Baymule’s Journal

[Weldman]

Out here I mounted a hoist inside the pole barn at the peak cause when deer season rolls around, it's not nice skinning a deer 25°F with 60 mph winds over a trench I dug doing it at night as it's always the evening when I get them. Use to use a backhoe like this, but this is better with a fired up torpedo heater.
This little winch can do 800 lbs, more than enough.

 

[Alaskan]

@Baymule it looks great! That door closing mechanism is what I have on 2 coops...

And I love your (and @Weldman 's) powered carcass lifters.

In the past we have always used our readily available child labor.. and hung carcasses over the cross beam on the garage (when there was enough space in there), or over the swingset

 

[Baymule]

I’ve done that swing-set thing too!

 

[Weldman]

@Baymule it looks great! That door closing mechanism is what I have on 2 coops...

And I love your (and @Weldman 's) powered carcass lifters.

In the past we have always used our readily available child labor.. and hung carcasses over the cross beam on the garage (when there was enough space in there), or over the swingset

I’ve done that swing-set thing too!

It's get worse out here, there is times where the carcass is where ATV , tractor or human isn't pulling it home so it must hang in the nearest tree. Average mule deer buck weighs 150 to 300 lbs here some up to 405 lbs. Had the wife haul home each quarter as I quarter it up miles away in a ravine.

 

[Baymule]

It's get worse out here, there is times where the carcass is where ATV , tractor or human isn't pulling it home so it must hang in the nearest tree. Average mule deer buck weighs 150 to 300 lbs here some up to 405 lbs. Had the wife haul home each quarter as I quarter it up miles away in a ravine.

Teamwork. It’s a precious thing, treasure it.

 

[Mini Horses]

So while you & Weldman discuss butchering -- I'm checking for local processors AND buying chicken dead & cleaned.

 

[Weldman]

So while you & Weldman discuss butchering -- I'm checking for local processors AND buying chicken dead & cleaned.

Can't buy processed deer, antelope or elk and we got all three running around.

 

[Baymule]

Hey, it's a door !!

Actually, that pork looks pretty good from pics.

I’m thinking why raise feeder pigs, just trap feral hogs. But the darn things are so smart, they will move out where they are hunted.

 

[Mini Horses]

I'll be interested in meat taste...compared to those you've raised. Lucky to not have those rascals where I am, but ----

 

[Baymule]

I processed the hog meat yesterday. But first the girls and I put 2 pumpkin pies in the oven. The youngest birthday was Sunday and she wanted a birthday pie.

I cut meat off the bones.

I filled up a bowl and iced it down.

Got a little more.

Then I did the backstraps. I slid a sharp knife under the tough chewy white “silver skin” and cut it away. Then I cut in pieces and vacuum sealed.

I ground all the meat, first grind with coarse grind. It was 16 pounds of ground meat. I took out a pound, seasoned it and made breakfast skinless sausages. I fried 3, girls and I did a taste test and pronounced it good. So I seasoned the whole batch and started making breakfast sausages with the smallest tube. I pinched them off, laid on a cookie sheet on wax paper. I layered them between wax paper, got about 8 layers, got another cookie sheet and did another 3 or 4 layers. Put them in the freezer. I’ll vacuum seal them either today or tomorrow.

This took all day. Girls decorated a pie and we took it to Peggy and Bennett’s. Lit a candle, sang Happy Birthday and we all had pie. Then we all got in their truck and went to see the feral hogs in the trap. There was a sow with 5 babies and a young boar. That sow charged, hit the trap wire and bounced off. Again and again. Feral hogs are some mean critters.

Today I get 4 loads of dirt. On the youngest birthday list of what she wanted was a dirt pile. Well guess what? Mamaw is having one dumped in the yard and they can get as dirty as they want to. 3 loads are going to the site of the future barn and I’ll spread them with the tractor. The other one is for building up pads for the Quonset huts in the pens to possibly give the sheep some relief from the mud this winter. I won’t be able to get them all in the small barn in the front field. A bigger barn will go in the middle field, but not by winter.