Beep... Beep... Beep... BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP!!!!

That's the sound of a Renco Preg-tone II Pregnosticator/Ultrasound handheld telling you that you're about to be a grandma...  These little handhelds are awesome.  If you're anything like me, you're a nut when it comes to looking at piggy vulvas at day 21.  These handy tools allow you to check on day 18 to see if they're going to come into heat or not, so you can order semen for AI or make arrangements for a boar.  On Day 30, they're 100 percent accurate at detecting pregnancy.

For about 250 dollars, you too can be saved from scrutinizing the 'business end' of your gilts and sows, for hours on end, wondering if it's getting bigger, or pinker, or anything out of the ordinary.  http://www.rencocorp.com/preg_tone_ii.htm


So, a little over a month ago, we AI'd our two sows.  Today, we were thrilled when we touched our PT2 to them, and it was screaming a solid tone.  It didn't matter if we pointed that thing at their shoulder (like you're supposed to), or between their ears, or at their back, or anywhere.  It was screaming that they were both pregnant the minute I touched it to them.  The three gilts that we knew were open also sounded open, with persistent beeping.  Why did I check them?  I couldn't believe how quickly and absolutely the sows toned.  But there's no denying it.  They's preggers!

So, for the matchups, here's what we are expecting in about 3 months:

Porkchop (Fame Monster x Hamp)  has been bred to Gopher Nation 88-1 (Stinger 8-4 x Fame Monster).  We're expecting black belteds out of this litter.  It's a Fame Monster on Fame Monster, so we're curious to see what we get, but should be fairly consistent in type.

Porkchop:  Porkchop was bred by Gary and Tina Tuckwiller of Asbury, WV.  She placed 3rd in her class at the West Virginia State Fair in 2012.  She has been the mother to several class winners and top placers at the Greenbrier/Monroe County Youth Livestock Show in 2013, and a 2nd in class at the 2013 West Virginia State Fair:

Gopher Nation 88-1:  Gopher Nation 88-1 was bred by the University of Minnesota, hence his funny name.  He is currently housed at North Iowa Boar Stud http://www.omnitelcom.com/~nibs/index.htm, and they donate $5 of every vial to the Randy Morris Memorial Award:

Fame Monster, who is the father to Porkchop, and sired the mother of Gopher Nation 88-1, is housed at Lean Value Sires http://www.leanvaluesires.com.  He was the $55,000 Champion Crossbred Boar at the 2010 STC and sired the 2012 Indiana State Fair Champion Barrow, amongst others.  Here he is:

In Porkchop's last litter, she weaned 12.  This will be her third parity, and we're hoping that it turns out to be one of her best!

Calyse (War Fare x York) has been bred to Blue Genes 69-35 (Blue Blood x Monster 52-4).  We are expecting an assorted colored litter, with hopefully some blues, some belteds, some white, and oddly enough, some red.  I'm pretty jazzed about the pairing.

Calyse:  Calyse was bred by Ray Showpigs http://www.rayshowpigs.com in Cabery, IL.  Her mother was class winner at the NJSA Summer Spectacular in 2011.  She has raised a Heavyweight Cross Class Winner at the IL State Fair.  Also Calyse raised the 2nd in class behind the Reserve Grand Champion Market Hog at the Douglas County Fair in MO.  Calyse came to us by peculiar means.  We bought her as a bred sow, from a fellow who had used her, only it turned out she wasn't bred.  Sadly, she wasn't cycling either.  She had large abscesses on her rear legs, was lame, had a UTI and was severely underweight.  We got her in the dark, so when we got home after driving 19 hours, and got to see her in the light, we were surprised and disappointed.  After several courses of antibiotics, urinalysis, changes in her diet, supplements, tests and medical intervention, it was a true miracle when we managed to get her cycling again, almost a year after her last cycle.  We were told it would be truly a miracle if she conceived, but we wanted to try.  We're not a big operation, maybe because we don't give up on animals that probably need more intervention and care than it should take.  It's probably because we started with dog shows, and you would not believe the lengths we dog people go to when it comes to keeping our animals alive and healthy, even if it means we'll never get a litter out of them.  Or maybe it's because I have my own battles that made her circumstances that much more wounding.  

Blue Genes 69-35:   Blue Genes was bred by Sieren Swine Farm  http://www.sierenswinefarm.com in Keota, IA, owned and operated by Jayme and Scott Sieren.  His sire, Blue Blood, was the Champion Cross boar at the 2011 WPX.  Blue Genes placed 4th in his class at the National Swine Fall Classic in Duncan, OK, and was purchased by North Iowa Boar Stud for $6,500.  

I can't vouch for this litter with regards to fertility, but Calyse had two litters of 7 and 9 before she stopped cycling, so I don't think fertility was a problem initially.  Only time will tell.  Irregardless, she's trim, healthy, sassy and pregnant right now, so thank God, our veterinarians and the staff at Virginia Tech, my wonderfully supportive and tolerant husband, and the Almighty Dollar for making it happen.  

War Fare was bred by Edwards Family Genetics in Dublin, TX http://www.edwardsfamilygenetics.com  and was housed at Mike Fischer Showpigs http://www.fischershowpigs.com in Iowa Park, TX.  

Blue Blood was bred by W-D Swine Farm http://www.wdswinefarm.com in Turlock, CA, and is housed at Upperhand Genetics http://www.upperhandgenetics.com in Huntington, IN.  

We also bred our Hereford gilt, Lucy (Sycamore, bred by Cook Farms, Hillsboro, OH) to Hershel at Shipley Swine http://www.shipleyswine.com for a summer litter.  Will update to let you all know if she took or not.  Cross your fingers!!!  We had hoped to have a litter out of this paring this January, but Lucy got injured by being jumped by one of our much larger sows, and her placenta detached, causing us to lose the litter.  She's separated this time.

An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure -- Benjamin Franklin

Good ol' Benny there had some great advice, though it is rarely heard today.  He was actually referring to fire prevention, but for near 150 years it would become the motto of mothers, doctors, and farmers looking to explain the practice of preventative care.

I'm sure you've all heard it before, but probably from someone 70 years and older.  A grandparent, an elderly neighbor, someone from a generation that was born during that time period.  They heard it their entire lives, as they were kept home from school for fear of contracting small pox or polio, both illnesses that had a terrifying rate of contagion.  They heard it from their grandmothers who were soaping their tomato plants, and grandfathers who were burning the loosestrife. Their doctors would say that an apple a day would keep the doctor at bay.  It was a period where cures weren't advanced enough to prevent disease and illness from overcoming the sick, so prevention really was the only method a person could use to survive.  They had no idea at the time that what they were actually doing was Bio-Security.

Then Louis Pasteur entered the scene in the late 19th century, and during the 1800's compulsory vaccination was all the rage across the country.  It wasn't until 1905 that the Supreme Court determined that it was unconstitutional.  Irregardless, at that point, the 'ounce of prevention' had turned to medicine, instead of bio-security.  In the 20th century, as quickly as diseases were discovered, a vaccine or treatment was also discovered, and people began to think that if there was a bug, there'd be a pesticide to kill it.  If there was a virus, there'd be a vaccine to avoid it.  If there was an infection, there'd be an antibiotic to cure it.  If there was a weed, there was an herbicide to eradicate it.

During the Victorian period, chemicals really became mainstream, with your local Pharmacist able to concoct anything and everything you could possibly need, from mercury treatments for syphilis, to blood letting to correct an imbalance of humors.  In addition to this sort of treatment protocol change, farmers were experimenting with chemical fertilizers in place of good old fashioned green manures like mangelwurtzels and manure.  It was a dawn of a new age, and as with anything that is new, mankind scrambled for the latest and greatest.

However, with this idea that there was always a pill to fix what ails you, Bio-security practices fell by the wayside.  We became fearless.  So... when something devastating came along, and no cure was readily available, it left people scared, terrified, confused, and angry.  Why weren't their doctors able to prescribe something to cure AIDS?  Why weren't doctors able to prescribe something to cure SARS?  How come we don't have something that cures CANCER?  Ebola?  Lupus?  Creutzfeldt-Jacob Disease?  As these diseases have come to light, the cry for a cure has grown louder, but no cure exists yet.  What has the world prescribed for people who might contract these diseases?

Prevention.   Avoid unprotected sex, don't travel to certain areas, better diet and exercise to avoid cancer, drink bottled water when on vacation, get a blood test and don't marry someone who has the same recessive gene for CJ disease...  Thank goodness that prevention is coming in vogue again.  But are we too late?  Have our behaviors doomed us to a downward spiral, especially when it comes to PEDv?

I bet you were wondering when we'd get to something piggy related, lol!  Bio-security practices are being treated as something new-fangled in the farming industry, when in all aspects, it practically developed there, with Rinderpest probably being the most notable.  Cattle plague was easily transmittable through contaminated water and air.  Farmers instituted a variety of bio-security practices from eradicating infected herds to strict isolation of healthy herds.  No known vaccination existed that was truly 100 percent effective, and from before 3,000BC to 1999AD, intense Bio-security was really the only surefire method of keeping naive herds from contracting it.  They started working on a vaccine in the 1700's, and it took nearly 200 years to come up with one that truly worked.  The last known Rinderpest case was in Kenya in 2001, and in 2010, the FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization) declared that we were free of the disease on a global scale.

200 years.  It took 200 years to develop a vaccine.  Let's think about this for a moment.  Vaccine development hasn't really changed all that much.  The processes are very similar now to what they were when vaccines first came onto the scene.  Identify a virus.  Isolate virus.  Duplicate virus.  Identify antibodies in survivors.  Isolate antibodies.  Duplicate antibodies.  Develop vehicle.  Combine vehicle with antibodies.  Inoculate naive sample.  Test.  Success goes towards production.  Failure goes back to step 1.

Even if you look at what most would consider Modern Medicine, say... 1950 and up, many of the biggest diseases still have no known cure or vaccine.  Prevention has been relabeled from a pill or shot to avoidance.  Bio-Security has become the prevention of today.

But... PEDv is a big deal!  And there are plenty of cases!   And plenty of survivors!   And plenty of antibodies!   And plenty of affected cases!  Why don't we have a vaccine yet?

Well, a few different reasons.  One, say a University makes a breakthrough with some aspect of the virus.  They're on that threshold of a major discovery and potentially a cure.  Another University is also on that same threshold.  If they shared information, someone would for certain develop that cure...  But which one?  Both Universities have invested time, money and effort in developing this cure, but only one will be known as the school that discovered it.  Keeping this information close to breast is the best way they can figure to guarantee that their people get the credit.  This slows down the process for everyone.  Greed.

Another reason is that it's really difficult to stem the spread of an epidemic when every Tom, Dick and Harry is out there buying pigs and selling pigs without any concern for bio-security practices and travel logs.  "Yeah, I delivered a truckload of 150 pigs from Nebraska to Ohio the other day."  "Where'd those pigs originate?"   "I dunno, just picked them up and trucked them."  Greed.

SwineID is a program being worked on by the National Pork Board that would grant premises an identification number, and each pig would have accurate animal tracing through timely and accurate record keeping of its movements by producers.  It's still elective at the moment.

Another reason is the, "I'm in this for ME," mentality.  I've heard it time and time again this season.  People are flat out unwilling to source local pigs from known PEDv negative farms, take a bit of a hit this year showing their animals, all in the name of ethical bio-security practices.  They would rather risk everything to go into states that are PEDv positive, to farms that may or may not be affected, crossing areas that may or may not have the virus, playing the may or may not game, to get a pig they feel they can really compete with, all so they can get a big purple ribbon.  Folks, that ribbon costs 3 dollars.  In fact, you can buy a 4 foot long rosette for 12 dollars.  Any color you want.  Is that ribbon really worth risking the health and future of your herd?  What about the breeding program of everyone else?  Is that ribbon worth it?  Sadly, for many, it is.   Greed.

Greed is the primary reason it's going to take 5 years or more to develop a vaccine and cure, instead of 12 months.

Bio-security is the only thing we know that works.  Stringent, unwavering bio-security.  I'm not a gambler.  Some people enjoy gambling.  They enjoy that thrill of throwing the dice and seeing if the come up winning or snake eyes.  I'm not one of those people.  There will be a lot of those people at the fair though.  The problem is, their losses will be everyone's losses.  I pray it's not yours.

'Til next time, Carbolic Acid.  That's goodbye in any language!

I'm Sick And Tired Of Being Sick And Tired. -- Fannie Lou Hamer

PEDv.   A bunch of letters, that by themselves are seemingly as innocent and nonthreatening as letters could be, but together, they form the abbreviation for Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea Virus.  Now, if you haven't heard about it yet, you've either been living under a rock, or are genuinely one of these non-tech folks that don't own a television, computer, smart phone, or any other 'new-fangled gadget'.  Chances are however that you have heard about it, and probably either have a lot of questions, or have heard some misinformation.  Here's what you should know:

Q: What is PEDv?
A:  PEDv is a Type 1 Coronavirus, which means it's part of the coronavirus families known to often affect humans, pigs, dogs and cats.

Q: Can I catch it?  Can my dog catch it?  Can my cat catch it?
A:  No.  Tests by epidemiologists (fancy talk for disease-spread-experts) have indicated that this virus is not zoonotic (fancy talk for loving to infect a bunch of different species) in nature.

Q: Where did it come from?
A:  PEDv is not new.  PEDv has been around for over 40 years.  It was first identified in Europe in the 1970's, but the strain they had was relatively mild.  They wrestled with it all the way through the 1990's.  By the late 1980's, it had spread to Asia, and during that period, morphed into a strand of the virus which was imported by the USDA's National Veterinary Services Laboratory.  The idea was that they could research it, and develop a series of safeguards and possibly a vaccine should it ever make it to the United States.  The US also began to prohibit the importation of pork and swine from countries known to have diseases, in hopes of preventing them from coming here.  The US virus is 99.4% similar to the Asian version.

Q: Then why aren't we better prepared if we've had it this long?
A:  PEDv is very hard to culture.  It thrives in piggy guts, but in a lab, not so much.  USDA-NVSL successfully managed to get it to grow, but when you've got diseases already here like TGE (Transmissible Gastro-Enteritis) and PRRS (Porcine Reproductive and Respiratory Syndrome), killing pigs in the moment, it's understandable that a disease that wasn't here would be put on the back burner.

Q: But is here now?  Where?
A:  PEDv has been detected in 25 states, Canada, Mexico and Peru.  I have a partial list, but no one it seems has compiled a list of where these farms are located.  It may be out of concern for safety for the producers, but it may also be due to the isolationist approach to vaccine/test/treatment development that often comes in the face of outbreaks such as this.  Universities and pharmaceutical companies will keep their research close to breast to protect their work until they can patent and then distribute.  The list I have so far, which is INCOMPLETE and will add to as I get information is:

Colorado
Idaho
Illinois
Indiana
Iowa
Kansas
Massachusetts
Michigan
Minnesota
Missouri
Montana
Nebraska
North Carolina
Ohio
Oklahoma
Pennsylvania
Texas
Wisconsin

Q:  What does PEDv do?
A:  Inside a pig's gut are these little grassy fingers called villi.  They sort of grab all the moisture and nutrients the body needs to survive and be healthy. PEDv is like a lawn mower, set on medium low setting.  It mows over them, so they can't do their job.  TGE is kind of like a lawnmower on ultra low setting.  It gouges your lawn.  PEDV just cuts it to 'putting green' length.  As a result, pigs get watery diarrhea and vomiting.  For full grown pigs, this is hard on their system, but they usually have fat stores and can weather through it with supportive care, such as fluids with electrolytes and good quality feeds.  Piglets, however, don't have any fat.  Every calorie they ingest goes immediately to growth, and so it's almost always 100% fatal to litters.

Q: How will this affect me?
A:  Now that's the billion dollar question.  $1.8 billion dollars in income to be exact.  Pork is the number 1 consumed meat in the world, with people consuming more than 100 million metric tons of it.  The United States is the third largest producer of pork, behind China (1st) and the European Union (2nd).  The United States pork exports are over $6.3 billion dollars, and for every $1 billion dollars exported, it supports approximately 17,200 jobs.  Our pork exports account for $10.6 billion dollars in agricultural output.  All in all, this is a big deal, as producers across the country are having to face the very real possibility of bankruptcy.  Governors of Midwestern states are even discussing the possibility of declaring States of Emergency, and are pushing for the allocation of Disaster Relief funds.  Naturally, it's not unreasonable to expect pork prices to sky rocket in the coming year, with next year's pork essentially dying at birth.

Q: What can I do?
A: Well, there are several things you can do.

As a consumer -- You can understand that while this is a crisis, pork is SAFE TO EAT.  You cannot catch it, and you cannot spread it by eating it.  Please don't stop buying pork.  Also, if you are keen on local foods, don't insist on visiting farms, and if you do want to visit where your food is being purchased from, visit only 1 farm.  Don't 'farm-hop'.  Even if you change your shoes, shower, etc., the dirt carried on your tires from farm to farm is enough to spread it, and ruin your sources.

As a swine enthusiast and competitor -- Consider this year buying in-state, especially if your state does not yet have PEDv.  Buy from a single source.  Don't 'farm-hop'.  We all can appreciate competition and know that buying the best increases your odds of winning, but winning really, honestly, isn't everything.  Consider not participating in non-terminal shows, like county shows, and purebred events.  Shows and functions where your pig is around other pigs is just an accident waiting to happen, as the virus piggy backs its way to your farm.  Avoid auctions, livestock shows and events. Practice solid BioSecurity Protocol.  Limit farm visitors.  Source local feeds that are free from pork meals and proteins.  Require people to wear PPE (Personal Protection Equipment) gear, and to use disinfectant foot baths, and if they refuse, don't let them on your property.  Encourage your State Extension offices to reconsider non-terminal shows, and communal tagging events.  Understand that even if your pig had it as a juvenile and survived, there's a good chance they will never grow fast enough to make weight.  Do not purchase from farms that have had or suspect they have PEDv.

As a swine producer -- BioSecurity, BioSecurity, BioSecurity.  Swine-ID protocols, travel logs, good medical records, and good observational records.  If we all keep our heads down, and hold out long enough, we might be able to weather this storm long enough until a vaccine is developed.

PEDv is a terrifying and harsh virus that isn't going away any time soon.  We all need to support our peers in their efforts to strengthen their BioSecurity practices, and do our best to stave the spread of this terrible disease.   I'd like to thank Dr. David Farnum from True North Technologies (http://goinshowin.com/trueglo.html), Dr. Sherri Clark of Virginia Tech's Department of Large Animal Clinical Sciences (http://www.vetmed.vt.edu/org/dlacs/), Bryn Poliska-Jennson with the National Pork Board (http://www.pork.org), and Dr. Barrett Slenning with the North Carolina State College of Veterinary Medicine's Department of Population Health and Pathobiology (http://www.cvm.ncsu.edu/dphp/).

Chick-a-boom, Chick-a-boom, Chick-a-boom

That is the sound a one legged chicken makes when they're scooting across your living room floor.  So, during the crazy Polar Vortex (which many of you might not have heard of since practically NO ONE heard when the derecho hit WV, but seemingly everyone heard when some half-wits in Charleston didn't want to poop in yellow water...)  we tried everything to keep our chickens warm.  I mean, normally we don't get temperatures this low during the winter.

We had heat lamps, trough heaters, copious amounts of bedding, and tar paper stapled to the walls of the buildings, in every effort to insulate from the howling winds that were dropping the wind chills into the negatives.  And, for the most part, we came out of it ok.  It was several weeks that passed before the kids commented the one of the chickens was acting 'broody'.  I thought it peculiar because she wasn't laying.

Upon closer inspection, she wasn't able to flex one of her feet, and her legs were very warm to the touch.  We brought her home, gave her a bath since she had a poopy butt, and set her in a little cardboard box to hang out while we tried to figure out what was going on with her.

We, of course, turned to the Pet Chicken Owners of Virginia Facebook group for answers.  These guys (also found online at http://www.petchickensofvirginia.com) are a wonderful wealth of information.  Fanciers across Virginia with way more experience when it comes to these feathered fellows are on there almost as much as I am, reading, answering questions, sharing pictures and jokes, and even a few good deals.  They organize swaps across the state, and all in all, a great group of people to be associated with.

The first concern everyone had was Marek's, but thankfully that wasn't it.  Someone thought maybe a sprain.  After a few days of her not improving, we consulted a veterinarian.  Dr. Willis is probably one of the most tolerant veterinarians out there.  It is a very rare occasion when he will take any sort of payment for a kid's animal or advice, and that's really appreciated when it comes to livestock.  He felt that there was a good chance she had frostbite!

After a week or so, the pad of her bad foot turned hard and black. Just the pad though, the legs were in good shape.  The veterinarian felt she'd make a full recovery, just needed time.  In the meantime, Gladys as she came to be known made herself right at home.

She had improved, and enjoys daily treats of scrambled eggs (which still gives me the heebiejeebies), oatmeal, and chopped fruit.  She makes an utter mess, which results in daily Dust Buster use, but she seems to enjoy being inside.

Not far from her, in two incubators, we have eggs slowly being rotated by automatic turners, in hopes that in just a couple more weeks, we'll have some fuzzies to join her.  Cross your fingers!!!

"There are two types of vegetarians...Those that have beef with chicken, and those who are too chicken to have beef."

That is a quote by Mokokoma Mokhonoana, one of my favorite authors who hails from South Africa.  He's a brilliant satirist, with a wickedly sharp wit.  I recommend my readers check out his website at http://www.mokokoma.com for a laugh, and some interesting reading that will definately make you rethink the human equation.

As some of you may have read in my previous post, and as many of you have inquired, my father was involved in a terrible bovine-attack.  Many people have images of sharks,

bears,

lions

 and tigers when they envision a crazed attack on a human being.  In fact, this is what happens when a tiger catches you and has their way with you...

Pretty freaking terrifying.  But no one thinks of cattle as being one of the most vicious, vile, vindictive, and a bunch of other v-words animals on the planet.  My dad is like most people.  He thinks of all of his cows as being friendly, simplistic creatures.  You know, sort of like that 'special' cousin everyone has, that's not really quite right.  It dawns on you that they're different usually around the holidays when they're caught licking the ornaments on the tree...

Well, dad had one cow in particular that was a difficult cow. She had a hard life before coming to the farm.  Her feet weren't quite right, and they would curl and require veterinary care every 6 months with corrective trimming just so she could hobble to and from the trough.  We called her 'Sore Feet'.  She was always the last cow into the chute, and the last one to the hay bale.  Cold weather was the worst on her, and the biggest fear was that one day she'd lay down and we wouldn't be able to get her back up.  A down cow is a dead cow.

Every year, Dad takes a cow to be butchered.  One of the perks of living on a farm is, of course, some of the best meat on the planet.  He encouraged 'Sore Feet' to the trailer, and everything seemed to be going really well.  She was keen on the snackage, and everyone was thinking that this was going to be a cake walk.  That's usually when things go catastrophically wrong, and this was no exception.

'Sore Feet' suddenly looked around, and realized she was the ONLY COW getting into the trailer.  In what was seconds, but seemed like minutes, her eyes connected with dad's, and she read his mind.  I neglected to inform you that cattle are really super-alien-creatures with telepathic capabilities... In his mind, she saw steaks, burgers, and roasts... and what happened next is a mixture of miracle and armageddon.

She turned towards my dad, stood up on her sore back feet, and punched the snot out of dad.  Then, once she had him down on the ground, she jumped on him like a trampoline.  Up and down, up and down, reminiscent of the bear jumping up and down on John Candy in the Great Outdoors.  Cow: 1 - Dad: 0

Then, she took off across the field, prancing like a new calf.  Should have named her Twinkle Toes.  She acted like there was nothing wrong with her feet, mooing like a nutjob all over the field.  Dad came inside and his arm was all swollen.  He was covered in bruises.  He couldn't twist his wrist, and we all told him he needed to go to the doctor because we suspected he had a fracture.  He refused.  Instead, he went back down there, where Twinkle Toes had apparently had a change of heart. She felt bad. She went right into the trailer without nary a peep.  Dad then subsequently shot her. *facepalm*  At least he waited until she got into the trailer.  Cow: 1 - Dad: 1

Sad part was, the neighbor's bull got in with her apparently, and she was almost full term with calf.  Cow: 2 - Dad: 1

Dad tried to baby his arm, but it wasn't long before he was out there, feeding the cattle.  He slipped on some ice, landed on it, and what was a fracture became a full blown break.  Being the insane-ex-navy-guy that he is, he set it in the field, and drove home before heading to the doctor's.  End result, surgical placement of a steel plate in his arm.  Cow: 3 - Dad: 1

Shortly thereafter, my Aunt Cindy asked me what sort of shape the cow was in.  I informed her that she was roughly steak shape...

What lessons can be learned from this?  Well, first of all, cattle are not stupid ruminants.  They are incredibly intelligent hell-beasts.  Secondly, the minute something seems to be going exactly to plan, expect total and complete chaos to ensue.  Thirdly, nothing good ever comes easy, and I guess fourth-ly . o (Is that a word?)  is that don't shoot the cow unless you're 100% sure she's not going to calve.

At least she tastes good.

The Good, The Bad and the Ugly

Time has not been good to us here at Honey Bee Hill Performance.  I'm sorry for the long period between posts but a lot has been going on, and sad to say, a lot of it has been less than ideal.  We'll start with the good, and see where it goes from there...

Over New Years, my brother decided we were going to butcher and scrape our first hog.  We've never done it before.  We've read about it in books like Foxfire and Henry Stephens Book of the Farm, but the actual practice had thus far eluded us.  

He picked a smaller pig from our July litter, because they were going to do a pig roast for the New Years Eve party.  He never really did grow that well after he had been stepped on, but he was big enough to feed a few folks.

I will say that this was probably the shaggiest, hairiest litter I have EVER SEEN.  He had probably 3 inches of coat on him.  THICK hair.  For those of you who know us, you can see dad here is in fine shape.  This is pre-bovine-attack.

So, we knew the theory was to pour boiling water over the pig.  Why pour? Well, we also knew from our reading that prolonged exposure to boiling water would actually do the opposite of loosen the hair, and would go so far as to set it to where we couldn't get it off, and we were very afraid of that.

So, Mo thought the best way to do this was hanging the pig up.  Remember, first time.  He had purchased these bell scrapers for the job, and we were heating water on a turkey fryer.  For those wanting to do this, I recommend a much larger vessel for heating water.

The steam made it hard to see, and the odor was less than pleasant.  Wherever the boiling water landed, the hair did loosen, but as it cooled going down the pig, there was a lot of wasted water we felt.

We did as much of it as we could with it hanging, but it kept wanting to slide loose, which didn't help matters.  Scraping was hard too.

Then we got smart, and put it on a table. The water was able to cover a greater area at that point, and we found that scraping was MUCH easier.

This is the pig almost finished.  They then gutted him and torched what little fuzzies were left on his feet.

The finished pig in the back seat of my brother's car enroute to the New Years party. 

Now for the bad...

As many of you are aware, our crossbred sow that we were counting on for a litter for the kids did not take when bred to what was a sterile boar.  She was hormonally crazed, and was jumping our purebred hereford gilt that was bred to Hershel from Shipley Swine.  The purebred hereford did take. However, the sow which was twice her size roughed her up so bad that the placenta detached, and the hereford litter was in essence aborted...  So no purebreds.

It gets worse.

The ugly. You know that 'guaranteed bred' sow we drove all the way to Missouri to purchase?  Well, turns out the guy only used the word 'guaranteed' because he didn't actually think anything was wrong, and he didn't mean it.  So when she wasn't bred, we didn't get any of our money back, and he actually wanted us to keep paying on her.  His reasoning was that in purebreds, the litter is worth only 40 percent of the asking price.  But, this wasn't purebred, and more importantly, I bought the sow for the litter, so to me, that litter was 100 percent the asking price.  One thing led to another, and he wanted us to have her butchered and send him the meat, which of course, when you have 1600 dollars invested in a pig that isn't putting out any piglets, you're not going to send the guy meat.  As a woman with fertility problems, the sheer idea of killing an animal without first seeing WHY they're not producing hormones is abhorrent.  Could it be that she was 60+ pounds underweight with ribs showing and two giant abscesses on her back legs that had blown out with raging infections... maybe?  Just maybe?  

Anyway, infections are cleared up and we've got 40 pounds on her. You can still see ribs, but she is improving.  Urine is being tested to see what is going on with her hormones, and if she can be salvaged.  The guy asked if we got her to cycle would we send him more money for her, and Kevin asked the guy, "And if she doesn't, are you going to give us a refund?"  The guy said no, so Kevin said no.  Kevin asked him, "You have to ask yourself. What's your guarantee worth.  A guarantee is your word.  What's your WORD worth?"  

The guy tried to put it in automotive terms, like it somehow would make things better.  He said if you got a loan on a car, and wrecked the car, you're still responsible for paying for the car, and that's true.  But Kevin pointed out that you typically have insurance on said vehicle, which is your GUARANTEE that the vehicle will be paid for if something happens to it.  Then the guy tried to criticize Kevin for coming all the way to Missouri, but I pointed out the message log between the fellow and myself.  When he first told me how much he wanted, I backed out and said that it was too rich for my blood.  The guy came after me and said she'd be a good investment and would do payments and encouraged me to consider it, knowing full well where we were from and our reluctance to make that kind of investment in a hog.  Anyway, end result... we have a pig with no babies, 2 tons of gestation and lactation feed with no litters on the ground, and our budget for the year absolutely fubar.

I don't think the guy meant for any of this to happen.  I just think he's a really really poor businessman, who doesn't even own a 250 dollar ultrasound machine, who probably needs to improve the conditions his animals are kept in.  I also think it was partially my fault for not demanding to see good pictures of the sow before we traveled 1800 miles on the word of someone I did not know personally.  When we have crap happen in our business, we have to eat it, because it's not our customer's fault.  It may not be our fault either, but that's the risk you take when you're in business.  A guarantee is your word.  What's your word worth?

I will say that perhaps the bright side to all of this is that we have had a wonderful group of people come together to make sure our children will have good, competitive pigs to show.  I want to let this be a shout out to some true gems in this industry, who really do make it all about the kids.  

To Surface Showpigs -- Thank you for holding our hand through this entire experience, and for helping Tiffany and Levi have some animals to show.  This guy is a real hero when it comes to kids in 4-H.  His willingness to work with the kids is just beyond compare, and he's a true example of someone who's not in it for the money.

To Travis Meyerholtz -- Thanks a million for helping us with the craziness of inducing and all that entailed, and for hooking us up with K and T showpigs.  

To LG Genetics -- Thanks for answering my million questions and your support.  

To Heather and Lee Helvey -- Thank you so much for just being there, crossing your fingers, cheering and commiserating when things didn't go the way we had hoped.

To Mark and Kambe Mabry -- You guys are great. Will be crossing our fingers for May pigs out of Outreach, and hope to get some Hamps next year from you all.

To Rickey Heavilin -- You're a saint, and thanks for your support and help.  We appreciate it so much.

To Clesie Hines Davidson -- For making me realize I'm not alone in my suffering.  Friends bonded in misery and hope for the future. :)

And Lisa Brooks and Edith Wade -- For letting me vent, and giving me good tips for the future.

If I've missed anyone, I'm sorry.  It's times like this when you are able to look around after the dust settles and see the gems shining for who they are.  Sometimes, I think that the only way to learn these lessons is the hard way.  Here's hoping that Fall of 2014 and Spring of 2015 is a few octaves higher than this year. :)

I'm Piggy-whipped!

You ever have that fleeting thought that maybe, just maybe, you're off your rocker, and everyone but you has known it all along?  In the middle of the night Sunday, I got a frantic phone call from a friend of mine that her dog, who is lean, likes to lay on her side, and when she gets up, the dog acts like it's feet have fallen asleep.  I told her that it sounded like pressure on the hip joint on the hard floor was pinching a nerve and she could try some mild anti-inflamatories from her vet.  In casual conversation, it came up that I had gone to bed early because we had gotten back late from making an epic road trip to Indiana, then Illinois, then Missouri and back.

Naturally, the question that lept to her mind and inevitably launched itself from her lips...  "Why, Taz?"

Speaking to someone who has known me for the majority of my life, from adolescence on, I caught myself feeling a twinge of guilt for the honesty I was about to share.  Guilt, shame, something akin to both of those.  I knew what I was going to say was going to sound crazy.  The entire trip felt crazy by the time we got home, with all of the trials and tribulations.  There was no way to really minimize the shock factor, so I just said, "Pigs."

"Pigs?"  she replied, incredulously.

"Yeah, had to go out there to do some pig stuff."

I don't know what was worse.  The fact that Em didn't seem surprised by this, or the fact that I had an entire defense worked up that I had thought and mulled over during the 15 hour drive back home, on how I was going to justify travelling all the way to Missouri for pig business.  Even Grandma inquired to my mother if I was aware that we had pigs in West Virginia.

Yes.  I am aware.  But the grass is always greener on the other side... of the country.

But, I'm getting ahead of myself.  We started off leaving later than we wanted to because someone worked later than he was supposed to.  I had been planning this trip for weeks.  AccuWeather was advertising what I feel comfortable deeming 'Perfect Weather' for the weekend out in the midwest.  

I figured we'd run out Saturday, come back Sunday, it'd be hunky dory.  First stop was to check out poultry farming, free range style, in Evansville, Indiana.  I must have been clairvoyant, because as we were out there checking out someone else's 'chicks', one of our hens was prolapsing back home.  More on that later.

It was, in all aspects except smell, exactly what I would have expected to see.  Soggy fields, rotting brown grass, all being scratched and shredded by dozens and dozens and dozens of hens, clucking merrily as they carefully each step closer to what I'm sure they thought was a pupa lying in wait for spring.  But, with that many birds comes that much more poop, and with that much more poop, we're talking mad heinous stink.  I scolded myself for thinking the poop killed the grass, knowing full well it was the winter.  Still, it reassured me that we could make a successful poultry concern back on our farm.  

Then, we were off to Illinois.  Greenville to be precise.  Now what, if anything, is in Greenville, IL you might be wondering.  You'd be surprised.  It's like Lewisburg, really.  And, in the middle of that little city is an amazing little wonderland called "Country Depot."

I came here because I had decided that this year, we were going to do a mixed feed for the show pigs instead of buying it premixed.  The food we had settled on was not distributed in our area, or even close.  To purchase the base mix, these folks were able to get it for the day we were scheduled to come through Illinois, and even better, the wonderful gentleman on the phone gave us his cell number to call if we were coming through late, and he'd keep the store open for us.  Service with a smile.

When we stepped into the little store, we were flabbergasted.  

While there wasn't a ton of space, they made up for it with content.  Want to feed your wildlife?  Want to build bigger and better racks?  If there was such a thing as a Deer Show or Chickadee Show, would you have what it took?  They do.  How about dogs?  Got one? Want to show it?  Have to have the gear, right?  But you don't know what kind of gear you need!  They do at Country Depot.  And... the center aisles... anything and everything you could possibly ever need to show cattle, lambs, goats, swine and poultry.  They had everything, from top dresses to conditioners, show sticks to electrolytes.  They had it all.  You could never have shown a pig before in your life, walk into that store, and Mark Goodson would hook you up with the goods you needed, tell you how to use it, tips and tricks of the trade that only experience can teach, and leave you in awe in just 5 minutes of conversation.

He was exactly how we hoped he would be after talking so many times with him on the phone.  Nothing but smiles and generosity.  The information we learned in our visit with him enlightened us so much.  We had been overthinking so many things, and the K.I.S.S. method has made more winners in every industry than all the high dollar fancy goops and gucks.  A veritable genius when it came to explaining to us layfolk in simple terms what the feeds do and how, we left with our bags of basemix feeling exuberant.  The visit with Mark alone made the entire trip worth it.  

When we made it to Missouri, we were happy to get a room in Kingdom City.  The weather seemed nice.  But while we were eating at the restaurant, we noticed first one plow truck drive by... then another... then another.  Before we knew it, the entire fleet it seemed of MDot had mobilized to the roads.  After asking our waitress what was going on, we were informed that a massive ice storm was coming our way...

Of course, right?  But... it gets better.  Settling into our hotel for the night, Kevin kindly says, "Honey.  I don't want to worry you, but we don't have any four wheel drive."  *facepalm* I had hit the 4wd button while going 70 the other day, accidentally mind you, while putting the cell phone back in the cubby while Kevin was driving.  There was mad panic at the time it happened, but I knew, and so did Kevin, that the bangbangclakclunkathunk was bad when it happened.  I don't know.  Maybe I thought it would fix itself.  But, for crying out loud, the weather was supposed to be gorgeous!  Again, leave it to me to glibly believe those stupid meteorologists.

And, for the record, it's not that hard to accidentally hit that button.  Chevrolet put it in the most stupid place EVER.  

Anyway, Kevin insisted it wasn't my fault, but I knew it was.  We needed to figure out which component failed, so naturally, we went to a dealership.  The dealership, while well meaning, misdiagnosed the problem, while Kevin patiently tried to explain the symptoms of the failure.  Kevin kept saying, "I believe it's the encoder, but I need you to hook up and check."  The tech, however, insisted that it was not the encoder because his fancy uber savvy flowchart was pointing to the computer module, that conveniently cost 500 bucks, but inconveniently was located in Indiana.  One hundred and fifty dollars later, and no closer to a repair, we thanked them and left.  On a Saturday, I'm calling junkyards who are closed for the holidays until I'm able to find one that lets us go yank a computer out of a truck to test it on ours to see if, by some strange coinkydink, the dealership was right... they weren't.  A wasted half hour later, still no 4wd.  

Our parts company's closest sister store was near Saint Louis, which was the better part of two hours away. So, reluctantly, we called O'reilly Auto Parts, and found that not only did they have the part we needed, but they were a scant 5 minutes from where we were currently at.  We made a beeline for their store.  They watched, amused, as I confessed to being the culprit destroying the 4wd, and Kevin yanks the truck apart in their parking lot.  He pulls the TC, then the TC motor, does basically surgery on the truck, running into the store every few minutes for a part or a seal.  The guys at O'reilly's really hooked us up.  Twenty minutes later, and a full 6 hours after this entire thing started from the hotel, we have 4wd.  O'reilly's, DJ, all you guys in Macon, MO are great.  Thank you. 

In the dark, we arrived at our destination.  Now, Farming in the midwest is different than here back East.  Corn is king.  Yards are no bigger than a postage stamp, and if you're raising livestock, chances are they're in little pens, in barns, never see the light of day, because every last scrap of land you have is going to be devoted to grain.

When you ask a farmer out here, 'Hey, what do you farm?'  You're likely to hear in response, "Oh, a few hundred head of cattle, sheep, chickens, hogs, y'know, just a little of everything."  The eastern farmer is usually a diversified farmer that lives by the adage, "Don't put all your eggs in one basket."  This is partially because the volatile market that all farming plays party to, but also because our land varies in quality so much.  You're going to have property that is in no way suitable for crops, due to rocks and crazy grades, which is well suited to livestock.  It's just the way things are.

Out there in the land of flatness, however, you'd be crazy not to capitalize on the flatness.  During WWII, the British Ministry of Agriculture determined that grains were of greater importance than livestock.  They practically wiped out all livestock production to repurpose pasture for grain production.  At the beginning of WWII, the UK imported 20 million tons of food a year (70%), including more than half of its meat, 70 percent of its cheese and sugar, nearly 80 percent of fruits and veggies and more than two thirds of its cereals and fats.  Germany determined that by cutting off the supply ships to England, they would essentially starve them into submission. What followed was considered one of the greatest feats in world history, as the little island of Great Britain went into massive rationing mode, leading campaigns like Digging for Victory, and Food Will Win The War.  By the end of WWII, the face of agriculture had changed from jacks of all trades to specialized agriculture.  Domestic grain production increased to almost 10 ton annually, and has steadily increased since then as new farming methods have encouraged greater growth.

But, sadly, as a result of this, most breeds of English livestock are now threatened and in danger of extinction.  I think that were it not for the differing regions within the United States, our own domestic livestock would be at risk for loss.  

But, moving on... We visited a pig farm.  Buildings filled with feed, filled with pigs, with fields sitting dormant until spring would allow them to raise another year of corn. We had a grand time talking 'pig', and it was no surprise to anyone when we hit the road that we had a new member to our family.  Calysse.  Named for the daughter of Andraste, a Gaul warrior goddess.  Haven't had a chance to take any decent pictures of her, but did get these couple.  She's bred, and due to farrow in January.  Most of her babies will not stick around here, have to recoup on our investment of course, but we might keep one or two.  Who knows.  It will be fun!

She's very very very sweet.  More details to follow on her, as she settles in to be part of our family.  

Oh, and regarding the chicken prolapse that we discovered when we returned home.  By the time we made it back from the land of Ice and Snow, she had been pretty abused by the rest of the chickens in the coop.  I could have tried to reset the oviduct and done a purse suture, but after talking to the vet, they agreed that putting her down was the best thing.  Plus, I had nothing thawed for dinner. So, she was appreciated up until the end.  By the by... farm raised chicken is waaaay better than store bought.   Peace out, Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, and all that jazz.