Damn, @Popped Cherries sorry to hear that. I know too well the feeling of going out to a massacre like that. Even though my birds aren't "pets" like they are for a lot of people, they're in my care, and it sucks.
I guess it's a bad day for everyone, today: One (or more) of our dogs killed one of our geese, an egg-laying female. Jungle Julia is beyond pissed. Popped Cherries, were there any kind of marks on the chickens?
@walt Yeah, I was at work and my fiance went out to do their morning routine of water and worms before they go outside for the day. She got to the door and looked in but thought they were just having their dust baths until no one moved and she freaked out. They were definitely more pets to us. Everyone had a name and they all had their own little personality quirks and we loved just sitting in the back yard and watching them do all the funny things chickens do. We'll probably get a new flock in the spring time and in the time between I'm going to build a secure roost inside the coop just to be REALLY safe and I'll probably make some adjustments to the hardware cloth around the rest. I'm thinking of running it under the horse stall mats on the floor right up the walls so even if something happens to break in through a crack in the corners, nothing can actually make it inside. @dixiebandit69 They were pretty torn up. Two were decapitated, a bunch were missing a lot of the feathers around their necks, a few had some blood around their faces. Sadly, they were very passive hens and were very sweet, loved to cuddle with us and follow us around so it looks like the weasel just cornered most of them and killed them. They tried to break out of the coop into the run, but couldn't push the flap open. A couple tried to hide behind the feeder and under the nesting boxes, but it didn't matter. It was really heartbreaking.
We pressed cider yesterday using the apples picked from just five of our six trees. This is what we got, not counting the bushel in the cellar for baking and whatever else: A few years ago my Dad got a good deal on an old fashioned cider press. He changed out the wheel for a larger one, to make it more "elbow grease efficient". Basically you feed apples into a hopper and turn the wheel, which grinds them up and drops them into a cheesecloth sack surrounded by a wooden, bucket like frame. ( Note the tray it sets on and the cork in front of it): Then you close the cheesecloth over the apples, and put a wooden "lid" over top of them. Line up the groove on the lid and turn the handle to push down on the fruit. The juice is squeezed out onto the tray. The cork plug is removed and the cider pours down into a container beneath: Each batch yielded about a gallon of cider. From there we poured it into another container, filtering it through a smaller woven cheesecloth, then bottled it. Dad expected 5 gallons, we ended up with more than 10. I bottled mine into 2-liter soda bottles and managed to fit nine of them in the freezer: There's more than shown here, obviously. I saw in the grocery store ad that cider is going for 6.99 a gallon. And it's pasteurized which doesn't taste nearly as good. Needless to say, we won't need to buy much, if any, this year. There's more apples at my parents' house, but Dad said the deer can have those. Overall, I think it took us about 2-2 1/2 hours to produce.
I freeze water bottles all the time. Plastic will expand and be fine. Glass and aluminum cans explode.
Another work around is to freeze them upright with the air bubble exposed to outside air, then capping.
Ahh... I freeze bottles too but I just don't fill them up that much. One of those things you COULD experiment with, but not sure it's worth the cleanup effort when you hit the limits.
There’s no way we’d drink that much cider without explosive diarrhea. We’re saving some for the holidays and when our son comes home from college. I’ve frozen bottles of water to use in a cooler before with no problems. So I made sure to leave space for expansion and went for it. My parents froze theirs upright as Bewildered mentioned. Interestingly though, I noticed last night as it got cold the plastic kinda retracted, which I think helps too.
Don’t know if your a hard cider guy but the linked German version is fantastic. https://www.homebrewtalk.com/threads/man-i-love-apfelwein.14860/
Ahh, country living. We received word our geothermal project, which we were told would start sometime in November, is now not likely to start before January thanks to labor and materials shortage. I can't believe there's that many people in our region having it installed, but who the hell knows. So now, how to heat this Winter. We have enough heating oil and firewood to last us to Thanksgiving, maybe a little longer, depending on temperatures and our tolerance. We'd figured by then we might need one tank of fuel oil and then we'd "go green". Our yard is like an oversaturated sponge, so there's no way in hell they're getting a ten-wheeler with firewood in here. So we'll see how fast the ground freezes and where we are with our fuel needs. If the grounds hard, I'll order wood. If not, then I'll have to grab my ankles and go with fuel oil at over $4.50 a gallon.
Talk to me folks...about to purchase a couple of pigs. Not for eating, but more for pet/land tiling. Anyone have any pig experience?
I raised pigs for butchering a long time ago, any questions in particular? With feed prices what they are, I wouldn't now. Certainly not for pets. But if you can afford it, more power to you.
I'm with @walt here. That's a ton of expense and effort to not slaughter them every winter for sausage. When we did it, I only had to feed and water occasionally. I can give you a lot of tips on killing, gutting, scalding and butchering. The slaughter days are a ton of work. I can get you good video when we start killing hogs round Thanksgiving.
Our feed prices are crazy here too. I was told to expect each of their shipments to be a higher price. I need to buy in bulk to lock in my price. Shoulda done that last year but never got around to it.
Will do. There are already videos out there that show those farmers processes, if you want to take a look now. Our family's operation is well equipped and experienced. Tractor for lifting, vat with a fire pit beneath it for scalding and a well equipped building full of professional butcher's grinders, slicers and saws. Even with all that and a dozen helpers, we're only doing about four hogs a day. It's that much work. Adding hogs to your homestead might be the most work you'll ever take on.
I can’t even begin to imagine what you’re paying out there. A 50# bag of layer pellets is 15 bucks now ( I think, it might be $16…I try to block it out ) and I’m paying $4 a bale for 1st cut hay. It’s fucking nuts, and I’m beginning to question if it’s worth having the chickens and turkeys anymore.
To take a step back, they aren't going to be full grown 500lb hogs, we are getting KuneKune pigs, which max out at about 150-200lbs. As far as feed prices go, it works out to be ~$40 a month for two pigs. I don't think that's unreasonable, but I'm also not particularly worried about recouping costs for animal feed so maybe that's expensive from a farming standpoint, but it's not a huge concern for me. We have about a half acre of woodland/pasture that is constantly overgrown with weeds and grasses. I know a couple pigs could root up that whole area over the course of a year which would be perfect. We could then actually grow some things in the back area of the house and section off a rotation for crops and other things. This would be the main reason for getting them and it would cut down on the cost of feed as well. As far as questions go, since losing our chicken flock, we are hyper focused on making sure predators can't kill any more of our animals. I know piglets are an issue being outside, but a full grown pig shouldn't really encounter any predators in my area face to face. We are building a hog pen with 6' high hog panels wrapped in chicken wire to make sure nothing can easily get in and they can't get out. I know pigs can be pretty nasty if need be and I don't think a coyote or fox is going to willingly climb a fence to face off against a couple full grown pigs, but should I be on the look out for any other predators who might put up more of a fight? There are no wolves in the area and if there are any bears, I haven't seen one. How well do pigs and chickens get along together in an enclosure or in a large fenced paddock? We got a new flock of chickens who are just about a month old. They will be moving into their newly upgraded indestructible coop within a coop home in about another month, but it would be nice for the pigs and chickens to "hang out together". I've read mixed reviews about this. Some people say they work well together as the chickens eat most of the bugs that can harm pigs and the pigs loosen up the soil and leave a bunch of leftovers for the chickens to scritch around in. Some people say their pigs ended up biting and killing a chicken or two because the pigs got territorial over their enclosure. What can you do with the pigs in the winter time to entertain them? During spring, summer, and fall they will have the run of the back pasture to have a blast all day, but during the winter, we'll keep them mostly contained in their pen. I want them to be happy during the winter so what are some things I can do to keep them entertained so they aren't just eating and sleeping for 4 months? Was their vet needs something you can do at home, or do you have to get the to a vet once a year for vaccinations/deworming/hoof trimming?