Colin McNickle At Large

Weekend essay: Up on ‘the farm’

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JONES MOUNTAIN, W.Va.

Two amazing things recently happened in unison high atop this Appalachian outpost: Not only did the weather finally break but it did so on – drum roll, please — a weekend.

And wonder of wonders never being anything at which to sneeze, it was time to make some proverbial hay while the sun shined.

The mountain weekend being unusually calm, and a “red-flag alert” for brush fires having expired, it was time to dispatch with the burn pile. Nothing quite like a good batch of ashes to augment the compost pile and garden.

Moved and new raised beds – temporary growing spaces as more expansive, permanent and in-ground gardens are prepared for next year – were augmented with rich, natural amendments — mushroom manure and blood and bone meal.

Tall fences also were erected to keep Garden Enemies Nos. 1 and 2 – deer and groundhog, among others — at bay.

And then the early planting began.

One bed was sown with shallots and no fewer than five varieties of onions.

Another was sown with garlic. Indeed, it should have been sown last fall. But even this late-planted crop, though the bulbs won’t be very large, will be used, in part, as a good seed crop for planting this fall.

Another bed was sown with scallions. And four varieties of lettuce were sown in yet another.

Still to come, and likely not until mid-May, will be several varieties of carrots in a special raised bed that’s a full foot deep.

And lest one forget, there will be still another bed for herbs, traditional and not so traditional.

Tomatoes? Green beans? Of course. In due time and in due time.

Even the wood, in desperate need of thinning and replanting, saw some work. That concentrated on the slow slog that is cutting off great vines at the knees in advance of some serious logging.

But all has not been sunshiny in this long overdue hay-making. As an 8-foot by 8-foot test patch was being cultivated with the tractor’s 48-inch rear tiller, an “uh-oh” tell-tale piece of a silver something caught the eye.

There on the ground was a 6 centimeter snap ring. Its deformity signaled a failure to secure something (though what, exactly, is to be determined). It appears to have come from the rear PTO (power takeoff shaft).

How? Why? After all, the tractor is only several months’ old. It remains under warranty. Thus, all that now is in the hands of the dealer’s tractor troubleshooters. Ah, the joys of tractor ownership, eh?

A long, long time ago, a fella by the name of Joannes Stobaeus offered that farming “is a senseless pursuit, a mere laboring in a circle.”

“You sow that you may reap, and then you reap that you may sow,” wrote the noted 5th-century anthologist of Greek thought.  “Nothing ever comes of it.”

Au contraire, Master Stobaeus. For in farming — gentlemanly or otherwise — much is to be learned. Such knowledge, though at times frustrating in acquisition, should not be so easily dismissed.

Colin McNickle is a senior fellow and media specialist at the Allegheny Institute for Public Policy (cmcnickle@alleghenyinstitute.org).

 

 

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Colin McNickle
Colin McNickle

Colin received his B.G.S. from Ohio University. The 40-year journalism veteran joined the Institute in October 2016. That followed a 22-year career with the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, 18 as director of editorial pages for Trib Total Media. Prior that, Colin had a long and varied career in media — from radio, newspapers and magazines, to United Press International and The Associated Press.

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