Innholdsfortegnelse for February/March 2019 i Farm and Ranch Living

Green Wagon Farm is a small-scale certified organic vegetable farm in Ada, Michigan, about 20 minutes from the center of Grand Rapids. During the summer of 2014 I joined the crew as a farmhand; over the past three seasons I have come to manage the Community Supported Agriculture program, market stand and local restaurant and wholesale relations. At the season’s height, we work 12 of the farm’s 18 acres, with a focus on season extension so we can offer organic food throughout the year. We are intent on producing beautiful food in the most ecological way. We love farming and are filled with joy to be part of the agrarian renaissance in western Michigan. Chad Anderson began Green Wagon Farm in the spring of 2010 on a small piece of…

Sometimes God puts you right where you need to be. Last fall my husband, Mike, and I were out looking for the shining colors of autumn when we came upon a young man driving a beautiful John Deere 4020. He was inching across a field near an old barn, and as we approached, both he and his momma started toward us. “I’m keeping it in the tracks of the other tractors so I won’t mess anything up,” the young man said. “I hope it’s OK.” His name was Dalton, and his mother, Amy, explained they were there taking his senior picture. She asked if we owned the place. Mike and I assured them we weren’t the owners and didn’t intend to run them off. Dalton, we learned, had been diagnosed…

WHEN THE HORSES AT THE RIVER VALLEY RANCH in Carver, Minnesota, get hungry, they head to some oversized tires. The ranch staff has found that these feeding bowls are “about as injury-proof as you make something around horses because they are relatively flexible but durable,” says Evan Buell. He starts by having the bead trimmed off one side of a tire, which is then turned inside out. Then he cuts a circle out of a piece of old belting from a quarry conveyor. (River Valley finds a lot of uses for this tough material that a nearby quarry otherwise discards.) Evan fits the circle in the bottom of the tire “bowl,” drills holes through both pieces and secures them with carriage bolts with plenty of washers on each side. “At…

LOOKING FOR YOUR STORIES! Do you have a story about feeding work crews on a ranch or farm? If you were part of a ranch team, do you fondly recall meals together after a roundup? Can you tell any humorous tales of large meals on the farm with extended family? We’d love to read them. Go to farmandranchliving.com/submit to share your memories. AMERICAN GOATHIC Our Nigerian dwarf goats, Princess Leia and Luke Skywalker, decided to pose in an American Gothic photo board, re-created by local artist Michelle Lamb, that we have on our family farm. I had to snap a photo! KATIE DONALDSON HACKETTSTOWN, NEW JERSEY LIVING THE RANCH KID LIFE Being a 2-year-old is fun when you live on a ranch. Newt loves riding horses, working in the barn…

Ruby, our fox red Labrador, is 2 years old. We got her from family friends who are breeders. We own a dairy farm in nearby Toston, Montana, and although we don’t live on the farm, it’s only a short drive away. Whenever we go, Ruby comes along with us, always ready to help out. Ruby definitely has an attitude and she can be very sassy, but we treasure having her around. And she absolutely adores the cows—she’s always running up to them and licking their noses. When she’s not doing her version of herding or giving a loving lick to a newborn calf, she’s right at our heels. We have a few cats on the farm as well. Most are barn cats, yet they’re friendly and Ruby enjoys playing with…

BACK IN TIME Seventeen Mile House, in Arapahoe County, Colorado, is a life-size time capsule—a 158-year-old farm that was a way station for prospectors and pioneers traveling wagon trails through Denver in the 1860s. Back then, 17 Mile House was one of six such inns, where travelers could stop to eat, sleep, make repairs to their equipment and rest their animals. Today, just two of these outposts remain intact. The other, Four Mile House, is now a pastoral oasis within Denver’s city limits.…

On a Saturday in late February, when the grass starts growing rich and fiercely green, I walk around to the back of an old ranch house to a yard full of picnic tables for a barbecue. Folks in dirty jeans sit side by side on bench seats, and cowboy hats and sunglasses obscure faces as the hum of conversation and laughter rises up. Old trees stand sentinel nearby, bearing witness to the gathering. This isn’t my home, but it feels like it. At the Asa Porter Ranch in San Luis Obispo County, California, weathered barns and drifting cattle are the backdrop to tables laden with food as the late afternoon sun reflects off the cans held in tired, callused hands. John Porter and members of his family scoot down and…

My family has driven Chevrolet pickups since 1941. I got my first pickup (a Chevy, of course) when I was a junior in high school. A family friend asked if I could fix his tractor, and after a few hours of work, it was running like a top. Since I had just gotten my driver’s license, the friend suggested I trade my labor for his father-in-law’s old truck, a 1981 4x4 Chevy Scottsdale. The truck had been sitting for five years and didn’t run. It had a busted windshield, rust holes and three types of tires. But I was ecstatic—my first car! I borrowed a flatbed truck and hauled it home. After replacing the carburetor, I started it up, and moss and walnuts came flying out of the exhaust pipes.…

Ag Workers Unite On March 3-5, the National Farmers Union hosts its 117th anniversary convention in Bellevue, Washington. The NFU, representing farmers, fishers and ranchers across the USA, believes that opportunities in production ag are the foundation of strong farm and ranch families. Colorado fruit-grower Harrison Topp is on the board of the union’s Rocky Mountain division; read his farm diary starting on page 23. nfu.org/convention Come One, Come All The World Ag Expo, happening Feb. 12-14 in Tulare, California, brings over 100,000 attendees and some 1,500 exhibitors from across the field for seminars, product research, networking and more. This year’s theme is Harvesting Technology; be sure to look for the Top-10 New Products Competition, which will spotlight devices and apps designed to save time, labor and money. worldagexpo.com Ski…

They're here. Robots might not be ready to take over the world, but they’re definitely finding a home on farms and ranches across the country. Fast-evolving technology is giving birth to a wave of robots that will change agricultural practices forever—and in the process, alter how much time farming families spend at both work and play. While most agbots are still in the development and testing phases—including systems to harvest fruit, plant corn, and fertilize and weed crops—some have been toiling away for years. Machines to pick wine grapes and process tomatoes are already significantly reducing labor costs, and milking robots are now used in around 5 percent of the nation’s dairies. That figure is expected to grow by as much as 20 percent annually for the foreseeable future. These…

FARMING VALENTINES My wife, Stephanie, maintains a large garden, and we are the exclusive growers and suppliers of the heirloom Shirley Hammond multiplier onion (named for Stephanie’s mother). Our Farmall collection started with my late grandfather’s Super M. Soon after we married, I bought my wife a 1955 Cub for Valentine’s Day, and she still uses it to work the garden. We have since added a 140, a 100 and a Super A, all of which she uses for cultivating; and a 1948 Super AV High Crop, which we use when the veggies get taller in late season. For groundwork, like tilling, we generally use the M. We hope to keep growing our collection in the coming years.…

Q: We have just put up a new barn. We have an abnormal amount of flies and huge spiders. How do I kill them? CHERYL STUNKEL TUSCARORA, MARYLAND A: I’ll tackle the spider part of your question in this issue, and my colleague Erika Machtinger will address the flies in the April/May issue of Farm & Ranch Living. While spiders can be scary, the majority do not have harmful bites. In fact, across much of the U.S. the only spiders of medical concern are black and brown widows, which are relatively easy to spot, due to the presence of the classic red hourglass on their abdomen undersides. Recluse spiders are also dangerous, but they’re restricted to the South, the lower Midwest and the Desert Southwest. Because most spiders are…