Free's piggie thread...new pics p 19

[freemotion]

A few oak leaves won't hurt them. I used to have to get out there with the leaf blower when I had the horse, when the walnut leaves all came down in a couple of hours. They are bad news for horses. But the goats cleaned them ALL up this year, I never saw them on the ground! Just noticed a few days ago that the big walnut tree in their paddock is bare.

 

[Henrietta23]

Leaves are just starting to change and fall here. I had Donki out on a lead and she was chowing down on everything on the ground but we avoided the heavily oaky areas of the yard. We have a lot of some kind of nut tree, planted by the squirrels I think. She particularly likes those leaves.

 

[freemotion]

Just added 8 five gallon pails of tomatoes in various stages of decay to the pig pasture, and will have more later tonight if I have time. Got a load of hay coming, so may not get to the tomatoes and another load of acorns that I need to pick up. Need to glean more corn before it rains, too! Aaaagh! Why does everything come in at once? Not that I'm complaining, mind you, just wish it were on my day off. Gotta run to work now.

 

[freemotion]

Dad and I picked up a load of acorns today, along with about three feed sacks of black walnuts. The pigs don't seem too interested in them, but they sure smell good to me. I find the smell of the walnut leaves and the husks to be very intriguing. Sweet and spicy...yum. If I were a critter I'd take a bite.

The nuts were in two adjoining yards, daughter's family and widowed mom. The older woman was home and we talked....and talked....and talked!! All I could think was, "I have SOOO much work to do! I need to be here for 15 minutes, fill a few sacks, and get home to the mountain of work outside on a perfect fall day!!! AAARRRGH!!" But I took a breath and tried to tell myself to relax enjoy the beautiful setting.

Then I spotted the grape arbor. I asked it I could take a closer look, as I wanted to build a simple one next spring, and this one sure looked simple. She was delighted to tell me all about it, and I got under it and got a really good look. It was simply two pressure-treated 4"x4"x8' posts with a scrap of some type of metal on top. Then another piece of wood was added at some point to sure up the middle. There was a grapevine planted on each side, and from underneath, evidence that many, many clusters of grapes went unpicked this year.

Turns out that the lady got stung by a yellowjacket while trying to garden underneath the arbor, and got a bad allergic reaction. She was afraid to pick the grapes this summer because there were always bees of some sort around the grapes. She tried to pick at night with a flashlight, but it was too hard. We discovered that what we both really wanted was a large arbor with room underneath to put a table and chairs. We bonded.

She gave me a grapevine volunteer that she'd tied up to a lamppost this past spring, nurturing it and hoping to find a home for it. I planted it in a holding garden for the winter. It is a concord grapevine.

So the conversation was good, as she is a kindred spirit...she even wants to learn how to spin! I will be saving that phone number and address for next year, for sure.

I had one of the landscapers that I called actually call me back...he will drop off a load of acorns with the leaves...it will be mostly leaves, but I need to see if it is an avenue worth pursuing next year. The pigs will work the leave into the soil, improving it. That area is in serious need of some good topsoil. He told me he gave a lot to a buddy and he has very rich topsoil in his pig pasture now, whereas before, it also was very poor.

I'm making connections from a silly little ad on craigslist! Imagine that!

Oh, and the lady with the grapevine also had a medium-sized white dog that I thought was Bichon at first, but when I got closer, it was not...but what? She said it was a cross between a ****zu and a miniature American Eskimo. She said the white was from the Eskimo and that when the dog is wet you can see black spots on her back...just like our Biscuit! I knew he was not a cockerpoo. His nose is too smooshed-in. He is white with black spots on the skin of his back. I now can officially call him what I've been wanting to call him....a Sh!tpoo!

 

[Farmfresh]

Great connections! Perhaps you can pick the grapes for you new friend on shares!

 

[freemotion]

That is what I am hoping!!!! She made a comment about giving so much stuff away and wondering if anyone actually used it or threw it out....sad....I am careful about who I give stuff to now. But still I get naive and give something to someone and find out they chucked it after all....sigh.

But to those who appreciate it...well! I give the most stuff to a friend who can most afford to pay me for it but I never let her...even eggs, that I sell to everyone else (those hens have to eat!), she gets for free since she appreciates them so much. She even opens the cartons and enjoys the textures and colors and shapes as much as I do.

How many people do you know who are suspicious of your hen's eggs because they are not all white and exactly the same?

 

[Javamama]

How many people do you know who are suspicious of your hen's eggs because they are not all white and exactly the same

Oh, about half my family and all of the neighbors Whatever. But we give excess eggs to the food pantry people at church and they love them. And there's a Nigerian couple who wants some of our old hens and would also like a goat someday

 

[freemotion]

Picked up another three large bags of acorns that a friend raked up!

 

[freemotion]

I got brave and went into the pig pasture with dh. I took a stout stick and a hoe and poked those pigs on their snouts so they would back off from my scrawny, yet delicious, legs and feet.

I got a chance to kick through the acorn pile (LOTS left! All the original, black, fermented ones are gone, as are the sprouted white oak acorns.) I looked at the corn ears to see how many were eaten and how many were left, as it is hard to tell from a distance if a husk is empty or full. There were quite a few left, but I still want to get a couple more loads if I can.

I got a chance to get a close look at the plowing the pigs have done. Amazing! They have cleared out all the pokeweed and the smaller trees growing on the mound. If they keep going, they will clear the cherry and sumac trees growing there. I hope they do. I will have more space to plant peas and oats for hay in the spring before the next batch of piggies arrives.

I finished cleaning up the tomato garden that the goats destroyed before I got a single picking done. I put 8 more five gallon pails of rotting tomatoes into the pig pasture, for a total of 16 five gallon pails. No salsa, not spaghetti sauce, no chili, no ketchup, no pizza sauce, no diced tomatoes for recipes..... At least there will be more bacon! At least I know I can grow tomatoes!

 

[freemotion]

I picked up 11 more sacks of ear corn today. I kept one in the barn for the chickens. Today I fed them their evening corn from the ears. I put on gloves and rubbed the kernels off as I walked around the paddock with a mixed flock of poultry an a herd of greedy goats following me. Free feed! A few lucky hens got a fat, green corn worm, too. Most ears had one.

I handed the other ten sacks of corn over the pig pasture fence to dh, who spread them in a large pile in the center of the field. We'd dumped the last 21 sacks along the fence, and that was not the best plan. The pigs push some up against the fence and the goats grab them, and some critters (racoons? coyotes?) are dragging some out along the other fence. So they are all in the middle now.

The pigs had eaten a lot of the previous corn. There are still plenty of acorns left in their pile, but they have made a serious dent in it. They ate a lot of the tomatoes, and have gutted all the pumpkins. They eat more of the rotten ones, so they will be going eventually.

Cheesemaking tomorrow=more whey for the piggies!