Inside this issue you will find:
My Yearly Cycle in Sheep Farming —Ulf Kintzel
Raising sheep can be a profitable way of making a living. It can as well be a complementary side business for an existing dairy, beef, or crop farm. Or it can be an additional income for somebody who has an off-farm job. I am often asked what is involved in raising sheep. In this article I would like to outline a yearly overview. This yearly cycle is based on my specific grass-fed flock and it is not universally true. Where in the year shall we start? Since this is the spring issue we might as well start with LAMBING. Lambing season is most likely the busiest season for any sheep farmer. This is the time when a lot of money can be made or lost. The percentage of raised lambs per ewe is one of the, if not the, most important economic figures in a sheep operation that raises market lambs. I let one batch lamb in March in the barn and one batch lamb in late April and early May on pasture. Because of different seasons I am able to provide market lambs for a longer time period throughout the year. A new small winter lambing season in December is planned for 2009. ...Read more
Could Horse Farming Be the Better Way After All?
—Gene Logsdon
Amish farmers like to tell a story about Henry Ford from back in the 1920s. Seems that Mr. Ford struck up a friendship with an Amish bishop in Indiana and by and by he made the bishop an offer. The Ford motor company would provide him with a new Model T every year for the rest of his life if he would only assure his Amish community that it was quite all right to buy and use Fordson tractors. Needless to say, the bishop politely declined. Needless to say, Mr. Ford, who despised farmwork according to his biographers, went right on with his campaign to discredit the draft horse and to promise economic salvation for all farmers who bought a Fordson. Guess which one is still out there plowing. I thought of that story when we were confronted recently by what was surely one of the most amazing scenes in American history: the scions of the almighty automotive industry on their knees in Washington, begging for alms. What made that scene particularly ironic was something else happening at the same time. While investment bankers and automotive billionaires begged for money, the news was all over the media about a little bank in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, that was having its best year ever. Hometown Heritage may be the only bank, certainly one of the few, with drive-by window service especially designed to accommodate horses and buggies. Some 95% of the bank’s clients are Amish. According to the news, the banker, Bill O’Brien, said he had not lost a penny in 20 years serving them. They are careful with their money, he pointed out, pay their debts on time, do not use credit cards, and do not have auto loans. They might not need bank loans at all except for buying farmland, which has reached astronomical prices, especially in Lancaster County. The bank is doing a hundred million dollars’ worth of business in farm loans every year. O’Brien knows his farmers personally, visits their farms, discusses their loans with husband and wife both—it takes both to make a successful farm business, he says. (True of any small business.) Furthermore, the bank does not bundle mortgages from Amish farms and homes to resell to the money-changers. Even if it wanted to, an obscure law prohibits bundling mortgages on homes not served by electric utilities. Amazing grace. . ...Read more
Swarming Time
—Kim Flottum
It’s spring. It doesn’t matter what the temperature outside is. It doesn’t matter if there is snow on the ground or if it’s warm enough to work up a sweat. It doesn’t matter if maples have already bloomed where you are or if it’ll be yet another month until the earliest willows show their furry blossoms. It’s spring because the sun says it is. It’s all in the photoperiod. How long is the day? How short is the night? And if you happen to be a honeybee, that photoperiod thing is important. Here’s why. Back in early January, the barely lengthening days prompted a subtle behavior change, sort of an awakening of the workers in the colony. This in turn initiated a whole series of behaviors...cleaning and building and scurrying about, but mostly, increasing the frequency, the amount, and the quality of the food they were feeding their queen. So the queen eats more and the queen eats better. What does she eat? Protein…lots and lots of protein. And that protein is pollen collected last fall, mixed with honey as a preservative and stored in the hive all winter. Or it may be beekeeper-supplied pollen. The bees don’t care where it comes from…but protein is what’s on the menu, with lots of honey to wash it down. . ...Read more
Also in this issue are:
Spring 2009
-Spring Plow Days at Malabar
- Arthur Bolduc
-Bridging the Generation Gap - David Bontrager
-My Yearly Cycle in Sheep Farming - Ulf Kintzel
-Bucking the Trend with Hogs - Kelly Klober
-Family-Scale Farming is Anything but Small Potatoes
-A Discussion-Getting Children Involved
-Fencing
Simplified
-Swarming Time - Kim Flottum
-Could Horse Farming be the Better Way? - Gene Logsdon
-Q & A Feeding the Working Draft Horse
-Growing and Preserving Dry Beans
-The Backyard Herbalist
-The Roarin' Post
-Hummingbirds: Rainbows of Light -
Sharon Lovejoy
-Companions
-The Secret Ingredient
Regular contributors to our magazine:
-Jim Van der Pol
-Wendell Berry
-Jo Ann Gardner
-Joel McNair
-Jigs Gardner
-Joanne Lehman
-Arthur
Bolduc
-Gene Logsdon
-Art Bolduc
-David
Bontrager
-Kristi Bahrenburg Janzen
-David Kline and
more