I'm Farming And I Grow It

Maybe you've seen these guys by now--they've gotten pretty popular.  K-Staters, they were featured at halftime of the KSU-Texas game (which, for the 5th straight time, was a KSU victory but I digress again).  Check'em out (click on the link).  Gotta Feed Everybody

A Load Of Bull

Our 4 little bulls from 2012 and Lambert, the one I bought in Kansas, are spending a celibate time away from the females, eating the left-over Coastal over at the Gamblin place and grumbling to Tommy Fuqua's bull through the east fence or Larry's across the road.  I take them range cubes each morning and drink a cup of coffee while they eat.

Kind Of Nutty...

The Pecan is the official state tree of Texas so I assume it must also be the official nut of Texas.  Apologies to my children, who grew up believing that distinction was held by my brother Pete (I don't know where they got that idea).  In fact, Pete is actually from Florida, and when Mom and Dad corrected his residency from Texas to there, the average intelligence of both states increased.  But I digress...

The Busted Handle Pecan Factory is enjoying its best harvest since we've lived here.  The nice big tree in the back yard has marble-sized, thick-shelled pecans that taste great but are just too much trouble to shell.  The big dogs enjoy crunching them, though, and the back porch will be covered with shell fragments if we don't sweep it often.  The little scraggly tree in the front yard, however, is loaded with big thin-shelled pecans.  I enjoy picking them up every day or so, and our recent cold snap will probably yield the last of the crop as the husks freeze or dry out, curl away from the pecans and let them drop to the ground or expose them for picking.

I can spend a productive time cracking them and picking them out by hand during a Cowboys game or an evening by the fire but, when I accumulate enough and have reason to go to Stephenville, I really enjoy taking them to a nursery there that has this Rube Goldberg machine for cracking them.  I wish I had invented it.  It looks like it's built from spare parts, so I'm sure I could have.  You pour your pecans in the top and they drop to a bin at the bottom, where a bicycle chain with little claws riveted to it that look like they were sawed off the back of a hammer rotates through the nuts, picking up one in each set of claws.  As the chain continues to rotate each pecan is carried upward past a little anvil where a hammer head is spring loaded and timed to whack it.  The claws continue over the top of the sprocket and dump the cracked pecans into the hopper at the left, where they're poured back into our gucket and taken home to be shelled.  It makes a joyful noise, sprays fragments all over the place and is a delight to watch.  A dollar a pound and worth every cent.  Someday I might build one if have have an old bicycle and enough hammers.

The result, whether shelled by me or Rube, is perfect for pies, cinnamon spiced pecans, or eating just as God made them.  We have plenty--come on down and help me eat'em.

Calves Status

I delivered the marketing alliance steers on Wednesday, Oct 24.  One, the youngest of all, was under 600 pounds so I kept him back for a load in December.  The others averaged 625 pounds, right where they were supposed to be.  Now we have the 11 Polled Herefords, the one baldie steer, and Lambert the yearling bull left here at the house.  I fed them all in the barn trough then left the gate open so, when they finished and ambled out, the 2 little twins would go with them.

They did, and they all stayed together last night in the pasture, but the little ones didn't come up with the others for breakfast.  I guess they have to develop social skills and the herd instinct.  They did all come up for dinner tonight, so I bet they figure it out pretty quickly.  We'll see if Kathy still sneaks Starr a bottle through the fence.

Eggs and Pecans

The Poultry and Pecan profit centers came back online recently, after seasonal outages.

Monday I heard a hen making the "I just laid an egg" sound from the barn.  I looked and found 10 eggs in the nest box I built for them there, that they've never used (obviously I haven't been listening closely enough lately).  So the dogs got eggs for breakfast that day, since I didn't know how old they were, and we've been getting one a day since then.  It's been months--all summer, at least--since we had eggs and I had about given up on the hens and figured we'd raise a new batch next spring.  It's nice to be getting eggs again, even if it's just from one hen.  Maybe more will get the idea.

I've been watching the pecan tree in the front yard all spring and summer, realizing that it was full of pecans but sure that the heat, drought, grasshoppers or some other catastrophe would prevent a crop.  Today I gathered all that had fallen or looked like they would fall soon, and filled my hat.  They're big, full and tasty and the tree is still loaded--the lower branches are touching the ground.  Bodes well for pecan pies at Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Life is good.  Come on down and have eggs for breakfast and pecan pie for dessert.

Farmer's Holiday

That's what Larry calls a rainy day, and we're having a welcome one.  We had half an inch overnight with 100% chance of rain forecast today.  The low dark clouds must have fooled the calves' alarm clocks so they were late coming up to eat and that let me sleep in  a little.  They stand at the back yard fence and bellow insistently until I come out and feed them.

It's a slow, soaking rain that will really benefit the oats and the pastures.  The effects of last year's drought are still visible on much of the country.  The cool weather rains we had in the spring didn't help the warm weather grasses and the Coastal much, and the summer has been very dry.  Luckily I've had the cows off the big pasture letting it grow out to burn, so it hasn't been abused but it hasn't gotten much help either.  Bob Self's pasture, where the cows are now and which was burned last winter, is about out of grass.  I'm feeding hay there every day (thank goodness for a good hay season).  Some cool season grasses should start coming out soon.  I'll have to watch our pasture after we burn and not overburden it too soon.  I might consider leasing Bob's another year to let ours grow out.

The weaning calves are doing well.  Our target weight is 600 pounds in mid-October and I'm confident we'll be in good shape.  I had a nice talk with the nutritionist at a nearby feed mill and he made me feel good about the way I'm feeding and showed me how I could cut down a little, which will help with costs.  We advertised the calves in the paper and have had several calls.  We sold the 5 baldie heifers as breeding stock, which I always like to do.  The steers will go to the marketing alliance and I'll keep one or 2 Hereford heifers and sell the others and the bulls at West or through the newspaper ad.  People are becoming aware, through the ad or word of mouth or both, that we have them and I probably get a call a week asking about Hereford bulls.  I'm babying the Angus bull and my new Hereford bull.  The Angus hurt his knee, and I'm trying to see if rest will let it get better.  The Hereford got pneumonia soon after arriving last spring (I bought him in Kansas) and is still slowly recovering.  Starr and Skye, the twin Hereford heifers, are in the pen together.  Starr is eating hay (also from Kansas) and weaning ration enthusiastically and Skye, who I just weaned, is getting the idea.  Starr is still quite a bit smaller but the gap is closing.  Kathy still sneaks out after supper and feeds Starr a bottle.

The dogs, cats and horses have all found dry places to rest and enjoy the cool weather.  That's what we plan to do today too.  I hope yours is as good.  Be sure to wish Amy a happy birthday.

Recipe For A Miracle

- 100 pounds per acre of Oat seed
- 15 acres of reasonably prepared seedbed
- 1 inch of rain
- 6 days of sunshine

- a dash of faith

God is always bringing new life to us.  It's my favorite thing about the farm.  Calves, kittens, fawns, doves, oats...all pretty miraculous to see.

Life is good.  Come on down and watch the oats grow.

If It Flies...it's safe

Amy and I are observing dove season this week by spending the last hour of daylight hunting.  We've seen a few birds and fired a few shots but, so far, not a feather has been ruffled.  Life is good--come on down and hunt with us.

Amy and her pink camo shotgun

If you aren't relaxed you aren't doing it right

Mojo, our wind-powered decoy

Wildcats

The family almost reached critical mass Saturday, driving to the K-State game in the RV.  Jeff cracked wise until we quit laughing at him, then went to bed.  Amy and Holly chattered endlessly about everything and everybody, while Lawrence napped in the passenger seat.  Kathy smiled happily the whole time, making Touchdown Taco Dip and basking in our togetherness.  We missed you, Montgomerys.  Come join us when you can.

Oats

I've worked the last few days to get the field plowed and oats planted before the forecast rain arrived.  I finished planting 15 acres today about 10:00 and it started raining about noon!  Although I intend them for winter grazing, last year I deferred the grazing, fertilized them and made 60 bales of hay.  It's nice to have those bales now--I'm already feeding hay, something I usually plan to start doing in November.

Here the horses are cleaning up the oats I spilled as I loaded 2000 pounds of seed, one 20-pound gucket at a time.  At one point Kitty was eating them off the ground, Sugar from one of the guckets I was trying to fill and CT was eating out of the grain drill.  They really bonded with that red grain wagon--they're probably standing out there beside it right now, waiting for it to drop some more oats on the ground for them.  We've gotten half an inch of rain so far, hoping for more as we have significant chances all weekend long.  Life is good--come on down and watch the oats grow.

Weaners

As soon as I got home from Alaska, Amy and I vaccinated the calves and started the process of weaning them.  It's a process because my fences aren't what they should be, and each day a couple of calves unwean themselves by crawling through the fence to get back with their moms.  I'll keep the cows here near them for about a week.  By then the calves will have figured out how to eat the weaning ration and not be so desperate for milk and the cows, relieved of the requirement to produce prodigious quantities of milk, will be able to gain some weight and go into the fall and winter in good shape.

We'll put the cows on the Self's pasture, although I'll have to start feeding some hay and put out a liquid feeder.  Grass is getting sparse everywhere.  The calves will stay at the house and eat weaning ration and hay.  The commercial calves will be sold through Pacesetter Beef Alliance in mid-October.  We'll keep 2 or 3 Polled Hereford heifers for replacements and sell a few at the Cross Timbers Polled Hereford sale in March.  I continue to get calls for Polled Hereford bulls so I'll keep them and advertise in the paper.

Life is good.  Come on down and help us give booster shots.  There's always room for a pour-on moron.

The Most Dangerous Catch

OK, it wasn't all that dangerous but we saw their boat.  I took 10 days out of the Texas August heat to go fishing with Pete, Rex Reiley and Bob Gonzales in Alaska.  We fished 3 days for Halibut out of Homer, one day for shrimp out of Whittier and 3 days for Silver Salmon out of Seward.

Here's our best day's catch of halibut.  Pete has a great boat, is skilled in its use and got us into fish every day despite the bananas.  We also hired a charter for one day in Homer.

Here's one day's salmon catch in Seward.  We also saw whales, eagles, sharks and the occasional microbrewery and didn't need no stinking charter.

The four amigos and their boat.  You can see we had a variety of weather, but no 100 degree days. It was an excellent trip--great company, great experience.  If you ever feel like fishing in Alaska, call my brother Pete.

Expanding

Today the Weavers closed on their purchase of Nettie Streater's place.  As part of the transaction, I sold Larry the 17 acres across the highway from us and bought from him the triangular 30 acres of Nettie's on this side--across the lane from our house.  It's rocky and mesquite-covered, but it will be handy due to its location.  It needs some fence work, so bring your gloves and boots.  We have highway frontage now from the roadside park to Zane's, and Larry has the same on the other side.  Pete says we should secede, form our own country and make Highway 22 a toll road.

It's a good thing the new land isn't hay ground.  The latter half of June and the first half of July have been devoted entirely to cutting, raking, baling and hauling hay.  We've done well, even with a couple of breakdowns.  I'm ready to not be driving the tractors for a while, but the cows will be happy this winter.  We may be feeding in 2 places--Selfs and in the house pasture (maybe I'll use Nettie's) so it's good we've made plenty.

Beach Boys

Zane donated 2 dump truck loads of sand for a beach at the tank for Kathy.  Travis and his friend Chase donated some sweat equity and we opened the beach today.  It's not ready for prime time yet but it's ready enough to cool off in the water and get a sunburn.

Ridin' The Rails

After dropping his mom off at the airport, Ethan and I rode Amtrak from Fort Worth to Cleburne.  Then came home and played with our trains with new insight into the sights, sounds and smells.

Busy Times

It's been busy at the Busted Handle.  We've started cutting and baling hay and it looks like the 2 remaining Sudan fields and 2  Coastal fields will be ready as soon as we can get to them.

We've weaned one litter of kittens and are about to start another--everybody try to push kittens.

Looking for a home

We've had lots of visitors--Barney and Susan Tull from Derby, then Bill and Cathy Flandermeyer from Colorado Springs.  Holly and Lawrence squeezed in a visit before her departure for Tanzania.  Jeff, Amy and Todd came for a weekend, and we had Elizabeth for a week and Ethan for 2.  Now we have Pete, Susan and Travis and their friend Chase.  It's great.

We're getting a little rain now and then, the calves are growing and the cows are fat.  Life is good.  Here are a few scenes from the past month.  Also see Barney's great shots on Flickr here.  Come see us.

Home is where my horse is

Ethan and CT exercising Grandad

Susan learns ranching

Butterfly bushes attract our favorite friends

Beef, it's what's for dinner

We enjoy having visitors

New Guy In Town

His name is Cowtown, but his friends call him C.T., and he's Ethan's birthday present.  He's an 8-year-old Pony Of The Americas gelding, and very friendly.  You can see he's mostly a red roan with a loud Appaloosa rump, but they say in winter he changes to a sorrel.  He's a little smaller than Sugarfoot, but still big enough to carry a fat old Grandad.

Amy and I rode him and played with him to be sure he's gentle, and we'll probably bring him home this weekend.  I'll rig him up a saddle, bridle and halter.  Hurry down and ride your birthday present, Ethan.  And everybody else--Ethan is always good to share his stuff.

That's How It's Done, Son

Yesterday Amy in the John Deere, Kathy on the lawn mower, and I on the IH mowed the weeds in the hay lot and carried our 61 new bales of oat hay off the field and into the hay lot.  Next we'll put up a temporary electric fence to let the cows graze the remainder of this field while keeping them off the Coastal, in preparation for separating them for breeding.

The picture, with the long evening shadows, doesn't do the hay justice.  It's over half of our requirement for the winter and, after last summer's meager harvest, it's a big deal.  It was a beautiful day to be outside and fun to all be working together.  Come on down and we'll find you a tractor to drive.

Parrotheads

We ate the last mango in Paris...

              ...and missed Richie.

Hay, So Far

It's a work in progress, but baling the oat hay is going well.  Yesterday I made over 40 bales on the main part of the field, between the dirt road and the waterway.  I'll finish this morning and expect the total to be over 50 bales.  Holly took this nice picture of the sky but, if you look real close near the bottom, you can see some hay bales.

Bull News

Here is the new yearling bull I bought in Kansas last week.  His name is Lambert but I'm sure we'll think of something more manly.  His genetics favor calving ease, so he'll get to breed the 3 heifers this year and probably become the main Hereford bull next year.

Bottle Baby

She drinks 2 quarts of milk substitute twice a day and I'm trying to get her to taste solid food (the horses' sweet feed).

We'll still try to bring her mother up and see if she'll nurse both twins, but my concerns for the survival of this one are past.  It's fun to feed her and see her grow each day.

First Hay

I cut the oats yesterday and today.  It looks great.  If the rain can hold off for a few days (don't say that very often) for it to dry, we'll get the hay season started off in good shape.

Bonus Baby

It's a rich season, with grass and weeds everywhere, oats about ready to cut, two litters of kittens on the grounds (here's a picture of Carly and hers)...

...and then one of the cows gives us twins!  It took us a couple of days to figure out that there were 2, because we kept finding one in strange places.  We put a tag in one's ear so we could tell them apart, and then it became clear that the cow was favoring one and ignoring the other (the tagged one).  So yesterday we decided to bring the unfavorite to the barn and bottle feed her (I think they're both heifers), but we couldn't find her anywhere.  We searched until after dark.  This morning I was out at sunrise on the 4-wheeler and searched until 2:00.  I took a break to get some things ready for the weekend, and was back in the pasture by 5:00.  Under different circumstances it would have been a beautiful day to drive around the pasture, with wildflowers and grass everywhere.  Kathy joined the search on the Gator when she got home.  Finally about 7:30 I found her, and commenced following her around on foot trying to catch her.  At about 9:00, after nearly a complete circuit of the pasture, we were able to walk her through the gate and into the hay lot, go home for a rope and finally catch her.  Here she is adjusting to her new pen in the barn, which Lawrence and I built and I'm extremely proud of.    She got the idea to nurse immediately and likes the bottle.

Hurry home and help take care of all these baby critters.

Polled Hereford Sale

On Saturday the 24th we participated, as sellers for the first time, in the Cross Timbers Polled Hereford Association sale at West, Texas.  We sold the 3 heifers I mentioned in my Extreme Bovine Makeover post and they looked great.

Here's our little "pen of 3" after their final shampoo, blow dry and and brush on Thursday.  They spent the night on pine shavings in a pen I built for them in the barn (it was muddy outside).  Amy and I drove them over Friday morning and got them into a pen, then looked at everybody else's cows and talked to people about ours.  That evening there was a dinner and a business meeting.  Saturday morning more looking and talking, then Kathy and Amy attended the sale while I helped work the pens and alleys in the back.  Amy said that when our calves came in the auctioneer said, "Whooee, these look like show heifers."  And they did.  It was a great time and I was proud of our cattle.  Thanks to all of you for helping when you can and being interested.  I think Dad and Rich would be proud of Heyroth Polled Herefords.

Did I Mention Kittens?

Not to be outdone by the cows, Barney the barn cat (friend of Carly the garage cat) presented us with 6 kittens yesterday.  She had them in the tall weeds on a balmy sunny day that turned cold and rainy, so this morning Holly and Lawrence moved them to a snug little nest behind the barn.  There are 4 black, one white and one gray just like Barney.  Let us know how many of each color you want and stand by for breaking news...we think Carly's pregnant too.

The Busted Handle Calf Factory

It's fun to go to the pasture these days and see all the calves running around.  We're nearly finished calving with a current total of 21 and probably 2 more to go.  We have 27 cows and I either know the reason for the other 4 not calving or plan to sell them.  You can see that Amy and I have kept busy tagging and weighing most of them as they were born.  After a while they get suspicious of us calling them to the pen and we have to lay off for a few days.  Our big roundup, vaccinating and finish tagging, and separating into breeding pastures is scheduled for March 19, or sooner if I can get Amy to come home.  You're all invited to come help.  Bring old clothes, you'll get a little western on them.  It's the best time of the year.

House Makeover Too

I should have done like Pete--documented all the heartaches and tears, conversations and research and included samples of the Kumquat, Loquat and other shades we considered before deciding on Benjamin Moore HC-134 Tarrytown Green for the clerestory wall.  Then I could have included step-by-step pictures of the first can being opened, the first brush being dipped, and the first stroke being applied because dang it, people are interested in all that...NOT!

But I do agree I should have taken a "before" picture to help show the changes we've made.  Here you can see the (Tarrytown) green upper story wall and the new roof.  Gutters aren't up yet, but will arrive next week.  If you look close (click on the picture to get more detail) you can see the roofers' trailer and the torn-off roof piled in front of the garage.  Bet those Mexican roofers never considered that dumps in Texas might be closed on Texas Independence Day!  The internet and satellite antennas are off the roof and the dead cottonwood that wanted to fall on the house is cut down.  If you look even closer you can see that Lawrence has spent hours scraping the grass and weeds out of the circular drive so we can have it repaved.  We'll christen it the Lawrence Olal Opundo Parkway (the LOOP).  You might also notice the peach trees blooming on March 2.  With an average last frost date of March 25, I have low hopes for a peach crop again this year.

  There's plenty of paint brushes.  Come on down and get paint on your jeans.

Pasture Strategies

With the recent rain and warm weather we have a good bit of winter grass in the pastures.  Lawrence and I had planted 13 acres of oats for winter grazing but, since we have the winter grass and still have at least a 30-day supply of hay, I decided to try and finish out the winter without grazing the oats.  I had the fertilizer guy come out to fertilize and apply weed killer, and we'll see if we can cut them for hay.  We can always go ahead and graze them if things all turn bad, but I'm optimistic for a hay crop.  If we can avoid buying hay in Kansas or the Dakotas and trucking it down here again, I think we'll have made a good choice.

The drought damage to the pastures isn't repaired by a wet winter though.   The warm weather grasses and Coastal could really use some rest.  In 2005 Dad and some of the neighbors had some guys come out and cut cedars, and they were supposed to come back within a few years to burn the brush piles and conduct a controlled burn of the pasture to kill weeds and more cedars.  We hadn't heard from the guys in quite a while but they've contacted us and assure me they still have funding and are in business.  This winter they've burned part of Bob Self's pasture and hope to burn the rest before it gets too green.  A fall or winter burn requires that you take your cows off in the spring and summer, to let grass and weeds grow up for fuel to sustain the burn.  Bob did that last year, asking Tommy Fuqua to hold off renting for a year.  I've talked to Bob and Tommy to see, if they get his pasture burned and the grass comes back good, if I can put some of our cows on his place and let ours get ready for a burn this fall.  The near term benefit would simply be letting the pasture rest and recover from last summer's damage.  The long term benefit, if we can get it burned, would be the elimination of more weeds and cedars that compete with the grass for water and nutrients, and maybe make it better than it was before.

Larry and I have signed a hay lease with the Operstenys, the owners of Garlon's old place, to cut Klein and Coastal hay there.  We have a lease at Ischy's for Coastal and Sudan, the fields at Wesley Jones' and the Sycamore for Sudan, and the Gamblin place and part of the field above the house in Coastal.  Hopefully there will be plenty of hay work this summer.  I've fixed the air conditioner in the tractor, so come on down and drive it around for a while.

Watch Your Weight

 In a business where much of what we do is weight-based, we've had little data to work with on a daily basis.  We've done well against our weight targets with the Alliance calves, but it's probably more because the targets are reasonable and the traditional rules of thumb for feeding and weight gain are accurate than because of any specific knowledge I've had.  If I wanted to weigh a cow or batch of calves, I had to trailer them to the feed store and get the load weighed on their scale.  This is tedious and error-prone when you want the individual weaning and yearling weights the registered cattle require (less so for the Alliance calves which were all averaged, steers and heifers).  This year I've added a scale so we can have some weight data on the ranch.  It's not permanently installed but we gave it a test run yesterday to get yearling weights for the heifers.  In the first photo I'm stress testing it, and in the second it's in actual use.

Weighing newborn calves is another matter.  It usually involves me roping one, picking him up and holding him while standing on the bathroom scale I take to the pasture with me.  Finding a level spot clear of mud and manure can be tricky, and I always need a helper because I can't see the scale over the calf I'm holding against my chest (yes, I can see it just fine when I'm not holding a calf).  So here is the solution to that, a little sling that hangs on a scale suspended from the chute in this case, or from a little arm that fits in the stake pocket of the pickup.