Skip to main content

 Settling in

Coco and Vanna are selttling in nicely, though they do cry still right about dark. They are in a 10x10 converted kennel for now, while I finish the property fencing. I have done three of the four sides of our acre, and I am going to be cross fencing the back 1/3 for all the animals to graze eventually. We will allow the chicken, the goats and the sheep to graze, but I am on the fence still on the pigs we are scheduled to get in two months.

So, speaking of pigs, we are scheduling getting them on the farm in two months. so pens need to built soon. I am thinking of doing a modified KNF -Korean Natural Farming method of piggery that results in a no smell pen. Yeah, I thought the same thing too. JoAnn and I went through the KNF certification process and when we got the opportunity to visit a piggery with 4 full sized 400 pound sows and found that there wasn't ANY smell other than the animals around them, we were sold. I will need to dig down a bit or find a puka to build a deep base of logs and branches. Then it's mulch and then soil- their method dictates 4 feet, but thats where I AM modfiying the system.
Logs and branches will be of thinner dimensions and the mulch and soil layers will be only a foot for a total of  2 feet. I am too old to have been injured by falling off our pig skyscraper! 
Oh, the digs the goats and the sheep are in are temporary while JoAnn and I come up with a design we like for them. We try not to do Utilitarian if we can avoid it. We know that they may cram together in one shelter but we'd like to do two so they at least can have a choice. We are going to start with this and tweak the design a bit to fit 4 animals. 
Next, Cross fencing so we can get these sheep and goats out in the yard.  

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Update

Update Chickens are growing Big news, right? Well, it has been a while since I posted here and a lot has happened. Yes, the chickens have been getting bigger; the Cornish Cross are insanely huge and the Rhode Island Reds and Barred Rock hens are now officially old enough to be called pullets.  Their Foster Moms have abandoned them, meaning they are no longer protective of them and instead are making sure they (the hens) are getting the pullets inducted into the flock's 'Pecking order'. The pullets are basically on their own, though chickens really don't need to be taught much. The pullets are finding a pecking order of their own, fussing at and with each other as it should be in the natural order of chickens. The Cornish Cross are amazing. We purchased them three weeks after the pullets and they caught up in size in just two weeks. At three weeks old, the Cross chicks were taller than the Pullets at 5 weeks. Tomorrow they will be 7 weeks old, and they are...
2 comments
Read more

More Cute! Photo heavy...

 The Cute continues.  As promised, our flock has doubled in one shot. We responded to a post on Facebook regarding a mini flock for sale and snatched it up. The awesome people that run Kapanaia Farms in Kapaau, Hawaii put up a Ram, a ewe, and two sister offspring as a family unit and we fell in love immediately. three messages and two phone calls later and we were waiting for the day the babies could travel so we could head out to pick them up. This is Hemi. Not sure where they got the name, Sandra did speak of having a hard time coming up with 70 plus names every lambing, so she really couldn't recall where it came from. JoAnn and didn't have that problem and kept the name.  We decided that his name full name is Ernest Hemi Hemingway and Hemi's name is permanent. His lineage is out of Kapanaia's anchor stud Ram, 'Abacus'. A fine specimen that is fully spotted and has a history of black and white lambs. He is a cross of Katahdin and Dorper breeds. He has the sig...
Post a Comment
Read more
Has it been THAT long? Lots have happened in the months that have gone by Lightning has healed, grown and fathered his first two broods of chicks. 12 chicks total of straight run, meaning we are still a bit unsure which one is what yet, but they are getting bigger everyday and we have introduced them into the main flock already.  The Marans.We purchased 6 Cuckoo Marans at the Pahoa feed store. We were in the area and dropped in to see what was up and there was their chick delivery- peeping away. We knew this breed laid a deeper shade of chocolate brown egg and bought the lot of 6. Turns out this breed isn't one of the "hardy" listed breeds and we lost one within a week. They are now feathering out nicely, and we were assured that all our chicks were hens.    We have also gotten turkeys! Sadly, not the breed we wanted, but then the state of Hawaii is a bit militant as to what they will and won't allow on the island. We wanted the Oscillated  breed, bu...
Post a Comment
Read more