Gerald. In Memory.

R.I.P. Gerald

Gerald was the boar who several times came to visit Daisy. He often overstayed his welcome, but he really was a very gentle giant.
It's been a while since he's come to stay on the farm, but yesterday I heard the sad news that he passed away a few days ago. He was still at a pretty young age.
Apparently he had been off his food for a while and the vet had called, but quite out of the blue he was found dead the next morning.

We will have fond memories of him.

This Little Piggy...

Sunday 2nd September 2012

 



The Last Photo of Gerald?

Today saw Gerald moving off back to his farm. He's done his job here. Very sad news though...

Gerald's next journey will probably be to the sausage factory. He has grown rather large which means that his line of work puts smaller sows at risk of injury. On the harsh, economic side it also means his feed costs are higher, as I have witnessed while the farmer has been not collecting him!

There's also the fact that his first offspring on his own farm are now the farmer's breeding sows so new blood is required. This is an eternal problem with all animals when they are kept on a small scale. These days, not enough people keep a boar to make it viable to swap them around, as artificial insemination is the more common way to impregnate the sows. Not only is it cheaper than the cost of hiring in and feeding a boar, but you don't risk damage to the sow and you can choose the pedigree and bloodline easily. 

We will miss Gerald and so will Daisy. She had a good relationship with him.

 

 

 

Gerald moved just in time that we could move the pigs around a bit to separate our own two boars, ready for their own little journey tomorrow morning! They had a final treat of fresh grass and runner beans before being led up the garden path and into the waiting trailer.

They are one week short of six months old. Since we left them intact as boys, if we keep them longer there is the risk of their hormones spoiling the taste of the meat (boar taint). Although some people reckon you can keep them up to a year, we prefer to play it safe, even if it means they go off a little on the small side.

 

In the past this moving process had been somewhat stressful and occasionally chaotic. We have learned to leave enough time so that, if the pigs wish to stop for a munch on the grass or double back a few times to more familiar territory, it won't be a problem.

 

More importantly, the whole run from the pig pens to the stable yard (that's more of a measurement than a description!) is securely fenced. This means that, in theory, we could even leave the pigs alone in this stretch. It also means that we no longer need to worry about them bolting past us and blundering through one of the areas of weaker, temporary fencing.

And so, everything went very smoothly and the pigs spent the night nestled in a pile of clean straw in the trailer, completely ignorant of what was to come.

 

Do I feel guilty? No. Not at all. As I've said before, if you are going to eat meat then better to face up to the facts of where it comes from and ensure that the animals have a good life and a humane death. It does not grow in neat little frozen cubes on trees, nor are neatly trimmed chops, joints and strips of bacon harvested from the ground!



"Look, Mummy's giving Daddy a piggy back!!"

Early morning romance.
Scroll no further if you are easily offended.



Friday 13th July 2012
The sunrise was nothing to talk about, but there was plenty else to talk about on the smallholding this morning.
Today saw some of the heaviest rain we've had here all summer.
And that's saying something.



HOT GOS this morning.

Or should I say hot Gloucester Old Spot?

For Gerald and Daisy were enjoying the sunrise, though neither seemed particularly impressed by the experience. Clearly no-one had reminded them that it was Friday 13th. Anyhow, November 6th is pencilled in on the calendar. Should be the patter of tiny trotters.



Down and Dirrty...with the pigs

Saturday 7th July 2012
A promising start.

A young Roe Deer at first light comes just close enough to snap.

An early start today to make the most of the fine weather. A day of ragwort and thistle extraction. More on this in tomorrow's post. Suffice to say I've been pricked, stung, electrocuted and I have a nasty rash on my arms! And how could I forget...a tiny bit of sunburn!...And back ache.
By early afternoon I'd done 8 hours and was whacked. A good time for a supermarket trip as we'd not been for almost four weeks.

Down and Dirrty with the pigs

Rejuvenated by my break and on a slight sugar high from my supermarket treats, it was now time to move Gerald, since I'd separated the piglets from Daisy yesterday. We'd been holding Gerald in the stables for a while, mainly to avoid having to sell the piglets as weaners over the Christmas period. It takes 3 months, 3 weeks and 3 days for a pig to have her babies, then another 8 weeks till I separate the piglets from their mother. So even if Gerald does the deed today, it will still be about New Year's Day when they are being weaned. It could be up to two and a half weeks before Daisy is ready to become pregnant, though in my experience it seems the sow changes her cycle to make the most of the boar's interest!

After a relatively straightforward journey from the stables to the pig pen, Sue and I spent a pleasant summer's evening with the pigs and chickens. Spending time observing the animals is not only a very pleasant experience, but is an important part of good husbandry.



The rest can be told in pictures.

 

Gerald was keen to get
out of the stables.



Watched by the geese,
he headed straight down to the pig pens.



 

He even broke into a trot at one point.
The only tricky bit was getting him
over the threshold into the pen.
For some reason, pigs are never keen
to go through gates.
Could be that he discovered clover along the way!
We actually brought Daisy out
and he followed her back in.



 





Daisy clearly remembers Gerald. She was
impressed at how well turned out he was.





Until...











That's better!
Gerald doesn't get out much these days.
He was straight into the mud.

Now, this website is not in the habit of displaying adult content, but the next section comes with an X-certificate. 

It contains scenes of a sexual nature as well as full on nudity.

Look closely and you'll see a part of Gerald that doesn't normally come out! (It's the thing underneath him that looks like a stick poking out of the ground.)

He was clearly pleased to see Daisy. I had heard rumours that the part in question was corkscrew shaped at the end and it was!!

Gerald's amorous advances included

gently nibbling Daisy's tail.

But Daisy was having none of it.
The last time she saw him was
2 months ago and he had been playing away.

She was in no mood for forgiveness.

Not yet at least.

... and definitely not with the children watching!





Gerald played the family man card



The piglets were very keen to meet their

father. Did they know who he was?

Only one of them had ever seen him before.

  



Lest we forget, the chickens proved more than capable of providing entertainment too. When we led Gerald down, they all lined up along the fence to watch. But their minds quickly turned back to chicken affairs, especially their evening ration of wheat.



Gerald and Daisy were last seen getting very grumpy with each other over accommodation for the night. The ark will be very cosy, but I'm sure they'll make their peace and find a way to snuggle in together.

I left them at dusk, both mooching around outside.

Bee Action and Pig Pimping.

Saturday 28th April 2012


Bee Background
Bee-keeping is a fascinating hobby, but not a cheap one to start up. After you've bought a hive, there's the bee suits, the smoker, the hive tools, the honey extractors, a few things I've probably forgotten, and then ... then you find out it's always a good idea to have a spare hive too!
So you've been on a course, spent some time with some bee-keepers, and forked out a fortune. All you need to do now is get hold of some bees. Easier said than done.

Everyone's aware that honey bees are having a hard time at the moment, which means they are quite difficult to get hold of. The ideal is to get hold of a swarm, but everybody is after free bees and plenty of people are higher in the pecking order for receipt of such goodies.

So you have to buy some. They're very cheap to buy, just one or two pence... each. Problem is, that adds up to a small fortune when you consider you need them in their thousands.  A full brood box consists of eleven frames and lots and lots of bees.              

A full brood box complete with 11 frames.
We were lucky to be able to buy an established colony
with a proven queen. 



The normal way to buy them is to get a five-frame nucleus, which consists of a young queen and a core of bees. These are united to form a young colony which need to build up quickly in preparation for their first winter. We bought our first nucleus when we lived in London, joining the trend of urban beekeeping. However, due to a shortage of queens, we didn't get them till mid summer. Everything seemed to be going fine (judging by our very limited experience) until early the next year.

One spring morning we noticed an unusual buzz of activity around the hive entrance, with bees fighting and many emerging from the hive laden with honey.

Our bees were being robbed! Despite our best efforts, within a day the hive was empty, pillaged, all its occupants murdered or expelled.
Obviously they'd not had time to get strong enough the previous summer. We had fed them and the queen had survived the winter, but this one we just had to put down to experience.

When we had purchased the bees, we felt a huge sense of responsibility to them and we had let them down big time. Knowing that we would be moving at some point, we decided to hang up our bee suits for a while.

Planning for our new hive

We left replacing the bees until we knew we could give a new colony everything they needed. Primarily, I was worried that fields of wheat and sugar beet might not provide enough food throughout the year for them. This worry was soon allayed when our old pasture flourished into a clover filled meadow last summer. It was a bee bonanza.

My next worry was that bees appreciate a bit of shelter, but still need to face the sun so that the hive can warm up, especially early morning. Our site was so exposed that finding a suitable site would not be easy. The orchard would be ideal, in about ten years time!

The only decent shelter is afforded by the house, but we wouldn't want them living quite so close to us. The stable wall would give a good backdrop and the bees would fly straight out over the herb bed, but the prevailing winds put paid to that idea.

Eventually I used a line of transplanted laurels to afford shelter from the wind, tucking the hive in behind them but still exposing it to the morning sun.

So we dug out the old hives, scorched every surface with a blowtorch, and followed up the ad in the local paper. We were delighted to be able to get a two year old queen and a full colony, and at a sensible price too.





Sticks and leaves across the entrance
make sure the bees don't just fly off
before realising they're in a different place!



First Contact

We were up early to sort out the bees before they got active. We didn't yet know how they'd take to us. We dusted off and lit the smoker, though  a stiff north-easterly made sure it hardly touched the bees. At least the weather meant our feisty little friends were in a most subdued mood.

We prised off the lid, brushed the bees out of the way, and placed the queen excluder over the brood box. This is a plastic sheet which allows all the bees except the queen to pass through. This ensures that the stores of honey stored in the frames above the brood box do not become contaminated with eggs and larvae. Onto this went  the super, a box of wooden frames with a wax sheet of tessellated hexagons enclosed, ready for the bees to build their comb and store their honey, ready for us to steal!

Finally, another super into which we placed an inverted bucket of sugar syrup to welcome Swallow Farm's newest inhabitants.

We then left the bees to settle in, although they were in no hurry to explore given the continued cold weather and strong, icy winds.

Pig Pimping

Gerald is a good natured Gloucester Old Spot boar. He doesn't belong to us, but spends a lot of time here. He has given Daisy two litters so far, and in between fathered a couple of other litters. But the farmer who kindly lets us borrow him is never in a hurry to have him back! Food costs have to be considered and it is amazing how often that farmer's phone gets lost or is out of order! I don't mind too much, as it's not all about money, and I get lots of other favours from the farmer too.

Anyway, while discussing Gerald with a fellow smallholder recently, he was keen that Gerald pay a visit to see his two sows. I OKed it with the farmer, and arrangements were made for him to be moved at the weekend. Gerald would certainly not be complaining, as it was now quite a while since he had a lady friend.

So it was that, shortly after we'd finished dealing with the bees, Dave arrived and Gerald obligingly followed his food bucket out of the stables and up into the trailer. He'll enjoy his new surroundings and company, and should be back in about six weeks to keep Daisy company once again. Meanwhile, we've done someone a big favour and we're not having to feed a spare mouth. He's only just down the road, so we can visit him if we miss him.

The Nursery Area

Today's weather went from bad to worse to worser. I had the bright idea of using some old ground cover material and some old wooden decking to give my nursery area a refurbishment. Fed up with thistles and nettles popping up to bite me in every nook and cranny, even inside the greenhouse, I decided to starve them of light and at the same time give myself a proper surface to walk on and to rest plant trays on. Of course, this meant moving everything first, and as the weather worsened I eventually just accepted that I would be soaked from head to toe. (This often seems to happen in reverse, with the water permeating through my shoes and socks and up my trouser legs.)

No more spikes and stings.
A few pig food bags were used to
fill the gaps when I ran out of the proper stuff.



Access to the back of the bee hive is essential.
The straw bales are to stop the hive being
blown about, and to give it some insulation too.

A reclaimed perspex sheet supported by
straw bales provides an excellent
hardening off area for young plants.





By late afternoon it was necessary to take refuge in the house, as a storm raged outside.