These 2 girls don't look much bigger than they did when they were born- which is usually nothing but skin and bones! So, I brought 'em in and tried feeding them with an eye dropper, by golly the one little girl looked like she wanted to suck so I decided to try the beer bottle and "lamb" nipple I use on the goats and wouldn't you know, that pig took to it like a fish to water! Dumb luck? I don't so. #2 girl took to it like a fish to water too and so now I am bottle supplementing all the ones who are looking a little less plump than some of the others and no one seems to have an issue taking the bottle at all! I think it has to be in the nipple! What's funny? I can't even get the goat kids to take it as easy as these pigs!!
They need to be fed often when they are this young and for that reason, I am leaving them with the sow for the most part. They seem to take to her just fine too but boy when they see me, I think they know the real chow wagon has arrived! I'm not real sure how this will all play out. My hope is that I can train them to a pan fairly soon. By the time they are about 10 days old they start to nibble on regular hog feed so it shouldn't be much time at all before I can start getting them milk through alternative means other than a bottle. I would imagine if a momma sow wasn't available, it would be a very time consuming proposition! They're getting goat's milk, by the way. Goat's milk is a well known universal supplement for so many animals because it's so easy to digest - cows (some dairies will even give their replacement heifer calves goat's milk instead of cow's milk as a preventative of disease transferable through milk or as a means of keeping their cow's milk for sale...seems almost silly but that's entirely another thing), puppies, kittens, foals, crias (baby alpaca), piglets, etc.
Pigs really are funny things. So smart and really very friendly once they know who to take a liking to. I'll tell you the same thing I tell the kids, "Don't get attached!" Everything has a purpose and her purpose is to make bacon.
The weather has been super nice up until this morning. I think it was 72 on Tuesday (!) and yesterday I had clothes hanging on the line. Last night wind picked up, the temp dropped this morning and about 7:45 when I went out to do chores, it was hailing and windy as all get out. The hail turned to snow shortly thereafter and now it appears it's all blown through and today's high is supposed to reach 51. Go figure!
I think the building construction class is about done with our milk barn. I thought it was supposed to be done by now as today marks the end of the 2nd trimester. I don't know what else is left to do seeing as how we're putting on the rood and side walls and pretty much the only thing they were to do is floor and framing and rafters/roof joists. They didn't want to do the metal siding and rooding which is fine, that goes up quick enough.
This last trimester another class is making our bee hives. I need to go in and speak to the instructor about what I want and give him some blueprints. Our bee colonies are reserved and will be ready for pick up come late April I think.
One of the does was bred earlier than I figured she was, as in, I had no idea! We had a couple buck escapes at different times which I wrote down and there have been no surprises as of late...except this doe. We have some round bales of hay out in the pasture the girls free eat off of and Tuesday when I went out mid-day to water the sow here she came walking up with 2 kids in tow - a boy and a girl. We're up to 7 kids now (4 boys & 3 girls) and one of the buck kids has gone on to his new home already.
Goat prices are up at the sale barn. I am not sure if it's because of the time of year (ethnic buyers) or because beef is scarce and more expensive (doubt it) or an influx of local ethnic groups (???) but anyway, we made quite a good price off of the whethers we took on Sat. It's not my favorite thing to do and we try to avoid taking animals there but it is what it is.
We ran out of wood, ran clean out, last week...when the temps were in the teens during the day! Not a stick left. That's a little frightening when propane is sky high ($3.64 locally a gallon and reports of up to $5.15 a little father up north). We paid $1.64 I believe last Oct. when we filled up. Granted, that was last Oct. and well before these polar vortexes and cold storms dumping lots of snow everywhere but sheesh, if that don't make you want to go out and find some wood, I don't know what will!
After some unusually above average temps at the end of last week, the snow as pretty much gone by Saturday. Last spring when we rented a dumpster to clear some brush from the front of the property we separated good burnable wood from junk brush. We barely made a dent in what's all out there but the burnable limbs sure came in handy! We loaded them into the truck, backed up to the garage and had a field day cutting up the 4-6" limbs with the miter saw. That miter saw is the way to go for quick firewood cuttin', I tell you what.
Additionally, Jeremiah is yet again modifying the log splitter. Nevermind I have been asking all along why we have to have a cylinder wedge driven splitter. It seems so dang slow! One night he was "You Tubing" log splitters and saw one with a cylinder driven plate that drove the log against a splitter shaped like a all-in-one pie slicer. That's the way to go! Split all your slices all at one instead of one at a time! Some day we'll have something that saves us time!
This winter has seemed long, but then, they all do. I am sure we're still a ways off from spring but the warm temps every now and again are a nice reprieve. The weekend after next we're supposed to be plunged into cold again just in time for March to come in like a lion.
I suppose it's better than a perpetual beach day, more interesting anyway =). Have a great day.
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