Teresa & Mike CHS - Our journal

[Mike CHS]

Before we moved here we literally played "tourist" just about once a week since there was so many sights to see in and around Charleston, SC Since we elected to 'retire' to our small farm world we find it almost too easy to just stay home. To keep from getting too far into that rut we do things that can be done in between morning and evening chores and other than animal responsibility, it's fairly easy to reschedule things that need to be done. We enjoy farm tours and will be going to a farm a couple of hours away up in Kentucky next Friday. It's still farm related but it gives us the chance to keep on learning and accelerates learning about the different ways of doing things from those that have have 'been there and done that'. The farm is right at 200 acres and they raise 350 head of sheep and 120 cows.

The agenda for Friday is: Adaptive Multi-paddock Grazing: Managing summer and winter annuals, Multi-species grazing, Boom or Bust grazing, Top third grazing (weed issues), Drought management, Grazing and Recovery
periods, Stockpiling forage, Feeding Hay in fall, Sacrifice areas, Livestock selection, Effect of stock density;
Forage Options: Warm and cool season annual cocktail mixes, johnsongrass/ryegrass forage sequencing
for weed control, tall fescue, orchardgrass, bermudagrass, clovers, chicory, turnips, lespedeza, Other
potential topics and stops: Corrals; Water & Fencing options; Mowing cost, timing and benefits; etc

 

[Wehner Homestead]

That sounds really interesting. Wish I could come too!

 

[CntryBoy777]

That sure sounds informitive and covers some very interesting topics. That's a whole lot of animals, so they must know what they are teaching works....hope they allow ya to take and share a few pics, too....

 

[Baymule]

Go Teresa! That sounds like a lot of fun, plus meeting others and learning more. And a farm tour! That sounds like a good way to spend the between morning/evening chores.

 

[farmerjan]

We have found that if the calves are "younger" rather than older, they often get along with the sheep better; but they also rather want to play whereas older calves will be more into grazing and just kinda ignore the sheep. But they will not allow them anywhere near a feed trough whereas the younger ones just aren't quite as aggressive. Different breeds act differently too. My dairy cross calves just dive right into feed and have tried pushing the sheep around if they crowd in too, the bigger beef calves tend to intimidate the sheep just by the size.

 

[Mike CHS]

The feed issue is something I had not thought of but I think I can work around that pretty easy. The sheep that have been bred won't get any feed until the few weeks before they are due and by then I will have pulled them into the nursery paddock and away from the calves.

 

[Bruce]

That sounds really interesting. Wish I could come too!

Probably closer to you than to Mike!

Those birds are a menace.

 

[Wehner Homestead]

Probably closer to you than to Mike!

Those birds are a menace.

It likely is! The problem is more related to getting away. My mom is the only person besides DH and I that can care for DD2 and she helps so much that I hate to ask for more!

 

[farmerjan]

Anyone that has given you any grief or flak about the black mexican vultures, needs to do a little googling. They are considered to be one of the biggest menace now to livestock there is. They do not go after just dead or dying stuff. They will attack a cow calving, or a newborn calf before the cow can get it cleaned up and on it's feet. They will go after sheep that are trying to lamb, they will pick out the eyes of a lamb and attack baby calves, not newborns but just young ones, and go after the eyes and the rectum. They will often even challenge a person if there is a group of them. They are technically protected because they fall in the group of "raptors" and "birds of prey "etc like hawks and eagles and owls. There are several states that have started issuing permits to kill them and some senators that are pushing to have them taken off the list of protected birds.
These are NOT the naked necked (turkey) buzzard that is pretty homely, and is 99% a carrion eater. They will go after something live, but only if it is 99% dead and doesn't know it yet. These black mexican buzzards have really started to migrate north and they are here in Va and get disposed of as fast as we can. I had them go into a shed, attached to a barn, and get the eyes and started on the rectum of a 2 week old calf that had scours. I had to put him down. It was enough to make you gag. I also took several of those b#@$#.. and disposed of them too.

 

[Mike CHS]

@farmerjan everyone in our area is hanging those things in effigy but that doesn't get rid of them, it just makes them avoid the area where the dead ones are.