Autumn Fashion Show of Misfits

The Autumn Fashion Show of Misfits was a success, although quite exhausting for attendees and models not to mention the photographer who rallied against slippery mud and slippery goats to dress each one quickly to make it on the runway in time. The Misfits now have a great selection for the colder, rainy weather that might require outfits and we are all thankful for the generosity of our followers who sent us dog coats, pony jackets and old sweatshirts [which are remarkably useful on a farm].

If you don't see your coat in the fashion show, it is only because the models ran out of steam. And the upper barnyard of Misfits already had a little fashion extravaganza. I also have two now that will work for Victor and Sophie should they need them on top of all their curly wool some extra cold winter night. There are some very small ones that would work on Moose, or sick lambs if needed. Thank you, everyone!

So sit back, and enjoy the show!

More plethora of pigs

They are growing and getting chunky and their activity level is increasing.

I'm hoping they can wait two more days to stay out of trouble-which mainly involves squeezing their little heads into pasture fence and getting stuck-it happened once so far. We have to put up the No Climb on Saturday to ensure nobody plops into an adjoining paddock.

I think I can give a sigh of relief now. With the lambs I always wait about 5 days before getting too enthralled with anyone as things can still go wrong. And I'm happy to say the little male runt is catching up and holding his own. Next week the vet comes to...castrate. It's a quick procedure, but I'm told the first one squeals like crazy, and then every starts squealing like crazy, so my pig friend gave me lots of good advice for preparing the stall right to make things happen more smoothly. I think many people who haven't been around pigs might be intimidated at first by their language. It definitely takes time to understand your pigs. They make lots of noise at dinner time, to the point where a newcomer might be afraid of them. They talk with their noses-as you see in the second photo below. I know you really want this to be a piglet kissing her sister, but it is a piglet nibbling on her sister, telling her to move over.

Meanwhile, Doris is still waiting to piglet. I'm now assuming it might be even another 2 weeks since she must have missed the first cycle I had her with Earnest. Amazing, because she was so attentive and helpful to the poor fellow on his first sex adventure, where as Pearly wanted nothing to do with him!

In a few days, the piglets will be out of control, leaping and running! And I will be spending lot more time tendering them and holding them. Lucky me!

In about three days all heck is going to break loose

When you have your first piglet litter, there suddenly appears a plethora of piglets pics. How many piglet pics can the piglet loving public ponder? I hope I don't over piglet you...but, they grow fast, so I intend to enjoy them. I will repeat that, although the days have been hot, I have had many moments this month of feeling completly in my element, where I should be. I got up again at 7 and rode Boone this morning, stopped over at a friend's with horse in tow, picked up some pig stuff and as I drove home I thought,

I just got to take my horse to a friend's house to pick up a bunch of pig stuff. This is a good life for me.

My pig friend–I just love saying that–came over yesterday to see the new piglets. She was amazed they were the same size as the piglets that come out of her Berkshire sows. Our Guinea Hog breed are about 150-200# full grown, and her sows are about #500 full grown. They do have larger litters, sometimes 12-14, but we were both in awe that Nature made them the same size.

She also told me in about 3 days those piglets are going to be jumping all over the place.

I got a feel for that jumping this morning. Nature was also smart when she devised these little eating systems. Man, piglets are tough, very different than lambs. I'm really enjoying the process of learning their behaviors. Today they were doing a bit of romping, still in the wood hut, but I think by late afternoon or tomorrow they will venture down the ramp to sunshine. They have plenty of escape shade areas near the hut so it will be okay. My friend lent me a waterer they devised out of pipe, so I can get them on drip waterers right away. I made the mistake of not doing that with Doris and June, and they will learn to use them too. If you are wondering why this is a good idea, pigs will try to bathe in anything if they don't have a wallow of water and mud. It is hard to keep the water buckets clean for other animals.

I can already see the gilt [unbred girl] with the white front feet will be the tiger of the litter. The little male runt [shown above]is doing well, he is a fighter for food and gets on that teat and doesn't let go, so I think he will be okay.

And although we didn't get Earnest's colors, all the piglets definitely appear to have his squatter Kune face.

Pigletting!

The proper term is farrowing, but I always forget how to say it, so I began saying "pigletting", which I think is a much better term.

And as you can see, we have pigletted! I rose at 7 am to beat the heat and went on a ride with Boone, our first in over seven days due to the temperatures. It was a wonderful ride, and stayed cool. Upon arriving back at the farm, it was the usual suspects lying around chewing cud or bathing in mud pools.

I went down to fill water buckets in the lower paddocks, and saw the pigs, Doris and June, lying together in the shade. Nothing strange about that. I got a little closer to check on Pearly June's privates, as they had swollen up a few days ago and I assumed she was close to farrowing time. I'm new at this, remember. And there they were, two little feet coming out.

She hadn't even made a nest to birth in. And she of course was in the paddock, not the pen I had envisioned her in. Now if these were my sheep this wouldn't have happened this way, as I know to the date when they will lamb and they come into lambing stalls at night and then out into the paddock during the day. I have two areas for the pigs for pigletting, but, things are a bit chaotic. Unlike sheep, who give me clearer signs, pigs don't seem to. My pig friend who has been raising pigs for some time said they basically start digging around looking for bedding to make a nest and boom, piglets pop out. So that's about what happened.

Thank goodness she didn't do it in the wallow.

So she popped the piglet out and then she starts casually roaming around, leaving the baby in the dust. Oy. She goes into the duck hut, a perfect place to have pigs I might add, but Stevie has taken it over during the heat wave, and then in came Doris, and Pearly June got very upset. I had brought the piglet over to her, telling her to take care of this baby. At least she showed she didn't want Doris around, good mothering.

After much chaos-I admit here, I was not calm, and I regret this-the last thing any birthing mother needs be it pig, sheep or woman- is someone in a huff trying to get things reordered. But I wanted her to get in this other paddock which had the intended pigletting palace.

Nope. She didn't want that pigletting palace she wanted to be in the hut she first knew when she got here a year ago.

Fair enough. I got the piglet in with her and got a fair amount of hay for bedding, but not too much as the babies can get buried in them. Meanwhile the piglet felt cold, even though it was about 85 degrees. I ran into call my pig friend - I love that I have pig friends - and asked her some more advice. Besides, I wanted to give the Pearly June time on her own, away from ME, the screaming pig tender. Unlike lambs who need mother's milk within two hours, piglets can go quite a long time. She suggested I lay him in a box in the sun, while Pearl got her pigletting going. She had sows that birthed the whole litter and then hours later, they milked.

So about 40 minutes after settling her into her hut, with one piglet, I went out to check on her and she had 5 more. Wow! That was one quick pigletting! In fact the final piglet had jut come out and was a real whopper, with white front feet like her mom. They are all black, which is sort of disappointing as we wondered if we would get some Kune color in there. But that is okay, they are alive. There is one teeny runt, but within time he was up there grabbing teats like anyone else.

Tonight I will hope nobody gets crushed. I've been told to prepare myself for this fact. When Martyn gets home, I might try to move her to the intended stall I had for pigletting, as she needs to be separate from Doris for a few days at least. But I might opt to let her stay in her hut. I will need to put up a temporary wood wall to keep them in at night. I covered the swimming hole but that is a long ways off, they aren't going to be walking over there today anyway.

Nap like a pig

I went out to take some photos this afternoon, and I obviously came at Pig Nap Hour. Nobody informs me of anything around here. All around, little lumps of pigs. To the untrained pig eye, one might gasp,

"They're dead!"

No, just napping. And yes, if Pearl and Doris look extra plump, they are. They are both full with piglets. Stay tuned.

But now I must nap.

A day with pigs

I have been letting Earnest in with Doris and Pearly June for days at a time, and also they have been allowed out into a middle pasture for grass eating, which they of course love. By the time I bring them back to their hut at night, they fall to the ground in their piggie collapse and fall off to piggie sleep.

Doris and June are over a year now, as is Earnest. I've been tracking their cycles so hope to have piglets sometime this year, but it's a crap shoot the way I'm choosing to do it. I like having Earnest in the barnyard-he is just such fun and agreeable, and Marcella is so close to him, so for now I let him go back and forth. He seems to like his pig dates, but also likes his barnyard. When the girls aren't in heat, they pretty much ignore the poor fellow, try as he does to impress them, but they push him off, or snap at him in pig language.

The other afternoon after a day of grass eating with his ladies, Ernest was napping by the pig hut. I called him to come back to the barnyard. He always responds and runs to me. But he just kept napping. He was happy there. I felt like the mom who must witness her five year old say for the first time,

"Mom, please don't walk me to the bus today, I can do it my own self."

The farm as church

I was not raised with a church background, or a religion. Years later when I was in my thirties or older, my mother said she wondered if they did us a disservice by not giving us some sort of organized Sunday church going. I told her that it allowed me to figure it out on my own as an adult, and I didn't have to peel off the many layers and dogmas many churches prescribe too. I went to church for a short time at certain periods in my life, often to hear the choirs and I did enjoy the spirituality of certain buildings and communing of people.

But nature is one of my churches. So is the farm. I know it is Passover today and we-me and the Misfits and the other worker bees of the farm-are all busy today putting our spirits into action here on the farm. As is Martyn, of course.

I have new gates up which I'm pleased with-thanks to the Dirt Farmer- so now I have the pigs tilling up some of the vegetable area. But now that the ground is drier, they seem to prefer eating grass. The first weeks of warm weather I let Doris and June graze, but they rototilled soft areas of grass looking for worms. I was worried I had trained them to only till since they spent the winter in a dry paddock being fed hay and feed. But yesterday I spent the majority of the day with them as I tidied up the veggie area, getting ready for planting. And they mainly ate grass and weeds. If I created a wet spot for them, they did a bit of rototilling. I am still learning the language of Pig and it is very interesting.

Yesterday was also a big day for Earnest as he spent it with Doris and June. I have been on the fence about breeding them. It was my intention when I bought them all. We are self sustaining and while you can rest assured that Doris, June and Earnest will always be part of Apifera, some of the offspring will be sold, and a couple will grace our table. I know this rankles some of the rescue world-a world I separate myself from and stay out of discussion with online-but Martyn and I choose to eat pork and chicken and some lamb [lamb is anything up to a year-so if you are a zealot vegan, please do not write snarky comments about us killing baby lambs-they will be deleted anyway as I don't tolerate dogma from anyone of any agenda]. Anyway, the pig behavior is so different than sheep, and with pigs the fencing must include a bottom board, or the pigs will lift the fences with their noses. One of the reasons many small farms are going to the smaller pig breeds is their manners and maintenance are much easier-on fences and farm. Having experienced the power of Big Pig-who we tried to adopt so she could retire here- I know how important good pig fence is.

SO I wanted to see how Earnest's weight and height was compared to the gilts [an unbred girl pig]. Earnest is a Kunekune and will get to be about 200-250#. The girls are Guinea Hogs and currently a tish taller. The Kunes are a wonderful, docile breed. So are the Guineas, but from what I read and hear, the Kune is more docile. Earnest is not pushy at all and still easy to handle.

So, in they went. And little Earnest began his job with gusto. I will keep this post PG rated, but let me assure you Earnest gave it the college try-for hours. I was there the entire time and even made him take time outs with mud baths. From what I can see, I'm not sure he is quite tall enough to make full contact-but we'll find out. I was pleased to see he is catching up in size, as I know the Kunes grow a bit slower.

Today I have the smaller Misfits in the veggie bed, and Old Rudy is in the back yard off my back studio-usually shut down to animals-but Rudy is helping me clean up brush and grass there. The sheep are grazing, Aldo is watching, Scooby is napping..oops, well, we all must rest during our work. The donkeys are busy with brush and eating too. Chickens are grooming the flies off water buckets. Marcella is trying to help with everything.

So church today-with a big top blue sky and warm temperatures-has been glorious.

Pig snow dance

As a former Minnesotan, I get a little embarrassed when we have what my old homeland would consider a slight snow accumulation. But out here, even a dusting causes great excitement and dread. Last night I was in stitches watching a weatherman outside in Portland with a pencil, showing the viewing audience how-Good God!-the snow was halfway up the pencil. Of course when the infrastructure of the whole state lacks plows and de-icing, it is havoc from the get go when snow does come, especially since the cities are built on hills and valleys.

Out here, snow like this means one thing-hauling water to all the stalls and paddocks, twice a day. The worst is over, as the winds were so fierce on Wednesday night I had to move the elder ponies into the goat barn as their hut could not keep the snow and wind out, causing both of them to be layered in 4" of snow! And the winds made it impossible for them to stay warm. All the shelters were adrift, so the goat barn became one giant sleepover-with little pigs, old ponies, and Great White walking around, with his befuddled llama look. Ernest the pig was having a great time though–it was as if he was the little kid who got to hang out with all his old cousins for one whole night.

But it is all cattywampus in the barns. I have specific areas to feed everyone so no one gets too piggy, so with the ponies and the llama in the barn now, it makes it all the more problematic. But we all got by. Hoping for warming tomorrow, as the sheep have not been in the fileds for two days-and we are entering the final month of gestation for some of the unborns. Rosie is probably the only one who suffers-her favorite bed area is now where the ponies are for a couple more nights, which means the pig princess has to recreate her bed, and-gasp-sleep near Moose and Goose, the latter two who have been displaced from their sleeping area due to the fact The Great White and his sidekick Scooby are bedding down there for now.

So, I went out to try to take some photos this morning, which is always hard in snow. I have a hard time seeing what I'm focusing on in the view finder. The fields were not only animal-less, there weren't even bird tracks. It was all so quiet since everyone was in the barn-except for Doris and June, who remained in their pig hut. It reminded me there might be a time when there would be no animals in the fields, and it felt kind of lonely.

But Pearly June came running out of her hut, and reminded me of how glorious it is to experience snow for the first time. We get so jaded with weather, but what a beautiful, remarkable thing it is. Each little flake unique onto itself, drifting and accumulating into sculptural land art. So, I thanked Pearly June for reminding me of this-and I wondered what I looked like when I first saw snow. My mother must have been amused, and perhaps she too had a moment with me as I had with my pig this morning-stopping to embrace the wonder of it all.

On any given day

I don't carry my camera at all times - but on any given moment there are photo opportunities all around me. Like the other day when Pearl knew I was in the barnyard and that dinner time was coming but she just had to have a quick nap - strategically located - before supper.

Or sitting the other day amongst the goats and Little Moose and Wilbur side side side, motionless, just cracked me up. They stood that way without moving for about five minutes.

I am surrounded by a bunch of comedians.

Autumnal signs and a game of pig ball

Martyn and I have somehow created a mystery squash. It came up in our vegetable area, not the squash/pumpkin patch. We think some of the compost we carried into the veggie garden this spring must have brought this new creation on. It appears to be a spaghetti squash-pumpkin? They aren't quite ripe but I offered one to Doris and Pearl who vigorously challenged each other to a game of Pig Ball, a favorite autumnal pastime. Within about five minutes they had it opened and eaten.

Pony shelters, pig naps and life as the young elder

Martyn is busy, busy, busy building the pony structure for Old Mama Sugee and Wilma. We should have a roof up today and a structure so next weekend I can put up cedar siding. I have a lot to do in the paddock area too like putting in new gates and posts, making a culvert for winter water flow and improving existing fencing. I think we will also do a rain collection gutter on the hut too. Sugee and Wilma will then have nose neighbors - Boone and the rams, and Doris and Pearl on the other side. Eventually they can mingle with goats I think, as long as Sugee is secure. They get along with everyone it appears.

It's hot, but tomorrow should cool down. Martyn amazes me how he just works in it, without complaint. I'm so fortunate to have a friend and husband like this! The farm is a source of continuing projects, and of course I can't build much on my own which Martyn points out is a blessing! I did manage to secure the back gate on the hay barn so that Boone and the rams can't snack on the hay anymore. Rascals.

I feel quiet, but in a nice way. I told Martyn I feel like I have stepped up a level in age this week. I feel like a young elder now, not only in heart, mind and attitude, but also in appearance. And it's all fine. I've lost my mother and two aunts in the last four months with only one remaining uncle left. I am taking my place on the great mandala I guess. One thing I've noticed is a new and improved distaste for other people's dramas - especially those who always seem to be in one calamity or another. There is enough healthy excitement every time I go to feed the barnyard that I am shunning anyone or anything that brings uneccessary personal stuff into my life. Martyn and I talked about that last night - we don't need it, or want it, or deserve it. We just want to help our farm, do good work in our businesses, and enjoy our days and nights together. As usual, he treated me to a wonderful meal last night with lantern light and stars joining us.

I have to start the autumnal chore of trimming feet and giving shots to the sheep and goats. I get slower every season I think. I'll wander on out after I write this and do the rams and the goats. Maybe I'll do the sheep tomorrow, or next weekend. But first I took time to sit with the pigs for a little bit and watched them nap, and then sat and watched Martyn work on the new hut. He's like a goat on a ladder, up and down with ease. I thought of all the projects my parents worked on together, and Dick and Alice - or so many of our now young farm friends. When you work on a house together, or on land and a farm, you are part of it. It never leaves you, and vice versa. I won't fast forward to a day when we can't be here. But if we do have to leave someday, our blood and that of any creature living here others is here forever.

Pigs, a Pearl and a Doris

I'd like you to meet Pearl and Doris. These two ladies are three months old and will live long and happy lives here, even after retirement. I will breed them in the spring so they will be working gals here at the farm - Working gals with fields to roam, a mini swimming pool, mud holes to lie in and plenty of belly rubs.

They are guinea hogs, a heritage breed that is becoming more popular due to their smaller size and wonderful temperament. When full grown they top out at around 150# for females, about the size of 2.5 Rosies.

They are so different than Rosie, who will always remain our little Grumpolopogus, a princess in her own realm. These two gals follow you around and wherever you stop, they stop, and flop. Pig people know the "flop"! I was working on some fencing for them and it was all I could do to keep them out of the way so I could hammer nails in the fence posts.

You can not resist sitting with them and rubbing their bellies and ears. I'm very happy to have them here, they have already brought me such delight. Rosie has met them through the fence, but Rosie is a non pig gal, I think. These pigs will get along with anyone, but at this point I am keeping them separate.

Pearl [the one with white feet] acts more like the little sister [they are litter mates], and Doris is slightly bigger and bossier. I hope to get a good photo of them in their make shift pool, it is very amusing.

I think these two will end up in a lot of future art and story!