Misfitmorgan's Journal - That Summer Dust

Sara Ranch said:

Congrats on the new addition!

With the super cold weather, some of my animals are eating WAY less than they normally would. Drinking less too. I keep an eye on all and make sure there is movement. I encourage all to go outside daily. The ducks get a pass when it's negative and single digit temps outside.

For you - I am hoping it's the new environment and the cold weather that has her eating less than you think she should.

For you and DH - *hug* I hope you guys feel better soon! I know it's tough to do farm chores and care for animals when you don't feel well and/or have an injury. Especially when the temps are cold!

Click to expand...

Thank you!

Rose has been eatting better since she returned and is being more engaging with us. she now meets us at the door and checks out what we are doing when we are in there.

Latestarter said:

Really glad you caught the "almost froze/past shivering" little ram lamb. That would have been a shame to lose him. Is his momma not caring for him?

Click to expand...

I'm glad i caught it too, the big tip off was the way he was standing and the where he was standing. Then after i picked him up and he didnt make a sound, you know something is wrong. His momma is doing an excellent job it is just that cold for him. Overnights have still been dropping into negative temps before the windchill is factored in. Momma is feeding him well and checking on him a lot, making sure he can nurse every 15-20 minutes if he wants too. I think 310 knows he is having a hardtime.

Maybe a lambykins parka or some such to help him retain warmth. Hope he gets his furnace working pretty quick. I remember cold like that and I don't much care for it anymore. Glad to hear momma is doing right by him... or trying anyway.

Latestarter said:

Maybe a lambykins parka or some such to help him retain warmth. Hope he gets his furnace working pretty quick. I remember cold like that and I don't much care for it anymore. Glad to hear momma is doing right by him... or trying anyway.

Click to expand...

He has a little lamb coat on i made for him to try to help, he has had it on....probly not beefy enough. It's hard on single lambs in the cold, when there is more then one lamb they lay together and help share warmth. Being inside the barn near the pigs it is always a lot warmer then outside and zero wind so he should be ok now.

It sounds like Rose is figuring out that she is in a good place. I hope she continues to warm up to y'all.

Sorry that you both are sick. You can lay it on the doorstep of being stressed beyond the breaking point, by the whole process of buying, financing and moving to your new home-compounded by insane former landlords. And when you finally heaved a sigh of relief, you both were exhausted and your immunity was depleted. Boom.

I hope you two can catch up on your rest. You certainly need it.

Baymule said:

It sounds like Rose is figuring out that she is in a good place. I hope she continues to warm up to y'all.

Sorry that you both are sick. You can lay it on the doorstep of being stressed beyond the breaking point, by the whole process of buying, financing and moving to your new home-compounded by insane former landlords. And when you finally heaved a sigh of relief, you both were exhausted and your immunity was depleted. Boom.

I hope you two can catch up on your rest. You certainly need it.

Click to expand...

I certainly can't wait to be feeling better.

Didnt do much of anything yesterday, DH and i are both still sick. I believe we are having house guests this weekend to help process Eva. Hopefully we will get our pork bellies into some brine so they can get ready to be smoked. We also have somewhere over 150lbs of pork to grind. Eva will be hams (rear legs and front legs), bacon, loin/tenderloin, jowl bacon, and the rest will be added to what needs to be ground.

Are and DH feeling well enough to process Eva? (I hope so!)

Did help arrive to help with processing? (I hope so!)

Hope you guys start feeling better.

*hugs*

Eva is still hanging, we had intentions of processing her and then both tie rod ends went out on the trailblazer.....

So that was $80 in parts, really sucks we had just finally got caught up with bills and money and all and were looking at actually having a tiny bit of "extra" money and now the budget is back down to shoestring for another 3 weeks. This was going to literally be the first week i could breathe and not worry about what groceries to buy

We will get eva done eventually, atm it is cold enough overnight she wont spoil.

We did have house guests and still have house guests, they will be helping split Eva tonight and possibly process part of her.

DH seems ok i still feel like run down garbage.

Well, crap. I posted, it double posted, so I deleted one. Only it deleted both. Phooey.

Here I go again.

I am glad you got the pig slaughtered and still have help to get her cut up. I know it is a weight off your mind to get that done. One of these days you will have to take photos of your processing.

Are you taking vitamins, vitamin C, B complex? As run down as y'all are, you probably could use the boost. Sorry that you still feel so run down. Feeling like garbage.....have you squooshed any lately?

That sucks about having to buy parts, but at least you don't have to pay repair labor $$$$. There never is a good time to break down, but some are worse than others. I blew my truck engine many years ago. After I quit crying (I was broke and poor) I got a bottle of Jack Daniels ( I wasn't that broke) and after the hangover, I felt much better.

*hugs*

On the bright side, there is progress with processing! And the temps are cold enough to help.

I took some airbourne Bay, i dont think it helped much. I think part of my worn out is it being winter and not being able to go outside and do the things i want to do. Plus it geting dark so early and not being sunny much. I guess us northern people are actually suppose to take vitamin D in the winters but i dont know many that do. Wednesday will be 38F i really hope to go out and start pruning the apple trees because we want to use the wood to smoke the bacon/hams. I am also itching to get the grape's pruned they have been let go for a few years and are a bit of a mess. I took care of the rhubarb and asparagus before we got snow.

Been a few days since an update.

Eva is still hanging though she is split now and just waiting on the curing salt to arrive today for the bacon and ham. We thought about just salting her(with normal salt) to help preserve her because of the warmer temps but seems she is doing fine.

We also thought about cutting her up but as DH mentioned if meat spoils it spoils from the outside in usually, so leaving it the largest piece we can is better. Temps have been crazy, she was frozen rock solid in about 8 hrs the night we butchered. 8hrs is a fast freeze for a lump of 325+lbs of meat. Now we have had several days of daytime temps above freezing and two days(separately) of 45-50F. Meat is not spoiled but I will be happy to get the cure on.

The bacon is getting a dry cure(belly/jowls), back bacon would be wet cure and the ham will be a wet cure. Mostly because i just dont feel like cutting around the bones in the ham and packing them with cure. Atm we believe we will be doing hind legs into 2-3 hams each and shoulders into 2 hams each. We have several bellies to do including ones saved from the barrows, and jowls. So we should end up with 100lbs of hams, and 7lbs of jowl bacon, 60lbs of (normal)bacon, and 40lbs of back bacon, 12lbs spare ribs, 2 small loin roasts, and around 80lbs of ground pork possibly for sausage.

First problem to solve is enough large bins to do the cure's in. We have two 66qt sterilite containers with lids, i'm worried they wont be enough. If they are not enough we will do bacon first since it is faster, hams have to cure for 14 days.

So anyone who has made bacon....do you leave your skin on or take it off, if so before or after smoking? Not sure if we will leave ours on or take it off, if we take it off it will be after the smoke.

If you havnt seen our lambing thread here is a link
https://www.backyardherds.com/threads/misfitmorgans-lambing-2018.37261/
A bit slow atm but we did have one lamb so far.