Bluefield Acres

Wild Edible Foods!

2011-11-05T09:44:00.000-04:00

We recently bought Nature's Garden, Samuel Thayers book on foraging for wild edible plants, and I can't say enough about how awesome it is. Not only does the book go into great detail about 40 or so American wild edibles, but 98% can be found in North Carolina where we live. Samuel provides enough information to make you feel confident about exploring wild food in a safe manner. As Sam explains, you should never eat anything you're not absolutely confident about, but learning to tell the difference between wild varieties can often be as easy as telling the difference between a head of cabbage and a head of iceberg lettuce. We can all do it, it just takes basic observation skills, committment, and time.

Our first foray into wild food was not in Thayer's book, but since I'd observed and researched the above mushroom over an extended period, we felt very safe digging in. This is a cauliflower mushroom and is typically found at the base of conifers in our region during the late summer and early fall. Even though we were super confident on our identification, we took Samuel's advice and only ate a few bites the first night as never know how you'll react to any new food - wild or otherwise. Fortunately, we found this mushroom simply delectable!

Day two we went all out - spicy Guinea Hog burgers topped with Guinea Hog bacon, cheese, and sauteed wild mushroom . . . yummmmmmmmm!

We will definitely try this one again!

BLUEFIELD ACRES

Best Sweet Potato Pie . . . Ever!

2011-10-08T14:27:00.000-04:00

Scott finally made that sweet potato pie he promised - our sweet potatoes, home-rendered lard, and farm fresh eggs plus a few non-homegrown ingredients.

Here's our recipe for a 9" pie.

If you have time, make crust and chill overnight.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees before baking.

Pie Crust

1 1/3 cup all purpose flour
1/2 heaping teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 cup well-chilled lard
3-4 tablespoons bourbon (water can be used, but bourbon or vodka will produce a more tender crust)

Directions

Sift flour into large bowl
Add salt and mix thoroughly
Add chilled lard and cut in with two knives until lard is the size of peas
Add just enough bourbon to form a dry dough ball
Refrigerate for at least 30 minutes (overnight is better)
Place ball on well floured surface
Mash out with hands until approximately 6 inches in diameter
Flour top of crust and flip
Flour top again and roll to desired thickness
Gently fold in half and place in pie plate

Gently form to plate and trim or crimp edge

Here's what a 1/2 cup of our homemade lard looks like.

Crisco can be substituted.

Cutting in the lard.

The bourbon and lard are Scott's secret to a tender crust.

Pie Filling

1 pound of baked sweet potatoes

1/2 cup butter, softened

1 cup dark brown sugar (firmly packed)

1/2 cup milk

3 medium-sized farm fresh eggs (or 2 large eggs)

1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1/2 teasponn ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/2 teaspoon dried ginger

Directions

Bake sweet potatoes until tender, then remove skin.

Mash sweet potatoes in bowl.

Add butter and mix thoroughly (we us a Kitchenaid mixer).

Stir in sugar, milk, eggs, nutmeg, cinnamon, and ginger.

Beat on medium speed until smooth, then add vanilla and mix.

Lastly, run through ricer to guarantee smooth consistency, and pour filling into unbaked pie crust.

Cooking Directions

Cook pie for 50-60 minutes at 350 degrees (until knife inserted in the center comes out clean)

Cool pie to room temperture, add homemade whipped cream, and serve.

Enjoy!

bluefieldacres@gmail.com

Spanish Goats and Sweet Potatoes

2011-07-31T14:15:00.000-04:00

Well, it's been a busy summer. Between two graduate classes, traveling to Atlanta and Spokane, and working full time for Scott, I haven't had much time to blog, so I'll do my best to sum up what's been going on at the farm in this post.

The garden did horribly this year. It's just been too hot! We harvested a few ears of sweet corn last month, but our field corn (which was shoulder high and beautiful at the beginning of June) didn't produce at all. Our tomatoes grew like crazy, but most got blossom end rot and had to be thrown out, and any that were edible were consumed by the rabbits. Thank goodness our sweet potatoes did well! We harvested them today and look forward to devouring some very soon - think SWEET POTATO PIE!

Yesterday we delivered four gilts to customers and picked up two 4-month old Spanish goats for ourselves. Godiva, the brown one, is extremely curious and outgoing, while the black one (Snickers) is a bit shy. The girls are currently in a holding pen so they can adjust to their new home, but we hope to introduce them to more of the property (and the pigs) very soon.

These little ladies will be the foundation of our breeding stock and will be in charge of landscaping all fenced areas of the property . . . let's just hope we can keep them out of the orchard!

Nothing quite like sweet feed for making friends!

Looking forward to FALL!

bluefieldacres@gmail.com

Hot Weather; Cool Pigs

2011-06-25T17:43:00.000-04:00

The weather has been miserable hot in Southeastern NC since about mid-May. . .

but we've got some really cool little pigs.

Magnolia had a litter of three boys and five girls on June 7th. Unfortunately within two days of their birth, two baby pigs were dead. We think Magnolia smothered them but can't say for sure. We assured her that our freezer had room for extra sausage, and she's been a doting mother ever since.

All six remaining babies are spoken for at the moment, but we're hoping Scarlet is pregant and will have a litter herself within a couple of months. Here are some pictures of the happy and healthy little guys and gals.

If interested in getting a pig from Scarlet's litter, email bluefieldacres@gmail.com.

Decorative Hand Hoe

2011-05-10T15:16:00.000-04:00

Scott got an order for another hand hoe, so he banged one out while heat treating knives for the Blade Show in June. See what you think.

Which reminds me . . . I need to hoe the garden!

If you want to see more of Scott's metal work, go to http://www.guineahogforge.com/, and I'll post more on the garden soon.

http://www.bluefieldacres.com/

bluefieldacres@gmail.com

Making Traditional Bark Baskets

2011-05-03T17:05:00.000-04:00

Over Easter Scott mom decided that we needed to try making baskets out of tree bark. She has a traditional style bark basket from the North Carolina mountains, so using it as a template and a handout as a guide, we trudged into the forest to find the right trees for our project.

Scott's parents live just north of Raleigh, NC on a heavily wooded tract of land. The handout on making traditional NC mountain baskets stated that poplar tree bark should be used for the basket and hickory bark for the thread, and specified that the deed should be done in mid-July around the time of the full moon. Well, being in an area quite a bit warmer than the mountains, and given that we might not be at her house in July, Peggy decided that Easter week was the right time for making baskets in central NC and declared that full moon or not, we had a mission to fulfill.

Scott found a poplar and tested the bark to see if it would come off after being cut with a hatchet and pounded upon with a hammer. The pounding separates the outer bark from the inner tree but will only work at certain times of the year. Voila'! It worked like a charm, so he broke out the chain saw and dropped the tree on the ground.

Well you didn't really expect us to make the baskets in the forest did you? It's tick season.

After cutting the poplar into manageable sections and finding a few small hickories for thread, we headed back to the shade of a tent beside the house and set the entire family to work. Check it out - these folks are all expert bark basket makers now!

Scott found an old dogwood cudgel that he made as a teenager and put it to work separating the bark from the inner tree. It was the perfect tool. Once beaten to submission, the bark will pull away relatively easily in large sections.

Next, you have to scribe a football shaped line in the outer bark near the center of the basket to make the bottom. This has to be done carefully to prevent cutting through the inner bark, and allows the basket to fold into shape. Here's Bonnie doing a fine job with one of Scott's custom knives.

Apparently it is very important to have lots of supervisors when scribing! Good work Grandpa and Dylan.

Next you have to make holes for the thread. Yes, we cheated again - power drills definitely make the job easier. Hard to tell in the picture, but Conner is pounding hickory bark to get the inner strands off for thread while Jacob drills holes in the basket.

Soak the bark to make it thread easily, thread away, tie it off, and . . . viola' . . . you have a basket!

Hmmmm . . . since we're supposed to be in the mountains this July . . .

http://www.bluefieldacres.com/

bluefieldacres@gmail.com

Vintage Gravely Walk Behind Tractor

2011-04-18T12:38:00.001-04:00

Scott, the kids, and I spent the weekend cleaning up this 1961 Gravely walk-behind tractor with mower, sickle, and chipper attachments. It's a great machine that we thought we'd use around the farm a lot after Scott aquired it, but the purchase of a shiny new BCS walk-behind tractor/tiller for the garden quickly relegated this antique to the shed. We considered restoring the Gravely to take along when demonstrating blacksmithing at the local farm shows, but we simply don't have the time between graduate school, work, the farm, and Scott's knifemaking . . . and we could really use the space:)

So, we've decided to sell. If you're interested, let us know. If you know someone who might be, pass the info along. This is a highly restorable, mostly original, very functional Gravely tractor. The engine is the original Gravely and, although a few things could be tweaked, everything works.

The chipper was originally green, as indicated by a few spots where the tan paint didn't adher.

The sickle has a few broken teeth, but all the parts move freely, and the attachment link is immaculate.

We even have the original manual, some maintance records and other Gravely artifacts.

We're asking $1000 for everything and are located in Clarkton, NC. Email if you have additional questions.

http://www.bluefieldacres.com/

bluefieldacres@gmail.com

Lake Waccamaw Southern Farm Days

2011-04-13T14:35:00.000-04:00

In March the entire family demonstrated at the Lake Waccamaw Southern Farm Days Festival. Scott, the bladesmith and blacksmith, forged over green coal and was assisted by his two sons - Jacob and Conner.

Scott's mom Peggy, daughter Bonnie, and nephew Cullen cooked traditional style.

Apple dumplings - Conner helped by eating the peelings.

Fire roasted apples

Chicken roasted in a traditional reflector oven

Corned beef . . .

. . . browned to perfection by Cullen . . .

. . . under a salamader blacksmithed by E. Scott McGhee.

Cowboys, wranglers, saloon gals, and all kinds of interesting folk attended the event.

See you next year!

http://www.bluefieldacres.com/

bluefieldacres@gmail.com

Scott's Spicy Sausage

2011-03-10T17:26:00.000-05:00

At Bluefield Acres, we grind and blend our own sausage using fresh meat from naturally raised American Guinea Hogs. You can use the following recipe to blend your own sausage, but it may need adjustment depending on the pork you use. Our Guinea Hogs graze for much of their food, which may account for a higher salt content in the meat. We're not sure why the meat is saltier, but we use less salt in our GH sausage than we would if using commercial pork (about 2 grams less). If you are raising your own hogs on pasture or forage, please keep this in mind, as you may find it necessary to play with the recipe to make it work with the terroir of your farm (soil, climate, topography) and the eating habits of your animals.

If starting from scratch, cut separated meat and fat from your animal into cubes, then blend at 80% meat to 20% fat. Cool in refrigerator before grinding, then course grind this mixture once without spices and refrigerate again until cool. We use an LEM grinder.

Next blend in the spices at the following measurements and grind the blend twice on course to medium (depending on your preference). We prefer our sausage course ground and mix it to have a low fat content.

1 lb meat/fat
6 grams of salt
2 grams black pepper
1.1 grams red pepper flakes
0.6 grams chipolte
2.4 grams brown sugar
* sage - see below
50 ml water

*2 teaspoons sage per 5 pounds meat/fat

Remember to cool the sausage in the refrigerator between grinds to keep the meat from getting too hot, and always wash or freeze grinder attachments between grinds to prevent contamination.

Enjoy!

bluefieldacres@gmail.com

Mak'in Bacon

2011-02-14T12:29:00.000-05:00

Scott finished curing our bacon last week. This requires fresh pork bellies with the skin left on. Once you have the bellies, here's how it's done.

Lay out bellies and rub with sugar cure (see LEM for pink salt; read instructions carefully to make the rub); seal in 2 gallon bags and refrigerate.

Flip over once daily checking consistancy; when stiff at the thickest part, the bellies are ready for the next step (note: for safety reasons bellies must be removed from the cure in 7-10 days).

Take bellies out of bags, rinse throughly, and pat dry; then smoke with indirect heat or bake in oven at 200 degrees until internal temperature is 150 degrees; take off the grill or out of oven and remove skin while bacon is still warm.

Walla, your bacon is ready to slice and fry, and, as the old lady at the local butcher shop says, "You can slice 'em thick, thin or just right." Personally, I always opt for "just right"!

We usually bake some in the oven and smoke the rest with apple wood on our homemade grill.

For definitive information on curing, refer to Charcuterie by Michael Ruhlman and Brian Polcyn. Scott learned most of his curing techniques from this book, and we highly recommend it.

Enjoy!

http://www.bluefieldacres.com/

bluefieldacres@gmail.com

Look'in for Love

2011-02-10T12:35:00.001-05:00

Sex: Male
Age: 9 1/2 months old
Born: May 1, 2010
Sign: Taurus ("The Bull")
Element: Earth
Enjoy: Rooting, grazing, laying in the sun, belly rubs, and wallowing

Hi, they call me Tyrone (although I don't have an official name), and I'm a young registered American Guinea Hog male look'in for love. I am quite handsome (straight black hair with just a hint of curl), very laid back and rather gentle. I'm not real big yet, but I expect I'll be a big boy when I grown up. I currently stand approximately 21 inches tall at the shoulder, and I'm about 3 feet long. I've never weighed myself, but I'd say I'm around 100 -110 lbs (give or take a few). I live in eastern North Carolina, but am happy to relocate as I'm very interested in finding a lady friend and having piglets.

If interested, please contact my personal handler at the following address bluefieldacres@gmail.com or call 910-540-4475. Ask for Lydia.

Hope to hear from you soon.

Love,
Tyrone

Hog Harvest: A Comedy of Errors

2011-02-04T13:20:00.002-05:00

We harvested two America Guinea Hogs on Saturday. We planned to take four, but, given the comedy of errors that ensued, two was all we could handle. The following post is about processing hogs and is not for the squeamish, so proceed cautiously. Below I've listed our basic method and have included a slide show of Saturday's activities.

Our Method for Processing Hogs - Click for SLIDE SHOW

Do not feed hog for 24 hours
Shoot hog between the eyes with .22 LR
Cut and bleed the jugular
Scald hog in water at 150 degrees until hair pulls out easily
Scrape hair until skin is clean
Wash carcass
Gut hog
Remove head and feet
Butcher into desired pieces of meat and fat
Blend and grind sausage

We started the day a bit later than planned. At 7am, Scott went out to fill the scalding tank that had been set up the day before, but the hose still had water in it and was frozen stiff; we should have filled the tank the evening before. An hour later the tank was finally full, but one of the propane burners wasn't working properly, and it took forever to get the water to the necessary 150 degrees for scalding. Luckily a neighbor loaned us an extra burner, but it was still 10am before the first hog hit the water.

The comedy did not stop there, however. Both pigs made it from the killing field to the tank without incident, but getting them out of the tank and to the scraping station was another matter. We've always used a strap around the ankle to haul the hogs via tractor from station to station, and have never had any issue with this method. In the past, however, we've left the strap on during scalding. This time we removed the strap to more evenly scald the pig, and this was a mistake. Scalding is utilized to remove hair and the first layer of skin, and the reapplied strap would not stay on the foot as the skin and hair instantly sloughed off. The first pig fell back into the scalding pot several times, and the strap slipped off the second pig while in transit to the scraping station allowing the hog to unceremoniously the ground. Next time we'll use a hook through the mouth.

The scraping and butchering thankfully proceeded without incident, but I noticed that Scott appeared to be in pain while working on the first hog. Afterwards, he admitted that he had indeed thrown out his back but felt he could continue, and (at about that same time) we realized that our struggling propane burner was now dead. Our scald temperature was now far too low, and it would be another hour before we could process the second hog.

The second pig entered the water around 1pm and by 3pm we decided to call the harvest to a halt. We still had meat from two hogs to process/freeze and sausage to make, so two hogs got a stay of execution. It was a beautiful day however, and, thanks to friends and family, we have some wonderful Guinea Hog pork to eat. Thank you all. You are always welcome at our table.

There was a capping moment to the day's comedy of errors. While sampling some fresh Guinea Hog sausage later that evening, Scott's two-day-old crown dislodged from his tooth. This is no commentary on the sausage, however, as it turns out that experimental glue used by the dentist was to blame for the failure. Certainly a day to remember!

bluefieldacres@gmail.com

Scott Passes ABS Journeyman Bladesmith Performance Test

2011-01-26T20:21:00.000-05:00

Okay, so what is the ABS Journeyman Bladesmith Performance Test, and why am I talking about it on a blog about homestead farming?

Well . . . Scott (my husband and Bluefield Acres partner) is an aspiring bladesmith. He forges beautiful, high-performance knives out of carbon steel. He is a certified arborist by trade, but wants to bladesmith full-time. He desires this to satisfy his inner artisan, but also so he can work at home and tend to the farm. Scott currently works in an urban area about an hour from home, and the garden suffers in his absence. While I do well with animals, I do not speak plant. With Scott at home bladesmithing, our garden and orchard will flourish, but there's a hitch - the knives must sell, and for that we turn to the ABS.

The American Bladesmith Society (ABS) is a non-profit organization that promotes the art of bladesmithing and certifies journeyman and master bladesmiths. The certification process is very rigorous; candidates must apprentice for three years and pass two tests - a performance test (prove you understand steel well enough to create a performance blade) and a beauty contest (prove you can craft a functional work of art). Last weekend Scott demonstrated his knowledge of metallurgy by acing the performance test. In 2012 he will show his work to a panel of mastersmiths, and, if they give him the journeyman stamp, Scott's marketability as a bladesmith will rise substantially. Two years later, if he passes the master bladesmith exams, his marketability will rise once again.

So, the following is a post about Scott's journey to become a fulltime bladesmith and, as a result, a more committed gardener. If you enjoy traditional arts, we hope you will enjoy what you see here. More info is available at Guinea Hog Forge.

When it comes to making knives, bladesmith E. Scott McGhee suffers from a rather severe case of obsessive compulsive disorder. In preparation for his official ABS Journeyman Performance Test, Scott forged and destroyed four practice knives - one in July, one in October, and two last week. Scott recently forged three knives - two practice blades and the candidate. All three blades were forged at the same time, and then heat treated separately. Scott set aside the nicest one, then ground out the other two and put them through the paces. The following photos are from the test he did in July (I didn't photo the most recent tests), and you can view videos of these early tests by following this YouTube link.

The ABS Journeyman Smith Performance Test
1. Cut a 1-inch diameter free-hanging manilla rope 6-inches from the end in one pass
2. Chop two 2x4's in half
3. Without sharpening, demonstrate that the knife still shaves after after completing tests 1 and 2.
4. Bend the knife to 90 degrees without cracking it more than 1/3 of the way from the edge to the back

All of Scott's practice knives have passed with flying colors, and the most recent ones were brutalized. One suffered the 90 degree bend test four times before breaking, while the other blade went to 90 degrees twice, then broke after being pushed to 135 degrees. That, however, was simply not enough torture. Scott gathered up the remains of the knives, wacked them on steel angle iron for a while, then on each other, and finally snapped them in half to examine the grain structure. Proceed cautiously, the following pictures are somewhat disturbing.

Yes, he meant to do this and for good reason. The performance test proves that a bladesmith understands edge geometry and how to produce tough, flexible blades. Breaking the blades into pieces demonstrates why these knives are so spectacular. What is evidenced in the following picture is extremely fine grain structure produced by the bladesmith during the heat treating process. Making these knives is difficult; the real trick, however, is successfully passing the performance test in the presence of an ABS Master.

Feeling cautiously confident that the remaining knife would survive the official test, Scott finish ground the knife, crafted a micarta handle, let me snap some photos, and then drove down to South Carolina for a date with ABS Mastersmith Jason Knight.

Almost too pretty to destroy.

Upon arrival, Jason informed Scott that the test rules had recently changed. While the manilla rope test was essentially the same, candidates would now be required to chop through a railroad tie twice and bend the blade into a circle to pass . . . Jason has a wicked sense of humor.

The candidate passed with no issues - notice that the knife didn't even crack during the bend test. Scott is now one step closer to his ABS Journeyman Blademith goal. Unfortunately he has another year as an apprentice, so it will be June 2012 before a panel of mastersmiths at Blade in Atlanta will determine whether he receives the journeyman stamp.

DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME!

Santa Brought Piggies!

2011-01-05T13:10:00.008-05:00

Magnolia waited for the snow to melt before having her second litter. I can't blame her, it's been really cold lately. Six new Guinea Hogs were born on December 29 in 20-degree weather, and the poor dears had to burrow in the hay all day just to stay warm. Thankfully, the weather warmed up considerably over the next week, and the new arrivals have been exploring their pen and enjoying the sunshine as much as possible.

Magnolia is a girl makin' machine. She had 4 girls and 2 boys this time. We have Dancer, Prancer, Comet, Cupid, Donner . . .

. . . and Rudolph!

Actually, you can name yours anything you want!

There are 2 girls and 1 boy still available, and they can leave the farm as early as February 9th.

bluefieldacres@gmail.com

White Christmas in Bluefield

2010-12-27T14:20:00.000-05:00

It doesn't snow much in eastern North Carolina, and when it does it's quite the event. Prior to last year, we hadn't seen snow in over 8 seasons. We got a good snow the day after Christmas though: 6 inches in one day. The pigs didn't think much of it, and the chickens refused to leave the coop (even after the sun came out).

Scott, the dogs and I enjoyed the snow thoroughly. I do not, however, look forward to dealing with all the downed trees, especially the ones on the electric fence.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Christmas with the McGhee's

2010-12-24T11:54:00.001-05:00

Scott's family loves to cook, especially with fire. His parents built a replica of a historic kitchen in 2000, and the hearth always gets a workout over the holidays. This year we roasted a goose in an antique reflector oven and browned a homemade sweet potato pie with an iron salamander forged by Scott.

Scott's mom and Bonnie (his oldest) made the sweet potato pie, and Scott forged the iron salamander as a gift for his mom Peggy. The head of the salamander is placed in the fire until glowing hot, then set over the pie for a few minutes to brown the meringue. Scott repeated the process 4 or 5 times to brown the pie to perfection.

As always, the fire was a family attraction and fun was had by all.

Merry Christmas everyone!

The Grass is Always Greener

2010-11-17T17:12:00.001-05:00

Guinea hogs are firm believers that "the grass is always greener over there". If you put down two piles of food, they will constantly go back and forth between the two worried that they are missing out on something special. Maybe hogs believe this because if you leave them in a pasture too long they will root up all the grass and "the grass over there" really will be greener!

This weekend we finally fenced in a third pasture and transferred our 9 teenage hogs to this new paradise. They couldn't be happier - acorns, pecans, fresh grass - ahhhh pig heaven.

The plan is to eventually have multiple pastures that we can rotate the stock through. We have seeded their old pasture in winter rye. Hopefully it will come up quickly and they will find it tasty. We'll let you know how it goes.

Expensive, but tasty education

2010-11-17T16:58:00.000-05:00

Scott and I decided to add bees to the farm this year. We added our first hive in April and a second in May, but now we only have one - because I made a huge error. Throughout the spring, we checked the hive every few weeks to get acquainted with our bees and learn our beekeeping tasks. Once summer arrived, however, we stopped going in the hive because it takes about 3 days for bees to adjust after a hive inspection, and we didn't want to stress them out too much. The heat this summer was stress enough for anyone, and daily exterior inspections indicated that the bees were doing well.

Fall is the time to resume hive inspections, but I failed to keep an eye on my calendar, and before we knew it November had arrived. That was simply too late. A week ago, the bees were busily buzzing about the hive. Now they are gone, and we have no definitive answers as to why.

Did the queen die? Was she superseded? Were the bees starving or did they sense that starvation was imminent given the amount of honey they had accumulated? These are questions we can't answer. What we do know is that the bees had stored away about 4 frames of honey (which wouldn't have been enough to feed them through winter) and quite a bit of pollen (that had begun to mildew) in the upper hive body, and that there were a fair amount of developing bees abandoned in the lower hive body. We saw no evidence of disease or infestation, just a fair amount of honey and a disturbing lack of presence.

We cut out the combs, melted the wax, and then separated the wax from the honey by straining the liquid through a cheesecloth. It's a messy business, but was well worth it (thank you Peggy!). We got 3 quarts of delicious honey and about three quarters of a pound of wax. If you count the cost of the bees and beekeeping equipment, (and don't factor in the wax) each quart of honey is worth about $60. Now that's an expensive education! Luckily the equipment can still be used, and we aren't done with this beekeeping business yet.

The bees we got in May are still alive and with us. We are feeding them sugar water now to help increase their winter stores and hopefully they'll stick around for the long haul. We plan to buy more bees in the spring, and this time I promise to pay better attention to the calendar (well, with a little help from Scott). For now, I'll just enjoy my honey and hope for better times ahead.

Scarlet's Second Seven

2010-10-12T11:59:00.000-04:00

Scarlet had her second litter yesterday - 5 boys and 2 girls. Seven is apparently her lucky number.

She once again looked like she was going to pop for 2 weeks before she went into labor, then had her babies without any fuss at all. I fed Scarlet and the 9 teenage guinea hogs that she shares space with at 7am yesterday morning and didn't notice her litter in the barn until around 1pm. My guess is that she had them in the night and I just missed the big event.

Scarlet and her shoats are now confined to a smaller area of the hog pen so that the babies can have access to mama anytime and to keep the teenagers from annoying the new family. We'll expand Scarlet's area a bit in about 2 weeks, but for now Scarlet seems content to lounge and is happy to see that we've increased her feed ration since she won't be able to forage freely.

Girls $250 per

Boys $150 per

bluefieldacres@gmail.com

Chicken Surprise!

2010-09-28T17:04:00.001-04:00

When we acquired Jock-a-doodle do (our lead rooster in residence), we acquired two gamecock hens as well. We had an issue with our Wyandottes refusing to go broody (which results in baby chickens that we want) and were told that gamecock hens were great mothers who could fix our problem. The plan was to wait for a game hen to go broody, replace her eggs with Wyandotte eggs while she was sleeping and presto...we'd have chicks in about 22 days.

Well about 3 weeks ago our light colored gamecock hen went missing. We assumed that she'd been taken by some animal and let it go. She'd generally kept to herself and didn't lay eggs in the coop anyway, so we didn't see it as a great loss. To our surprise, a few days ago the hen showed up again and wasn't alone. She had gone broody! She had hidden herself and her eggs just under a wood pile near the chicken coop and had stayed out of sight until the eggs hatched.

Yesterday I watched her march around the yard with nine gamecock/Dominique chicks in tow. She is raising them with minimal human assistance (we throw her food when we see her) and is teaching the chicks to forage for food around the yard. So far they are doing great. They all sleep outside the coop at night though, so we are hoping for the best.

As for our Partridge Rocks (the chickens we got to replace the Wyandottes), they are growing up fast and seem to be doing well. They are extremely friendly which is nice, but we didn't exactly get what we bargained for. We got a straight run of 25 and figured on at least half being hens. Instead we got 6 hens and a mess a roosters. Hopefully these hens will be good layers because our Wyandottes have given up laying altogether after only a year and a half. Scott sadly bought a dozen eggs at the grocery store last week. The first store bought eggs in over a year.

So, we've got 6 potential Partridge Rock laying hens, 9 mystery chicks, several expired Wyandotte hens and way too many roosters. If anyone wants a old chicken or a Partridge Rock rooster, speak now! They're disappearing fast.

Sausage Creole

2010-09-16T10:56:00.000-04:00

When you live on a farm that raises free range pork, you gotta get creative about what you do with all of it. Scott's mama gave him the following recipe and it works great with our home grown and blended Guinea Hog sausage.

1 lb sausage
1 medium onion
1 can green beans
1 can lima beans
1 can corn
1 large can tomatoes (28 oz)
1 shot of vinegar (to taste)
3/4 of a teaspoon of Tony Chacere's seasoning (or spice mix of your choice)

Now the idea is to use all your own stuff. Tomatoes you've canned yourself, onions, beans and corn right from the garden or (at the very least) preserved right at home. Tonight that wasn't possible. The sausage and corn was our own, but everything else came from the store. We've had a brutally hot and dry summer here in southeastern NC and had to abandon our garden in June. The baby pigs have enjoyed rummaging through the remains however, so maybe we'll get something back from the garden after all:)

Back to the recipe... fry the sausage in a pan, chop the onion and saute it in olive oil (our GH sausage isn't greasy enough to saute in!), mix all the ingredients in a sauce pan, then simmer for about an hour. You can serve it as a stew or over rice like we do. Our secret weapon...Guinea Hog sausage of course, but also fish sauce on the rice. Substitute fish sauce for salt anywhere you want a rich, deep flavor and you'll be pleasantly surprised. Just don't sniff the bottle before using. Asian fish sauce reeks, but tastes wonderful if you use it sparingly.

Belly up! Cold weather is coming. I know it is, I know it is (I keep telling myself that anyway) and this is a great cool weather meal. Enjoy.

Bees and Power Tools

2010-08-01T10:31:00.006-04:00

Note to self: Do not use power tools on the bee hive without wearing proper attire.

So, I needed to remove one of the handles from the hive body and had seen the old timer I bought the hive from use a power drill to do just that without wearing anything... so, I decided I could do the same. The bees disagreed. Within approximately 2 seconds I'd been stung in the eyelid and the knee. Oh well, live and learn.The eye stayed swollen for about 4 days and I'm happy to say I had a normal reaction, not an allergic one.

Other notes on our bees - they don't seem to be producing as much honey as we'd like to see but the fall honey flow hasn't yet begun and it's been a brutally hot summer this year. I think the bees have been working really hard just to stay hydrated.

We have some hive beetles and a few varola mites, but overall the bees appear healthy and have been very gentle save my one stupid manever with the power drill. Whenever we go in the hive we wear full attire and always use smoke to calm the bees down, but we often sit a few feet from the bees and watch them without any issue at all.

Jock-a-doodle-do, the Chickies, and the Art of Castration

2010-06-08T20:38:00.008-04:00

So we haven't made the chicken tractor yet because we found a better solution for the wild hen issue. Meet Jock-a-doodle-do.

Jock is a young Dominique rooster that was residing at a friends farm. Jock had been dropped off by someone who didn't want a rooster, and he'd been accepted until he decided to attack one of the owners prize gamecocks. Luckily we stopped by the day after the fight and suddenly were offered a free rooster to handle our wayward hens.

We weren't sure if adding a new rooster to the flock would work, but Jock has done an amazing job of keeping the hens in line and so far has roosted them in the hen house every night for the past two weeks. I think we'll keep him:)

In addition to this success, our Partridge Rock chicks arrived about a week ago. We are raising them in the shop and so far they are doing quite well.

We still plan to build the chicken tractor, as this will be the new chicks first outdoor home. If we put them in the coop with the big chickens, they'd get picked on, and, if we let them run loose before full grown, the local hawks would pick them off. We'll post pictures of the chicken tractor once it is up and running.

Lastly, we castrated our baby pigs last weekend. I've always said, "Our hogs only have one bad day in their lives." I must now recant that statement and note that some males have two bad days. Scott did a show-cut on the boys which doesn't leave visible scarring, but we think in the future we'll go with a scrotum cut which should be easier on the boys.

It was a bad day for me too as I was very worried for my little boars (they seemed to be in quite a bit of pain afterwards), but by the next day they were up, running and begging for food just like normal so I hope they will forgive me soon. We waited a bit too late (7 weeks) to make the cuts and in the future we will castrate them earlier (at 2-4 weeks).

Night Prowling for Jailbirds

2010-05-10T13:53:00.007-04:00

As expected, without roosters our hens stopped coming home to the coop at night and started roosting in the woods. I never really gave the name "rooster" much thought, but it's pretty clear that they have an important job to fill on a free range chicken farm - they tell the hens where to roost and without them it is fowl chaos. Crowing and spurring aside, a rooster's value on our farm has gone up expotentially.

In order to reclaim our hens, Scott and I made two evening forays into the woods to capture the missing birds. Scott read somewhere that once a hen has fallen asleep, it is easy to pluck them off their roost. Sure enough, this was correct. On the first night Scott walked right up to two hens, snatched them from the shrubs they were roosting in (at about waist level) and took them back to the coop.

We weren't able to locate two of the missing hens (4 of our 8 were easily chased back into the coop), so the next evening Scott watched carefully to see where the jailbirds planned to roost. One choose a rather high spot in a tree, and the other (who'd been badly injured by one of our roosters) actually choose a pile of sticks near the ground. We went after the injured bird first and captured her easily. After applying a bit of neosporin to the side of her face (where the rooster had pecked her unmercifully) we stuck her in the coop and went off after the chicken in the tree. She proved to be too sly for us. She was so high that I had to pull a limb down to get Scott close enough to touch her and that wasn't close enough. She eventually woke up, flew off and obsconded as we tried to figure out a way to get to her. No worries though, the next morning I found her snooping around the coop, opened the door just a bit and she went right in. I guess two nights in the woods alone were quite enough.

All eight surviving hens are now miserable, but alive in our coop. It is obvious that they very much want to free range and have retaliated by reducing egg production by more than half. We used to get an egg or so per chicken, per day. Yesterday Scott only found 3 eggs and that was two days worth.

So now we are thinking chicken tractor. We never understood why so many free range chicken farmers had these. Our hens free ranged, roosted at home and gave us plenty of eggs without a mobile chicken house, but now we understand. Without a rooster around, a chicken tractor is the only way to let hens free range without the worry that they'll be eaten by predators or go feral in the woods. We'll let you know how it goes.

A Tale of Two Roosters

2010-05-04T07:56:00.012-04:00

We had two roosters. Now we have none.

Life on a farm can be fun. It can also be really unpleasant. When we first got our Wyandotte chickens, we culled down to two roosters and waited to see who would reign supreme. The smaller of the two (Spot) appeared to be the better provider and protector, but Dinner (we were supposed to eat him) was far prettier and had a better crow. Well, we got complacent and decided that having two roosters was fine. They fought a little, but eventually worked out a deal - Spot got 7 hens, Dinner got 4 - and they basically shared the same space without too much commotion....until this spring.

Once the weather got warmer, rooster testosterone levels went haywire. One evening Scott and I watched Spot and Dinner fight for about an hour. It was more of a dance than a fight though. Each rooster would fluff its neck feathers, charge, then jump over or under the other. No blood was drawn (even though they both have large, sharp spurs) and it was kinda pretty.

Well, as time went on the fights got more serious and blood was eventually shed - sometimes in copious quantities. We decided that one of them had to go, and Spot made the culling decision easy. Spot had always been aggressive toward us and the kids, but for the most part he'd been all charge and no spur. His bloody attacks on Dinner, however, made us rethink the possibilities, and (with an outdoor wedding coming up on the property) we decided Spot simply had to go. As Ruby said in Cold Mountain, "I hate a flogg'in rooster. Let's put him in a pot."

This, however, may have been a mistake.

At first things were sooo much better. No more peaking around the corner to see if Spot was waiting to charge. No more displays of fowl aggression on mankind. Everything seemed so peaceful...until we noticed that some of the hens looked rather abused.

Apparently a few days after realizing that he was now supreme chicken, Dinner decided that it was time for Spot's girls to be his girls. They however declined to submit... so he got nasty. Yesterday I noticed a hen that looked really beat up, but she wouldn't let me get close enough to check her out. Then, later in the afternoon, I went in the coop to check for eggs and was amazed at the mess - feathers were everywhere. I opened one laying box and half the eggs were smashed, then I checked another and...uh oh...there was a dead body inside! I called Scott in to perform a detailed investigation. His diagnosis - Dinner had spurred the hen in the back until he had splayed her open - a brutal murder. We found two other hens that were injured in a similar manner, though still alive.

Scott got the .22 and took care of Dinner. Seemed like the thing to do at the time, but in hindsight, this too may have been a bad idea.

A good rooster will call the hens in at night, find food for them and alert them to danger. Last night the girls were still out after dark and the two injured ones never came in the coop at all. We hope the girls will come out of it, but 24 hours later they still seem a bit lost. I think they became dependent on the guys and may be easy pickings for predators without a rooster around. A good rooster is obviously a valuable thing.

Scott called a friend who raises chickens and found out that rehabilitation might have been a possibility for Dinner. In the future he said to put the attacking rooster in a box (aka prison) for a few days, cut his spurs, let him out after a brief incarceration and see what happens. Apparently this occasionally fixes the aggression issue, but the success rate is low (hmm, that sounds about right), and we'll never know whether it would have worked on Dinner or not.

The good news is that we have new chickens on the way and we're a little smarter now. June 1 we should receive some Partridge Rocks. We hope they will be good layers and will go broody at some point as well. The Wyandottes have shown no interest in being mothers, and we'd like to have some bitties of our own someday. We'll also cull down to one rooster as soon as possible. Two was one too many.

Oh well, live and learn.

Bo Diddley - Midnight Lover, Hog of Mystery

2010-05-02T19:04:00.012-04:00

We've never seen our year old plus boar (Bo Diddley) attempt to mount either of our sows, and that was beginning to worry us, but Bo obviously likes the ladies. Our sow Magnolia had 4 babies Saturday morning - 3 girls and 1 boy - and Scarlet, Magnolia's sister, had 7 boys on April 9th (see previous post). Apparently Bo works his magic at night, then lounges during the day.

3 Girls - $250 per (1 is already spoken for)

8 Boys - $150 per (7 from Scarlet; 1 from Magnolia)

Magnolia's lot of 4 will be ready to go June 12th, and Scarlet's 7 boys can leave the farm as early as May 21st. All of Scarlet's boys look great, but one in particular is quite the specimen. If you're interested in any of our hogs, send an email to bluefieldacres@gmail.com or call 910-540-4475.

"Tank" (the specimen) above on the right and Scarlet's 5 other boys below.

Seven Brides for Seven Brothers

2010-04-18T12:37:00.007-04:00

We got the brothers, if you got the brides. All seven of our newly hatched America Guinea Hog piglets are male. Born April 9th, 2010 - $150 each.

Lucky Number 7

2010-04-09T16:19:00.017-04:00

Bo Diddley knocked up Scarlet a few months ago, and we've been anxiously awaiting the birth of our first litter of registered American Guinea Hogs ever since. Last night at about 11pm Scott heard some interesting noises coming from Scarlet's pen, but we were too tired to investigate and fell into bed wondering what might await us the next day. First thing this morning I headed out to the farrowing pen and was thrilled to find five adorable baby pigs burrowed in the hay. I hollered the news to Scott and hurried off to get Scarlet her breakfast.

I stopped by Bo's pen to let him know that he was a new daddy, but he was more interested in breakfast than piglets.

When I got back to Scarlet I was in for a surprise. Scott informed me that we had six piglets, not five. Apparently one of the babies had been knocked out of the farrowing pen and was wandering around by himself in the larger pen. Luckily the three teenage pigs that live in that area hadn't bothered the little guy, but he was very tired and didn't squeal when Scott picked him up - not a good sign. We took him to mama and tried to get him to nurse, but it didn't look good. He kept wandering off and no matter how many times we put him on a teet, he didn't seem to know what to do with it. After about 30 minutes we gave up and decided to let nature take its course. He would either figure it out or he wouldn't.

Later in the afternoon while moving our picnic table, we heard a strange noise in the woods. It sounded like a puppy....or maybe even a baby pig. We took off in search of the noise and...low and behold...a baby Guinea Hog came stumbling out of the pine forest. It appeared that #6 had broken loose again, so I scooped him up, chided him softly and took him back to mama. He was covered in pollen and looked a bit "green", but if this was #6, he was actually looking much spunkier than previously and squealed readily when scooped up.

Upon returning to the farrowing pen I realized that #6 had not gotten loose after all. This was number 7 - "Lucky #7" that is. This little guy had been out of the farrowing pen since early in the morning, if not before. What are the odds that he could survive on his own that long and be found by his owners? He seemed quite fine and immediately went to work fighting for a place at the milk bar. I looked around to see if I could find "Pitiful #6", but he was no longer discernible. He had apparently learned how to run the tap at the bar himself and was feeling mo' better.

So, if you are looking for an American Guinea Hog to add to your farm, shoot us an email -bluefieldacres@gmail.com - we've got quite a few. We haven't actually sexed the kids yet and 6/7 may in fact be girls. We'll post an update on that soon. We're just trying to keep them corralled in the pen and well-fed for the moment. They should be good to go by the 21st of May - one week before our wedding. Man, do we know how to plan or what!!!

Bees

2010-03-26T07:38:00.017-04:00

We are planning to add bees to the farm in late April or early May to enhance pollination and produce honey. I signed up for a 5-night class on beekeeping to learn the basics, and yesterday evening (around 6pm) we cracked into the campus hive and got hands-on with the bees for the first time. This is what I learned.

First, you should wear these funny little suits, hats and gloves to avoid being stung.

Second, you need to smoke the hive before entering to calm the bees. Italian honey bees are relatively gentle, but any bee can become agitated for a variety of reasons. Bees don't like dark colors (note all the white), don't like perfumes and dislike cold or cloudy weather. We were careful to enter the hive on a warm day just before dark as bees are calmer later in the day.

The multicolored stuff in the left corner is pollen and the shiny open cells have honey in them. Pollen and honey are both used as bee food. The white stuff is actually larva that will transform into pupa by eating royal jelly, pollen and honey. After 5 days of being fed bee food, they are sealed in and become capped brood (growing worker bees).

The next picture shows drones and drone cells. Drones are males. The hive produces a lot of these guys in the spring, but by fall they will be kicked out or killed by female worker bees. Drones have one function - to mate with the queen - so their work is done early in the season. Drones can't feed themselves and are a liability during the winter. Worker bees (all female) live for approximately 42 days and literally work themselves to death.

Propolis is a glue that bees make from tree resins. They use it to seal up and strengthen their hive and it must be scraped off periodically by the beekeeper to maintain hive access. Here you can see where the bees have been gluing the inner cover to a hive super (supers go on top of a hive body and give the bees a place to store honey).

We looked and looked, but never found an active queen. Although we did see some queen cells. If new queens are allowed to hatch in the hive, they will split the colony and swarm to another area.

Queen cells look like peanut shells. See lower middle. These were destroyed to prevent a swarm. Queens do nothing but lay eggs and can lay eggs for 5 years off a single period of mating.

I was stung once on my glove, but wasn't hurt at all. By and large the bees were curious, but not aggressive. There were about 20,000 bees inside this hive which was composed of a brood box and two supers - about standard in size. If you took the honey from this hive you would get about 5 gallons a season.

Can't wait for next week. I just hope I'm done with this nasty cold by then. You can't imagine how unpleasant it is sneezing in a bee veil.

Lake Waccamaw Southern Farm Days Festival

2010-03-22T07:52:00.016-04:00

We spent two days at the Lake Waccamaw Southern Farm Days Festival this weekend showcasing Scott's talent as a blacksmith and bladesmith. Grandma Peggy attended as well to demonstrate old time hearth cooking and the kids, Papa and I came along to help out. All the money raised by the event went to the Lake Waccamaw Home for Boys and Girls. Here are some of the highlights.

Scott and Jacob firing up our coal fired forge (circa 1800's) with a newly added chimney to keep the vendors and guests from drowning in smoke and soot.

Grandma Peggy and Bonnie kept us well-fed over the weekend. They cooked up some homegrown grits and sausage on Saturday morning, then chicken and dumplings and bread pudding Saturday afternoon. On Sunday, they kept the crowds happy with beef stew and apple dumplings.

Jackie, the master of the bullwhip and a member of a local horseman's association, kept the crowds entertained.

Brian, the festival's farrier, took a turn cranking our Buffalo Forge Blower on Sunday while enjoying a cone of homemade butter pecan ice cream. Jackie came over to watch too as Scott knocked out a tribal knife that Papa dubbed "The Waccamaw".

Check out Guinea Hog Forge to see how "The Waccamaw" was made out of an old tool file.

On Saturday, Scott wowed the crowds by hacking through a 2x4 with one of his latest custom knives, then shaving with it to show how well his blades hold an edge.

We had a blast and plan to come back next year! Hope to see you there.

Cat Head Biscuits

2010-03-15T08:04:00.003-04:00

Scott decided to try his hand at making old time cat head biscuits - really big biscuits the size of a cat's head. He used his tried and true recipe (which is posted further down on this blog) and simply made them bigger. Twenty-two minutes in the oven and they were done. These were quite tasty, but difficult to finish in one sitting!

Home made Guinea Hog sausage and home grown eggs rounded out the meal, and the biscuit was made with our own GH lard. Yummmmm!

Weaving a Chair Bottom

2010-01-23T11:03:00.000-05:00

A friend gave me a really nice old rocking chair last year that was lacking a seat. After contemplating the task for several months, I finally ordered some reed, a book, and set about weaving a new bottom - something I'd never attempted before.

The wood of the chair had a grey patina when I got it, but it had never seen stain or paint. I decided to go with a mahogany stain (because it's what I had laying around) then coated the wood with Tung Oil. After the finish set, I started the seat.

I choose to go with a Carolina Close Weave for several reasons. 1) I live in North Carolina so it just seemed right 2) The weave was appropriate to the style of chair 3) It was one of the easier weaves to tackle.

The process was fairly easy using the directions I got from http://www.chairseatweaving.com/. The only difficult parts involved tying the strands together (each strand is about 4-6 feet long) and being patient. Each strand must be soaked in water for 30 or so minutes before weaving, then each 2-3 lines of weaving must be allowed to try before continuing to the next section. All totalled I probably worked on the chair for 12 hours over several days.

Good fun, not hard, and a very inexpensive way to revive an old chair. I'll do it again!

Guinea Hog Forge

2009-12-23T12:19:00.000-05:00

If you're looking for info on Scott's bladesmithing, please check out our new Guinea Hog Forge blog. I have transferred any posts about Scott's knife making to this site.

Merry Christmas!!!

Home Grown Grits

2009-12-06T08:55:00.001-05:00

Mr. Tipton from My Cousin Vinny said it best, "No self respectin' southerner uses instant grits. I take pride in my grits." We take pride in our grits too. So much pride that we've taken to producing our own. This year we grew Wapsi Valley corn for making pig feed, grits and corn meal. It is an open pollinated variety of corn that naturally comes in two colors - gold and blood red. You can buy Wapsi Valley corn meal online, but the only way to get WV grits is to grow the corn and grind it yourself.

The corn grew beautifully all summer without any complications, and in September we harvested the ears once they had dried on the stalk. Then it was off to the shop to air dry for a month before shelling. We used two shelling methods - by hand (which takes a while, can lead to blisters, and elicits a fair amount of whining from children) and with a old time hand crank sheller (much more fun!). After the corn was shelled, we let it sit a while before grinding (the drier the corn, the better it grinds). We also ground it by two methods - old school hand crank and new school Kitchen Aid. For corn meal (which is ground very fine) the Kitchen Aid grinder ruled. For grits (course grind), the hand crank was actually faster.

Both the Wapsi Valley grits and WV corn meal are fantastic. We had shrimp and grits the Saturday after Thanksgiving along with homemade corn bread (made with pork cracklins'). The flavor of both was outstanding and very different from anything you can buy at the grocery store. Check out the red flecking in the corn meal.

BLUEFIELD ACRES SHRIMP & GRITS

Prep. Time: 7 months (1.5 hours if you simply buy some real grits; instant grits NOT allowed)

Serves: 12

Ingredients:

3 cups Wapsi Valley grits (corn grown, shelled and coarse ground at home); Moss' Grits will substitute

1/2 stick butter

1 cup grated Parmesan cheese

20 multiplier onions (like a green salad onion)

1 pound bacon

4 lbs head-off fresh North Carolina shrimp (shelled)

1/4 cup lemon juice

Kosher salt (to taste - the grits take a lot)

Black pepper (to taste)

Cayenne pepper (to taste)

Grits: add 12 cups cold water to grits, bring to a boil and put on simmer for at least 45 minutes; stir constantly; add salt, butter, black pepper and cheese to grits 5 minutes before serving; the grits take a lot of salt, but add slowly and taste often to avoid over salting

Shrimp: fry bacon until crispy; remove bacon from pan; chop onions, discarding the top third; add the white part of the chopped onions to pan; sautee onions in hot grease at medium high until tender; crumble bacon and add back to pan; add the green part of the onions, the shelled shrimp, lemon juice, cayenne pepper & salt; cook until shrimp turns pink (only a minute or two) stirring constantly.

Serve shrimp over grits and enjoy! Happy eating from Bluefield Acres!

Thanksgiving at Bluefield

2009-11-27T13:18:00.000-05:00

BFA Menu
Pork Ribs
Pork Tenderloin
Mashed Sweet Potatoes
Collards
Baked Beans
Cranberry Relish
Apple Sweet Potato Casserole
Homemade Oatmeal Bread
Broccoli Salad
Potato Salad
Pumpkin Pie
Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies
Chocolate Pound Cake

So awesome!!!!! Thanks to all who came, brought food and enjoyed!

Putting American Guinea Hog Back on the Table

2009-11-26T13:18:00.002-05:00

Rare breed heritage farm animals are a valuable genetic resource, and, to maintain this resource, the animals must remain a part of the food chain. I know it sounds weird, but if these animals aren't valued as a food source, they will go extinct. We raise American Guinea Hogs (a small heritage breed hog) to help preserve the breed, put excellent meat on our own table, and eventually to sell to the general public. This Thanksgiving we ate our first Guinea Hog - a 1-year old female feeder that we obtained from a fellow breeder.

Processing a hog takes a good part of a day. We started at 7am and were done with the majority of the work and clean up around 2pm. We ground breakfast sausage and stuffed bratwurst the next day, and we'll be smoking our bacon next week.

The following is a breakdown of how we process a hog at Bluefield Acres, and, if you click below, you'll also find a slideshow of the slaughtering and butchering we did on Wednesday. The pictures aren't for everyone, so proceed with caution. The slideshow starts with the scalding.

Processing a Hog - CLICK FOR SLIDESHOW
Isolate hog and do not feed for 24 hours
Shoot hog in head with .22 LR
Cut and bleed the jugular
Scald hog in water at 150 degrees until hair pulls out easily
Scrape hair until skin is clean
Wash carcass
Gut hog
Remove head and feet
Butcher into desired pieces of meat

We got approximately 50 pounds of boneless meat off our Guinea Hog - tenderloins, loins, 3 small roasts, fatback, bacon, sausage and bratwurst. Plenty of meat to fill a small family freezer. Below are the ribs. We ate them on Thanksgiving, and they were the best ribs I've ever had by far.

Things that we learned
1. Guinea Hogs get enough salt by foraging that the meat doesn't need to be salted as much as other pork.
2. Due to their free range diet, Guinea Hog meat is much redder than standard pork and more flavorful.
3. Lard from free range Guinea Hogs won't solidify easily. This is because it is low in saturated fat - grain fed meat is high in saturated fat, forage fed meat has very little. We had to freeze the lard Scott rendered to firm it up.
4. Biscuits made from pork lard are yummy. The biscuit on the left was made with lard and the one on the right was made with butter. The biscuits may not look different (and both are delicious), but the lard biscuit had a lovely bacon flavor all by itself. The sausage in the picture is ours, and it was absolutely wonderful! Guinea hog sausage has a strong meaty flavor that we found fantastic.

For a full description of our Thanksgiving meal, check out our next post.

And Then There Were Three

2009-11-09T06:59:00.000-05:00

Five piglets were born in early August. All were healthy at birth, although one was a runt. Now there are three.

American Guinea Hogs are incredibly easy to raise. Feed them a little bit every day so they'll come when called. Give them a bit of pasture or woodlands to forage in, and they'll take care of the rest. No antibiotics, no worming treatments, no worries.

At 8 weeks, we weaned our piglets from their mother. They turned 12 weeks old this weekend, and we were planning to castrate the males on Sunday morning - something that is best done when they are young. We woke to find 5 sickly piglets in the pen Sunday morning, and decided to put the castration business on hold.

We usually give the pigs (adult and juveniles) slops from our table, but we'd been gone the previous weekend, and I'd gotten out of the habit. It had been a week since I'd doled out slops, and the food at the bottom of the bucket was pretty ripe. I didn't give it much thought though as I've watched our adult Guinea Hogs eat a week old rotten snake and thoroughly enjoy it.

I dished out the leftovers on Saturday around 11am, and the baby pigs ended up with the oldest slops because I fed them last. By Sunday morning two babies were extremely sick (vomiting and staggering) and the rest were lethargic and showed little interest in food. It hit me that the slops may have been somewhat fermented, and we wondered if the piglets were just drunk. Unfortunately, that wasn't the case. By 1pm the largest male was dead and our big female looked horrible - really bloated, very uncomfortable and exhausted. We crated "Easter" and took her to the house to keep an eye on her. Scott autopsied the pig male and found a healthy, but very gaseous pig - no worms or parasites at all, but the piglets innerds had a strange odor and his bladder was very full.

A little internet research gave us our answer - foodbourne botulism. It attacks the nervous system (thus the staggering) and eventually shuts down the respritory system leading to death. It also shuts down the bladder's ability to void, leads to constipation and gas. "Easter" lasted a good 12 hours longer than her brother which allowed us to watch the botulism progress. If she stood up, she staggered, and she stood very little. She threw up once (and it smelled horrible), but in 12 hours she never voided her bladder (although she did drink) and only had one minor bowel movement. She never had a fever and just seemed to fade out slowly. She died around 1am in the morning.

At first light we checked to make sure the remaining three little pigs were okay. All ran out of the pen and proceeded to pee like mad - a very good sign. All were very hungry too. The adult pigs that are penned next door (and got some of the same slops) never showed any signs of illness, so my guess is that they were never exposed to the botulism. Although the three smallest piglets were obviously exposed, they must have injested much less of the toxin. I guess being at the bottom of the pecking order isn't always a bad thing.

We are bummed today, but are taking the lesson learned to heart - fresh slops only from now on.

Piglets!

2009-08-17T19:13:00.000-04:00

Okay, so we decide to go on vacation and Christmas (our feeder pig) decides to have piglets. Now if that ain't life on the farm, I don't know what is. Luckily our vacation spot (Holden Beach) was only an hour away so we were able to enjoy the beach and keep an eye on the new crew all at the same time. Well, Scott kept an eye on the new additions. I kept an eye on the beach and his children - with a little help from my mom:)

We acquired "Christmas" in June. She was slated to be butchered along with her brother, but the previous owner was suspicious that she might be pregnant and gave her a stay of execution. Instead, we got Christmas in exchange for our butchering services. We all thought that she was due in about 2 weeks, but those 2 weeks went by and then a month, and we all gave up hope. Oh well, she would still make a fantastic Christmas meal. "Se la vi".

Then a couple of days before vacation, we noticed some changes - things in the back end started to swell that hadn't been swollen. Then swelled some more. Mammaries started to hang, then swing as Christmas walked. We turned to each other and confirmed that she hadn't looked this way last week. Times were definitely a chang'in.

We prepared a special birthing area away from the other pigs and put Christmas inside the day we were supposed to leave for the beach. It didn't take long. Within hours Christmas was panting and obviously uncomfortable - sitting, standing, sitting, standing. Classical pregnant female stuff. Scott offered to stay and babysit, but I was adamant that we were going to take some time away. We called the breeder who raised Christmas to get some advice. She told us not to worry. American Guinea Hogs had been birthing piglets without human help for years and, most likely, everything would be fine. We went to the beach and tried not to think about it.

That was Sunday afternoon. Monday morning, with my full support, Scott returned to the farm to check on Christmas. Sure enough, 5 perfect little baby pigs were hanging out with Mom. Due to the condition of their umbilical cords, Scott surmised that they'd been born just that morning - 3 boys & 2 girls. One female was a runt and, according to Scott, was about the size of a stick of butter. All were healthy.

Christmas is an amazing mom. She feeds her babies what they need, when they need it. Nothing more, nothing less. She roots a hole in the ground (or in the hay), lays down and lets them feed about every 4 hours. She feeds until they've had enough. When she's not feeding them, the piglets either sleep or beg for more food. Unlike human moms, Christmas is not swayed by their begging. She lays down with her belly protected, and she goes to sleep.

The first week I was worried sick that the runt wouldn't make it. She was so small and didn't even beg much. Often she would bury herself in the hay while they other piglets made sneak attacks to get milk. All the same, the runt seems to be doing fine. She gets her milk every 4 hours, and she's already doubled in size. Christmas has paid her no more mind that the others, and our little runt has responded by being exactly what she is - a happy little piglet in a happy little world.

I think we humans could learn a lot from Christmas. Give your kids what they need. Teach them what they need to know. Ignore them when they want that which is excessive. Hmmmm. More on baby pigs later.

A Hanker'in for Biscuits!

2009-07-13T08:52:00.000-04:00

I got a desperate call from a good friend last night. Catherine, who happens to be pregnant, got a hanker'in for Scott's homemade buttermilk biscuits and asked for the recipe. Unfortunately, Scott doesn't use a recipe so we attempted to come up with one this morning. This one's for you Catherine!

Ingredients

1 stick of butter

6 cups Daily Bread self rising flour

2 1/3 cups buttermilk

Tools

baking sheet (we use an cushionaire insulated)

biscuit cutter (we use special glass for cutting biscuits)

sifter

bowl

NOTE: All ovens and flours are different. Mix your ingredients slowly and focus on the consistencies we mention. If amounts need to be altered, please do so.

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees
Sift the flour

Cut 1 stick of butter into cubes
Hand mix flour and butter in bowl until the flour will stick together when squeezed, but will also break apart easily if crumbled
Make a well in the flour (which should now have a cornmeal consistency) and pour in approximately 1/2 of the buttermilk
Mix buttermilk in by hand by slowly swirling the hand around the center of the bowl and working out the the edge. Mix in more buttermilk as needed to form a wet, sticky mass.

Mix until you have a nice sticky mass that clings to the fingers

Sprinkle flour on your kneading surface, roll sticky mass out of bowl onto work surface and knead the dough lightly (no more than necessary to make a ball)

Sprinkle the top of the dough with flour and mash the ball flat (about 1 inch thick). Dough should still have a soft, malleable consistency.
Cut out the biscuits and place them touching on an ungreased baking sheet
Bake the biscuits at 425 degrees for 10 minutes, then check and turn them 180 degrees. Bake for another 5-10 minutes until the tops are golden brown

Wrap biscuits in a towel on a plate and allow to cool for a few minutes
Eat and enjoy!

Radiator Charlie's Mortgage Lifter

2009-07-12T22:06:00.000-04:00

Radiator Charlie lived in West Virginia during the 1930's. He was a radiator repairman by trade, but a tomato breeder extraordinaire by right. He only developed one tomato in his life, but the plants sold so well he used the proceeds to pay off his home mortgage during the tough economic times of The Great Depression. With a story like that, Scott and I had to try these heirloom tomatoes in our garden, and we must say...they lived up to the hype.

I don't think I've ever had a better sandwich tomato in my life! And I say that having eaten about 10 excellent tomato sandwiches in the past week. Mortgage Lifters are huge, spicy, beefy tomatoes that are low in acidity and high on flavor. We grew several other varieties, including Cherokee Purples (which were beautiful), but nothing of ours could compare to the Mortgage Lifter on taste. In the picture below, The Cherokee Purples are on the left with the bright red Mortgage Lifters stacked underneath. The purples were good, but a bit mild by comparison.

The tomato crop is almost done for this year, but we're still looking forward to winter squash, okra, peas, feed corn and planting the fall garden. Our last tomato harvest is shown below. Most of it ended up in a wonderful spaghetti sauce that we ate tonight. The peas in the picture are complements of our neighbor as ours aren't quite ready yet - thanks to the rabbits. He lives only a hundred yards away, yet hasn't suffered the rabbit issues we've experienced...and he doesn't have a fence like we do!!!! Silly rabbits, you may be next on our list of delicacies!

Pumpkin Pie in July?

2009-07-12T07:56:00.000-04:00

It appears we planted our pumpkins a bit early as they are coming ready in July. We planted the pumpkins and the squash in April. Several squash and zucchini varieties came due around the same time (about two weeks ago) and Scott was forced to can much of it in a mad rush to avoid losing the crop. The pumpkins will last a while, but certainly won't last until the appropriate season. Next Spring we'll plant a few squash varieties every couple of weeks to spread out our harvest. And we'll plant the pumpkins in June. For now, we'll suffer the consequences.....

Pumpkin Pie

Pumpkin Pancakes

Pumpkin Ice Cream

Life is hard.

Farm Update

2009-06-30T20:58:00.000-04:00

Life has been busy of late, so this will be a quick farm update. Our squash continues to grow like mad, but the zucchini is finished for this year. Here's a look at some canned squash - a future yummy meal - and our last zucchini. We went with heirloom round zucchinis this year and were very pleased. They were excellent just about any way Scott cooked them!

The tomatoes are trying to get ripe. We've eaten a couple of mortgage lifters and yellow pears, but the intense heat and a multitude hungry rabbits have taken their toll. We've eaten several ears of silver queen and should be canning corn like mad before the weekend. It's hard to beat a fresh ear of corn!

We've also had a few weird farm moments. The following is by far the largest egg we've seen yet, and we fear the chicken that laid it may never be the same. We were hoping for triplets, but alas the egg only produced a deformed set of twins.

No comment on the carrot. I think the picture says it all!

Our herons babies are growing up. This juvenile green backed heron was spotted drinking out of the pigs' water bowl. I saw a frog in the bowl later so it may well have been fishing. We weren't quick enough with the camera to catch him in the bowl, but were still impressed that this guy let us get so close.

I'll try and blog more soon!

Garden Time

2009-06-15T17:19:00.000-04:00

Why would a southerner lock his car with the windows up in July while parked in a known safe location such as the church parking lot?

To keep friends and neighbors from filling the car with squash!

Our garden is exploding with squash and zucchini and the tomatoes aren't far behind. We expanded the garden this year and decided to try some new varieties including round zucchini, open pollinating corn and heirloom tomatoes. Our favorite tomato so far is Radiator Charlie's Mortgage Lifter. Our preference is based solely on the name as we haven't eaten any of them yet (just one more week to go!). Scott grew all our tomatoes from seed this year, and they're all heirloom varieties - Mortgage Lifter, Red Pear, Yellow Pear, Cherokee Purple, Katinka Cherry, Indian Stripe, Principe Borghese and Romas. Good thing Scott likes canning!

Our Silver Queen corn is doing fabulous as is our Wapsi Valley, a open pollinating variety given to us by a friend. The Silver Queen is hard to beat for good eats, but the Wapsi is absolutely georgous. The kernels can be either red or yellow, are quite large and should grind into excellent grits and corn meal.

Due to heavy rain our potatoes didn't make it, and due to a bumper crop of rabbits our beans, peas and peanuts are struggling. We have an electric fence around the garden to keep the deer and pigs out, but the long-eared rodents have bypassed it with no problem. They've had a field day in our garden, and even tried to establish a nest in the carrot patch! Check out that Cosmic Purple carrot on the left - it's orange on the inside and tastes wonderful.

We harvested an exceptional crop of Vidalia onions and Russian Garlic this summer, and our asparagus and hot peppers are looking great too. Earlier this spring, however, we had a bit of a garden tragedy and I figured now was as good a time as any to describe what happened.

It was around 10am in the morning and Scott was calling for help in the garden. Not just help weeding (which I pretend not the hear), but "help!". I could see that he was squatting over something and working on it at a feverish pace.

We have netting over our strawberry plants to keep rodents from enjoying the fruits of our labor. The prior evening the wind had blown the netting into a pile, and I remember telling Scott that we needed to straighten it and stake it down.

Needless to say, we forgot, and now the netting was in a tangled mess at Scott's feet along with two large snakes that were trapped inside. One was alive, the other...not so much. With my assistance Scott freed the larger snake (a male?). He didn't look very good, but he did slither away after being freed. Then we detangled the smaller (female?) snake and threw her over the fence to see what the pigs whould make of it.

Okay, okay, I know it sounds a little gross, but American Guinea Hogs are supposed to be ruthless varmit killers and we wanted to see their reaction. It was amazing. Their little snouts started working overtime as they slowly approched the dead reptile. Then, once within about 6 inches, they'd squeal and run away. So much for being killers!

Ahhh, but time heals all wounds...so to speak. Or maybe it's simply that hunger will make us do things we might not otherwise do. Everybody knows the "Alive" story about the soccer players in the plane crash over the Andes. Well, our pigs aren't cannibals, but by 5pm they were very hungry and that snake must have started looking and smelling good because Magnolia was walking along with a large mustache dragging the ground on either side of her. Crunching sounds and sister Scarlet were only seconds away. Bo avoided the fray initially....I do need to keep a check on how much feed he's getting... but he eventually gave into the feeding frenzy.

We were really bummed to lose the snake....well, potentially many snakes. The male will hopefully make it, but our theory is that the snakes were in a mating ball when they unfortunately discovered the netting and got tangled. A bummer of a way to go (I guess) and a shameful loss of some really good rodent hunters. We later identified the reptiles as Rat Snakes, and they were probably protecting our strawberry crop from field mice. Oh well, it was an excellent opportuity to watch the pigs get a little primal, so we'll take the good with the bad and try to be more careful with the netting in the future.

From Pasture to Table

2009-06-13T19:02:00.000-04:00

Where does our food come from? What type of life did it lead? What was it fed? Was it given antibiotics? Was it happy? These are some of the questions that led Scott and I to start Bluefield Acres - a homestead farm in Bladen County, NC. We want to eat meat that's free of unwanted chemicals, preservatives and medications; food that's led a happy, stress-free life prior to providing us with valued nutrition.

Today we slaughtered and butchered our first guinea hog, which is why I'm thinking about this out loud. The hog wasn't one that we'd raised, but one raised by a colleague and friend. The boar was about a year old and led an idyllic life on a beautiful farm in Chatham County prior to becoming food. He was raised on pasture and alfalfa and spent his days roaming a 14-acre farm .

Taking a life is not an easy thing, but hogs are food and this one was slated as a feeder pig from birth. He never knew what happened. Life just ended while enjoying a treat of cracked corn, then the process of slaughter and butching began. He only had one bad second in a happy life.

We started the day early (6:30am) as the forecast called for temperatures in the 90's and high humidity. Not ideal conditions for the task at hand. After the boar was killed and bled, we scalded it in a large tub to loosen the hair for removal. The scalding water must be at 150 degrees and you only scald the hog until the back and jowl hair comes out freely. Scald it too long and the hair will set; too short and the hair won't come out. We left it in the water for about 1 minute and used our tractor to dip and remove the carcass.

6:45 am - The hair was removed by scraping the skin with a knife. After the hair was removed and the hog washed, we brought it inside our air conditioned workshop to remove the internal organs (7:00 am) and begin the butchering process. We're happy to report that the organs looked extremely healthy and the hog was free of parasites.

7:30 am - Scott broke the hog into primal cuts that we put immediately onto ice then brought back out to further process after chilled. We used a cloroxed sheet of plywood and plastic cutting boards as our work surface. Fatback and random pieces were saved for making sausage; hams and shoulders were cut into small roasts; loins, tenderloins, ribs and bacon were cut out separately; select sections of fat were saved for rendering and neckbones were saved as well. We were done with butchering by 10:00 am, then cleaned up and retired to the house to process the sausage.

American Guinea Hogs are small in comparison to commercial hogs. Commercial hogs are grown quickly in confinement and slaughtered at 6 months when they weigh around 300 pounds. AGH's are grown slowly on pasture and at slaughter we estimate that this one-year-old boar was around 150 lbs. By growing American Guinea Hogs slowly on pasture as opposed to grain, you get a richer tasting meat that is higher in nutritional value than commercial pork. By knowing where the hog came from, we were assured that it was raised humanely and without unwanted additives.

I worried that looking my food in the eye before processing it might be a problem, but in truth it wasn't. I am truly thankful for what this boar will provide in the way of meat and know it led a good life worth celebrating.

There's a movie that's just been released call Food Inc. - http://www.foodincmovie.com/. It's asks a lot of questions about where our food comes from, how it's handled, and what the food industry doesn't want us to know. I haven't seen it yet, but plan to see it soon. America has become extremely efficient at producing cheap food, which has its positives, but unfortunately it has its costs as well. What's your food worth?

Eggs, Glorious Eggs

2009-06-07T12:56:00.000-04:00

Having free range chickens is great. They're easy to take care of, keep the fire ant population down and produce copious quantities of eggs! We have 13 hens, 2 roosters, and get anywhere from 10-13 eggs a day. Our Wyandotte chickens free range on our land and use approximately 5 of our 20 acres. We've read that chickens will only range about 500 feet from the coop, but our birds regularly explore further.

The eggs are incredibly delicious and very different from commercially produced eggs. According to Mother Earth News, free range, pasture fed chicken eggs have 1/3rd the cholestrol, 1/4th the saturated fat, 2/3's more vitamin A, 2 times the omega-3 fatty acids, 3 times the vitamin E, and 7 times the beta carotene of eggs produced by cage raised hens. They also come in a variety of sizes and colors, which is one of my favorite parts. We get "cone-head" eggs, round eggs, and giant eggs to name a few. The giant one in the group below was a double yoke. All of our hens produce brown eggs, and while the darkness of the shell varies, all yokes are bright orange. This comes from eating lots of bugs and other good stuff that you don't find in chicken feed.

When you have as many eggs as we do, you have to get creative about what you do with them. Today we're having deviled eggs for lunch, and we had scrambled eggs for breakfast yesterday. (I do hope that cholesterol statistic is correct!) Last week Scott made a beautiful fritatta with our eggs, home grown broccolli, onions, & garlic and store bought bacon (we're looking forward to home grown bacon as well). A fritatta is an italian dish that is sort of a cross between an omelet and a quiche. You start the frittata in a frying pan much like an omelet (saute your vegtables, add meat and eggs) and cook it on medium until it will slide loose in the pan, then move everything (pan included) into the oven and cook at 375 degrees until a toothpick will come out clean (30-45 minutes).

We have eggs for sale as well, but for now they're in a strange location. I'm working in Holden Beach for the summer so we're selling them at the place I work - www.outsidesouth.com. Hopefully by next year we'll have more chickens and enough eggs that a booth at the Wilmington Farmer's Market will be warranted. That's the goal!

Feeding Time Fun with American Guinea Hogs

2009-05-30T19:10:00.000-04:00

Disclaimer: The following feeding method should not be attempted with pigs other than American Guinea Hogs.

American Guinea Hogs are known for their gentle disposition. I've belly-rubbed full-grown intact boars, and I've witnessed week old shoats being plucked from underneath a momma Guinea Hog's nose without protest. Pigs can be dangerous animals and should be treated as such, but American Guinea Hogs are one of the pleasant exceptions to the rule. Having said that, however, they are the hungriest animals I've ever encountered and, as such, take meal time very seriously. Feeding time requires the right equipment and the right attitude. Proper Equipment - rubber boots and a good bucket. Right Attitude - something akin to that of a halfback going for a touchdown.

Every morning and evening we supplement our pigs foraging with a custom mix of scratch grains and dried, ground, baked soybeans (nothing artificial & blended to 15% protein). Our porcines graze on pasture and root in a wax myrtle forest all day so they don't need much feed. We also add a touch of diatomaceous earth to help with parasites. Between Bo (our boar, 5 months old) and our two 4-month old gilts (Scarlet and Magnolia), they get 2 quarts of feed twice daily.

Our hogs LOVE, LOVE, LOVE their feed. Did I make that clear enough? Let me reiterate. They LOVE their feed and will do darn near anything to get it. This includes jumping on you, bumping you aggressively with their noses (which leaves muddy marks on the legs), and fighting amongst themselves. The boots help with the muddy issue, and I avoid wearing pants that I care about. Although most nudges land on the shins, the little porkers do occasionally get in a good thigh tap. Avoiding the jumping requires some moves, so I try to stretch well prior to feeding time (okay, not really, but I probably should:).

We start at the gate. Me on the outside, them on the inside. Like good defensive lineman, the hogs grunt and squeal and make charges on the line. Once ready, I sling the door open and sprint towards their feed bowls. They immediately move on me to block and tackle so I spin, dance and jump my way to their bowls. I'm faster than they are so I always get there first, but spiking the bucket isn't an option. This is where it gets tricky as I have to split the feed equally into three separate bowls. (We tried using a feed trough, but Bo just crawled in and laid on top of the feed to hoard it. We feared he was going to break his legs getting in and out of the trough and the girls weren't getting anything to eat so we ditched the trough idea.) Once I reach the bowls, I dump a shot into the nearest one. This takes the piggies' focus off me and onto the food. As the three of them attack bowl #1, I fill the other two quickly as they're always a mere hoof step behind me.

I am happy to say that our hogs have never attempted to bite me, although they occasionally do nip each other. The pigs are hilarious. The food in each bowl is the same, but the little porkers constantly move from bowl to bowl kicking out the lesser pig and sending them packing. Poor Scarlet is the little one so she spends the most time moving from bowl to bowl. Bo is the biggest and gets the most feed, but this doesn't stop him from thinking the feed must be better in the next bowl. Bo bullies Scarlet and Magnolia; Magnolia bullies Scarlet; and Scarlet just eats what she can. Every once in a while she makes a move to bully one of the other pigs, then pauses, thinks better of it, and returns to her bowl. I pet them through the whole process and our chickens often join the meal.

In the future we're going to build a feed tray for the bowls that I can access from outside the gate. As they get bigger and hungrier I don't want to take the chance of getting knocked down. That is truly a frighting thought - tackled by pigs with no referee to stop the fray. The chickens wear the right uniform, but they seem more interested in pecking up the extras than monitoring the game. Oh well!

Birds of a Different Feather

2009-05-26T20:06:00.000-04:00

Some friends came out to the farm on Sunday to see the pigs, stock up on eggs and loot the garden. They left with some excellent booty (carrots, onions, garlic...), and we gained some valuable knowledge.

We have a 1/2 mile trail on the property and of late it's has been spattered with discarded bird eggs, large blue-green ones to be exact. The eggs aren't as big as our chicken eggs, but they aren't small like a robin egg either. Our friend Cary happens to be an avid birder so we were hoping that she'd be able to identify the eggs and the birds that produced them. Based on the size of the eggs and a description of their call (something similar to a fox barking), Cary told us they were probably herons. She sent us a link to http://www.allaboutbirds.org/ and after listening to a few calls we narrowed the birds down to Black Crowned Night Herons which make a barking call and are nocturnal. We've only heard the calls around dark so her identification fit perfectly.

We love our chickens and will post more about them later, but this discovery was too exciting not to share.

Porcine Cave Art

2009-05-25T18:45:00.000-04:00

Well I've heard that pigs are intelligent, but this is ridiculous....porcine cave art! Who would'a thunk it? Okay, okay, the pigs didn't really do the artwork. We just finished their new pig shelter and the kids thought a little wall art was just what the place needed. I'm not sure if the pigs are impressed, but we had fun.

If you're just joining us, we raise American Guinea Hogs - a rare homestead farm animal. As of 2005, there were approximately 15 AGH's left in the country. The number is now up to 400+ as the breed is making a comeback on small farms around the country. Guinea Hogs don't paint (well, not to my knowledge), but they are special in other ways. They have friendly dispositions, have the ability to feed themselves by foraging on pasture or woodlands, and they produce exceptionally tasty meat. The American Guinea Hog is one of three pigs listed on Slow Food International's Ark of Taste. We have three breeder hogs at the moment that are in the 4-5 month old range and should have young pigs for sell around Christmas time of this year. Stay tuned for more.

Welcome to Bluefield Acres

2009-05-18T10:48:00.000-04:00

Welcome to Bluefield Acres blogspot. Bluefield Acres is a homestead farm in Bladen County, NC. We currently raise free range Wyandotte chickens and American Guinea Hogs. American Guinea Hogs are a rare heritage breed hog native to the Southeastern United States. They are known for their excellent disposition, ability to forage for their own food and their tasty meat. This blog will talk about our adventure in homestead farming and we hope you enjoy what you read.