Happy Piggies

   Through trial and error I finally got the pigs in their pen. I thought that the problem was the wires in the fence had to big of a gap between them, so I ran more wires between the existing ones to close up the gap. After that I put one of the pigs in the pen to see what would happen. Well, he walked up to the fence, and went right through it again letting out a little squeal from getting zapped. So again, I was chasing a pig through the woods. This time it didn't take too long now that I had practice. Once I caught him I put him back in the temporary pen, and went back to the drawing board.

   After doing some research on the internet, I found that the fence charger I was using was only putting out .5 joules. I took the charger back to the store and got a bigger one. The one I got puts out 6 joules, joules is an amount of energy. I hooked the new fence charger up to the fence and tried again. I grab the same pig and put him into the pen, this time when he touched the wires he let out a screech that was unbelievable and ran back to the center of the pen. I went got another pig and put her in and once she touched the fence she quickly ran away from it. When I turn around to get the last one he was standing up looking through the opening and wanted to be with the other two. When I put him in he must of watch the other two enough, because he stayed away from the fence.

   Once they figured out where they can go and not go they seemed very content with their new pen. The next morning when I went out to check up on them, I found the pen empty. It was until I made a noise tell I saw one of them pop up from the straw in their shelter, then all of them popped up. I guess they like to sleep underneath straw. They also took right to drinking out of the metal nipple that is hooked up to a trash can filled with water. When I bring their food out to them, they start run around, I don't know if they're running from me or running around because they're happy to get food. Either way they're starting to get used to being around us and their new home.

The Potato Bed

    The potatoes we planted a few weeks ago, have been growing pretty good this year so far. The warm sunny days and cool nights we've been having  this spring, have really kicked off this year's growing season.

   One of the important things to do when growing potatoes is mounding the plants when they get a certain height. The potatoes are planted about three feet apart, and when the plants which about a foot or so high you mound them. You do this by digging a trench between the rows and piling up the dirt around the plant.

   The reason you do this is to make the plant grow more potatoes. What happens is the plant recognizes the dirt and will send out more tubers to eventually grow into potatoes. The plant will also grow taller because of this.  We have ten rows with about 10 plants in each, so hopefully the potato crop should be very plentifully this year.
   Potatoes are a great plant for new garden beds, because you have to dig up the ground to plant them, then dig up the ground to mound them, and dig up the ground to find the buried treasure ( aka potatoes ). The kids have a blast with the last one. When you do all that digging you're aerating the soil and allowing nutrients to mix in. Potatoes are also a great plant for beginner gardeners. They are a very hardy plant, grow great in cooler regions, and can live through small droughts. In case you forget to water them form time to time. The only real problem you might have with them is the Colorado potato beetle.

   The Colorado potato beetle lives all over America, not just Colorado. These little flying beetles love potato plants, along with a couple other plants in your garden. The adults will eat the leaves, mate, then lay there eggs on the backside of the leaves. Once the eggs hatch, the larvae, which look like tiny slugs, will devour the entire plant. They also cover themselves in their own poop so that no bird or animal will eat them. We have tried using a insecticide spray on the plant, but found it not to be very effective due to the fact that the rain would wash it off and the beetles would be right back. I'm trying a new method this year, which is a little more organic. I use a mason jar filled with soapy water and try to knock the beetles into the jar or just grab them and throw them in. The beetles tend to have a fight or flight reaction so knocking them into the jar is pretty easy. I also check underneath the leaves for eggs and either wipe them off or tear the leaf off and feed it to the chickens. 

  Another method we're trying for planting potatoes is called a Irish potato barrel. It's not a barrel or from Ireland at all. What you do is take a tire and put it flat on the ground. Then put the potato seedling in the tire on the ground, and fill it up half way with dirt. Once the plants gets about a foot tall you fill up the tire completely. Then when the plant is again a foot tall you stack another tire on top of the other tire and fill it with dirt. You keep repeating the process until you run out of tires, or get tired of stacking tires. It look kind of ghetto, but we're going to give it a try.

    Some facts about Maine and potatoes.

• According to the USDA and the National Agricultural Statistics Service, potatoes accounted for 24 percent of Maine’s total agricultural cash receipts in 2009, the highest percentage.
• There were over 6,000 farmers devoted to raising potatoes in Aroostook County, Maine around 1930-1940.
• In the middle of the twentieth century, Maine produced more potatoes than any other state in the nation. Today, potatoes continue to be a critical part of the state's economy, with the fertile soil of Aroostook County being the largest growing region.
• 
  

  Schools in Aroostook County still take a three week long "harvest break" in late September to pick the potatoes, just like they did 70 years ago.

      And you thought living in California was exciting.

The First Strawberry of the Season

We'll see which one of the kids gets the first one.

When A Chicken Has A Bad Day

When you think you're having a bad day, just think how this chicken's day went when she had to squeeze this egg out.

The egg on the right is the an average size from our chickens, what the stores would call "extra large". The egg on the left is from a chicken, it's just a double yoker.



Homemade Granola

    One of the things we've been trying to do is make are own food and snacks. Part of it's to save money, part of it's to know what we're eating, and the other part is two of our family members are gluten free. After many adjustments to the recipe, I think we found a winner for homemade granola. The kids love to eat as a snack, or sometimes the eat in the morning on top of their yogurt. Either way you eat it, we think it's really good, and want to share it.



                                                        8 Cups of Oats

                                                        1 Cups Mixed Nuts (or whatever you got)

                                                        2 Ripe Bananas

                                                        1 Cup Brown Sugar

                                                        1/2 Cup Honey (or Agave Nectar)

                                                        1/4 Cup Molasses (if you got it)

                                                        2 Tablespoon Cinnamon

   

    Pour your oats into a large bowl. Then chop up the nuts in the blender tell they're a coarse meal and add them to the oats. Then put the bananas into the blender first, then the rest of the ingredients. Blend everything up until it's a liquid. Pour this over the oats and nuts, then mix it with a spoon until all the oats are coated. Spread mixture on to a large greased cookie sheet, preferably with sides on it, and make it as flat as possible with the back of the spoon. Toss the cookie sheet in the oven set at 250 degrees, and cook it for about two hours. Then take it out of the oven and let it cool in the pan. When it's coll enough to handle you can break it up into pieces and enjoy.

Three little pigs



Three little sausages links



    We just got our three little pigs on Sunday, and already one prove to be an escape artist. When I picked them up, I put two in one dog crate and the other in the other dog crate. Then put them in the back of the truck. When I got home, I put the first one in the pen I made for them, and watched him for a second or two and he seemed to be content. Then I went to get the other two, still keeping an eye on the one in the pen. I noticed he was walking to the back of the pen, but didn't think to much of it, thinking the electric fence would stop him. I turned around to grab the other two and I heared the pig squeal from the fence. I turned back around only to see the pig keep walking into the woods past the fence. That's when the pig scramble began.

The porker on the left gave me a run for my money

    Needless to say catching a free pig is no easy task. He took off towards the neighbor's house with me walking right behind him. The neighbors were out working on their porch, when the heard a wrestling in the leaves, they turned around to see a baby pig coming out of the woods onto their grass. I can only imagine what a shock that would be. Then I showed up right behind the pig, and explained to them what was going on. The pig then took off back into the woods, I tried to grab a couple of times, but failed. Then I tried to coral him back to the neighbors were they tried to corner him and grab him, but this also failed. After chasing him down for so long he was starting to get tiered. He stopped behind a big pine tree, where I was able to sneak up behind the tree. I reached around the tree and dived for his back legs, and was able to hold onto one of the legs. He was not happy about this and let me know vocally. I scooped him up still holding his back legs with one hand and his chest with the other. I talked to the neighbors for a minute or two, since we haven't talked in 3 years, and thanked them for their help.

Quick pen I put up

   Once we got back to the house I realized the pen was not going to work, and had to do something else. I put him back into dog crate, and made a quick 10' x 10' pen out plywood next to the shop. Put some straw down and cut a hole in the plywood for me to get into the pen. It's not pretty but it will do. Put the three little pigs in and watched them play in the straw.

When I makes some adjustments they'll live in here

The gap he jumped through

   When I went to the back of the pen where he got out, I noticed that the gap between the first wire and second wire was pretty big, big enough for a baby pig to jump through. He probably saw the first wire and jumped over it, but still got a shock from the second wire. His body weight carried him through and he was off through the woods. Not knowing how big the pigs were going to be I thought it would be OK. Of course my lovely wife somehow new that the spacing of the wires wasn't going to work, and informed me of this before and after the pig got out. I guessed I should have listen.