I started seeds indoors last weekend for tomatoes, broccoli (already up), eggplant, peppers, three kinds of basil, some other herbs and some flowers. Unfortunately I didn't obtain my Stella Natura Biodynamic calendar until this week so did not know that the stars were not entirely in my favour, except for the herbs....it was a "leaf" day when I planted. However now that I have it I am all set to plant flower seeds this Saturday for my cut flower garden, as it will be a "flower" day!
I do not totally understand or even know that much about biodynamic farming, a concept or philosophy promoted originally by Rudolf Steiner (creator of Waldorf Schools) and augmented by the work of Maria Thun. It recommends making the farm a closed loop of production, a self-contained system and also incorporates the movements of the moon and the positions of the constellations.
Ideally a biodynamic farm would have a variety, even a small one, of animals, so there would be ruminants to eat weeds and grass, create manure for fertilizer, and other animals who would graze the land in succession, like cows first eating grass, chickens eating other things left behind, and pigs coming in to turn up the sod and eat what the others didn't. The land gets naturally tilled and fertilized, waste gets composted and crops get rotated so that no outside sources of fertilizer is required. And there seems to be a certain amount of magic attached, or rather, a sense of the Divine really, based in the idea of the energy of the land and the beings on it being inter-connected.
"Preparations" are also used, for example, a cow's horn full of the manure of the cow could be buried in the garden for winter and then the composted contents spread in spring to infuse the whole area with its energy. When planting seeds, a farmer could put each seed in her mouth before planting (a little hard with tiny ones like for herbs and carrots!) to infuse it with the energetic connection that will make that food the healthiest for her to consume. A cross of manure or compost placed in a certain location on the farm where there are energy lines could impart its nutrients miraculously throughout the property rather than having to be spread on every bed of plants.
It is a system, if it can even be called that, that involves respect for the natural earth energies as well as the natural inter-conenctedness of all beings and life cycles. It respects and honours the local ecosystems. Edward and I had the pleasure and honour of being able to join a group to visit and tour the farm of Charles Hubbard in Colchester County, Nova Scotia, a couple of years ago, where biodynamics is practiced at a high level, with all those factors mentioned above, along with things like building pyramid-shaped greenhouses and even open pyramids of copper tubing to conduct energy to the plants beneath. Apparently everything grows amazingly well on this land. It is a sacred space.
Last year we planted by the calendar and moon phases whenever possible and certainly seeds sprouted really really quicky and grew well! If only we hadn't had a June and July full of rain and fog and cloud we might have had a stellar crop of tomatoes along with the other things that did grow well...actually most things grew well, just didn't have enough sun time to ripen as they should have. This was our advisory to build a bigger greenhouse this year, just in case, and to extend our season.
So rumour has it we're in for hot and dry this summer. Certainly it is still dry, relatively speaking, which while good for lavender, may not be good for the well if we have to water everything else.
And while we don't have livestock other than the chickens, we will use what we can on the land to self-fertilize. We have the chicken poop pile, along with our own kitchen scrap compost, augmented by the buckets of coffee grounds we've been bringing home all winter from the Wildwood Cafe in Bridgewater. We plan to harvest some seaweed and make seaweed tea and integrate some into the beds. (I guess technically that would not be biodynamic unless we actually lived at the seashore...)
We have had our property doused for energy lines, not specifically for where to put a cross of manure to send its energies outward across the property, but we have incorporated some gardens using sacred geometry, some spirals (more or less based on the Golden Mean), an octagonal garden containing a pentagram (star) and we built a medicine wheel garden, honouring the four directions, which has a cross of paths running north south and east west, near to an energy vortex. So we will see what all that brings to our land this year! We built those gardens last year to reclaim an area we had called "the Wasteland", a former logging yard that was hard-scrabble, compacted land.
If you wish to learn more about biodynamics, other than Googling it, you can order the Stella Natura calendar by contacting info@stellanatura.com or looking at the Stella Natura website. Or if you are in the Bridgewater area you might be able to still buy one at Helping Nature Heal.
For information on the work of biodynamic farmer Charles Hubbard and to obtain his book, check out http://www.sacredstewardship.net
Tending the land is, as Charles' web site name suggests, sacred stewardship. Edward and I certainly regard our role here on this property as a stewardship role. When I bemoan the abuse that this piece of land had formerly suffered the message comes through that that is precisely why we are here now, not to inherit something already perfect, but to steward this place back to natural health and vibrancy and a sense of sacredness. We do what we can and we honour and enjoy this creative opportunity to regenerate both the land and ourselves in the process.
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March is rarely a pleasant month in these parts, at least in my recollection. Usually there is rain, freezing rain, another good snowfall or two and some more rain, but here we are three weeks in, with mostly bare ground, the frost pushing out of the earth in sunny spots, some tulips peeking through, even an odd crocus blooming next to the house (transplanted by some squirrel I suspect...I know I didn't put it there!)
People along Rt. 325 have been raking the roadside gravel from their front lawns that had been pushed over by the snow plows. We need to do that ourselves on our own lawn....there's a great pile of our newly-resurfaced gravel driveway resting just below where we park our cars, scraped over by my very thorough tractor-man Edward. He's pretty skilled on our little red Massey-Ferguson, but there's a fine line between plowing low enough to avoid packing the snow into ice on the driveway and gouging out the surface itself. This year we had much less ice. ‘Nuff said.
Speaking of which, we were well into April last year I think before the longer driveway was ice-free and driveable. This has been a benign winter in comparison, and much better for the lavender so far. It looks much healthier, last year's plantings seem to be holding fast, some still have slightly green leaves at the bottom instead of dessicated grey, which suggests it was not as cold. And while temperatures are supposed to go down again this week to more normal average readings, below freezing at night, overall it seems we have survived the season much better (knock wood) and may have a robust harvest yet!
In that vein, that is, the lavender department, I have enlisted help. Feeling somewhat overwhelmed last year by the extent of the garden chores required to maintain all our plantings in good health, I received the "guidance" one day, if you will, that "You don't need to do it all yourself". I think that message may have come after I had already broken down and called on Beau, former gardener to the stars, to come and pull weeds in my lavender patch last Spring. At that point I needed no guidance other than the frightful observation that the weeds between the rows were higher than the lavender shrubs on the raised beds. HELP!
Beau to the rescue, at a fee I can only presume was far less than what he must have charged the movie stars he gardened for in Los Angeles before moving, with his lovely partner, to the backwoods of Lunenburg County of all places. Digging the weeds out here was no doubt somewhat beneath his expertise and might have been mind-numbing, had I not joined him in the work and engaged in some delightfully eclectic conversations. The work was, however, body-numbing, but we "got ‘er done" as they say, rows cleared, weed-matted and mulched to see if we could deter their regrowth. So far so good.
But the recent decision I have made regarding the lavender and delegating tasks was to seek out the help of a seamstress to help create the lavender-stuffed products I sell. I have realized that my passion and perhaps forte is in the garden, being outdoors tending, even weeding, selecting the varieties, harvesting and drying. And I do like deciding what products I wish to make with the dried buds and choosing fabrics for each.
But as the winter passed and I was out of eye pillows and had planned for months to make flax and lavender neck pillows and was getting no closer to the dust-covered sewing machine upstairs, I remembered the advice, "You don't have to do it all yourself..." So I got the name of a good seamstress who has done work for an artist friend for years sewing tiny clothes for sculptural puppets, and emailed her about doing or recommending someone to sew my products as piecework, hopefully affordably enough that there would still be some compensation for me for growing all this lavender and stuffing them!
We had an enthusiastic meeting, she is doing up a batch of samples for me now and is skilled at costing it all out so I can conceivably deal with this like it's a real business...wow! I have had to realize that I am not making these products as a personal expression of a craft, but as a way to use the lavender I grow, which is more truly my craft. So I can relinquish control of the actual sewing to someone else. Turns out she's an expert, with far more experience than I'd imagined and is keen to be involved! It has been an incredibly freeing experience, lifting a huge weight off my mind.
My block had been in having to pay for the help, as in, "how can I afford this if I am not selling much?" But if it is done more efficiently, both more quickly and with less waste, and frees me up for other kinds of work, then presumably it's well worth it, especially if we can then make more, of higher quality and sell more. I know, it's not rocket science, but sometimes it takes me a while to "let go".
I am anticipating a much better harvest this year after the milder winter and drier weather right now.The famer's almanac with the grey hair, that font of folksy wisdom that I call "my husband", has been forecasting a "hot dry summer" since Groundhog Day, drawing on some kind of magical foresight gleaned from his upbringing on a northern Alberta homestead. Probably been reading the wattles on the chickens again.
Speaking of which, I entered the coop the other day to find to my horror, a blood-spattered water dispenser on the roosters' side, although anyone with more than one rooster in a pen would probably roll their eyes. ‘Seems two of them got into a little spat on their own and wattles and combs were picked and pecked. The large Silver Lace Wyandott was not a pretty sight, his lovely neck and shoulders stained a dirty red. No doubt he was trying to overthrow the authority of Sargeant Major, the previous head of the coop, whose extensive wattles are now scarred. It will soon be time to ship the rooster gang off to the butcher. Roosters are sort of useless as a group. One is good for keeping an eye on the hens in the yard, not to mention making new ones, but too many are a nuisance, prone to scrapping, or wearing the feathers off the backs of the hens if allowed to intermingle.
We "did in" our own roosters the last two times. It's do-able, but hard on the nerves. We did it with ceremony, smudging and giving thanks, but at the end we still felt as if we had been beaten ourselves, and that's only doing about seven at one go. Perhaps if we had a team of people to be more production-line about it, it might be less stressful. Maybe.
But this year we decided to delegate in this department too, and hand the duties off to a pro. When we factor in the high cost of having fed them all winter on organic feed we figure an extra $3 or so per bird is worth relieving us of the task. Now I know why free-range organic chickens cost so much. And bigger producers must be getting a better deal on feed! Now if we just have mainly hens left we can perhaps recoup the cost of their feed from egg sales. We only have about four and a half dozen per week with 8-10 laying.
Tonight I am actually simmering some "rooster soup" on the stove, featuring broth from the last two roosters we had in the freezer (Rhode Island Reds I think) which were fricasseed recently. These fellows had free-ranged all last summer, and while deliciously wholesome and "happy chickens" (as several of my friends would say who now only eat "happy meat"), they were extremely lean with skin like leather. All that running around, hormone-free and not bred for heavy breast development like those Franken-bird "Meat Kings", produces a tougher bird. (You can't grow a Meat King past a certain time as they will literally fall over from over-development of the breast. That's the price of masses of boneless chicken breasts in restaurants and supermarkets.)
No, in our roosters, under all those fluffy feathers was a small-breasted 4 or 5-pounder, with stewing the most successful culinary option. A little wine, some "herbes de Provence" concocted from the herbs grown in our garden, and mmmmmmm. Dee-lish. That was the fricasee. The bits and bones I didn't stew were turned into the broth that is the base for tonight's soup, carrots, turnip, onions, garlic, celery, white beans and rice pasta shells. It's a cure-all, I am hoping, for the nasty Spring cold my hubby is suffering from, the first I've witnessed in the past four years.
Well, time to stir the soup, and then closer to dark, shut the hens back in the coop who have been out to play today in the field. They have been enjoying the sunshine lately, digging and scratching in the dirt, taking dust baths and likely appreciating some distance from the nine noisy roosters who each think he's Pavarotti in a crow-off.
Nine roosters in the freezer is not enough to get us through a year by any means, but it's a start. More and more we work to be aware of where our food comes from and how it was raised. It's very challenging and I know everyone can't have their own chicken coop or even vegetable garden, but conscious consumerism is a good start.
For your edification I propose two films, which we had already seen but which have just been presented publicly this weekend for free in Mahone Bay (not far from here) at a mini film festival sponsored by the Council of Canadians. One film is "Food Inc.", which is still in the new releases at your video store, a captivating look at where our "farm fresh" food mostly comes from, and where it can, with conscious effort, come from. It features author Michael Pollan (of "The Ominivore's Dilemma") among others.
The other film is a 20-minute amazingly concise take on how we function as a consumer culture, called "The Story of Stuff". We found it on the internet a couple of years ago and have been recommending it since then. You can get a free download of that short film here .
Happy Spring! Lush may your garden grow, loud may your roosters crow!
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The sunny day was glorious, and mild enough to let the hens out of the coop for some fresh air and sunshine, and to have a wee bit of bare ground to scratch in. The "girls" were happy with the weather but I was apprehensive, hoping the thaw would be short-lived and that more snow would soon follow.
What, me crazy? No, just a desperate would-be lavender farmer praying that the freeze-thaw-rain-freeze cycle of last winter, which killed so many of my lavenders, would not be repeated. Happily, yesterday was a snowy day, a bit miserable with constant winds and gusts up to 70 kph, but enough drifting snow piled up to almost cover up all the lavender plants again.
Looks like we're in for a cold snap all week too, not that I need -17C wind chills, but at least I know the ground won't thaw for a while yet. So far winter has been pretty good, not severely cold but below freezing, consistent snow cover to protect the plants, no ice storms to damage trees, and not too windy.
Angus the dog has been loving the snow again and this year we're all having much more fun than last because he can now be left off the leash (and his "snow anchor") to romp freely, dig in the snow piles, eat the snow piles and lead us for happy walks down to the frozen pond in the woods. He leaps and bounds for joy when you say "Yes, we'll go to the pond!" and he stops and looks back to make sure we are following on the way. He has become a true companion, keeping me exercised as we navigate the narrow trail of our previous footprints down the logging road and back uphill again once or twice a day.
Every so often Angus will dash off the trail into the trees, tracking the hares no doubt, whose paw prints criss-cross the main path, back and forth and sometimes around in circles! Only twice have I caught sight of a snowshoe hare this season, when their white winter coat blends into the snow. One silently traversed the trail as I was pausing to listen to "Grandfather Hemlock" (my spirit tree), seemingly unaware that Angus was snuffling only moments behind him. And Angus was seemingly unaware how close he really was to Mr. Hare!
One warmer day as we passed the beehives on our way to the woods I noticed a number of bees on the surrounding snow, some still moving weakly, most dead. They were coming out one by one from the hole in the hive, flying a foot or so and then dropping. While it's normal for some to leave the hive on a warm day in winter, to relieve their waste for instance, I was concerned that something was wrong when it seemed so many lay dead on the ground. Not being the beekeeper in the family, however, I discovered later that sometimes it's just "a good day to die", and out they go. Overall the numbers were pretty small when you think of how many throusands inhabit a hive! It being our first year with bees we are just hoping we have done enough to help them make it through winter unscathed.
Speaking of the tiniest critters on the farm, Edward introduced me to some even tinier inhabitants of the woods one day when he said, "Look at the snow fleas!" At first I was simply incredulous thinking, "What is he trying to pull on me now?" But as I saw the little specks about the size of ground pepper start to jump around I got a bit panicked thinking we'd be covered in bites but for our multiple layers of warm clothing. As we trudged through deep snow under the pines, each footprint seemed filled with these leaping specks!
To my relief, when I Googled "snow fleas" upon our return home, I learned they were not actually fleas at all, and may not even be insects according to scientific classification, but are some other form of arthropod known commonly as a Springtail. To my relief they don't bite humans but do eat decaying organic matter, pollen, bacteria and other things, possibly consuming algaes that are in the snow under the trees. If that's not already more than you needed to know you can Google "snow fleas" for yourself!
What else is there to report? A front wheel fell of the tractor while Edward was plowing last week, necessitating a new hub and rim and fortunately no hospital visits! We're up to about 5 eggs a day from the hens if anyone wants some, all organic feed! And the fire in the wood stove burns hot on this bitter night, inducing great relaxation amongst Angus and the five cats who live in the house with us. The moon is full and bright and all is well on We Are One Farm.
Oh and as for this week's Groundhog Day, we're waiting to see if the one we have named Newcombville Nick (the groundhog we see poking his head out of a hole in the hillside across from the firehall) will see his shadow or not on Tuesday. Will it be six more weeks of Winter? Or only 45 days until Spring? Supposed to be sunny all week!
Oh and if you are interested in my Soul Coaching practice, please check out my Third Eye Soul Journeys site which also has it's own blog with a perhaps more "spiritual" and self-help bent, and also a newsletter subscription link.
Happy Imbolc!
]]>What a change this week from June and July....all that rain and fog and mist and drizzle and cloud cover that went on for weeks, not to mention unseasonably cool temperatures several degrees below normal, has passed and the overhead fan now tries to push the warm air around in the bedroom. Hot and steamy.
In the past two months we didn't actually get more rainfall than normal but the continuous cloud and fog held the moisture on the plants, the cool temperatures stalled growth of the veggies we'd transplanted, and the darkness made everyone cranky and listless. The lavender was getting "Septoria Lavandulae," aka, Lavender Leaf Spot, and had the damp and dark continued a week or two longer I fear there would have been some more die-off from wilted leaves.
And now Edward's words of mid-July echo in my ears, "Just wait, in a few more weeks you'll be wishing it were raining!!" Well, almost. I can survive for the next two days of our now 5-day heat wave of 30C + temperatures for the rain that is to follow. I think the well will hold out that long for our cooling showers and more importantly, keeping the plants watered.
Although we might get a little more than just rain in a week's time -- the first named hurricane in the Atlantic this season may be headed our way. "Bill" is forecast to track west and north of Bermuda, and depending how it either bounces off the coast of the eastern seabord or gets diverted by the warm Gulf Stream slightly northeasterly, we may be in line for a hit ourselves. I have been following the hurricane season forecasts for a number of years now, after having sailed on some Windjammer cruises in the Caribbean and hearing of disasters affecting the homes of favourite crewmen (not to mention a Windjammer ship that was lost, including the crew, in a hurricane off Honduras). I followed, with apprehension, the approach of Hurricane Juan which was a rare and direct hit on Nova Scotia in 2003.
I remember reading the forecasts from the National Hurricane Centre in the US and going, "Jeez, why aren't they saying anything about this on the radio? It looks like it's going to be a direct hit and all they are forecasting is rain and winds!!" I set about to "batten down the hatches" as it were, although my home at the time was already 20 miles inland from the sea, and in a sheltered hollow, but nevertheless tied down the barbeque and put away potted plants and all outside furniture and garden tools. The forecast landing point was to be Mahone Bay, a town 20 minutes away but as I waited and watched until after midnight in the eerie quiet, the storm had moved northeast, landing squarely on our capital, Halifax, notably wiping out all the trees in lovely Point Pleasant Park at the entrance to Halifax Harbour, and causing much damage elsewhere.
Windy nights on our exposed hilltop farm, far as we may be from the sea, are quite frightening for me as the house shudders and shakes, our large, sharply pitched roof feeling a bit like a big sail. There won't be much sleep for me if Bill gets too close after the weekend.
And now as I type a little later than when I began this piece, it is 3:14 a.m. We have been roused from our sleep rather painfully, not by any pre-hurricane winds, not by the sticky heat, but by my cat Charles ("Charles" as opposed to "Charlie" when I am not happy with him). Although a very cute and often sweet cat, Charles has made it painfully clear in the last week that, like it or not, he's going out at night, and he will howl and pick at the door mercilessly until we get the picture. So, out he has been several nights lately. His habit, when he is done mousing around, or just wanting a snack, is to climb up onto the roof of the gallery from the patio fence, and meow at our bedroom window until we unhook the screen and let him in.
Normally I just throw some cat food in a bowl and roll back into bed. Not tonight. At about 2:45, as I woke to let him in, I thought I was having a "scent hallucination" in my grogginess.......sniff sniff, sniff sniff...."what the hell is that??" It was some strange blend of eye-watering onions and gasoline, maybe some rotten onions in that basket on the counter or something? I noticed as I followed Charles downstairs to the kitchen it got stronger as I approached the counter by which Charles waited for a snack.
I put out his food and sniffed around the room, in the fridge, in the cupboard, the basement stairs...was there an oil leak?? Sniff sniff, sniff sniff, what could it be? Charles ate his fishy goop and I went back upstairs with a knot in my face wondering if I was losing my mind. I made a stop in the bathroom and then Edward awoke to the sound of Coco the cat barfing nearby. "What is that smell???" he moaned as he went to clean up the cat barf.
"Oh good, I thought I was losing my marbles," I said, thinking maybe I was having some kind of peri-menopausal hormonal moment with my olfactory nerves in overdrive. Sniff sniff, sniff sniff, we both went around the house, Edward heading toward the basement to check out what might have been that fuel leak. And then, as Charlie was on his heels I grabbed him, thinking, "don't go down there Charlie, " and then it dawned on me....
...maybe it was... Charlie. Yup. We'd been skunked.
So here I sit at 3:29 a.m. Tuesday morning, with Charles thrown back outside as my eyes still water after a quick shower, and Edward off in the car to Bridgewater to the 24-hour grocery to pick up some bottles of 3% hydrogen peroxide, some extra baking soda, and some lemony-fresh dishwashing detergent. We were all out of peroxide, which we usually keep to clean cuts & scrapes, we had a bit of soda, and I feared the "natural" dishwashing liquid we use might not be up to the task to deodorizing Charles.To my relief, I had saved an email from my sister-in-law back when we first got our dog Angus, in which she kindly shared her skunk remedy recipe taken from an article in the newspaper. Apparently this concoction creates a chemical reaction which neutralizes the parts of the skunk smell that make it linger. She says it works. I think "Great...but have you ever tired to bathe a cat ??"
Edward returns with the critical ingredients. "Charlie's way down the lane near the woods now," he says, "I saw him on my way up." So we decide, "back to bed", until he hollers to come back in.
It's now late Tuesday morning, another scorcher of a day already, and all de-skunking is complete. Charles appeared about 8:30 and we put our plan into action with military precision, ingredients and towels laid out in the bathroom, Edward got the rubber gloves and we set to work, one holding, the other shampooing. Charlie (my love and sympathy for him gradually returning) was a very good boy, a little howling after a few minutes of being doused and scrubbed, but all in all a good kitty. I wrapped him in a dry towel as he shivered from the bath and eventually he found his way to a sunny window sill to warm up and dry off with much licking of fur. We think it has worked as planned, although a visitor who hasn't been immersed in the odour may beg to differ. I'll have to see how it is after being outside awhile.
The only trouble is, with today's heat we have shut down the house, windows and curtains, after the night's cooling temperatures, trying to keep the day's heat out. So it is stuffy. And possibly slightly skunky. I hope not. It's not easy to sell lavender in a place that smells like skunk.
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Now that it is drivable we are awaiting the arrival of the fellows from Bernard Mailman's, the contractors who will re-surface much of our driveway with "Class A" gravel, filling in that low spot as well as building-up and smoothing out the ruts that have eroded over the years from heavy rains and bad drainage, as well as the parking area in front of the gallery which hadn't been addressed since we backfilled after building the gallery addition. Necessary but unglamorous landscaping.
I am also waiting, with bated breath, to see how much of the lavender survived the winter. We never did get the rows mulched as we had considerable snow fall before the ground was frozen and for the most part it never left. Often there is a "January Thaw" but not this year, so I counted on that snowcover to be the protection needed for the plants. The older Munsteads, hardy to Zone 4, seem to have weathered it. I am not so optimistic about the Grossos and Twickle Purples, both Zone 5 hardy (we are 5b here I believe). The Twickles, (a type of lavandula angustifolia as are the Munsteads) that were planted last year grew well and quickly, but this spring I find many of them have split down the middle and are weak and/or dead.
Such splitting is a problem generally with older plants which have not been kept pruned to a compact shape, but these were only first year plants and I had pruned them. So I am left wondering what happened. I am also waiting for them to green up. A few of them, and a few Grossos (one of the "french" type hybrids, l. X Intermedia that are raised primarily for oil production and for their sturdy long stems for bouquets) are just starting to show a leaf or two of green near the bottom while the Munsteads are much further ahead. These do however bloom a lot later than the others as well. Patience is required, and restraint, as I am inclined to write them off as dead and yank them to re-plant. A mistake I have made before, and regretted upon seeing good roots and one little green leaf starting to emerge.
But right now my lovely lavender farm looks like a field of regimented porcupines, sitting very still. So I watch and I wait.
Besides this waiting and watching and wondering I am also weeding, something else that wasn't done well in the fall as I became overwhelmed with the number of chores here while wearing my multiple hats as lavender farmer, grower of our own food, producer of a (small) variety of products using dried lavender buds, photographer/gallery owner and now emerging Soul Coach ®, trying to get that part of my vocation off the ground. If you are interested in learning about that aspect of what I do please look at my new web site, Third Eye Soul Journeys.
I think I am going to have to get some help this year to keep on top of it, I am finally resigned to accepting, sort of, the idea that I do not have to do it all myself. Oh I know I have Edward, my wonderful husband, who is farm-hand extraordinaire, having been raised in this crazy lifestyle in a more self-sustaining way and under harsher conditions than I can ever imagine, but he does have his day job still, the one that pays a lot of the bills while all these other enterprises evolve. We're still at the capital investment stage on a lot of fronts! He does as much as he can on the days he's not at his own office, like yesterday, in the rain while I weeded, he moved the chicken coop to the other side of the driveway to a more sheltered place where they could have a better outdoor run now that we have given up on free-ranging them for the time being.
Yes, I'm afraid we have limited their range quite severely, for two, no, three, reasons: First, we got a dog, Angus, last October, who it seems is still fascinated by little creatures that run around and wants to chase them. He hasn't managed to catch one yet so we're not sure if it's a herding instinct or a hurting instinct and we don't wish to find out. Secondly, the roving gangs did a number on many of my flower beds last fall as they got braver and traveled further from the henhouse. They tossed mulch on the gravel paths and vice versa, impossible to clean up. They are quite intrepid little beings but there always seems to be a ringleader. And third, besides the garden damage, they just roved too far afield this spring as soon as they were allowed out, I shooed them out of the neighbour's yard more than once. They were getting closer to the highway too, only a matter of time before the chickens crossed the road.
Our flock has dwindled to 5 as a result of the autumn rooster cull (tasty but really lean birds!) and a few sad casualties due to un-identified illness through the winter, one of whom was my little favourite, Skippy. Like they say, never name your chickens.
That said, the remaining Gang of Five consists of Sargeant Major, a pompous Speckled Sussex rooster; Number Three, a fluffed-up Barred Rock rooster; Button, a seemingly intelligent and brave Barred Rock hen; and the two Rhode Island Red hens, interchangeably named Little Red and Ginger. They are obviously the "popular" girls in the coop as they have many of their back feathers worn off by the excessive friskiness of the roosters. We think we'll segregate them soon to give them a break, but we had hoped one of them would go broody and hatch some chicks. No luck so far. Floozies the two of them.
The ruby-throated hummingbirds have returned, by the way, practically chattering "hello we're back" as they zoom by us in the garden. Edward got their feeder out just in time and they seem appreciative.
So life is full and so is this blog post. I sometimes wonder how I got myself into this mode involving so much hard labour and constant attention, but as I work in the garden, blackflies permitting, I know I am indeed in my element. I am sure there will be more to write as summer nears and life speeds up.
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Life here on We Are One Farm has been continuously full and active since summer, and since my last entry at the Autumnal Equinox. Poor Gimpy, the injured Barred Rock rooster, finally had to be put down, his good leg having frozen in the opposite direction to the first injured one so that he looked like he was doing the splits. He could no longer move nor feed himself. Poor chicken, it was a sad loss, even though we are in fact raising some chickens for food. As I had written before, he had been a calm and strong presence in his infirmity, a quiet companion and support to a couple of other chickens who’d fallen ill, and an outlet for mothering for me which I seem to need. Gifts come in strange packages indeed. We still have six hens, five who are laying, and nine roosters, two of whom will survive winter unless we keep putting off the difficult task of doing them in.
In the garden, only some of the lavender rows eventually got covered with sandy gravel mulch after liming and weed-matting the rest of the 320 new plants. I had trouble keeping up by late summer. Weeds were running rampant, perennials had to be cut back, the veggie garden uprooted after we had gleaned as much as we could. There are so many jobs to prepare for winter.
Edward completed the woodshed construction, at least enough to use it. It currently has a tarp over the plywood on the roof where shingles will go next summer, and the vertical boards need to be overlapped with the battens, but it will do for now. Having a proper farm tractor allowed Edward to haul fallen trees from near the driveway, “junk” them up, as they say in these parts, with the chainsaw, then rent a woodsplitter and put up about four and a half cords for the winter. I love having a guy who was raised on a farm where there was no electricity! Talk about self-sufficient and a real can-do attitude. He is an inspiration to me. It all has to get done and he just does it, with ease and grace, no resistance or complaint.
Chores took a backseat for a week while we went off to Alberta to visit Edward’s family, both ancestors and descendants. And some “laterals” too I guess. We could really have used a vacation after the work of the season but perhaps we can find a reprieve in the winter. Family visits can be both rewarding and challenging, depending upon what you have taken with you on your journey from your family of origin and what changes you bring back with you when you return.
Navigating relationships of any kind, especially long ones of many years or decades, is another test of your ability to find the grace in a given situation. Sometimes you have learned all sorts of lessons, usually the hard way, and transformed yourself to some degree. Or the opposite, you haven’t perceived your life challenges as lessons at all and become even more entrenched in the way you always were. Sometimes one of you has changed and other hasn’t.
Grace, the guiding hand of Spirit or Universal Consciousness plays an interesting role. Originally it was thought of as “unmerited pardon” or forgiveness from God. That works maybe if you think of God as a singular being meting out rewards and punsihments, which is not my perception. I think of grace as more that moment of Divine insight or awareness of the inherent goodness in life, that spark of finding just the right answer when you need it, the unexpected gift in a situation where you can’t imagine there is a gift. Being “gracious” has that element of gratitude in it, accepting the gift of compliments perhaps, accepting what life is handing you with appreciation. Being graced with talent again suggests a gift of talent. Being graceful is expressing beauty, the beauty inherent in all life, being conscious and appreciative of the gift that is your body.
In our challenging relationships, grace says, “You know, we are all one in this together, despite our differences or perceived differences. We are all here to learn, to grow and ultimately to love. And to know that you are loved.” Finding the grace in each moment when faced with tests of our patience or our understanding of each other, and even finding the love for ourselves, is a gift.
Weather-wise we’ve enjoyed a long and benign autumn season although it is only two-thirds over, but it seems today winter has arrived with a bang. Just when I thought it was safe to have a pre-Christmas open house event in November instead of December this year, for my gallery and for Edward’s clients, a social drop-in for friends, art buyers and colleagues alike, our first snowstorm squelched the best-laid plans.
I had spent weeks getting ready, preparing some reprints of favourite hand-coloured images, making more notecards, sewing dream pillows, sachets and eye pillows for my collection of lavender products, then the past week baking cookies, house-cleaning, shopping for cider and wine & cheese. Our hours by invitation to a fairly extensive list of folks were to be Friday evening from 5-9, and Saturday & Sunday noon until 5.
Then the forecast came out, “Major winter storm coming to Nova Scotia Friday night,” to start snowing around midnight. Well, we thought, that means, if it does indeed happen as forecast (which, based on the past summer’s forecast record seemed questionable at least), that people will be more likely to show up Friday night as they’ll expect to be digging out and snowbound on Saturday and even Sunday, depending how long the snow flies.
So we got extra provisions in for Friday, finished decorating and awaited the crowd. “I think it’s going to be a good night”, I said. “Me too,” said Edward. Around 5:20 a couple of Edward’s clients arrived, a man and wife originally from Switzerland. “Are we the first?” they asked, looking around the room. Yes, we told told them, hoping that a few more would arrive soon to create a sense of festivity. After a visit and chat, some hot cider and a few purchases from the lavender table, they departed for another event. They were also the last visitors of the evening.
“I should have known”, I said, “from the way things were at the supermarket this afternoon.You know how crazy people get around here when there’s a winter storm warning, they expect to be stranded for days so everyone panics and floods the Superstore all at once the minute such a forecast comes out! Don’t people keep two or three day’s worth of food at home??”
So I surmised that even though the snow was not expected to start until around midnight, that everyone was hunkering down, expecting the worst. I was frustrated and disappointed. I had worked so hard. "What’s wrong with them", I wondered, "they could have come and gone easily before the snow started". As it turned out, the snow started closer to 10 or 10:30 at our place.
Feeling disappointed and somewhat sorry for myself, I opened my box of Denise Linn’s Soul Coaching Oracle Cards, shuffled and spread them out in a fan on the desk. I felt for energy coming off a card, asking the question, “What do I need to know from this?” The card I pulled was “Grace”. I knew immediately that it was indeed apropos. The guidebook with the card deck said, among other things, “Be gracious and understanding with yourself. [....] Kindly honour the reality of others.” Thanks Denise, right on point as always!
It’s the morning after now and it has dawned bright and clear and absolutely beautiful here with the snow blanket on the ground. There’s hope for the last chance at the open house now with the roads and driveway cleared thanks to Edward’s all-day efforts on the tractor yesterday. And I have had a few more revelations that bring me back to the idea of grace working in my life.
The past three weeks we have been adapting to having a new member of the family, a dog from the shelter whom we’ve named Angus. He's a German shepherd/collie cross according to the best guess of his origin, although sometimes it seems beagle might be more likely than collie, similar colouring but with a nose that knows no bounds, not to mention that soulful way of looking at you that only a hound dog can do.
We have felt slightly challenged with the new obligation to get up a little earlier every morning, earlier than the chickens need us, to take Angus out to relieve himself. And since we are fairly early-to-bed, we are also out somewhat later at night for this task than we’d like to be. With his super-smeller, living here surrounded by deer and other wildlife, Angus is not ready to be let off the leash, especially at night. There are too many stories of friends’ and neighbours’ dogs who’ve run off after a smell, gone for days sometimes, in one case getting caught in a snare.
So as I have been adapting and bemoaning the intrusion into my normal sleep schedule, I have also been presented with those “moments of grace” that remind me of the gifts that love and kindness, like adopting a shelter dog, can bring in unexpected ways, that is, beyond the affection an animal shows for it’s owner and the affection it is capable of eliciting from them.
Two nights ago, before the snow storm, I took Angus for his before-bed pee run. I had to bundle up in my boots, hat and warm coat, get the leash on and trundle across the lawn when I really wanted to crawl into bed. But as I grumbled gently to myself as Angus nosed around for the right spot, I looked up, and the starlit sky remined me that this was November, the time of the Leonid meteor showers. Maybe I would see a shooting star.
I just kept looking up, surrounded by quiet, and I asked the question, “Will I be a good soul coach, counselor and writer?” And a small shooting star silently moved across the sky, not with any drama, but it appeared when I asked. I know the Leonids can shower even more than 100 of these per hour, but I didn’t care, that star was for me.
And yesterday, as I again grumbled quietly about having to leave our cosy bed too soon and go out into that first snowfall that I was protesting for ruining my open house, I was once more given that gift of grace upon witnessing Angus’s unfettered glee as he bounded and dove through the drifts, tossing the flakes up off his nose, springing in spirals like Tigger from Winnie-the-Pooh. What joy, what sweetness, what a gift to be out there with that great dog!
And once more this morning, although Edward pulled dog duty to let me sleep in a bit, it was futile. Charlie the cat started howling to be let out, Coco the Siamese started barfing something that disagreed with her sensitive tummy, and then one of them knocked something off the kitchen counter. “No rest for the weary here,” I muttered to myself as I padded down the stairs to view the chaos.
What I was given instead was another opportunity to experience the joy of being up early with pets, not the cleaning up of the cat barf, mind you, but the chance to look out the window and see Angus once again plowing into the snowbanks with delight as Edward tossed the leather bone toy to him again and again.
And from the guy who also, moments earlier, had complained to himself about having to go out in the cold so early, another beautiful gift: the look of childlike happiness and innocence on my husband’s face as he played with Angus, taking him back in memory, perhaps, to his own childhood dog who was not unlike Angus in appearance.
Recognizing these moments, these gifts of the spirit, that manifest in the heart, when you start to doubt that you are blessed; to get the message when you need it, in unexpected ways; to appreciate the needs and differences of others when you feel things aren’t quite going your way; and to learn to be gentle on yourself in the process. For me this is grace, in its various permutations. It is a gift, and we must stay open to receive it at all times.
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Yesterday was the last full day of Summer. And boy were those summer days full, right up to the end.
The dawn came crisp and clear, with a little mist settled in amongst some trees in the distance, where I think the LaHave River flows under the highway. A white-tailed doe and two fawns were nosing around the crabapples before the sun topped the horizon. Either a crowing rooster or one of the restless cats on the bed had awakened me, so I wandered as I always do to the windows, starting with the one to the northeast side of the bedroom, to take in the view from our hill top. It reminds me daily why I love this place, one of many reasons.
I opened the window to shoo the deer, “Don’t you touch my garden....get going!” They are so elegant and sweet, except on the days when they have destroyed the fruits of your hard work. We have been lucky so far this season although yesterday we found some hoofprints and nibbling around our pepper plants in the herb garden. They’d be gone in a hurry if they’d tried the jalapenos.
After the chickens were released from the henhouse for the day, we received a call from a friend who’d been over for dinner the night before. A retired commercial pilot from Germany, he invited us out for a tour in his ultralight, meeting at 10 a.m. The weather was perfect, clear and bright, winds light. As it only seats two, he took us up one at a time, taxiing slowly around the small lake before a short take-off into the wind. What a glorious view! There are so may little lakes dotting this county, hidden from main roads, the secret treasures of those fortunate to have sought them out through realtors. My favourite sight was that of the many hill top farms, older and more established than our own wee one, with huge open pastures, still bright green and freshly mown, topped often with a white house and a red barn. In other areas a few clear-cuts left their scars on the landscape, as did some of the hidden dump sites that I missed but my husband saw, revealing a disprespect for the land that we can’t understand.
But overall the beauty of this place, Lunenburg County, is remarkable, rolling farms and hectares of forest spreading down in fingers to the the jagged coastline full of rivers and inlets, tiny islands and coves. The LaHave River on which I spent my teens looked quite majestic, glinting black and silver, backlit by the morning light, opening out to Dublin Bay and the LaHave Islands beyond. Then a turn to the east and out toward the coastline to the heritage town of Lunenburg, the sun lighting up the candy-coloured waterfront of red and blue and more, and a surprise, the Bluenose II sailing in toward the harbour, returning to it’s homeport after touring as our sailing ambassador.
Of course a highlight was seeing our own farm, recognizing the ones that were landmarks along the way until there it was, We Are One Farm, diminutive in comparison, and harder to see with our soft green house and even the purple sheds, receding into the earth unlike the white and red of other farms. The lavender beds were not so appealing from the air, half of them covered as they are right now with only the black weed mat, not yet mulched with the granite filter sand. And the field down back, which is not really a field but a wasteland formerly a logging yard run by the previous owner. It is starting to be reclaimed by nature with a variety of grasses and clumps of sweetfern, but needs some TLC. My vision is a lavender labyrinth although it might be a nice spot for an orchard, protected from winds and quite hot in the summer.
And the beaver pond, oh the beaver pond, far bigger than I realized, remnants of the original pond’s berm barely visible, more like an island, but the first of at least three dams quite visible, as well as the fine lodge. Looking at photos later one can see that the pond now traverses almost the entire width of the property, cutting us off from the back acreage.
It is simply one more thing we don’t have time for and is at a stage now that would require either major excavating equipment to destroy, or in my husband’s latest notion, the converting of the woods between our field and the pond, into a cleared pasture, effectively robbing the critter of his food supply, the trees on the north side of the pond being perhaps too large for his liking. Then, the theory goes, he would, by his own volition, pack his bags and leave, taking his toothy little family with him.
But there are enough chores to keep us busy for the time being, so perhaps he will winter with us one more season.
And after the beautiful flights we enjoyed, (oh, did I mention the bald eagle twirling at eye level as we banked for our landing?), and breakfast at a local diner, it was home for more end-of-season duties. Edward’s afternoon was spent on construction of a very substantial woodshed which he started last fall, mine on picking still more of the delightful plum-shaped yellow grape tomatoes which insist on producing still, another mixing-bowl full yesteday. Buckets have already been consumed in salads and sauces and prepared for the freezer. And I plucked some twenty or more acorn squash, some a bit small but ripe. We had so much rain in early August I think some things slowed their growth and then I stopped watering as it had been so wet for so long.
The lack of a second bloom on the Munstead and English lavenders suggest that is indeed the case, it got so cool and wet for about three weeks they failed to produce new spikes after the July harvest and pruning, unlike last year. Last summer I got a fairly substantial harvest of buds, albeit on more stunted and irregular spikes, not good for bundles but fine for any use of the dried buds.
I spent the rest of the afternoon doing some more pruning, starting on the Grosso which didn’t bloom until late July and also seemed stalled by the August wet spell. I have held off pruning them as they have been sending up sporadic spikes still but I think the best are done. There is no expectation of a second bloom with these under even optimal conditions, as far as I know. So I must clip them into tidy tight shapes before the hard frosts come.
A gang of five or six Barred Plymouth Rock chickens gathered around me while I crouched and cut between the beds, some looking simply curious and enjoying the company, others apparently hoping that I was digging, turning up the odd earthworm for them. “No worms today, “ I told them.
I also spent considerable time with a chicken I call Gimpy, please excuse me if it is not a very “pc” name, I do alternately address him with Big Guy and My Handsome Boy. Chicken rearing has been more challenging than I expected, to say the least. They say, “never name your chickens,” but somehow it is inevitable as some of them develop notable personalities, and unfortunately this summer the most notable ones have all been those who have succumbed to the odd condition and died, like Sleepy whom we thought was merely, and amusingly, narcoleptic, as it lasted for a couple months until he suddenly lost control of his motor functions and died. Then Peeper, a noisy and talkative little Barred Rock, who was always out front leading the pack of his contemporaries, finding the most worms and full of energy. He (or possibly she) regrettably recently died from what we now believe was likely Marek’s disease, as did a few others, one at a time, after being quite healthy. It has no known cure.
In Gimpy’s case, he is a most handsome Barred Rock rooster, beautiful bright red comb and wattles and white and dark grey barred feathers, beautiful feathers, the ones around the neck falling like a fringed collar. Gimpy somehow had an accident, a fall from a roost perhaps, dislocating his hip forcing his left leg out straight behind him. It did not look like something we could rectify, and as he did not show obvious signs of pain, surprisingly, maintaining energy and an appetite, we have kept him in segregated quarters, with his own side yard off the coop, so he would not be assaulted by the merciless pecking order of other healthier roosters.
Gimpy has been stoic, and when we have had to separate other chickens who later died from their illnesses, he has been a fine and quiet companion, the others often sleeping pressed up to Gimpy’s larger size. Being slightly older he may have been immune to Marek’s or whatever has taken them, but his time seems to be rapidly coming as now the muscles of his good leg can no longer propel him around the pen. He did remarkanbly well for a while, even getting stronger for a while, hopping on one leg to get in and out of the coop on his own, over into some shade or closer to the feed.
But he is having more trouble and cannot now balance well enough to feed himself and keep his head from nose-diving into the earth when he tries to move around. So yesterday I held him a few times to prop him up so he could eat and drink, as did Edward this morning. He can’t manoeuver himself in the coop anymore or get out into his yard so we pick him up and place him in or out as needed. And we’ve been taking him for “walks” to see the sights on the farm, cuddling him close to our chests. Apparently exercise is important to chickens, as their gizzard in which the grit they ingest goes, serves to grind up their food, but it requires their movement to work properly. As Gimpy slows down and has lost the ability to even hop or drag himself around, he cannot properly process what food he does eat.
So regrettably and inevitably perhaps, his days may be limited and we are contemplating putting him down soon so he won’t have to die from wasting or starving. As he can no longer clean himself or tuck his foot under him, it would be a problem as the cold weather comes too for him to keep warm enough. He will not be a meat bird.
After teary prayers were said for Gimpy last night, on the eve of the autumnal equinox, we did what may be one of the pardoxes of farm life, at least for a newbie like me. After pouring out my love and nurturing on a lame chicken for the day, we sat down to a meal of the leftovers from Saturday’s dinner with our pilot friend, ratatouille made with our own tomatoes, peppers, summer squash, eggplant, and herbs, mashed potatoes dug up that afternoon, and our first roast chicken, one of the Rhode Island Red roosters that we killed ourselves, with grateful ceremony and the smell of lavender and sage smudge in the air, on Saturday morning.
While those roosters were not yet fully grown, we needed to “do” some to allow the management of the other chickens within the structures we have and to permit the hens to lay. With the quantity of unsexed chicks we got in the spring we are “rooster heavy”, okay in one sense since we planned to consume some of the flock as meat birds, but difficult to get them to full grown first, due to their aggression towards the other roosters and hassling the hens who have been trying to lay.
Our birds have been raised completely free-range, they have had the run of the field all summer, returning to their coop at night on their own to roost quietly together. But lately we have had to build an outdoor run for certain roosters, trying to determine who’s picking on whom in order to separate them successfully. One red rooster has run to the woods daily for the past week to get away from another, so now he gets “room service” down there with food and water rations delivered 200 feet away until he voluntarily returns to roost at night.
There’s officially just less than an hour left of Summer now, Autumn due to arrive I believe at 12:44 ADT. I think I will go down to the coop and check on Gimpy, help him feed and drink, put him out in his yard leaning against the hay bale. Maybe we’ll have a walk and a cuddle before I go to town. My Handsome Boy.
]]>Maybe Spring really is here. April showers have arrived, mainly drizzly and foggy this weekend but no snow as was originally forecast. The earth is releasing its aromas of the winter’s decay as the frost comes out of the ground and the land is wet and muddy, really too soft to work around the gardens yet. I did a little pruning of the crabapples and forsythia the other day when it was warm but will wait until it is drier again to do more. I debate about uncovering the lavender, afraid of late snow or ice storms but worried about them becoming too soggy and rotting if I leave the mulch on too long.
The birds are singing Spring songs, I guess it is the arrival of the robins in greater numbers that makes the difference to the sounds outside on this quiet morning. Everyone is singing and chatting away. Likely some of them are saying, “Why haven’t you filled the birdfeeder missus?” They’ll have to make do with the new suet cakes until we go to town this afternoon for more seeds. Under the high-pitched chirps and warbles and the odd shriek of a bluejay is the gently haunting “wo-ooo, woo woo woo” of the mourning dove, which I used to think was an owl.
There have been a few delighful bird encounters this week. First was my sighting of a red-winged blackbird, right on the feeder. I don’t think I had ever seen one before. It had me humming David Francey’s tune all day, “Red Winged Blackbird”:
.....He'll be there beside the river,
When Winter finally breaks its bones,
He'll be king among the rushes,
He'll be master of his home.
Thought I heard a red winged blackbird,
Red winged blackbird down my road.
Thought I heard a red winged blackbird,
Red winged blackbird down my road.
Safe as Moses in the rushes,
Builds his home on the river wide,
Every time I hear him singing,
Makes me feel like Spring inside.
......
And I don’t know which song is the red-winged blackbird but perhaps that’s one that is sounding like Spring today.
The next day another sighting that was new to me, a merlin, right outside the dining room window in the crabapple, identified by Edward. It was beautiful, a type of small falcon, but not necessarily good to see in the crabapple as that is where many small birds come to feed and merlins are known to eat small birds and even larger ones like robins. This one was either full or tired as I saw him half-heartedly hop over towards a chickadee and then take off.
Two days ago there was a loud “thunk” on same the window, and alas a sweet chickadee had hit the glass and fallen to the ground. I went outside to check it out, for if it was merely stunned it might’ve fallen prey to Charlie, one of the cats, if not to the merlin if he was still around. The bird was awake and blinking but in a bit of shock.
I have heard mixed advice on picking up birds, one says not to as it shuts down their natural fight or flight response and they don’t recover. Another says if they are in shock to keep them warm until they recover, as getting chilled could kill them. I picked him up, his neck wasn’t broken, his right foot seemed unresponsive but finally opened up. There was some warm afternoon sun hitting the tree by the suet cake so I eventually placed him on a branch and he took hold. Another chickadee came and went a couple times but this little guy didn’t budge. Then after a while another bird rushed in and he hopped over to another branch. Yay! Looking good.
He rested a while longer and a redpoll came and sat on the same branch a mere 7 or 8 inches away. I went inside and watched from the window as the redpoll sat there, repeatedly looking at the chickadee as if to say, “hey buddy, y’all right? You gonna be okay?” He really looked concerned or at least curious. And shortly afterwards the chickadee took flight to another tree nearby, found his way to the other suet cake and had a good feed. Hooray, another patient recovered!
This did not quite match my excitement last June as I captured a ruby-throated hummingbird who had flown in an open door on the verandah and worn itself out trying to get out a high window. I climbed a ladder and managed to pick him off the sill of the window above our vaulted-ceiling living area. I took him outside, it was drizzly but warm. He didn’t want to leave or perhaps his flight or fight system had shut down. I tried to get him to climb onto a branch but he wouldn’t budge.
After walking around holding him so lightly in my hand for about 15 minutes, feeling the life force in his tiny body, I thought to take him to the rhododendron which was in full fantastic bloom, bursting with hot pink blossoms. Surely that would get him excited! And it did. He sat in my open palm and as I moved him close to the blossoms he finally poked his beak into a bloom and drank. Knowing how they moved around like bees I took him to another and then another until he had sipped from eight blossoms, all while sitting still in my open hand. And then he was refreshed and he flew, first only to a couple adjacent flowers inches away and then zoom, he was gone! As I write I can still feel that little life force in my hands and heart.
I have even fallen in love with the large crows and their funny ways, how they gather on the power lines in the morning in a clutch of about 5, make their way over to the rough-hewn trellis that carries the wisteria vine in the garden where they seem to have a good chat, and later, when they think no-one’s looking, the odd one or two will sidle over to the ground beneath the seed feeder to see what they can scrounge. They are more timid than the small birds, taking off to the trees if they even see me at the window whereas the chickadees wait inches away as the feeder gets refilled. The crows also like to poke around the compost bins after the raccoons have managed to get their sneaky little hands between the planks of wood to haul out some delightful scraps in the night.
And just moments before this writing as I stood on the verandah listening to the bird songs, a nuthatch zoomed right through the porch, inches in front of my chest such that I could feel his energy as he flew past. Oh how they lift my spirit! Birds are such a gift, a real symbol of Divine presence at work, full of beauty both visual and audible and bright spirit, light energy that can’t help but lift one’s heart. Thank you!!
At the end of last summer I was thwarted in my effort to keep harvesting the chamomile flowers by the appearance of aphids clinging to the underside of the blossoms. My hand-picking method was labour-intensive enough without having to now turn over every head to check for aphids before picking. I finally gave up, wasting much that could have made good tea or added that soft, almost orange-y scent to my dream pillows.
Another sign of spring, a full two weeks before the Equinox, are the big ruts left in the softening driveway by the lumber truck which came yesterday to deliver wood for the new chicken coop. That’s right, there ain’t nobody here but us chickens....and cats and me and Edward and all the resident wildlife who might make free-ranging more of a challenge than I want. We have foxes, skunks, raccoons, red-tailed hawks, osprey, bald eagles. Reputedly the raccoons and skunks are only a threat at night at which time, I have been assured, the chickies will be roosting comfortably in their new digs. But foxes and hawks have appeared here in mid-day, prime chicken-scratchin’ time.
Twice this week alone I have glanced out to see the red-tailed hawk flapping to hover low over the lawn near the lavender beds, no doubt spotting mice who have over-wintered under the straw mulch which is now free of snow. ( I am hoping they have not chewed the young plants to the nubs as happened to some last year.) Charlie, my smallish young cat, has been happily sniffing out the same area, bringing back a juicy vole last week in fact. But my concern is not for the voles but for Charlie himself, a tender morsel for a hungry hawk I fear, although the huge bald-eagle who came by last week looms as a bigger threat.
When I see the raptors and the cats are outside I fly out the door in a flap of my own, raising my hand and reminding them, “We have a deal! No cats!!” And now it will be re-written to be, “No cats and no chickens!!” I try to persuade Charlie to leave the rodents and birds alone so there will not be some karmic lesson coming back to haunt him in this lifetime. I invite the hawks to check out the rabbits in the woods. Too bad they aren’t big enough to take on the massive beaver who’s been wreaking havoc down there at the pond.
And speaking of hunting, what escapade was it that somehow led Charlie to the roof of Third Eye Gallery this morning? I glanced out from upstairs to find the cat on the one-storey addition. I do not know how he got there and from his nervous demeanor as he came in through the bathroom window, it appeared that neither did he. I expect it involved climbing the willow chair on the patio and from there up onto the new fence around our courtyard area and up along the top edge of the fence to make a final leap for the eavestrough, the only explanation seeming to be that he'd been in hot pursuit of a squirrel. Now I have another place to look when Charlie doesn't appear at the door when called.
And where else is spring? It’s in the itch to get into the garden, the urge to purge the accumulated stuff from the past year that is slowing the household chi, the desire to clean windows. It is in my list for Richter’s Herb Farm of the flats of lavender plugs I plan to order, as soon as we cobble together some kind of small greenhouse to keep them in until they are big enough and it is warm enough to plant out. Indeed, it is in the fact that there are three farm-related expos going on in the maritimes this weekend. We’re heading to the inaugural Nova Scotia Small Farm Expo tonight as it happens. Whoda thunk I’d ever be doing this? And for Edward’s part, having left the family farm at 18, whoda thunk he’d being getting back to this?
And alas, spring is in the details that I must turn to now, as I continue dredging the seemingly bottomless vat of receipts and bank statements that need to be organized for the bookkeeper so that we can prepare for that other inevitable sign of spring, tax time.
]]>I spent a good part of today sitting at the dining table, enjoying the view through the windows while sifting through old infrared negatives of mine, pulling out some to reprint for hand-colouring, images which had sold last summer. This is my season to do any darkroom work I wish to stockpile before the gallery opens for the summer and the farm delightfully takes over my days. I just received my supply of new paper for colouring, I chose Kentmere in a fine-grained semi-matte surface so I am looking forward to seeing whether it will do as well as the Agfa I used to use. I tried some Forte Warmtone recently and while the surface seems good for colouring, I decided I would like more neutral whites. I knew that if I sepia toned it it would be much too yellow.
But just as I get excited to print on the new paper I am met with news of another death-knell for film-based photography. I received an email this afternoon from my friend at the local photo store advising that Polaroid has announced the discontinuance of instant films although it may be licensing production of some to other firms for "diehards" like myself. However I got the impression that that may be just the consumer-level 600 film as they mention stopping production of large-format film in the next quarter.
This comes just two months after I heard that one of my other staples, Kodak High Speed Infrared film, was being discontinued in December 2007. I have tried to order some to throw in the freezer but it was out of stock, although apparently there is still some available. So every few months my favourite media are becoming more rare...first Agfa papers and chemistry, then SX-70 Polaroid, then infrared, now all Polaroid instant film. And what is available is getting expensive. I guess my days are numbered until I am forced to go all digital or learn to paint!
The only thing I can hope for is a sudden increase in the value of the work I have in stock here at Third Eye Gallery. Hmmmm......
]]>Last week in my post I was talking about my resistance to getting down to the darkroom and knowing that once there in the flow I would wonder what had taken me so long. Well, I was right about that, although it did take me an extra day to begin printing. I was taking my time, cleaning the print washer, mixing chemistry, some new hypo clearing agent for washing the prints and more selenium toning solution. That doesn’t really take very long but I did manage to procrastinate for quite some time waiting for my water to come to precisely the right temperature for mixing the hypo clear....I had it too warm then had to cool it down. Excuses, excuses.
While waiting, but out of earshot of the phone, I had a call from a close friend, who left me a message saying her mother was in hospital, had taken a turn for the worse and was now nearing the end and removed from any life supporting measures. Although she had had a number of ailments for some time, this sudden deterioration in her condition was a sad surprise. So part of my delay on the day I last wrote was in waiting for a reply to my reply to that missed phone call as I was anxious to comfort my dear friend. As it turned out, her mother passed away three days later and we will be attending the funeral this week.
While I had met my friend’s mother on a number of occasions I did not know her well but for stories of her love for things pretty and pink, very much a genteel lady. This is no doubt a very difficult time for my friend as she is an only child and this is her first parent to pass. Her mother’s last few days in the hospital brought to mind my own’s parents’ deaths some years ago, two years apart, first my mom then dad, each one in the hospital for a few days at the end. They were difficult deaths, not the tv kind where everyone gathers around, has some nice sentimental words to share, good-byes are said and hands held as they pass. The death of a parent, whatever your feelings and relationship with that parent, seems a complex emotional process, not just them leaving your life but the things said or left unsaid, the manner of how they pass and the state they are in at the end. It can be very painful to witness.
It is also the first anniversary, give or take a few days, of the death of one of my brothers, so this week’s funeral will be only a day or so from the anniversary of his funeral. His ashes sit on my windowsill with a view of the garden, awaiting this summer when my other brothers have assured me they will come to Nova Scotia to witness his burial next to our parents. I brought him home with me from Montreal last January 26th.
And yet in this frigid January weather, today well below our South Shore normal for this date, with a minus 25C windchill and drifting snow, there is still hope of new life, creation and springtime. When I finally made it to the darkroom to print last Friday I rediscovered that, once in the flow after remembering how to work the 40 year-old Beseler enlarger, a darkroom can be quite womb-like and comforting. It is small (or at least, mine is), warm, dark, humid and lit only by a red safelight while developing. And at the end of the process you are giving birth to your creativity, bearing new images out of the liquids. Certainly for me, being childless, my acts of creation in the darkroom or the garden are my way of giving birth to something that originates within then emerges in the outside world for all to see.
And then to inspire more hope for new life to come, we were surprised this morning to see a pair of handsome red foxes, trotting across the field behind the house in the breaking dawn’s glow. One of them was actually black (but which I learned through the internet was still a red fox although colloquially called a silver fox....go figure), and it was likely this pair were in breeding mode as their time is between late December and mid-March. We can surmise that somewhere in the surrounding 4 to 8 square kilometers there is likely a den being established for potential pups to be born in the spring.
So the symbols and signs of new birth, new creations and the reminders of the universe’s regenerative nature can appear to us in sometimes surprising places and serendipitously at times when one most needs the hope that the cycle of life does indeed continue. I give thanks for that today.
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It is a blustery day here on We Are One Farm, minus 5 C with a wind whipping around our hilltop home, whistling through cracks in window frames, sucking up smoke from the wood stove making it seem much colder. And still Charlie whines to get out, to which I acquiesce, once again, and he dives under the porch for cover. So I’ll keep watch for a while for his return to the verandah door, giving me one last reprieve before I “suck it up” and enter the darkroom.
Yep, I’m a photographer, I love the moments I am out seeing things, exploring new places, being with people, being still in the garden and then I love the time when I have created a body of work that is cohesive and meaningful to me and sometimes beautiful. But some of the in-between stuff, mainly the descent to a basement room to spend the day in the dark with chemicals, I find very difficult. It is not so bad once I have made the commitment and am in the room with everything mixed and poured and laid out, but actually getting me down the stairs is a struggle.
It’s partly just sequestering myself in a dark, cramped space that I’m not crazy about, but partly my fear that once I start to print I won’t create anything worth showing. And when I have been out of the darkroom for over a year, as I have been now, I resist because I think I’ll have forgotten how to do everything, especially with the ancient but new-to-me enlarger that I purchased when I moved here which was quite different from my old one. I have used it, in the autumn of 2006, to print Earth Air Water Spirit, but it has been idle since. And my print washer has been sitting out in the laundry room collecting dust so I must first wash that out.
The wind is really wheezing now and there is Charlie at the door. My reprieve is over, no more excuses today. I have work to do, prints I owe my models to start with. Laws of physics which I never studied say, I’ve heard, that a body in motion tends to stay in motion, a body at rest tends to stay at rest. Once I am back in the flow I know I will wonder what took me so long to start again.
Winter came long before the Solstice this year but I am starting to embrace it like never before. I dislike winter sports and being cold but with my new Sorel felt-lined boots and some manly mitts I am prepared this year to embrace winter, indoors and out. Perhaps it was the intensity of the summer's projects that has me looking forward to winter this year. As a steward of our land all spring, summer and fall, engaged with the plants and animals, I am wanting to continue our relationship in whatever way I can as winter passes. I am hoping to be newly inspired to photograph the winter and immerse myself in it as I did in the summer garden this year.
I am already enjoying the changing landscape as the snow comes and goes, changes form from blowing, fluffy flakes filtering the views like a greyed snowglobe, to a crisp, smooth sheet on the ground, pristine and sparkling, demanding sunglasses for daytime and bouncing the light of last night's full moon around, spotlighting the euonymous shrubs for the deer mother and baby to chew on in the middle of the night.
I am delighting in the changing parade of birds, the redpolls I have noticed for the first time at the feeders and the rosy pine grosbeaks seen for the first time in the crabapple, just part of a succession of fruit eaters like the cedar waxwings and evening grosbeaks who have been providing the outdoor decoration of the trees for the past few weeks.
We cut our solstice tree in the woods, not far from the formerly modest pond that the resident beavers have overflowed and commanded as their own rural development. They have left two barricades across the road before the pond, 20-30 foot trees, each at least 8" in diameter, felled and stripped of small limbs. We walked across the ice to their white-covered lodge, following the deer tracks which led us to the top to the holes in the snow that vent their warm breath. How to live compatibly with these ingenious little critters is something to ponder for the winter as they gather strength to mow down more trees, flood more acres of the woods and keep the back of our property inaccessible due to their 100-foot-long dam.
And I am looking forward to the winter as a time for rest and introspection, reading and pondering, the time to reflect on what we have accomplished in the past year and incubate plans for the next season. Physically it is a time for enjoying the cosiness of the fire, shorter days and the appetite for different foods.
Speaking of different foods, the tourtiere has just come out of the oven, Mme. Jehane Benoit's recipe as scribbled by my mother who made it for Christmas Eves of the past, a nod to our Quebec upbringing and my father's Quebec heritage although we were/are Anglophones. Tourtiere and the almond cake recipe are one way of keeping my mother and family in my heart when some have passed on and others are at a distance.
That's what Christmas is all about Charlie Brown....isn't it? While the traditions of Christmases past still call to me with a longing for the familiar, the family, the need for connection to my tribe of origin, I am indeed a neo pagan I guess. Tonight, and on the Solstice of the past week I am celebrating more my connection with nature, living in the country closer to the land that I ever have, and celebrating the changing of seasons, light, weather and wildlife and the seasons of the psyche as our time of activity, growth and harvest turn to the time of introspection, hibernation, incubation to prepare for the next cycle.
The light is returning, in the daylight lengthening, in the awareness growing. It is a time whether Christian or pagan or otherwise to celebrate, at least here in the northern hemisphere, the opportunity to rest and renew, to celebrate the opportunity every day to create anew, and welcome the light that shines both without and within each of us.
Happy Solstice, Merry Christmas or whatever tradition helps your own light shine.
]]>Those pictures are also an indication that I did not get far from the farm this summer to shoot anything else as the work here was all-consuming. This is the year for planting the seeds, literally and figuratively, for things to come in the future, the business of the gallery shop and the lavender and herbal products of We Are One Farm. It is a labour of love based on a vision of creating something both beautiful and healing, in the products we create from what we grow, in the images I print, and in the place itself as a special and lovely corner of the world.
I hope you also like the changes to my web site, a long time coming due to my own procrastination and inability to find the right person to do a major update and overhaul. I think Jay Gilmore of SmashingRed Web & Marketing has done a great job, making it easy to navigate and view the images. There are a few images missing from my Polaroid and Hand-coloured galleries that I need to find and a few new ones to create for the About Me page, so I expect we'll have some tweaking here an there for a bit, but otherwise I guess we're up and running! Thanks Jay!!
Now if you can only shut me up now that I have a blog... We may have opened a can of worms here as I have a lot of thoughts these days needing expression, most of which are entirely unrelated to photography, but perhaps we'll save those for some of the snow days through this winter when I have time to wax philosophical.
And winter seems to have come early here in Lunenburg County, so it shouldn't be long 'til my next post.
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