Betsy's Backyard Blog

Betsy Freese is the editor-in-chief of Living the Country Life and executive editor of Successful Farming. She grew up on a fruit farm in Maryland (see www.strawberryfarm.com) and moved to the Midwest to get an agricultural journalism degree from Iowa State University. She and her husband, Bob, a veterinarian, have three children and own a farm where they raise sheep, hay, corn, and soybeans.

ATV accident

In our new issue, I wrote a story about Neal Sawyer and his grass-fed beef farm near Princeton, Iowa. Photographer Mitch Kezar and I visited Neal and took photos of him riding around his pastures on his four-wheeler, checking the cows and moving electric fence. Neal talked about how he convinced his father, Norman, to switch the herd from grain to grass, and it worked. They sell Sawyer Beef at farmers' markets.

As the Spring issue hit mailboxes, I heard that Norman was in a terrible ATV accident in the pasture where we had photographed Neal. A blog set up by the family says, "On Thursday morning, April 19th 2012, Norman Sawyer was thrown from a 4-wheeler. He landed on his back, injuring his C6 and C7 vertebrata. From what we’ve been able to piece together, one of the high-tension electric wires caught the 4-wheeler throttle and caused the 4-wheeler to take off, bucking Norman off. Neal was with him in the pasture, but did not see the accident. When Neal got to Norman, both could tell it was a serious neck injury. Due to the condition of the pasture, the ambulance could not reach Norman. He was helicopter evac to the hospital in Rockford, IL."

You can follow Norman's progress at http://www.nwsrecovery.com/ and leave him an encouraging note.

Betsy

Graduation

All good things come to an end. High school ended on Sunday when Caroline and Michelle graduated. Michelle's mother is arriving from Sweden tonight and we are planning fun activities all week. Michelle is packing up her cowboy hat, John Deere cap, prom dress, and cap and gown for the trip home to Sweden. It's been a fabulous school year -- the best senior year for the girls. I had a blast, too. I am going to have to stay very busy so I am not sad next week.

In classic Freese Farm style, after the high drama of the graduation ceremony Caroline had to help worm the ewes and vaccinate the lambs. We left her enough time to take a shower before the party that night.

Tags:
Family Fun

Kubota

I traveled to Nashville this week to check out new products from Kubota Tractor Corporation. The fancy tractor above is part of new generation of deluxe M-Series tractors. The Grand X is available in four models, up to 118 PTO horsepower with a 4-cylinder turbocharged diesel engine which meets the EPA 's Interim Tier 4 regulations. The Grand X cab is one of the largest in its class and features an unobstructed view and room for two adults. Compared to the standard M-Series models, the Grand X cab is 10 inches wider with 7 inches more headroom. With a massive windshield and skylight, "The Grand X is the ultimate luxury workhorse," says Kubota Senior Product Manager, Paul Williams (below).

Kubota also introduced the M8560 and M9960 tractors, which are upgraded models adding strength, comfort, and efficiency to its M-Series. The newly-designed 4-cylinder diesel engines (above) produce cleaner emissions.

I also got to drive Kubota's new fuel-injected utility vehicle, the RTV400Ci, and a larger diesel model. We attached a broom and cleaned the streets around the arena. Fun!

For more information on all these products, visit Kubota.com.

Tags:
Tractors Kubota UTV

Making hay!

The hay season started yesterday at our place, weeks earlier than normal. The grass hay is perfect, the alfalfa way past prime. Bob is stacking small bales of grass for a neighbor with horses. The alfalfa will be round baled.

Make hay while the sun shines!

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Hay

Building a new porch

Our house is almost 100 years old and the front porch was showing its age. The bricks and concrete steps were cracked and crumbling, the floor rotting. We hadn't used it for two years and decided something had to be done. It won't be cheap. The new bricks arrived yesterday from a brickyard in Sioux City, Iowa. A local family is doing most of the construction work. I can't wait to see the final result! Stay posted...

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Porches

Weighing the 4-H goats

Caroline took her 4-H goats to the fairgrounds to be weighed and entered into the system for the county fair. She entered five goats and they each weighed between 40 and 60 pounds. They screamed like kids when they were eartagged, and one tried to squeeze between the rungs of the pen and got stuck. The largest of the quads did a vertical leap from the floor of the scale to the desk where the women were filling out paperwork, knocking off papers and shocking them. "I've never had a goat in my lap," said one woman. Everyone had a good laugh. Goats.

Speaking of the quads, that doe is now milking 200 pounds of kids. They get supplemental grain and grass, but still. Amazing.

Tags:
Goats

Perfect timing for big projects

Just in time for Caroline’s graduation open house this weekend, the workers showed up to tear off and replace the front porch of our house. This was a project we planned last year, but the construction company was busy elsewhere. The job will take two weeks, so our guests will be able to admire the work as they eat cake.

And that’s not all. Two big hackberry trees near the shop died over the winter and needed to come down. Guess when the tree company could remove them? This week. I took both of these photos this morning.

If you are coming to the party, you can admire Caroline’s photos and displays…just don’t look too hard at my house or landscaping. And good luck with parking; it’s predicted to rain every day this week.

New Holland

I grew up 30 miles south of New Holland, Pennsylvania, and would often ride with Dad to the town’s livestock auction market to sell our feeder pigs. My sister and I would hang out in the barns and watch the Amish children play.

This week I rode by that sale barn in an Amish wagon on my way to a New Holland Agriculture media event. The company has brought more than 15 new products to the market in the past two years and wants to tell farmers about the innovations. The products serve the entire range of agriculture, including large cash crop farmers, dairy and livestock producers, small farmers, and rural lifestyle enthusiasts.

Below are a series of photos from the event. For much more information on the products, visit www.newholland.com/na

Abe Hughes, II, VP North America, welcomes everyone to the original headquarters of the company. New Holland was founded in 1895 by Abe Zimmerman and is the leading company in the world for hay harvesting technology.

We enjoyed a ride to the company headquarters in an Amish wagon.

The massive T9 with tracks is targeted at the largest grain producers in North America and especially popular in Western Canada and the Dakotas.

I’m not going to buy one this year for our small farm, but it sure was fun to climb aboard.

Here is a classic workhorse for the company: The T6 pulling a round baler. New Holland has sold 200,000 round balers and 700,000 small square balers. That’s a lot of hay!

Speaking of hay, here is a stacker for small square bales. My husband would love one of these!

The Rustler is New Holland’s utility vehicle. It’s made to be both practical and fun to drive. I took it around the track and up and down a hill. Great ride! That’s Dan Valen in the seat next to me.

Meet the MegaCutter Triple Disc Mower-Conditioner. If you want to cut down more hay in less time — 29 feet of hay with each pass — this is the machine for you.

This tractor is not a toy! The popular Boomer series has expanded to include two new models: the 23 hp Boomer 20 and the 27 hp Boomer 25 . The line now includes six models ranging from 23 hp to 47 hp. “The new Boomer 20 and 25 compact tractors are the ultimate power tools for homeowners, landscapers, hobby farmers and others who live the rural lifestyle,” says Dan Valen, New Holland’s Residential/Commercial/Municipal/Utility Marketing Segment Leader. “And, like all Boomer tractors, these are real tractors for real people who have real work to do,” he says.

The TS6 and Powerstar tractors are perfect for livestock farms.

New Holland segment managers push for new ideas and alternative ways to deliver products and innovations that farmers can use every day to make their lives easier.

Quad city

We have had four sets of quads this year. That is highly unusual, and not a good thing. One ewe died, along with three of her newborn lambs; the fourth lamb we grafted onto another ewe. Two ewes had two dead and two surviving lambs. And one ewe is nursing all four tiny lambs — now that is a miracle.

The key to successful quads is having all four lambs the same small size. That way they can compete with each other evenly for milk. Usually one lamb is big, one tiny, and two in the middle. Often that many lambs in one ewe depletes her and the babies of too many nutrients.

Here are some older lambs we moved to the back lot in the sunshine. (That’s our overgrown alfalfa behind them.)