Misfitmorgan's Journal - That Summer Dust

[misfitmorgan]

Isn't that all you need to make hay?

If you are only making small squares and have someone else with a mower, rake, baler and wagons....then yes.

 

[misfitmorgan]

@Baymule ......pictures

 

[CntryBoy777]

Sorry about the pig issues....and happy for the new additions!!....really glad ya are only having to deal with issues at your own place rather than the fiascos ya had to endure at the other place. As each year passes ya will be able to improve and advance much further, because issues like fences and pens and such will be already done....tho, I sure there will be some redesigning done then, also.....especially if ya don't get a grip on the animal "math".....

 

[Baymule]

@Baymule ......pictures

That is a beautiful view, looking out the window at your barns and sheep. The light snow on the ground just makes it more picturesque.

 

[misfitmorgan]

Sorry about the pig issues....and happy for the new additions!!....really glad ya are only having to deal with issues at your own place rather than the fiascos ya had to endure at the other place. As each year passes ya will be able to improve and advance much further, because issues like fences and pens and such will be already done....tho, I sure there will be some redesigning done then, also.....especially if ya don't get a grip on the animal "math".....

Thank you

It is still nice to be on our own place. I know things will get done in time, making due for now.

A grip on animal math... That doesnt seem likely, DH was talking about wanting ostrich's on Sunday and we still want a few cows/cattle.

Our current end goal is about 50 Ewe and 30 or so meat goats. If we have lambs/kids as expected we will have 33 sheep and 14-17 goats. Figure on half being females that should put us into winter 2019/2020 with 23 Sheep and 10-12 goats to over winter. If all goes well we should make a little under 2k selling the boys off which will buy a lot of fence. Not that i'm counting my chickens....err kids/lambs. Modest projection says we should be able to have our goal numbers by spring 2020, we shall see.

 

[Bruce]

Sounds like you are squarely on your road to success.

 

[Baymule]

What is your market for selling lambs/kids? Craigslist?

 

[misfitmorgan]

What is your market for selling lambs/kids? Craigslist?

We do use craigslist but we also have a good word of mouth community, active 4-h and people who just want lambs/goats to raise for butcher. We already have 2 goat kids and 2 lambs on hold for the spring kids/lambs which is a first for us. Of course we also have 2 piglets on hold...again a first.

If it came down to it and we used the sale profits from 2020 spring kids/lambs to buy a decent size trailer we could haul down to the eastern market about 4hrs away and sell all goats/lambs without a problem in a couple hours for $150-200 each. Last year adult meat goats were selling for approx $600/each in the eastern market...in the fall/winter.

We also have the auction route which is around 2hrs away but thats a bigger gamble, and of course the meat for our freezer route too.

On 50 ewe if you figure half have twins that would give us 75 lambs/yr. Locally we should be able to sell about half of those to 4-h kids/raise for butcher. We would want 2-3 lambs for our freezer. We should have a good amount sold to other breeders as breeders. Then we have out of area sales, people have driven to get livestock from us from 3+hrs away. The remaining would go to auction, eastern market, our freezer or be held over for christmas/fall lambs/sold ready for butcher. We figure we will have 10-20 lambs left to go on the last option there...minus any replacement ewes we need.

In the next few years we will have to replace sweetie and the polypay for sure, not sure ages on the new sheep. Sweetie is at least 5yrs old and the polypay is at least 6yrs old, making them 7 and 8 by spring 2020 plus time to raise the replacements puts them at around 8 and 9 years old minimum and definitely time to think about retirement based on condition and lamb vigor. We do plan to retain a number of good healthy looking ewe lambs for replacements for older/poor performing ewes every year. We will likely slowly phase out ewes that consistently throw singles or are poorly looking. Once we have all ewes who give twins/trips we may drop down to 40 ewes total depending on the market.

 

[misfitmorgan]

I forgot to mention we do have a restaurant about 45 minutes away that is very interested in finding a local source for lamb for the restaurant. Conservatively he estimates needing 40-50 lambs/yr butcher ready. We may go down that road in the future as well, it would be a bigger gamble though and done on contract.

Switching to meat goats should improve our sales and we plan on switching to a registered boer buck for 2019 breeding and hopefully getting our boer does NOA so we can do some % registered stock.

 

[Bruce]

I forgot to mention we do have a restaurant about 45 minutes away that is very interested in finding a local source for lamb for the restaurant. Conservatively he estimates needing 40-50 lambs/yr butcher ready.

That would be great!