Will and Christian cleaned out the cow stall and yard

Taking advantage of the great weather, Christian manned the tough job of hand-pitching a winter’s worth of calf poop and old bedding out of the old goat barn/cow stall so we could put Lace back in so we could milk easier. While he did that, Will took our bulldozer, Old Yeller in and pushed all of the old manure out of the outside pen. What a pile all that made!

Then Will used our new reconditioned manure spreader to haul the manure out onto our new pasture and pumpkin patch on the new forty. It took many trips but you can never have too much manure on a farm, not when commercial fertilizer is well over $500 a ton! The milk and meat are not the only valuable products our cattle make.

We finally got our tomatoes in the ground, protected by Wall O’ Waters…all 52 of them. And that’s not counting the ones I’m putting up in our house garden’s raised beds.

Will’s busy right now tilling in the garden where our hoop houses will sit. He and Christian moved them out of the area yesterday to facilitate tilling. Hopefully, soon the hoop houses will be covered and be ready for me to plant.

The knee’s been not so hot; it’s swelling and very sore, so back to the doctor today. Sigh. Hopefully he can wave a magic wand over it and it’ll feel better? Yeah, right.

Yesterday, I drove to my son Bill’s house to meet with two people who had bought half a pig each. Sarah drove up from the Twin Cities and Becca met me after her work in Duluth. I hope they enjoy each and every bite! We really do like the taste of our Red Wattle pork and it seems that everyone who tastes it does too! Darn, now I’m hungry! — Jackie