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Steady
Lane Farm
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The farm is 72 acres of hayfields and pasture
in the Berkshires, 30 minutes from Greenfield
or Amherst.
We seek to be successfully sustainable so that the land can remain
in farming, its most productive use for earth, neighbors, hilltown
farms, and cities and towns. Nort and I hoped to
complete our move to Ashfield before now, but can't do it yet. Read our newsletter below if you want
to know more, and definitely come and visit! Janet
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NEWSLETTER VII
7/2005 (I-VI follow below)
Well, it has been 18 months since I last wrote,
and you may be surprised to know we are still at it and making
progress! Here is a list of
accomplishments:
Our
pastured beef has a label, and is available to you and in two
stores. The cattle are happy, the
pastures are responding to their grazing and manure, and the product is
healthy for humans and is very flavorful.
We bred seven of our heifers to a belted galloway
bull, and hope for seven calves starting in September!
We
harvested and sold or used over 125 tons of hay in 2004. Last weekend we harvested 28 tons for
this season's first cut on half of our hay fields, also called 'mowings'.
The first cut is coarser and preferred by horses. Sheep and dairy animals prefer second
cut, which is called 'rowan'. In
hay production, we depend a great deal on Tom and Ed, who run that part
of the operation.
A
thousand beautiful pumpkins and gourds and sunflowers were grown at Steady Lane
Farm in 2004, and sold at the Ashfield Farmer's market and by the
roadside. This year we are partnering
with our neighbor, an organic farmer in Ashfield for 20 years. Joel has
planted part of the 3-acre pumpkin field with winter squash. Nort and I disked and planted the
remaining area with buckwheat, which is a green manure and weed
suppressant. Should we plant
strawberries? Would you come pick
your own?
A goat
dairy farmer now lives in apartment
#2. Desiree
has 12 alpine does and their 9 adorable and colorful kids. She also has 4 guernsey dairy cows, which
are beautiful, gentle and remarkable producers of high butterfat milk on
pasture (no grain).
The
white barn has had two posts replaced on newly poured concrete
piers. This has restored the roof
to a straight line across the peak, three stories above the new
posts! And, that change brought
the shingles on the roof together in their original and waterproof
alignment.
We built
a perimeter fence for the west pasture.
This five-strand, high-tensile style
required significant driven-post structures at the corners and
modifications for stone walls, bedrock and valleys. We also grubbed out many large
multiflora rose and japanese barbari bushes, which are unwelcome
invasives. We burned them in great
bonfires. The fence is strong and
also mildly electrified, and will discourage coyotes and dogs from this
rather isolated pasture.
So we are
farming! Although only at the farm
weekends, we have partners that maintain momentum. Out bodies are more flexible and
stronger than when we began, and we use a lot of sun screen. We also swim in Ashfield
Lake or at the DAR State
Forest 4 miles
away. We buy our eggs from several
area farmers who pasture their hens, and our vegetables and berries and
honey from the farmer's market. We
are exploring photovoltaics, wind and hydro power alternatives, and this
weekend will begin a wildlife habitat protection plan with help from a
forester. Come visit!
NEWSLETTER VI
12/2004
Looking back over the year, we can see much has been accomplished.
In summary, we have removed solid waste, repaired barns and the
farmhouse, formed partnerships with several farmers, and met many people
who are neighbors, former farmers on this land, farmers in this area, and
friends and family. We’ve harvested hay and have beef cattle.
It
has been a wonderful year, and we are very grateful to you all!
Thanks for helping out! This land has a way of reaching out, and I hope
you get as much as you have given to it.
We
were honored to be chosen the site for the Franklin County Land Trust
Member's Picnic this September. That was a wonderful day of
meeting area people who work to save farmland, and are responsible in
large part for this farm being available to us.
All
through the fall, people stopped their cars on Route 112 to watch the
cattle. Artists set up their easels, and walkers stopped to chat
with us. The farm has been alive!
DETAILS
of the year's accomplishments:
In the
farmhouse, joists and interior of half of the farmhouse are repaired, and
we added some heating units and repaired the slate roof, and created and
rented 2 one-bedroom apartments. (Nort and I camp out in the
unimproved area of the farmhouse on weekends. When you visit, bring
a sleeping bag.)
We
cleaned and whitewashed the coop for four dairy goats who
never moved in. We have cleaned most of the white barn and repaired some
of the site drainage.
We
harvested hay -- over 4000 square bales and 140 round bales of first cut
and some second cut.
We
have we have 17 feeder calves representing different breeds and
ages. To prepare the pastures we brush-hogged, removed plastic
sheeting from the soil, made single wire electric fence for rotational
grazing, and created controlled access to water
The
red barn and equipment shed have been repaired enough to store our hay,
house 10 of a neighbor's sheep and their guard Llama, and provide a
winter run-in area for the cattle.
Now,
the snow has covered the ground and the cattle keep pretty tightly to the
shed. They love the haylage and intensly gather round when the
tractor is started up to lift the 1000 lb round bales. Then, when
you finally get the plastic film off and
dump it into the feed bunks, they cavort! They positively prance
and play at shoving each other. Cold temperatures
does not seem to bother them at all. I will post some
pictures. (anyone know where to recycle
polypropalene file?)
NEWSLETTER V On July 16, the counter on the hay
bailer indicated we have made 3500 bales of timothy hay. They make great
mountains in the red barn, where they are snug and dry and perfectly fine
for a year. They are for sale, so spread the word and remember us in
January!
We have been in the fields, driving tractors, brush hogging and cutting
hay and being in the barn throwing bales. This will be a sporatic
activity at the farm all summer every summer. The fields improve with 2
or 3 cuttings a summer, and there are large fields ("mowings").
The 10 Romney sheep are actually 7 Oxfords and 3 Dorsets.
I apologize for the inaccuracy. The oxford sheep is a beautiful animal
with a handsome head, and these are gentled by their handlers Edward and
Meredith. It is uplifting to see these animals, and it centers me to
touch them. To cool off, the Ashfield
Lake has clear
water for swimming ½ mile away. Come visit.
We have laid out plans for the middle south pasture, and are getting
ready to make fencing. Nort and I are removing barbed wire fencing; which
is a cruel if inexpensive material -- and we are collecting old tensile
wire fencing, which we will reuse. He has firmly replanted posts for the
corners, and the old stone walls will help fence two of the straight
parts of the new fence. This weekend he will install the steel posts and
attach the insulators that will hold the wire.
NEWSLETTER IV The soil samples revealed that fields are
mostly in good shape! The hay has been ready to harvest for 2 weeks, but
it needs to be dry! It keeps raining.
Its June 17, and tomorrow we take delivery of a
tractor! With that used John Deere we hope to apply its 75 horsepower to
the disk mower, tedder, rakes, balers and wagons
our partner brings to the haying operation. Now, if only the sun would
shine for four days in a row! We hope to be able to start this weekend
and continue through the week to next weekend. COME AND HELP!
The 10 Romney sheep and one guard llama (Ferrance is his name) are happy
and have cleared one pretty big strip of pasture and are moving on to
another. We are looking for a herdsman to get a sizable herd of cattle,
flock of sheep and possibly a herd of goats working on those pastures.
Our neighbor saw a moose walk up the stream, past the white barn and on
up over the big road!
The new apartment in the farmhouse will be ready next week, and we hope
to rent it by then. Rent coming in will be the first $ coming in the
other direction, which is a very good thing.We have wonderful composted
manure and bedding for sale! It is in bulk, so I hope you will consider
buying a truckload or two.
NEWSLETTER III On April 26-27, there were seven of us in the rain,
tending the two bonfires we built to burn the century old white pine that
was blown over this winter in the center pasture. Since we were very wet
and muddy, we also pulled tires out of the sod and plastic around the
bunker silo, and made a pile at the end of the driveway for easy pick up.
Among the tires we threw was one filled with a small skunk, pretty angry
and trying to spray us all but contained by the tire. We all survived
clean. If you know of a good way to get rid of 500 tires … On May
9-11, we rented a skid steer (bobcat) and a dump truck and spent long
days cleaning out the red barn and fields behind of manure pack and old
hay. We made a monster compost in the bunker
silo, and hope the rain will give it power to heat up one more time. We
also hauled another load of scrap metal (6 appliances, etc) and removed
bags and bags of plastic twine and sheeting from all we were
composting.The farmhouse porch has been rebuilt, and the door to the
white barn looks new! The fields are fluorescent green and up to my knees
in lushness.And… on May 11, Tom Carter put 17 of his Romneys
(sheep) and one guard llama “Ferrance” on the field
near the red barn. WE HAVE ANIMALS ON THE LAND – BEST WAY TO
PRESERVE SOIL. YEA!
NEWSLETTER II On April 1, we were facing floods inside and out as 3 feet
of snow melted off of the porch roof, sending buckets of snowmelt into
the century old timbers of the farmhouse – encased in vinyl
siding - into the center of the living room ceiling where it dripped for
a while onto our bed on an inflatable mattress. The site drainage
meandered to threaten the Town road. In the barn, four feet of drifts
melted to create lakes of snowmelt where cattle were milked for that same
century. How are we going to restore the barn and fields to productive
use as farm and habitat?But, Oh! To see the
ground free of snow was exhilarating, and the urgency of new grass
pushing up takes your breath away. This month, we have built a cover for
the north springhouse and located the near west spring in the stream
area. We also submitted a Notice of Intent to the Conservation
Commission, and cut hanging dead trunks and branches from the maples and
apple trees throughout the farm. We plan to burn them on the last day of
the season for open burning THIS SATURDAY APRIL 26. Whitney took soil
samples to send to the Amherst
lab for evaluation for amendments. She dug over 100 samples out of the
fields to be mixed for the 10 that will be sent, greeting field mice,
garter snakes and mocking birds as she went.
NEWSLETTER I On January 1, Nort and I began to live frozen weekends at
the beautiful farm we had just bought on Steady Lane Road in Ashfield. We
began to experience this tired land and these buildings to be as solid as
a century and a half, … and fragile as a battered ship in icey
and deep snow. Visions of sheep bedded in the cleaned red barn warmed our
spirits. These past 2 months, Nort, and our daughter, son, friends, and a
good waste hauler, have cleaned barns, hauled trash, and begun to
evaluate utilities. Meanwhile, a helpful neighbor is fixing the doors and
roofs of the red barn. A young carpenter from Hawley was hired to repair
the front door for this building, and our next steps will be to steam
clean it, removing the residue of years of good use as a milking parlor
and loafing area for the cows. We are checking to see what is needed to
get the barn well working again, and are pleased to learn that the drains
work.
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