleaning and cutting Antelope meat and then drove home the following morning. It was a good little trip.

Digging Potatoes

It was finally time to harvest our small field of potatoes. There have been a couple of killing frosts over the past 2 weeks and the tops had died off. I had hoped that the skins of the potatoes had set enough to avoid damage going through the digger. I have an old horse-drawn digger that has been modified by a previous owner to be pulled by a tractor. The N did a pretty good job, although a tractor with more hp and a lower gear would have worked better. We ended up with somewhere around 600 pounds of Russian Blue and Banana Fingerling potatoes. The kids followed behind the digger collecting the potatoes that were left laying on top of the newly dug soil. We put all the potatoes in a wagon and brought them back to the house to be stored in the cold room downstairs.

Another Chicken Day

I took another load of chickens up to St. Paul for processing last Friday. As you can see in the picture, it was terribly rainy that day and has been for more than a week. I used the tractor to pull the trailer from the field where the chickens are instead of the truck. The truck is much heavier and I didn't want to risk getting stuck or making a bunch of damage to the field of Fall Rye.

Harvesting has ground to a halt and the ground is too wet to do much of anything lately. I have been tinkering around the farm here and there, but other than that, I have been enjoying a bit of a rest. Still though, with winter coming fast, it would be nicer to be out getting the harvest complete and finishing some other tasks around the place that are weather dependant. We had a killing frost on Sunday night...that means that the potato tops are now dead or dying. I can go ahead and harvest potatoes anytime after this coming weekend. Tonight, Cindy is renting a one-man auger for installing some fence posts. I have to finish my new pig pen before it snows.

Small Farm Canada

This publication is self-explanatory. It is a great magazine that has many different articles geared towards homesteaders and small farmers. I was honoured to have an article published in the magazine in the latest issue. It is simply an article about winter feeding tactics for pigs.
I don't think I can scan the article to show everyone, I will have to check on that.
http://www.smallfarmcanada.ca/

If you scan WAY WAY down the page, you will see the little blurb about my article.

New Doors

I finally decided to take on the task of building barn doors. Until now, and for the past 5 years, our barn has been without doors and doesn't look all that great. The wind carries the rain and snow into the building and the sunlight still wreaks havoc on the rubber tired implements and tractor. Most importantly though, Mrs. Schneider wanted doors. I thought about how best to accomplish this task. The openings are 10x10' and so that effectively ruled out plywood as I would have to piece together sheets or buy special 10' boards. I decided I would try to build a door using 1x6 rough cut spruce in a more traditional type of door. I was worried about weight, but I bought some BIG hinges and went ahead. Admittedly, I am probably the worst carpenter in the world. Nothing I have ever tried to build with wood has worked out terribly well. I just don't seem to have the patience for fitting things together properly. Give me a cutting wheel and a welder any day.

I layed out the boards side by side on the ground until I had the desired width and then snugged them together while screwing braces on the back side in a "Z" shape. To my surprise, and with considerable effort, the door came out square and even! A quick measure and a run with the cirular saw...and then a mighty heave to get it up there and I had half a barn door mounted. I was impressed enough that I duplicated my efforts and got the other half built and mounted in a very short time. The only screw-up was that I ran out of lag bolts to secure the hinges...I thought I had more than I actually did. I substituted a small hinge with wood screws for the time being. The door works well and looks really good in my opinion. I still need to mount a door stop on the header to stop the door from swinging inwards as far as it does, but that will not take long.

I still have two more openings to go before I am done. I will take it day-by-day and when I find some time, I will finish the doors this fall.

Weekend Tasks

I spent the weekend busy as usual around the farm. On Saturday I was combining for most of the day down at Vince's place. We were still combining oats. These were the oats that I had swathed last weekend. We had had hot dry weather all week so the combining went really well. I was in second gear with the variable speed kicked up a couple notches...as far as a 1968 combine is concerned, I was flying! Still though, it was a little disheartening to watch Vince's much newer John Deere 8820 going past me on a regular basis. It was like the first time marathoner, so proud to have trained so hard to be there in the first place only to watch the entire field of runners filing past one after the other throughout the race! No surprise though, the JD has almost three times the capacity and a 280 horsepower diesel compared to my 105 hp gas engine.

On Saturday morning, I did manage to get one irritating problem corrected. On my old tidy tank, the hose was leaking every time I used it. I had to stick the hose end deep into whatever tank I was filling to avoid losing fuel onto the ground. I went to the UFA store and picked up a new hose...then I thought I may as well install a filter. It didn't take long to install, but it wasn't a cheap R&R either. It is an older tank with 3/4 inch hose fittings. The only filter fitting I could find was 1". I needed some pipe fittings and teflon tape to make everything come together. It is a much longer hose now too...I don't have to get quite so close to whatever I am filling anymore.

The 503...a blur of activity

This photo didn't really work out. With the flash on, all you could see was the inside of the cab...with the flash off, it was dark enough to be blurry. Still though, it is kind of an interesting photo...I like it!

The 503 at home

Here is a picture of my new 503 at home in a field of oats. I am excited to have a combine and it is quite a bit of fun to use this old piece of machinery. The 503, at the time it was new, was the largest combine in the world. It is still big enough! I plan to fix it up and keep it running for another 30 years or more.

The New Combine

I picked up my new combine last Thursday. My Uncle Ren gave it to me. It is a late 60's International 503. It is in very good working condition and I was trying to figure out a way to get it home. I had to get it from his farm near Gibbons Alberta to my place more than 50 miles away. I really didn't want to drive it that far, but with the extreme high cost of transport in Alberta right now, trucking was out of the question. I took the day off work and bit the bullet...I packed a lunch and a thermos of coffee and decided to try driving it home no matter how long it took. I was surprised at how little time it actually took. I drove it home exclusively on gravel roads and 4.5 hours later I was home! The combine ran fine and I had absolutely no troubles. There were some concerning times, when I had to go down steep hills and across bridges...these combines are belt driven and are very large and heavy...if a belt breaks on a hill, you have a runaway on your hands. On Friday, I went over it with the grease gun, replaced some lights and prepared for the next leg of the journey which was to my friend's farm down near Thorsby (about 1/2 an hour by truck). This would be a shorter drive, but much more dangerous with many hills and rivers to travel over. Still though, the combine ran perfectly and in 2.5 hours I was there ready to help him with his harvest of over 800 acres of organic grain.

I started actually combining on Sunday afternoon. I started on a field of oats. The combine ran well enough, but we think that it isn't running fast enough. Vince is ordering me a new spring for the governor so hopefully that will fix the problem. We have perfect weather for grain harvesting right now. I spent the whole day Monday helping Vince and it was terribly hot. I ran the swather for most of the day while the dew dried and then later in the afternoon, I started combining again. The 503 overheated a few times (again probably due to the lower rpm problem). Later in the evening when things cooled down a bit, I went along without a hitch.

Collecting Hay

Summer is almost over and it is time to start getting ready for our long winter of feeding animals. To that end, we have purchased 100 2nd cut alfalfa bales. They are certified organic and are very rich. We will mix this hay with our grassy organic hay from our own land when we feed the cows. The pigs will eat this rich alfalfa hay as it sits. I will run it through the hammer mill and then mix it with the grain chop. I can feed it dry, but they much prefer it when I mix it with warm water. It makes a great smelling green porridge! Very tempting. We only got 72 bales on this load. Tonight I will drive to the farm and pick up the remaining 28. I do need a bigger trailer. Usually, I would take the big Ford diesel for a job like this, but I have the insurance off it for the time being and didn't think to reinstate it for this week of hauling hay.

Seed Drill Ready To Go

I spent a good part of Sunday working on the new Seed Drill. I needed to get it degreased, washed out (Organic regulations) and then I had to tackle the missing drive chain and broken seed housing. The first thing I did was take a trip to the local Ag Store (UFA) where they were mostly likely to have chain in stock. Sure enough, they had exactly what I was looking for...only $50!!! Next, I needed some sort of epoxy and some bolts for the seed housing repair. I settled on JB Stick Weld, a putty epoxy that you knead in your fingers and apply. I needed something that wouldn't run into the cracks and mess with the rotating seed dispenser. It seemed to work really well and set up hard in a matter of only a few minutes. Actually, before I applied the epoxy, I clamped the housing together and drilled and bolted it tight. There were still some gaps in the cracks, but that was OK because I knew the epoxy would fill them. Actually, I was glad for the gaps, thinking that perhaps they would give the epoxy something to 'grip'.

Figuring out how to separate that chain was an excercise in futility. That is the thing that is missing on my farm...some old-timer who knows second nature, how to do these basic chores. After much deliberation, it occured to me that I could bend the link a certain way, give it a few blows with the hammer and it would pop apart...success! I got the chain down to the correct length, got it on the sprockets and that part was done.

Chain was on...seed housing was fixed...a quick wash and degrease and I had a fully operational seeder for the back of the N. Now all I need to do is find some seed. For whatever reason, I am having one heck of a time finding both Fall Rye and Buckwheat seed right now. I don't need the buckwheat this fall, but I sure need the Fall Rye. I have placed many calls and the organic farmers I am talking with are all having the same problem. Why more people don't grow it for seed is beyond me considering the demand amongst organic farmers. I can't wait to take the seeder out to the back field to get it earning its keep.

The Broke Seeder Part

Here is a better view of the part that I broke. I assume that it is cast aluminum and it is quite thin. Any ideas out there for how I can fix this? There is a sliding cam that needs to fit into this housing and it does need to have the strength to resist the turning of said cam. Still though, I don't think it needs to be tremendously strong or they would have made it thicker to begin with. I have been told that perhaps some sort of epoxy would work.

My Project Last Night

This is the new seeder that I bought. Well...as you can see it is definitely not new...new to me though. It is a Midwest One Way Disc seeder. Actually, it is quite ingenius for how simple it is. As the discs rotate in the soil, a chain (that is currently missing) turns the sprocket that drives the rotors in the seed compartments. As the rotors turn, seed is dispensed into the tubes that are located between the discs. The seed drops and then are covered in soil by the discs. It is so simple and basic and yet fairly clever. The old fellow that I bought the unit from had it for 40 years or so and never used it as a seeder! He had it for working summer fallow. As a result, the shaft was steadfastly rusted and wouldn't turn. Heat and oil and penetrating fluid and a lot of banging and clanging around managed to get it to turn. However, without taking it completely apart I had no idea where it was bound. I finally forced it enough that one of the seed housings broke and then I knew where the problem lay. The good news is that only one assembly was rusted solid...the bad news is that the cast aluminum housing split. Now I have to figure out how to weld cast aluminum (or braise it). I have no idea what to do at this point in time, but I will ask around and figure it out. Once I get the seed housing fixed and continue lubricating the shaft, I will have a usable old seeder for behind the N.

One other fascinating aspect of this seeder is the lifting mechanism. It is a big ole heavy thing that normally the Ford N 3pt. hitch hydraulics wouldn't be able to handle. The lift arms actually hook on to the seeder and when you lift them, a cable and pulley system pulls the wheel at the back of the seeder down, thereby lifting the entire set of discs off the ground. This of course disables the seeding action and allows you to transport the seeder between fields. I will post a picture of the seeder in action once I get it unloaded from the trailer and hooked up to the N.

Happy Girl

I moved both sows into their farrowing field. I am hoping that they are now both bred. The farrowing field is approximately 100' x 100' and has a good mix of grass pasture and bush. There is a large amount of shade and rich pasture full of dandelions and clover and grass. It has been vacant for several months and when I put the girls in there this weekend, they were in hog heaven! They grazed for a few hours and then slept soundly for many more hours! I think they were happy to be away from that pesky young boar who was always nudging them around.

Bubbles is still in his field, but it has been greatly expanded with the removal of the electric fencing. It is about the same size as the farrowing field and is where the corn was growing. He is very busy now destroying corn stalks and grazing away happily. The cows and llamas are in the large field beside him and when they come up for water, he has company.

The Farrowing Hut...another view

Here is a view of the roof opened. You can also see the carpet flaps that allow the pigs access to and from the hut. When I last farrowed at the end of January, I hung a heat lamp from the peak. That, combined with the body heat of all those pigs, made it very comfy in there!