Excuse me, but ...

[Wildsky]

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Good point! Still some days I don't wanna go out - I rush outside, open up the chickens and FLY back into the house!

(I wonder if I could keep a goat in the basement?)

 

[Farmer Kitty]

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Twice a day 4 a.m. and 4 p.m. The barn holds 34 cows and in the winter that is tops. We have switched milk (milking some and turning them out to bring in more) in the summer months but, we have no housing outside for the extras in the winter.

4am !!!

That right there is why I don't have a milk goat - no way I could scrape myself out of bed so early in this cold.

The time doesn't matter so much as getting the mikings roughly 12 hours apart. DH works out so with 4 a.m. he does morning milking while I'm doing chores. I do the afternoon chores and milking. During fieldwork it gives us time in the evenings to work the fields more as I'm usually done or about done when he gets home. My fieldwork time during the day is limited since we had the girls. Soon though I will be out there more as Kute Kitten is getting older and can babysit Peanut. We have a trailer for the 4 wheeler that we take out to the field and they put all their stuff they want in it. That way they are close and can stop me if they need me and I can still work.

 

[2manyhats]

I don't milk and I'm out in the barn at 6am. I do the AM chores of feeding and watering and DH does it in the evening. It's hard to get motivated now that it's cold, but once I'm bundled up, I enjoy the brisk morning and the chat I have with all the critters. We butchered the 2 pigs on Sunday and now the barn seems awfully quiet. The goats and sheep are not nearly as loud as those pigs were.

 

[ozark hen]

God Bless all the milkers out there!! It is going on 9 a.m. here and temp is up to 27`. Waterers have a skim of ice left on the tops but we break them in the am's for the poultry who still don't want to get off their roosts....don't blame them!

 

[CarriBrown]

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That's what our bill is all summer long and we don't run A/C all day (2k sq ft home). If we ran it all day, it would be a lot more. I pretty much tell people to shut up when they complain about their electric bill!

 

[Mrs MIA]

Criminently... ours would be like that in the winter if we heated with electricity. Luckily we have a gas furnace, and it runs even when the power is out.

Which is a good thing because we're at -8°F this morning.

 

[cajunlizz]

YES , because my daughter has 2,300 Sq. ft. home , ALL electric and only thing she does is raise the temp to 78º during the day while not at home . Actually turning off your A/C or C/H is the worse thing and MOST expensive thing that you can do . It will run alot longer to coll off furniture , walls , flooring , ETC. Raise the temp slightly and lower it back down when you return . Oh by the way , her utility bills are about $135.00 a month , and REPEATING FOR A 2,300 Sq. Ft . home

 

[BFeathered]

Miss Prissy, where in VA are you? (if you don't mind..) I lived in Richmond for 7yr, went to VA TECH after that. I miss the 4 real seasons, hills (we're FLAT), curves in the road, real trees (not these stunted things).... sigh. But definitely grateful for the cost of living down here (thank heaven for gas heat and new a/c units that dropped our electric bill this summer -- 2800sq ft).

 

[MissPrissy]

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Orange county. That makes me a Real Housewife in the OC????

Normally my bill is $100. I live in a 100 yr old farm house, 2 story, 4 square. 1 heat pump and a/c for the top floor and 1 for the downstairs.

My electric topped out at $400 this year. Not because of a/c. The pool pump is MURDER! I dred starting up the swimming pool. I know every month in summer the bill is just going to climb!

 

[AllChookUp]

We have a propane furnace, but also try to heat a lot with another wood furnace. We go through about 6 full cords of wood per winter. That helps keep our heating bill down to about $500/year.

Electric for everything else (stove, water heater, lights, etc.) winds up being about $ 80/month on average.