Sugar Creek Farm

Some of you that have been around this here blog a while may remember that time I broke my tailbone feeding chickens. Or that time I fractured my elbow feeding chickens. Well I’m here today to write Chapter 3 in my ongoing Saga of Clutziness. The chickens are just happy that they have nothing to do with it this time.

Meet “Big Daddy” (named by Madeline.) He just looks like he’s up to something, doesn’t he? Big Daddy was the last of the last group of hogs we sold. The customer who bought him wanted to have him processed at a different locker than the one we use, so they came to load him up and haul him themselves.

They came the morning of New Years Eve to get him. I bundled up and headed out to help, and Matt asked, “Do you want to chase, or do you want to run the gate?” Normally I’m a run-the-gate kind of girl, probably because that’s the job my dad always gave me when he was sorting hogs for market. But on this fateful day I decided to change things up a bit and chase for a change.

I chased Big Daddy successfully from the outside pen into the shed, and then stood in the doorway to keep him from coming back out.

Big Daddy took one look at me and thought, “I can take her.”

He went between my legs, dumping me right on my tailbone on the ice. Matt started laughing, and then (finally) noticed that I wasn’t getting up off the ground. “Are you okay?” I couldn’t get my breath back to answer. Darn tailbone. I suppose since I injured it once already it’s always going to be sensitive. I thought I might pass out. Mostly from embarassment at being taken out right in front of our customers, who were now rushing over to see if I was still alive.

So I’ve been hobbling around this week. Just like last time it only hurts when I sit down, stand up, bend over, or sneeze. Oy.

The temperatures here have been bitterly cold the last few days. The creek is really icing over, but small areas of open water remain. I can’t imagine how frigid that water must be. But still the ducks trek back and forth between the cattle’s winter lot and the creek.

So I trekked out on my lunch break today to snap a few pictures of them.

Brrr, they look cold to me! But I did see a little bit of steam coming off the creek, so I suppose the water is a little warmer than the air. Still, brrr!

I hate to play favorites, but see that black duck with the white chest? Love the coloring of that duck!

2 years ago:
Year in review (a guest post by Matt)

1 year ago:
What we did on New Year’s Day

And you thought the daily after-chores game of football ended when the snow flew? Indoor stadiums are for wimps!

Santa brought Rafe a new football, a “real, big-kid football!” Since Mom generally frowns upon punting, passing, or kicking in the house (though it still happens on a daily basis) the games continue outside. His favorite thing is still kicking.

Pretty good form for being bundled up and kicking in snow boots 🙂

number crunching

I’ve created a monster. I showed Matt how to use Excel, and now he won’t stop!

It used to be, say prior to the 1980’s, that a person could raise a handful of feeder calves or hogs and pretty much figure on making a profit. And that’s the assumption we carried when we bought our first 4 bottle calves. And when we bought the next group of calves, and then the cows, and then the hogs.

But farming has changed. (This past year more than ever, but that’s another post for another day.) You can no longer assume a profit. And in the interest of giving you a real life look at our farm, I have to say that we’ve never made a profit on the farm as a whole (let alone a living.) We might make a profit on one enterprise or another but when you factor in all of the indirect costs, the farm as a whole has been operating at a loss. Obviously that cannot continue indefinitely.

It’s been 3 or 4 years since we started looking at this farm as a business and not just a hobby, and still budgeting and indirect costs and cash flow projections are a struggle. This time of year we’re looking at our numbers for 2007, trying to learn the lessons the numbers are trying to teach us, and project our numbers for 2008. With all of the volatility in agriculture the last year or two it’s become a daunting task.

Especially difficult is trying to set prices. I feel bad every time we have to raise them. I feel such a personal connection with each of our customers. I want to provide them and their families with tasty, safe food. I know how it is trying to keep to a grocery budget these days. But if we can’t get what we need to get to make at least a small profit, then we won’t be here next year.

So what’s going on here on the farm these days is a lot of time spent with the laptop and Excel spreadsheets. The numbers for 2007 are definitely teaching us something. I’ll share more about that as the year goes on.

2 years ago:
Happy 2006!

1 year ago:
Happy 2007

A handful of quick business-related items…

*We have 4 quarters of beef available for March butchering.
Email if you’d like to reserve 1 or more – at 2007 prices!

*We are now taking reservations for March & April pork.

*We are also taking reservations for 2008 chickens. Tentatively we plan to butcher in June, July, September and October.

We are still working on prices for 2008, but we do already have people placing orders. Yes, that’s kind of nice 🙂

*The 2008 Sugar Creek Farm calendar is still available. Maybe something to spend that Christmas money on?

Sunset over Sugar Creek

Happy New Year, everybody! Thank you for all of the Christmas wishes you left! I hope yours was merry. I’ve had a fantastic 10-day break from the blog, spent enjoying time with the kids, extended family and friends.

And of course, the number crunching. ‘Tis the season!

In thinking about this blog and what I want to do with it in 2008, there will be a few changes coming. I’ve thought long and hard about adding advertising to this site. I don’t want to annoy my regular readers. But a significant percentage of my traffic comes from Google Image searches. I’ve been thinking about how to capitalize on that, and help put hay in the cows’ mouths. So I’m going to give Google Ads a trial run. I’m also going to work on offering prints and image licensing.

The calendars went over pretty well, so I may in time design a few other items for a miniature “store front” on the website and also to sell at farmers market this summer. That will be a fun-for-me project, though, as I have time.

On the content front, I want to try and give a more day-to-day look at life on the farm. A “what’s going on right now” type of daily post. (The first one will be posted shortly!) Perhaps some “how-to” types of posts as well?

I’d also like to do a regular (weekly?) food post. One thing that was eye-opening for me doing the farmers market this summer was the number of people that don’t know how to cook basic things like a ham, or a roast. So I’m going to try some “How to Cook…” posts.

So there’s a sort-of list of resolutions/goals for this website in the coming year. If you have any burning questions or suggestions for topics, please leave them in the comments!

“Pigtails”

Submit your best photo of 2007 at Photo Friday!

Sorry for the photo-heavy post, but I couldn’t help it. It was just so beautiful today, what with the fog, and the hoarfrost, and later a touch of sun and blue sky. After a stressful bit getting Christmas packages mailed to faraway lands, a walk around the farm with camera in hand was the perfect tonic.

With white frosting for contrast, colors pop that you wouldn’t ordinarily notice on a typical gray, winter day.

Red berries,

blue-green needles,

a forest of chocolate-colored twigs.

Even weeds in the ditch become artforms under the cloak of the hoarfrost.

Graceful curves,

prickly spikes,

curlycues and starbursts,

and my favorite, tiny buttons that look like hornet nests.

Ollie is such an unassuming fellow. He doesn’t clamor for the limelight, like those glory-seeking cows.

Here’s Ollie and the hole he’s digging to China.

Hey there good looking!

Nice tusks!

Oh, now you are showing off!