Episoder
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I found a comfortable spot to sit/ lie down on a hillside near the river, with a view of the grazing cattle, the river, and the small field I call the bowl. Oakley came with me as well as a barn cat who probably thinks he is also a dog and should come on long walks. It was nice of my friends to turn up in the rain for the EFAO field tour last week. I was expecting about six people but there were maybe twenty. I didn't know what people would be interested in, so I did a two hour show and tell. Looking back, I think I should have mentioned organic weed control with more clarity, so I make an attempt in this episode. While recording, a fawn emerged from the woods along the river. Sunset. Peace. I am grateful.
Find your place in the world. Dig in, and take responsibility from there. - Gary Snyder
Please contact me with your own stories.
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Having heard a calf bawling in the distance, I decided to see if it was one of mine. It seemed like a good time to record a farm update. It was nice to hear the sound of the river, plus the grassland and forest birds. It really was a beautiful morning!
Find your place in the world. Dig in, and take responsibility from there. - Gary Snyder
Please contact me with your own stories.
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Manglende episoder?
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This episode was recorded at about 6 am across the river, as I checked in on the cattle after their recent move. It is nice to hear the birds in this nice little clearing at the edge of the water. Soybeans are planted and the electric fences are all up and in decent shape. I'm also thinking ahead to planting cover crops, fixing equipment, planting cover crops, and haying season coming up.
I'm so tired! LOL
Find your place in the world. Dig in, and take responsibility from there. - Gary Snyder
Please contact me with your own stories.
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Finding time to record an episode isn't easy.
Oakley decdides to spend time on the neighbour's porch.
Critical tractor repair goes well.
Bringing a White 8700 combine home from Londsborough.
Looking for a break in the weather to plant organic soybeans.
Find your place in the world. Dig in, and take responsibility from there. - Gary Snyder
Please contact me with your own stories.
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Somewhere upstream, a farmer has altered the path of water. Cutting deep gulleys and picking up soil, it made its' way onto this farm. Slowing in a waterway with natural grass banks lined with trees, the water dropped some of the soil and stone. Pulled by gravity and unable to flow in the plugged waterway, it flowed into our pastures and cropland. With deposits of six to eight inches, the pasture is now low ground and water is flowing in it. Similarly, the field planted in rye is now low ground and will probably continue to receive silt deposits throughout the year. An excavator will be needed to repair the damaged stream....costly in several ways (1) the ecosystem is damaged (2) the cropland and pasture will be permanently damaged having been buried in sediment (3) time (4) money, probably a couple of thousand dollars or more.
I read a relevant bit from "What Are People For" by Wendell Berry to finish things off.
Find your place in the world. Dig in, and take responsibility from there. - Gary Snyder
Please contact me with your own stories.
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Grazing season has officially started! I've got some noisy audio here from a windy day. It is also dry enough to get the disc out on the field, another step toward getting organic soybeans planted.
I used noise reduction on the raw audio, but it's still noisy at times. That's okay for me though, because it's the reality of the day.
Find your place in the world. Dig in, and take responsibility from there. - Gary Snyder
Please contact me with your own stories.
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When to let the cattle out on grass the first time is a big decision. This episode is a good one if you are new to rotational grazing. If you are an experienced grazer, you might reflect on what you do and possibly pick up some new ideas. I also talk about running the disc to incorporate a cover crop that was planted last August. It had a huge amount of biomass, and I have been a bit concerned about getting the field ready in time to plant soybeans.
Find your place in the world. Dig in, and take responsibility from there. - Gary Snyder
Please contact me with your own stories.
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Coffee with friends in the driveshed.
Forgetting Friday night, and splinting a calf with two broken legs.
Fencing across the river.
The "essential ordinary" makes things go smoothly.
The disc needs repairs.
It's probably safer to scratch your calves on the tail head rather than the head.
Bo the barncat follows me to do more fence repairs.
Vegetable garden progress, digging paths between beds, hardening off some seedlings.
Find your place in the world. Dig in, and take responsibility from there. - Gary Snyder
Please contact me with your own stories.
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Recording in the barn (you can hear the fence charger clicking away).
I've spent about five days maintaining field edges and I'm not done this exhausting job.
Rule of thumb....May 10th is the Bruce County day to put cattle on pasture.
My fencing system is archaic.
The field tractor needs my attention ASAP.
The cover crop in the field named "Bobolink" needs to get turned in so that the biomass can broken down in time for planting.
Rule of thumb...Mother's Day is the first day you can consider doing field work in Bruce County.
Introducing the bull to the cows is my highest priority right now.
Susan has helped me with a plan to artificially inseminate the yearling heifer (she is the bull's daughter).
Abby and I have pulled the dash apart on the Honda Civic and we need a win with this job.
The swather is a wild animal.
The sweep auger for the grain bin is almost ready, which is good because I'd like to sell the wheat.
My "no-till organic soybeans" experiment has been set back by ponding water.
Find your place in the world. Dig in, and take responsibility from there. - Gary Snyder
Please contact me with your own stories.
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This episode is all about the fun I had, and how I was struck by the beauty of nature while on holiday in British Columbia.
And then I get started talking about my decision not to fly and it seems like I couldn't stop talking about it LOL.
Find your place in the world. Dig in, and take responsibility from there. - Gary Snyder
Please contact me with your own stories.
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I've never seen a chicken break up a cat fight, until now. While Peter and I are busy welding and repairing equipment, a cow decides to have her calf. How I dealt with her retained placenta. I am starting to think about all kinds of spring activities including chainsaw work in the field edges, fence repairs, planting equipment, helping to coach boys and girls rugby at the high school, and off-farm contracting work. Busy days ahead!
Find your place in the world. Dig in, and take responsibility from there. - Gary Snyder
Please contact me with your own stories.
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The bull and a nest of bees
The importance of manure as fertilizer
The skidsteer's time to shine
Rugby is my volunteer work
I am an idiot and wrecked my chainsaw
A chill drive through Mennonite country
My fence chargers can be repaired
Mennonite and Amish farms look very different from English farms
Our farm doesn't have any bare soil
Today I can feel spring coming on!!
Wendell Berry's 1992 iv @ 18 min 49 sec
Find your place in the world. Dig in, and take responsibility from there. - Gary Snyder
Please contact me with your own stories.
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Are you thinking about making a move to organic agriculture? Larry Kraemer shares the details of his path from a life in Toronto to his organic farm near Kincardine. This is a great episode if you are thinking about transitioning from conventional farming to certified organic.
Contents:
Raised in Toronto
Great memories of summers in Bruce County
The joy of hard work
Operating a conventional dairy farm
The challenges of high interest rates in the 1980's
Running a business and raising a family while also farming
Raising beef cattle
The circumstances that lead to growing organic row crops
Record keeping for organic certification can be easy!
Grain storage
Crop rotations
Growing organic soybeans to illustrate what it takes to raise a crop organically
Equipment and strategies to keep weeds at bay
Marketing organic crops
Farming as part of a rewarding life!
Find your place in the world. Dig in, and take responsibility from there. - Gary Snyder
Please contact me with your own stories.
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This afternoon I travelled to Southampton to celebrate the life of a teaching colleague, Pat Joynt. This episode was recorded in the bank barn while sitting with the calves.
The Present...until the 6:45 min mark. Noticing the small stuff in life. Calves, a barn cat, and hockey on the radio.
The Past...from 6:45 to 16:47 min. Thinking about the joyous life of Pat Joynt and the unique community that existed in the high school where I taught.
The Future...from the 16:47 min mark. It's time to start thinking about tomorrow. I call what I do each day the essential-ordinary. There is a lot to be said for finding joy in thoughts of tomorrow. As we all know tomorrow will be the new present, before living again as the next memory in the new past.
Find your place in the world. Dig in, and take responsibility from there. - Gary Snyder
Please contact me with your own stories.
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We get the sugar maple seeds planted, and a mouse helps to make things interesting in the seeding room. I worked on marketing my hard red winter wheat using an "everybody needs to win" approach. Teddy the bull sees the great outdoors for the first time since he got here.
Find your place in the world. Dig in, and take responsibility from there. - Gary Snyder
Please contact me with your own stories.
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I learned some lessons when Flint the cow suddenly became maximally aggressive when a strange person entered the bank barn.
Also, it is a requirement of organic certification to maintain field histories. The added bonus is you can look back on a field and really get a sense what worked and what didn't. I discuss the challenges presented when cropping this field and some of the steps I have taken so far with crop rotations and cover crops.
Find your place in the world. Dig in, and take responsibility from there. - Gary Snyder
Please contact me with your own stories.
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As they say, if you have livestock you're going to have deadstock. That's always in the back of my mind when I check on the cattle and the calf I noticed today didn't look right. Also, I have a few minutes to check on the tree seeds that I put in the fridge.
Jan 11 - tree seeds placed in damp paper towel then stored in ziploc bags in the fridge
Feb 25 - checking the seeds 46 days later
Walnut, birch, silver maple, sugar maple, oak.
Conclusions? Some of the sugar maple seeds have germinated, so I should transplant them to soil right away. The silver maple seeds just don't look good, and it was probably a mistake to vernalize them in the fridge. I should have just planted them last spring when they fell. Too early to tell with the walnut, birch and oak.
Send me questions, comments, or advice about growing trees from seed.
Find your place in the world. Dig in, and take responsibility from there. - Gary Snyder
Please contact me with your own stories.
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If I hosted a field day, would anyone even come? Do I have any useful knowledge or experience to share? These are some of the questions that come to mind as I entertain the idea of hosting an open house "field day". As this episode was recorded I arrived at a few tentative conclusions. I think I have some experience to share when it comes to rotationally grazing cattle because I've been doing it for a long time. Likewise for anyone interested in organic row cropping, I might have interesting things to offer because I am relatively new to it. If someone likes to experiment, they might be interested in my attempt at organic no-till soybeans using rye and roller crimping. There is also the equipment! I farm in 2026 using equipment from 1970 and could set all of it out for people to see. The agroecological practices that I've been doing over the years, and the new things like starting trees from seed all might appeal to someone who attends. Who knows? I'm tempted to host the field day and see what happens...there is only one way to find out if it would help someone.
Find your place in the world. Dig in, and take responsibility from there. - Gary Snyder
Please contact me with your own stories.
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Sure I'm a farmer. But I'm also what you'd call a contemplative. Here is the poem, I Have Decided by Mary Oliver. Let me know what you think!
Find your place in the world. Dig in, and take responsibility from there. - Gary Snyder
Please contact me with your own stories.
[email protected] -
I'm hoping that you might find something in this episode that will help you during calving season, especially if you are just starting out! I think there might be a couple of takeaways for experienced farmers too.
I talk about my calving bins, keeping safe when near a new mom, home made electrolyte solution, colostrum, milk replacer, selenium-vitamin E, castrating, and many other things.
Here is something I forgot to mention LOL and I thought of it as soon as I was done recording. If a calf isn't breathing, reach for a piece of straw and insert the straw a couple of inches into the calf's notril. I've had success a couple of times doing this.
Electrolyte: store these ingredients in a ziploc bag and administer the solution with a tube doser or bottle
1.9 litres warm water
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon "salt free" salt
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
2 tablespoons corn syrup
Find your place in the world. Dig in, and take responsibility from there. - Gary Snyder
Please contact me with your own stories.
[email protected] - Vis mere
