Happy Life, Happy Wife!

Colonel’s Blog, Earthdate 6 July 2023…

Hey Y’all!

Good evening and happy Thursday from Air2Ground Farms! It rained Tuesday evening! The bottom 3 pics are the rainbow as the rain started. We were under one of those pop-up thunderstorms and it rained an inch and a half in 45 minutes. The wind swirled and blew down some limbs but we were very glad to have the rain. Yesterday we moved the beef flerd, dairy flerd, and bottle lambs. By the time I finished in the garden, it was after 9:00pm and I didn't have it in me to write the blog. We started the day by moving the dairy flerd. Not actually, truthfully, we started the day like normal with coffee, staff meeting, and rounds. Then we set up the next paddock for the dairy flerd, then we moved them. It was a total non-issue. We called the rams and they obliged by meandering to the new area. Then we just opened the gate from the milking area letting Happy and Betty out. That’s it. The beef flerd move was also very uneventful, just the way we like it, but a bit more involved. Makaylah, Shelley, and I set up the new pasture by running two poly-wires with temporary step-ins along the road to further encourage everyone to stay put. Then we went to the pasture where the flerd spent the night and opened the gate to the lane where we wanted them to travel to the next pasture. I called them…”Sheep, Sheep, Sheep!” Our bottle lamb, ewe now, Sheepster came running. That’s all it takes to convince the entire sheep flock that it’s time to go. I jogged and walked, staying just in front of them calling Sheepster, encouraging her to keep up. Up the hill we went all in a bunch, me in the lead and Shelley and Makaylah making sure everyone stayed together. We shut them in their new pasture and went back down the lane to get the cows. This time Shelley led the group. She called “Come on cows, come on cows, come on cows!” The entire group, including the newest bull calf, came running. I kept everyone going at the end of the train and Makaylah drove the side-by-side behind us so we could ride back. After we got them in their new area, we had to move their salt and minerals, set up a water trough for the lambs, and hook up the fence charger. Two moves complete, we set out to move the bottle lambs. We set up their new area and just picked them up and moved them. All-in-all, a very good day. Today was forecast to be overcast and in the low-80s. So…we called an audible and started processing the beef chickens instead of waiting until next week when it is forecast to be in the 90s. Since we changed the plan, my parents weren’t able to make it so it was just Makaylah, Shelley, and I. After morning rounds, we set up the assembly line and we started processing around 11:00. We processed 36 birds and were finished cleaning up by just after 4:00. The birds are chilling in water in the ice-cream freezer, awaiting their final move to freezer-camp in the morning. We will do the rest of the birds tomorrow and today's batch will be frozen and ready to sell at the market this Saturday. Rebekah made the milk and egg delivery to town for us this evening so we could stay home and do evening rounds.

The past two days have been a lot of hard work. We are tired by the end of the day. As we were chatting about things this morning over coffee, we thought back 2 1/2 years as we would sit in the same chairs, having coffee before my commute into DC to the Pentagon, and we would discuss the possibility of having a farm someday. We wanted to move animals to new pastures and live the process of regenerating land. We would wonder if we would or even could have meat birds and process them ourselves, like we would see the “experts” do on YouTube. Just two years ago, neither of us had owned a cow or a pig in our adult life. We had never had anything to do with sheep, ever, except maybe at a petting zoo. We had never owned a meat chicken, and certainly never processed one. We had never milked a cow. Now, this is just life, as if we have always done it. I think it is important to take a step back sometimes and remember how we got here. We took a moment this morning to be happy in this life we’ve built. I know folks say “Happy wife, happy life.” I think the reverse is true: “Happy life, happy wife!”

Local Farm Report for 4 & 5 July 2023:

Harvest:

55 Chicken eggs

12 Duck eggs

1 Goose egg

10 1/4 Gallons of milk

Cheers!

Psycho & Shelley