June was a slower month here at the farm, which was welcome! Grateful for a month to generally coast and just enjoy the fruits of our labor. Here are a few things we did accomplish:
+ Broiler chickens 2.0 arrived on June 2! They arrived super healthy and we’ve only lost one so far.
+ We harvested peas, strawberries, spinach and lettuce. We have also picked the first raspberries, blueberries, jalapenos, onions and new potatoes.
+ We borrowed a friend’s wood splitter to help us cut firewood. The big storm really helped us get ready for winter, ha.
+ I continued working on the food forest. We have so many areas to fill with compost and it definitely won’t all happen this year (because $$$), but I’m trying to do what I can with what I have. The big vision is slowly coming to life!
+ We received our first Chip Drop! So, so excited! We did edit our request to offer $20 for delivery and heard from an arborist pretty quickly afterward. (Chip Drop is free for gardeners, but costs $20 per drop for the arborists, so it seems fair, especially with gas prices so high.) In even more exciting news, the same arborist later dropped off a second load for free. It pays to know your community! We plan to fill our garden paths and then use the rest for a permanent winter shelter for the pigs.
+ And the “We don’t know what we’re doing!” story of the month: two of our pigs, Phyllis and Fiona, were scheduled to go to the butcher on the 30th. Just like everything we do around here, trying to get them on the trailer was a complete circus. We were on a time crunch and had to be on the road by a certain time to drive the 45 minutes to get them in the stall by 8am. So we’re in the dark in headlamps, pleading with pigs to climb the ramp up to the trailer! Insanity. (Recall that you can’t force a pig to do anything, you have to convince her that she wants to do it.) We managed to get Phyllis on board but Fiona was adamantly opposed. With time ticking and us panicking, we ultimately decided to leave her behind. So one pig went to the butcher and we’re deciding next steps for Fiona. Anyone in the market for a beautiful, friendly, slightly stubborn Tamworth/Berkshire mix gilt? 🙂
Josh and his brother had to load the pig we bought from his parents, and it was an ordeal! They decided to load her the night before. They put her food on the truck and eventually they got her up there. In any event, the morning of, she was already loaded.
Maybe that could work next time?
We borrowed the trailer from a farmer friend but will definitely ask him for TWO days next time, ha! We’ve also heard that withholding food for a day will make it much easier to load. Always learning around here! 🙂