Making hay while the sun shines
July 22, 2013Farming involves a lot of looking forward and hoping. All through June we were hoping the rains would stop – and worried that they wouldn’t. On the 28th of June the Otsquago Creek swelled, jumped its banks, and flooded the village of Fort Plain. In those days hope was hard to find amid the sadness. Here are some pictures of the devastation.
It was heartwarming to see the efforts of the neighbors going into the affected area to clean-up, but shocking to see how much damage there was. Marc and I went down for one day. After this experience, we will never store much in the basement.
Two weeks later the sun finally came out. Regardless of how wet June was, last weekend was dry enough to the cut hay. The fields delivered much more hay than usual–it grew for an extra month and it got all the rain it could ever want. We worked all weekend and finished up on Monday. Now, the fields look like a 90 acre lawn. The barns are full of sweet smelling bales of summertime to distribute daily when the winter rolls around. 
My worries in June seem so foolish now. Now, we hope for August to be breezy and not too hot, and not too dry.
Posted by Marc Kratzschmar. Posted In : Farm Life
