Would you believe that it was still dark enough for a flashlight to be real helpful at seven this morning? The sun is supposed to be putting in an appearance by 7:24 so it is usually quite bright by then. However, it was weirdly gloomy and damp out and stayed dark about as late as I have ever seen it this time of year. We had to turn fans on in the barn that hadn't whirled a blade since early fall, and the air was still heavy. Then by ten AM the sun was shining and it has been lovely ever since. We have made it up to nine hours and fifteen minutes of daylight or what passes for it. Beats December anyhow.

Of course the new camera ate its batteries so I can't go out and take pictures. The chickens very nicely posed in the flower bed this morning, but the batteries were dead when I went out to take their portrait. Guess the lady at the store was right about rechargeables.

Liz and Spruce 

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I have heard of revenge, but this story beats all. It just goes to show that if you must light mice afire, you had better do it a LONG way from your house.

I never did like mice much, and this one proved that they can be dangerous for other reasons than just carting hanta virus and Lymes disease around. However, John Deere's magazine The Furrow published an article in the January issue saying that they do a lot of good out in the crop fields by eating weed seeds. Seems scientists placed sticky cards covered with seeds of noxious weeds, like giant fox tail and velvet leaf, out in fields. Mice removed one third of the seeds in 48 hours. Crickets do much the same, according to the article. (Those are a bit more popular with me, as I like to hear their cheerful chirping late in the summer.) Iowa State University researchers call the small creatures, "Little Hammers" in the fight against pests in the fields. I guess we need all the little hammers we can get as long as they stay out of the house, whether aflame or not.

For a bunch of stay-at-homes, we sure got some travelin' done this weekend. You wouldn't believe the stuff we saw. Saturday we went to the city to take care of some belated Christmas gathering-type stuff with my brothers. The trip down and back not dull. First we passed a small airport where the whole field was covered with snowboarders carving up the snow behind kites like you might see on an ultra-light. They were quite graceful, like swooping, soaring raptors hitting the updrafts on a summer day.

I checked into the sport and found that it is called kite boarding, except when you do it in the snow, wherein it becomes snow kiting. It looks like something that would have been a whole lot of fun back before we turned twenty. In those days we loved to ski while being towed behind the neighbor's snowmobile and the sports look fairly similar. (They are also alike in that you aren't going to catch me doing either now.) You can get a basic kite for about $199. Guess you just add a snowboard and some flat, snowy ground...oh, and maybe some lessons.... and you are G2G.

Next we drove through the historic district of the city where we were treated to the sight of a massive young gent, about seven feet tall, strolling up the middle of the road carrying a huge pile of binders under one arm and dangling a telephone by its cord from the other, sort of bouncing it down the street. He was gently swaying and staring off into space like he had been puffing on something a bit stronger than Virginia Slims. We wended our way carefully around him and went on our way shaking our heads. I am sure that sort of thing doesn't even raise an eyebrow downtown, but to us rural folk it was plumb unique and different. About the only thing you see wandering down the middle of our roads out here is an occasional woodchuck or maybe a stray cow.

Then Alan saw three owls sitting all in a row in a tree. I missed that amazing sight, as I was keeping the car pointed at the road, but I sure wish I could have stolen a glance.

Add in the maniac in the red car who whipped around us at a red light, running the same at about fifty MPH right in town, who only avoided t-boning two on-coming cars because the other drivers were awake and quick, and you have an eventful journey.

Believe it or not, after all that sensory overload, we actually went out again today to a retirement party for my aunt. Had fun too. I am feeling almost like a citizen of the larger world.

Open the door, please, please, please.....

Above is the first picture from our new digital camera, a Canon A520. Nick and Gael are wishing oh so hard that they could get into the coop and get those bunnies. Thanks to Courtney for helping me start using it.

Favorite Cows

Pretty near everybody who keeps multiple animals has a favorite or two, even if they'd rather not admit it. It is certainly that way on a small dairy farm. Every day, twice a day, you get out there and milk them and in between they are fed and cleaned up after and all those sorts of chores. Spending all that time with them, you get to know them pretty well. They all have different personalities and you soon notice them.

Having said that, things happen to animals, just like they do to people. Folks have car accidents, or are victim of all sorts of calamities. Cows get caught in fences, beat up by other cows and have other troublesome difficulties too. I can attest, from a lifetime of personal experience, that calamities almost NEVER happen to animals that you don't like. If there is a cow that won't go in her stall, that kicks you every time you come within reach; if she is a dirty, snidely, miserable witch, nothing will ever, ever happen to her.

However, your favorite cow, now, that is another story. If there is a loose wire she will get caught in it. If there is a bully she is sure to be the victim. My personal favorite cow is a little black Citation R Maple daughter named England. She is not particularly lovely, being too small for the ideal and having a head shaped like a cracker box. She is not particularly friendly either, with feet that are so light they come right off the floor quite easily when she wishes to express displeasure. However, she is clean, easy to milk and a wonderful producer. She was, in fact, top ME heifer last year in our barn. She is also a red carrier and has a sweet calf by Golden Oaks Andy, which I named E-Train.

Naturally, she stepped on her back teat the other day. Then she did it again the day after that and the day after that until she had it mangled like hamburger. The boss managed to get her stanchion adjusted so she isn't doing it any more, but it was almost impossible to get any milk out of the injured teat because of the swelling. I was distraught more than someone who doesn't love a cow could imagine. That kind of injury all too frequently leads to infection, loss of the affected quarter or even unplanned culling of the victim. The prognosis is never very happy for a cow with a crushed teat. Then, last night, I could not get poor England milked by machine no matter what I did.

Enter Alan, who is a real good guy when he wants to be. He sat on an upended bucket for at least half of milking, with his head in her flank, trusting her not to kick him to hell and back and hand milked her. Unless you are Amish this is a darned hard job. Had he not done it though, I don't know what would have happened. It certainly would not have been good.

This morning although things didn't go perfectly, I was able to get her machine milked. She was a lot more comfortable than she was last night too. I sure am hoping she comes along and doesn't step on herself again. Anyhow, I have to say thanks to Alan for buying her at least a bit more time.

Another summer camping picture

Ring around the moon tonight. They say that it is a sign of ill weather to come. The forecast is for cold and clear, but that ring is plain evidence of ice clouds up there somewhere. The first quarter looked like a chilly grin in the center of a circle of pearly silver, bound by a border of almost-red like rusty blood. It was the biggest and least iridescent moon ring I have ever seen. Wonder what it bodes for weekend weather.

Logger Justice

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There came to mind a true story about a young girl who used to work in a well-known restaurant up in the Oneida County area. This was back in the days when loggers lived in the woods all winter, used horses in their work, and had a code of honor rarely observed today. One day a young fellow, new to the crew, made a remark to the young lady in question. It must have been a pretty rude remark, although she didn't actually hear exactly what he said. However, one of the older gents waved a hand to bring the rest of the crew with him and ordered the offender outside. They hauled him out of sight of the public, stripped him to his birthday suit, pitched him into a snowbank and stood around watching him for a spell. When his ardor was plumb cooled they left. A while later the restaurant owner found a shivering hunk of blue goosebumps out behind the place, (still bereft of appropriate covering, which the loggers took along with them) and offered him a table cloth to hide his embarrassment while he went for some pants. Needless to say, he found alternative employment and didn't bother that waitress again.

Ah, Friday, the day the Farm Side runs in our local paper, the Recorder. Since delivery is anything but reliable here in our just-barely-rural location, I signed on to the paper's website to see if FS actually made the day's edition. (You never know what might happen between my word processor and the editorial page.) I also love to find out what the title is each week, as naming each column is not my privilege. Imagine my chagrin when I discovered that the paper has begun running a pay site for its online edition. I can't blame them I guess, as most of the other local dailies have done the same thing. However, it makes me melancholy to be able to read the New York Times online version in all its singularly biased splendor, when I can't get to my own column without slogging down the hill from hell, through snow and sleet and freezing rain, all the while hoping that the paper delivery-meister actually brought it and that it isn't enthroned in some soggy snow bank somewhere. (There is something discouraging about having to dry the darned thing by draping it over the step stool on the kitchen heat register-that's MY spot!)

Anyhoo, I discovered that for a buck I could register for one day and read the paper from my trusty little green desk right here by the dining room window. Thus I dug out the Master Card, billed that massive charge to it and looked over this week's Farm Side in splendid comfort. The title turned out to be Farmers Always Learn to Adapt, and my mention of the nifty local weblog, UPSTREAM: a Mohawk Valley Perspective, made the cut. Hope it brings the author some well deserved traffic, as he has some compelling opinions on area politics and history.

I guess I can afford a dollar. Now I only hope that the paper-meister brought the hard copy so I don't have to shell out another fifty cents down at the self-service machine at the post office for a copy for my files.

A little taste of perfect peace.

This morning we arose to a world encased in silver-white hoar frost, with the ground frozen hard as a bowling alley. Every single blade of grass, each twig and all the dried stems of goldenrod were coated with thick, bright icing like a huge, valley-sized wedding cake. It was blindingly lovely to look at, but ever so cold to venture out in. Therefore I am posting for your enjoyment (and my own) a picture taken from a sturdy little wooden row boat anchored over the best rainbow trout fishing I have ever experienced. We were watching the sun coming up over Peck's Lake NY when I took it with our Canon AE1 camera.

Alan and I have spent many July mornings (not to mention afternoons and evenings) in this favorite cove of ours, either fishing from the rowboat or watching deer and ducks from the silence of the gliding canoe. Even mergansers , which are normally very wary birds seem to have no fear of the little metal boat, perhaps because it is so utterly quiet. Here in the early days of January, with our surroundings covered with water in its most solid form, it is comforting to remember those golden summer days. Sometimes the only thing that keeps me chugging along is secret memories of that wonderful lake...that and the knowledge that I have a reservation for a week this July too.

"For the most part, I mean, it was a big adjustment (when I got home) just trying to get in that mindset of being able to just roam, run around without fear of being shot at or where to look for danger. … It's unexplainable. I mean, just to go from that mindset to being able to walk around freely and just enjoy it."

Above is a quote from a CBS story entitled ‘Marlboro Marine’ : Home Front Woes about a young man, Lance Cpl. Blake Miller of Jonancy, Ky., whose picture was featured on many news services around the world as particularly representative of the military in Iraq.

What struck me most about the story was how much we here at home truly take it for granted that we can walk around freely as he says. Oh, we may lock our car at the mall or cast a wary eye on suspicious looking strangers when walking in an unfamiliar spot, but for the most part we wander around oblivious to our surroundings and quite contented to be that way. Out here in the country I always have an ear cocked for rustling in the bushes, because you never know when a bull might get out or a coyote come prowling too close to the house in search of barn cat sushi. However, unless I am out in the fields during hunting season I certainly am not worried about getting shot or listening for incoming missiles and watching out for snipers in doorways. This poor young man instead has been panicked by merely hearing something that sounded like a rocket propelled grenade.

How at once terrible and yet wonderful it must be for our young people to come home after their time away from that privilege of freedom. It must constantly be on many of their minds, how great the contrast is between here and there. I am sure they appreciate the here a good deal more than most of us who haven’t been there.

On this second day of 2006 it is back to business as usual, although the kids are all still home from school. (This is admirable on the help-in-the-barn-front and excruciating on the sibling rivalry front. If I hear one more word about football, smoke is going to issue forth from both my ears and fireworks are sure to follow.)

I don’t have a lot of positive thoughts about prospects for prosperity in the coming year on the dairy-farming front. A lot of ongoing trends appear to be on the point of converging to make things ugly. One of these situations is the reopening of the Canadian border to mature cattle. As the US has been scrambling frantically to get Japan to readmit American beef in the wake of our two cases of BSE (also called Mad Cow Disease when looking for dramatic effect) they can’t really avoid offering the same deal to Canada without looking stupid and hypocritical. (Not that behavior of that sort has been a problem in the past.) The USDA wants to get it done by midyear and you can bet that they will. However, the free and easy import of Canadian cows is rough for smaller dairy farmers as it facilitates further expansion for the big guys, some of whom import a tractor trailer load of springing heifers every few weeks. This increases the supply of milk and, with that old debbul cause and effect, it also lowers milk prices for everyone.

While the border was closed, small farmers enjoyed both higher milk checks in their mailboxes and a higher price for replacement heifers when they had a couple to sell. (Ironic how the CWT program claimed all the credit for this, when it was really just a coincidence that the program was instituted at about the same time as Posilac was rationed and the border closed, with a side helping of lousy weather nationwide.) Big guys can afford to flood the market with cheap milk, as they get the best deals on hauling and volume premiums and have the benefit of economy of scale. Little guys just get washed away with the extra milk.

Then there is the marketing situation. Milk supply in the USA is controlled almost entirely by a few gigantic food companies. When there is an ample amount available they close their plants to farmers who are not under contract to them. Heck sometimes they close the plants entirely. This leaves smaller, less desirable from their point of view, independent farmers forced to join them or lose a place to sell their milk. This results in lower prices once again, along with the loss of quality premium programs and the need to accept heavy debt in the form of equity. It is hard to stay small in the new world of farming today.

Weather is another not so positive circumstance. For the past decade or so, our summers have been either extremely dry or wet as a tropical rainforest. Heck, last year we had both a summer long drought and the wettest fall in ages. With this going on, fields lose their fertility; it is hard to put up either enough feed or feed of adequate quality to keep the cows producing well. Even purchased feed supplies are short this winter. Expensive too.

Add in increased fuel prices, which raises the price of fertilizer, sky rocketing taxes, hard to find help and an aging farm population, along with ever increasing environmental regulations and a mass exodus from NYC to rural areas and you have a rather frightening aspect for the New Year. Maybe there will be cows at Northview this time next year and maybe there won’t. It depends on how inventive and resilient we can be. Time will tell.

Snow collies

Winter has its rewards. We bought some second and third cutting alfalfa hay from an area dealer and it is of spectacular quality. It is a real pleasure to watch the cows grab a mouthful, and then chew it with as much enthusiasm as a kid with a jaw full of bubble gum. They only get three bales split among the lot of them, as they get other hay throughout the day. It is gone in minutes.
I like to stand at the end of the aisle and watch them eat each night before I go to the house. There is something deeply satisfying about the simple contentment of animals. They are not complicated creatures in their desires and pleasing them seems straightforward and somehow correct.

When all is done in the barn the scent of smoke from the woodstove as we walk across to the house is another joy. The men have brought in cherry and hickory for the fire today. In the sharp, cold night air it smells like the pipe of a favorite grandfather or something good cooking in the kitchen. It speaks clearly of home and hearth and comfort in a cold season.

Inside the house Liz is treating us to a New Year’s Eve dinner that is a rich delight. It smells as good as the woodsmoke in the yard. She spent the day baking cream cheese brownies and herb filled bread. Then since her dad gave her a break from evening milking, she made lasagna with sausage from our pigs, ground beef from the last angus we raised, and four kinds of cheese. Along with a fresh salad it will make quite a meal. I guess we don’t have much to complain about today do we?

I wish a safe and enjoyable New Year’s Eve to all tonight. Everyone knows the rules, if you drink don't drive; if you drive, don't drink. Now we can all hope that everyone follows them. For us, sitting at home with a half-hearted argument over Giant's football vs. PBR rodeo is enough excitement for the five of us. It is Liz's day for the remote so I am betting on rodeo. If anyone sees midnight I will be surprised, although anything is possible. Me, I have a whole pile of good books and tomorrow morning off. Ahhh....

Cactus 

Nancy, do you know this fellow?