Burning Bushes and Feeding the Goats

My education in the vagaries of the hay business and feeding goats continues. We started off the winter by feeding the goats with square bales from a local farmer. However, we found out late in the season that hay has become something of a hot commodity around here and prices are going up quickly. The reason? The drought in Texas. Apparently, the prices have gotten so high that it's become cost effective to send the hay there, so now there's none here and the people that do have it are holding on tightly. We were also getting tired of having to go down every couple of days to feed them. The animals plow through the small square bales pretty quickly, so we were looking for new ideas. Luckily we found a guy in Spring Hill that was selling the giant 5x5 netted bales at really reasonable price. Each roll has enough hay to feed the animals for a month (or possibly more). I also found out that the netting is superior to string tied rolls because the strings cause pinch points that allow water to pool and seep in. Water and hay don't mix. When it's netted, the top layer gets moist, but the insides stay dry. I was happy to find a cost effective alternative, so I had the farmer load us up a couple rolls.

From 2011-12-20

I was a little worried the trailer wouldn't handle it, but it performed admirably and we were able to haul them with no problems.

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Sawyer was an excellent helper and had a great time climbing around on the rolls.

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We ran into a problem when we arrived at the prop. How do we get these monsters off the trailer without a tractor? We decided to string a rope between the trees and then pull forward.

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It worked pretty well. The roll came right off the end.

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Once it was off the trailer, we were able to muscle it into the corral. Sadie was very happy with her new endless food supply.

From 2011-12-20

I decided to take advantage of the nice weather and took a day off work, as a Christmas present to myself. Since there was no wind and we had a couple days with no rain, I decided it would be a good time to burn one of the big brush piles. It's hard to see how big the pile is from this picture. It's about 7-8 feet high and 20-25 yards long.

From 2011-12-20

The dry cedar burns better than gas! I just put a cup full of diesel on it and lit a napkin and we were off to the races.

From 2011-12-20

The pile burned down to a smoldering pile. The only thing left was the stumps. That's then next problem I have to figure out. How to remove the dirt from the stumps so they'll burn? I've tried rolling them and beating them up with the bulldozer but that dirt is tenacious. I can bang the smaller stumps against the ground and clear them but, obviously that won't work on the big ones. The experiment continues ....

From 2011-12-20

Great Fall Weather

We continued to take advantage of the beautiful fall weather to clean up and build roads. This week we were lucky to have Sammy finally join us after a long absence. The first of the two big projects was to move the old fireplace that was left over from the blown down cabin. The problem was that it was in the middle of the area I'm trying clear for a barn and was becoming a pain to work around. The rock was very nicely shaped, and it seemed a shame to bury it, so we decided to stack it by hand, out of the way, to save for some future use. We worked hard and got most of it stacked in about an hour. However, I think we'll be turning up rocks for months to come.

From 2011-11-21

Part of Sammy's job was to be the documentarian as we worked. She has a real talent for photography and took these nice pictures of the goats. The first one is of Little Momma giving us one of her looks. She's very smart but standoffish and only comes around when there's food. We like to joke that it's lucky she has brains, because she definitely wasn't blessed with looks.

From 2011-11-21

Gracie is the social one. Here she is, sticking her head through the fence, fighting to get some corn. She is a fun little goat and will follow us anywhere. She is very curious is always coming up to see whats going on.

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We also did a lot of work getting the new field cleared so we could start putting the road in. The idea is to create a big loop, so that we can pull a trailer straight through and not have to back it in. We've been taking it slow, to get a chance to see how the water drains during big storms, to see how it looks in different seasons, and to just get a general idea of how to lay things out.

From 2011-11-21

After much thought I finally took the bulldozer to it and laid out where we want the road to go. So far, I like it. Once things dry out, we'll try pulling the trailer through it and see how it does. The next step will be to dig a deep hole for the septic system I'm noodling.

Goat Wrangling

We did a lot of farm work Saturday. The goats have been penned up in the main corral for the longest duration since we've had them. During the spring and summer, they'd always been out in the forest with plenty to eat. Now that fall has hit, we've had to keep them in main corral and feed them hay. We've also had to deal with keeping their stall cleaned out.

From 2011-11-14

I've alternated between a couple of strategies and haven't really settled on the best one yet. The first is to rake out the straw and burn it. It's pretty easy to do but as you can see below, the wet hay is very smoky when it burns and it's kind of a pain to babysit the fire. The second is to just shovel it into the little trailer, spread it around, and use it for compost. You don't have to deal with the fire, but it's a pain to hook the trailer up to the quad and it's less efficient because you have to shovel twice. I'll keep experimenting until I find the best way.

From 2011-11-14

Our next project was to deworm the goats. It sounds a lot worse than it is. We just feed them some treated feed mixed in with their regular feed every 3 months. The hardest part is keeping them from eating each others batch and getting the wrong dose. This time we tried make a little cage and just feeding them one at time. It was still tough. They ones who were waiting kept crashing the gate, trying to get an extra bite or two. Greedy little buggers.

From 2011-11-14

To keep Little Momma away, Sawyer tried riding her. We were amazed that she held up and was able to ride him around. It's not something you want to do the poor critters every day, but I have to admit it was pretty funny to watch.

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Of course Seth couldn't miss out on the action and had to start riding Gracie. Gracie was so happy to have her feed that I don't think she even noticed.

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Seth celebrated getting them dewormed by carrying Gracie around for a victory lap.

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We also moved the old cut-rock, hand built chimney so we could finish bulldozing by the old cabin. It was kind of sad to move it. Not just because it's a pain carrying and stacking and endless supply of heavy rocks, but because it was the last remnant of the old house. It's all gone now. I'll have to post a before/after picture in the next installment.

New Road, New Fence

All the stars lined up last weekend and I was finally able to g0 to the property and get some work done. I started the day by calling in load of gravel, as a base for the roads I've been building. I've never coordinated this all by myself, so I started off a little conservative. I figured there would be less risk to try out the process with one load and see how it went before going crazy on the rest.

From 2011-10-12

After getting the new roadbed laid, I realized that my fence line along the road was too far back, which was aesthetically unpleasing as well as I was cutting off a big part of space I could use for the corral. As much as I didn't want to move fence posts, I bit the bullet and did it. In the background you can see the old fence posts (the post hole digger is laying against one) and how much area I was able to recover.

From 2011-10-12

The joy of digging fence posts in this area is that you can go down 24 inches through nothing but clay then move 10 feet over for the next post and hit nothing but limestone. Generally, if the layer of rock is thin enough, you can break it up with the breaker bar, but other times it's too thick and you have to either drill or have uneven fence posts. Neither is a good option. As you can see from the picture below, I was bringing up nothing but limestone on this hole.

From 2011-10-12

Luckily I had a well place tree at the end of the fence row. I was able to hook the come-along to it and stretch the fence. If that tree wouldn't have been there, it would've been tough trying to get the truck or quad back there to anchor to. I've come to the realization that stretching the fence is problaby the most critical aspect of putting in a good one.

From 2011-10-12

After all the hard work, the boys tried out the new road by playing Frisbee. I think, for a first effort, the road turned out pretty well. I definitely learned some lessons on what to do and not do next time. Stayed tuned for more news to come.

From 2011-10-12

Tracking the Deer

Now that bow season has started, I've been watching the trail cam closely and have been very happy to see nice bucks show up. The video below is from the inner perimeter clearing. I've mostly been putting down corn to draw them in, but last week we tried a little doe eustrus. I'm thinking it's working well because on this round of video, I've caught more big bucks than ever before. It's funny how the deer turns around and notices the LED's from the came and freaks out and takes off. This video is from down by the tree stand. I was especially glad to see some nice bucks down there after spraying the eustrus since that's where I'll be hunting.

Winterizing the goat shed

Spent the beautiful day on Saturday getting the goat pen ready for winter. I did a lot reading and all the experts seem to agree that all they need to survive winter is a 3 sided shed with a roof.

From 2011-10-03

To make sure they're warm, we tarred up the roof and put tarps around the sides to keep the breezes out. Hopefully it will be enough.

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Sawyer was a big help, although he wasn't such a help when he fell asleep on the ground, with his foot sticking through the tire wing. I'm glad chigger season is over.

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It wasn't all work though. We spent a bit of time sighting in the bows and rifles. I'm happy to say the bow is looking good and 20 and 30 yards. Forty yards is still a little sketchy. I'm not worried though. Unless it's an area I've taken the bulldozer to, there isn't 40 yards clear enough to get a shot.

From 2011-10-03

Goat Farm in St George

I was pleased to see a small goat farm in St. George on my recent visit. One thing that I thought was interesting was the wood lean-to goat sheds they'd made. I wonder how those would hold up in TN. The wood probably wouldn't last long with all the moisture here.

From 2011-09-16

Before and After

We've been working hard this summer, trying to tame the wilds, to get the property ready for winter. Sometimes it's been hard to see progress, so it's been fun to go back and look at pictures, to see how much progress we've made.

One of my projects has been to clear a new road up into where the old cabin was. The old timers were good at picking out the best land, so I've followed their trail and started clearing things out where the old structures were. The overgrowth was so impenetrable, that it's been hard to figure out what exactly is there.

Here's a before shot of my first foray, with the bulldozer, into the area where I want the road.

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And here is the after shot. It was a lot of work to get to this point. It's now ready to put down some gravel.

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One of the hardest parts of clearing is getting rid of the all the cut down trees. We've been moving the stumps, branches and tree tops to the burn pile in preparation for our third or fourth bonfire of the year. This is what the burn area looks like before starting to pile things up.

From 2011-09-06

And here's one of the smaller piles we plan to burn. I used to do much bigger ones, but the big ones are just too scary. It's very nerve wracking to see the 30 foot flame kissing the tree tops when the wind kicks up. The heat gets so intense that it kills living trees up to 20 yards way. Thank goodness for humidity.

From 2011-09-06

The other project, this summer, has been to clear out the corral in preparation for planting trees. Here's a before shot that shows how thick the brush and trees were. Actually, it was even worse when we started. This is after a month of the goats eating it down.

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After a lot of hard, hard work, we finally have it ready to plant grass. We just need to wait for the weather to get right. It's going to look really nice when it's all done.

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And lastly, the tools of the trade.

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Getting ready for winter

Our current project is trying to get the corral ready to plant grass, so the animals have something to eat this winter. It's getting pretty close. Last Saturday, I had Boston, Seth, Sarah and Mckenzie help me out. With their help, I was able to get a big log pile moved, the temporary fence moved, and most of the brush in the corral cleaned out.


After a hard mornings work, the kids decided to take a break by driving Gracie around the trailer. I'm not sure how much the goat liked it, but the kids had a great time.

From 2011-08-22

From 2011-08-22

We also started working on another of my hare brained ideas, which is to train Sadie to walk on a lead. This is in preparation for getting some harnesses so she can start dragging logs. I think the exercise would be good for her, both mentally and physically. The picture below is of Sarah and Mckenzie trying to teach her to whoa and giddyap. It actually worked better than I thought.

From 2011-08-22

Restarting my mushroom farm

My first attempt at mushrooms failed miserably. I think it was because the spawn got fried when it sat on my porch for a couple days in July.

I've found a lochttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifal commune down by Summertown that does seminars on growing. Hopefully I can make contact and learn the proper way to do it. I'll update as things progress.

Taking a night off

Sethie and I got sick of working so hard on the prop and decided to take Thursday night off and try out the boat on the Duck. We'd been noodling around this idea for a while.
The main concern holding us back, is that we would hit shallow spots and not be able to make it back up stream to the launch and end up having to drag the boat by hand. I can testify that it's not fun pulling a boat upstream with a rope.

From 2011-08-01

We had no problems going downstream. We have a depth finder so we were able to map things and generally avoid shallow spots. Fortunately, the boat is able to run in about foot of water, so we have a lot of mobility.

From 2011-08-01

However, we did run into a few scary moments going upstream. We'd purposely not gone too far, because I didn't want to go any further than I thought I could drag the boat back. Although, when your going downstream, it doesn't look as far as when your looking upstream, facing the prospect of a long drag.

About 1/2 back, the engine died. I tried to restart, but just got a clicking sound similar to the sound it makes when the battery is dead. This was definitely worrisome. It didn't make any sense though. The engine had been starting fine, and the battery still had enough power to run the trolling motor. I decided to open up the engine case and poke around. I'm glad I did, because as I looked closer, I noticed that the starter gear had gotten bound up with the flywheel.

It was a relief to know what the problem was, but we faced another. We had no tools. I tried banging on it with the anchor, but it had no effect. I was getting close to giving up when I found and old broken shaft from a screw driver. It was just long enough to pry the teeth apart and let the starter gear fall back into place.

After that the motor started right up and we were on our way. As we motored up the river, I started comprehending how difficult it would have been if we hadn't gotten the motor started. We probably would have been dragging all night. As it was, we made it back to the truck just before dark.

Enjoying the heat wave

We decided a good way to spend a hot July Saturday was to burn off some of the burn piles we've been accumulating. Actually, I can think of a lot of other things I'd rather do. Unfortunately, we had to get it done before we could move forward with more tree clearing.

From Drop Box

From Drop Box

From Drop Box

The goats have been doing a good job clearing as well. On the right of the trail is the area they completely ate down, and on the left an untouched area. As you can see, there is quite a difference. I just wish they could eat cedar trees. I still have to go in and clear those with a chainsaw or the bulldozer.

From Drop Box

We've been experimenting with temporary goat shelters and have come up with this, our latest design. Sethie came up with a good idea of bending the wire fence panel between the trees, to use the trees for anchors. So far, it looks like it will work well. Now we just need to figure out how to make a shelter for Sadie the donkey. The goat shelters are just too short.

From Drop Box

From Drop Box

The goats enjoyed relaxing in the shade while we setup the fence and the shelters in their new area. It brings to mind the questions, who owns who?

From Drop Box

Reclaiming the land

As we start clearing the overgrown cedar thickets and letting the goats clear the understory, the ground is getting the first sunlight it’s seen in 30 years. The plan is to clear the old corral to the point where we can plant grass. I’m hoping this will help supplement the goats diet over the winter as well as organizing and beautifying it.

We've spent the last couple of weeks knocking down trees, sorting them, and burning the leftovers.

From Drop Box

I found this interesting spot last week while cutting down some cedars in the old corral.

From Drop Box

Lot's of mushrooms growing out of Sadie's deposits. What better way could there be to fertilize these dead spots.

From Drop Box