Windmill Wednesday

Here's my Wednesday Windmill View. What's your view today?

Branding Menu:

As part of our appreciation for everyone help we prepare a good supper and lots of beer to drink and socialize after the long day of work. I simply cannot handle being in the house cooking all day while everyone else is outside working with the cattle so I prepare nearly everything in advance.We usually have a crew of our 40 friends and neighbors come over to help with our branding.  This year we had a small group help run our cows through to get a breeding shot, weight, and a pour on. So we needed a lunch for the few helpers in the morning and then a big meal to accommodate all of the afternoon help.

Lunch was simple. Hamburgers and brats thrown on the grill right after the last cow had been through the chute. We had a simple macaroni salad, chips, and brownies to go with the burgers and brats.

Our supper consisted of BBQ Beef Sandwiches, Cheesy Potatoes, Corn, a couple of macaroni salads, leftover chips from lunch and a cake for dessert to help celebrate my brother-in-laws birthday.

For the BBQ Beef  I cooked 10 chuck roasts all week long in the crock pots while I was at work.  In my opinion the chuck roast is the best for shredding. Every night we would sit down and shred the roast, pour some BBQ sauce on the meat store it in a big bowl in the fridge. Bonus by cooking the meat ahead of time, I get help from Tyson shredding the meat. J On the day of branding I put all of the meat in a roast and warmed it on low a few hours before we planned on eating.

BBQ Beef

The cheesy potatoes is one of those recipes I just throw things together in a roaster until it looks and tastes good. I used about 6lbs of frozen hash browns (left in the fridge overnight to thaw). I added in sour cream, cream of mushroom soup, onion pepper, shredded cheese, and cream cheese. I put all of the ingredients together in a roast at lunch time and let it cook until we were ready to eat it.

We have lots of sweet corn left over from last summer, so took some out of the freezer the night before and let it thaw in the fridge then put it in a crockpot at lunch to warm as well.

The macaroni salads my mother-in-law prepared in advance and brought them out for us. My sister-in-law made some deviled eggs and took care of the cake for her hubby.

Our group likes to enjoy a few beers after the branding, so we have a couple of coolers filled with beer. I also have some bottles of water, and some lemonade to go with the meals.

Here is Tyson.. Enjoying his beer while working. 

Honestly the meal is a lot of work, but with a little prep work ahead of time it isn't so bad.What do you feed your branding crew? Do you make it ahead of time or do all the cooking the day of? Or do you have it catered? 

Branding 2015

We had our branding this past weekend. Branding is an important part of ranching. By branding our cattle we ensure the our calves do not get lost or stolen. The cattle brand helps folk identify cattle that may have gotten out. With the high price of cattle these days, I am ever so thankful that if our calves are lost or stolen they can be properly identified and brought back to the correct owner.

With a brand we also give our calves a set of vaccinations that help to prevent any viruses they might pick up during the summer. These vaccinations are much like those that you give to your children before they attend school. We also choose to implant our steer calves. We band our bull calves at birth therefore making them steers. All of our calves get an ear tag at birth as well. Each ear tag has the mother's tag number, the date of birth, and the AI sire if there is one.

Here are some photos from our branding this year.

My brother-in-law was in charge of the branding iron. 

Waiting on the branding iron. 

Our neighbors are awesome!

My mom with Clara. She was loving the action.

My brother-in-law and nephew from Eastern Nebraska. 

Our brand an upside down TV. 

Don't let him go! 

Ready to go back to her Momma. 

How do you do your branding? Do you use any practices to prevent illness in your calves during the summer time?

Confession: I'm a "Shoe-aholic"

Flip flops, boots, heels, sneakers, I love them all! But ever since I got married and am actively in and or around farm equipment all day, there are very few days that I am not wearing boots. So I've been refraining from buying any new shoes, but now that summer is going around I couldn't help but splurg on something new...

So I ordered these from NRS :

Twisted X Breast Cancer Awareness Driving Moc

And I ordered these, don't tell Tyson...

Twisted X Neon Yellow Boat Shoe

A gal that I work with bought a pair at the NFR and has been wearing them around the office. I have been obsession over them and finally decided to order myself a pair of each! I cannot wait for these to  arrive in our mailbox. I love my boots, but I am looking forward to having another and much cuter option to wear to work! Now hurry up postman!

#TransformationTuesday

Well I have decided to join the fad on Instagram and Facebook... Transformation Tuesday, but I am going to do it Rancher Styler!

This little guy was born February 18, 2013. In just a few short months he grows to be about 7-8 times his birth weight. We wean our calves in early October, this year it was more towards the middle of October because wheat seeding went extra long with the wet fall weather that we had. The calves go out to grass late May or early June again depending upon the weather and moisture in our pastures. In October we round up all the calves and bring them home to the lots at the farm. After a few days of missing their moms, they soon forget and start to get pretty hungry.

We believe that our best opportunity to sell our calves is the first big calf sale in January, usually within the first two week after the new year. So in the three months that we have the calves in our lots, we feed them a very specific ration. These calves are still growing at a rapid rate so it is crucial to feed them exactly what they need and not too much. We try to be as efficient as possibly with everything that we do, so yes that meets a feed ration needs to be perfect so that the calves are fed enough to put on weight, but not too much so that their isn't any left over or wasted resources.

Currently we are feeding a ration that has sorghum sedan grass that we raised, sugar beet pulp from the local Sugar plant, and Dried Distillers grains a bi-product from corn ethanol. We are ever so thankful to have bi-product resources available near by to help control the feed costs. If we didn't have these bi-product resources we would have to replace the proteins and nutrients with more costly options such as alfalfa.

So I hope my post isn't too "ranchy" for you! :) But I must say that I am always amazed by God's creations that I thankfully get to experience everyday on the ranch.

Beans, Beans, Beans!

This year we had an over abundance of beans! After our first attempt at planting and not having any come up we replanted and then gave them some extra fertilizer. We soon had more beans than we knew what to do with. There is nothing better than fresh green beans right out of the garden, but you can only eat so many. So what do you do with the rest of the beans.. Freeze them!

Freezing beans is a relatively east task, but still a lot of work. I am every so thankful for my hubby who actually picked many of the beans since I have been traveling a lot for work. 

Sadie loves to tag along on the farm. After being scolded for digging in the garden, she decided it was best to take a nap!

After all the bean picking is done bring the beans into the house and prepare to wash, cut, boil, bag, and freeze the beans. You may be able to wait a day or two after picking to put them up, but it is best if you can do it right away.

Grab some beans and put them into a strainer.

Wash the beans thoroughly making sure to get rid of any dirt or leaves. 

After the beans are all washed cut the tips off and then cut into 2"-3" pieces.

You'll have a bowl with your clean cut beans and a bowl for the scrap ends.

After all the beans are cut, you can throw them into a big pot of water on the stove. Bring the water to the boil then cook the beans for 3 minutes. Once the beans are blanched you can start spooning them into quart size freezer safe plastic bags. Then simply put the bags in the freezer and store until you are ready to eat. I promise they will taste just as good as the day you picked them out of the garden.

If you are going to label your bags make sure you label them before you add the beans. It is best if you eat the beans within a year of freezing to assure the best quality.

What else have you been freezing from your garden?

Tips for a Successful 2013 Hay Season

Gearing up for a Successful Hay Season

Ongoing drought conditions and hay shortages have made the need for good quality forage crucial. Specific management practices are necessary to maintain hay quality and minimize hay loss during harvest, transportation, and storage of large round bales. The following helpful tips will ensure that when the hay is ready in the field you and your equipment will be too!

Windrower Inspection:

• ·         Sickle-bar headers: Replace cutter bar teeth and ledger plates. Replace the guards once yearly.

• ·         Disk mowers:  Replace knives and rotate or replace worn turtles covering the knives. Proper blade maintenance is critical to achieving a good cut. Blades must be sharp to cut the forage cleanly and to minimize stem and leaf shattering. Grease all lift system wear points. Check all belts for signs of wear and check the tires and tire pressure to insure proper inflation.

• ·         Self-propelled machines: Change engine oil and filters, and blow out all air filters, including the cab air filter. Make sure the radiator is free of dirt and debris. Stock up on key replacement parts such as cutter blades, sickles sections, guards, drive belts and hoses.

Round Baler Inspection:

• ·         Grease all of the grease zerks on wear points and chain lubricating.

• ·         Inspect the belts on your baler for damage. The belts should be running straight and not coming into contact with other belts of side sheets of the baler. Many times the belts can stretch and need to be resized to proper length. Be sure to take the belts off and measure them every two years to ensure they are all the same length (plus or minus one inch). Also check the lacings on the belts every 800-1,000 bales.

• ·         Check the chain to ensure proper length is maintained. Over time the movement of the chain over the sprockets will cause the pins and rollers to wear and become elongated or oval-shaped. If this happens the pitch of the chain will change because of the increased length. At only 3 percent extension the chain should be replaced to avoid failure.

• ·         Replace any broken pickup tines.

• ·         Check gearbox fluid levels and change if necessary. Run the baler for about a half hour and then check the temperature of the bearings with an infrared temperature gun.

Cutting hay:

Cut hay after the dew is gone and when the topsoil is dry to reduce soil compaction and hasten hay drying. A long stubble keeps the windrow off the soil surface to aid drying and improve subsequent pickup performance. Research shows hay quality is increased when hay is cut while the sugar content remains higher in the plant. Cutting late morning or early afternoon will result in lower quality hay as the plant sugar content decreases with increased air temperatures. Choose the right blade for the job. A shallower 10 or 11 degree blade creates less air lift thus pulling less dirt into the forage. Thick matted forage may require a blade with more lift such as an 18 degree blade. Set the cutter height between 1.5 and 3 inches. Avoid pitching the cutter bar downward at too steep of an angle to reduce dirt contamination and knife wear. Ideally, the cutter will gently float across the ground without scuffing the surface. If you see scuffs across the field you don’t have enough flotation pressure, or the mower is set too heavy. If you see waves in the field, you have too much flotation pressure, or the header is set too light. If the field surface is rough and uneven, flotation should be increased making the head lighter to glide over rough terrain.

Conditioning:

Conditioning speeds drying by opening the waxy cuticle layer surrounding the stem to allow moisture to evaporate faster. Hay conditioning can reduce drying time by two to five days. Correctly adjust the conditioners to maintain adequate roll pressure uniformly along the entire roll length. The roll gap is one of the most crucial adjustments for the conditioner. Apply enough pressure to the hay to cause a noticeable break in the stem skin, but not so much pressure that leaves are broken off. In general the roll gap should be at 1/16 inch or less. Set the roll tension tight enough to achieve a consistent roll gap, if the crop is being over-conditioned then reduce the tension. Keep the rolls clean and free of material. Check and make sure the roll is not worn down in the center and replace the worn rolls if necessary. It is essential to maintaining uniform pressure on the conditioner roll. Adjust the swath board to match the width of the baler pickup. Make the windrow width as wide as possible; it should be at least half the width of the baler pickup to minimize baler loss. Ideally the swatch should be nearly the full width of the baler pickup.

Raking and Windrow Formation:

Raking can form swathed hay into a windrow or accumulate two or more windrows into one. More leaf loss can be caused by raking hay than by any other harvest operation. When raking, synchronize the field speed and PTO speed to provide a gentle lifting and turning action. This will help avoid aggressive handling of the forage and excessive leaf loss. Set rake tines to skim just above the ground so they don’t dig up dirt, there should be one-half to one inch of ground clearance at all times. To form bales of consistent density and shape, make windrows uniform in width and uniform in the amount of hay contained. As mentioned previously it is best to create a windrow as large as possible to meet the baler pickup capacity and reduce field loss. Loss occurs as the bale turns within the bale chamber, so try not to run the baler when there is no hay feeding into the chamber to reduce unnecessary hay loss.

Baling:

When hay is baled, moisture content should be no higher than 18-22 percent. The higher the moisture content the less loss will occur so try to bale with the maximum moisture content without going above 20 percent to prevent spoilage. Synchronize the field speed to the pickup rotational speed to reduce pickup loss. If forward speed is too slow, the pickup device snatches the hay and pulls the windrow apart as it feeds. Or, if the forward speed is too fast the hay will start to bunch up in front of the pickup. The windrow should flow into the baler with minimum disruption. The operator should follow a weaving pattern to fill each side of the baler with crop material evenly. The feed rate should be as high as possible to minimize the number of turns within the bale chamber. A high feed rate can be attained by using large windrows and high forward speeds. Where windrows are small or field speeds must be slow, use a lower PTO speed.