DECEMBER ON THE FARM

I’m finally getting the opportunity to sit down and write this month’s newsletter.  It’s the day after Christmas, and our energy level is beginning to run low, as is our patience.  While we had big plans of getting a little down time, and enjoying the Holiday season, we ended up spending days out preparing for the coldest cold snap we have experienced in years.  We had bedding that had to be put out for all the hogs, 2 sows that had to be watched in the farrowing house with one having a small litter on Christmas Eve, water lines that had to be kept flowing, and chickens that had to be fed and cared for in their houses rather than letting them out daily as is their normal routine.  Jesse cut the water off to the chicken field to prevent busted pipes and had to carry them water daily.  Today, once everything thaws, Jesse will fix the pipes that we know are broken and get water flowing to the chickens again.  Thankfully we use 80 gallon tanks at all of our hog grow lots to insure they have water when things freeze but think some of the supply lines to them will have busted even though we had the water supply to them cut off.  Hopefully we’ve seen the worst of it and expect a big warm up later this week.