The Trickster Month

March is a trickster month, when a farmer stands at the door, trying to decide whether to wear one layer or four. She settles on two, then flings off her coat in the sunshine, thinking Gee, isn’t it nice and warm! Then the next minute, when the wind nearly knocks her over, she grabs her coat again, thinking Gee, isn’t it nice and brisk! 

It’s the month when we farmers are glad there’s still snow holding down the greenhouse sides, so that the greenhouses don't blow away in the wind. A few days later, we’re glad that the snow has melted away, so that we can open up the sides and get some cool air into the overheated greenhouses. 

In March, we might be walking in snow or squelching in puddles as we check our pasture and garden fences, which sometimes look fine after the winter, and sometimes are a big mess. In the garden, it might be dry enough to direct-sow carrots and turnips in March, as we sometimes do. Or maybe not. 

Who knows? March likes to keep us wondering, about weather and crops and fences, and even about our own farmer moods: is this nervous excitement about the upcoming season, or is this nervous worry about the upcoming season? Can we do it again? Every year we’re a little older, and the mountain of the season looks a little higher.

But there’s one thing we do know: in March we’d better start getting into farming shape. Luckily, it is a gentle start to the season. We carry the tables into the greenhouse, set up the heat mat, roll down the big plastic curtain that divides the greenhouse into heated and unheated zones. We fill flats, sow seeds, and water them in, looking forward to the tiny cheerful green seedlings.

In March, my fellow farmer also starts taking the horses out for an occasional jaunt. These are getting ready for the working season jaunts, after a winter of eating hay and loafing around the paddock. 

Our new team, Willow and Fern, groomed and harnessed, set out with my fellow on the fore cart, a light, two-wheeled cart used to pull implements, and perfect for getting horses in shape.

“How’d it go?” I ask, after the first short jaunt.

“Great,” my fellow answers. “We went up the dirt road to the top of the hill.”

"How’d it go?” I ask after the second slightly longer jaunt. 

“Great,” my fellow answers. “We went to visit our neighbors who were boiling sap in the sugar shack on the dirt road. Also Willow bucked some.”

“That sounds nice,” I say, a little worried, “except for the bucking.”

“She didn’t like the tight turn, I guess. It was just a little bucking.”

“How’d it go?” I ask after the third even longer jaunt.

“Great,” my fellow answers. “We went around our fields and then up the dirt road. This time Willow and Fern were both bucking.”

“Hmm,” I said, a little more worried. “What’s that about?”

“Nothing much,” my fellow answered. “Just kind of remembering what it means to be getting back to work.”

Ah. We know how the horses feel.  It’s a good thing we all get to start slowly: sowing seeds, or walking up a dirt road. A little buck can’t hurt, and might even help work out the cricks and kinks: the winter’s slow stiff farmer back, slow stiff farmer shoulders, slow stiff farmer mind. 

Don’t worry, laughs March, I’ll loosen you right up. Then you can really get to work, in April.

Originally published in the Monadnock Shopper News, April 2 - April 8, 2025

Goodbye to a Good Horse

The farm puppy gallops around, his ears flapping, his tongue flopping. The farm weeds gallop around, seemingly moving their giant selves from one section of the garden to another overnight. We clear out one section, and then the next section is overrun, by the very same weeds, it appears.

Also, the famers gallop around, when they aren’t lying on the ground in the great heat, tongues flopping, watching the weeds gallop.

But there is one who is no longer galloping here, and that is our old horse Moon. 

Moon died recently in the pasture, in the company of our second fully retired horse Ben. Moon and Ben got along well, though Moon might have preferred to be in the company of his sister Molly. One of his primary life goals was to always be with Molly.

But Molly was with our other horses, in another pasture, as we struggled to manage the reality of six horses on a farm that’s only ever had four. We couldn’t bear to send away our old horses who’ve worked with us so well and so long, so we have been juggling horses and pastures, doing the best we could.

Now we have five horses, and Moon is buried under our apple trees, next to our first New Hampshire team of horses. Moon was 29, which is a good old age for a draft horse. He had been semi-retired for years, only doing light work occasionally. But he seemed pretty happy to slide into full retirement, and got even peppier on the other end of the lead rope.

He’s always been rather high-headed while being led, which can make a farmer wish for longer arms. Mostly Moon’s head was high so he could keep track of wherever Molly might be, whether three feet away or fifty. 

Ideally, he would be right next to Molly at all times. The two would graze nearby, and if startled, swing together in perfect turns, in the same way they swung together in harness. Moon always worked best with Molly, though even then he had all the tricks figured out: to lag behind a little on the uphill, so Molly pulled most of the load, or to go ahead a little on the downhill, so Molly held back most of the load.

But Moon also had wonderful characteristics: when Molly and Moon first came here, many years ago, Molly was jumping out of her skin at everything. Moon had the rare and remarkable quality for a horse of stopping when he was worried about a sound or sight, instead of running. 

For a while, in the beginning, we separated Moon and Molly in harness, because Molly was getting Moon unnecessarily worried. Moon and Ben worked together, albeit a little crossly, with my fellow as teamster, while I walked Molly ahead, behind, to the left, to the right, so that she could get used to every bit of strange noise and motion of every farm implement.

Eventually Molly settled down, and was ready to work. Moon let out a sigh of relief: at last he and Molly could work together again, or he, Moon, could relax in his shady and cool stall, while Ben and Molly worked, which was almost as good.

In the paddock or the pasture, if there was ever a line at the water tank or the hay pile, Moon went last. But given a little time, Moon could slip his way into drinking or eating with every other horse, since he grumped at no-one. He was also the official greeter for any new horse who came to the farm, which always surprised us. 

Where’s that boldness come from? we would wonder. Perhaps it came from the same place as his steadiness at new sounds and sights. We hope that steady boldness served him well as he galloped along that mysterious path of death. We think of him now, standing in the wind, head high, eyes bright, calling for Molly, saying, “Don’t worry, my sister, it’s all right. Whenever you’re ready, come and join me.”

Originally published in the Monadnock Shopper News, July 24-30, 2024

Farmers and Horses: All Stirred Up

We farmers have been trying to remain calm. But we’re all stirred up, and not just because of the springy feeling in the air. It’s not just because we’re working in our greenhouses: raking beds, setting up propagation tables and heat mats, hauling in potting soil and seed packets.

No, we’re stirred up about horses. For one thing, we’ve been feeding grain all winter to our four draft horses, because they’re all at the age when a little extra in the winter helps. 

Now grain is highly exciting. It’s hard for a horse to keep calm in the face of a grain feeding, and it does a farmer good to remember the order of things: which horse to halter and bring in to the stalls first. Which horse will stand nicely next to which horse, even when grain is on the way. Which horse gets a little more grain, because they’re harder keepers, and which horse gets a little less, because they’re easy keepers.

Most important is which horse goes out of the stalls first. For instance, yesterday I brought Ben out first. He went nicely over to the hay waiting outside. Then I brought Molly out, not realizing she was going to race back in and check Ben’s grain bucket to make sure he hadn’t left any crumbs, either in the bucket or on the ground. 

Meanwhile Moon, who I hadn’t even bothered to halter, because he went into his stall on his own, decided to come out. But I was already asking Clyde to back out of his stall, and then I had to both keep Clyde in one place and try to get Moon out of the way at the same time. Finally Moon cooperated, but I had forgotten about Molly and Clyde.

Molly was sure Clyde was going to get the grain crumbs, so she started bucking and squealing, and Clyde stopped backing, and I said “Molly, for heaven’s sake!” and chased her out of the barn, while Clyde waited for me. Then I went back for Clyde, led him out, and was getting ready to take off his halter at the barn door, when Molly decided to squeeze past back into the barn.

“Molly, you turkey!” I said, letting go of Clyde, who went forward, and didn’t want to stop for me to take off his halter because now Molly was behind him. But he finally did, and pretty soon I had four horses calmly eating hay in the barnyard. 

All this is to say that grain is as exciting to horses as horses are exciting to horse farmers, which is why we farmers are all stirred up: we’re planning to buy a new team. We don’t really want to buy a new team, but our nice old horses don’t have the pep for another full garden season. 

We get pretty jazzed up on our horse trips, sure that this will be the perfect team for our little farm. So far we’ve been to Connecticut to look at a giant team of Belgians, about whom my fellow farmer said, “It makes my stomach hurt just to think of those dinner-plate hooves trying to walk down our narrow garden pathways. All those heads of lettuce going crunch crunch crunch.”

We’ve also seen a pair of black Percherons, who had the opposite effect: “It makes my stomach hurt to think of asking these two little horses to pull a full hay wagon up and down our hilly fields.” Way out in western New York State, we saw two more giant teams of Belgians, and a lovely little too-expensive pair of Belgian mares. 

Next we’re headed to Maine to see three more teams. Maybe one of these will be the perfect team for us! Meanwhile we visit our four perfect grain-loving horses in the barnyard, wishing they were a little younger, and reminding ourselves of just what kind of horses we’d like to have come live and work with us.

Originally published in the Monadnock Shopper News, March 6-March 12, 2024

Borrow-a-Draft-Horse Agency: Thank Goodness for Farriers, Mothers, and Draft Horses

We farmers were stumped. With three out of four draft horses unable to work, due to injury, and our first decent stretch of haying weather coming up, late in the summer, we needed to borrow a draft horse, in a hurry. But how likely was that?

“Maybe we could call the Borrow-a-Draft-Horse Agency?” I suggested.

“Let’s think,” answered my fellow farmer, “Who could we even ask? X’s team is pretty old, and he won’t want to split them up, anyway. Y’s horse might like the company of our horses, but Y would miss her horse too much. Let’s try Z.”

“And A, and B, and C,” I added, so we made phone calls and sent emails, thinking our chances were pretty slim. How many people have draft horses anyway, and who in their right mind would ever loan one?

Luckily, our farrier, Jake, whose generosity far outweighs his right-mindedness, said “Sure, you can borrow Button. She could use the work.”

We could hardly believe it, and we not only borrowed the horse, but the horse trailer to haul her. Button, who is half-Belgian and half-American Cream, is a big horse, a beautiful pale gold color. She was also out of shape, a “cream puff,” said our farrier’s mother, Mary. In fact, Button was so round and gold we were tempted to call her Butterball instead of Button.

Button was not pleased to be separated from her two pasture-mates. Happily, Mary helped us, leading Button into the trailer, multiple times. Button backed, right off the trailer, multiple times. Mary sighed, led Button’s mother into the trailer, tied her, led Button in, tied her, then untied and backed Button’s mother off again.  

Thank goodness for mothers, we were thinking. 

But “Thanks, George!” was what Mary said, relieved. George is Mary’s spouse, and Jake’s father. George died, in 2021, of cancer. George was also a farrier, and a teamster, and a draft-horse legend, and he carried that great spirit of generosity we still see in Jake. We all miss George. As my fellow farmer said, “I never thought I’d get to drive a horse that George trained.”

Button gradually settled down on our farm, showing her solid training, and remembering her good manners. But that didn’t mean she wasn’t a handful. George liked “hot” horses, and Button is hot. (She’s a hot button!)

At our farm, we introduced Button to just one horse, Clyde, while our three recovering horses stayed at our neighbors’. Luckily Clyde is a very steady, sleepy horse, so he made a good calming partner for the high-headed Button. 

Button was learning a lot, and so were we, such as how Button likes to run away when she sees a person coming with a halter. A person without a halter? Button is your best friend. Still, a horse-horse relationship always tops a horse-human relationship, and Clyde never minds being haltered. So we would halter Clyde, as Button trotted around in circles, and then walk away. By the time we got to the gate, Button would give up, and stand for the halter.

Button loved Clyde, but she didn’t love all the rest of the new stuff: new stable, new harness, new noisy scary farming activities. But she managed. She even muscled up. 

“I think we’ve gotten her from cream puff to cream cheese,” my fellow reported to our farrier and his mother. “She’s doing great.” 

Button is doing great, and are we ever glad to have her visiting, hot or not. She is getting us through one long hard garden season, thanks in no small part to George, and to his human and horse legacy. 
 

Originally published in the Monadnock Shopper News, Oct 18 - 24, 2023