Recovering the North Side of the Cow Barn

Overcast and humid. Not a fun day to work outside.

Sherry came to clean house today. She mentioned over lunch that she'd purchased some 6 foot t-posts at the Farm Store and they were $5.69 each. I was aghast at the price. I have plenty of t-posts that I bought from various sources fairly inexpensively and she needed several to re-fence part of her property - so I gave her 15. It hardly made a dent in the stack.

Chas and I moved the 250 lb protein block (actually a large round tub with molasses and soybean and other goodies that farmers use to supplement low quality hay) into the road pasture. We moved the tire I put the block in over to the other side of the road into the pasture so that we could work near the barn. We also put the 125 lb protein block in a metal wash tub and put that into the Dexter's stall. They'd been complaining that they didn't have access to a block for at least a week now.

After that we moved a rather large gate - about 16 feet long and very heavy- with the tractor and leaned it up against the east fence. And tied it into place so that it wouldn't fall on the cows with them rubbing against it.

Both of us worked really hard in the morning cleaning up the north side of the barn. We had put doors from the barn there intending on doing something useful with them. After we took away the doors we found lots of treasures including a tire, boards, metal pipes and steel channel. There is still a piece of funny-shaped metal under the stock tank. I'll get that out eventually when I scrub the stock tank.

Chas used the tractor to scoop dirt away from the barn. He used that dirt to fill in holes that the animals made around the protein block container and the hole where the horse used to roll. What he couldn't get I dug out using a shovel. That dirt got put into the bucket and spread.

In the afternoon Chas used the box scraper to level off the area by the barn. I think we still need to dig out the area around where I put the automatic waterer. We'll lower the gound level in front of the waterer and put in a layer of larger rocks and cover that with smaller rocks (gravel) so that the cows will have a firm but not mucky surface to stand on when they go to drink. I think we'll need to go down about 8 inches.

We'll need to pressure wash that side of the barn. It's all covered with mold and mildew and dirt.

As we went along we dumped quite a bit of trash over the electric fence including a tire, two long lengths of 1.5 inch pipe, a piece of metal conduit about 3.5 feet long, binding twine, boards, fence-posts and other stuff that had been piled up alongside the north side of the barn.

Ryan came about 12:30 to work. He and I did a lot of work today (even though I was already tired from my morning work). We cut additional horizontal space in the barn wall that we'd cut yesterday for the Dexters' round bale feeder so that we could get a 4 ft + bale through the wall and into the feeder. I do not know where my mind was; I certainly did not look at the bale to see just exactly how wide a wide round bale is.

Later I asked Chas to put a bale in the feeder. It was so easy, a piece of cake. I think Chas was not certain my idea would work. I really wanted it to be easy for him to feed when I went away for my San Diego trip.

The only thing I noticed was that we have to keep the sides of the feeder well away from the round bale otherwise the cows pull the grass through and waste it. About a foot on each side seems to work well enough. So, one of the things I did was to move the sides out. The sides were touching the round bale. We put the futon gate (funton backs that were welded together one on top of the other to make a gate) on the animal side of the barn and attached the feeder ends to the it.

As the animals eat the hay back I can simply move the wide ends closer together and tie the ends to the futon gate at the width I want. The gate stabilizes the feeder, keeps the animals out of the stall and keeps the round bale feeder ends at the the correct distance apart.

Ryan and I measured the Dexter lean-to addition. It's about 13.5 feet wide and 17 feet long. I want to turn that area into a fenced-in area, like a corral, so that I can separate babies from mommas for weaning and castrating. The sizes are so dang unusual. Not 12 feet long but wider by 1.5 feet more or less. Frustrating.

I had Ryan take 6 bales of hay from the cow barn and put it into the goat barn so that I could use it for feeding my goat barn critters.

After that Ryan and I disassembled the large duck pen made out of two 16 foot long stock panels and two 6 foot long end panels and put together five of Jim S's sheep panels which made a smaller pen for the ducks. I needed the panels and wasn't about to buy two new ones, not at over $42.00 each.

We put the 16 foot long panels over the goat fence (also made of stock panel). Tomorrow or next week we'll expand the size of the smaller sheep paddock by incorporating the two duck panels into the exterior fencing. The current configuration is set up so that I have two sheep paddocks. The second paddock is quite small but with the addition of the two stock panels, well, those two panels will definitely make the grazing area bigger. Plus, I'll be able to rotate the animals through two paddocks. Not ideal but better than one large paddock. Rotating the animals is important; it gives the grass a chance to recover.

Charles was in the road pasture grading the area we'd dug out this morning. He tried moving one of the former barn doors out to the burn pile but was having trouble keeping it on the tractor bucket. Ryan and I moved in to help load it onto the tractor and opened the gate so that Chas could put the door on the burn pile. It had rotted out which is the only reason we're getting rid of it.

Since we were in the paddock anyway Ryan and I picked up rocks from the north side of the cow barn. Ryan dumped them in the rock pile which is getting quite large now. We still have other rocks to pick up but the area looks quite a bit better - and there aren't so many stones to stumble over.

Ryan and I picked up all the trash Chas and I had pitched over the fence. The metal went to the scrap heap and the wood to the burn pile. We now have two large burn piles to light off when the county allows us to burn.

He and I picked up the gate I'd taken out of the Dexters' pen and laid by the tack room and put it on the ATV. I asked Ryan to put the gate on the south side of the goat barn. That way it's out of the way but still accessible if I need a gate.

By this time I was already dead tired. I'd worked physically hard most of the day. I paid Ryan for his time, gave him a Pepsi, and we sat and chatted for a few minutes before I sent him home.

When I did my chores and picked up the mail I also picked up some windfall apples for the pigs and MSB02 (second shorthorn bull calf). The calf is so funny, I'll cut a piece off the apple and hold it out to him. He sucks on that piece of apple for a couple of seconds before chewing it. This calf is mad for apple pieces. I cut up the apples for the pigs to make it easier for them to chew. It's fun watching them toss the piece of apple from one side of their mouths to the other in order to chew it. They sure know the scent of windfall apples. I took one perfect apple up to the house with the mail for later eating.

Dinner was salmon with tortellini and some of Sherry's pickled carrots. Yum. For dessert Chas prepared the strawberries which we ate with yogurt. Yum.