Pigs Hinder Surveying

With the rains of the last two weeks, the cover crop has poked up well, and the market garden has a lovely green shine. Wonderful to see in the morning light!

Phil and I headed down to survey the bottom of the finger, in and around the current pig pen. All was going smoothly when suddenly the five remaining pigs came to investigate. Apparently, they have deep affection for Phil the feeder, as they came, sniffing curiously.

We had a bad few moments as Phil tried to protect his surveyor's level from pig tipping. No matter how loud a noise, the pigs just wouldn't spook. In the end, we dragged four gates over to make a little pen of safety around Phil (naughty Chunky nosed the device even when almost wholly boxed in), and the pigs retreated to the woods.

But only for a few minutes. Then they were back, nibbling at the pink plastic survey flags, set in place with time and effort. When Chunky pulled one up, Phil and I loosely fenced the pigs out of our area, and hurriedly finished placing flags and measuring distances.

The topography of our land is steep enough (roughly dropping about 25 feet in 100) that we had to reset the level to continue surveying. The big pigs, by that time, had pushed through our temporary fencing. And the piglets came wandering through the woods. And they nibbled on the flags! We would run after them, waving our arms, and they would race away, only to creep back as soon as we were back at work.

I will not be sad when the pigs are in the freezer. In fact, I salivate and eagerly anticipate that day.

Surveying done at last, I helped Phil move the chickens to a new pen. It is not easy to herd headstrong chickens! But they were finally contained.

The layers' production has decreased again. I noticed, in moving them, that they appeared quite low on oyster shells (the free choice calcium), so I replenished that.

There was a day earlier this week when we had 14 white eggs and six browns. Of the six, two were large enough they could have come from the old Rhode Island Reds. Which means that the new Barred Rocks are laying four eggs to the 14 of the Leghorns. It made us seriously consider cutting our losses with the eight-month old birds and just having fewer white eggs through the winter.

But the brown production has come up a bit each day since, so perhaps they have won a reprieve. We aren't sure.

Jadon saw an illustration in a book of a house of cards. He cleared his bed (a sheet of plywood lofted near the ceiling: he's rejected the air mattress on top that the other boys enjoy) and practiced for some time. In frustration, we checked online for hints. He was doing it right, except trying to make the bottom edges touch, rather than keep them separated. That was the tip he needed for success. Not a bad accomplishment for an afternoon.

And Joe instantly conquered his fear of heights. Lately when it's time for bed, I'll teasingly sit him up on Jadon's or Isaiah's upper bunk to see if he wants to sleep there. I would keep my hands on his waist as his little wiry body would stiffen, and he would say, "Get me down!" But today he realized he could climb up onto Isaiah's bed on his own and jump down.

So he did, over and over again, with great glee.