Quite the weather

“Quite the weather we’re having,” is a popular phrase in our family this winter season. Then again, what winter season in the Upper Midwest isn’t it a popular phrase? Some weeks it’s blue skies, sunny and fifty degrees feeling more like late April than January. Some weeks it’s negative 20 and the heated waterers quit working because it’s so cold that the supply line freezes below the heat tape. I spent hours carrying around tools and pails of hot water getting them thawed so the thirsty cattle could get a drink.

The Christmas season had brought warm temps along with some rain to work in and we celebrated the season in an unusually comfortable outdoor way. We haven’t seen any snow accumulation since that time, and it’s looked a lot more like Kansas here than it should. Ironically, last week, Florida had more snow than us. They may have even gotten more snow than we’ve seen all winter. At this point, I’ve come to peace with the idea the hay fields may have a lot less alfalfa in them this coming season. The dangerously cold temps came when we had no snow cover whatsoever. I am hoping though the cold temps may not have been a big issue as we’ve found what really seems to be the kiss of death to legumes in the hay fields. The worst winter survival conditions, in our experience, have been fast snowmelt or rain that causes flooding and then freezing days that keep those puddles smothering the legumes. Sometimes even the grasses don’t survive those events and replanting is the best course of action in the spring.

It’s probably time, or maybe I’m already late to get some alfalfa and clover seed reserved at the seed house on the offhand chance we do have winterkill. I prefer it if I can get decent quality organic seed options locked in. They usually sell out pretty early. We were late this year on making our chicken purchase and slaughter schedule for the upcoming summer pasture season. Every summer, we raise somewhere between 1,000-1,500 Cornish cross and freedom ranger broilers out in one of our cow pastures. The butcher shop already had one of the dates we prefer to schedule chickens filled up. Also, the hatchery we buy freedom ranger birds from only had straight run unsexed chickens for sale as they sold out of cockerels on every date from March to September. We got the scheduling figured out, chicks ordered, and butcher dates blocked. Hopefully the avian influenza that’s been a popular topic in the media and on farms stays away from both our chickens and cows this summer.

Lately our farm equipment has been behaving as if it is passing around a communicable disease. Our manure scraping skid loader shelled its hydraulic pump, then our feeding skid loader had an actuator fail. After I got the actuator fixed, the Kubota UTV started having its front tires try to point different directions thanks to an inner tie rod end separating. I got the Kubota fixed and the feeding and now also manure skid loader has a catastrophic belt tensioner failure. We got that fixed and then the Kubota lost the ability to steer right because a retaining clip broke inside the steering cylinder. Lastly, a hydraulic hose blew on the skid loader and dropped the bucket into the total mixed ration mixer. God only knows how, as once the wedges are engaged, they’re not supposed to go anywhere with or without hydraulic pressure. Maybe we ought to start parking all those pieces of equipment in different sheds. Hanging out together in the heated shop has been bad for their mechanical health. Our neighbor, Dan, has really saved our butts, allowing us to borrow his skid loader twice in the last month when ours seems to break down every other weekend.

Until next time, keep living the dream and monitor your equipment for signs of the mechanical flu. Quarantine them quickly if they start to sputter or cough like I had to do to myself on our family ski trip. But that’s a story for another column.

Tim Zweber farms with his wife, Emily, their three children and his parents, Jon and Lisa, near Elko, Minnesota.