This discussion of our farming year has to start with Kai's sheep operation. And the action started early with the first set of twins born on January 15. The last lambs came on May 5 as a result of the rams breaking out in early December last year - good thing or the crop would have been 6 fewer lambs. So the total count was 17 lambs born from 13 ewes. Four ewe lambs were kept here for breeding and the rest of the lambs were finished and marketed directly to consumers in Calgary and area (exept for the one that is in our freezer).

Eight more ewe lambs were purchased from neighbors and Kai used his summer wages (working on 2 nearby farms) to buy ten ewes of various ages from a flock dispersal at Crossfield. So there are 32 ewes here now with 30 of them bred and ready to lamb starting in February.

To provide enough pasture for the expanding flock Kai built some new fences around part of the farm yard and a portion of the coulee. This is in addition to the area fenced last year around the coulee next to the pighouse. He also seeded a new 5 acre pasture (bromegrass) south of the yard to be fenced next year.

The hay crop is a huge success story. The first cut wasn't great since it contained a percentage of weeds. But we received 10 inches of rain after the first cut and were able to harvest an excellent second cut. We put 400 small square bales of it into the loft and the balance is in 16 large round bales. This is from 20 acres that was planted to an alfalfa/brome mix last year. So the sheep will be well fed.

Last year we put a new roof on the old cow shed (new sheep shed). This year's improvement project was to reconstruct the back wall. In order to accomplish this we had to clean out about 4 feet of steer manure which had been composting for the last 20 years. We also rebuilt a poor section of feedlot fence into a feeder for the hay and filled in a low spot in the feedlot.

Now for the cropland. Since we had to spend a huge amount last year on repairs to the old John Deere tractor (4020 from 1965) we decided to do as much of the field work ourselves as we could rather than hiring custom services as we have in the past few years. This started in late March with Kai running the crazy harrows across the field he had spiked last fall. We applied annhydrous ammonia with the 4020 and an applicator provided by the fertilizer dealer. We had some nice rains right after the Taber wheat was planted and the great moisture conditions continued through the growing season. We bought a pull-type John Deere combine (6601 from 1979) on Kai's birthday with the same amount of money we usually spend annually for custom combining. We thought our old 25 foot swather would work out if we only cut with 20 feet. However, the crop was so heavy that our little combine couldn't handle about 100 acres of it. The yield seemed to be about 60 bushels of 1CPSR and most of it has gone to the CWB via AgPro Grain at Trochu.

Now for the story on the rest of the livestock. Kai decided he wanted to learn how to raise pigs and chickens. He started by cleaning out the old brooder house and building a small pasture fence at the old pighouse. At the end of May we brought home 50 baby chicks - 25 meat type and 25 brown layers. We soon learned the 2 types weren't compatible and lost about half of the broilers. By this time Kai had constructed a chickenwire fence outside the brooder house so we put the layers out there and kept the remaining broilers inside. That wasn't good either because predators stole all but 7 of the laying hens. By this time the broilers were ready to eat so we butchered them all for the freezer and kept the layers inside. It was September before we started getting any pullet eggs and by the end of October the water was freezing so we butchered the hens too.

We bought two 45-pound weaner pigs from a local Hutterite colony in early June and fed them in the old pighouse. Water had to be carried up from the creek and the feed (mix of wheat, oats, barley, peas from the Monsanto research plot last year) was ground in the barn and carried across the coulee to the pighouse every day. They enjoyed rooting in the dirt when we let them out into the new pasture that Kai had fenced. And they really enjoyed the spoiled pumpkins we started feeding them in September from Uncle Dino's huge crop. By the second week in November the creek was frozen over and the pumpkins were gone so the pigs went to the butcher. One of them is now in our freezer with the lamb and all the chickens. The other one is in Grandma & Poppy's freezer for them and Uncle Dino's family.

So 1999 has been a huge learning experience for Kai and we are eating a wonderful variety of homegrown meats (including half a beef from Nana & Grandpa).