Hope this message finds you all doing well. I've been busy. 
Hayguy asked for an update on my activities here, so, here goes.
First off let me say that my camera crapped out long ago and I've been too busy to head to the city to buy another. I have taken some pics with my telephone but haven't taken the time to figure out how to download them to my computer yet.
Hay baling has been a bit slower this year mostly because of equipment problems and the lack of spare parts here in the People's Socialist Paradise of Venezuela. But, I've managed to fight through most of the problems and continue baling even here in June which is rare for me. We usually finish our year in early May and then get ready for the next 'season' which begins on about the first of July.
For those who don't recall, we have two seasons here, dry and wet, or summer and winter respectively. Our summer was very dry this year though our last winter was reasonably wet. This year's winter is really slow getting started.
I planted grain sorghum at my place last year in early August. I'd have planted earlier though I couldn't find seed. Fortunately, my timing was still good as we received decent rains in August and September when it really counted. My crop was ready for harvest by about mid November, but again, a lack of harvesting equipment kept me waiting. I finally got the crop in at the very end of January! :shock:
The problem is that my sorghum harvest corresponded with the area corn harvest. My place is fairly isolated and I have no nearby neighbors who grow grains. So, the choice for the harvesters was simple......stay put harvesting hundreds and hundreds of hectares of corn, or leave the area and lose time to harvest a relatively small crop of sorghum. If I was harvesting corn, I'd have told the gringo to take a hike as well.
Anyway, I still managed a decent grain harvest considering the time delay with seeds falling and the local parakeets feeding by the thousands for a couple of months.
I stored my entire crop, 25,000 kilos, in steel drums with the idea of it lasting until the next harvest but that hasn't worked out the way I wanted. During the month of February I started tinkering with making animal feeds since the regular suppliers became really erratic with their production. At times it was almost impossible for me to find feed for hogs, cattle, and chickens and my hay buyers were reporting the same problems all across eastern Venezuela.
Anyway, I finally settled on a mix that seemed to work really well for both my hogs and my cattle, but especially the cattle. In short order my hay buyers were leaving with sacks of my feed, word spread, and now I can't keep up with demand.
Recently I had a visit from a distributor for a company called Protinal which makes animal feeds. He's also a vet and asked if I can produce feed for his clients. When I commented that he probably sells more feed in a day than I can produce in a year, he responded that his problem is that his supply is constantly dwindling and he's got preferred clients for his animal medicines that he doesn't want to lose. We've got a meeting scheduled this coming week to discuss how he can help me put together a decent feed for chickens which is a huge market here. While I'll never be able to produce feed for producers with 200,000 birds, I can produce enough volume for producers with 500 to 3,000 birds or so and there are a lot of those types of producers in the area.
Starting Monday I'll be plowing ground at the ranch to plant both corn and grain sorghum. I need to at least triple my sorghum production to keep up with my projected feed needs. I'm planting the corn mainly to reduce costs. While I can buy plenty of corn on the local market, not many farmers produce sorghum in the area.
Well, that about covers for adventures of late. Feel free to ask any questions and when time permits, I'll post pics to go along with the narrative.
Hayguy asked for an update on my activities here, so, here goes.
First off let me say that my camera crapped out long ago and I've been too busy to head to the city to buy another. I have taken some pics with my telephone but haven't taken the time to figure out how to download them to my computer yet.
Hay baling has been a bit slower this year mostly because of equipment problems and the lack of spare parts here in the People's Socialist Paradise of Venezuela. But, I've managed to fight through most of the problems and continue baling even here in June which is rare for me. We usually finish our year in early May and then get ready for the next 'season' which begins on about the first of July.
For those who don't recall, we have two seasons here, dry and wet, or summer and winter respectively. Our summer was very dry this year though our last winter was reasonably wet. This year's winter is really slow getting started.
I planted grain sorghum at my place last year in early August. I'd have planted earlier though I couldn't find seed. Fortunately, my timing was still good as we received decent rains in August and September when it really counted. My crop was ready for harvest by about mid November, but again, a lack of harvesting equipment kept me waiting. I finally got the crop in at the very end of January! :shock:
The problem is that my sorghum harvest corresponded with the area corn harvest. My place is fairly isolated and I have no nearby neighbors who grow grains. So, the choice for the harvesters was simple......stay put harvesting hundreds and hundreds of hectares of corn, or leave the area and lose time to harvest a relatively small crop of sorghum. If I was harvesting corn, I'd have told the gringo to take a hike as well.
Anyway, I still managed a decent grain harvest considering the time delay with seeds falling and the local parakeets feeding by the thousands for a couple of months.
I stored my entire crop, 25,000 kilos, in steel drums with the idea of it lasting until the next harvest but that hasn't worked out the way I wanted. During the month of February I started tinkering with making animal feeds since the regular suppliers became really erratic with their production. At times it was almost impossible for me to find feed for hogs, cattle, and chickens and my hay buyers were reporting the same problems all across eastern Venezuela.
Anyway, I finally settled on a mix that seemed to work really well for both my hogs and my cattle, but especially the cattle. In short order my hay buyers were leaving with sacks of my feed, word spread, and now I can't keep up with demand.
Recently I had a visit from a distributor for a company called Protinal which makes animal feeds. He's also a vet and asked if I can produce feed for his clients. When I commented that he probably sells more feed in a day than I can produce in a year, he responded that his problem is that his supply is constantly dwindling and he's got preferred clients for his animal medicines that he doesn't want to lose. We've got a meeting scheduled this coming week to discuss how he can help me put together a decent feed for chickens which is a huge market here. While I'll never be able to produce feed for producers with 200,000 birds, I can produce enough volume for producers with 500 to 3,000 birds or so and there are a lot of those types of producers in the area.
Starting Monday I'll be plowing ground at the ranch to plant both corn and grain sorghum. I need to at least triple my sorghum production to keep up with my projected feed needs. I'm planting the corn mainly to reduce costs. While I can buy plenty of corn on the local market, not many farmers produce sorghum in the area.
Well, that about covers for adventures of late. Feel free to ask any questions and when time permits, I'll post pics to go along with the narrative.
