Changing goals and speed

[Bruce]

I ran a hollow pipe through the roll, ran wire through the pipe and connected the wire to the hitch on the garden tractor. It unrolled pretty well as I drove along slowly and my wife adjusting things as needed (yes I stopped when she was doing that).

 

[AClark]

My SIL bred thoroughbreds. They don't eat more than other horses the same size. All horses eat a ridiculous amount though. My husband calls them hay burners for a reason lol

Hay burners is right!
I go through 2 round bales (800 lbs or so each) a month and I just picked up 200#'s of pellets and 250#'s of cubes the other day. However, everybody, goats included, eat the pellets, cubes, and bermuda hay. I would say I probably total out around 500 lbs of cubes and 600 lbs of pellets in a month. My neighbors at the hay farm love me, since I buy the bales and cubes there. I write them checks since they don't like messing with debit cards, memo line: horse feed. I'm half debating writing "Unprocessed horse sh*t" on the next one. Of course I go through the hay because I free feed it so they can eat as much as they want, and then I just feed the pellets and cubes at night.
I'm glad I paid off my truck, it gives me a good chunk of extra money, that is now going into horse food, lol.

Belle is no small horse, she's at least 15HH, maybe more, I don't have a stick handy. Her withers are at the top of my head though, and I'm 5'3" so a good guesstimate would be 15.2 HH.
The other two are in the 14 HH range - Dixie is gaining weight well, but I feed her as much as I do the TB.

I have chickens hatching today...on day 18. WTH. So this morning I got up, and turned the turner off and moved them down on the grating. I heard chirping...ok cool. I've heard chirping all day. I like to watch them rock around and looked in, since today was supposed to be day 1 of lock down, and 2 eggs have pipped. They weren't due to hatch until Saturday, but tell them that!
The ones that are hatching are Cochin and Cochin crosses. I also have a mixed batch of eggs. I candled them as I went today and all is looking good for a big hatch. I ordered extra eggs since my last batch of chicken eggs didn't work out good and now I think I over did it. There are 31 eggs in the incubator now that all candled as good and alive this morning. I candled them at day 7 and chucked the yolkers out and one red ring. Oops.
My quail didn't have the best success rate. I still have about 20 out of the 50 that hatched. Not sure what went on there, but they dropped like flies the first two weeks - I did use medicated feed. I moved them out to the barn early this week with their heat lamp and all is well there. They should be about ready to go outside, and the weather has been in the high 80's, low 90's so not very chilly at all.

My Californian buck passed away the other day. No clue as to how or why, he was just dead in his cage. He wasn't sick or anything you could see, but could have been age as I have no idea how old he was when we got him a year ago. Nobody else looks sick or anything. He should have 2 litters on their way April 7th if the does caught this time and I have 1 of his daughters. It sucks because I don't care much for the other buck and had planned on selling off my 2nd buck but I'd be shooting myself in the foot now if I did. I'll wait and see if I get a decent buck out of the litters I hopefully will get.
I did skin him out and saved his pelt. He was really tough to skin!

I rode Dixie the other day for the first time and she did great. All the kids got a turn riding her with me leading, since none of them know how to steer and she doesn't neck rein.

 

[CntryBoy777]

It sounds like ya will be making up the Quail losses with Chickens instead....gonna be a while lot of Peeping going on over there. Sorry to hear about your buck, hope those expecting come thru for ya. I do love Horses, but it is costly to have them. Are your goats doing okay and staying at home?

 

[NH homesteader]

Oh my feed bill!

 

[Bruce]

Does one feel a might puny when standing next to a horse whose neck STARTS at the top of their head?

 

[Baymule]

You have been busy! We were given 6 Californian bunnies a few weeks ago, they are in the freezer. I cooked one, they are good. Dixie is looking good, sounds like she needs some reining lessons. The new horse we bought needed a tune up, but we took him to a trainer because DH had shoulder replacement surgery and I didn't have time.

How is that beautiful baby doing? We need an update!

 

[AClark]

Does one feel a might puny when standing next to a horse whose neck STARTS at the top of their head?

Ever watched the Kentucky Derby and seen the jockeys getting up - yeah, I feel like that. Like them, I might need someone to give me a boost to get all the way up there. I'm used to short horses, most of the ones I've ever had have been in the 13.2-14.2 HH range. I can easily swing up on those, her, I'm going to have to jump to get a foot in a stirrup.

I have 9 Cochin chicks this morning, 6 black and 3 that are cream colored. Some of my other big chicken eggs are pipped and we are waiting! The incubator is nowhere near as nasty as it was with the quail, that was flat out disgusting.

 

[Baymule]

Congrats on the new chicks! I think I'll borrow the neighbors incubator to hatch out some Easter eggers before I kill that darn mean rooster that I hate so much.

I'm 5'7", but my knees are crapped out and getting on tall horses is a chore. I sold a 16.2 hand mare last year because of that.

 

[Latestarter]

I love horses, but do NOT envy you the cost to keep them. Just too much for me to cover...

 

[AClark]

Two of my bigger eggs have hatched. Both of them are buff colored.
So, now it's a bunch of black ones with white stripes all Cochins
2 or 3 buff colored Cochins
1 bright yellow Cochin
and 2 "I don't know, came out of a large light brown egg" buff colored ones.

I'm debating buying another Californian buck and still selling mine off, I saw some up on Craigslist a couple of days ago. I have a doe that is freezer-bound if she doesn't produce this time. She's been bred 3 months in a row and nothing.

Round bales aren't expensive, they are $40 each, that's my lowest cost. A 50# bag of pellets is around $7, cubes are $8 a bag. I do feed a lot, which will drop back some when Dixie gets up to a decent weight and I'm not having to feed her as much as a huge horse.

I guess I don't think too much about it since horses are my true love as far as animals go. I like the goats and the birds and rabbits, but I don't love them like I do the horses. You can't put a price on happiness.

Dixie definitely needs some reining lessons, she responds to leg cues very well so I will have no problem teaching her to neck rein. She's on very light riding now since I am pretty certain she's in foal, that big belly didn't shrink down with good food and a big tube of dewormer, so it's a good bet that's a baby. I'll probably get the vet to check her soon, as she needs her teeth floated anyway. Both of the mares came with a nasty case of feed lot snot, and I didn't want to drag the vet out since it looked very similar to strangles and that stuff is so contagious, it's better the poor vet doesn't drag it back to their office to share it.

I'm trying to upload pics from my iphone, but my computer crashed the other day and I'm having to reinstall itunes and all of that. It crashed so bad I had to wipe and reinstall everything. Will post some pics later.