Trees are in!

We picked up my order from Trees of Antiquities this last Saturday. With the help of many naps we were able to get all trees and currant bushes in the ground. With any luck the trees will thrive and we'll be able to have our little medieval orchard.

New pig pen

So I got to spend the day building the new and improved pig pen. The old pen is still a morass of mud and filth after a week of dry weather. So I spent the day building a new pen out of the old chicken coop. Now our piggies will have a good place to get out of the cold and the damp as well as having a "yard" they can run around in and destroy to their hearts content. For any who are thinking of building a pig pen, the easiest way Rosie and I have found is to use "hog panels" and "T" stakes. The hog panels are 3ft tall, 1/4 inch thick welded and galvanized wire mesh, they are about 16ft long and a little heavy but easily movable by one person. The "T" stakes should be sunk in place with a post rammer, a large section of pipe with handles and an end cap welding in place. The panels and "T" posts are easy to install, weather proof, and will stand up to just about anything. We also use the same type of panels for the goats, but the goats get "cattle panel" same as hog panel but about 4ft tall. Oh and the panels are held in place with "U" bolts. All of the fencing goods are available from any good feed store or hardware store.

As much as I liked seeing how happy the pigs are running free threw the property, they have simply been too destructive to be allowed to continue. They have been destroying everything that they can; screen doors, bbq's, wood fired bread ovens, tarps, welcome mats, tools, the ground, the wood pile, and probably a few other items I have yet to discover. Nope, back to the pen guys. With any luck the chickens and the pigs will be able to co-habitat reasonably well. the feeding may be a bit of an issue as the pigs seem to think anything within 2 feet of the ground is made for piggy consumption but we will face that problem tonight with the evening feeding.

Flooding and guard pigs

The Central Coast of California recently had some epic disaster level rain resulting in wide spread flooding. Our home was pretty lucky, with our location and the earthworks Sam and I did with an excavator our flood was fairly minor. One casualty was our pig pen, it turned into a muddy morass about 12 inches deep. Digger our new pig and Oreo our big pig where uncomfortable but more or less OK. Macaroon was another story, her legs are so short that she was unable to get her main body out of the water and as a result became hypothermic. Rosie found her shivering and slow to respond in the middle of the pen. We decided that the most viable option was to open the pen up and let the piggies go "free-range" out in the property. The people who have been following our blog can understand why I had sudden visions of the pigs of evil. But we felt that we needed to give our current pigs a chance and let them get to some drier land. Well all in all our three pigs are doing well and love having the entire property to run free in. The only down side is that the pigs are far more destructive than we had thought, they get bored and smash, eat, knock over, pull around, or shred anything and everything they can get their little piggy mouths on. So far they have trashed our welcome mats, the BBQ, the table saw, a sun shade, the wood pile, and all the other animal food they can find. There will be a new pig pen in the very near future in order to limit the damage.

On the plus side, we have not been locking up the chickens and ducks at night as we normally do. Despite that we have not lost a single bird, due in no small part to Sergent Oreo of the pig patrol who seems to patrol the fence line at night and chase off any of the predators that seem to regard our yard as a protein rich snack bar. We see him huffing his way around the yard at night and one night inparticular we heard a whine/bark/screech that we are pretty sure was the sound a fox or coyote makes when charged and assaulted by a 500lb pig. I keep telling Oreo that if I ever go out into the yard and find him munching on a dead coyote or fox he gets to live on our farm for as long as he wants, never to see the inside of our oven. A guard pig is a good pig.