Farm Note: Week 1, 2024
Welcome welcome to this new year. The low last night – ten degrees – felt like actual winter instead of the creepy faux-cold we’ve had thus far. I’m torn on what to wish for. Mild weather with no snow is so much easier for farming. The animals need fewer calories to stay warm, the pipes don’t freeze, farmers remain free of frostbite during chores, and zero snow to plow is a savings of time and money. I still miss the smooth and flattering blanket of white, and the clean cold that feels like a fresh start. The new USDA cold hardiness map puts us in zone 5b, rather than our previous designation, 4a. This means our expected extreme low is -15 instead of -30. The USDA cautions against apocalyptic interpretation, saying that the new zones are based on new ways of using new data. In a sentence on the website that reeks of political caution, they state, “Climate changes are usually based on trends in overall annual average temperatures recorded over 50-100 years. Because the USDA PHZM represents 30-year averages of what are essentially extreme weather events (the coldest temperature of the year), changes in zones are not reliable evidence of whether there has been global warming.” But if you feel brave enough to look the apocalypse squarely in the eye today, I’ll give you another tidbit. For each of the last 20 years, on average, we’ve added an additional day of frost free weather to our growing season. Good news for the tomatoes next year, perhaps, but disaster for the children.
We had a new calf born in the dairy herd this week, to a cow named Bailey. When a high-producing middle-aged cow like Bailey gives birth, milk fever – a life-threatening, acute drop in blood calcium levels – is always a possibility. We always give prophylactic doses of calcium gel at calving, but it’s not always enough. Milk fever can show up as a full metabolic collapse, or it can manifest as a more subtle weakness that can look like the cow is a bit tipsy. Three days after calving, Bailey was getting a final calcium supplement post-milking, and she fell down, with her hind end in the gutter. Though she looked otherwise alert, she didn’t have the strength to get herself out. I hate situations like this, because the chances of a cow injuring herself are high. Indeed, Bailey managed to cut a teat while scrambling unsuccessfully to rise. Teat injury in a fresh cow that has to be milked is no fun for the cow or the milkers. Luckily, Nick, Jackie and I were able to get a calcium IV in her, then brought in a tractor and a handy cow lifter that buckles around the hip bones. Up she came, like magic. We got her calcium levels stabilized, Jackie has been tending the teat wound, and I have high hopes Bailey will make a full recovery.
Above: new friends the Andres family, who raise Christmas trees and sheep in France! They visited us just before the New Year and helped plant all those new fence posts. I wonder how you say 'busman's holiday' in French?
Beth is finalizing the seed order right now, and we’re laying ambitious plans for the coming growing season. Today is our first distribution for our 2024 membership. We’re so happy to welcome some brand-new members on board, and are grateful as ever to our returning members, whose loyalty supports our full year of full diet production. This year, we’re sending extra special thanks to those who contributed to the Essex Farm Food Fund, which allows us to bridge the gap between the full cost of membership and what folks of more modest means can afford. This funding is so meaningful not only to the people who are using the funds to access membership, but to the health of the farm, and the morale of everyone who works here. We love feeding people, and widening the circle of our membership is smack dab in the center of our goals. We still have funds available, so if you or someone you know is interested in a membership, please reach out to us as soon as you can. In addition, we can currently accept the Adk Action Fair Food cards in our farm store, and we’re very close to getting our certification to accept SNAP (EBT) both for the farm store and our membership. Please help us spread the word that there are multiple ways to access a membership here, and shoot any questions my way.
Mark has spent most of the last week planting the most perennial crop we grow: fence posts. He and Scott Hoffman (our favorite alumni farmer) and a rotating cast of strong hands finished the first step in a new line of high tensile fence along Blockhouse Road, one along the farm stream, a line up the sugarbush hill which will make moving sheep so much easier, and a line at the east end of Field 10 along middle road, 300 posts in total. This was partly funded by a USDA conservation grant project to improve grazing. Mark and co. also resurrected a useful old culvert crossing on a path through the woods between the Firehouse and the CATS trail, which adds a lot of flexibility for sheltering animals during heat waves, and simplifies the job of moving livestock in that zone. Thanks to all who lifted those heavy posts! And thanks to the USDA’s CRP program for the funding.
One last little piece of news for our far-flung farm friends. We are working toward converting Barbara Kunzi’s former house on Main Street in the village of Essex to a rental house, specifically to people who are interested in spending a stretch of time near Essex Farm. We are currently looking for mid-term renters who want a place for one to four months. We are painting inside this winter, but it’s furnished and perfectly comfortable, so if you’d like a winter retreat and don’t mind a rough edge, shoot me a note. We will have it freshly painted and ready to go for more rentals in spring. Don’t forget, Essex is right in the middle of the full solar eclipse happening on April 8th!
I hope you’ll forgive me for the large gaps in the farm record in 2023. I’m committed to getting the farm note out regularly in 2024. However, I’m going to be traveling for the rest of January, so unless I encounter something agricultural in Bangladesh that I feel I must share with all of you, expect the next note the first week in February. And that’s the news from Essex Farm for this brave 1st week of 2024. Find us at essexfarm@gmail.com, by text (to Mark) at 518-570-6399, or on the farm, any day but Sunday.
— Kristin & Mark Kimball
Important PS for all members: Please make sure to sign in when you get your share this week! If you don’t see your name on the sign-in list, write yourself in and we’ll fix it up for next week.
Essex Farm Food Fund Details
If you would like to contribute to the Essex Farm Food Fund, or would like to ask your company to make a matching gift, here is how to do it. If you have any questions, please reach out to us directly.
Donations may be sent to University Impact, the 501c3 that manages this Donor Advised Fund. They will be allocated to the Essex Farm Food Fund, to be used to bridge the gap between the full cost of Essex Farm’s sustainable, diversified, full-diet, year-round membership and the price that lower income people in our community can afford to pay.
In order to assure proper allocation, notice of any donation should be sent to Michele Polanis, michele@glightfinancial.com, before funds are wired or checks mailed to University Impact.
Checks may be made out to University Impact and sent to:
University Impact
ATTN: DAF Accounts, for Essex Farm Food Fund
3305 N University Ave, Suite 275
Provo UT 84604
For wire transfers:
Bank name: Zions Bank
Account Number: 980213961
Routing Number: 124000054
Donations are tax deductible.
