Beauty

I don't dwell on the topic of beauty over-much, but I do notice it now and then in a striking sunset or a perfect warm breeze. As often as not I find myself arrested by its absence rather than having some heart-wrenchingly gorgeous scene laid at my feet. Unfortunately, the vast majority of the times I stop short because of something I find ugly or repulsive it is due to decisions another person made. Usually I can only guess at the motivation for the decision to create something I find ugly - lack of time, lack of money, restrictions of the State, or most fundamental of all - a lack of care. With enough heart in it the first three factors can in many instances be surmounted.

Rather than delve into examples of ugliness, I'd prefer to share one of my small attempts to create beauty. I believe there is something to the idea of an "archetypal landscape" that breathes a sense of belonging into the human soul. The biologist E.O. Wilson's 'biophilia' incorporates aspects of it, and there are now replicated pschyological studies that demonstrate a landscape that is "most attractive" across all cultures. An occasionally treed grassland is that landscape. The African savanna is a classic example and other images can be seen here (scroll down a little to see images).

And here is a photo of me standing under some Hawthorne trees that I've pruned up. It probably would have been just as fast, or maybe faster, to cut the trees all the way down and push this little corner of scrubby pasture into pure grass. But that would have been less beautiful, and it would have sacrificed the beneficial aspects of trees in a pasture, which included tapping deeper sources of minerals than grasses can reach, shade for ruminants, and wind breaking during cold weather.

This spot is not currently fenced so I don't have cows up here and won't for a little while yet. In the coming years though I look forward to their assistance in shaping these trees into a form I find even more lovely than they now appear.

Finally, no, it is not lost on me that this is one of the less beautiful photos posted to this blog... ;)

-Edmund

When it's 20 below....

It was 20 below last night. Normandy went to start some wash this morning and the pipes had frozen to the laundry room. After 5 hours with the stove cranking and our thermostat set all the way to 55 degrees (I know, it was extravagant) all the ice had thawed and no pipes had burst. I went out to feed the chickens after lunch and peering into their nesting boxes I thought a wayward hen had savaged the eggs. A closer look revealed that each had split down the long side. They had frozen and burst, all but one of them. I propped the carton in the egg mobile and checked their water. Behind me a hen jumped up onto the dozen and knocked it from its perch throwing all of the eggs into the air. That one viable egg of the day went the way of the rest.

-Alanna

Winter bias

Last week I brought my camera along for my daily walk outside. It strikes me that a photograph is the perfect way to capture winter up here. Inherent in a photograph is the bias of the photographer: how an image is framed, cropped, and pointed. Similarly, I find my attitude does much to frame these upstate NY winters. They are at once beautiful, austere, sparkling experiences as well as miserable, chilling, and embittering. One thing is for sure: our cows have not seemed bothered by the cold and snow. It is amazing that their coats insulate them so well, the snow builds up on their backs.

Sometimes I think that winter is just a four month lesson on appreciating the color gray. The pictures above perfectly illustrate that.

-Normandy

The Herd Reunited

Most of our cows are wintering out. We have a large bale feeder that we keep flush with hay and a tank of water that is constantly full, and they move about at their leisure between the two. There is a wedge of pasture that is protected from the wind by two converging hills with thick woods on either side. They go there when it blows. The Kerry cows in our herd have a genetic advantage over the two Dutch belted cross steers in that they have thicker coats and ample reserves of fat. Our best cow, Juno, is maintaining her condition in this weather with a growing calf under her. She is amazing. Her calf has ballooned into a tubular marshmallow overtopping his short and stocky legs. This indicates to me that they are doing fine. But about a month ago, the two steers began looking a little worn and unthrifty. We decided to bring them down to the barn with the younger cows where they could enjoy a more sheltered existence. The following day we saw that Juno's calf had slipped under the wire. We walked up the hill to them, observing his solitary set of hoof prints in the snow. He must have missed his two young companions and ventured off to see where they had gone. He had walked three quarters of the way to the red barn, stopped at the crest of the hill, and then turned reluctantly back to his herd, having seen no sign of his comrades. Meanwhile, they were stuffing themselves with second cut hay, kelp meal and the little splattering of grain we give them from time to time. On top of this luxurious diet we decided to worm them. Then they might really get the upper hand over the microscopic life forms that were keeping them impoverished. A week or two after the treatment their coats had improved in luster and they were lively enough to take turns mounting a cow in heat despite their not having testicles. It was time for them to return to their friends on the hill.

We took some grain with us to coax them along and got them out the side door without any hassle. Taking a small journey on foot with two playful cows made me see the allure of what I imagine to be the shepherd's life. Walking with large animals, moving with them at their own pace, brought such a vital sense of collective well being even though we were only going a short distance.

I brought a camera with me to capture the moment when the steers were reunited with the rest of the herd. It was full of bravado and excitement.

They moo-ed at the first sight of each other and starting horsing around immediately. Everyone got so wound up that they were losing their footing in the snow as they ran around in circles.

-Alanna

Chipping

There hasn't been a whole lot going on at the farm since it got really and truly cold at the start of December. We've been enjoying plenty of time at the table plotting out our garden for next year, pouring over seed catalogs and tracking down sources for our COF (otherwise known as "complete organic fertilizer").

Here is one project I've spent a little time doing and will undertake more of this winter. We have a piece of land that used to be pasture a long time ago, and want to convert back into grazing land. In order to get there I have to cut down a bunch of scrubby trees and bushes. Here is a photo that shows me chipping the branches I cut for chip mulch on the big garden paths and for weed suppression around the bases of our apple trees.

-Edmund

There Has Been Blood

It's been a bloody day.

This is a photo of our three new cows taken a day or so ago. You will note the horns on each of the mature cows. Their horns were 'banded' before they came to us, i.e. a very tight rubber band was attached around the base of each horn with the purpose of constricting the blood flow, eventually causing it to fall off on its own. This is not my favorite de-horning method. I hear that skilled people with wire saws and needle nose pliers can do a very quick and relatively clean job of it when they have to, but the best option by far, for everyone involved, seems to be burning the bud of the horn when the cow is very young. I came to this opinion this morning when I went to the barn. Having greeted the cows and grabbed a pitchfork to begin cleaning up their manure. I was forking a patty when I noticed a splotch of blood on the hay. That was alarming. I looked around and saw many spots of blood until I finally lifted my head to see that one of Datura's horns had come off last night. The left side of her face was covered in blood as well as a large spot on her body where she had nestled her head last night. She was no longer bleeding and all the blood on her body was dry. In fact she was behaving very normally, taking a little grain from the bucket in my hand, drinking water, eating hay and so forth. I was alone on the farm at the time and called someone with more experience who reassured me that as long as she was not bleeding anymore, things would be okay. This was relieving to hear, but it only just takes the edge off of seeing one of your cows covered in blood.

These two roosters look guilty for a reason. Garth and I came to the egg mobile this afternoon to find these two and another mercilessly attacking a fourth rooster. Some male chickens will actually repress their sexuality in response to a very dominant rooster in the group. This was the story with two of our roosters. They had been odd looking hens their whole lives until a few very aggressive roosters were extinguished, at which point they promptly began learning to crow and commanding their own little harems. I don't know whether it's that the cold has forced them into tighter quarters, but three of them had abused and terrified this fourth rooster to the point that he was burying his face in a corner of the hen house with his own blood smeared down the walls. Garth decided he would have to kill both the persecutor and prey or it would no doubt continue. He lifted them gently by their feet and carried them over to the old milk house where they will stay overnight before meeting their end tomorrow.

Deer season draws to a close at sundown on Sunday. We heard from one of our elderly neighbors that there used to be 'old timers' around here that would gladly take the organs from any hunters who didn't want to deal with them. "But they all died," he said "and now everyone just throws them away." Edmund took the heart of a buck this man shot a week ago and I guess word got around. This evening a van pulled up and stopped. Garth recognized the man walking toward our door as one in a group of local hunters. He brought us a bag. In it was the heart and liver of doe he killed this afternoon. So I am happy that we are beginning to fill a hole in the community here, no matter what it is.

-Alanna

Frozen Water

Not a lot has changed here since the last post I wrote. The sky is still grey, shedding snow occasionally like finely grated parmesan cheese. The cows are masticating their hay constantly, blurring their bones from our sight with layers of valuable fat. The water for the chickens freezes every night. Edmund just set up this heat lamp with a timer on it to keep the ice at bay. The extra light may also persuade a few more eggs from the flock. I shut them in tonight and thought it looked so cozy in there. Maybe I am lonely for the Thanksgiving company we just had, but it looked like a sleepover to me. I'm sure they'll be talking long into the night.

-Alanna