Visitors to our farm have commented on how peaceful the place is and how they would love to have a farm like ours. We're thankful that they can feel the peace, but they have no idea about the blood, sweat, and tears it's taken to run such an operation.
These romantics don't see the blood shed by coyotes taking out a lamb in the middle of the night, or the tears when a calf dies and you were unable to save it, or the long days spent working in the fields with wind blowing dirt in your eyes and the dust clinging to your sweaty face. It's hard work with the reward looking miniscule at times. But we wouldn't trade it for anything else because we love to do this. We're "bloomin' idiots."
Let's look at some of the facts for what it takes to get that food to your fork.
Vegetables have a relatively quick turnaround from seed to harvest – usually just one growing season. Still, it does take years to amend the soil to get it to the condition where it produces exceptionally tasty vegetables that are highly nutritious.
Strawberries are a different story. The variety we have requires planting into well-worked rich soil the first year, weeding, watering, and fertilizing that season without any fruit being produced. The second year involves more weeding, watering, fertilizing, and spreading straw between the rows in preparation for a mediocre crop of berries. The same work is required in the third and fourth years, until finally, hopefully, we have an abundance of strawberries. But now that there are berries, they need to be picked at their peak of ripeness, no rushing and no delay. All extremely labour intensive.
And remember the weather, something over which we have no control. We've suffered heavy rainfalls and hailstorms that have reduced our crops to almost worthlessness after expending all that blood, sweat, and tears over the years. Imagine spending thousands of hours and dollars of expense working for someone and not getting your pay. Now what value do you put on those strawberries?
Eggs seem to be a simple commodity to produce. Are they really? This past year we've had a shortage of eggs for a variety of reasons: the laying hens we purchased from the hatchery had some kind of genetic weakness and died prematurely; the other hens were getting older, so their eggs weren't suitable for sale; and we had an increase in customers with whom to share the few eggs we did get.
To help alleviate such challenges, Martin decided to raise our own layers, which are healthier, will live longer, and lay better eggs. Fertilized eggs hatch after 3 weeks in the incubator. From chick to laying hen is another 6 to 7 months. Of the eggs that hatch, half are pullets, which become layers and half are cockerels, which will be soup chickens when they're big enough.
You need to hatch a lot of chickens to get enough laying hens and it takes about 8 months before you get any eggs from them. In the meantime, being a surrogate mother hen to a few hundred chicks is no easy job. Enjoy those eggs when you get them and appreciate the idyllic idiots who serve you.
Broiler chickens are the fast food of the farm – fast in the sense that it only takes 9 weeks from chick to processing. The chicks are purchased from a hatchery, set up in a comfy place to grow, put out on pasture at 5 or 6 weeks old depending on how warm the weather is, and processed at 9 weeks.
But wait! Is it all that easy? How then could we excel at being heroic idiots?
Much of the work to raise these guys takes place before they arrive on the farm as chicks. Special pens are built with appropriate structures to keep them at a consistently warm temperature with lots of nutritionally balanced organic feed and fresh water.
More structures are built for when the birds are ready to go out to the pasture. These units keep them shaded when it's too sunny and hot, warm on cool evenings, and safe from predators, like coyotes, foxes, hawks, owls, and stray dogs. They need to be light enough for one person to move once or twice a day by hand, so the chickens have fresh pasture and an abundance of bugs.
Because broilers grow quickly, they consume copious amounts of feed, which means regularly mixing the appropriate proportions of grains to meet their needs.
Raising lamb from field to fork takes about a year. A ewe, bred in the fall, will give birth to lambs in the spring. A healthy lamb can be processed at about 5 months old. The birthing period for sheep is the most labour intensive because they need to be watched nearly 24/7 during that month. Most ewes give birth without much ado, but there are always agonizing situations when you lose a lamb or both ewe and lamb. It can be heartbreaking.
The rest of the summer tends to be uneventful as the sheep are moved regularly from one green pasture to the next. Now that we have Harriett, predators keep their distance and the sheep are safe. And Harriett needs loving care, too, of course.
Getting beef from field to fork is a much longer process and a serious investment. A cow must be at least two years old before she can have a calf. That calf is raised for about 10 months with its mother until she's close to having her next calf. Then, it's another 20 months before it is ready for processing. During these years, you've fed these animals hay in the winter, moved them regularly to fresh pasture in the summer, watched for any issues like lameness, insects, digestive issues, and generally keeping them healthy and happy.
Raising beef may not be the most labour intensive, but it does take the longest before you see any returns.
Farming isn't for the faint. You gotta love doing it if you want to be a bona fide idiot. Welcome to our blood bought, sweat soaked, tear stained haven.
Seriously, we ARE here because we know it's good for us and everyone involved. And there IS great reward and satisfaction in many aspects. We just like to inform and remind you that these rewards come with a commensurate price.
