February was all about winning some and losing some …..the ups and downs of life …..
There is no light without dark …. good without bad ….. trading quality for quantity. This past month was also all about rain. Lovely, life-giving, soaking rain. Filling up the dams, lifting the water table and quenching the dry earth. The veld and mielies have loved it but the hay contractor not so much! And our roads even less! We did manage to pull the pumps out of the river in time – the Little Mooi River is not a huge river and it has bursts it’s bank at least three times this month!
The day the contractor arrived to cut and wrap our oat bales across the river is the day it started to rain …. The timing for the quality of oats hay was scheduled perfectly and then it started to rain …. and so the contractor took his kit away, in the rain …. and so to date we still have a stand of oats in the land across the river, and so we now have quantity and the quality is decreasing by the day. At the beginning of the month we were finishing off making our own dry erograstis bales with the baler soldering on with constant running repairs.
The dairy is on the cusp of the season with calving starting, albeit slowly, and the majority of the herd being “dried off”. This happens 2 months before a cow is due to calve, they are moved out of the dairy parlor and sent to rest before calving. It is a battle to keep the milk production up as many of the cows are leaving the dairy and many of the remaining cows are 90/100 days after calving (which is their lowest milk production period of the year). Add to this the fact that cows don’t like all the mud they have to battle through when heading to the dairy twice a day.
The beef bulls are out of the herd and enjoying a bit of a rest after their breeding season. With the lovely rains we have had, the veld will surely look good in a few weeks time and the beef animals will just love that. We had a herd across the river in a camp that we could not access for the month. When we could get over the bridge, one animal was missing and the herd was dripping in ticks, desperate for a dipping. Tick burned diseases start reacting their ugly head at the end of spring with many cases being reported but for us it has been so far so good …
The mielies are still looking good and hanging on until silage season. The mornings and evenings have a definite chill in the air so autumn is here and it is just going to get colder and drier. The whole district is keeping a watchful eye out for the destructive army worm spotted elsewhere in the province. To supplement the silage in winter, the foggaging (growing out) of the kikuyu has been an ongoing chore. We sold a group of long yearlings this month and got a good beef price. This has been put down as due to the shortage of animals due to the drought. Yay … score for us!
The jackal are back ! Not good news for our sheep flock. This means that every night they have to be kraaled and let out in the morning. No midnight snacks for them….
The usual staff issues have been ongoing. Many of the staff are taking their well earned leave but it also comes with a negative in that one of the HF tractor drivers did not return from leave ….
As in all industries retaining trained, hard-working staff is a challenge.
That’s all for the moment …
Till next month …..
http://northernnatalcourier.co.za/65426/army-worm-invasion-detected-kzn/
Pink Farm Chick 