MARCH ON THE FARM

Ah March, the month when the weather is always changing, the pollen is flying, and the greening pastures seem to be constantly fighting to stay green after the last frosts of the season. Just when you think you’re going see the pastures green up and start growing, a frost hits and browns it back out again. The warm weather also builds the desire to start spraying fields for weeds, spreading fertilizer, or as in our case, hook up the disk and start cutting ground in preparation of spring planting. Spring always builds the desire to get going, a desire that can have you wasting time and money when one of the last, sometimes unexpected, cold snap hits. Probably the biggest spring time project we have on the farm is to take 1 of our permanent pastures, and part of another, and convert them to seasonal pastures. In order to do this we will have to kill the existing pasture, disk it, and plant it in whatever we want the cows to graze on. Our plans are to plant Pearl Millet in one field and Sorghum Sudan grass in the other this spring followed by Cereal Rye, oats, or a combination of the two in the fall. This will provide us higher quality grazing in the summer when the permanent pasture grasses lose quality, and will provide us more winter grazing that will be available to graze earlier in the fall and help carry us through winter. For years we’ve planted winter rye grass which has provided us good grazing beginning in February but we want, and need, grazing that is available earlier in the year and help us eliminate some of the hay that we need to purchase annually. We feel planting these fields seasonally will help us achieve those goals. We have been trying to rotate our cows through all the fields to get them as much green grass as possible and to cut down on the amount of hay we have to feed. Unfortunately, the weather keeps flip flopping around with the weekly frosts keep throwing the permanent pastures back into dormancy. We expect the weather to level out this week and don’t expect any more frosts. If we’re right, we should begin getting better growth out of our rye grass and begin seeing the permanent pastures begin greening up. It will sure be nice not having to worry about putting hay out every other day and just let the cows wonder in the fields. By late April we should have enough grass to begin our warm season pasture rotation schedule. We also have plans to move away from having a herd of momma cows and producing some of our own steers to raise out and process to buying steers and feeding them out. The reason is simple, I’m getting older and need to step back more and having bred cows to attend to is very time consuming and limits the number of animals that can be raised on our farm. It takes 30 months or so to get a new born calf to processing size plus the additional 9 months it takes from the time of breeding to the time of birth. We can buy yearling steers and graze them on our grass for 18 to 24 months before they’re ready to process. This allows us to grow more beef on the same amount of land and makes our beef enterprise more efficient. Having a breeding herd on the farm can present several issues including having to pull baby calves. I didn’t mind getting in there to help pull a stuck calf but just don’t have the desire to continuing doing so when it happens. As much as we enjoy seeing the new born calves, we have to keep in the back of our mind that we don’t just farm; we have to handle all of the logistics of having it processed and sold here at our farm store or packed and delivered to our customer’s homes. Once Annie and I are out of the picture, it falls on Jesse and Amy who are already busy handling the market, deliveries, and cutting and packing a large amount of our products. It seems that we have finally moved past PRRS in our hog herd. Over the past several months we have seen more of our sows become pregnant when bred and have seen larger, healthier, litters being born. Recently when Jesse was giving iron shots to the litter, he had a hard time getting his hand around the piglets because they were so thick and healthy; the shots were given at 2 days old! These piglets will soon be 4 weeks old and should weigh around 17 lbs at weaning. The subsequent litters have also been extremely healthy, growing fast, with very few deaths from secondary infections as occurred during the latter stages of the outbreak. This week our Duroc/Berkshire boar, Chief, was moved to his new pen at our sow lots. This move makes utilizing Chief easier and allows us to move our weaned sows to Chief or to our Yorkshire boar Wilfred by simply walking the sow down the alley and into whichever boar lot we chose. There is no stress on the animal or the handler and will make moving the sow even easier once warm weather gets here; a hog can’t sweat and can easily overheat in summer if stressed. By using 2 boars we have more control over our breeding and the meat qualities we are trying to achieve while also providing longer resting periods for our boars. Those of you that follow us on Facebook know that the new market here on the farm opened about 3 weeks ago, well the retail side of the market opened. Though we passed our DHEC inspection, we were told the week the market opened that the market required a DHEC approved commercial well. We weren’t expecting this since we had our existing well tested and there was no bacteria or contaminants found. A good friend of ours that had owned a butcher shop for years had told us that the DHEC requirements had changed and that if the water tested ok, we wouldn’t be required to have a commercial well. His facility was actually DEHC and South Carolina Meat and Poultry inspected, it wasn’t that DEHC changed their requirements, it was that SC Meat and Poultry doesn’t require a commercial well whereas DEHC does. I can assure you I have now learned to ask DHEC and not depend on what someone else tells me. DHEC allows residential wells for homes and requires commercial wells for all businesses that handle food which we do. We are working with DHEC now on the permitting process and will have the well drilled as soon as the permit is given and the well driller can drill the well. Many of our customers are avid smokers and grillers and often post pictures of the food they produce. We always enjoy seeing the posts and learning what our customers are doing with the meat they purchase from us. Our customers like the fact that Jesse also enjoys grilling and smoking and often cuts things like Thors Hammers and Tomahawk rib eyes for them to enjoy; cuts that aren’t normally found at a grocery store. Jesse has also started stocking premium lump charcoal and pellets in the market, things that our customers have requested. In the future they will be stocking a line of premium seasonings and rubs with the hopes of better serving our customers that enjoy Sunday afternoons by the smoker. Seems we’ve become the place where avid smokers come to get their meats and we couldn’t be happier. Just a few minutes in the market and you’ll hear conversations of how they smoked this or that and what they plan to do next. It’s not what you expect to hear when shopping at a typical grocery store. Recently the market has been stocking several flavors of coffee from Charleston Coffee Roasters. Amy plans to increase the numbers of flavors offered and is considering possibly stocking whole bean. Charleston Coffee Roasters is some of the best locally roasted coffee around; a certain amount of all coffee purchased from Charleston Coffee Roasters goes to support the local Loggerhead turtle initiative. We couldn’t be prouder to sell their product here in Walterboro. This time of year is extremely busy on the farm, so busy that I’m sure there is a lot more happening than I have written about or can even remember. The days are now filled with work from early morning until after dinner time. There are daily chores to handle, books to keep updated, orders to process, and inventory to maintain. With April right around the corner we will be adding a day or more a week of mowing, pasture spraying, and occasional bush hogging to maintain our pastures; the warm and lazy days of summer are anything but on a farm. All things considered I don’t think there’s one person here on the farm that would have it any other way. Enjoy the early spring weather! Annie, Marc, Amy & Jesse