Saturday, September 22, 2012

Horse Drawn Days


Before cars and trucks, airplanes and trains, horses got us from here to there.   In the villages and cities, horses pulled the milk wagons, hauled the beer wagons, toted everything that needed toting, including people.

On the farms, by the 1850s, draft horses began replacing oxen, those docile critters that did the heavy work of plowing and hauling heavy loads, and providing transportation for people as well. But they were so slow.  It’s claimed that if a family with oxen wanted to arrive on time for Sunday church, they had to leave home on Friday.

Soon draft horses were pulling the plows, the hay mowers and hay wagons, the grain binders and everything else that needed pulling. 

For many farmers, horses continued doing the heavy work through the Depression years of the 1930s, and through World War II as well, when tractors replaced the steady steeds.

Want to learn more about horses and horse-drawn equipment?  Travel to the Wisconsin Historical Society’s Stonefield Village, near Cassville, where next Saturday, September 29 you can see horses being harnessed and working. And you can hear me talk about the history of horses on the farm at 11:00 a.m. and 2:00 p.m.

If you want to learn still more about horses in our history, check out my book HORSE DRAWN DAYS, published by the Wisconsin Historical Society Press.

THE OLD TIMER SAYS: When you farm with horses, you never have to worry about them starting on a cold winter morning.  Tractors are not that dependable.

UPCOMING EVENTS:

September 29, Stonefield Village, Cassville, WI.  Horse Drawn Days.

October 3, 6:00 p.m. Onalaska Public Library, Rural Wit and Wisdom

October 4-6 Midwest Booksellers, Minneapolis. Book Signing. RURAL WIT AND WISDOM and my new novel, TAMARACK RIVER GHOST.

October 13, 9-4.  The Clearing.  Writing Workshop: Writing From Your Life. (Still some openings. Go to www.theclearing.org for information.  Click on workshops.)

Saturday, September 15, 2012

Garden Harvest


Several people have asked how my vegetable garden turned out this year.  The quick answer: some of it great, some of it not so great.

As most know, my garden is in northern Waushara County where drought and extreme heat made growing anything difficult this summer.  I didn’t expect much from my garden—and I wouldn’t have gotten much either, without lots of watering (much of it thanks to my brother, Don, who turned on the hose when I couldn’t be there).

As any gardener knows, weeds grow in spite of the weather.  Much thanks to Steve and Natasha who spent many weekends, rototilling, hoeing, and weed pulling.

The cool weather crops such as lettuce, radishes and broccoli did poorly.  They started quickly, and then the heat just as quickly did them in—after only a couple of meals of lettuce, a handful of radishes and no broccoli at all.  Early red potatoes, planted in March—average yield.

The sweet corn (again with water at the right time) was outstanding. Yields were good, taste was special.  Cucumbers—average.  Short season, all through bearing before Labor Day.  Carrots, average.  Beets, above average.  Onions, average.

Squash and pumpkins.  Germinated well with warm soil temps in May, and grew well, but with the extreme heat—and lack of pollination, crop was late and about half what I expected.  Not so for the zucchini, tough plant, lots of yield.  Still green and producing in mid-September.

Tomatoes—outstanding crop.  We picked probably four bushels.  Tomatoes like hot weather.  Key this year was mulching each plant with straw, which kept down the weeds and kept in the moisture.

Late Potatoes—Best crop in several years. Blemish free, uniform size.  Key was ridding the plants of the cursed Colorado potato beetles as soon as we saw them appear.

Harvesting is about completed.  All that remains is a row of very tall broom corn that is not quite ready for cutting and a row of ornamental corn that needs a week or two more before it is ripe.

All and all, in spite of the weather challenges, a good vegetable garden year.

An aside: I met a fellow the other day who bought my new garden book, GARDEN WISDOM.  He said he had a bone to pick with me, that his garden was a complete failure.  I told him buying the book was not enough, he should also read it.  He didn’t reply.

THE OLD TIMER SAYS: As we get older, we forget things that happened, and remember things that didn’t.

UPCOMING EVENTS:
  
September 18, 10:30-11:30 WAHCE Conference, Marriott Hotel, Middleton, WI. Rural Wit and Wisdom.

September 22, 2:00 Wade House Historic Site, Greenbush, WI. Garden Wisdom.

September 24, 11:30, Learning in Retirement, Oshkosh. Stories From the Land. Rural Wit and Wisdom.

September 29, Stonefield Village, Cassville, WI.  Horse Drawn Days.

October 3, 6:00 p.m. Onalaska Public Library, Rural Wit and Wisdom

October 4-6 Midwest Booksellers, Minneapolis. Book Signing.

October 13, 9-4.  The Clearing.  Writing Workshop: Writing From Your Life. (Still some openings. Go to www.theclearing.org for information.  Click on workshops.)

Sunday, September 09, 2012

Wilderness Loon Calls


Steve and I just returned from a week in the Boundary Waters of Northern Minnesota, a place where we have returned to again and again for nearly 30 years, a place where silence is the rule, except when a loon’s mysterious call reminds us that we are in a special place.  A place that is called wilderness.

It was summer at the beginning of the week, and clearly fall as the northwest wind brought rain clouds and lower temperatures, and made canoeing impossible one day when the waves were too high for comfortable paddling.

It’s been hot in the Boundary Waters this summer, as it has been in much of the country.  So. . . our excuse for catching few fish.  You ask how many fish did we catch?  Well, a good fishermen brags about success and remains mum on failure.

 It was a great week for reading, thinking, paddling, and yes, fishing.  Catching was a bit of a problem.

If you have not read Campfires and Loon Calls that I wrote about our adventures in the BWCAW over the years, you may want to check it out. (Steve did the photography).  Fulcrum Press, Denver is the publisher. http://www.fulcrum-books.com/productdetails.cfm?PC=6083


THE OLD TIMER SAYS (Quoting John Muir): In God’s wildness lies the hope of the world—the great fresh, unblighted, unredeemed wilderness.

CHECK THIS OUT:  You can preorder my new novel, THE TAMARACK RIVER GHOST (fifth in my Ames County Series) from Amazon.com.
 See press kit at this link for information about the book: http://uwpress.wisc.edu/Presskits/Apps_RiverGhost.html

UPCOMING EVENTS:

September 15, 1-4 p.m. Old World Wisconsin, Eagle, WI.  Book Signing. Barns of Wisconsin, Garden Wisdom, Horses Drawn Days and more.

September 18, 10:30-11:30 WAHCE Conference, Marriott Hotel, Middleton, WI. Rural Wit and Wisdom.

September 22, 2:00 Wade House Historic Site, Greenbush, WI. Garden Wisdom.

September 24, 11:30, Learning in Retirement, Oshkosh. Stories From the Land. Rural Wit and Wisdom.

September 29, Stonefield Village, Cassville, WI.  Horse Drawn Days.

October 4-6 Midwest Booksellers, Minneapolis. Book Signing.

October 13, 9-4.  The Clearing.  Writing Workshop: Writing From Your Life. (Still some openings. Go to www.theclearing.org for information.  Click on workshops.)

Sunday, September 02, 2012

One Kernel


My brother, Donald’s tree farm is adjacent to mine, and we have both been lamenting the havoc the dry weather has been having on our trees.  But the drought goes further.

Don also plants food plots for the deer and turkeys and whatever other wild creature wants a special treat.  He plants mostly corn and rye on these little cultivated pieces of ground.  This past weekend, my son, Steve and Don inspected one of his corn plots that he had planted in the spring.  By now the corn should be dark green, six feet tall, with plump ears hanging on each stalk.

Because of the dry weather, Don’s corn is about three feet fall, mostly brown, and a pitiful sight by any standard for decent farming.  Steve went hunting for ears—and finally found one.  One ear in the entire food plot.  When he stripped back the husk, he discovered the ear, which was about six inches long, had but one kernel on it.  Of course a corn ear should have kernels from tip to base.

“It is a nicely formed kernel,” Steve said, smiling. 

The wild critters will have to look elsewhere for their special treats this fall and winter.

THE OLD TIMER SAYS: Next year will be better (he hopes).

CHECK THIS OUT:  You can preorder my new novel, THE TAMARACK RIVER GHOST (fifth in my Ames County Series) from Amazon.com.  See press kit at this link for information about the book: http://uwpress.wisc.edu/Presskits/Apps_RiverGhost.html

UPCOMING EVENTS:


September 7-8, Southwest Wisconsin Prairie Festival, Folklore Village, 3210 Co. Hwy. BB, Dodgeville, WI. Keynote, Saturday, Sept. 8, 1:00 p.m. “People and the Prairie.”

September 15, 1-4 p.m. Old World Wisconsin, Eagle, WI.  Book Signing.

September 18, 10:30-11:30 WAHCE Conference, Marriott Hotel, Middleton, WI Keynote.

September 22, 2:00 Wade House Historic Site, Greenbush, WI. Garden Wisdom.

September 24, 11:30, Learning in Retirement, Oshkosh. Stories From the Land.

September 29, Stonefield Village, Cassville, WI.  Horse Drawn Days.

October 4-6 Midwest Booksellers, Minneapolis. Book Signing.

October 13, 9-4.  The Clearing.  Writing Workshop: Writing From Your Life. (Still some openings. Go to www.theclearing.org for information.  Click on workshops.)