Our first attempt at Broiler Chickens

As the Homestead continues to progress the next step for us are chickens. On July 28th 2016,  25 Ideal 236 laying hens and 30 Cornish Cross broilers arrived in the mail from Ideal Nursery down in Cameron, Texas.

We've had a couple of very small batches of chickens between us, but never this many at once, so we're learning a lot. The Cornish Cross are amazing to watch grow so fast. In a week, they've already doubled in size compared to the Ideal 236s.

We're using shredded paper as bedding and have re-purposed a leaky 100 gallon water trough as their temporary home.

As with any venture, there are going to be losses, and they always break my heart. The first loss died straight away, from an unknown malady. The second appeared to have gotten himself wedged under the water and then crushed by others. Tonight I went outside to terrified chirping to find a 4 for long snake attempting to eat one of the Cornish. The snake meet his fate at the business end of a flat head shovel.

Hopefully the next 5 weeks will pass peacefully for the Cornish, before they graduate to the freezer.

Adventures in Paddocking

Before on top, 3 days later on the bottom.

So last year, before my lovely bride got here I tried to throw together some paddocks, and shift the cattle by myself. To be honest it was a failure. I didn't spend enough time researching best practices, but I learned a lot from that failure. Not running a ground wire allowed the cattle to walk through the fence when the ground got too dry. I didn't have a strong enough shock even when getting a solid ground from the .5 Joule charger. The fence is always going to be way longer than you think it is.

So this year, new start, lots of reading about how to build a fence that will work when it's super dry. I settled on more grounding opportunities. I broke down and bought the three galvanized, 6 foot tall rods that were recommended by Zareba https://amzn.com/B0079GH4HU on the 25 mile charger. Those were grounding rods were banged as far into the ground as I could, then an additional ground (-) line was run in the middle of the fence giving the opportunity to shock the cows twice, from both completing the circuit through the grounding rods if the cattle only tough the top or bottom wire, or if should they grounding rods are too dry to complete a ground if the cows walk into either top of bottom wire and the middle wire, they should, and so far have, receive a healthy shock. So much so that after just a few encounters with the wire, they're giving it a healthy respect.

11 days into this experiment, and I couldn't be happier with the fences, and ease of moving the cattle. After the first shift, they've figured out that the grass is always greener on the other side of the electric fence and run through the gate as soon as they're lowered. 

If you're thinking about buying the polywire, stop thinking and do it if you can afford it. So much easier to work with and visible to the cattle. And after buying 3 rolls at $44 at Tractor Supply of the 1310 foot variety, I found this deal on Amazon:  https://amzn.com/B01BQB5S8A which works out to $40 for the first 1310 feet and 2620 feet free. Best deal I've found.

Range Management Can Be Fun

Blue Bonnets

Belted Galloways and Regenerative Agriculture

The Belted Galloway

Part of the homestead plan is to feed our family, along with that we hope to have an excess of meat to sell to help fund the Reds college. 

In 2014 we bought two young Belted Galloway heifers, in May 2015 I sold the donkeys and bought a cow/calf Dexter pair. I had read good things about both, and specifically good things about raising them both here in Texas. Nearly a year later the Galloways are proving to be the better fit for us. 

The Galloways did amazing on what was really scrub pasture the first year here. The superiority of the Galloways was very apparent after the Dexters joined the herd. The Galloways stayed fat and happy on the scrub whereas the Dexter struggled a bit. 

The other advantage, for me at least is the Galloways are naturally polled, meaning they are born without horns. Momma Dexter is a great mom, but when she gets excited about the feed bucket, that I've taught them all to follow, I get a bit nervous.

New Used Tractor

Massey Ferguson 135

Well, I finally broke down and bought a fixer-upper tractor. She runs. Leaks fuel when shut down, probably needs the carb rebuilt. I replaced the cap, wires, and coil. Immediately it ran better. I've gone through and replaced the radiator hoses that were pretty much all at the end of their serviceable life.

I've replaced the metal oil filter cartridge with a twist on. The front tires will need replaced in the next year. She's not much to look at but 43 horses of getting stuff done, and she's all mine. She's easy to work on, straight forward, and intuitively put together. That and there's a YouTube video for just about everything out there.

So far I'm digging her. Hopefully she'll work out well for the farm. I'll keep updates coming for folks who're looking for an older tractor. I spent almost a year and a half on Craigslist getting to know the market for used tractors (I was lucky enough to borrow my neighbors tractor the couple times I needed to brush hog) and knew a good deal when I saw it on a tractor that is prized for it's simplicity, ease of maintenance, and solid availability of parts (NAPA in this tractor's case).

An Old NCO Eating Dinner Alone

You don't know me, often I don't get to say thank you. This had never happened to me before I moved to Texas. Since moving here though it's happened at least once a month, sometimes much more.

I've been alone, I've been in a large group, I've been with another old crusty NCO, but you don't know me.

I'm an old man in a young man's business. I'm weathered, rough around the edges, knuckle dragging dinosaur in a profession that hasn't changed in many ways from its inception in the Roman Legion. On the other hand as a social experiment nothing is the same as when I first put on the uniform, but you don't know me.

I swear too much, I'm more comfortable among other men of my ilk than eating alone in a crowd of strangers. I've spent 4 of the last 5 years away from my wife and our kids. It's my lot in life, and am so blessed to have a wife that understands my calling. My love of country. Dedication to the Ideal that is America, or my view of it anyway, Family, Duty, Honor, but you don't know me.

We'll probably never get to sit down and visit, but I want you to know how humbled I am by that meal you bought me. You don't know me, but you went out of your way to be kind. You don't know me, but you went out of your way to sacrifice your means to pick up a meal for me, or a group of us.

I'm so proud to wear the uniform, I have the best gig in the world, I work with men who'd I kill for, die for, live for. I won the lottery to be in Texas, to be part of a flying unit, each day is a blessing. You don't know me, you'll probably never read this, but on the slim chance you ever bought an old NCO a meal know it means the world to him. Thank you.

The Impotence of Government

Yes, this too could be your Driver's License Photo

I worked as a CDL examiner for about a year in Oregon. It was an education on how oppressive Government, at any level can be. I saw rules followed simply to irritate or give a sense of power to the person behind the counter, versus taking care of the person who paid my salary. Don't get me wrong, I worked with really decent, good people in my office, but they were human.

It was most apparent in my training class in Salem. The instructor there told us if the final score on the test was within 5 points of passing, to deduct another 5 points just to make sure the test taker didn't push back on the score. Having a hatred of bad referees, and an overly active sense of fair play, I pushed back and told the instructor there was no way I was going to do this.

She told me I would, or that there'd be consequences for me. My time at the VA left me jaded to ominous threats, so I responded where in the regulations this directive was to be found, and that unless it was codified, the score the test taker earned was the score they'd be given. She left arrogantly, telling me that she'd get it in writing and insinuating that I could tow the line or be let go during the training if I didn't acquiesce. Having been looking for a job when I found that one, I resigned myself to my fate. She returned after lunch and without looking at anyone said that we were all free to give any score the test taker earned to them.

So why spend all this time relating this story under the picture of a lady with a colander on her head? I'm glad you asked. I have a good friend that recommended I read Alinsky's "Rules for Radicals" and after reading it I realized how good the Left has become at forcing everyone else to play by the Rules, even when it seems ridiculous, case in point, after granting religious exemption to head garb in DMV photos, the Pastafarians sued for legal standing to do the same thing.

More and more folks on the right/libertarian/liberty factions are beginning to embrace this rebellion through rule following. I don't think my friends on the left understand what they've started in binding up multiple arenas of government. You're seeing the fruit of this with police officers who understand they can't be fired for writing reports, but can be fired for interacting with minorities, so to feed their families they're getting more and more content to use the rules to protect themselves, even as cities burn.

Combine the hamstringing of police (versus the call for a demilitarization, they're two very different things) with shrinking budgets do to growing costs and fading revenues and I think we're going to see more and more disparity in police outcomes (ie crime stats) in SJW cities (New York New Orleans, Baltimore, Chicago, etc), versus traditionally strong law and order cities (think Red South, mid-West, and intermountain West). This will lead to a hastening of productive citizens from those cities, decreased tax base, more crime, until you have more and more Detroit like failures of those cities.

Anytime you see your city, county, municipality, or even the Feds doing something silly, don't get mad, make them get into the weeds doing what their regulations say...