Farming life in Maine is hard work but rewarding.
The kids on a family farm learn work ethic and responsibility. The skill set grows when you have to use the business end of a hammer. Or fire up a welder or cutting torch, twist a ratchet wrench. Or repair with bailing twine, vise grips and hay wire. Making do with what you have for repair items makes a person pretty darn resourceful. It helps develop a positive can do attitude through out the family household.
Even the barn yard cat has a very vital roll in keeping the rodent population under control. Rats, mice, anything in the grain bin nibbling on the animal feed is the enemy for the cat. The dog chases off the fox who wants a chicken dinner too. If the farm is not just crops but critters, herding the cows, sheep, whatever is out in the pasture land becomes part of his role on the homestead surrounded by Maine land.
They also say by Tuesday noon a true farmer has logged the standard work week 40 hour tally. Ever heard the Paul Harvey God Made A Farmer?
And is racking up more working pretty much around the clock. Burning the midnight oil, not wasting daylight on the other end of the rise and shine. That’s why they say thank a farmer when you sit down to dine. No farmer, no food. Ever thought of buying a Maine farm?
More and more folks are turning back to an agricultural approach to living. To get food they know was not sprayed with
something in a container wearing a skull and cross bones. Food insecurity is one thing when a person is not sure when or what is going to be their next meal.
But food safety is a concern when you are not involved in the planing, cultivating, fertilizing, harvesting the bounty of the rich soil we are blessed with in Maine. In my area the Amish community use carriage horses for travel and plow horses to pull the motor-less farm equipment.
Our family cat was not the most social, he was never altered, a Tom.
His name was Satan and he was total black fir and never grayed. Satie lived for 14 years and he was a worker. No other cat, not many rodents of any kind got close to the set of farm buildings he patrolled. He would travel into town, some other area once a year and come back to the farm with torn ears, other scrapes and bruises.
As a Tom cat, the family just figured he was on vacation from the farm chores and fraternizing with the opposite feline sex.
Satan pulled his weight around the Maine farm property.
Dr Perkins, the local vet at the time who lived on Court Street in Houlton Maine had to put Satan the farm cat down when his ailments became too much for any quality of life.
As a young child, there is nothing harder than having to struggle to accept when a family pet of any kind has to be put to sleep. Being on a busy US highway 2 meant loss of dogs too. A German shepherd, a St Bernard that both got hit out in traffic and that ended their life.
Dr. Cal Newman worked on the 160 pound St Bernard named Rudy who broke his front leg badly in the car accident. Dad told me this was too big a dog to hobble around on three legs when one had too badly crushed bones and other complications lead to the end of his short life on the family farm. A special insulated dog house was his domain that replaced the potato barrel on its side used when the too hot for inside living mountain dog moved beyond the farmhouse glass porch bed.
I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker
207.532.6573 | info@mooersrealty.com |
MOOERS REALTY 69 North Street Houlton Maine 04730 USA