2012: A Year in Review

Phil, Isaiah, and I looked at the retrospectives from the last three years this morning. What changes have come to Spring Forth this year?

The unedited view of our farm, from a point just below the blue barn, standing on the driveway.



In animals: I killed my worms. In bovines, we had two calves born. One calf died and so did our bull, so we hold at 14 cows, no meat. We sold all sheep. Phil misses them. Our duck pets were killed, as were the three baby ducklings new to the farm. In chickens, we lost all but but rogue white Leghorn, and 73 Hollands chicks and births. The other 27 birds are in the freezer, and we should probably compost their feathers one of these days. We plan to do birds again next year.

The guinea survived another year. His little wheetles have become a farm constant, as he is now the oldest survivor on our farm, dating to the first October we lived here. Happy third birthday to him.

Our single beloved Tiger cat was replaced by lousy mouser but pretty and unannoying Cadbury.

And good mouser but incredibly annoying Mr. Bigglesworth. We have learned to exit and enter the motor home rapidly in order to keep the cat out. When he gets inside, we've learned to wrap him in a towel to get him out without scratches. I like that he growls when we feed him a mouse.

Bitsy gave birth to nine puppies in February, sadly adding nine unwanted dogs to the over-saturated puppy rolls. (We're sufficiently embarrassed.) We kept Shadow, Phil's friendly companion. That was the largest non-food livestock expense this year: to fix two girls was almost as much as buying a new calf. But the peace of mind that comes with no more unwanted offspring: maybe not priceless, but cause for thanksgiving.

The bees were the best livestock success this year: we tripled our hives! They are hibernating now. I hope to add supers early this coming year in order to actually get some honey. I think I would rather have honey than more hives—new swarms would require buying new hives, and I think I'd rather see a return on investment before I put more money into them.

In major projects, Phil finished the big barn. Almost not a day goes by that Phil doesn't rejoice. Instead of needing hay bales delivered a couple of times a week, we can get hay delivered once or twice a month, which is less stress, and much nicer for our supplier, too.

The last few days, Phil has been assembling a work space for himself. What a relief for him. Maybe our equipment will last longer, too, being under shelter.

And the driveway is cleaned off now, except for one batch of fencing logs. When those are either installed or put in the barn, we'll have an open driveway! So much better than the construction zone we had for a year and more.

Phil also put in cross-fencing on the neighbor's land. That was a bigger project than he expected, but it is nice to have much less to manage when moving the cows.

And we've started (and temporarily stalled) on the underground storage structure. Phil goes back to the doctor in a few days: I'm guessing even these three weeks of rest won't prove enough, as he still gasps when people tap it. He can touch his palm again, but not straighten it up all the way.

As for growing, there was nothing dramatic like 400 trees or 10,000 daffodil bulbs. But in retrospect, I did a good number of things, mostly on the cheap.

Bit by the permaculture bug, I ordered tree seeds and started what I could. My homemade potting soil mix did not offer great success: next year I'll buy potting soil, and not fiddle with making my own. (Penny-wise, pound foolish. The vegetables I started did almost nothing.) But I had 24 or so pawpaws come up, about 40 jujubes come up, six mulberries grow several feet high.

Three little pineapple guavas.

And I had about 35 osage orange seeds sprout, root, and get transplanted along the edge of the property. More fruits are fermenting now: next year, I'll be sure to catch them earlier, before they root through the bottom of my tree pots.

I ordered ten elderberries, full of hope. I had four die in my poor potting soil, but the other six survived. I hope to multiply them next year. I love elderberry syrup!

I ordered 200 blueberries. They haven't thrived, but most of them have stayed alive.

I planted 100 comfrey plants in the orchard. Twenty died, but I replaced them and extended the planting. I'm hoping to extend this next year, to have more dynamic accumulators in the orchard.

I planted the 600 comfrey bits in the greenhouse, then began filling in the spaces that didn't take. I didn't quite finish before the year ended, but I am so pleased to have that bit of good growth, multiplying and making new plants for next year.

The blackberries next to the comfrey were a disaster. Well, they grew beautifully, but they didn't set fruit, and the weeds took them over. I've decided I don't like blackberries in my greenhouse. (I plan to pull them this coming year, and grow vegetables for us. When we had the failed market garden, I got out of the habit of buying vegetables, and I look back now and realize how much I've missed the range of colors and tastes of vegetables.)

The peaches, transplanted to contour, had a rough year. One or two are beautiful, full of buds.

Strong in trunk, tall in stature, waiting for the coming of spring.

More, perhaps, were chewed by cows (or chickens), knocked about and broken. Are the peaches really happy here? Perhaps we'll pull them and put in more apples. We're talking.

We harvested some delicious plums, and a bushel or so of tasty apples. The apple trees themselves grew. I can't touch the tops of them all now.

We pruned in the spring, and I think the shapes look more properly "apple."

The understory, in some rows, is a lush orchard grass.

The trunks of the trees nearest the road are astonishingly fat.

The trunks down slope remain slender.

My moon bed was, in many ways, a disappointment. I had hoped for an orderly flower and herb garden. I did have flowers and herbs, but mostly I had weeds and more weeds. Better success next year.

I grafted 360 trees: 270 bench grafts, and 90 bud grafts. Of the bud grafts I've checked, I don't think any took. But I have probably about 200 little trees. That was the most intensive weeding I did this year. I'm not a big fan of weeding. Maybe a deep mulch would be better....

Twenty-two of those went to our former stone fruit orchard. Finally planted in a fertile circle, with a good layer of peastone at the base to keep back weeds, and a ring of daffodils and comfrey at the outer edge, we look forward to some startling growth from the apples. The cover crop, too, planted maybe six weeks late, sprouted. It's not up very high, but I'm thankful it's up.

From our window, we see a bit of green on the tips of the trees. Is it mid-winter growth?

We had the cows up in the future garlic patch, and Phil tilled for me. But I didn't plant the entire area to garlic. And without a cover crop growing, that was a waste of soil fertility. Ah, well, if you knew it all beforehand....

Phil looks back on the year with a sense of accomplishment, a feeling of progress and hope for the future. The pastures he manages improved this year. The fourteen cows that didn't die are in better condition than last year (and we hope for a good calf crop in the next couple of months).

For me, I don't know why I don't look back on the year with more joy. Writing it all down, it doesn't seem like a bad year: we learned more, and tried more. I've appreciated, this December, a chance to read, to become inspired again, to get some inspiration about what went wrong, to remember what went right.

And maybe it's okay that not every year feels like a triumph. Maybe it's enough to say God stretched me this year. And sometimes stretching hurts.