Water Woes

We keep missing our rainfall and the grass is parched and thirsty.  Today, we had a 65% chance of the wet stuff, but we came out on the short end of the stick and got 0 rainfall at all.  On the north side of our barn, I positioned some water troughs to catch rainwater running off of the barn roof.  Normally, these stay full.  Very rarely do we have to turn on the faucet at our water trough under the pecan tree because they drink out of these three water troughs.

The water troughs are empty.  The cows use this opportunity to push the empty troughs around in the pasture.  I have to stay on my toes and push them buck under the drip line in the event we would catch a surprise shower like we got last week when 0.4 of an inch fell.  They've already finished all the rainwater we caught during that shower.

But there are other water woes.  Nicky, the bull would like to tell you about one that has affected his pasture that we call, "The bullpen."  Lean in close and he'll tell you about it.

Speaking of Nicky, he's little Betsy's father.  He is full of muscle and he's mean.  If you get around him, he's snorting and kicking up dust and making threatening gestures at you with his big old head.  It's time to bring him to the butcher shop and fill our freezer with meat.

I'll get back on topic.  The water woe in the bull pen was noticed a couple of afternoons ago when I looked out and saw a geyser spraying up into the air from the water trough in the bull pen.  I walked out to see that the plastic float valve had broken.  The float valve is very important as it allows the trough to fill until the water level pushes against the float and turns the water off.  This keeps the water from overflowing the trough.  When the plastic piece broke, it allowed water to spray into the air and make a big mud hole around the water trough.  There's no telling how long the water was flowing.

Fortunately, I got a new float valve and installed it.  That process wasn't without adventure.  Fire ants had built a big mound right where I needed to undo the old one and install the new one.  Those fire ants tore me up!  I got it all installed and turned the water back on only to find a leak in the threads.  I was rushing so fast to avoid the ant bites, and I forgot to put the teflon tape around the threads.  I had to go back and do it again!  But this time, I got it right.  No leaks.  It will, however, take a while for the water to soak in to the ground.  It's not good for animal health to have mud holes like this as it is a vector for parasites, mosquitoes and other things that plague good animal health.

Rainfall Data - 2025

We always keep very detailed records about things at Our Maker's Acres Family Farm, partly because it's interesting, but perhaps moreso that we may be a little weird.  Take rainfall, for instance.  Rain is very important to everything we do.  Without rainfall, grass doesn't grow, vegetables don't grow, our entire ecosystem shuts down.  We thank the Good Lord for rain!  

In 2025, almost 66.5 inches fell.  That's 5 and a half feet of rain.  Just the top of my head would be sticking out if that all came on one day.

66.492 inches of rain is the highest total of rainfall since 2021 and is a couple of inches more than our 13 year average.  As you can see May is the month with the most rainfall, both in 2025 and for the 13 year average.  April of 2025 was the month with the least rainfall.  March is the month that is the driest month over the 13 year history

Finally, let's look at the daily log of rainfall.  It never rained on the 2nd, the 19th and the 20th of any month in 2025.  (Good days to have a picnic)  It rained the MOST on the 23rd of each month in 2025.  (Good day to sit inside and read a good book)

Just something fun we tally up and look at each year.  How much rain do you get in your neck of the woods?  Next, we'll be looking at yearly totals for egg production.  

After 50 days

 

After 50 days of no rain, on October 30th, finally the clouds opened and 3 inches fell.  It took a long time for any rainwater to show up in any puddles in the yard and pasture, but finally you could actually see water standing.  It didn't take long, though, and the ground soaked it all in.  

We had a drought last year, but it was during July - August and it was a lot hotter than it was during September - October of this year, so the effects of the dry spell didn't seem as pronounced this year.  The grass in the yard died in some spots, but that was about the extent of it.  We kept the garden alive by irrigating every single day.  Rainwater is SO much better than tap water, but if we didn't water, most of the garden would have died.  Our water bill over the last 50 days was double the cost of our normal bill, but that's okay, we'll enjoy fresh vegetables and that makes it all worth it.

I began walking around the house to check on the rain barrels that we have positioned along the drip lines in the back.  They were all filling up with water.  With a two inch rain, we maximize our rain-holding capacity at 700 gallons of water.  As I was checking out all the buckets and barrels, I made a grim discovery.  On the southwest corner of the house, we have a rain barrel that holds 70 gallons of water.  That's what we call the bee barrel, because the bees go there to drink water and bring it back to the hive.  As a result, we never pull water from that one for irrigation.  In fact, we don't go near it because there's so much activity around it from the honeybees.  As I got close to it, I saw a dead, bloated squirrel floating in the barrel.  I figured that during the drought, there wasn't much drinking water around.  The squirrel must have tried to get a drink and fell in the bee barrel and couldn't get out and drowned.  Rest in peace, Peanut, Jr.

We're hoping that since the temperatures are still in the 80's, that this rain will give a little boost to the grass in the pasture and give the animals some new, tender growth to eat on.  I walked out to the garden and was amazed!  The rain seemed to make the plants jump out of the ground overnight.  I could visibly see a difference in the growth.

It also softened the ground in the sweet potato patch which will make the ground conducive for the sweet potato harvest.  I'll be showing some updates of that annual process a little later this week.  I think we have a little more rain coming in the forecast.  That's a good thing.  We can further fill the water troughs for the cows and goats that are under the drip line of the barn.  If we fill those, that will hold us with rainwater for the winter.  

Thank you, Lord, for the refreshing rain!

Foul Weather Wednesday

We knew it was coming.  We expected it.  Last night we watched the weather report.  We like to make fun of how weather forecasters miss it, but they nailed this one.  We woke up at 6 AM and were having coffee when we checked the weather.  Fierce storms had just gone through Lake Charles heading east (toward us) with a massive front line with damaging straight line winds.  

We put down our coffee and got outside with the quickness.  I'll show you the bad news first.  It's not really bad, just unfortunate.  We were blessed.  We lost a medium-sized pecan tree in the pasture.  It blew across the fence that separates us and our neighbor to the east.

The pecan tree broke off a Chinese tallow tree on the fence line before going down.  This might look sad and unfortunate to you.  It is.  But what it really looks like is a lot of work!  We'll have to get this all cleaned up.

With that out of the way, let's rewind and I'll show you where Tricia and I hunkered down as the storm passed over.  It was IN the chicken tractor.  When we put our coffee down and got outside, our first thoughts went to our Cornish Cross meat birds.  They are two weeks old.  The chicken tractor is staked down, but rain water quickly saturates the ground.  If straightline winds are strong enough, it'll pull the stakes right out of the ground and flip the tractor over.  

In the midst of the thunder, lightning, rain and winds, this is where we were:

The tractor had a tarp over it and we were inside, trying to hold it down while the wind tried to pick it up.  It turned it sideways and several times, I thought we were toast.  We were praying and I had a fleeting thought that if someone's roof comes off to the west of us, we will wake up in heaven.  

The birds (and us) were soaking wet.  They were shaking and had their eyes closed and had hypothermia.  We've got to get them warmed up but there was one big problem.  The electricity, we could see, was out in the house.  We loaded them in buckets and set up the brooder in the garage.  Tricia began to try to warm them up by drying them off with an old t shirt.

I got our solar generator out.  Fortunately it was 100% charged.  We plugged in both heat lamps and the beleaguered birds began to rally.

The power stayed out for about six hours, but the solar generator did a wonderful job and we didn't lose a single bird out of the 32 in total.  What a lifesaver!

In no time at all the birds destroyed the garage, pooping all over the place.  I had to bleach the garage to clean up the area in the afternoon.

Somewhere around 3 PM the lights came back on.  Hooray!  Not only that, but the skies turned blue and the sun came out.  What a change!  A neighbor came by and said the winds had been clocked at 80 MPH.  He laughed when I told him we rode out the storm with the chicks.

We moved them back into the chicken tractor once we were pretty sure that the storm had passed over.  I think they enjoy being back out on grass.  We count in a blessing that we didn't lose any birds.

In what started out to be a day on which the weather was foul, we counted our blessings, because everything turned out alright.

Rainfall Totals - 2023

It's been quite a battle for the past few days and hence my "radio silence."  I developed a bad toothache.  It's the canine tooth on the front right side.  My face is swollen and am experiencing throbbing pain and although I'm taking antibiotics every 12 hours, there's no knocking this thing down.  The dentist can see me tomorrow morning at 10:15.  I am counting the hours...  But I see the light at the end of the tunnel.  We'll try our best to power through this thing.

Let's change the subject and talk about rainfall for the previous year.  We keep detailed records by day and month, showing totals.  Here is the chart for 2023:

This was quite a shocking year for us, with only 45.63 inches of total rainfall!  August, in addition to being swelteringly hot, was desert-like dry.  We recorded 0.0 inches of precipitation in August.  The biggest rainfall we got was back in January, when we gladly accepted 8.9 inches.  In a weird thing we always record, you'll see that it NEVER rained on the 18th or the 19th day of any month in 2023.

Below is a summary, by month, showing rainfall.  The year was extraordinarily dry resulting in grass that did not grow, animals in poor condition and garden yields down.

The table below shows the trendline, based on a compilation of 11 years of data collected on Our Maker's Acres Family Farm.  The record annual rainfall in that period was 2017, when we received 79.9 inches.  The low annual rainfall record was set this year, with only 45.36 inches.  The 11 year average rainfall was 64.03 inches.  This means this year we were about 19 inches below the average.  Yep, a dry year.

We already talked about the driest and wettest months of 2023.  For a 11 year average, however, the wettest month has been May and the driest month has been March.  Just some interesting, albeit nerdy stuff we track.  We pray that the rainfall returns back into the normal range for 2024.

Casualties of the Drought

It rained two inches in October.  None so far in November, although my weather forecast this evening shows a 48% chance of the wet stuff on Friday and a 79% chance on Saturday!  We are praying that we get it.  For years we have sequestered rain water by placing barrels, buckets and water troughs under the drip line of the house and the barn.  Not counting the barn, I think I calculated at one time that I can catch 400 gallons of rainwater with a 1 inch rain.  

We use that rainwater for watering the plants, the chickens, and the cows and goats.  It helps minimize the water bill - when it rains!  Yesterday morning I walked out to bring a 5 gallon bucket full of rainwater to the hens in the chicken tractor.  When I dipped the bucket in the rain barrel, something surprised me.  There was a big dead rat in the barrel that had drowned.  

Upon closer inspection, it was a squirrel.  The poor squirrel had no doubt tried to drink from the barrel and fell in.  Squirrels aren't good swimmers and he succumbed.  With the drought, water isn't as easy to find.  All the water in the ditches has long since evaporated.  We are overrun with squirrels.  They eat all the acorns and pecans and they are plentiful and fat.  I was just thinking that I was going to kill a mess of them and make a good squirrel gravy. 

And then this morning I was greeted with this sight in the water trough that catches rain off of the barn: (Can you see something at about the 4 o'clock position?)

Another drowned squirrel!  But that's not all.  Tricia had pulled another drowned squirrel out yesterday!

There are more shallow water troughs than this one.  I don't know why they are going to that one to try to drink from.  Three doesn't really put a dent into the squirrel population, but I'd rather not see them die and go to waste.  Hopefully we get the rain forecast for this weekend and fill the ditches and holes in the woods with water, thus making available safer places for them to find water.

Becoming Drought Resistant

In normal times, this simple blog contains the ramblings of a simple guy that likes the agrarian life and simpler times. I am partial to old fashioned values and a Biblical worldview.  Sometimes, we depart from that theme, but not often.  

Before Benjamin's accident, we were in the middle of a long drought.  What made it worse is that it was during the peak summer months where temperatures exceed 100 degrees for days on end.  To give you an illustration of exactly how dry it is, I'll share some numbers with you.  We have a rain gauge that we watch and tally the numbers.  Yes, it's kind of nerdy but we've done that for a while.  In fact we have 10 years of rainfall data.  Our ten year average annual rainfall is 65.89 inches.  I added up the numbers through September and for 2023 we've had 32 inches of rain.  Granted, we have 3 months left in the year, but October and November traditionally are two of the driest months.  We have 10 years of data to back that up.  We're almost 3 feet short of rainfall.  That's hard to imagine.

I've been looking up different techniques of drilling my own water well in the back yard, just to perhaps be self-sufficient in terms of water for the animals and for irrigation.  We do have about 500 gallons of rainfall catchment capacity coming off of our roof, but in order to sequester rainwater, you've got to have rain.  The drought has made me think of water more than I normally do.  Water is usually so prevalent in south Louisiana.  In hindsight, when building our house, I wish that I had sunk concrete cisterns and piped all of the greywater into them to use for irrigation of the garden and fruit trees.

The other day, we made a short trip to our church to water the landscaping.  In the spring we had put in some new plants and we have tried to water three times a week to keep the plants alive.  Here is a photo of the grass in the church yard.  It's dead, brown, crispy when you walk on it.  Normally it's lush and green.

Our little country church has parking on both sides.  On one side, we call it the 'country side,' because it's just grass with a limestone base.  On the side closest to the main road, we call it the 'city side,' because it has a concrete parking lot.  We parked our vehicle on the city side and walked around the corner to begin watering the box woods and knockout roses.

And then I looked down at the concrete.  This concrete bakes in the summer sun.  And yet, there's weeds growing through small cracks in the surface!  How can this be?  If this was something good like a vegetable plant, it would have withered up and died a long time ago.  But these weeds are as healthy and lush as ever.  

The weeds aren't stressed.  They aren't brown.  They are thriving.

Okay, I know I'm being overly dramatic.  I'm bad about that sometimes, but this blog is a therapeutic thing - a journal of sorts.  How does one become drought resistant?  What lessons can we learn from the weeds thriving in cracks on the city side of the parking lot in the middle of a drought?

First is determination.  These weeds have an absolute will to live.  Their prognosis is not good.  Even in times of rainfall and good conditions, they don't stand much of a chance of survival.  The odds are stacked against them.  They don't listen to all that.  They just survive.  

The next is some wisdom I learned from an old-timer I was talking to the other day.  He told me, "Kyle, even though it it dry, try not to water your garden too much.  Give it just enough to keep it alive.  You see, if you water too much, the plant's root system will be shallow and when the rainfall stops, they suffer.  But, if there's not a lot of water, it forces the plant's root system to grow down deep to get to the water."  That's what these weeds in the parking lot have done.  Their root system has grown down through the four inches of concrete and deep into the soil below where it finds water to keep it nourished - even in the midst of a drought.

Sometimes we miss it, but if we slow down, there is knowledge we can learn most anywhere we look.  We can learn a lot from the bahia grass growing in the cracks of the city side of the parking lot at Cornerstone Baptist Church in Jennings.  There's some great spiritual principles there as well.  Be determined.  Even in tough times, when things aren't going your way, persevere.  In times of adversity or even persecution, stand fast in your faith.  Grow your roots deep in God's Word and be nourished on his daily provision.  Drink the Living Water and never thirst again.  But the Good Book says best:

7 Blessed is the man that trusteth in the LORD, and whose hope the LORD is.  8 For he shall be as a tree planted by the waters, and that spreadeth out her roots by the river, and shall not see when heat cometh, but her leaf shall be green; and shall not be careful in the year of drought, neither shall cease from yielding fruit.  Jeremiah 17:7-8

That's how you become drought resistant in a dry and thirsty land.

 

Farewell to August

We're wrapping up August with a bow and saying so long.  What a long, hot, dry 31 days?!  We're glad to be putting this one in our rear view mirror.  My son, Russ, was over visiting today and when we passed by the rain gauge mounted on a post in the garden, he remarked, "That's a lonely rain gauge, right there!"  He's right!  It has seed not precipitation in a very long time.

How long, you ask?  Well, let's look at the matrix that we chart daily rainfall.  It has been 47 days since we've had over an inch of rain.  We've had NO rain in the last 41 days.

We have 10 years of detailed rainfall records.  Normally, in a year we average 65.9 inches of rain.  Through August, we have usually had 49.14 inches of rain.  This year we are only at 29.8 inches.  That's about 20 inches short!  Normally, in August we get 9.08 inches of rain.  This year 0.0 inches.  The grass and landscaping is dying.  

The grass looks like it normally does after a heavy frost.  We turned the water sprinkler on and the grass greened up under the oak trees.  Today, we put the electric fence up and let the cows eat the new growth.  They were happy.

There is good news, however.  As I look at the forecast, we have a 37% chance of rain on Sunday, a 53% chance on Saturday, and a 55% chance of rain on Monday.  Those are the best chances we've seen in over a month.

The other good news is this.  LuLu and little Nicky are doing well.  I have had the water sprinkler going in her pasture.  The grass is green and growing.  That's helped her.  She is not back to normal.  The heat has her stressed and I spray her with water daily to cool her down.  But she is getting better.  We thought we might lose her for a while.  Nicky is growing and he kicks his legs in the air and runs around the pasture with energy!

We welcome September.  A month that promises better chances of rain and hopefully cooler temps.

What's the Dill?

September is drawing to an end.  This morning at church in Sunday School we finished up our 13 week study of Jeremiah and Lamentations.  It was a heart-breaking study.  Jeremiah was called the "weeping prophet" because he told the people of Judah a sad story of judgment that was coming.  They had walked away from the one true Living God and were serving false gods.  The prophet pleaded with them, but they would not listen.  

God chastens those who He loves.  There was famine and pestilence across the land.  Jerusalem fell and the people were taken away in exile.  As bad as things had gotten, the study ended with hope, however, that God is a God who is faithful even when His people are not.  His mercies are new every morning.  We fall and miss the mark, but He calls us back.

We know nothing of the suffering like the people of Judah faced, but I'll tell ya, this summer has been trying, for sure.  Paul Harvey, in 1978 said, "Despite all our accomplishments, we owe our existence to 6 inches of topsoil and the fact that it rains."  Except this summer it hasn't rained.  Today it was 106 degrees.  We will get through this, but the plants, animals and humans plead for rain.  We look back longingly to the spring.  Daily we ate crisp cucumber salad with blueberries and fresh dill.  So refreshing and healthy!  The dill has long since died, dried and gone to seed.

I gently pulled the seed heads off of the remnants of the dill flowers.  Some seeds had already shattered and will likely volunteer next spring in the herb garden.  

In the event they don't, I wanted to ensure that I had a good amount of dill seed to grow for next spring.

If the Good Lord wills, cooler days will once again come.  I'll save these seeds for the time when it is right for planting early next spring.  In the meantime, we'll continue to pray for rain.  It's time to be planting the fall garden, but it would be futile to plant anything right now.

Hot & Dry

Summer is always hot, but this summer we're hot AND dry.  Below I've taken a photo of the log that I track daily rainfall.  Tomorrow it will have been a month since it rained.  Everyday high temperatures have exceeded 100 and with no rainfall, well, it's getting serious.  We normally average almost 9 inches of rain in August.  We are at a serious deficit.

The grass is dying and the dirt is now dust.  Apparently there is a high pressure system sitting over the south that won't let up.  Normal afternoon thunderstorms are non-existent.  We have been praying for rain for weeks.  The forecast has not looked promising.

The cows and goats have eaten all of the remaining grass down to the ground.  We're supplementing with hay.  That hay is normally reserved for the fall, however.  Never had we begun haying the cows this early.  Now that I've gotten the chainsaw blade sharpened, I've been lopping off live oak branches that need pruning and tossing them over the fence for the animals to eat on.

Not only is the drought concerning for the pasture that the cows, goats, and chickens depend upon, but it is delaying getting the fall garden in.  We normally have fall Irish Potatoes planted by now as well as getting the cole crops planted by seed.  I haven't even begun any of that.  Afternoons are spent watering sweet potatoes, peppers, okra, butterbeans, etc. that are struggling in the garden.  Five of our Seven pumpkin plants waved a white flag and withered into the dust.

We'll continue to pray for showers of blessing that will bring a refreshing to the land.

Not Enough Sense to Come in Out of the Rain

Saturday morning it rained.  It wasn't a torrential downpour.  It was more like a slow, soothing, soaking rain.  It rolled in from the west and deposited 6/10ths of an inch of rain.  Before it started coming down in buckets, I walked out to the barn to put the goats inside.  There was an old saying people used to say about people who weren't too sharp.  They'd say, "Ol Kyle, he ain't got sense enough to come in outta the rain."  Sometimes they're right.  Conversely, the animals RUN to the barn to get under the protection of the tin roof of the barn.  Cows, goats, and chickens alike skeedaddle to stay dry.

I have two videos to show you today.  I got stranded out at the barn while the spring showers passed over.  I wasn't in a big rush so I sat out and took in the sight and sounds of a nice spring rain.  Here is the first one.  This is looking southward toward the little piece of woods that borders the sound end of our property.  I have my egg collecting baskets hanging from the rafters of the main barn.  The hen house is the structure you'll see close to the woods.  That's why we catch so many possums in our traps and snakes in the nesting boxes.  I need to get out my sling blade and clean up the encroaching wilderness!

I ran around to the north side of the barn and sought refuge with the cows.  You can see the two big water troughs that fill with rainwater running off the roof.  You can also see (curiously enough) a badminton racquet hanging from the rafters on this side.  It is a nifty tool I use to kill carpenter bees that like to drill holes in the 2x4s that support the tin roof. The video also shows Rosie, LuLu and Elsie high and dry.  

The best part of the video is the sound effects.  If you turn up your volume, you can hear the relaxing sound of rain falling on a tin roof along with the added bonus of hearing the thunder roll.  If you're not careful, you'll fall asleep!  Around these parts, many people grew up on a wood frame house on piers with a tin roof.  We had a camp in Oberlin at the farm just like that.  I tell you, there's nothing quite like the sound of rainfall on a tin roof.  Someone, (my brother-in-law, maybe?) told me one time the story of a lady who got married and moved into a brick home with a composite shingle roof.  She missed the sound of rainfall on the tin roof so bad, she made her husband lead a sheet of tin against the side of their house so when it rained, she could hear those soothing, nostalgic sounds!

As I stood there listening  to the rain, I couldn't make it back to the house without getting soaked, so I began to think of songs about the rain.  Here's my list:

Elvis    Kentucky Rain

Ronnie Milsap    Smokey Mountain Rain

Keith Whitley    I'm no stranger to the Rain

Conway Twitty    Rainy Night in Georgia

BJ Thomas    Rain Drops Keep Fallin' on my Head (Butch Cassidy & the Sundance Kid

Albert Hammond    It Never Rains in Southern California

Boy, those songs sure bring back some memories!  Do you have some favorite songs about rain?

2022 Rainfall - By The Numbers

Well, I normally have this post up early in January.  Either more is going on to distract me, or I am slowing down.  Regardless, here's the information that I tallied tonight.  Rainfall, it's an important thing when you are growing a garden or growing grass for your cows, goats, and chickens.  2022 started out to be a normal year, but by April, May, and especially June, we knew that we were in for a dry year.

As it turns out, 2022 ended up being the driest year on record since we started tracking rainfall in 2013.  We now have a full 10 years of data to compare, and I always find it interesting to look at.  First, we established that 2022 was the driest - a full 1.4 inches less than back in 2014.  Over the ten year period, we average 65.89 inches each year.  We were a full 9.15 inches less than the 10 year average.  In ten years we've had 55 FEET of rainfall!

May was our wettest month and June was our driest month in 2022.  May is our wettest month for the ten year period, but June being so dry was an oddity.  Normally, March is our driest.

For an interesting statistic, if we were planning picnics during 2022, it would seem that the 16th of the month was a good day to picnic.  It never rained on the 16th during any month of the year in 2022.  So far for 2023 we are having an above normal January and February as far as rainfall goes.  We'll see how the rest of the year goes and report back in 11 months.

The Turkey That Keeps On Giving

The day after Thanksgiving the skies opened up and it began to rain.  A slow, soaking rain that nourished the landscape.  In true feast or famine experiences, rain either refuses to fall (this summer) or comes down in refreshing abundance.  We had plenty of leftovers.  There was not much to do outside.  The options were slim.  So we stayed inside and ate.

Around the back of the house, I have water catchment that enables us to catch over 400 gallons of water with a 1 inch rain.  All of our rainwater reservoirs were overflowing.  You can see one below.  Our cup runneth over.

Look at this big ol' turkey wishbone.  I'm not a superstitious person.  I remember as a kid, we would each grab one side of the wishbone and pull until it broke.  If I recall correctly, the person holding the biggest piece of the wishbone was supposed to be able to make a wish and it would come true.  

One thing I was wishing for is to turn the carcasses of the fried turkey, the baked turkey, and the smoked specklebelly goose into stock.  My wife wasn't nearly as enthusiastic about that venture as it makes a big mess in the kitchen.  The results, however, are well worth it, in my opinion.  We make lots of broth and stock, primarily out of our grassfed beef and chickens.

It's a little different with store-bought fowl as you really don't know what's in the bird.  It's surely not near as healthy for you as the animals that come off your land.  At least the specklebelly goose was wild and we could be sure there was no antibiotics in him.  Stock and broth is really good for you.  It's loaded with nutrients, minerals, protein, amino acids.  It's got collagen which is good for your connective tissue.  Broth and stock is a big booster of your immune system, giving you power to fight off sickness!

So I pulled out the big pot and put the carcasses into the pot with some celery, onions, carrots and herbs.  I added water and got it boiling and then turned it down to low and let it cook for hours and hours.  The next day I heated it up again and then let it come to a luke warm temperature.  I poured through a sieve and captured 12 cups of turkey/goose stock!

We froze it in quart-sized ziploc bags.  We'll use it as a base for soups in this winter season.  I like to use it in place of water when cooking rice.  There were a couple more beneficiaries of the stock-making enterprise other than our family.  I completely picked all the remaining meat and fat from what was left of the carcasses, making sure no bones remained.  This was placed in a big bowl.  Belle, our Great Pyrenees, and Ginger, our cat, will get to enjoy Thanksgiving leftovers for a few more days than their humans.  They like it a lot better than their normal diets.  

Though making broth or stock can be a messy ordeal, resulting in a lot of dishes and countertops to clean, the dividends are great!

A Dry September

 17 Now Elijah the Tishbite, who was of the settlers of Gilead, said to Ahab, “As the Lord, the God of Israel lives, before whom I stand, there shall certainly be neither dew nor rain during these years, except by my word.”  1 Kings 17:1

The prophet Elijah shut off the rain for three years.  That must have been just terrible!  It was a very dry June.  It rained a decent amount in July and August, but now, it hasn't rained in a month.  I haven't looked at the rainfall data to see the trend on our little homestead, but I heard on the radio that we are 20 inches behind the average YTD rainfall totals.  That is a significant shortfall.

The fact that we keep a four inch layer of wood chips over the garden soil retains soil moisture.  In fact, we seldom have to do any irrigation at all.  But lately, without significant rainfall, I determined that if we wanted to have crops, I'd better water 'em.  I found the old oscillating water sprinkler that I hadn't used in over a year and hooked it up to the hose.  Well, it no longer worked.  It was pitiful watching it.

I went to the hardware store and picked up a new one.  It cost right at $20 and gave me sticker shock for a bit.  Walking by the clearance bin, I looked briefly at a sprinkler for $5.  I picked it up and came real close to bringing the $20 one back to the shelf.  Then I looked at the square footage of coverage for each.  The more expensive one would irrigate more land with less labor and time expended moving it around.  I purchased the $20 sprinkler and I'm glad I did.  I set it and forget it, and it waters 1/3 of the garden before I have to move it.

I have a big plot of sweet potatoes that are just about a week or two away from harvest.  I want them to grow to the fullest extent and have the soil slightly moist and pliable for harvest time.  Right behind that I have a couple rows of snap beans.  They are full of blooms and little pods.  Good watering will boost the harvest.  We always really enjoy fresh picked green beans wrapped in bacon for our Thanksgiving feast.

But the most important thing is to irrigate the rows of newly planted seeds that I need to keep watered so the seeds germinate and the little seedlings don't wither in the sun.  I have two rows of cabbage, 1 row of cauliflower, two rows of broccoli, two rows of beets, a half row of Swiss chard and two and a half rows of tomatoes.  Watering those things is crucial at this time until they get established, so I'll do it at least every other day until we have a soaking rain.  The 10 day forecast shows none.

In looking at the fall planting calendar, I still must plant (in this order): bok choy, lettuce, kohlrabi, radishes, carrots, mustard greens, turnips, and spinach.  I'll be planting several varieties of lettuce, carrots and spinach.  The sweet potatoes must be harvested first to make room for those items, though.

The Long(horn) Walk

After a VERY dry June, July and August got us back into the normal rainfall we get during those months.  I think we're still behind in rainfall year over year, but we have been catching up this week with rainfall every single day.  As I may have told you, Tricia and I embarked on a lifestyle change where we try to get out in the late afternoon and walk briskly to get our heart rates up.  

We use a step counter and our goal is 7,500 steps each day.  I try to beat that, though, and want to get the average up to 10,000 steps each day.  We normally walk around the perimeter fence in our pasture.  One lap is 700 steps.  With all the rain, walking in the pasture is an impossibility unless you wear rubber boots.  That's not conducive to walking!

So we've altered our routine and we walk down our country road.  It is paved for a good ways.  We take Belle, our Great Pyrenees with us.  She enjoys the walk and sets the pace.

Even though it is a country road, people drive too doggone fast!  We get off on the shoulder and let them pass.  About a half mile down the road is an interesting sight - at least for around here.  A farmer has a small herd of Longhorn cattle.  They are always right by the fence to greet us.  The big pink cumulus cloud in the background makes a nice shot.

The longhorn cattle look at us curiously as we walk by.  I always wonder how you work those cows in a chute.  It seems like their horns would not fit in a normal squeeze chute to work them or load them.  I guess there's another way to do it.

Looking at those cows remind me of watching The Dukes of Hazzard in my childhood.  Those horns on those cows look just like the ones mounted on Boss Hogg's 1970 Cadillac DeVille.  Just the good ol boys, never meanin' no harm...  Time to stop singing and get on home.  There's a big storm cloud brewing in the north.

And We Prayed for Rain

And Elijah the Tishbite, who was of the inhabitants of Gilead, said unto Ahab, As the Lord God of Israel liveth, before whom I stand, there shall not be dew nor rain these years, but according to my word.    1 Kings 17:1

And it came to pass after many days, that the word of the Lord came to Elijah in the third year, saying, Go, shew thyself unto Ahab; and I will send rain upon the earth.    1 Kings 18:1

Three years without rain!!  That is one heckuva drought!  Our lack of rainfall hasn't gone on for three years, but it has been very dry.  We have been praying for rain every single day.  I even saw this guy out by the garden praying (for rain, I assume?), too.

Rain is so important and unfortunately, we often take it for granted.  Our garden needs it... badly.  Watering with a water hose isn't as good as good old rainfall.  Then there's our pasture.  The grass out in the pasture is parched.  With no rainfall, there's no new growth.  The cows and goats and chickens have eaten it down to the ground.  This is not good.  When they eat it that close to the ground, they pick up parasites.  The only bright spot is that I haven't had to mow the yard a single time during the month of June.  Grass in certain spots in the yard is dying.  Landscaping and small shrubs that we can't get water to are starting to die.

For the past 10 years, I've tracked rainfall at Our Maker's Acres Family Farm.  Check it out:

So from January - June 2021 it rained 40.4 inches.

Average rainfall from January - June 2013-2021 is 36.63 inches.

Look at what it's rained so far this year:

For the period January - June 2022, it has only rained 17.675 inches.  The weatherman says that around here if you aren't getting an inch of rain a week, you are falling behind.  We certainly are!

If you look at the first two days in July in the above tracking chart, you'll see that it rained both days!  The cows are out eating fresh green grass that has grown.  I even mowed today.  I checked the weather forecast and it shows decent chances of more rain for the next four days.  Maybe the weather pattern has loosened up!  We certainly pray that the drought is over.

Son of a Gun, We're Gonna Have Big Fun on the Bayou...

On Tuesday we had some mean thunderstorms blow through.  Strong wind.  Torrential rain.  Thunder and Lightning.  After a rain, I like to do what I've done since I was a kid - walk around and observe the changes.  You can smell the ozone in the air.  The grass seems greener.  You can hear the frogs croaking.  The rainwater is rushing through the ditch.

Our live oak trees are casting off the old growth leaves and are replacing with new growth and tassels.  The leaves were blocking the ditch, holding back lots of water.  I had my rubber boots on, so I started on the easternmost side of the property and proceeded to kick the leaves out of the ditch.  This relieved the back pressure and the one and a half inches of rainfall began to evacuate the property.

As I looked down, I spotted a pair.  The one on the left is a male crawfish and the one on the right is a female.  They were not happy to see me.

I picked them both up to observe them.  The old-timers always say that the thunder and lightning get the crawfish out of their burrows in the ground and bring them to the surface.  They're right!

When I picked up the female, I realized she was full of babies.  Her little ones stay secured under her tail.

Here's a little closer look.  There are dozens and dozens tucked beneath her tail.  She was very protective of her babies and was itching to pinch me, but I wasn't going to allow that to happen.  I set her back down in the ditch so that she could raise her babies.

Sure does make me hungry for some boiled crawfish with potatoes and corn.  Now that the price has dropped off a little, we'll have to go get some platters.  C'est bon!