Heading Into Summer

Things are going well on Farver Acres. Lorrie is so proud of her garden, she wanted me to share some pictures. Also included some of the more recent "wildlife" pictures.

The garden is about 22 feet by 33 feet. For those that don't live in the woods, the yellow strands are electric fence to keep the wildlife out! We have a solar powered unit, seems to work well.

Bush green beans.

Sweet corn.

Yellow squash & peppers of all kinds.

Tomatoes.

Spring Tom turkey with some hens.

Cows? One day I looked out the window and yes, there were cows in the pond taking a dip. Some of the "neighborhood" cows got loose. Bet they will be back as the summer heats up!

A snapping turtle enjoying the afternoon sun. He'll have to go, they like to eat fish and if I ever want to take a swim, don't want something like that in the pond!

Spring is Here

The weather has finally broken and spring is here. We pretty much accomplished all our goals over the winter months and we are ready to start really enjoying ourselves on Farver Acres.

We wanted to get all the major projects done during our first winter, which primarily consisted of getting the shop areas done. When we moved in, in September 2012 the house was pretty much finished and we have actually not done much of anything in the house since we moved in. In the shop areas all of the walls, ceilings, insulation, electrical, lighting, drywall, OSB, painting and trimming are complete. This includes all of Deer Processing, the Man Cave and the Automotive/ Woodworking areas. We also have a separate furnace and central AC in the shop areas now, that will be awesome when it is 90 degrees and high humidity this summer!

This is the walk-in cooler in the Deer Processing Area, all framed in and ready to go!

This is in the Deer Processing Area, "my" washer and dryer for doing hunting cloths. The door goes into the main House.

This is the Automotive/ Woodworking Area. Two garage doors and a man door to the outside.

This is the Automotive/ Woodworking Area. This man door goes out into the Storage Area.

This is the Automotive/ Woodworking Area. This set of double doors goes into the Man Cave.

This is the Automotive/ Woodworking Area. The area to the left is the "Tool Room" and the door goes into the Deer Processing Area.

The Bar Area of the Man Cave. The lower of the two doors on the left goes into the cooling unit of the walk-in cooler. The upper door is to the "furnace room", it has the furnace/ AC for the shop areas.

Different Man Cave View, Doors Go Into the Automotive/ Woodworking Area.

Different Man Cave View. The door goes into the Deer Processing Area.

I call this "Canada Corner" in the Man Cave. Everything here is from/ has a Canadian theme, more will be added.

A TV will be on the wall here at some point in the future.

Different Man Cave View.

Shop Areas Coming Along

We started working on the shop areas during the Christmas holiday period. Over the past 6 weeks or so we have roughed in all the electrical outlets, all the lighting circuits and insulated all the interior and exterior walls in preparation for the Amish crew to come back. With the amount of work they get done for the price, it was a no brainer to have them back. In just over a week, they hung OSB in the Deer Processing Area (23x15 w/15' ceilings) and in the Automotive Area (23x37 w/15' ceilings) and they also hung the drywall in the Man Cave (23x22 w/15' ceilings). Then once that was completed, they installed metal ceiling in all areas, Deer Processing, Automotive, Man Cave and the 29x48 Storage Area. The final activity was to blow in insulation in the entire 66x48 shop area. It took 275 bags of insulation to get a solid R38 or higher but I can tell you, it is already paying off. They also framed up some closets for me in the Deer Processing Area for all our hunting clothes and supples. All of that in just over a week!

During all that we installed light fixtures in all areas. In the Automotive Area we installed 8 flourescent fixtures which are 4' T5 High Output, 4 bulbs per fixture. With the 8 fixtures we have about 200 lumens per square foot, nice and bright! We also installed two of those same fixtures in the Deer Processing Area and then in the Man Cave we hung 4 pendant lights that are dropped 3 feet down from the ceiling so they hang at about 12 feet or so.

Finally, we turned on the heat! The shop areas are all heated by the boiler and each is its own zone with its own thermostat. Lorrie no longer has to dress in 6 layers to come out to help, she complains now about being hot. Nothing better than being able to work in a T-shirt in the winter time.

The painting in the Deer Processing Area is done and the painting in Automotive is 90% done, just need to paint the bottom 40 inches dark gray, thought that would be a good idea for some contrast from the "all white" walls and to help cover up the dirt, dings and dents that are likely to occur in an automotive work area.

Our drywaller guy is coming in the evenings this week to finish the drywall in the Man Cave and we are in the process of thinking about the paint scheme/ colors. Thinking about doing multiple colors to give it some character, we will see.

Hanging lights in the Man Cave. You can see the drywall has been hung but not finished yet and how nice the ceiling is.

This is the Automotive Area, all nice and bright. With the white walls, white ceiling and high output lights, it is very well lit and will make a nice work area. Just need to paint the gray at the bottom and this room will be ready to start setting up.

This is the Deer Processing Area, looking at the walk-in cooler and one of the new closets, still need to get closet doors and will need to trim everything out with wood trim.

Another angle of the Deer Processing Area, the paint is all now dry so we will begin to set it up for "grinding day" which is in a couple of weeks.
 



A picture of the hoist in the Deer Processing Area. We braced up above the ceiling to ensure strength and then flush mounted the hoist on the bottom of the finished metal ceiling, also ran power so it will be clean and neat.

Wrapping Up 2012

We looked forward to 2012 for many, many years. We knew that 2012 was going to be a big year with Danial graduating, building our new house, selling our old house, moving, etc. Now that 2012 is over and we reflect back, it was a great year and pretty much everything turned out the way we had hoped and planned it would. We are living our dream on Farver Acres.

I thought I would catch up on a few items that wrapped up 2012 before we head in to 2013. The outside wood boiler is up and running and is pretty much completed, we have a few tuning items yet to do but the propane furnace has not come on in weeks now though we have had some pretty cold nights near 20 degrees.

With the boiler up and running, we are starting to use the wood we had previously cut and we make it a habit of going out every week to cut additional wood. My goal is to cut enough wood to get us through this season and also by spring, to have cut all the wood we will need for next year. Then going forward, in winter/spring, I will cut the following years wood to always be one year ahead.

We had our first Christmas in the house and the boys were here, just took down the lights, stockings, etc yesterday and plan to take the tree down and take it outside today.

We have started to finish the shop areas. Lorrie and I ran all the electrical power to all required locations and about 90% of all the exterior walls have been insulated. Over the next month we hope to get the ceiling in and the attic area insulated so we can then start heating those rooms with the boiler.

We are not done hunting, just put it on hold for the past 3-4 weeks with other projects/ priorities. We need to at least take a couple of more does for our grinding and to get us through the coming year.

More to come from time to time as we have things to report.

Since we will be cutting a lot of wood and getting it from way back in the property, we purchased a trailer that can be towed behind the ATV or Tractor. It has 4 wheel independent suspension, an electric dump bed and electric brakes.

This is in the utility room, these are all the pumps and water lines running out to each of the 8 heating zones we have. Five of them are turned on, the other 3 will be turned on once the shop areas are fully insulated. This room is always very warm, we keep the door open to let the heat out into the hallway!

First Christmas Tree on Farver Acres.

First Ice on the Pond since we moved in.

Electrical and Insulation nearly completed in "The Man Cave".

The back side of the cooler in The Man Cave. You can see the beer tap out of the back of the cooler. I plan to build a bar in this area, will start on that over the coming weeks.

First Snow on Farver Acres

Hurricane Sandy has brought us an early snow on Farver Acres. We probably have about an inch and it is still snowing. The higher elevations in WV are supposed to get 2-3 feet just a couple of hours South of here.

First Snow on Farver Acres

Fall at Farver Acres

2012 Hunting Season...So it Begins

We had an awesome time with Sophie, Hans, Brenda and Ray here, they along with Christopher and Lorrie all helped me celebrate my 50th birthday, great time! As much as we loved having our house guests and sure miss them, they know we put hunting season on hold for their visit, something that rarely occurs in the Farver household!

With the deer processing area ready, food plots growing nicely, the hardwood leaves changing their beautiful colors and "fall" temperatures in the air, it was time to take to the woods......

Though we have owned the property since 1999, we never had the equipment to put in food plots, I knew if we did, it would provide us a way to give the local deer herd year round nutrition and to also allow us to harvest the deer we need and keep the herd in balance. It sure paid off...now the story... you know I always have a story.

Lorrie and I had been checking the trail cameras for the past several weeks and were seeing many different bucks of varying sizes (and tons of does), mostly smaller bucks that would get more of our attention in a year or two. However, there was this one deer that got our attention that was showing up at Christopher's stand deep in the woods well before dark, then showing up in the food plot (which is just down the valley from Christopher's stand), still during daylight hours. I decided that was the deer I was going to go after, now I needed a plan. I had to decided, do I go to Christopher's stand or to the food plot. It is quite an up hill hike to Christopher's stand and as hot as it was, I would need to ride an ATV to keep from getting very sweaty. But riding the ATV would make more noise than I really wanted, I wanted to keep the pressure low this early in the season. Lorrie suggested she could take me and drop me off and the deer would hear the ATV come in and then leave and the deer would assume we were gone. Sounded like a good idea but I was concerned with after dark, she would need to come get me and would spook anything around the stand or in the food plot both. I decided to take the most conservative approach, ride the ATV to the lower field below the house, park it there, then walk back to the back food plot (mostly a level 1/4 mile walk). The only issue I might have is when it got dark, if there were deer in the food plot, I would have to wait them out (however long it took) to clear the field so I could leave undetected. The plan was set.

I wrapped up work at 5PM Friday evening and hit the shower, all my hunting gear was ready weeks ago, cloths washed in scent free, bow sighted in, backpack ready, etc. Now "I" was scent free after the shower so I suited up. It was warm (low 70's) so I dressed in my lightest Scentlock Savanah series clothing and un-insulated rubber boots. As planned, I rode to the lower field and started a very slow walk back to the back food plot. As I got closer and the trail opended up where I could see the food plot, something looked different. I stopped and used my binoculars to check it out, there was a smaller buck standing down in the stream bed to the left of the trail and all I could see was his head. I watched him and he climbed up out of the stream bed, ate in the food plot for awhile then dissappeared to the right behind the hunting shack I was heading to. I assumed he was going to keeping going to the right and leave the food plot up into the woods. I waited and again, something caught my attention, I looked with the binoculars again, and he was down in the stream bed again, this time on the right of the trail just below the hunting shack, check out the picture..... click on it to make it larger..... and look dead center......



Look in the center of the picture, right above the ground, you will see the bucks head/antlers.

It gets better......he climbed up out of the stream bed and back into the food plot then walked to the left where I could not see him. I could hear him in the leaves from time to time but I stayed still and just waited him out. Movement caught my attention 15 yards below me to the left, it was him, again down in the stream. He must have been really thirsty and looking for any moisture he could find. There were pretty thick woods between us so he could not see me but I could watch him with binoculars. I was getting impatient, by now since I approached the food plot, 20 minutes or more had gone by. I knew I needed to get into the hunting shack at the edge of the food plot very soon or more deer would likely be coming out and I would never make it there.

I watched the deer and "gave him 5 more minutes" and I was going to keep walking. When he started to close his eyes and fall asleep, I knew there was no better time so I gave up on him not knowing I was there and just started my slow walk to the hunting shack. I have no idea if he saw me or not, he never ran off, never snorted or anything, I just never looked back. By this time it was approaching 6PM. Finally I was in the shack, got settled in, checked everything out to make sure I was ready to go.

About 20 minutes later a mature doe entered the food plot first from just about straight ahead of me, I ranged her at 50 yards. She was followed into the field by what looked like her 1 1/2 year old doe and her 6 month old doe. They all milled around the field eating away for about 15 minutes and wandered up into the woods to the right.

At about 6:40PM I could hear movement in the very dry leaves to my left coming down out of "Poplar Valley". Sure enough, within minutes I could see a smaller buck and then another buck behind it. The smaller buck came down near the food plot and, like a child at a road crossing, he looked left then looked right and then jumped down off the hill into the food plot. The second buck then started forward, I could see it was "him". I couldn't believe it, really.... it never works out that way. They never do what you think they are going to do, but here he was. He dropped down into the food plot and immediately started eating, relaxed as could be. His "buddy" moved all over the food plot, at one point walking right up to a trail camera and actully hitting it with is antler, he then walked within 10 feet of me, down wind. I was expecting him to smell me and start snorting, nothing, he kept going behind me. The big buck kept eating, he was the only deer in the food plot at this point but he was over 40 yards away. He then just picked his head up and started walking in my direction, stopped and put his head down to eat and I ranged him at 22 yards. He turned to my left and kept eating, it was all up to me at that point.

I didn't hesitate for more than 10 seconds, I just waited for his left leg to come forward in alignment with his right leg and the arrow was on its way. I could see I had made a perfect double lung shot. He was gone..... ran up the hill to the left, I could hear some crashing as he went, then silence.

I called Lorrie and told her the news, she couldn't believe it. My first night out of the season and I had only been away from the house for less than 2 hours..... She walked down to the ATV and drove it back to the food plot. In the mean time I had gone looking for my arrow. Sure enough, a complete pass-thru, what every bow hunter wants to see. Lorrie arrived and with Christopher's sooped up SureFire flashlight (I call it the "mombo light", this is just a small fit in your hand flashlight but it drives the LED so bright it actually gets hot after you hold it for awhile...best blood trailing light ever!), we started looking for blood. Not a single drop at point of impact or anywhere in the food plot. About half way up the small hill we finally found the first drop, normally I would be worried with how little blood we were finding but I was very confident in my shot. We would find a drop every 10 feet or so and once we were on top of the hill we hit one of our ATV trails and that's when the blood trail become intense. It entered some very thick briars so I went up the ATV trail and was going to re-enter the woods past the briars, no need, he was laying there 20 feet off the ATV trail!

I have to say, this is the fastest I have ever taken my buck in any deer season so far. Everything came together like I had always dreamed it would once we moved to the property, living the dream!

Living the Dream!

We field dressed the deer and though challenging, Lorrie and I were able to get him up on the ATV. We took him back to the house and he became the first deer in the game cooler! We placed him there for the night with no worries at all. We used to have to go in to town and get ice to pack the deer to get them chilled down, make sure we had them in a location at camp where the coyotes would not get them, etc, no more!

Saturday first thing we took him in town to check him in and then took some pictures in the daylight, check out how we moved him around, did I say how much I loved my tractor?

With all the pictures out of the way, I removed the hide. We all decided a few years ago, that we would only mount deer that were "125" or bigger. This means that they needed to have 125 inches of antler as defined by Boone and Crocket. I had measured this deer and he just made it over 125 and especially since he was the first buck taken after moving into the new house, Lorrie and I decided he was getting mounted. We contacted some locals we had gotten to know during the construction process and located a recommended taxidermist, we put the rest of the deer in the walk in cooler and took the cape and head to the taxidermist. He said he was backed up quite a bit from having to take some time away to take care of his elderly father who had fallen and it would likely be a year before I got him back, but we could come get the antlers in a coulple of days to keep them and show them off until he was ready for them. Back from the taxidermist we proceeded to cut up the deer meat, vacuum seal it and get it into the freezer. All in all, we finally finished up completely by about 5PM Saturday!

Now we will see who is next to take a deer this season on Farver Acres, stay tuned.....