wildlife and the garden

Sorry for the lack of post. All I can say is we have just been busy with work, fall baseball, and school. So here is a update on all that's been going on around here:

Recently, we put out some more deer feeders, and planted our food plots. With the unseasonably warm weather we have had the past month the deer were slow to show. Then this past week a cold front moved through, Senior said to be on the look out because they move around more in cooler weather. Well,  this morning the dogs started barking, I  looked out the window and saw this doe and her two fawns smack in the middle of our driveway of all places eating acorns. Then they drifted to the edge of the woods and hung out there for another 30 minutes. I quickly grabbed my camera to show Senior and the boys.

Usually, when we see deer its at night on our trail camera, or they are running across the road in front of us. We never see them this close to the house but here they were just right outside our front door. I got to tell how serene and peaceful the moment was to sit there and watch nature at its best.

Again being surrounded by woods makes for lots of wildlife..one morning I sat on the porch with camera in hand watching the hummingbirds:

We have had two male cardinals around the property on a regular basis. I usually see them early in the mornings

  Things in the garden are starting to come to a seasonal end, we have given away so much okra that we could have opened our own road side stand and made a nice profit ( hmmmm   ideas for next year).  Senior and the boys love it pickled, so I made a few jars enhanced with red peppers

  Tomato's have been coming off the vines like tic- tacs, so I processed some sauce:

  Then there are the Collard Greens..  leaves so big they look like elephant ears. I was approached by a local culinary school about them, the head instructor wanted some for a function his students were cooking for. He also wanted to give a lesson in cooking traditional southern foods, so I loaded up a garbage bag full and donated them to the culinary school. They have also started buying eggs from us as well...that helps with the chicken feed cost.

The summer growing season has been long and I think we are all ready for a rest. We love being so self sufficient and able to store away all the good things we have grown. I will miss our daily chore of picking our veggies, but spring will be here before you know it and planning for next season has already started.

-JUGM and SENIOR

prayers for vegas

Where do you begin to put your brain around the events that happened in Las Vegas? Its is horrific and heartbreaking

All Senior and I can do at this time is pray for those families who lost a loved one, we just can't fathom that kind of pain. Our prayers are also with those in the hospital, May God heal them and help them through this.

We have our views on the POS shooter...But now is not the time for us to say them. Today we mourn

God bless those concert goers, and God Bless our Country....

9/11

With Hurricane Irma, all the devastation from Hurricane Harvey, wildfires out west. It is easy to put today on a back burner. But, lets try not to. So many innocent lives lost that fateful day. Our prayers are with the families for continued strength and healing at the loss of their loved ones, and with our Nation to keep us strong and never forget....

A yuppies evacuation plan...

JUGM here, and sharing this Facebook post from a yuppie friend of mine from Florida. No evacuation orders have been given for her area, and from what I understand they probably won't issue any,  and should any be ordered it will be the coastal areas, which she is not in:

#IrmaGerd #whattodowhattodo
Ok would going to Jacksonville and staying in a high rise condo (14th floor!) be a good idea?!?! (*Edited to add... my family, my parents who I don't want to separate from, our Uncle Joe and 2 sweet puppies!) Every Jacksonville hotel is fully booked cuz people from South Fl are going there for safety?!
Trying to think of all possible evacuation strategies. Also could drive 5 hours to ATL to J's family. Or 6.5 hours to T in Cary North Carolina. What to do what to do! Omg. Jax option seems easiest since it's only 40 mins from our house in Fernandina Beach.

So yea...lets evacuate to a high rise on the river in downtown Jacksonville, so when the power goes out you and your entire family will have to truck up and down 14 flights of stairs with your toddlers.

I post this so people can see what not to do during these type of storms, and the mentality that is out there..  

Operation Bacon

     As planned this past Saturday, the day was started early. We all rolled out of the house a little after 0700 and finished setting up for our contingency plan. We also needed to wait for the sun to come up some more to give us better light. Once complete setting up, we began with first up, Katharine. JUGM started to tap the slop bucket and she came right over to the fence and I took aim with the Henry and one shot was placed about 1 inch above the eyes, center-lined and  she dropped straight down.

    So as she was on the ground flailing around, the other two went to her to see what was going on and nudging her. As her reflexes were ending, I had the perfect shot of Lisa and took it, she dropped straight down and started her flailing. Now by this time, the last remaining sow, Joanie had figured out what is going on and she knew she was next. As I tried to take the shot outside the pen like I did with the first two, she was not cooperating and here I go into the pen. Once in there, she would try to keep ahead of me while leading her head out of the way. After a few minutes of back and forth in the pen, she showed the shot. As soon as I took aim, pulled the hammer back, put finger on the trigger, she moved her head as I shot and let out a hellish squeal that had all the dogs in the area barking. I hit her about an inch below her left eye. So now I have a pissed off pig running around and what can you do but just let her calm down. So I wait a few more mins and she is standing in the back corner and trying to hug the fence to walk past me,  I lifted the Henry with hammer already cocked, pulled the trigger and she dropped down next to the fence. With all down, we commenced to remove the fence panels to pull them out to wash them off. Once they were washed off, we rolled them into the bucket on the tractor and I loaded them into the trailer.  

L to R, Katharine, Lisa, and Joanie

    Got them all wrapped up like a piggy in a blanket with the tarp and set off to the processor.

Lisa on the scale

Joanie on the scale, Katharine on rack

    Here are the numbers for them:

Katherine: 262 lbs

Lisa: 236 lbs

Joanie: 228 lbs

Grand total: 726 lbs

(I'm sure "APINC" doesn't care for the names, but who cares.)

     Tuesday morning we got the call that they were ready so I took Wednesday off to make the trip down to get them while the kids were in school. Once home, we went to work putting them away.

No bacon, want to experiment with some recipes for pork belly

Ribs

   

Pork Chops (3/4" thick)

   The processor complimented us several times on the girls, and how great they looked. The accolades continued when we picked them up,  he was very impressed with the overall color and consistency of the meat. I will say, those were some outstanding pork chops and they were very good. I am very proud of JUGM as she did the majority of the work raising these sows for our nourishment and she did an awesome job.

Current plan is to take a break and redesign the pig pen into a concrete pad with a metal roof and a waste removal system that can be washed either into a drilled hole 4 foot in the ground or maybe a small septic tank and drain field, who knows which route we will go.




Senior

Hurricane Harvey

  We have friends and family in San Antonio, Houston and in Helotes, TX and they are all saying stores are emptying out, gas lines are long and the highways are congested. Some reports are saying that fighting has broken out. This is why we preach the gospel of being prepared....  My family members in Houston have not forgotten Tropical Storm Allison  that dropped so much rain that it was almost up to the highway over pass signs, she has reminded people not to be complacent but yet they are.

She posted this to her social media account it was June 2001

Nearly 35 inches of rain is expected, as this monster not only makes one landfall on Saturday but eventually a second one sometime later in the weekend. The darn thing is just going to sit there and meander across the coastline of Texas, which is by far the worse case scenario for any tropical system. Our thoughts and prayers go out to all those in the path.

Please heed all the warnings and stay safe....

-JUGM

Update on the Garden, Solar Eclipse, Preparing for Operation Bacon, and some thoughts

    Took the day off from work. Kids only had a half day as we are in the path of the eclipse. We are projected to be at 98 here. I don't really care to go to a city that has 100%, mainly because of the traffic. Took some pictures yesterday in the garden of the tomatoes, collards, and squash. I added pictures from 2 weeks ago of the mater's and greens to show the growth. Now I know there are some amateur pepper's out there that get their "Panties" in a wad when they pull up parts of their gardens and blame the heat and sun for their plants demise. Here is a pro-tip for ya, how about water your stuff...... Trust me it works. Also proper fertilization helps too.

Tomatoes

08/06/2017

08/20/17(zoom in for the tomatoes)

Collards

08/06/2017

08/20/17

Squash (picture is from 08/20/17)

Notice the stress from the heat

No need to pull them up and be a quitter, water does amazing things

yesterday's bounty

     This coming weekend, "Operation Bacon" will begin. Joanie, Katherine, and Lisa will make their way to the processor. Operation will commence at 0600 and Winchester report to follow. In preparations for the event, there were a few things to do. We have stopped buying 16% pig feed and switched strictly to corn for their last few days. Once they are gone I can use the corn for deer season.
This morning we both took the kids to school then headed to get another barrel filled

at the grain mill

    So with their last meals on hand, next was to prep the storage of those cuts of meat. We went and purchased another freezer Sunday. We already had a 14.3 cuft upright and we added a 16 cuft chest to take us up to 30.3 cuft of cold storage. Making sure we could use all available space in the upright, I pulled it out of the building today and defrosted and cleaned it.

     Now, once they are ready to go, I was intending on taking the tractor and picking them up and dropping them in the back of my truck, but with all 3 it might be a tight fit for all, so this past weekend went and got 3 new tires for the trailer, hell the tires were 7 years old and still looked good but there is that little "Murphy's Law" standing on my shoulder putting thoughts' in my head of having a blow-out with 600 lbs. of pork sitting on the side of the road in the hot sun. I figured it would be a good time to change them out. While changing the tires, I pulled both hubs off, checked the bearings, and packed and put new grease in there. So with the tarp already layed out, all we have to do is back it down the hill to load up.

    Well I put in the title that I had some thoughts so here you go (Reader discretion is advised). I want to talk about this "Statue Issue" that the left has just been in an uproar since Charlottesville. First off, why do you wait until Obama is out of office to pitch-a-bitch? The first 2 years of his first term, you could have made farting in public a felony. So why now do you all of a sudden have a problem with Confederate Statues? I know, because there is a non-career politician that is white in the presidency that is trying to make this country successful again. When I heard that Nancy Pelosi wanted to remove the confederate statues from the capital rotunda after the stupid bitch has walked past them for how many years, I started to laugh. Just shows you how many stupid asses there are in her district in California.

    So these white-supremacists, neo-Nazi's, or whatever you call them this week in the media, they applied for a permit to exercise their freedom-of-speech and had every right under the law to be there and spread whatever message they wanted too. Some may like it, some may not but who are you to prohibit them from exercising that right under the Constitution? Well let's add social media, probably the media and a few other liberal organizations getting involved to set up a counter protest, without a permit and setting up camp to stir up trouble and violence as they always do, then all these media outlets show up expecting to see violence, well that's what they got. It's a shame that someone lost their life in the protesting.

     Why have we come to this? I feel that the liberals are trying every avenue, to include the race card to derail the current president from office because the are so pissed that their "Wonder-Girl" lost again, but this time to a white guy...... Let's look at the left and remind them of a few things......

Democratic party was established by President Andrew Jackson. remember him from the trail of tears.

Democratic party was prevalent in the south during the civil war and from what you liberals know that the south was about slavery, but you all vote democrat during elections even today.... Sorry, scratching my head while trying to figure out why all of you are "FUCKING DUMB-ASSES"? I apologize, I had a senior chief moment.

Democratic party was strongly against the passing of the Civil Rights Act but you still continue to support and vote Democrat.. LMAO

Republicans under President Abraham Lincoln passed the Emancipation Proclamation to end slavery, not the democrats, but you still vote for those turds.

Last but not least, I am sure way back in time, there was no hunting season in Africa for slaves. You were sold out by your own people, the strong selling off the weak to benefit their bottom line so I think if you really want to protest and actually make a real justification for your actions, do your research and find the family's that were involved in the slave trade and go after them. That's where it starts!

You cannot erase history, you can learn from the mistakes from the past and build on them to make our country successful. Remember that. One thing I can say is that in a time of emergency in the navy, we never chose who we would save from a flooded or burning space nor never leave a shipmate alone on the beach to get attacked. One thing I will always remember from standing the mid-watch on Delta pier at Naval Station Mayport. There was a writing on the wall in the Sentry's shacks that stated "Why is it when we are overseas we are American's, but in homeport we are white, black, Asian, or Hispanic"? Think about that.....

Senior