Progress

We had several acres of land cleared in October as the first step in building out our final pasture.  My dad's little herd of pet cows will need to be relocated to our farm and we had nowhere for them to go, thus we entered the construction zone again.  I really nagged Jason about getting the land cleared and was concerned that the work had been done a tad too late for the grass seed to catch.  Jason kept assuring me that it was not too late and it turns out he was right.  The pictures below are the progress pictures of the grass.  As you can see there is a good amount of green in these pictures a  mere seven weeks later.  

progress picture 1

progress picture 2

"before" picture taken right after the land was cleared

Jason spread a mix of cool season grasses that will get established and grow through the winter months.  Our area in general tends to have more warm season than cool season grasses and those warm season grasses will make their way into the pasture without us having to put any effort into it.  That being said we will probably go ahead and seed with some warm season grasses in the spring anyway.

In a few short months I think this area will be shaping up into a very nice pasture for Buster and friends.  At some point we will need to be thinking about getting it fenced, running water lines, etc.  Jason and I are both content to avoid these projects for now.  Whenever we discuss it we agree that we will need to get to it "soon" but neither of us is inclined to set a more specific date than that.  

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Traveller

Levendi, Tony, Thomas and Baby

Norman and Calimba

Murphy and Sam

Merlin, Lightening and Noble (who appears to be attempting to eat something in the trees)

Gus and Romeo (unfortunately the nappers behind the trees were almost impossible to include in the picture but they are George and Lotus)

B-Rad, Johnny, Lighty and Africa

Dutch, Chili and Renny

Snappy, Slinky and Walden heading in for breakfast under a bright morning sun

Wiz and Sebastian

Site Selection - Things we thought about

(post by Jason) We still answer a lot of questions about our new farm even though it doesn't feel all that new to us at this point. We've found that the questions tend to be similar with the common them revolving around why we chose that particular piece of land and the location. We chronicled our search for a new farm on this blog and everyone knows that Melissa and I had many "discussions" about many tracts of land.


After we had spent two years searching for the right land to buy with nothing to show for our efforts I think most people decided we weren't ever going to buy anything. After a couple more years of searching even Melissa and I were starting to think we were looking for a needle in a haystack and we were never going to find what we wanted. As you know we did finally purchase land and then we had many more "discussions" through the building process. Below is a list of some of the major checkpoints we had on our list when searching for land:


1. Access to services. Like any business we needed to have easy access to certain services. Veterinary care, farrier care and a good feed store are pretty vital to us on a daily basis. We also did not want to change vets or farriers so this limited the geographic range for our search.


2. Based on previous known history, how likely is a natural disaster and if we get one, what are the most likely events ? How do we prepare for them ?

Thunderstorms - In my opinion, a thunderstorm is basically a loud rain with a noisy light show. It's not a natural disaster, although some folks disagree with me. While there exists some possibility of a horse/horses being struck by lightning the threat is no higher here than it is anywhere else and, realistically, what can you do about it ? Some folks feel better bringing their horses in during bad storms. Others feel better turning them out. Sometimes horses get hit in the field. Sometimes barns get hit and the horses in them also get hit. It's six of one and half a dozen of the other.

Drought - Like most of the United States, Tennessee experiences drought conditions from time to time. The only real concern with drought in the Southeast is a lack of available forage. We built enough hay barns in order to keep adequate amounts of stored forage to allow us to get through winter AND periodic drought conditions.

Flood - This one is easy. If you don't buy low lying land that is located in any sort of flood plain there is probably nothing to worry about. Our farm is not in any sort of flood plain. Not hundred year, not five hundred year and not thousand year. If our farm floods it would fall into what the insurance companies call an Act of God and it would be a one in a million event.

Ice Storm - The big danger here is that ice can knock down power lines and trees and can also damage fences. We don't need power to do any sort of feeding or other normal chores on our farm. This would include felling trees and repairing fences.

You'll note I didn't list tornadoes on here. An F4 or F5 tornado is a completely devastating event and if you get hit by one it's going to wipe you out. Just like most of the rest of the United States, Tennessee is not immune from the threat of tornadoes. But the likelihood of any one location being hit in a human lifetime, even in the heart of Oklahoma in the middle of Tornado alley, is so infinitesimally small that it's just not worth worrying about, and since we aren't in Tornado alley it is even lower here. While I would never say it couldn't happen it falls in the same category as lightning strike. In other words, you can't avoid them, prevent them, or even really prepare for them. The best you can do is hope like heck you never experience one directly.

3. How far away is the nearest nuclear reactor ? Are we likely to be under evacuation orders ?

We are more than fifty miles away from the nearest nuclear facility. This is forty miles beyond the area likely to be evacuated in the very unlikely event of a nuclear emergency.

4. How far away and where are the nearest large scale natural gas, oil, and gasoline pipelines ?


Although we never did worry about disaster striking, these things come with right of way/easement access issues and we weren't keen on having to deal with those. I guess you can call us hard to get along with in some ways. This issue knocked one property that we really liked out of the running.

5. How far away are the nearest large electric transmission lines ?


What can I say but we had no desire to have major power lines running near or through the farm. This issue knocked a couple of otherwise suitable properties out of the running.

6. How would a lack of electric power affect our ability to care for the horses ?

Not at all. We're on county water and we have a creek and a small pond. We don't require electricity to feed hay or grain, and as long as the tractor has a few gallons of diesel we are good to go for several weeks.


7. Accessibility.


The farther you are off the beaten path the more inconvenient it is to drive there with a horse trailer, especially with large commercial semi trailers. Anyone who has had to wander very narrow, winding back roads trying to find a farm with a horse trailer (all the while wondering if you are lost) knows why we wanted a reasonably accessible location.


I'm sure there are things I've forgotten since but in addition to land quality these were the main things we considered during our search.

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Tiny and Johnny grooming each other

Clayton and Largo grooming each other

Cuffie and Traveller playing

Hemi and Thomas grooming each other

B-Rad, Sebastian and Sam

Renny and Murphy with Wiz behind them

Wiz

Rampal, Clayton and Stormy

a closer look at Rampal and Clayton

a closer look at Stormy

Addicted to Gravel; Miracle Video

As Jason mentioned a few days ago we have had a lot of gravel trucks coming and going lately. I lost count after 20 or so loads. We needed to finish putting gravel on the driveway. We had been driving around our rock for quite awhile. We finally dealt with that and now have 3,500 feet of fully functional driveway. It is nice to not be navigating around the rock every day and not be creating a dust storm or a muddy mess when driving on 2/3 of the driveway.

We also had been dumping load after load of gravel around the gates and run-in sheds. Of course this is all in addition to the numerous other loads of gravel that we had already had delivered over the last year. However we had always had it delivered 3 to 4 loads at a time, not 20+ loads at a time like we have in the last couple of weeks. Yesterday Jason and I were discussing our gravel situation and assessing our gravel needs. We were thinking that we would have another 2 to 4 loads delivered and then be done.

I made the comment during this discussion that we were addicted to gravel. Apparently when your names are Jason and Melissa you cannot have too much gravel. When we were discussing where we would place our last few loads our inner gravel addicts still were not going to be satisfied. However we had lost count of how many loads had been delivered, like I said I lost count at 20.

Today we got the bill for our latest gravel extravaganza. I have previously written about one of my meltdowns when being handed the latest and greatest construction bill that is larger than anticipated. We have a lot of practice with this scenario at this point but we are only human and sometimes it just gets to you. Today it was Jason's turn to have a meltdown. If there had still been a dump truck parked on the farm he probably would have started shoveling some of the gravel back in by hand. Needless to say we will not be having a few more loads delivered and we will have to be happy with the gravel that we have.

However addictions are powerful, and by the end of the day we were back discussing about where we could use more gravel. I was joking with Jason that maybe we should buy our own gravel pit, then we would never have to deny ourselves. If anyone is racking their brain for the perfect Christmas gift for Jason and Melissa, we can give you the number for our gravel delivery guy. Hint hint.

Our poor driveway only had gravel on it for the first 1500 feet

But now our redneck driveway is gone and we actually have a functional driveway

another before . . .

. . . and after

one of our beautiful curves that we almost straightened out over a stupid rock

Thankfully the curve stayed; we started with crush and run as you can see here and then came back and added inch and a quarter gravel on top. Maybe we should have stayed with just the crush and run for now, or maybe we shouldn't have lost count of the number of loads!

Spreading gravel in one of the pastures; as the truck went back and forth with the bed lifting higher and higher they just stood in the shed without so much as a second look. Of course it goes without saying that if anyone had been trying to ride them you would have been bucked off.

A short video of the horses watching the gravel truck (this is Sam, Fuzzy, Dutch, Wiz, Sebastian, Alex, Renny, etc.); by the end the truck is less than a foot from the shed and nobody moves.

Contrast the above video with this video from two years ago. Some of you may remember this video of the Big Boys acting silly spooking at their new gravel pile at the old farm. The Big Boys are an endless source of entertainment and as you can see it is the same cast of characters:

Dutch and Sam finally came over to check out the gravel

A load of gravel being dumped in the not yet finished barn at the end of the driveway. Jason is in his element, feeding his addiction and directing the placement of the gravel.

Jason guiding the gravel truck into the mare/pony pasture

Cinnamon gave the truck a passing glance on her way to the water trough

Norman and Cuffie were hanging out in the shed and uninterested in the gravel truck

Maisie was only mildly interested in the gravel truck. There's Jason directing away. I was looking at all of these pictures and was playing "Where's Waldo" with Jason. Anywhere there was a gravel truck Jason was nearby directing and looking happy. He was looking a lot less happy when he got the bill!

A brief video of Miracle running in the pasture along with Sky, Bonnie, and Sparky the donkey

Stormy and Clayton

Darby

Moe

The Big Boys grazing; they were way out in the back of their pasture when gravel was delivered to their pasture. It would have been fun to see if they reacted as strongly this time around to the gravel delivery!

Kennedy napping

Trigger grazing as the sun was coming up

Chance, Leo and Homer

Clay and Fuzzy

Asterik, Silver and George

More Fun With Rocks

Everyone knows that Jason and I do not have a good track record with rocks. Unless you have been living under a rock (it is a joke - get it - HAHA) you already know the story of our first encounter with a rock. If you happen to have missed those posts here are the links:

Finding the Rock

Rock: 2, Jason & Melissa: 0

As we continued our construction progress, and thus the lengthening of our driveway (which is now just shy of 4,000 feet long), we found another rock. Another big rock. The lovely rock was located right in the path of where the driveway would run. Jason asked me if I thought we should change our plans and reroute the planned fencing along the driveway to avoid the rock. In a very cavalier moment I announced I would "not live for the rest of my life with our fences and driveway in a less than perfect location over a damn rock." God I'm stupid sometimes.

I refused to redesign this masterpiece of fencing and driveway location over a rock.

We built our fences as planned. We kept driving along our "driveway," and driving around the large rock sticking up in the middle of it. We built more run-ins, built another barn, ran water lines, and merrily went on with life, all while driving around this rock. Jason kept telling me it was pointless to start having gravel hauled in until we had dealt with the rock and gotten it out of the way. We carried on with life, driving around the rock on our redneck, dirt/mud only driveway.

Finally I said to Jason on Monday that the time had come, we had to deal with this rock so we could have a real driveway. You know, one that has an actual surface aside from dirt. Jason started telling me how busy we are, how much we have to do. I replied that I was fully aware of how busy we are and how much we had to do - and that maybe some things would be easier without this stupid rock in the way all the time. He broke down and called the equipment rental place. Yesterday a bobcat with a jackhammer was delivered to the farm for our entertainment frustration near death experiences rock removal.

This time we had a plan. Instead of trying to remove the entire rock, because we had no idea how big it was, the plan was to just bust the rock up to the point where it was now level with the rest of the driveway. I have bad news for those of you hoping to read about our usual disasters and projects gone wrong.

The plan worked.

Yes, you read that correctly, the plan worked. The equipment was big enough for the job. The equipment did not break. We did not break. There were no "marriage building exercises" involved. I know, we're in shock too.

Jason was able to bust big chunks off the rock, and then bust those down into smaller pieces. And then our rock was level with the driveway after awhile. At one point Jason was whipping around on the bobcat and gleefully slamming the jackhammer down on rocks with a big grin on his face. He looked like he was actually having a grand time. Later he told me that he was assigning names to the rocks - naming them after people he doesn't like or people who aggravate and annoy him - and then having fun smashing the rocks into bits. Of course this led me to ask "was my name assigned to a rock?"

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I posted this picture on facebook page with the caption "be afraid, be very afraid."

Something is wrong with these pictures. The plan is working.

Sam running from Jason on the bobcat. Just kidding, he was actually running for dinner.

Darby, B-Rad and Alex were also on the run

Noble, Snappy, Thor and O'Reilly

Fuzzy Punch

Clay and Chili

Maisie, MyLight and Lily

Renny using Sebastian as a scratching post

Rampal and Tiny

Dutch and Wiz