Farming:A year of retrospection

We've been on the farm over a year now. I had plans to make a post on the day we'd been living here a year but life happened and the post never did. So you're getting it now. Just last week I was reminded of posts I had made about researching animals for my future farm about three years ago. It's funny how things have changed since then. The only thing I've currently got on the farm that I'd planned on having all those years ago are my Nigerian Dwarf Goats. The breeds of my sheep changed with a desire to not need to shear animals that outweigh me by a few hundred pounds. The only remaining creature that has yet to be added are bovines. We don't have a cow yet.

This last year has been one full of lessons. There's been a lot of mucking,mud,feeding,watering, and processing. We've seen animals born and lost some to predators and to our own mistakes. It hasn't been easy and it hasn't always been fun, but I wouldn't change it. Hard work is the name of the game and while it isn't a lifestyle for everyone more and more I find it the place I belong. If you'd have told me five or six years ago that I'd be happy to be at a point in my life when I couldn't be further from African soil or missions work I'd have told you that you were out of your mind. Amazing how God changes things when you really give it up. Not that I don't want to go to Africa still or do more mission trips but I've realized that I'm where I was meant to be all along, it just wasn't the way I'd have planned to get here. 

I've long since grown used to the sound of a rooster crowing before daylight and even with them outside my window I rarely wake up when they start their songs. Until winter hits and water needs to be busted, feeding and watering takes anywhere between thirty minutes and an hour depending on what needs to be done that morning. When things get cold that time will increase quite a bit but even fighting the wind and single digit temps with wind chill didn't dampen my spirits lastwinter when it came to heading to the barn to bust water and feed the goats,sheep, and pigs (the pork has since moved to the pig pen that no longer requires mucking). I like the physical work. I like walking out my door and staring out across the hills next doorthat are often filled with a mix of cattle that I can sit and watch for hours. I like to sit and watch sheep and goats wander around the pasture playing and eating and occasionally settling an argument with their heads.

We've had a garden planted and harvested completely by now and what was a thriving wonderland of produce is back to bare soil waiting to be filled again with future fruits of next years crops. The brown ground is a little sad to see after eagerly picking beans, tomatoes, peas, and corn (for the first time) but that is the changing of the seasons and it brings with it different work.

What will follow is a bunch of pictures. Many of them are not for the weak stomached. I won't sugar coat the life I've been given the opportunity to live and to some there are aspects that are gross. You've been warned.

                                                                A clean goat pen

                         A clean sheep pen (Getting both of these cleaned took several hours. )

All the manure from those two pens filled the trailer

        Compost! (One of my favorite things to do is turn waste into black gold for the garden)

 I told you some of these were not for the weak stomached. This is the inside of a quail hen we processed. The yellow things are eggs that hadn't finished developing. You're seeing the yolks . This was one of the neatest things I've seen. We had several eggs that had developed but had not been given their colors yet.

Fresh bacon that we cured ourselves from last years pig. Nothing like fresh bacon.

I don't know what yall do on your birthday but I spent mine this year learning to trim hooves thanks to my neighbor Len Young and his eldest son Lane.

This years pigs. They aren't tiny and cute like this anymore.

While the bacon is good, this is my favorite part of fresh pork;the chops.

I debated adding this picture. It isn't one I like to see. Losing Tinker is the only thing I would change this past year. It was a hard lesson to learn. She was and still remains my favorite stock to ever be brought to the farm. In reality she was more pet than stock but she was supposed to be our herd matriarch. She was a sweet girl who had a fondness for chewing your clothes if you got close and weren't paying attention. But, I told you I won't sugarcoat the life I live, good or bad. This was what solidified what I do in my mind. I got through this with a lot of tears but I did get through. If anything had made me change my mind it would have been losing her to my own negligence.

My dad with "Walter" the first stock born here. He is our Katahdin Ram. Though he's not this tiny anymore. He's just 3 months shy of being a year old. Watching him being born was one of the neatest things in the world.

My favorite farm purchase. This is HTS Arwen. I told myself I would have a border collie of my own to work my sheep. She came to the farm a few months ago and is no longer a tiny puppy. Her ears are up and she's all business when it comes to working. There is nothing like watching a dog do what it was bred to do. She will be moving stock around the farm for years to come and I hope eventually giving me a puppy or two just like her and Max.

That isn't an exhaustive look into what has been going on this past year but it is a good look at what I've been up to on the farm. A lot of sweat,tears, and sore muscles but even more satisfaction. It isn't easy. It's not clean. There's no certainty to it. In fact it's quite an adventure, but I can say without a doubt the farm life is the life for me.

If you have an instagram and want an up to date look at what is going on follow HTSfarm.