This last week was an incredibly challenging one for me as  John had to travel for work and was away for five days, leaving me to manage not only my regular responsibilities (markets, promotions, and managing our online presence) but also the care and feeding of all of our livestock – some 50 head of cattle, 20 sheep, 17 pigs, 500 broiler chickens at various stages, 70 turkeys, and a flock of laying hens.  Although I've taken on John's chores before—though for shorter periods—I felt reasonably confident that I could handle it this time too. One of the perks of being married to an engineer like John is that he's designed systems and automations for many of our ranch tasks. These systems not only lighten our workload but also make it more predictable and manageable.

 

Tuesday really put me to the test, as I had to get everything ready for the Pflugerville market by myself. Normally, John and I work like a well-oiled machine: he handles order fulfillment and invoicing while I take care of egg preparation and van loading. Juggling market prep on top of my usual animal chores made for an especially long and exhausting day.

 

But it wasn’t until Wednesday that I started to run into real problems.  John has fans and heat lamps connected to a temperature controller in the brooder barn.  The temperature controller senses if it’s too hot (turning on the fans) or too cold (turning on the heat lamps).  He texted me Wednesday afternoon that he’d received a high temp alarm on his phone and asked me to go out and see what was wrong.  It turns out the entire system was down because something had tripped the breaker. After a bit of trouble shooting via facetime, John asked me to run an extension cord from the hay barn for the fans and called it a day.  Without the temperature controller, it was now up to me to ensure the chicks were comfortable.  Fortunately, they are just about ready to go out on pasture and no longer need heat lamps at night.  So each morning I had to turn the fans on and remember to turn them off before I went to bed.

That same evening, I went out to check on the birds on pasture and turn off the misters (used to keep them cool in this brutal heat) and I was startled to find the turkey tractor flooded. Considering how hot it’s been, even at night, the turkeys seemed to be enjoying the little pond that had appeared in their mobile coop, but that much water leaking was a definite problem. I traced it to the adjacent broiler tractor where one of the water nipples on the automatic waterer had come off. I never did find that missing part and had to call John to ask where replacement parts were and how to install them.  A bit more Facetime and we were back in business.

Just when I thought the worst was behind me, Thursday decided to throw me another challenge – this time with our payment service. The entire Square payment service went down as I was preparing to go to the Elgin Market causing confusion for customers.   Fortunately, we were only delivering pre-orders that day since I didn’t have anyone to handle chores that evening, so not too many customers were affected.

 

All-in-all I think I handled things pretty well and will chalk this one up as a win. This week has deepened my respect for the incredible work that John does here at the ranch every day. Taking on just a fraction of his responsibilities was an eye-opening experience that reminded me how much goes into running this place smoothly. Sometimes we need a stressful week to remind us how much we depend on family, neighbors, and friends like you who support our work here. While I may have made some mistakes over the past week, I'm grateful to have understanding customers who are willing to look past the occasional hiccup and offer a warm smile in return. Looking forward to seeing you all at the markets this week!

We're pleased to announce the Pflugerville Pfarmers Market's permanent move to the Green Red Barn at the back of Heritage Park. Say goodbye to the hot parking lot, and hello to shaded comfort with parking available next to the barn.