Last week I noticed my fence charger was not putting out as full of a charge as usual—which by the way is a BIG charge. Since I have over 80 acres fenced and cross fenced I bought a powerful charger and I love it.. I have cut out switches along the fence which allows me to isolate areas and aid me in detecting any “faults” or shorts in the fenceline. I enlisted my daughter Zoe’s help--- as we armed ourselves with our cell phones, I walked and rode the ATV, opening and closing the switches as she reported back to me the effect on the charger’s output. I never thought I would find my cell phone to be so helpful. Sometimes technology is a good thing, once you learn to use it to your advantage. For a cell phone to be of any use to you however, you have to remember to carry it with you and also remember not to leave it in your pocket when you do a wash.
August is really the month for clipping fields- Lots of weeds with seed heads that must be mowed down. Since we have had rain nearly every day… I have to sneak it in when I can… kind of hurrying and feeling pressured to get it done. I hitched up the brush hog one afternoon, merrily tootling off to mow. I heard a jingle and clank, looked behind me and decided it was just the chains and chokers knocking against the back of the 3 point hitch. I always have my chains and chokers with me as my motto is—never travel “empty”. If I have to head out for one reason (carry hay or whatever) I generally hook onto a log and drag it back to my log area for cutting and splitting (winter’s fuel supply). I have lots to do so I just need to keep at it and FINISH, but I took a closer look as I kept hearing the noise…. WHOOPS… my longer chain was dragging under the mower and I actually mowed off a goodly length of chain and the hook. Uh-oh. Oh well, easily remedied.. just a shorter chain now.
August is also the month I try to spread manure. Some of the areas where horses congregate need to be scraped off. I make a BIG pile and then go to work. The spreader is a very old John Deere ground driven spreader which is pulled by my sweet old Ford 8N. My new and very useful Kubota does the loading. The last few years I have been working on an 8 acre area which was new growth trees and brush, clearing it off and planting for pasture. It’s coming out beautifully. I have been taking the manure load by load in my handy dump trailer and making a pile down there. I have to load and haul with the Kubota, since the 8N does not have the hydraulics for dumping. So load after load, I hitch on, travel, and dump… return, un-hitch, load again. Tedious repetitive work. Sometimes a tad scarey as most land in Vermont is what we call “side-hills”. Not somewhere you want a big heavy load pulling at you the wrong way.
Well, the trailer was all loaded, I went to hitch—got the hoses hooked, hopped on the seat and took off----- WHOOPS…. I forgot to raise the jack. Actually, you take this off and hang it off the side of the dump trailer, neatly out of the way while you are in motion. It’s bent badly enough that I could not remove it, nor could I raise it for traveling. Well, easily remedied…. With a BIG old sledge hammer (which by the way is always with me behind the seat of my tractor- you never know when you need to bang something into submission)--- beat the thing into position… and pretend it never happened. Sometimes denial works best on the farm, especially when you are busy.
As I was back and forth with my loads, I wondered to myself… why is it there are several yellow jacket wasp things following me everywhere? Next day—I figured it out – on closer inspection, there was a nest under the lip on the side of the dump trailer. So even after all these years of working on my farm… I am always learning new rules.
· Check your equipment out for wasp nests before you hook onto it.
· Look behind you before you drive off and make sure the jack is UP.
· If you hear noises of clanging metal when you are mowing it’s probably something you should stop and check.
One important “rule” I learned a long time ago --- LOAD LIGHT AND GO OFTEN.
It’s better to make extra trips than it is to overload and get in trouble. As I age, I am realizing this applies to myself just as well as my equipment.
So you too—load light, go often and Enjoy the day ~
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