This last Saturday my brother-in-law, Lynn, helped me put my boat in storage. On our drive through the countryside, he asked me if I noticed the lack of orange clad hunters in the fields. We recalled that years ago when the deer hunting season started, there were vehicles alongside the road and hunters walking the fields, and we did not see anyone clad in orange on this day.
Once the farmers that existed on 200-300 acres grew older and realized that they could no longer make a living with what they had, they had to make a choice. Many of them initially took factory jobs to supplement their income and they rented out acres of land that they no longer had the time to farm. As the small farmers eased out of farming, the big farmers grew larger and our habitat started to disappear. I have noticed that fence lines are disappearing, and woodlands are also less abundant than in years gone by. Most farmers are very conservation conscious, but when their farms are passed down, a lot of their children have lives of their own and don’t want to farm. When this happens, the farms are sold off and it gets to be more about the dollar and less about conserving our outdoors heritage.
When I was a kid, if you ventured onto someone’s land, they ignored it as long as you didn’t do anything destructive. We learned at a young age never to point a gun at someone or to shoot at anything with a building, property or person standing behind it. We didn’t have any gun safety classes, but we did have to use something called common sense.
In looking back, I knew many folks that had small acreages (180-250 acres) that had everything to be self-sufficient. I had a cousin who lived west of Emmons, and his mom and dad had about 200 acres, and I believe they planted about 180 acres of that. They had pastureland for their dairy cattle and also raised a few hogs. You could hardly walk around the yard without encountering the dreaded Banty Rooster. They also had geese, and a gander that would hiss and flap its wings if you got too close. They even had some peacocks, which were beautiful birds; I could never figure out why they had them because I felt that surely they weren’t for laying eggs or for table fare, but they certainly were pretty.
I remember when my cousin, Richard’s Dad, Hartwick, would milk the cows. After separating the milk, he would take the filter out of the separator and throw it on the milkhouse floor. The cats would appear out of nowhere and fight over it. Then Richard and I would slop the hogs using a mix of feed and the wash water from the milking machine. One day his dad told Richard and me that we could clean out the calf pen. After scraping the floor for some time, I told Richard that I liked doing this and he said, “You wouldn’t if you had to do it all the time like I do.” -Point taken.
I still frequented the farm place when I got a little bit older. One year we had to help bale hay, and as a treat we got to stack the bales in the hay loft. That was a hot job and the chaff from the hay seemed to find its way into every crevice on my body. I think that every kid should, at one time or another, have the opportunity to bale hay. It was hard work, but it also gave me a feeling of self-satisfaction. As a teen, I baled hay with my uncle Orville and also my dad. It was hard work and fun work all at the same time, and it gave me a sense of self-worth.
Until next time: The winter that we have all been anxiously awaiting will soon be upon us. Remember that venturing out on thin ice can be dangerous. They say that early ice is the best for fishing, but that doesn’t mean venturing out on two or three inches of ice. A four-inch minimum should be your guide for walking on the ice. No fish is worth your life, so be aware when venturing out.
I want to wish a Happy Veterans Day to all of our Veterans! Please show your support for the troops that are serving our country today. These servicemen and women are making that sacrifice, so that we may have the many freedoms that we enjoy today.