The recent weather has been amazing, and you may have noticed the flurry in the country; from haying, to combining, to hauling manure. This is the kind of weather we have been looking for since the beginning of July! I understand we are going to experience a drastic change by tomorrow. To be honest, (maybe not in Stratton) but in most other places it is quite dry again and rain would likely be welcome. I don’t have much for pasture, but it is partially my management – I need more fences to do a better job of rotational grazing. The cows (other than the 2-year-olds with their first calves) are in decent shape. I will aim to sell calves at our October 18 sale. The calves really grow at this time of the year with hard grass and less flies. It is enjoyable to see them change.
We finally took the time to get our lambs away from their mothers and on feed full-time. They were a bit sad to be away from their mothers but seemed to be less disturbed by the transition. They are booked for later in October to the abattoir so they will be on some good feed until that date.
Update on my duck situation – none of the eggs have resulted in a duckling. At one point she was sitting on 10 eggs, but she seemed to be down to one. It was not for lack of trying as she was quite a little mother protecting her nest and moving the eggs around. That is fine, we certainly don’t need any more ducks!
My summer students left me last week and it is a sad and lonely place currently. I was able to harvest a wheat trial alone on Thursday and then on Friday, Marlee came in and we worked on our Oat Trial. It was a little slow going and we did plug up once but we stopped in time so it wasn’t as painful as it could have been. The yields were incredible on the oats (nothing is calculated yet) but our bags were bursting. I am still hoping that I can go out and gather the straw and calculate straw yields as well. We just ran out of time on Friday, and the weekend was booked at home so I couldn’t come in.
The second phase of the Sales Barn project is nearing completion, and our facilities are looking top notch. The September 6 sale has been cancelled but we are full speed ahead with our September 27 sale. Katie Hay is our contact for booking cattle! You can reach Katie at 807-275-6273 – keep in mind the sooner you contact her the better; she is also preparing get married on October 4! Don’t worry, James is still our manager, but he is trying to wean himself off a few of these jobs!
