In our older age

By Christine Tailer
HCP columnist 

People often wonder – and I have wondered myself – about our plan as we grow older; I mean really older, and we are no longer able to do those things we do today.

It may not seem like it, from the outside looking in, but we actually do have a plan that we have already set in motion and have been working toward for the past several years. We plan to, and have been, slowly been cutting back on some of those farm endeavors that require more energy.

For example, we no longer plant crops in our six acres of bottomland field. In the past, we have planted and harvested such wonderful crops as white beans, black beans, buckwheat and sunflowers, and oh what joy it was to watch the buckwheat and sunflower fields dance with the buzz of our well-fed honeybees. These crops, however, required working the fields, and it was far from easy work. 

In the early spring, we'd do a shallow till to turn up the weeds, pulling the tiller behind our trusty Old Blue tractor. Then we might spread lime over the fields, this time with Old Blue pulling the spreader. We'd certainly till again just before we planted, to turn under any sprouting weeds. Some of the crops then required cultivating between the rows with our little red tractor, belly cultivators affixed to its underside, and then come fall, there was the harvest with our ancient Gleaner K combine. This all amounted to at least six passes across the fields with our antique farm equipment and aging bodies.

Now that we no longer plant crops, you may be wondering what we do with our six acres of fertile creek bottom land. We now grow hay. We used to employ a beautiful old square baler for the task of harvest, but we quickly learned that square baling is a very labor-intensive endeavor. Our ancient equipment required us to first lift the 50-pound bales off the ground and heft them up onto our hay wagon for stacking. We then needed to off load the bales and stack them again in the barn or under the hay shelter. Needless to say, this unloading and stacking was sweaty, prickly, difficult work, so now in our years of old age simplification, we employ the use a round baler. With this wonderful machine, that just happens to color coordinate with Old Blue, the entire hay producing process only requires one day of cutting, a lovely day of raking into windrows, and then a day of simple baling. There is no need for us to physically handle the hay at all. We simply cart the bales over to their storage shelter with a spear attached to the back of Old Blue. Easy peasy, old folk farming.

And what do we do with the hay? Well, our cattle, horses, sheep and goats happily eat it all throughout the winter, when the pasture is devoid of grass, and feeding is easy. We simply spear one of our 800-lb. round bales and trundle it out to the pasture while the cattle prance all around, and yes, cattle really do prance.

Then, we are also no longer beekeepers. It was sad to find the girls a new home, but a dear friend gladly took them in. A honey super, when filled with liquid gold is amazingly heavy, and harvesting as many as fifteen hives, was beginning to wear on our aging backs. I am happy to report, though, that ever since we let beekeeping go, I am greeted each spring by foraging bees. They are no doubt feral colonies that split from my hives over the years, and now live in hollow trees up on the hillside.

Of course, I still plant my garden, though it really has grown smaller with each passing year, and I no longer sell either my greenhouse seedlings, or my fall produce. I simply grow enough for our own use and that of our family and close neighbors. The same holds true for my chickens. As their numbers dwindle, I will not replace them, though of course I'll happily continue to gather their eggs each and every morning, and if the girls decide not to lay for a spell, well that is just a-okay. I am no longer selling their bounty to expectant customers, and what Greg and I don't eat, I can gift to our young'uns.

And so, we have retired from officially farming, and are simply doing those things that we choose to do, such as rehabbing tractors and steam engines, driving our vintage cars, and playing in the creek, and over the coming years, if we should choose less, then so it goes! Perhaps one summertime day, at some time in the future, you might drive down the creek valley road, and find us happily riding around on our zero-turn mowers, no cattle or horses, no goats or sheep or rabbits, no chickens, and the homing pigeons living up on the hillside. What you'll find will be two happy old folk doing what they love, and here's a secret. All that is required to drive a zero-turn mower is the ability to barely move your arms. Shh ...

Now you can see that we really do have a plan, and with that plan in mind, I am ever so looking forward to marking my 70th year. Seven decades really do feel pretty darn good, and I know that you know this, but I couldn’t imagine being anywhere else in this seventh decade of my life.

Christine Tailer is an attorney and former city dweller who moved several years ago, with her husband, Greg, to an off-grid farm in Ohio south-central Ohio. Visit them on the web at straightcreekvalleyfarm.com.

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