Innholdsfortegnelse for March - April 2018 i Grit

I enjoy reading my GRIT magazines and love the animal stories. We’ve always had dogs growing up, and it’s funny how I still remember their names and some of their habits. They have added so much to our lives. In October 2015, my husband and I retired and moved to the country in rural Tennessee. We took along with us some cats and two elderly dogs, which have passed on now. We started raising chickens and growing crops. About a year ago, we went into town to buy some hens, and an elderly woman there asked if we would be interested in a free puppy. I was shown the little black and white rat terrier, which I picked up and carried home with me. My husband was against it at…

Bee College BLOUNTSTOWN, Florida — Beginning and veteran beekeepers alike will find something of value at the Panhandle Bee College March 23 through 24 at Blountstown High School. Presented by the University of Florida Honey Bee Research and Extension Laboratory, the two-day event will offer training for beekeepers, gardeners, naturalists, and anyone interested in bees. Both days will feature classes in honeybee behavior, hive production, practical beekeeping, and more. There will also be live honeybee colonies on-site for demonstrations, with protective gear provided. Friday there will be a honey and bee-product show, followed by a Jr. Bee College on Saturday for children 12 and under. Learn more and register for the event at www.Entnemdept.ufl.edu/honey-bee. Starting a Vineyard CHARLOTTESVILLE, Virginia — Are you interested in growing grapes? If so, head to…

Wherever buffalo grazed, cattle were rounded up, or mustangs tossed their tails in flight, men talked of Bijah Catlow. He was a brush-buster from the brazada country down along the Nueces, and he could ride anything that had hair. He made his brag that he could outfight, outride, outtalk, and outlove any man in the world, and he was prepared to accept challenges, any time or place. Around chuck-wagon fires or line camps from the Brazos to the Musselshell, men talked of Bijah Catlow. They talked of his riding, his shooting, or the wild brawls in which, no matter how angry others became, Bijah never lost his temper — or the fight. Abijah was his name, shortened in the manner of the frontier to Bijah. He was a broad-shouldered, deep-chested,…

My alarm clock pulls me out of a dream — a vision of honeycombed patterns and boots sloshing through wet hunting grounds, my basket so full I have to weave branches into the sides to make walls to keep them all from falling over the edges. It’s 4 a.m. I’m already tired from hunting morels all night long in my sleep, but my eyes are tuned and I quickly realize it’s time to do the real thing. I am suddenly more alert than usual, realizing the excitement is just a couple hours drive away to make that dream come true. I start the coffee, and wake up my wife, Olga. I whisper to her, “It’s time!” while our daughter Heidi sleeps in. We carefully assemble in the kitchen for coffee…

Share your visual perspective with the GRIT community. Post your photos at Facebook.com/GritMagazine, Facebook.com/CappersFarmer, or tag us on Instagram (@grit1882). We chose several images you see here from those platforms, and you can find more within the blogging community on our websites. Share your best shots, and we just might select one of your photos for a future issue of the magazine. To admire even more readers’ photos, visit Grit.com and CappersFarmer.com. Join our Social Circle at Grit.com Celebrating Rural America 24 Hours a Day... JOIN THE CONVERSATION: The whippoorwill is often heard yet hard to spot. Learn about the elusive birds behind the famous call. (www.Grit.com/whippoorwill) Kevin Croom: “Mr. Whippy” has returned to my northeast Georgia back porch handrail every spring for six or more years. It’s his “courting rail,” and…

Organic Hay Pays Off For Minnesota Farmer Carmen Fernholz has been growing hay organically for more than 40 years, and he says it pays off in three ways: He has a strong market of organic dairy producers, it builds soil for his crop rotation, and it controls Canada thistle. “Canada thistle is the most challenging weed for me farming organically,” says Fernholz. “A good solid stand of pure alfalfa left in place for three years is the best practice I’ve found to keep Canada thistle at an acceptable level.” Fernholz seeds his alfalfa at about 15 pounds per acre with a cover crop of oats, wheat, barley, or dry field peas. He harvests the cover at maturity. “If you plant as early as possible, the alfalfa sprouts, but then lays…

Municipal composting is a hot topic. Across the country, townships and municipalities increasingly divert green waste — leaves, yard waste, grass clippings, and more — from overburdened landfills to composting facilities, offering the resulting compost to their residents at a reduced cost, or even free of charge. While this can provide a great resource for gardeners, there are risks involved, thanks to a group of highly potent persistent herbicides. In 2012, Green Mountain Compost, operating in Vermont, sold compost consisting of composted waste hay and manure from horse stables in the area. By June, gardeners who had purchased the compost began complaining of abnormal plant growth and crop failures in gardens where it had been applied. Green Mountain Compost suspended sales, and tested samples taken from their compost stocks as…

Considering how corn, beans, squash, and other “New World” foods have changed the course of human culture, the time is ripe to take a fresh look at Native American gardening. Here, within easy reach, is one of the greatest horticultural treasures — a system of gardening that is, by definition, an icon of biodiversity. Offering a rich array of unusual tastes and textures, the Native American garden is part and parcel of what I consider the “soul” of American food. And yet the full story is not exactly a happy one. Years ago I had the pleasure of chatting with the late Gladys Tantaquidgeon (1899-2005), a Mohegan anthropologist with whom I discussed some of the pressing issues facing Native American gardening. She expressed frustration about Mohegan garden seeds not being…

There’s a man and a woman who wait until the waters have settled from the day’s last bass fishermen before they head to their favorite lake. While the fishermen sleep, they gather their gear, readying for the hunt. Under dim moonlight, they are the nocturnal predator, fighting both lily pads and mosquitoes alike as they prowl the lake vegetation with spotlights. She doesn’t bat an eye at the passing water moccasin. A beaver tail slapping the water nearby goes unnoticed; the fright outmatched by determination. The spotlight captures two pencil-eraser-sized reflections floating together among the lilies. He inches toward them slowly. Spear tip is moved into position, about 3 inches from the target. Without warning, she thrusts into the water and pulls out her prey. Some people will never fully…

In the beginning stages of getting your farm off the ground, you’ll be making some crucial decisions, and there are a few fundamentals that will help guide anyone toward success. In addition to deciding where and what to farm, you’ll need some basic guidelines on farming itself. If you learn these basic principles and apply them to your farm, they will help you to avoid many future headaches and heartaches: ▪ Plan your farm and your goals carefully. ▪ Farm goals should be family goals. ▪ Look at the whole picture. ▪ A farmer should learn and grow through reading and meetings. ▪ Read, research, and experiment. ▪ Think. ▪ Old is not always obsolete. New is not always better. ▪ Natural fertility and slope of land are critical. ▪…

They are one-third the size and cost of your pickup, yet around the farm, they can be far more valuable because of their versatility and functionality. That’s why multi-passenger all-terrain vehicles, more commonly known as “side-by-sides” or “UTVs,” are becoming as common a sight in rural America as compact tractors, maybe even more so. Although the blindingly fast sport-model side-by-sides feed the need for speed, it’s the slower, work-oriented UTVs and sport-utility models that rule the day if you are a landowning country dweller. UTVs can typically tow more than half a ton, carry 500 or more pounds in their manual-tilt beds, and be easily outfitted with a host of accessories including front and rear blades, three-point hitches, enclosed cabs, heaters, cargo racks, winches, and lights. They are akin to…

When I first laid eyes on the neglected and overgrown property I would soon call my own, I saw through the saplings and trees that engulfed the pastures of the historic farm. I saw potential, and knew that with time and work it could be restored to its former use of pastureland again. It was apparent that no land management had been practiced on the 200-year-old farm for at least half a century. That meant in addition to the trees, there were decades’ worth of leaf litter and forest floor cover to work through to unearth the soil below. What I did not see or plan for was the price tag attached to the equipment required to do all of this work mechanically, as well as the cost of properly…