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HORSE FARMING 

Here at Blackleg Acres all of the farming is done with our horses.  We farm about 15 acres in hay, corn and oats that we bale for hay, in addition to the garden.  The following pictures will take you through our steps of farming with horses.  Many people ask us why we farm with horses.  For one it is cost effective, it involves the whole family, and finally there just happens to be something about the sound of  the plow slicing the damp soil and hearing the birds sing that can't be heard if you're driving a tractor. This page is graphic intense and will take time to down load, but I hope the wait is worth it.

 

PLOWING

Plowing the garden before planting sweet corn. Yentz (gelding, 1 yr.10 mo.) in the furrow, Bulah (filly, 2 yr. 10 mo.) on the land. Both are bay roan but Yentz turns darker in his winter coat.  2/1999

 

 

   
DISCING

Discing the garden with three Brabants: Rocky (Stallion), Yentz (gelding), and Bulah (filly).   3/1999

 

HARROWING

Annie using the spike tooth harrow to smooth the garden with April our blue roan Percheron.  12/1999

  
   LOGGING

Using the forecart to drag some logs. Yentz and Rocky doing the work. Yentz is just being broke, his first time working at log skidding. 1/1999

CORN PLANTING

Planting sweet corn in the family garden with Yentz and Bulah. First time for Yentz on the corn planter, he was just 1 yr. 10 mo. old. He and Bulah planted all of our corn that year.  3/1999

  CULTIVATING 

April our Percheron pulls the cultivator while Annie guides it through the sweet corn, trying to just get the weeds.    5/1997

CORN PICKING TIME

Rocky and Bulah pull the wagon, Annie does the driving. Picking corn at the Edisto Research Center in preparation for the Horse Farmers Gathering. The bangboard in the wagon helps with some of those near misses. 8/1998

 

 

CORN BINDING

From the left: Bulah (filly), Yentz (gelding), Rocky (stallion), pull the McCormick Deering corn binder. This was during the annual Horse Farmers Gathering held in Blackville, SC.  Two horses can pull this machine but it makes it a much easier job for three.         9/1999

 

 

GRAIN DRILLING

Percheron mares April (blue roan), and Sedata (bay roan), drilling millet for summer grazing in a small paddock. Sedata was 19 in this photo, she died in 1997 at the age of 20.  April is 3 in this picture of her working with her grandmother.      5/1996

 

 

MOWING

Bulah and Rocky mow hay at the 3rd annual Horse Farmers Gathering. The McCormick Deering #9 mower was originally used on a mule farm  where we now live. It was found where it had been sitting in the woods for 35 years, restored, and put back to use cutting all of our hay. Both horses are 2 yrs. old.   9/1998

 

 

RAKING

Bulah and Rocky pulling a John Deere side delivery hayrake. This is coastal bermuda grass in a field near Barnwell.     8/1998

 

 

 

    TEDDING

Flipping the hay with an International hay tedder. Rocky and Bulah at 2 years old.   8/1998

LOADING

Another demonstration at the Gathering, where Bulah and Rocky pull a McCormick Deering 9 bar hay loader. It picks up the raked hay and drops it on the wagon for delivery to the barn.      9/1999

 

 

  
BALING

Rocky and Bulah using a forecart to pull the New Holland haybaler. This was their first summer to use the baler, but after 1100 bales they know how it works.     7/1999

 

 

 

MANURE SPREADING

 

It always helps to add a little fertilizer. On a cold January day you can pull the spreader in the barn and by the time it is loaded you aren't too cold anymore! We usually have a load each week during the winter to spread on the fields. Annie uses Rocky and Bulah on the New Idea 10A.   1/2000

 

 

 

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