Old Fashion Dirt Farming
May 11th, 2007 by Northern FarmerWas working in the back forty today plowing all afternoon, wow what a nice vacation! I tell you, when a person is always working doing manual labor a day plowing is just what the doctor ordered! The old 4320 was just a purring along pulling those four 18s. It could pull a bigger plow but I like them four bottoms for hilly fields. At least it’ll stay in the ground a bit better than a bigger one will. Sittin in that tractor is just so relaxing and a person can dwell on a lot of stuff. Mostly faith matters, in fact almost all faith matters. I don’t know, it’s just all that’s ever on my mind these days and times. Even tonight trying to catch up in our bigger garden, that’s about all that’s on my mind. Didn’t catch up in that garden either. Want to get back to planting but by golly those weeds in the tater patch are growing like nuts! So I didn’t get to till any new ground, just trying to salvage the tater patch before those weeds get out of control! Almost got it under control, do a bit more tomorrow night Lord willing. Tomorrow we’ll be doing a family favorite job here, picking rocks in the oats fields. I realize I won’t be very popular tomorrow with my family, but that’s fatherhood on the farm. But these old dad’s have a bag of pretty potent threats to make the work progress! Nuthing mean or anything like that, just gotta know what to take away if the work don’t get done. Like ever going anywhere else on earth again besides the farm. Of course looking rock picking in the eye many times kids figure a lifetime spent in seclusion on the farm beats four hours of rock picking. But I have other tricks, we’ll see how it goes. Maybe we should praise the Lord when we’re doing all that. It’d work for me!
But spring is rolling along here, jobs are getting done one way or another. All winter I figure it’s impossible to do all of that work and somehow, someway, it just all falls together. It doesn’t hurt not having twenty pounds of winter clothes on dragging a person down all day either. This is always the time of year of promise on the farm. The ground is moist yet, no severe droughts looking a person in the face at this time. A person can dream of good grass, fat cattle, ten foot high corn, good hay crops. Yup this is the dream time of year! And you never know, one of these years we might not have a disaster here, you just never know. One should be due one of these years!
Don’t know what this summer will bring as far as church stuff, not really worried about it, what ever happens is OK with me. Just keep plugging here looking forward to eternity. Well, I guess as far as a believer in Jesus goes, we’re already in eternity. It’s a promise and it sure makes things easier when a person just realizes it. Time is short here and pretty soon there ain’t gonna be no more pain or sorrow. No more worries, no more struggles. Yee haw! Makes it a lot easier when a person just gets that into their heart! Whatever the world wants to throw at a person doesn’t really mean a hill of beans compared to that blessed hope of eternity. Hmm, getting myself all worked up just typing this! Gotta pay property taxes tonight, but someday there won’t be none of that. There won’t be none of a lot of stuff that there is on this here world! No more worries about wars, no more worries about anything. Hard to comprehend! In fact durn near impossible to figure in between my ears.
Yup, even if the crowd tomorrow isn’t all the happiest picking them rocks I do think there’ll be some praising the Lord out there regardless! Just start belting it out and let the Lord take over! Make a joyful noise!
May 13th, 2007 at 9:30 pm
This is totally off topic, but we wondered if you borrowed the Kant Kick device and if it worked for you. We have a dancing jersey we are milking right now and my husband really related to your post of April 24th. We are thinking about getting one.
May 14th, 2007 at 6:23 am
Marci,
The kant-kick device works. The people who loaned it to me had to bend it a little to fit Jerseys. (They had to heat it with a torch to get it bent.) The only thing that you have to watch for is that with the kant-kick on a cow, the cow can fall over. The heifer I am milking, up until this weekend, was jumping up and down a little bit, which could throw her off balance. I started putting a rope around her and tying it to the beam holding the head locks. This helped keep her from falling over. A number of times she would start leaning toward me. On Saturday she did fall over. The rope started to get loose and in my attempt to tighten it, she fell down. After falling over she has been more cooperative.
My kids also started putting a halter on her and pulling her head tight. This seems to have calmed her down as well.
Jim V
May 14th, 2007 at 11:31 am
I thought i’d stop in and wish you a Happy Monday.
May 14th, 2007 at 11:45 am
Hi Lori!
Just in for a quick bite to eat and then back out in the fields plowing. Tis the busy season for sure! A Happy Monday to you as well!
God Bless!
May 14th, 2007 at 9:02 pm
Thanks so much. I also talked to a lady we know that farms by herself. She said that she keeps a stick and when they dance or kick she pops them and then gently but firmly says NO. She can just get them to stand there while she milks them now. We tried that tonight. It helped, but she still danced a little.
May 15th, 2007 at 8:33 pm
Marci,
Hopefully your cow will settle down. It appears that mine has settled down some since falling over. My kids also think that putting a halter on and pulling the cow’s head down has helped. The 8 year old has insisted on milking her the last couple of days, including putting the kant-kick on her. Seems that he is up for a challenge. Fortunately the cow has stopped bouncing up and down so she is not going to fall over anymore. The neighboring dairy farmer says that sometimes jersey hiefers settle down after a month or two of being milked, but some only settle down after being milked for a year. I am hoping we can stop using the kant-kick in a month or two.
Jim V
Jim V