Spring is right around the corner by the calendar, but wow! we are still knee deep in winter cold here at Village Farm! In early December we moved the laying flock into its winter abode, one of the hoophouses.
Prentice suffered a serious shiner after tripping over some fence and landing face first in a frozen kale stalk. How is that for a farm injury? At first we thought he needed a more 'colorful' story to go with the shiner but then quickly realized that the frozen kale stalk was actually just the thing.
The ice storm of December 2013 was certainly remarkable in its beauty and its harsh reality.
We were lucky enough to have only last power for a few hours (I know!) but we made up for that luck by the near constant work of freeing the many hoophouses from the weight of the snow and ice.I only punched one hole in the plastic "skin" of one of the houses and felt like Rocky Balboa away at arctic training camp as I punched and slammed a janitor's broom into the frozen plastic (overhead).
We moved our herd of cows in there and for 12 years spent every winter morning chopping a hole in a nearby pond's ice to water the animals. The barn was sub-rustic. It was scary, but it served us well. This new barn has a frost free hydrant for watering, electricity (for a radio) and tons of space for hay storage, hay fort building and calving stalls for spring's bounty of wee bovine folk.
An awesome crew of carpenters built it with Prentice pitching in as the farm responsibilities would allow. Prentice has built doors and stalls, stairs to the loft and readied the building for shingles this winter. It is by no means complete but it is so delightful. We love our new barn. It will be treasured for many, many years of morning chores, and hopefully generations, to come.
I will have more to say about spring, seeds and the CSA soon, I promise.
Our best to one and all,
Polly and Prentice.
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