Peach blossoms just about to pop! Spring is almost here!
Wanting vs doing
This is an interesting article on why people say they want healthy food but when purchasing don’t actually buy healthier food. It was published on the Modern Farmers website.
This is something I witness myself. People tell me all the time how wonderful it is that we raise our animals the way we do. How great their lives are, but when I tell them how much our product costs, they immediately cannot believe it costs more than whatever is on sale at the grocery store. If I cannot compete with WalMart then they just don’t buy.
Sometimes these are the same people who actually begin the conversation with me squeamish over how rough we treat our animals when we literally couldn’t do any more for their welfare. They want me to treat our cows like they treat their dog then charge WalMart prices. When I explain the whole process to them, they leave thinking I’m too cruel (because we don’t put blankets on our cows or give them sweaters to wear) and I’m over charging then they go buy meat from a factory farm where animals are treated terribly with nary a thought about their conditions. Its a strange dichotomy, that’s for sure.
Chicken wrangling
No pic to go along with this post. This is simply a note for our records. Today we took 17 laying hens from the brood house and moved them into the main chicken flock. These birds were banded with white bands, numbered 1-17.
We also took 5 meat chickens and 1 meat rooster and moved them temporarily to the brood house. Tomorrow the meat birds will be banded and moved into a chicken tractor out in the pasture where they will spend their spring, summer, and fall. The eggs these chickens lay, after two weeks for clearing the blood line, will go into an incubator and be transformed into new meat birds for this year.
Hog class pics 9.0
Talking it through as the blood drains. You can see that it was a messy affair getting the pig on the hook by the mud on my face, which stayed there the rest of the day. I’ve learned now that students won’t always tell you when you’ve screwed up, better check the mirror occasionally. Of course darling SWMBO and the interns didn’t tell me either.
Finishing up the bleed. The pig is stunned by the gunshot and knocked unconscious. Bleeding it is what actually kills the pig.
Miguel moving over to the scald tank. Although this was an “old-fashioned hog killing” we did utilize modern conveniences like a tractor and an electric hoist to make the work easier. It didn’t seem to take anything away from the process.
Hog class pics 8.0
Get the hook in quickly so that we can hoist the hog in the air and bleed him properly. It took some muscle to hold him still while we worked.
Success. Now to wash the throat area off for the stick.
A successful stick. Part of the blood was given to Brent for blood sausage later in the day, part was taken to a friend who is a chef so that he can make the same thing.
Hog class pics 7.0
And then it was time. 
The unpleasant part of this job. Especially when the first shot didn’t do the job. Turns out, after a postmortem inspection that I shot too low on the forehead. No excuse and certainly not how you want to do it on class day. My shot was right between the eyes, it should have been about an inch or so higher. Of course the only time I’ve ever done this would be on class day. At least everyone saw how not to do it. 
A shot behind the ear did the trick. Now we can go to work.
Home again
Like most farmers, I have an off farm job. This week has taken me to ConExpo which is a once every three years show held in Las Vegas, NV. I gave up trying to take any kind of picture that showed the scale of the event, it’s just too big. There is 2.34 million square feet of exhibits and things like mining shovels literally get lost in the backdrop, literally. There is a Hitachi 1200 mining shovel in this picture. Can you see it?. I finally took a panoramic shot of the Deere booth. This is one of 2400 booths. All aren’t this big some some are larger.
If you’ve never been to Las Vegas you may not know how much walking you do. Add all the normal Vegas walking with covering the ConExpo event and you end up walking miles per day which is great for the body but bad for the back. Luckily I farm as well so I’m used to walking.
A couple of my customers standing in front of the tracks of a mobile crane. The counterweight on this crane weighed 100 tons!
Sunrise view on the last day. The weather was perfect in Vegas for the entire week and cold, rainy and sleety at home but I’m awful glad to be home and leaving Vegas behind.
Yep, work, work, work.
Hog class pics 6.0
A tour of the smoke house.
Intern Brian sharing how he managed the process of salting and smoking the hams this year. 
Intern John getting a fire going in the smoke house to demonstrate how we utilize the smoker. 
Our duck, looking on at all the strangers she doesn’t know.
Hog class pics 5.0
Showing the walk in cooler that we built.
Demonstrating how hard it is to separate pigs just by unassisted methods. Hint, it doesn’t work. 
Intern John taking a break after a couple of laps with the pigs. We were getting the pig boards at this moment so he’s not slacking. 
Intern Brian and I, now working the pigs with our home-made pig boards. The difference in working the pigs was dramatic.
Pics from hog class 4.0
In addition to the hog killing itself, Brent Miller came and taught cooking and prep for various traditional killing day fare. The pate was yummy!
The walking tour. This is where we made it over to the cows and discussed cattle management and pasture rotation.
Owen, one of the ninja babies, came up to see what we were doing.
One of our roosters, keeping an eye on everyone.