2026 Late Spring Update
Spring and Fall, those are the more active of the active seasons on the farm; lots of pictures
It is about the start of life in the spring, and harvest in the fall as you might imagine; also during spring there are a preponderance of maintenance and repair chores, many of those having to do with problems that arise in winter. Regardless of the “why,” it is a busy time, and a beautiful time.
This will be a lot of pictures, and I decided to organize them by month; just seemed easier than by subject, though I have made a couple of exceptions.
February
We met Albert at a Amish fundraising breakfast put on by the local roofing metal company, and invited him out for some ice fishing; he took us up on the offer. And, I had some very selective logging done on the property, ninety logs off of roughly 30 acres.
The first of two very large Sugar Maples taken down…
Felling of the second very large Sugar Maple… “yeah, you don’t won’t to be under that”
March
The F250 started bleeding profusely from the weep hole on the water pump; a job I thought would take me a few hours took instead a few days, a couple of new tools, and a couple of trips to the auto parts store. The first lamb came earlier, earlier than it should have had I not allowed the ram in with the ewes too soon. Still, I had done the math and knew to expect new life in March; I was not disappointed. Spring ephemerals, so beautiful, and milling of logs that we had hauled to Primal Woods last fall; thanks Chris!
April
Occasionally I get help, and in the case of the coop it came in the form of my son, Zach. We had a good time, and as the younger generations do, he took to the tractor no problem. We brought on seven feeder pigs; a second set of lambs were born, and I lost one of the two. While he tried mightily, mom wouldn’t let him nurse, and I saw it too late to recover. Let’s just say, that hurts.
May
We have lost a lot of pullets this year, some to “natural causes,” others to predation I presume, which is also a “natural cause.” After having the pullets in brooders for some weeks, I moved them into half of the coop; that did not work well either. There’s not much more prehistoric-looking than a snapping turtle, and when they head for high ground to lay their eggs we often get a good look.
I could not get the barn well primed this spring, and attempted repair myself, before calling the experts. If you’re out by me, Aaron Pressley, The Well Guy LLC, is the person to call for well service. And in a repeat of the picture from the top of the post, Geri walks Elmer back home.
June (though it’s not over yet)
Timothy has been back on-site this month, and helped me to erect a new “semi-permanent” paddock under the power poles, just west of the permanent pasture. Timothy also helped with the milling for Chris T.
And I will finish with another break from chronologic…
Lulu (the dog) and Battleaxe (the cat), get along famously. Actually, none of the four dogs messes with Battleaxe, he’s a badass. A barn cat himself, re-homed, he is the alleged father of many other barn cats. This winter, during the worst two weeks of subzero weather, he was outside the whole time, and came home none the worse for wear; though he does come back bloodied up on a fairly frequent basis.
And finally, I’ll just put up a few “Notes” that struck me.
Notes
And, under the #theresnothingnewunderthesun tag …
All the best, and God bless,
John