The past two days have been extremely busy here on the farm. We finally located a few pigs for my son's FFA fair project. We didn't think that we were going to be able to get his project underway but with the help of a few friends and unsuspecting souls it got underway and completed in just two days.
The prime location for the hog pen would of been up in the tree line but that wasn't possible as it stays to wet there and we couldn't have them to far from a water source. The only choice we really had was to remove part of the falling down barn and locate them there. Okay this is probably a blessing in disguise.
Day One:
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| BEFORE picture. At least 120 year old barn crumbling. |
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| After picture. |
We couldn't clean up the whole building as behind it is pasture and is holding in one bull that will be going to the butcher shop soon. The building is acting as a fence. Sometime next week we will have to build new fence so that we can remove the rest for more expansion.
We had to move all the debris from the barn across the creek and to our burn pile. It don't seem like much but, really it was. I know I had a good chunk of it all cleaned up before my son and husband made it back from Farmer Bob's.
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| This will be burned. Hopefully very soon. |
After having a cleared lot to work with they drilled holes for the posts which was a fallen down yellow locust tree, thanks to storm Drencho last end of June early July.
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| Drilling post holes |
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| Measuring for the next hole |
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| All posts set |
It seemed like it took forever to get to this stage of the build. There was a lot of father and son bonding going on too. I hope that our son learned a lot from this build. And now we are ready to start putting up the side boards. The lumber used for the sides is lumber that was timbered off the farm back in 1991 and 1992. It had been piled up in the old shed since then.
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| Saw mill lumber from the farm. At least 24 years old. |
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| Add the side boards. |
And like any other off the cuff builder some of the plans changed and the bedding area of the pen was moved to a different location. It was suppose to be off to the right but it got put on the back.
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| Added bedding area |
Thankfully my sons friend showed up after school to help them. It made my work a little easier as I was pulled away to go and work my sons mowing job. I do this from time to time when he has track meets, football practice or camp. Building the pig pen was really important so I tackled the mowing.
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| Getting the roof done |
They wanted to get the roof done before the extra help was gone. I don't blame them. There was no way I was getting up there to tack the roofing on.
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This scared the ba jibbies out of me. But, boys will be boys.
I think they were having a good time, anyhow. |
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Last thing few nails before we called it a night.
Not much more light to work in. |
This was the finish of day one! We were so thankful to have the Son's buddy to help. My son helped him build his pig pen so it was payback time for him.
Day Two:
Moved along pretty fast as much of the work was done. We only had to finish putting up the walls and make the door. On this day it was only our Daughter, Myself and Daddy working. Our son has a job at the local stock market with his buddy and they had to go to work.
We spent the first part of the morning going to the stock market to pick up the piggies. This was our meeting place of choice, plus we had some paper work to do.
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| Piggies in the stock trailer. Ready to go to their new home. |
So we made it home around lunch time and got straight to work. It was rather warm yesterday and we didn't want them to stay in the trailer too long. We finished up the hut and put the door together and on the cage then turned the piggies loose in the pen while we were finishing up the sides.
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| Now that's a door! |
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| Completed hut! |
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| Sissy helping out too! |
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| Completed Pig Pen |
Now that we have arrived at the completed Pig Pen. The only thing we have left to do is finish the watering system. Which will probably be completed early this week. We only need an elbow to install the self water.
This whole pen cost us roughly around 25 dollars. When pulling the old barn down we found some door hinges from the old barn. Our only expense was the gas to run the chainsaw, diesel to run the tractor to drill holes and retrieve the fallen locust tree, and the two partial boxes of nails. Everything else came off the farm.
This pig pen was probably an over kill but we shouldn't have to replace it anytime soon.
We took a page right out of
Eustace Conway book. If you don't know who I'm talking about he is a naturalist. Living on Turtle Island Preserve in North Carolina. He's fighting hard to keep his land and to build and live as natural as possible. I first heard about him on television on a show called Mountain Men on the History Channel. Very, very interesting man.
But, back to what my real story is about.
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| Meet Forest on the left and Bubba on the right. |
One last photo of the happy piggies.
I learned a lot during my time out there with my husband and children. WE all worked together to complete a project that will give us many years of use.
Have a great rest of the weekend my friends.
~ Farm Girl
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