Betsy's Backyard Blog

We have an old-fashioned county fair, and we love it. The Warren County Fair kicked off this week with the queen contest. Caroline was one of eight outstanding contestants, and the crown went to her friend Darcy Baker. The contest was a wonderful learning experience for all of the girls.

Next up was the sheep show (Caroline helped her friend Lauren in the ring) and the goat show, where Caroline had four entries. She placed second, third, and fourth in classes. There were 60 goats in the show this year -- a record number, and three times the entries from last year. Goats are hot.

Last night was the vegetable show, and I entered what I could from my garden. (The high heat and drought killed my cucumbers and squash.) I placed first in white potatoes, white onions, and peaches. I placed second in yellow onions, red potatoes, and white cabbage. And I had the largest potato at the fair -- 1.1 pounds. I was asked how I grow such large vegetables. Answer: Take sheep manure and old hay, compost it for a year, and then till it into your garden.

Here are some photos from the fair. The hog show is Sunday, so more to come next week...

Caroline is fourth from the left. Darcy Baker is in the white dress.

Caroline is in pink; Lauren in blue. Lauren had the champion pen-of-three lambs. It was hot in that show ring!

Showing goats.

The largest of the quads, a spotted wether of 100 pounds, is second in the heavy class.

My cabbage is the pretty green one in the middle.

The judge weighs my big white spud. It beat the big red potato below by 1 ounce.

Last night Bob baled the only field of alfalfa on our farm that grew enough to bloom again. It was a meager haul, but we are grateful to have it. The drought is bad at our place, but worse for others. The incredible heat is the killer right now. We have lost two 100-pound lambs in the past week, and we aren't sure exactly what killed them. We check the herd each morning and evening. Last night I walked the field at 9:00 and it was still a suffocating 91 degrees. The ewes stand and pant. We are in survival mode until Thursday when the heat should break, and we MAY get rain. Please.

I took a walk through my 22-acre pasture yesterday to see how it was faring in the drought. For the most part, it was a sea of brown. On the south slope were random spike-like weeds jutting up 5 feet with velvety leaves and yellow flowers. I took a photo and posted it on Facebook, where a friend identified it as Common Mullein (Verbascum thapsus).

This weed starts as low-growing rosettes the first year (I saw some of those, too) and then grows as tall as 10 feet the second year with a flowering stalk. An established population of common mullein can be difficult to eradicate, and the weed is classified as noxious in Colorado and Hawaii. Bob classifies anything the sheep and goats won't eat on our farm as noxious.

Here is another example of a plant not native to the U.S. being brought here to solve one problem and then causing another. Common mullein was first introduced into the U.S. in the mid-1700's as a medicinal herb. It quickly spread throughout the U.S. A single plant can produce 100,000 seeds which may remain viable for 100 years in the soil.

We are seeing it spike up this year because we didn't mow the pasture as normal, due to lack of rain. I cut as many of the hard stalks as I could (it was 95 degrees, so I didn't stay long). My sharp clippers could barely do the job. But it was a worthless job, I found out, because I left the blooms and seed capsules on the ground. I should have bagged them and sent them to a landfill.

When I posted this photo, a farmer friend said the real weeds are in the distance -- they multiply rapidly, and are very invasive!

Fresh out of college, Bob and I bought a small farm in Iowa in late 1987. The property was basically a big pasture, and we looked forward to starting a sheep herd. But drought hit in 1988. Our pastures turned brown, the lawn was crunchy, and I didn't even bother with a garden. We put all our plans on hold for a year and invested in an air conditioner for our old farmhouse.

We have not had a dry year since then, until now. I took this photo of a corn field a few miles south of our farm. There were lots more like that between our place and Kansas City. It's much worse in Missouri, Kansas, Indiana, and throughout the south. We have hay stockpiled in the barn, so our sheep are going to be fine this winter, but pastures are dry and hay is short all over. Feed costs are headed up.

We are going to cull our ewes heavily this fall, keeping only the younger and more productive females. We are selling all of our goats. 2012 will be a year when livestock producers have to make tough decisions. Take care.