The day after my birthday, I was online. I follow a variety of Morgan pages on facebook- groups, for sale, and rescues. I had such an incredibly specific horse in my mind I've felt like I would find her, but that it would take some looking. As I scrolled through my feed that morning, I saw a little Morgan mare on one of the rescue sites. Not much was known except she looked Morgan, probably foundation, she was fairly young and seemed friendly. That and she had just been run through an auction and purchased by a kill buyer who intended to load her on a trailer and truck her out of the country to be slaughtered for meat. (Butchering horses commercially is banned in the US. Unfortunately it does not stop the slaughter, they just have to endure horribly long & crowded trailer rides out of the country first.) Although a bay and not a chestnut like my little mare, something about this one struck me. I couldn't get her out of my mind as I went about my work in the greenhouse. When Dan got home that afternoon, I showed him the photos. He thought she looked like a great little horse, despite the fact we knew next to nothing about her. He asked if I'd contacted anyone at Morgan Safenet, and since he was on board, I did. That got the ball rolling. I needed to provide references, which I did, and asked some good friends if we could use their trailer for this. I sent the rescue a Paypal payment once my references were found to be acceptable (thanks ladies, you know who you are!!). then all I had to do was get up bright and early Sunday morning for the 4-hour trip down to pick her up. I'll forever be grateful to my friend who was willing to take me down and spend 8+ hours behind the wheel, not to mention give up his Father's Day, to make this rescue happen.
Every year, it seems like we look to add more animals to the farm- whether it's investing in a new heritage breed or just buying more piglets to raise for sausage, it's always kind of fun and exciting to bring new animals home. One thing we've been talking about was that we wanted to get me another Morgan mare. My first horse was a wonderful little Morgan whom I helped rescue- she was part of a seizure of 30+ starving horses. Our 20 years together cemented a love of Morgans in me. I lost her about three years ago and have been ready to look for another. While Morgans are not an uncommon breed, horses that descend only from the foundation lines are actually pretty rare, and are on the Livestock Conservancy's list of endangered breeds. Sara had great old bloodlines, so it seemed a natural fit to look for a mare that shared some of those same lines and add Morgans to the list of livestock we're trying to preserve here at the farm. The day after my birthday, I was online. I follow a variety of Morgan pages on facebook- groups, for sale, and rescues. I had such an incredibly specific horse in my mind I've felt like I would find her, but that it would take some looking. As I scrolled through my feed that morning, I saw a little Morgan mare on one of the rescue sites. Not much was known except she looked Morgan, probably foundation, she was fairly young and seemed friendly. That and she had just been run through an auction and purchased by a kill buyer who intended to load her on a trailer and truck her out of the country to be slaughtered for meat. (Butchering horses commercially is banned in the US. Unfortunately it does not stop the slaughter, they just have to endure horribly long & crowded trailer rides out of the country first.) Although a bay and not a chestnut like my little mare, something about this one struck me. I couldn't get her out of my mind as I went about my work in the greenhouse. When Dan got home that afternoon, I showed him the photos. He thought she looked like a great little horse, despite the fact we knew next to nothing about her. He asked if I'd contacted anyone at Morgan Safenet, and since he was on board, I did. That got the ball rolling. I needed to provide references, which I did, and asked some good friends if we could use their trailer for this. I sent the rescue a Paypal payment once my references were found to be acceptable (thanks ladies, you know who you are!!). then all I had to do was get up bright and early Sunday morning for the 4-hour trip down to pick her up. I'll forever be grateful to my friend who was willing to take me down and spend 8+ hours behind the wheel, not to mention give up his Father's Day, to make this rescue happen. These few photos were about all I had to go on...but she looked so much like Sara. And how could you let a horse like this die if you had it in your power to save her? I've been to livestock auctions numerous times, never looking to buy or sell a horse, but I know how they work. I felt totally prepared to walk into wherever she was. But when we got there, it was so different, and much worse, than I had imagined. The place was tiny, and hot. Although it was 85 degrees out, I'm sure it was well over 100 inside. And there were only horses. Not a few horses amid cows, sheep and pigs as expected, just horses. The place seemed to smell, not just of manure, but somehow of despair. This was not a happy place. I went up and said I was there to pick up #3692. I had no paperwork at all to prove this, but they went to get her no problem. She was literally still in the kill pen, crowded in with 20 or more loose horses, each fighting just for space to breathe. Food and water didn't seem evident in the chaos. They led her out. She seemed smaller, and sicker, than the horse I expected to pick up- her eyes were running and her nose was too. For a moment I wondered what exactly I had gotten myself into. We checked her teeth and the consensus was she was indeed older than two, more like eight years old. That's still young for a Morgan, so it was not a problem for me, really. I asked if we could get her a drink before we loaded her onto the trailer, and the big man who had gone into the kill pen none too kindly to get her helped us out. I was impressed by and am grateful for the compassion he showed us in helping get her a nice cold drink from a clean-looking bucket. He was also very helpful in recommending what to give her, medicine-wise, to try and get her on the road to health. After that, we led her to the trailer. She handled very well, we immediately suspected she'd been handled plenty in her past. She walked right up to the trailer and stopped. My friend, who was leading her, quietly said "C'mon, girl. You don't want to stay here." We gave her a minute to think about that and she stepped right on. Once inside, she practically attacked the bag full of hay that was ready for her. I expected she had not eaten much at all in her stay there, but was very glad to see she was hungry since she obviously had come down with something at the sale barn. Loss of appetite is generally the first sign something is really wrong, but she was ready to eat. She was secured into her space, the trailer door was fastened, and we were ready to roll. At that point another trailer pulled in- a large stock trailer. I've seen these many times at auctions and on the interstate. They are heading to the slaughterhouse, this was the ride she was originally scheduled to take. I watched for traffic while my friend and pilot backed out, and we headed home. We didn't look back.
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The garden is growing by leaps and bounds, and it's the time of year when it's more fun than a chore to eat seasonally for lots of folks. Eating seasonally gets easier as summer's bounty comes rolling in, and although we had a cold spring, things are really catching up...in fact, I'll be picking my first zucchini by Saturday by the looks of things! Produce seems like it's been a long time coming, but once we get to this point of the year, it seems like new things are ready to be picked weekly. It's one of the main reasons we expanded our hours to Tuesdays as well- a lot of produce, like green beans, cucumbers, zucchini & more benefit from being picked at least twice weekly. Opening another day of the week gave me another chance to sell our fresh organic produce rather than canning it all. Tuesdays, especially early like this in the farm stand season, can be kind of hard to calculate in terms of how much I need to pick for the stand, because the number of folks that stop varies quite a bit from week to week.
Sometimes, like last night, I had more than a little fresh stuff left at 6 PM, so it's only logical that I figure out how to use it for dinner. This week screamed salad as I had salad mix, a blend of heirloom lettuces and other greens (including the possibility of chard, arugula, spinach, endive, mustard greens, or whatever else is growing!) as well as radishes and spring onions. I'd made chicken salad recently and it was great, but I only had ground beef thawed last night. Then I remembered a great Rachel Ray recipe for a mini burger salad. I'm not usually a huge fan of Rach, mostly because her recipes rely on more processed foods than I generally use. I'm less concerned about having things ready in 30 minutes and more focused on using whole ingredients we produce ourselves. But this recipe is a winner in my house, and like any salad, I feel free to play around with the list of ingredients depending on what's seasonal or strikes my fancy! So, if you're intrigued or wondering what to make for dinner tonight, here is my take on Mini Cheeseburger Salad with Mustard Vinaigrette (serves 2): Mini Burgers: 1 lb grass fed ground beef Worcestershire sauce Salt & pepper or seasoning blend of your choice Form the ground meat into 12 or so meatballs and flatten to look like little burgers. Heat a good sized cast iron skillet, and season to taste with the Worcestershire and seasonings. Using our own Dexter beef, I like to use minimal spicing. It's got such a good taste on its own I don't drown it in Montreal Steak seasoning or anything. But flavor to your own taste! Cook to your own preferred level of doneness. In the meantime, prepare the salad and dressing: Mustard Vinaigrette: Combine 3 Tbsp mustard, 2 Tbsp white wine or apple cider vinegar, plus around 1/2 cup or so good olive oil. Add chopped fresh seasonal herbs (like chives!) to taste. I like to mix mine in a 8 oz (jelly) mason jar- just add all the ingredients and shake well to combine. The original recipe calls for yellow mustard, which is surprisingly good, but I like to mix it up with whatever mustard I'm loving at the moment! Salad: Get out a nice big plate. Cover it with: -Salad Mix or greens of your choice -sliced radishes -chopped spring onions -any other seasonal produce you'd like -a handful of chopped pickles (dill, bread & butter, any you like)- don't omit these, it really makes the salad! Top with mini burgers hot out of the pan. Top burger salad with grated cheese (we like smoked cheddar, but be bold and try any you like/have handy!). Finally, give the dressing another shake and drizzle over your salads and enjoy! One of the most interesting, and perhaps unusual, facets of the farm is our use of old-school technology. We farm with horses and our hands, much the way it would have been done many years ago. At home, we're pretty old school, too. No TV service, no smartphones...we only recently began using Tracphones, just to have a way to contact each other if we're out away from the farm. It's not that we're Luddites, but there is something good about being unplugged for the most part. We have enough going on in our lives that we don't need the constant distraction of these modern "conveniences". It's certainly not for everyone, but it works for us.
But then again, sometimes more modern equipment just makes sense. Dan is amazing when it comes to building things- from an actual buildings to auto repair to metal sculptures, he's just very mechanically inclined. We're not opposed to things that make life easier, especially for some of the more unpleasant chores of the farm. So, this past winter season, he spent quite a bit of time modernizing our chicken production. For the past few years, our chicken has been a very popular item, even though we sell it as a whole bird only, and for more than you'd find in grocery stores. But even so, I recommended customers order ahead of time as we sold out so quickly. Obviously, we were not meeting the demand that was out there. Why would folks be so interested in expensive, inconvenient chicken? Actually, lots of reasons! As soon as our chicks no longer need a heat lamp, we put them in moveable, bottomless pens called tractors. This way, our birds can feel sunshine and a cool summer breeze, and eat grass, bugs, and the natural things they were meant to be eating. This is a huge contrast to factory farms, where the birds are in overcrowded, unsanitary conditions and live out their entire lives without ever so much as seeing the sun .Even if the label says "cage-free", this is the reality- a sea of birds eating and living in their own filth. To survive these conditions, they are fed a steady diet of antibiotics and growth enhancing chemicals, which actually even include feeding arsenic (yep, the poison) to give the meat a healthy, pink color. Then, after the birds are processed, the meat is injected with a "flavor-enhancing" solution of saltwater. It helps preserve the meat a bit longer on store shelves, and you're paying by weight for the meat and saltwater is a very cheap way to make the meat heavier. It is also a huge hidden source of sodium for those trying to eat healthier. Our birds eat good food, and don't need any of the scary additives to thrive because they way we raise them is so different, and so much more natural. And you're not paying for saltwater. Up until this season, we processed the birds entirely by hand. We joked that one of my titles was Head Chicken Plucker. (In fact, the ONLY chicken plucker, as Dan was busy with the knife work.) I was proud that I could completely pluck a bird in about 3 minutes, as I've had plenty of practice by now. But most places use a plucking machine which saves lots of time- you can pluck 2-3 birds in only 10 seconds or so! Plucking chickens is not the most glamorous or pleasant job, so I really didn't mind outsourcing it to a machine. Plans are available for a very reasonable cost, so we bought one and Dan worked over the winter and assembled the parts. Basically, you've got a big round tub with rubber fingers protruding inside, with a bottom that spins, and also has fingers. The chickens bounce around and the rubber fingers rub the feathers off. I had to admit, although I was excited about my job getting easier, I was also wondering if a machine could really do a better job than I had been doing. Ultimately, the answer has been YES. There have been a few kinks to work out by trial and error, and we have had a few birds that had bad skin tears which we felt were not sellable, but hey, we need chicken for our own freezer, too. The temperature of the scalding water is more important now, but once they come out of the plucker, I can see they are cleaner than I got them by hand, and after just a quick inspection for any stray feathers, they are ready for packaging. This is also a time saver as I had to go over them a second time when I was working by hand. Besides the plucker, Dan also worked on improving the plumbing to the butchering pavilion, meaning we each have overhead sprayers, which also makes things go easier and more efficiently. All of this means we're processing more birds than before! This means we'll have fresh chicken much more often than in past years. We're still asking folks who want to order a quantity of chicken to fill their freezers to give us a heads up, but so far we have felt like this has been a wonderful improvement to our farming practices and we're looking forward to perfecting it as the season goes on!. This past Saturday was opening day. The date circled on the calendar for months, the ready-or-not-here-it-comes beginning to farm stand season. Yes, I had my typical meltdown prior- mostly because there was a partially restored 1978 Cadillac taking up pretty much the entire space in the stand up until 10 days before opening. Turning the building from a garage into a store is no easy task, but not only did I feel it looked great when we reopened, I felt like it was actually a real improvement from prior years! And while I never expect to be offering corn or tomatoes, usually I have a little bit more produce than just rhubarb & mustard greens. But this year, Mother Nature has been temperamental. In fact, the night before opening was rather sleepless, not only because I have a tendency to be awake prior to a big day, but because we had a cold front move through, taking the overnight temps all the way down to 28 degrees with a freeze. But the propane heaters we put in the greenhouse kept the plants safe, and our floating row cover prevented a lot of damage to the outdoor plants like green beans & potatoes. (We had held off putting any tomatoes/peppers/cucumbers/etc outside because this was in the forecast for some time.) So when the alarm went off (before 5 AM), we were happy that everything fared pretty well despite the weather, and got to work with Saturday morning duties like picking rhubarb and grinding & packaging 70+ lbs of sausage. Dan took the sign up to the top of the road, I put the farmer man sign out in front of the stand, we rolled the stand door open, and farm stand season 2015 was underway. My first customers were new faces, looking for eggs & bread. I was able to help them with the eggs, anyways. The rest of the day was busy. I had new faces and plenty of old ones. Hugs were exchanged, baby news told, as were tales of a puppy that had grown into a bad dog. While it is nice, and somewhat necessary, to be closed for the winter & early spring months and to have a reprieve from butchering that time, lots of my customers are more than just folks who spend money here. They are friends, an extended farm family. I genuinely look forward to seeing them again and catching up with what they have been up to over the winter. Beyond my regulars, there were LOTS of families that stopped by as well. I know the Tionesta Market Village was having a kids' day, so I don't know if that had anything to do with it or if it was just the beautiful holiday weekend. I think it's great that people bring kids to see a real farm and have the experience of seeing where food really comes from. I always try to make it a good experience as well. We had a pen of chicks for sale, and that's always an attention grabber. I'd come over and explain how to tell a baby chicken from a baby turkey, and lots of little fingers got to feel how soft a baby bird is. And I offer cups of bird food so folks can feed the chickens, turkeys, ducks, guineas and peafowl. One of my earliest customers of the day is a nice gentleman who always has me keep his change so I can hand out cups of feed to kids who otherwise may not get to experience that part of the farm. Since I charge only $.50 per cup, it's a pretty cheap act of kindness to pay forward, but it's a wonderful thing to do. But every single time I tried to give away a cup to a child, the adult with them insisted on keeping the pay-it-forward chain going, even if they had to go out to the car to bring me some change. While I've read in the paper about these kind of spontaneous acts of kindness that keep going until 70 folks in line for coffee pay for someone else's, this was the first time I had been a part of something like that. It's always heartening to see that side of the human race....or maybe it's just that we get such an incredible group of folks that stop by to see us!
This time of year, no matter where I go, I'm drawn to seeds. Dan can look for whatever he wants in Home Depot, I'll be over in the garden section. I don't always buy, but it's fun to see what is available. And if I do see something I can't live without, it's almost always seeds I can start myself. Not only are they cheaper, but I can be sure that they are grown in a way I am comfortable having in my gardens. Unfortunately, a lot of big box store plants are sprayed with some fairly toxic chemicals. It keeps the plants healthy looking and free of insects, but the chemicals persist on the plants and can kill ALL bugs, even beneficial pollinators like bees. The most awful part is many seedlings labeled "bee friendly" and marketed to consumers as great things to plant to help save bees have been poisoned with neonaticides, which means the bees die after being exposed to the chemicals on the otherwise pollinator friendly plants. (Just another reason to buy local, where you can ask the actual grower how the plants were grown and what, if any, chemicals they have been treated with.) But I digress. The point of this was that I saw a label on some asparagus spears I had never noticed before: As a farmer, I am fairly current on a lot of matters concerning the food stamp program, as it is a part of the farm bill each year and gets a lot of press in farming publications. I also hold a Master's of Social Work, and worked in that field for years before coming to the farm full-time. But the idea that food stamps can be used to buy plants that produce food, rather than actual produce, was completely new to me. I had to read the label again to make sure I understood correctly, because for a government program, it made so much sense I couldn't believe it!
There is a pretty common saying about giving a man a fish allows him to eat for a day, whereas teaching a man to fish can help feed him for a lifetime. I'd argue the same applies here. Some plants, like tomatoes or peppers, will feed you only for a season, but a well-tended plant will produce more peppers than you could buy from the store for the same amount of money. Buying perennials or trees can feed you for years to come, but only if you have access to land to plant on, which is not always true for low income folks. But even those in an apartment can have a few plants on a sunny windowsill or porch. And freshly picked produce is healthier, as it has more nutrients (nutrients degrade over time, so the longer they are in storage, the less vitamins you're really getting). Heirloom varieties also often are more nutritious than commercial counterparts. Beyond the nutritional value are a host of other benefits, too. Gardening makes you get up and move, contributing to a healthy lifestyle. Caring for a plant connects you with nature and botany and the whole circle-of-life thing. It reconnects us to where food really comes from. Caring for a living thing, even a plant, can be a great responsibility and teaching tool for youngsters. It hones a valuable skill, gardening, that can be useful for a lifetime. It can provide a small dose of self-sufficiency, enabling the recipient to be more responsible for his or her own food, and just maybe a window into providing more for yourself and needing less taxpayer-subsidized help. It can mean so much more than fresh tomatoes. The only unfortunate part about this is that I'm not sure many folks know about it. Whether or not food stamps should be able to purchase steak or cigarettes gets a lot of press and a lot of dissenting opinions, but this is left in the background. I think that's wrong, so I'm trying to do my part to spread the message about something positive. And I know there are obstacles for many folks receiving SNAP benefits- access to garden space, frequent moves, lack of gardening know-how. But I also see that it's a wonderful opportunity for some! It's May 7. It's been a beautiful week with warm temperatures, sunshine, and just enough rain to make the spring leaves start to show. For a change, Dan's been home helping me around the farm. We have a good bit of the garden planted now, with salad greens, radishes, spring onions, potatoes, peas, beets, beans and a few other things in the ground. Another big project down was tearing down the remnants of our greenhouse. While the new greenhouse we built last year is being prepped for tomatoes and peppers, the older one we've been using for years collapsed under the weight of a heavy snow. While it was a heartbreaker back in early January, now we just want to rid the farm of the eyesore and to use the ground as garden space once again. I have month-old meat chickens out on grass, and picked up a fresh batch of chicks at the post office this afternoon. We're hatching chicks & turkey poults weekly now, with the first guineas coming in days. We had some more babies this week- the last calf of the season along with a few more kittens, and my Silver Fox rabbit babies are growing like bad weeds. Transplanting seedling plants I've started keeps me busy, but it's actually one of my favorite farm tasks. I'm lined up with our meat processor and our coffee supplier to have what we need done by opening day, which falls on May 23 this year. It sounds like life is peachy on the farm, right?
Every year I go through an epic meltdown about this time of year. We're so close to opening the stand for the year, and each year a panic sets in that it will be a failure, that the tables will be bare. It's always tough to run your own business, but it's doubly so when you depend on the weather. It was snowing 10 days ago. It's 87 degrees out right now, but we had lows in the 20's just recently. Spring was late this year, plain and simple. It's a challenge every year to have produce to sell when the last night of frost often falls after we've already opened for the season. It's easy to panic when most of the produce is merely hope in the ground right now. But there is time yet too, and I need sometimes to breathe and remember that. We'll have meat, and so canned things like jam & mustard, and I'll have vinegars ready by then, too. And plants and baby chicks. Coffee and tea. Blacksmith-made metal creations. Jewelry. I have some cute aprons I made from feed sacks, and some rainy day soon I hope to make up some totes from them as well. By now I know we'll have enough to fill the tables and welcome our farm friends back for another season, which will be the 25th since the Stevenson family has been here at the farm. There is an incredible amount of things to be done in the next 16 days, but they will get done as they always do, with hard work and long days. That is simply spring on a farm, after all. Lots to do, and little time to panic... I love spring, but it's a crazy busy time. Now that the snow is gone (hopefully, anyway...we had some on the ground as recently as Thursday!) things are turning green, and spring on the farm is in full swing. The birds are laying lots of eggs, and I have lots of baby poultry. I've got lots of tomatoes, peppers, and other seedlings I'm caring for in flats right now, with lots more coming soon. Perennials are coming up- it's wonderful having some fresh chives and other spring treats to cook with now. And the real work of preparing the gardens & fields has begun, as Dan started plowing last week. The local area is starting to come alive as well. Last weekend marked the beginning of trout fishing season, and spring gobbler season starts next weekend. Our area relies heavily on tourists & seasonal residents (those with camps in the area) economically, so businesses that closed for the winter are opening their doors for another season. After a long, hard winter, unfortunately some camps are in need of some repairs and there is a yearning to take on some spring home/camp improvement projects now that the weather has warmed.
One of the things with which I struggle the most here on the farm is the fine line between home and work. It's a tricky thing to balance. On the wonderful side, there is no commute, no clock to punch, and I have great leeway in deciding what to tackle on a daily basis. I enjoy farming, and so whether I'm dealing with the incubator, or greenhouse, or gardens, or doing things in the kitchen, it often feels less like work and more like what I want to do. On the downside, you have to be self-motivated to get real work done instead of playing on Pinterest for hours. You're also never really away from the "office," so the work that needs done is always staring at you, making it hard to relax and just enjoy some down time. You're working far more than 40 hours a week. But by far, the hardest part about working from home (at least for me) is the idea others have- that if you're home, then you're not at work. Some days, especially this time of year, it feels like the phone calls and the visits from folks dropping by unannounced never end. Besides farming & blacksmithing, Dan is also a pretty well known handyman around the area. He knows how to do just about anything- concrete, block laying, carpentry, electrical, plumbing, roofing and some more things I'm probably forgetting- and because of the quality of his work and the reasonable rates he charges, he is often very busy. Spring and fall are by far the busiest times, when folks seem to want to get their projects done, and done right away, or are opening/closing camps for the year. It is a blessing that he is so busy he's booked up until about June for outside work right now, without ever running an ad anywhere- just word of mouth & repeat customers. Calls come in daily, anytime from 8 AM to 9 PM, even on Sundays. Since we don't have business hours, folks just call at whatever time is convenient for them, but it also means it's hard to get a break from the ringing phone if you're in the house. Some folks think it will work out better if they just drop by, although it still usually means I'm just taking a message because Dan's hard to catch at home right now. It's also tricky, because everyone thinks that their project is the most important, and surely can be squeezed in sooner. But, while the income this time of year is important, farm work is even more so, because what we do or don't get done affects our income for the rest of the year. So it's really important that Dan schedules time to just be here, taking care of the farm. The first task of the year in the fields is always plowing, and the garden is located along the road. I know that it's really cool to watch the horses work, but I'm also kind of amazed at the frequency with which people stop by for a chat while Dan is working the team, as though he's not in the middle of anything important. Some are inquiring about work, while others are just being neighborly. Five or ten minutes isn't much out of a day, so it doesn't feel as though you're inconveniencing us, I'm sure. But when you're the third person that has stopped for a little chat in the past hour, it starts to feel as though we just can't get anything done. At that point, from our point of view, it's a lot more neighborly to just smile and wave as you drive by, without expecting us to stop working. This time of year, folks are starting to come and visit the area, and some forget that we don't open our farm stand until the end of May. I am very appreciative that they take time out of their weekend to try and give us business, and I do understand wanting to stop and see the critters since they came all the way out. After all, I encourage folks to visit and even feed the poultry during farm stand hours. But...when we're closed, it's my front yard. Again with the fine line...how to balance being a tourist attraction with not having strangers tromp through my yard anytime they wish. Some folks stopped by last weekend- Dan told them that the stand wouldn't open for another month or so, and they asked to see the birds. They were just being polite before walking through the yard, but he misunderstood and came to get me because he thought they were interested in purchasing chicks. So I go out and ask if they'd like to see the chicks. Faces light up like it's a special treat and I knew right then that they just wanted a farm tour, that they didn't come knowing there were chicks here, much less looking to buy them. But we promised a chance to see the chicks, so I took them around back. It was a beautiful day, and I had laundry on the line. I secretly thanked my lucky stars that it was just a load of sheets and towels, not the other load I had ready. There is nothing weirder than random people wandering into your back yard when you have your undies out to dry. (Sometimes I wonder if I'm the only person who has to calculate the probability of strangers dropping in before deciding what to wash!) They really enjoyed the babies, and as I gently guided them around front again, I patiently answered all the questions they asked about the farm, the animals, the buildings, and how we do things here. But after a half hour or so, I was really getting ready to tell them to enjoy looking around but I needed to attend to other things, but they had their farm time fill and left. I was left trying to pick up on my own work where I left off 40 minutes prior. It's not that folks are trying to be rude at all, and to some extent it's my own issue. I understand that if the kids had a blast on their vacation petting kittens and seeing the birds Saturday, and the farm is walking distance from the camp, why parents would send them down here to entertain themselves on a Sunday morning. But...sometimes Dan and I like to enjoy a relaxed Sunday morning breakfast together. It's kind of hard to relax and enjoy when there are random people walking all around your home, and even sitting on your front porch. However, I guess every job has a downside, and it could be much worse, because as a general rule our farm stand customers are amazing people! Yes, even the ones that drop in. While it can be exhausting, it's also nice to know that there are so many people genuinely interested about the experience of a real family farm, and who want to take time to find out where the food we sell really comes from, and how it was raised. And with that I must be going...I think I hear a car pulling into the driveway.... I love spring for lots of reasons. One of the highlights for me is when we begin hatching out baby birds. This year, my first chicks hatched a week ago Sunday, and I'll be hatching every week until sometime in June. It's hard to believe, but Dan and I hatched our first eggs years ago, in a little styrofoam incubator in the trailer I lived at before we were married and I moved to the farm! Ever since then, I've been hooked. After we got our first hatching season under our belt, we invested in a large, professional incubator. It has 3 trays that hold 66 eggs each, plus a drawer on the bottom for them to hatch out. I set one tray per week, and hatch 50-60 birds each week, all through the spring months. It's pretty low maintenance as the thermostat is electric, it automatically turns the eggs so they will develop properly, and there is a large bucket that feeds water into the humidity tray which only needs to be filled every couple weeks. The trickiest part is keeping track of when the eggs will hatch. Chickens take 21 days, while turkeys, ducks, guineas and peafowl take 28. So to know when which eggs will hatch takes good notes, and often I mark the outside of the shell with a marker so I know which batch needs attention by color coding! I do all the setting and record keeping, essentially running the incubator without any help. I have a system and it works best when I handle it myself. It's funny how we see only omelets or baked goods or deviled eggs when we look at a carton of eggs, because this time of year when we see songbirds making nests, we think baby birds. The reality is that most chicken eggs will never hatch, because you don't need a rooster around for a hen to lay eggs, only if you'd like them to be fertile. Large egg producers don't keep any roosters around. Also, it's fascinating to me that eggs don't need to be put in the refrigerator. Most countries don't ever refrigerate eggs, so it's a bit insane how US government regulations state that farmers MUST or the eggs are considered unsafe to eat. Once they've been in the fridge, they have to be kept there or they will go bad. But when I collect eggs, especially this time of year, I keep them on the counter. Once an egg goes in the fridge, it gets chilled and odds are it will not hatch. But eggs on the counter are still tasty. In fact, if you buy farm-fresh eggs, you may know how hard it is to peel them once they've been hardboiled. Leaving them out for 10 days-2 weeks makes it much easier. Eggs can sit on the counter for about 6 weeks and still be safe to eat! And by not putting them in the fridge, I have the option of setting any or all of them to see them turn into adorable babies. When you stop and think about it, every egg is a potential miracle. After weeks of simply being kept warm, a baby bird is alive and pecks its way out of the shell. They are curled up in there to perfectly take up all the room inside, each and every one ends up in the same position. Sometimes the shell is hard, or they get tired, and they just can't make it out of the egg. Most sources say to just toss them out, that if they are not strong enough to escape the shell, they won't be strong enough to live. I take the opposite approach and crack the shells open, say Hi! to the little guy, and put it back into the incubator drawer to dry off and figure out how its muscles work before I remove it to the brooder pen where there is food, water, and a heat lamp for warmth. Not all of them make it, but I find most actually do. I've saved dozens of chicks, maybe more, this way, and we've hatched out literally thousands of baby birds! Somehow, it's still a thrill to hear the incubator begin peeping as the birds begin to hatch. (The incubator lives in the pantry off of my kitchen, so I hear them as I go about my day.) Opening it up and seeing a drawer crowded with fluffy little chicks that didn't really exist the night before never, never grows old! Besides the pure fun & wonderment of hatching out new life and replacements for our farm flock, hatching season has come to be a nice source of income in the spring. Springtime, financially, is always rough on a farm. Farmers have lots and lots of expenses going out- seeds, greenhouse and garden supplies, parts for machinery maintenance & repair, irrigation supplies, and so on and so forth. And all this investment will pay off, but when you're talking about growing crops, it takes time. Chick sales are a nice way to have a little income coming in now. Besides the pure financial benefit, it also is another way to further one of the philosophical goals we have at the farm, raising heritage breed livestock and helping to preserve it for generations to come. These are breeds of birds and critters that do wonderfully on small family farms (or in the case of poultry, do great tended with loving care in backyards). Most fell out of favor, and became in literal danger of going extinct, because they don't do well in industrial factory farms. But by hatching out Bourbon Red turkey poults or Barred Rock chicks and offering them for sale to others, I can help increase the global population of these wonderful creatures, all the while having a great time and making a little money. It's a win-win-win in my book! Plus the folks buying the chicks can see a real family farm, ask questions, and don't have to buy a large number of chicks like you do when you order through a commercial hatchery.
If YOU are interested in adding some feathered friends to your family this year, feel free to contact us by phone at 814-755-3911 or via email at [email protected]. We have chicks on sale now for $3 each, turkeys will be available in the next week or so ($10 ea), and coming in mid-May, we will also have guinea keets available($5 ea)! You can also get more info on the farm website! Spring is here! Things are turning green! There are blooms from early flowers like my daffodils beginning to show, we hatched out 52 baby chicks this weekend to start off hatching season, and the temperatures are beginning to be mild & pleasant (at least during the day!). But for all that excitement, the local & homegrown food scene is still a bit on the bleak side. The supply in the freezer is getting low, and we're still a long way from tomato season. But if you know what to look for, the first tastes of spring are out there already! As I mentioned a couple of posts ago, I have added perennials to the farm over the past few years, and they are often some of the earliest edibles. The chives are taking off to the point that I can snip a few for dinner now without stunting the whole plant. I also have parsley in the garden, which is a biennial, meaning this year the plant will try to reproduce, making seeds rather than a lot of leaves. But the leaves have to come first to give the plant energy, and my parsley is waking up. A new herb I planted last year was salad burnet, a neat looking plant that tastes like cucumber. Those are showing signs of life as well. So I do have a nice mix of herbs, but for dinner I was craving a bit more green than even that! When we think of edible plants, we primarily think of what we see in the grocery store or the seed catalog. While this is a wide array of tasty plants, there is a largely untapped world all around us, too. Over the years, I've learned a lot about wild edibles- it's something my husband Dan and his brother have always been interested in, and we love books and have an assortment covering wild mushrooms & edible plants. What has been the most mind-blowing aspect to me is that you don't have to wander deep into the forest to find wild edibles- there is an amazing array of them that flourish in yards, gardens and roadsides. In fact, many of the plants we've been conditioned to think of as weeds, and are encouraged to spray and kill, are actually edible greens packed with vitamins, and they're growing right now! So dinner last night was a delicious steak salad. I found a beef tip roast in the freezer, which I love because it's a pretty versatile cut- delicious as a roast, but also great sliced thin for things like steak salad, sandwiches, fajitas and more. Not quite as tender as steak, it does taste better if allowed to marinate first to tenderize a bit, which I did. Then I wandered out into the garden and began foraging. It's prime time for wintercress, which is considered a common garden weed. The leaves are young & tender and, in our opinion, even tastier than lettuce right now. Unlike many spring "tonic" greens, its flavor is mild & sweet, not at all bitter. Dandelion greens are great too, and young burdock leaves are also edible, so it's possible this time of year to make a great salad! Since it's been awhile since I've posted a recipe, here is what we did for dinner last night! This recipe isn't big on amounts, adjust to the number of folks eating dinner and your personal preference. It's hard to mess up, just use what you love to eat!
Spring Green Steak Salad Greens Herbs Other Seasonal Veggies Potatoes- In Western PA, fries are put on the salad. It's a regional specialty, but so delicious! Oil (for frying) Minced garlic Steak (or chicken or protein of your choice) Shredded cheese (I used a garlic & chive raw milk cheese) Hard boiled eggs, cut into pieces -Take beef and cut into bite sized pieces. Marinate, if desired. -Slice potatoes into french fries. Heat oil. Pat potatoes dry before adding to oil and fry until golden brown. Drain on paper towels. -Cook beef/other protein. Add some garlic too, if desired. -Bed of Greens- foraged, homegrown, and/or store bought. I also mixed in fresh parsley, chives salad burnet and garlic greens from some volunteer garlic I needed to move in the garden. -Top with whatever vegetables you have handy. I had some onion and some sun-dried tomatoes I grew and preserved last year. I find for spring salads, what I'm really craving is the greens, so as long as I have a nice mix, the rest of the veggies can be minimal and it's still amazing! Add some chopped hard boiled eggs, too if you have them. -Top with warm french fries, then the steak, then your shredded cheese. -Add your favorite salad dressing (I prefer Italian or a vinaigrette of some kind, while Dan's a ranch man) and dig in! We had our first thunderstorms of the year last night. I was pretty excited about this. Not because we needed the rain- everything is already a muddy mess, as the ground is well-saturated with all the melting snow. In fact, it made the stream that runs through the barnyard into a rushing torrent, which adds an extra layer of difficulty when you're carrying buckets to feed the animals at chore time. No, I was excited because I knew that when I woke up this morning, the farm would have turned green overnight. While there have been whispers of green, and the animals have been out finding at least a little to eat, this morning it was like an emerald blanket had covered some of the drabness winter had left behind. Everyone talks about the weather- if it's nice or it is going to rain, if we're done with snow or we're seeing the first warm spring days. But I learned when I came to the farm that farmers take it to another level. For a farmer, the weather is like the stock market- something in which you're heavily invested, that you can't really control, but that can make you rich or leave you broke, depending on how it goes. Where I see a pretty sunset, Dan can see a storm front moving and has a better guess at when it will hit than the forecast most of the time. Weather, like all of nature, is pretty complex, and something most of us don't understand very much, except to check the weather on our phones or the TV before we make plans. Most of us leave the science of meteorology to the weathermen (and then complain that they are so bad at it!). But for farmers, it's an intimate part of every day and what we're able to do, so it makes sense we pay a bit more attention. And it's fascinating to me that things that seem like old wives' tales often have a grain of truth, if not real science, behind them.
So, how did I know it would be refreshingly green this morning as the thunder rolled through yesterday evening? Did YOU ever notice that things look fresher and greener after a good storm? It's not your imagination! Nitrogen is the major element in fertilizers that makes plants grow and take on a bright green, healthy look. Nitrogen comes in many forms- from Miracle-Gro for your houseplants to the chemicals sprayed in non-organic farming systems. But there are lots of natural sources of nitrogen as well- compost, fish meal, blood meal, feather meal, pretty much anything used as a fertilizer has nitrogen to make plants green and grow. In natural ecosystems, nitrogen returns to the soil through manure, through bacteria during decomposition (of both dead animals and plants), certain plants' roots put nitrogen into the soil, and...by lightning. Yep, when lightning hits the ground, it takes some of the nitrogen that occurs naturally in our atmosphere and fixes it in the ground, in a more useable form, where it is now made available to the plants in the area. (If you want to get more scientific, you can check out what Wikipedia has to say on the matter.) So thunderstorms have a double effect on plants- obviously, they bring water to fields and forests, but each lightning strike is like a shot of fertilizer to all the plants in the vicinity. While these storms can bring destruction- high winds, lightning strikes to trees and buildings- they are also a powerful source of renewal. And it explains why, on a morning after an April shower, things look and smell fresh and new and green. |
AuthorEmily Stevenson is a real life farmeress and artisan and chronicles her experiences in food, farming and life here. Archives
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