Farmerjan's journal - Weather

farmerjan

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Thursday afternoon. HOORRAAY I have propane!!!!!! Guys came this afternoon and put in a tank, ran the new line for the kitchen stove, and a new line to the fireplace heater in the LR. It is lit and ready to go. The weather has warmed up so much that the heater isn't even on, on low..... I had to turn it up a bit to get it to light..... but it is working. Cannot believe it... finally. So hopefully we will be able to get the kitchen stove in here soon.... I think that then I will feel like I am getting "moved in" .. to be able to cook and all.

I went to bed about 9 last night, slept til nearly 7. I was tired, and hurting from testing. Of course PT doesn't make me feel great, but that's life. I do feel a little better this afternoon even though sore.

Truck battery had to be put on the full charge this morning before I went to PT. Didn't take the trickle charge overnight. But it was good to start after I got home from PT. So, I will take the charger with me and take the truck down the hill to try to load some stuff to bring up tomorrow. We aren't supposed to get any rain or weather until later Friday. I will have to replace the battery though. But maybe it will do okay for a bit. DS said he has one that he thinks will work good. The bigger diesel trucks have 2 batteries and he said the one truck has one battery that he thinks is bad, so he is going to replace both and I can have the good one for the truck. If not, then I will just get a new one. But he said he would replace both in the diesel, so it starts without putting too much stress on one. The truck can start on one but it puts more strain on it and can wear out the starter by cranking longer and harder instead of quickly starting. He said if that's the case, then I may as well get the good out of the battery that is still working right. Whatever works. He said otherwise he would keep it and it won't help it to just sit.... and if he has to have it for something else, then I can just get a new one. But batteries will "go down" if allowed to just sit and never used. Hopefully will get it switched in a few days. I will keep the charger with me just in case when I am at the other house. Plus I always keep jumper cables in every vehicle.....

I went and ran the car through the car wash today since the roads are dry, to clean off the salt and stuff from the last few days and would rather not drive it on the roads if we get rain/sleet/wintry mix tomorrow and get it all dirty again. But if I have to I will.
Plus the truck gets better mileage.... Gas went UP AGAIN.... 2.45 - 2.49 gal now. And diesel is up to 3.25 on road here. Totally ridiculous.... and it is going to get worse. Car is getting 20-21 mpg and the truck regularly gets 25-27.....

It has been sunny and very nice today. In the upper 50's which feels like a heat wave. But just nice. Clouds coming in tomorrow again, then the ???? tomorrow night and changing to rain for the weekend. Next week is looking to be a little cooler but no precip that I can see. That will help with moving more stuff.

So, I am going in to do some stuff in the kitchen while the sun is coming in the windows and feeling cheerful in there. Got all the pots and pans from the other house that are in boxes to wash and then put away. Need to clean up the floors a little from all the in and out; then take the vacuum down the hill. Might be a good few days to do some cleaning in the other house. I would like to maybe get DS to help me load the corner computer cabinet/hutch so I can get it set up in the LR and some things organized there.
 

farmerjan

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Headin down the hill. Did some dishes, emptied some boxes. Spent some time on computer catching up with a couple of the forums I go on. Read the information pamphlet from the gas co. Ate a bowl of cereal for supper... not very productive tonight. Tomorrow is another day. Knees ache from PT as I am trying to push a little in the pool sessions to get more flexibility with the lack of "gravity" ... I feel it later in the day. Gotta get the blanket out of the car so that I can maybe get a cupboard or something in the truck tomorrow. Got some boxes packed too and I will take the hand dolly with me too.
 

Baymule

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I wanted to move a room at a time when we moved here. That's not how it worked out. I barely finished the floors, we closed on the old house and moved 3 days later. It was a madhouse. Not at all how I wanted to move, but that's what we did. Crazy. The way you are moving is a MUCH better, MUCH more organized than slam it in the truck madness we did.
 

farmerjan

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@Larsen Poultry Ranch , I know that gas prices in CA are usually always higher anyway.... but OMG...... that's $1.00 more a gallon at least.

Just a short post as I am headed to town to the stockyard. There is a "cow sale" tonight at 6. About 35-40 head of cows that were supposed to be sold 2 weeks ago but the weather the past 2 friday's has prevented it. So the last 3 days have been warmer and drier.... and they got the cattle out to the stockyard. Farmer is losing this place that he has had rented for years, and is selling the cattle there as he just doesn't have room to absorb them into his other places.
BUT..... it started snowing about an hour ago and it is coming down thick. Small flakes, air is getting colder but this is supposed to change to rain later and then warm up. It was 36 this morning, but has not gotten over 40 and is getting colder again. Cold "wave" going through, then warming into the 50-60's tomorrow and rain. 2 more little waves of rain to go through, but maybe 1-3 inches of rain by Monday when it is supposed to move east and then dry up again. But 3 inches ...really????? In February????
We haven't had as much as @Mini Horses in the east, we had snow several times that they wound up with mostly only rain.... but 2-2.5 inches precip in Feb here are normal....If you figure that we get about 10-12 inches of snow for each inch of rain....... and we have had about 2.7 inches of actual liquid precip..... so a little more than normal..... but this rain coming......
I sure hope that it is not a portending of a dry summer as it seems that we have seen often in the past.

I am going to go to town for the sale. DS has to go back in to work this evening @ 8pm.... he has been feeding all afternoon to get into places because it might be really bad if we do get all the rain. I am not going to take the truck and trailer, told him that if I do buy any we can go back and get them tomorrow. No good reason to take the trailer and deal with snowy roads when we can go back tomorrow..... and if I don't buy anything, then it is better to only take the car. I am not going to take the truck because the car is heavier than the 2wd if there is much snow on the road. So I will have to wash it again.... besides, I would rather have the car down the hill and pack stuff in the back where it will be dry....
Deb came out to the farm and brought a bunch of boxes she had... flatter type but fine for packing some stuff in. I called to check because I was going to go feed the horses if she hadn't, when the snow started. I loaded the boxes in the car to take down the hill, she had just fed and was filling the water tank.....
Okay, leaving to go to town. Hoping that the snow isn't sticking to the road much...fields are white in the 2 hrs it has been coming down.
 

Mini Horses

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We've had about 6.5" of rain this month, raining tonight thru Mon in some amounts each day. Been a muddy mess!! Now more. Made sure I had hay and feed stocked and up close to feed areas in the trailer, barns, etc....save myself driving in/on the slick, soggy places 2x a day. :oops:

Hope you get a couple good cows at a great price!
 

farmerjan

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Well, home from the sale. The cows were not that great. The greater number were "FM....full mouth"... which means anywhere from 6-7 to 10+ years old....there were quite a few that were "BM...broken mouth" or "SM....smooth mouth". BM means that they may have a few teeth, SM means that they basically have no teeth. BM and SM are basically OLD cows.... what we often call one and dones.....calve out that year, let them raise that calf and then sell them in the fall.... sometimes we will keep the calf if they are real nice, but basically we just sell both. It is a good way to make some money if the cows have a good year, milk halfway decent and raise a decent calf. Of course the cow can die calving, or the calf born dead, or whatever.... If we buy one and dones, we like to buy them with the calf on the ground already.... at least you are past the chance of losing them during calving.....
I bought one cow/cf pair that was actually in a 2cows/2cfs group but the guy that bought the other cow didn't want this one because he said it had a long back foot. The calf was decent, looked like the cow has enough milk to raise the calf.... FM cow... paid $900.... which might be too much.... but she was 1100 lbs and had decent flesh. Then I bought a single BIG Hereford cow with a heifer calf.... weighed 1305 and only paid $750 for that pair. She was in good condition, calf looked good. Both have heifer calves... not worth as much as steer(bull) calves will be in the fall as 500 lb feeders.... but I also watched some 450 lb heifers bring $1.48 before the cow sale.... which is about $.20 more than they have been bringing... so that was very encouraging....
There were a few that brought less, most in the $900 range with calves, a couple in the $1100-1350 range and a group of 3 that had bull calves that brought $1750 which was way over priced in my opinion. Nice enough but way over what I felt they were worth. There were a couple that brought 650 and 750 with calves, but they had next to no udder, the calves were small and looked like they just weren't getting a belly full of milk... no point in bringing home cows that would raise mediocre calves.... a couple were really thin cows.... and they brought more than what they were worth.
You have to look at these older cows and figure their cull cow value .... you want to pay very little over pound cow price. The black one I paid over cull price... she weighed around 1100.... so that would be $.85/lb which is really too high since cull cows are bringing $.45 to $.60 right now. The hereford weighed 1305... so at $.50/lb she was worth $650... so she is good. Both are full mouth cows.... we will go get them in the morning, bring them home and run them through the chute, vaccinate them and probably worm them... and check their mouths ourselves. Then determine if they have a chance to get bred back or just will get put out on good grass in the spring and let them raise their calf and gain weight and get sold in the fall.
There is another cow sale in 2 weeks, 25 cows that are starting to calve now....due with 2nd and 3rd calves.... they will probably be high... but we will go and see. Those kind of cows you can pay 12-1300 for and they will pay for themselves in a couple years... in normal years.... we will see. Those are cows you buy with the plans to keep them around for 6-10 years. Not buying them at 15-1800.....
I told DS that 2022 would be the year for bred cows and heifers to be high.... overall throughout the country the cow herd #'s are declining as many heifers went to slaughter.... Then this whole covid crap has thrown things into a tailspin.... It is so hard to do the gambling on the "cow cycles" that are no longer "normal".... I hope we keep some of the heifers we have on feed and breed a bunch come this June/July, for spring calving in 2022, and sell some bred heifers or sell off some cows that are mediocre producers. Spring calving heifers and cows bring more than fall calving ones usually.

So, it was still snowing good when I came home and there was even a little settling on the road here at the house. It is supposed to change over to more rain in the early morning hours.... Then warmer and rain tomorrow morning... just cloudy for the day then more serious rain Sat night and Sunday.... can't do anything about it so we will see.
I am going in to empty the dish drainer and maybe do some more dishes and empty a box. Got a bunch of boxes in the car from Deb and a few from here to take down the hill. Will work on getting them packed. I could not get the "spice cupboard" moved by myself to bring up on the truck. I did bring up some boxes though. Then I went to get the meters from the farm I tested Tues/Wed and drop off his jump drive so he can put the info back into his computer. They are on the back of the truck getting good and wet so that I can take my hose and wash them off since they do such a crummy job before they pull them down off the milk line. There were several that had splattered manure all over them from where they wash down the parlor floor and it gets splashed on the meters, and they won't go through and wash off the meters last... I will hook up the hose if it gets as warm as they say and just wash them down myself, then put them in the "box" I store them in under the carport. So I figured it
best to leave them on the truck for now to get good and soaked.... make the manure easier to wash off the outsides.

So that's about it for tonight. I will get up and get going in the morning so I can go get the 2 cow/cf pairs, and DS will be getting off work and trying to get a little more feeding done before it gets any wetter... I think he got most of it done except the silage in the bunk in the barn and the old cows in back. It is muddy but there is a "bottom" to the mud where he has to go so didn't try to get that all done today. Plus he has to go pick up 1/2 a beef that was I took in a couple weeks ago to get killed and deliver it.... so if I go get the cows and he does all the rest, then we can work them through the barn when he gets caught up.
 
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