All about the WEATHER

Well its been a dark, wet and gloomy week all around in the TN Valley and beyond! It felt like it would never stop raining, but thankfully today the sun is glorious and all around us. The picture of the barn at Hidden Haven and below about describes my workday with Laura this week, just add light or heavy rain, wind and some more rain for good measure, and that was not only my day but the whole week. I went up on Wednesday this week, and we had big plans once again for seedlings and garden work, but spent most of the day - besides chores, getting feed, feeding, and making repairs to animal shelters. Wednesday was an unusually windy day for Chattanooga, which meant up at the farm it was extra specially windy, Laura had had a long night with the wind whistling round her house, and blowing tarps off shelters. So I once again got a lesson in being flexible.

Last year the TN Valley where we live had a record rainfall year, in 129 years of recording, which means we started 2019 off with very saturated ground and a never ending forecast of rain. This last week we have had some severe flooding in our area, we live near the Chickamauga dam and it has been quite amazing to watch TVA - Tennessee Valley Authority at work as they try control the levels of water up and down the TN River, the rain has stopped as of today with about 7 inches falling just this last week, and rivers are still rising, many lower lying roads are closed due to flooding, and farmers are struggling. The mud is thick on farms and farmers locally are having to deal with downed limbs breaking fences, like one of Laura below, shelters getting destroyed, animals getting weary of the rain and farmers feeling very discouraged. So, Wednesday after chores and a feed run, we set to repairing a couple of Laura goat and chicken coops that had gotten beaten up the night before.

The goats love Laura, and are ever curious as they tried to figure out what she was doing, and kept biting at her jeans and hovering around her, needless to say they were happy with their shelter repair, and thankful for the break from the cold and wind. Part of the large chicken coop, had also had its tarp blown off, and we got a little more aggressive with that, nailing it down. The duck house had been blown to the back of the paddock where they live, and moved another time while I was there during the day.

After we got all the shelters fixed and restored, we set about unloading all the feed we got at the feed store earlier in the day. I am learning the cost of feed for just the small amount of animals Laura has, winter can be an expensive time for farmers, especially with most pastures having turned to mud over the last few months. I got a great workout carrying the 50lb bags of feed and loading them all into their various containers in the feed room, this is a weekly task for Laura, costing almost $450/week to keep all the livestock, poultry, dogs and cats fed. I am having a whole new appreciation for farmers who chose good non-gmo and organic feed for their animals, as it is definitely a financial and times commitment, but also requires a love of the job to continue on through.

The other thing I was learning about this week, was the cost of hay! "make hay while the sun shines" it hasn't been shining much lately, so hay is a precious commodity costing around $40 for one of the beautiful bales.

Laura was teaching me how to unroll them, the quantities required of each animal daily. She currently buys the big round bales, but really prefers the rectangular ones, as they are easier for her to handle on her own, but not much is available this time of year, so she gets the large ones delivered, and has to take hay out daily for animals.

I didn't get as many photos as I like to this week, just because we were busy doing mending, feeding and clean up more so than usual, but in between everything Laura was giving me some great lessons on gestation of animals. She currently has 4 cows, two in milk, with them having a 9 month gestation, she tries to give them a 4-5 month break before birthing, as apposed to the standard 60 days, she feels its important to let them have a break on their bodies and udders and use their energy to grow healthy babies.

Goats are her main animal that she breeds and with their gestation being only 5 months, she too gives them about a 4 month break from milking before birthing. Currently she has 4 first freshness, that are pregnant, 3-3rd and 4th freshness, and then she has about 7 more that she is hoping are pregnant. Its been interesting to learn about different gestation periods, and the names of the goats depending on how many season they've given birth in. Animal breeding (other than chickens) is not something I have had a huge long term interest in, but my interest is getting piqued and I may consider one of the livestock courses in the future, if not only to have the knowledge.

Our poultry projects in the garage are growing, and I think we figured we have 147 ducks and chickens living in there right now, that are fast gonna run out of room, so we are really praying for the weather to be dry for a while, and warm up some, so some of these babies can be moved out in the next few weeks, especially the ducks, who had to be rehired again,

The Freedom Rangers are gaining weight and looking more like big chickens by the day, they are definitely not as skittish as the ducks and very curious when we got in with the shovel to clean their litter out.

Their weight based on a sampling of 5 birds runs between 1.73 and 1.79lbs.

Ducks are messy to say the least, I had been warned but now an a believer, they are super skittish and love to stay together, they got rehired this week, still in the garage, into this playpen area, I am amazed at their growth each week, even though they didn't weigh in much more than the chickens on average at 1.82lbs. One did weigh in at over 2lbs, but she is just bigger all around.

They are going through a tremendous amount of feed now - 62 chickens and 12 ducks - 63.5lbs in the last 6 days alone~which is almost double from last week.

The egg laying chickens, we are not weighing each week, but they are also in the garage with the others, and will move into the big brooder box once they move outside. They are still sweet and little and running around pecking and chirping, I love listening to them, chickens are definitely my favorite animal I am wanting to raise. Its a joy to be able to watch them each week.

Lastly, I check on Laura Saturday, as Friday night had brought more torrential downpours and in asking her how she was she texted me this:

This sums up farming right now in Tennessee, some serious drying out is needed for farmers to be able to bounce back, and get their pastures restored.