Before Winter Sets In

The “to do” list in the spring is always long, but the one for late autumn seems particularly long with a looming expiration day. “Before snow flies” is an old farm saying that doesn’t necessarily mean when the first flurries appear. It means when winter sets in for certain, and all those projects you were hoping to wrap up are now on hold until spring thaw.

The “before snow flies” list changes each year, from fixing roofs to cutting wood, building new winter poultry housing to the last of the butchering. There’s hauling straw home for winter bedding, pulling out the last of the Brussel sprout plants for feeding to the pigs, and pulling out the electric mesh fences before they freeze in solid.

Mom had quite the adventure with that lately, as the nights have grown quite cold and the lack of snow has allowed the ground to begin freezing in earnest. We’d brought the summer hen mobile housing in from the pasture and moved the feathered ladies into their cozy winter quarters. It was dark, so the hens were sleepy during the move. Even still, they screamed as if we were foxes tearing them apart as they were caught and carried to their new digs. The neighbors must have thought poultry murder was underway! Yet, as soon as the hens were set down on the fresh bedding, they hushed up and looked about the lit space, as if to say, “Oh, that’s what this was about? Ok, I can handle that.” No more screaming, instantly.

Ladies, really, me thinks thou dost protest too much!

The next day, Mom went out to pull the double-spiked step-in electric mesh fence but found them stuck solid in the ground. It took a crowbar, a hammer, and some serious tugging to rip the poles out of the earth. Her hands were quite sore that night!

Yesterday, as flurries swirled about the trees and covered the fallen leaves, we cut and organized firewood from dead or troubled trees we’d had taken down much earlier. The chainsaw whirred while we hauled armloads to the back of the pickup truck—some small enough for ready stacking, some needing a splitting party later. These were safely tucked away after dark on pallets under our deck as preparation for winter burning.

Big projects are also underway, including expanding the amount of the north field included in fencing for pasture rotational grazing. Our first round of perimeter electric fencing to include portions of the field Grandma and Grandpa used to land their airplane on was in 2006, and this year we were awarded a new NRCS EQUIP grant to expand to include the rest of the field. Our flock of sheep has certainly grown since 2006, and the immense improvements we’ve made in soil health and sword density within the current pasture can now be expanded in this carbon-sequestering management in the new acreage.

The exterior fence is made of multiple strands of high tensile wire, which requires strong wooden posts at corners and tops and bottoms of hills. The last few weeks have been busy with hauling home all the fencing supplies including the rental of a post pounder. The thought of hand digging so many wooden poles in the cold was daunting to all of us (we’ve certainly done our share of post hole digging by hand), and we remembered how the pounder used in our first fence installation made quick work of a back-breaking job.

The 1000-pound piece of equipment attaches to the front end of a skid steer, but our little four-foot-wide barn cleaning Bobcat can’t lift anything that heavy, so it meant renting a larger piece of equipment. When you’re up against oncoming winter and a bigger piece of gear is an option, you stack up all the jobs! Kara ordered road gravel to fix all the potholes and low slopes on the driveways, moved earth for better drainage in the sheep pen, and all the wooden posts went into the ground before it froze solid. It was a good feeling!

Today, while the ground is white, we know it won’t last too long. Upcoming mid to upper 30-degree weather means there will be additional time for projects—much needed as the list is very long yet! There’s still the garden fence to pull out, so hopefully the ground will warm up so we can get them out without resorting to the crowbar and hammer again.

Here’s to continuing to check the before snow flies projects off the list while the weather holds—before winter sets in. See you down on the farm sometime.