Daylight to Dusk

On weekends, you may recall, we slow it down a bit and get out to the barn for milking and feeding the animals a little later than on weekdays where we start promptly at 5 am.  Animals are truly creatures of habit and they crow and moo to let you know that you're tardy and they're impatiently waiting on their people.  Doggonit, they can mess up a leisurely weekend pace of enjoying a cup of coffee.

When you get to the gate, the chickens are there to urge you along so you can throw some rice for them to eat.


Throw me something, Mister!

 We walk out to the barn from here and with all the rains we've had lately, the ground in the barnyard is so muddy, especially right in front of the barn where the cows and the cows' people must walk.  The cows aren't particularly excited about walking through ankle deep mud and neither are Tricia and I.  The ground is so saturated that it is going to take a number of warm, sunny days to dry it up.  Last I saw, we were 19 inches over the average YTD rainfall.  I'll have to put it on my list to haul some dirt to fill in this mudhole and also look into putting some gutters on the south-side of the barn to direct the rainwater into a big water trough.


A muddy mess

I'd like to get in the garden and work up some land to plant the fall crops, but as you can see below, its going to take a while for that to happen. 


Water standing in the rows where I need to plant the fall crop

I know it looks like a jungle, but it's sweet potatoes and they're taking over the garden.  In about a month we will dig all the sweet potatoes up.  Nothing goes to waste, either.  The cows absolutely love to eat the sweet potatoes that are too small for us to eat or those we've cut in half when digging them up.  Then they also really like to eat all the vines and leaves.


In fact, here's a shot of a huge sweet potato that is partially exposed. 


I yam what I yam.

A few sweet potato facts:

• Indians were growing sweet potatoes when Columbus arrived in 1492.
• George Washington was a sweet potato farmer before becoming President of the United States.
• As a sweet potato growing state, Louisiana is second to only North Carolina.
• In 1987, LSU Agricultural Experiment Station developed the Beauregard variety of sweet potato.  This variety is the State's largest vegetable enterprise in the state and contributes more than $151 million to the state's economy. 

As I was looking at the sweet potatoes to try to determine when they'll be ready to harvest, the honeybees were hard at work amidst the flowering basil plants that the sweet potato vines have overtaken.  The basil smells so good.  I wanted to get a shot of the pollen sacs on the hind legs of the bees that were full, but I just couldn't as they were moving too fast.  The bees collect the pollen from flowers on tiny hairs on their legs and they carry this back to the hive.  While buzzing from flower to flower, some of this pollen falls off and pollinates other plants.


Honeybees on flowering basil

As it was getting dark, I walked out to the chicken tractors where most of them roost each night.  Magnolia and the hens must have been having a gossip session before bedtime.

Bedtime stories

Here is a view inside the chicken tractor.  You can see that it has no bottom.  What you can't see from this photo is that there are wheels on it.  You can see the chickens roosting on the roosting boards on the tractor and consequently poop on the grass underneath them.  Each day we push the tractor one length.  This distributes the fertilizer evenly on the pasture.  If we left it in one place, the poop would kill the grass.  We don't want that.  We are in the business of growing grass.
Farming Math:  Grass + Sun + Rain + Animal Fertilizer = Milk & Meat 



The chickens' crib

Here's a close up shot of the hens all tucked in for the night.



Appropriately named chicken wire

And finally, the end of the day.  We usually milk at 5 am and 6 pm, but we aren't always as routine as we should be.  Sometimes you have to be flexible.  I like this picture as it kind of illustrates the feeling you get at the end of the day when you get a reprieve from the heat of the day, the hard work has been done, and it's time to relax and recharge.  I also like the way the weather vane is silhouetted against the darkening, but starlit sky, the barn light is glowing warmly and the rooster that roosts in the barn is keeping a watchful eye on his hens.  All is well.


Good night, John Boy, Good night, Mary Ellen, Good night Daddy, Good night, Jim Bob, Good night, EVERYBODY!