Archives for Latest Blog

 

As the boys are too excited to sit still, one beef delivery is made, and the monthly beef order drop off is postponed a weekend, we start to prepare for the snow and cold temperatures that are forecast for our area.   Bobby starts up that tractor and puts out hay to all the livestock.  The boys and I clean out horse stalls, lay down fresh bedding, and get the horses settled in their stalls for the snowy night ahead.  All exposed water pipes are insulated or turned off and drained.  The trucks get plugged in so they will start in the morning.  Snow is not so bad; it is the cold temperatures that are so hard on us and the livestock.  It’s not like living up north when snow is regular for farmers.  After all, last week, we were in the high 60’s, and then this morning, it is a wind chill of 8 degrees!  And it is not a nice insulating, fluffy snow; it is more like watery, ice snow.  Then, the forecast has our area in the 60’s again two days later.  So while we have to prepare maybe three times a year, we are not in constant preparation like up north. [Read more…]

What, our hay fields have been invaded!  An army like no other!  Yes, the dreaded ARMYWORM, the Fall Armyworm to be exact.  How did this happen?  The fall armyworm cannot survive our cold winters????

It turns out, a lovely gray moth from the south floated north on the summer breeze, and found a tree next to a wonderful hayfield or pasture here in Georgia to lay her eggs.  Then, without warning, August 16th, 2016, three weeks later, our hayfields have HUGE brown spots in them.

[Read more…]

Check out our two new additions to deGraan Farms!  These bulls are only 15 months old and already weigh over 1200 pounds each!  This past Saturday, we attended the Spitzer Ranch Brangus Bull Sale in South Carolina, where we purchased these two bulls.  Our neighbors, Hunt Brangus had several bulls in the sale.  We went to buy one of the Hunt bulls, but he sold to high.  We had picked these two to buy as well. [Read more…]