Cold and your cattle

It’s pretty remarkable that warm-blooded animals can survive the extreme cold they sometimes must. The practical cattleman will not learn anything from this article to lighten the burden Old Man Winter puts on man and beast. It is intended to give an appreciation of some of the factors that affect the animal (and man) in the cold.

The normal core temperature for cattle is somewhat higher than for humans, 101.5 degrees Fahrenheit vs. 98.6 F. The cow is stressed if it goes below 100 F. Apparently that is beneficial to the function of the rumen, the stomach that ferments the cows food. This fermentation process involves growth of microorganisms that can turn plants the cattle eat into material which can be digested as it passes through the rest of the animals digestive tract. These microorganisms convert cellulose to simple sugars and some plant proteins into amino acids the cow can absorb and use which without fermentation would pass through without contributing to the cow’s nutrition.

A continuing supply of feed is very important for the animal because the fermentation supplies a lot of heat, which helps keep the animal warm in winter. Of course it also contributes heat the cow must loose in warm weather, too. The cow has a hard time getting rid of heat in summer, because, unlike humans and horses, but like many other animals, it does not sweat. Heat is lost by the bovine through evaporation of water in the lungs and breathing passages. A cow is most comfortable at 40 F. That’s why they are apt to be frisky when it is a little chilly.

One thing that helps conserve heat in dry cold weather is the hair. It helps to constrain the movement of warm air around the cow. The cow can (involuntarily) constrict the capillaries in her skin and prevent warm blood from flowing to the surface better than humans. So the surface temperature will be much lower than internal temperature when under cold stress.

Temperature is one factors in cold stress of healthy, well fed cattle. There are two others, wind chill and wet. Wind chill is familiar, we humans experience it when we walk around a corner from a still area to one where a wind is blowing. We generally seek to avoid it, and since we are relatively free to move where we want, don’t experience it much unless forced to work outside in windy cold conditions, like farmers and sailors must.

We are conscious of the effect of wet, too, but perhaps a little basic science will help understand why it is so potent. Water has a very high heat capacity, that is it takes a lot of heat to warm it, about ten times as much as an equivalent weight of iron. Strange, but true. If a warm object is in a dashing rain the water that runs off the animal (or object) is warmed, and that heat must be supplied from within the animal if the animal’s core temperature is to stay up where it belongs.

A second, even more substantial factor is that if the object is wet, water will evaporate from its surface, not just at the end of the rain, but constantly. Evaporation requires energy to separate the molecules of liquid water to allow it to become a gas. A huge amount of energy is required to evaporate water, about five and a third times the amount of heat required to warm the water from freezing temperature to boiling temperature (32 F to 212 F). This goes on all the time the animal is wet, since the skin cannot be allowed go below freezing temperature. The animal can’t avoid it. If the rain turns to snow, the evaporation goes on until the animal is dry. Dry snow is not as hard on the animal as rain, because it does not melt much, held off the animal’s skin by its hair.

Remember the heat you loose by sweating? And the effect of coming out of a shower in a cold room? It’s the same principle. The cooling is due to evaporation of water from your skin. The animal living outside must, in effect, sweat when it rains in addition to the heat that is carried away by water washing over it. And it has a lot of water retained in the hair which must evaporate before its skin is dry. A wet bovine in a heavy rain or somewhat below freezing temperature is in a pretty grim situation.

But what about a calf born into the snow? All the above apply. It needs to get a drink of colostrum as soon as possible to get digestion started as soon as possible. Colostrum is very energy rich. The calf has another adaptation, too. They have a brown fat specialized to produce heat (as do other animals, including humans). It has extra mitochondria, and a special chemistry that allows heat to be generated. It is not an unlimited supply of energy, but something the calf can call on when needed.

The best thing for your animals in the cold is to be able to get out of the wind. A shelter from the rain would also help. This is just common sense to the cowman, but maybe this discussion will help understand more about it.

Paid Hunting

Paid hunting is a resource we have in the East, but it is much less likely to be utilized than in the West. For one thing, is a bit more complicated here. Our farms are smaller and the population density is higher. Control is more likely to be a problem, since you have so many neighbors.

It can pay well, however. Fellows that buy a large four-wheel drive truck, a four wheeler, fancy clothes and an expensive rifle can be tapped for a little more for a good hunting experience. Paid hunting is not an entirely a profit making proposition, however. You have to have put something into it, too.

First, how to size up your prospects. The larger your tract, the better. The more remote the better. The better terms you are on with your neighbors, the better paid hunting will work. If you have a rocked road to the interior (coal striping road or well access road), that is good. If you have people coming to you asking to hunt, that is good. If you keep livestock, you need to keep them off the best hunting grounds. It is possible to hunt in the midst of cattle, but the hunters are inhibited by them, and you run a risk of getting one shot.

On the other hand, if you have a trailer court next door, or have a really determined neighbor who has no other place to hunt, you will have to become a policeman for trespassers, whether you have any talent for the job or not. Tracts near a busy highway or noisy industrial installation are not considered a good place to hunt. Think about your situation. Maybe you want to keep it for yourself or not bother.

How much should you charge? This varies widely, but remember the quality of the experience you provide for your hunters counts. Also the rules must be simple and clear. Some will pay substantial amounts for a good hunting experience

What is a good experience? Basically it means the hunter has a good chance of getting his game and there aren't any interferences. How do you manage that? You can encourage the game on your place. Round bales placed to hide behind will help the hunting. Allow your hunters to put up stands, feed the animals beforehand and put out mineral blocks. They might want to put up cameras, and they surely won't want to carry deer any great distance. Let them use four wheelers. You may have to pull hunters out if they get stuck. If they come from some distance, they might want to store the game in one of your buildings overnight if it is cool enough. They might want to camp, too, but that will command more money for you.

The most important thing though, is to be a good communicator. Talk to them when you see them. If they do something that you consider not fair, be kind to them by talking about it gently. Don't boss or talk down to them.

I have been impressed over the years how looking at the same scene, my hunters and I will see different things. They will see trails, openings in the woods, "sign" and foot prints, while I see the quality of timber, the height of the grass, cow manure, weeds that need to be sprayed, and so on. Unless you are an avid hunter yourself, you don't live in the same world with them.

What they pay helps reduce your bills. At the present time about one-seventh of my farm income is from hunting.

You will be unhappy with the tracks hunters leave when it rains. But avoiding most things that those of us complain about with paid hunters depends on maintaining good relations, which makes them want to close gates, not go through fences, not litter, and such like.

You need insurance. The duty you owe (1) trespassers, (2) permittees (those you allow to come on your property but make no money from) and (3) licencees ( those you make money from) are different. In West Virginia you owe tresspassers and permittees (for hunting only) just one thing. You can not rig up something to hurt them. Licencees are owed considerably more, including pointing out where there are hazards on the farm. The long and the short of it is that you need insurance. Not having it is a good way to lose the farm. But it is not expensive.

The insurance agent should be able to provide you with the mechanics of how to set up your procedure to satisfy his/her company. What follows is how I do it.

There are six different papers. These set up a hunting club with hunters as members along with the landowner, with no formal officers.

The first is an "application to hunt" form. It has the rules on the top of the page and the lower part is the application which each hunter must cut off and submit. This includes name, address, phone number, age (to verify no children) and a detailed description of each vehicle the hunter might drive. I allow one or two boys or girls over twelve but less than eighteen, and each must hunt with a mature hunter, someone old enough to be the father.

The second paper, the bylaws, is effectively a contract and talks specifically about a hunting club. It includes a statement of purpose and how many hunter members will be allowed. It lists duties of the farmer member (landowner). In my case, the most important of these are to transfer hunting rights, to discourage trespassing, to keep cattle confined. It includes a statement the farmer member will not support those who trespass on adjacent land knowingly or accidentally.

The duties of all members are to keep gates closed, to avoid littering and to travel on roads as much as possible.

The duties of hunter members are to obey all applicable laws, report dead animals, both domestic and unsalvageable game, to report accidents or injuries to civil authority and to the farmer member, and a few economic items such as put tree stands in least valuable trees and preserve farm resources. This paper stays the same from year to year.

The third paper is an annual list of details and members. It describes the area to be hunted, the payment, and the term, which runs from the beginning of the buck season of one year to the beginning of buck season the next. You could sell the right to each type of game separately, but that is not advantageous in my situation. The signatures of the hunters are on the left side below these items and the signature of the farmer member is on the right.

The fourth is a permission slip, which is to be carried in the hunter's billfold. This satisfies the game warden if he comes on the farm. It has the hunter's name and the name of the landowner - me. It says something to the effect "so-an-so has permission to hunt on my land in Lewis County," followed by my signature.

The fifth and sixth are optional, but I think a good idea. The fifth is a list of all hunters by name with address and phone number. Below this is a list of all vehicles, by color, that might be used hunting, which comes from the "application to hunt," followed by the owner hunter's name, address and phone number. Copies are given to natural leaders in the group and one is retained for the farm office.

The sixth is a map of the farm with boundaries, streams and some contour lines. It is a blown up tracing of a topo map with the farm boundaries drawn in. In actual usage this has pretty much fallen by the wayside, since much the same hunters come year after year. This kind of map might be useful with a new group or one where the hunters vary a lot from year to year.

It is important to impress on hunters that, according to the laws of West Virginia, they may pursue a deer on another person's property if it is wounded, but in no other circumstances should they walk on, or shoot an animal on, adjoining property. It is important to you to get along with your neighbors. And a stray bullet might find it's way into the hunter trespassing on the adjacent land.

All these can be set up to be used year after year and xeroxed, except the fifth.

This author is not a lawyer, and this article is not to be taken as legal advice. It is a series of observations and explanation of how it worked out for me. Many Appalachian farms should be able to ad a few thousand dollars a year income in return for several hours researching and setting up the program and a few hours work administering it annually.

Priorities for spraying

As I have detailed previously in this blog, spraying with a four-wheel all terrain vehicle with a trailer provides a convenient way to spray weeds and brush on hilly land. the operator can sit astride the four-wheeler and drive to the spot where spray is needed, do the job and them move on without the labor of crawling off and pulling hose the way you do with a tractor mounted sprayer. The trailer with spray tank allows the operator to move 40 gallons or more and the center of gravity is low allowing travel over rough, steep ground. Application of spray is slower, but more precise than a tractor mounted sprayer.

What sort of priorities should one have? Keeping fence lines clear should be first. You need to keep livestock at home. Barbed wire fence needs work regularly, but keeping the worst brush and weeds out of electric fence in imperative. Surely, fences have first priority, all the way around fields keeping livestock. Spraying can also serve to examine and repair fence. It is a good idea to keep fence tools and some materials, such as insulators in the tool box. On my farm I have a trail around the fence even through the woods to allow rapid, mobile access. It took some effort to get it there, but it was worth it, reducing time and effort year after year.

If you are just starting to spray, cover the ground that has the least, most widely spread brush to spray first, particularly if it is near the farmstead where your house and equipment is kept, then push away from the base. Around the tree line of woods will always take a lot of attention, because birds will drop seeds from the limbs above, and the shade discourages grass and allows brushy plants. Where the plants to be sprayed are continuous do last. It takes the most spray and the least pasture is freed up.

A 40 gallon spray tank will require two hours, plus or minus half an hour, to place. The time required to come to the farmstead and get a new load is about 20 minutes to half an hour.

Once again, avoid inhaling the stuff. Your lungs are very delicate, only two cell layers between the blood and the air pockets called alveoli. They also have a system to control surface tension, and spray has surfactants to help it stick to the leaves and stems of the plants you spray. If you can feel it on you face or can see it falling toward yourself, hold your breath and move on.

Pasture and some special considerations on spraying

Pasture is what makes you money in the cattle business. Some people don't spend any money on pasture and can't keep many cattle on their ground. They may even find they have to keep moving to new ground or go out of business. You need to provide as many days of pasture to your stock as possible. It's a lot cheaper than feeding hay.


At present there are three techniques that are feasible for weed control: spraying, clipping pasture that isn't too grown up, and and basal spray. You'd as well plant more brush as to brush hog. The objective is to keep the grass and legumes from being displaced by brushy weeds and forest, and to maintain the grass in the vegetative state as much as possible, rather than in the reproductive (going to seed) stage. Seeds and seed stems are low in digestible nutrients and have poor palatability. Proper rotation is the most important way to keep grass vegetative.

Spray You have to use herbicide to really kill brushy weeds. Spray works best if the brush is shoulder high or less, and use it when the brush is growing , not a dry time. I once used Crossbow, and they say you can use it at any time the snow is not on, but I have always used it as a foliar (leaf) spray. For two years now I have used Remedy Ultra and Forefront, which contain much the same ingredients plus a small amount of a similar herbicide. Remedy contains nearly twice as much triclopyr as Crossbow, and Forefront has a large amount of 2,4-D and a smaller amount of a similar compound. The combination was ecomended by my local Southern States dealer. I found using 80% of the recommended minimum of Remedy and 25% of the minimum of Forefront is very effective for susceptible weeds all season, no increase needed as the season advances. I have yet to find anything that will control raspberries, redbud and a very few other species, but these are a minor problem due to slow growth and limited propagation. They can be controlled manually. I use spot application, so application rates are far below the amount allowed per acre.

The instructions say to wet leaves and stems. Folks, you can't do more, because the excess runs off. Be through, but avoid a tendency to over do it!

It is hard not to get yourself wet with spray, and it is often hard to tell whether you are wet with spray or sweat, because putting it on is work. I haven't had an adverse effect from Crossbow, and I have been used it and it's predecessor for forty years, except twice I have had an effect from inhaling it. The effect was to make me feel a little weak for two or three weeks. Occasionally it would cause a runny nose or phlegm. I have never felt ill effect from the combination I use now.

I did some occupational health work for a few years, and worked in biological warfare two and a half years in the 50's, and from these learned a little about the body's defenses that apply here. The lungs consist or many small sacs the size of a grape, each enclosing an airspace which is connected to the trachea, the pipes air passes through to get to the lungs. These sacs are two cells thick, with air on one side and blood on the other, to facilitate movement of oxygen to the blood and and carbon dioxide in the other direction. They are very tender. "Smoke inhalation" in a fire is usually inhalation of hot air, which sears these cells. Sear enoug of them and you can not exchange oxygen. Goodby! Likewise if droplets of spray solution get down to them, they would allow ready absorption.

The passages which lead to these sacs are lined with fine hairs, and a think fluid catches foreign materials, solid particles and liquid drops, and they are slowly moved back up toward the entrance by the hairs. Your phlegm is this fluid. It comes up on its own, and comes up when you "hork it up." It also includes drainage from your sinuses. If you have worked in dusty conditions you may have noticed the thick part of what you spit up has dust caught in it. Same thing occurs with inhaled droplets. If you swallow phlegm with germs in it (when you have a cold) the acid of the stomach kills most all of them. If you have dust in your phlegm, it will pass through your digestive system with little effect. I really don' know abut he effect of the materials in spray, but I would think it is a good idea to spit the phlegm out - I always do.

In the biological warfare of the 50's (fifty years ago) they made a great deal of getting very fine droplets in the dispersing spray, because very small ones would be carried into the lungs, and not deposited in the airways, as larger drops would, which are cleared out. I don' think much of the volume of herbicide would be converted to very fine droplets in the low pressure sprays in ag use. In other words, most of it would come back up in phlegm.

Another consideration is that sprays are a complex mixture. The "active ingredient" is a plant hormone. Being a hormone does not mean it has an effect in human biochemistry, because human (and other animal) biochemistry is so different from plants. In effect, the hormone is a plant growth regulator.

In addition to the active ingredient (there are actually two of them working in tandem in in all three herbicides mentioned) there are other chemicals. The active ingredients are not water soluble, which necessitates an emulsifier, because you dilute with water, which is cheap. There is also a detergent to help the spray stick to leaves and get into holes and cracks. I suspect the problem I have had from inhalation was from the detergent, because there is a surfactant that controls the surface tension of the liquid in you lungs and the rest of the breathing apparatus, and I think that was "messed up." Best not to breathe the stuff!

At one time I used a full-face gas mask (I'd researched the appropriate canister for the spray), but it was hot and clumsy, so I quit using it. The kind of paper or fiber mask a painter uses may help, at least with the larger droplets, but this is questionable.

One problem with our West Virginia fields is that they are so irregular, and have many edges. At one time the woody growth was cut out of all the little valleys , and off all the places now too steep to get to with a tractor, including knobs. You could see all over the field. Doubtless these places were not smooth, they would have had tracks cut into the steep slopes so animals could walk around them. We could return to such practices with proper husbandry, if the (market) conditions encouraged it. This would mean elimination of cover for deer and coyotes, too, which would be an advantage.

Originally I used a tractor with a 150 gallon sprayer and got over all the farm every second or third year. Now we use a four-wheeler with a forty gallon tank on a low trailer behind. Using a tank mounted on the four-wheeler itself is a tip-over hazard when the liquid splashes from side to side. With our arrangement (see article below) you can get all over the farm, and can get it every year. Our arrangement eliminates getting on and off the tractor frequently, you can remain seated. It is far less labor, less exposure to the operator, and requires less material.

Basal spraying The use of basal spraying has been known for some time, but hasn't been widely used in this area. The solution is made up in diesel fuel or kerosine and is more concentrated than foliar spray. A hand sprayer is usually used. Spray is applied to the bottom fifteen to eighteen of the plant, all the way around. It is better than foliar spray for woody plants more than shoulder high (one application will frequently kill plants up to a foot or more in diameter for many species), and it can be done at any time of year, even if it will soon rain. However the February and March season suggests itself, when the ground is dry enough, and leaves are off. Inhalation of spray should be less of a problem, since the operator is always spraying downward.

Clipping pasture The advantage of using a mowing machine is that it is relatively fast. It gets the weeds that are not killed by spray, too. When you cut with a brush hog you cut six feet wide the first time around. After this is this considerably less because the brush hog is free to swing from side to side and you can't directly see where the edge between the cut and uncut grass is located. You do well to get a five foot width of cut after with a six foot cutter. With a mower you have the full width of the machine with perhaps four inches off for ovrlap. The problem is that the mower is much more easily broken. This means you have to pick up rocks, especially, and also fallen branches, etc. Trees must be cleaned up regularly, in any case, becausethey harbor new growth of woody weeds and make new edges to the pasture.

Never hit the same rock twice I usually have he loader bucket on when I do a piece or the first three times, so all I have to do is to stop and throw the rocks in. After that you don't need the bucket all the time, but can leave it in the field, and attach it when needed.

If brush gets larger than shoulder high, by neglect, no other word applies, you may want to brush hog it, then spray the shoots the next year (or likely for two or three years). The must be a delay of a year or two after the brush dies before you use the mower again because of the stumps. I recommend brush hog only on very steep ground, rough ground (where there are little washes, old cattle tracks, hidden stumps, etc), and there only because a brush hog is harder to break.

One disadvantage of the brush hog is the clutch. they all have a clutch to prevent injury to the tractor drive shaft (an expensie repair). But it requires some care to get it adjusted right. It should turn when something solid is hit, but should not be so loose it will get hot by slipping. It would be best to have it slip a little in ordinary use, to keep the clutch plates free of rust, but it will "polish" if they slip too much. The clutch must not get wet, because it will rust, and freeze up. Then it must be loosened so it will turn and you have to go through an extensive process of tightening until it is the right tension.

You can cut anything you can ride down with the tractor, by going slow and backing up a few times. However, many tractors have hydraulic hoses and other bendable parts under them. This riding down characteristic is how the brush hog gets its name. Hogs are sometimes put in standing corn, and they straddle the stalks and ride them down to the ground where they can get the ears. No tractor tha I know of that is now being manufactured has a truly hardened underside. Older ones are better in this respect.

You may be able to find a special kind of brush hog that is designed for larger trees, which allow you to cut them off by back up into them. They have a large heavy wheel underneath, which serves as a flywheel, four short heavy blades and a protective device on the back which retracts through compression springs to allow the blades to come in contact with the tree. With this you can cut trees six inches or more in diameter. It is about 20% to 50% more expensive than the regular heavy brush hog.

Pasture rotation The best way to maintain te grass in a vegetative state is to use adequate lime and divide the pasture in several fields and rotate pasture. This s a relatively new technique, and you should consult experts. The basic idea is to force the cattle to cleanup grass in one "paddock" and then move on to the another. When to move depends on how many paddocks you have and the condition of the grass. You don't want to graze the grass too short, because this will delay recovery, but at the same time you want them to eat it all, including cleaning out the fence rows.

Many experts say the more paddocks the better. Some try to move to a new one every day. The problem with this is you have to have water for each paddock, which increases the expense considerably. Of course the additional fence requires additional maintenance. Another problem is the variable rate of growth of grass. It begins in April, reaches a maximum in May and June, declnes cosiderably in the heat and dryness of the late summer and then has a second growth spurt in September and October when the rains return. And some years are much more productive, basically due to the difference between a wet year and a dry one. Some years in West Virginia you can pasture three times as many cattle on a given acreage as in the driest years.

You should think about at least eight or ten paddocks. Some of these would be cut for hay in the May-June rotation, and used for pasture in the dryer season. The plan should provide pasture into December or later, and might provide some planted hot season supplement, such as Sudan Grass in paddocks for August and early September. Paddocks could be subdivided by temporary (electrified string) fence.

Rotation is said to considerably increase the stocking rate, and works well with highly developed (limed and fertilized) pasture. It should considerably reduce the amount of spraying and clipping needed. It does require much more careful attention to detail, however.

The future As you know, the world supply of oil will run out by degrees. By 2025 the pinch will be sharp. This means great uncertainty in many respects. The advent of the petroleum driven tractor revolutionized farming. You could keep four or five cows where you kept a team of horses. Horses need daily attention, long training periods, are capricious, get sick, must be acquired by birth and raising, all of which reduce efficiency. It is hard to think they might come back as a source of farm power after the age of petroleum, but they might. Level land could be used to utilize other, heavier sources of power than the internal combustion engine.

I think what will happen in pasture is more efficient grazing systems, particularly with the utilization of more than one species. Sheep or goats to clean up after cows, for example. There will always be some weeds that are not eaten by cows and these will need to be taken care of by alternate methods. Sheep or goats require more secure fencing and more protection against predators. Alternatively it may be the old "grubbing hoe" or some similar tool will supply the need for weed removal again, at great cost in labor. The land owning class and the farm labor class may again become distinct.

I expect labor to be used in place of petroleum, to some extent. The lonely business I have experienced may change back toward the gang labor farming of the past. Local markets will become more important, communication by wire more important. This is if the free market prevails. If the government takes over it is hard to predict what will happen, other than things will go to hades for sure. in any case the person who thinks about what is happening and plans ahead will have a significant advantage.

The main advantage the Western cattlemen have, aside for being closer to the packing plants, which are located in the West because the feed lots are there, is that they do not have as many problems maintaining pastures. The biggest problem they face in the long run is that they will have severe water problems in a few years. The Midwest, the South and the more southerly part of the Far West are expected to have the most severe loss of precipitation. The giant Ogallala Aquifer is being "mined" in the sense that more water is being taken out than is being replaced by nature. About 27% of the irrigated land in the United States overlies this aquifer system, which supplies about 30% of the nation's ground water used for irrigation. Many feeding operatons are in this area, due to the corn and soybeans grown there.

Summary It is my belief that a judicial mixture of spraying and clipping when needed is the best pasture maintenance at the present. Rotational grazing has much to recommend it, but it is more management intensive.

The farm as a buffer in hard times

(Started March 2004)

I was born in “The Great Depression” of the thirties, and heard a lot about it growing up. It never did end for the West Virginia farm economy, at least until after my children grew up. It continued right through the forties and fifties for West Virginia farmers. For laborers willing to move out of state, to Akron (“The largest West Virginia town outside of West Virginia,” they said) or Baltimore, it ended with the boom of WWII.

However, the worst of it wasn’t too bad for our family, because they had something to sell – milk and eggs. People didn’t always pay their bills – Dad often let men work off their bills in farm work. He often said, “I have a half interest in half the kids in West Milford (where he delivered his milk) because I kept them alive at times.” There was some exaggeration in this, but certainly he supplied the richest and most dependable part of their diet. The reason the family got along well was because Dad’s sister, Aunt Lotta, who lived next door, had a dependable job (teacher) and Dad had something to sell that everyone wanted, and his price was right.

When I first came to Jesse Run farm one of the neighbors who had worked for Carroll Bond told me about being paid for work in potatoes and meat. This was not unusual at the time.

At the present time I see our farm, like most around, as being rather specialized, producing feeder calves and occasionally, timber. It has the capacity to do much else. The easiest change would be growing out cattle on grass. The farm could produce other food, gardens and potatoes for home use or sale (it once did), and space to drill water wells. A shop could produce furniture, do light repairs and maintenance on autos and farm machinery. Sheep have some possibility, but require a lot of labor, and must be protected from predators. And they need a building in winter.

Any of these things are a technology, and one would have to acquire the knowledge to conduct these enterprises, but that is only work. And you’d need a little capitol. A high speed connection to the Jane Lew telephone exchange (three miles) would allow computer work here.

If you learn to like it, the farm provides work that is as much fun as most recreation. Keeping the farm going is a balancing act, though.

As this is written in 2004, the United States is going in debt to foreigners at a rate of $500 billion per year. That is the value of imports minus exports. The only way this amount can be paid is by debt (which carries interest) and by selling American assets. Our debt grew by 6.3 times the growth of the economy in the fourth quarter of 2002, $2.3 trillion vs. $363 billion. Overseas investment payments are were $333 billion in 2002. The value of the dollar with respect to the euro is falling rapidly.

40% of the graduates of U. S. institutions of higher learning in science and technology are foreigners. Blue collar jobs have been exported to other parts of the world, and now white collar jobs, such as computer programming and low level management are going.

The population is aging, and a Social Security bust is bound to happen, they say.

The stock market is over inflated. The returns (dividends) do not justify the cost of stock, prices are held up by the expectation of gains in the value of stocks, capital appreciation. In other words, by speculation.

The average U. S. family carries an immense debt load. Interest is going down, which encourages more borrowing. Manufacturing is seriously sick, and can not compete with foreign industries. The economy is being carried by expanding consumer debt and government spending. Neither of these increase national wealth, but consume it. Our military is a massive financial drag for the nation, but affords huge profits for a few.

Much U. S. currency is used in exchange between foreign countries. (Petroleum, for example, is usually bought with dollars.) If the euro or some other currency increasingly becomes the medium of exchange, there will be a vast excess of dollars, far more than would be needed for U. S. commerce, leading to very serious inflation.

In short, it seems likely that bad times will return. How is the farm related to that?

In a depression stocks fall in value, some of them becoming valueless. The value of land falls, also, because much of the value of land is speculation on future worth, just like ownership of stock in corporations, this portion of the value is related to the general economic situation. Land does retain some of its value in a depression because there are always people in a depression who have money. Land is space, which is in demand, and it retains its productive value through a range of opportunities for the creative mind. And it is the home, the most important investment for a family, any investment councilor will tell you.

If there is a cloud on the horizon, the farm operation needs to be kept nearly debt-free, because after a fall occurs, the debts don’t disappear. The creditor will also be in trouble and will be desperate for his money. You must pay or loose it. If you loose livestock or machinery, you still have your home, but if you loose the farm, you loose it all.

Since the exact nature of the coming problem is not certain – it will not be a 1930’s type depression – I can not give specific advice, but must suggest you use your mind well. Get information, think ahead for the consequences of your action, get along well with your neighbors. In any case, you should be better off if you live on a farm managed for the times.

It is now April 2009, and we are not at the bottom, in spite of what they tell us.

The mortgage bust hit last fall. Experts tell us that about as many mortgages will fail in the near future as have failed in the past year. General motors plans to take a nine weeks vacation this summer, rather than the customary two weeks, and the other car companies are also about broke. Layoffs continue at a fast pace. Various kinds of corruption have made the headlines.

Even the military has been hit to some extent. The F-22 fighter appears to be discontinued, but the fight is hard in Congress. It is estimated to cost, including development cost, about $350M per plane. The F-35, a later, more versatile, high tech plane is being continued.

The average 401k retirement plan has lost 27% in the past year, according to CBS Nightly News. Many families are consolidating as a revetment against lost income. The army is tightening it’s enlistment standards, because hard times has made many young people choose that option. Bank loans are hard to get, credit card interest rates are rising and limits are coming down, many companies are advertising twice as hard and food is getting expensive in two ways – it is getting more costly to buy an article and the packages are getting smaller.

On the farm, timber has gone down to almost nothing, cattle prices are dropping and people are talking about raising a garden. That is a great idea for a farm in hard times. It is a lot of work, but it helps replace money for one of the largest expenses a family has. Another good project is potatoes. The yield is good, they can be prepared in many ways, and they have vitamin C, B vitamins, potassium and a number of minerals. The skins are a good source of fiber (needed by us old folks). They produce more food value for less work than about any other source and the technology is simple.

A technology that is relatively complex is keeping a cow or two. She must have food for the winter, but can survive, reproduce and give milk on hay and minerals. You will want a shed for hay storage and milking (no fun in the rain in winter) and fenced grass land, some of which must provide winter feed. You also need appropriate vessels for milking and storage, and refrigeration. This gets you milk, butter, cottage cheese. When she gets a calf (she must be bred once a year), that provides beef from the same diet. A dual-use cow must be carefully chosen. The bull can be any beef breed, or she may be artificially bred.

The cow’s manure is good fertilizer for many plants, and excess milk can be fed to a pig, along with household food waste, including parings, scraps and slightly outdated food. A cow or two and a few pigs should meet the meat needs of any family. There is a lot to learn if you have not grown up with the technology, though.

An orchard is a good bet too, lots of work and lots of new technology to get started, but once underway produces a lot of food with relatively little work. An orchard takes 4 or 5 years to get into production, however. Grapes, berries and rhubarb are good choices for side projects. All of these must be kept from the deer, which like them as well as you do.

Old timey favorites from the garden easily kept for the winter include kraut, buried potatoes, cabbage, Chinese cabbage, roots of various sorts, dried corn and beans of some types, and canned goods, such as green beans, tomato juice, beets, pickles.

Think about trading items, rather than buying them. You may be able to trade for skills, too, such as mechanic work, carpentry beyond what you can do yourself, and labor in some of these enterprises.

Use you head rather than your feet, as Br’er Rabbit said!

August , 2010. There has been some talk of “improvement” of the situation a month or so ago, but it is mostly “wishful thinking.” The U. S. economy needs 200, 000 new jobs a month to keep up with the population growth, they say, but new jobs amounted to less than one-sixth of that last month, and that was about the way it is running now. It is slowly dawning that there is no use to flagellate the consuming consuming public for not spending (70% of the economy). They are already deeply in debt and afraid of the future.

The problem is that the good jobs were sent overseas. The new ones that have been and are being created are low-paying. The beneficiaries have been, to a small extent, investors, and to a very large extent top managers. Unless we can put workers to work in good-paying jobs, they won’t have money to dispose of, to bring us out of the economic troubles. The only people who will have money to spend are the ultra-rich and they will not create jobs but will speculate with their gains.

In some places today the rate of mortgage failure is twice what it was earlier. Money is easier to borrow for agriculture than many other kinds of business, because the farm loan is invariably backed up, directly or indirectly, by the farm land itself. Beware! There are a lot of investors out there who would rather have your farm to see them through hard times than their money.

Living in dangerous times

In dangerous times, try to be in a position where a reduction in income will do a minimum of serious damage -
Live conservatively, put any savings into an appropriate investment. The worst of all is stocks - they have a nasty way of disappearing completely. Some kinds of paper are better than others. But nobody in our family has so much money they have to invest in someone else's' business. Bank deposits are safe to the extent of insurance provided by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, the government agency (unless the government goes broke). The problem with money savings is that in hard times it is almost certain to decline in value.

Some good investments are developing salable skills, developing your own business (selling something people will always need such as food, firewood, skills such as mechanics, house repair, etc .); buying items for resale in the near future (if you have the skills), but don't get over extended. Look for ways to make money on the side consistent with your life style.

The most important, and first investment anyone should make, is in a modest home. Rent is a bottomless pit you throw money into. Ideally, the payments should be well within your ability to pay. Pay off as quickly as possible. That way you are at risk for less time, and you don't loose as much money to interest. Fixing up an older house is a great idea, if you have the ability. If your occupation requires you to move, get something that can be resold easily.

Cars are a great sink for money. Own as few as will meet your family needs. Own one status car if you have to, but keep the others small and cheap. This saves gasoline, insurance, tires, etc. You are doing well by riding a bicycle if the distance to travel is short. This also great for your health.

Your occupation off farm, if necessary, should be something dependable, something that will be required even in bad times. Some government jobs meet this standard. Teaching is a good example. Of course, the salary may be reduced, but a job is better than no job. Some kinds of companies produce goods or services that are always needed. Groceries, health services, hardware, (but not clothes), public transportation (not airlines), etc. meet this criterion. You have to think about your individual situation, though. Think about the stability of a particular industry in which your skills are to be used. A computer programmer would find some jobs stable and others not. Hourly labor is very subject to changes, very unstable.

Don't use credit card borrowing. This is really important. If you have a credit card pay it off each time before interest becomes due. Interest on credit cards is sinfully high, and late payment or non-performance charges will eat you alive. For large items get a bank loan. Credit cards and too many big loans are the principal cause of bankruptcy at the present time, and any little nip up in interest rates, or downturn in the economy where people get laid off causes an upturn in bankruptcy.

Both husband and wife should have some insurance. The surviving spouse will miss them not only physically and emotionally, but financially, also. Term is best. Investment by the insurance route is secure, but it has a low payoff, frequently less than inflation.

Two incomes in the family help stability. You need benefits - medical, dental, etc. Getting them by one spouse is important, both is better.

Work hard to keep your marriage stable. Divorce is a disaster in many ways, financial not the least. For farm people it means “kiss the farm goodbye” in all too many cases. Get help from a pastor or councilor if you need to.

There are a lot of obvious things that you do already: avoid addictions (alcohol, drugs, cigarettes, gambling, expensive vacations, etc.), buy sturdy but inexpensive clothes and household items, look for bargains, don't buy until you can pay for things. Don't borrow from loan sharks. Don't put a mortgage on your home to pay other bills, or worse, to finance consumer spending. Better to have ratty clothes, an empty and cold house than no house at all.

It is absolutely painful to think about these things and make decisions, particularly when it requires withholding part of your income you are used to enjoying. People seldom bother to think about money and how to get it, nor was I taught to, but the older I get the more I realize all these things are within the range of rational analysis. Not one person in twenty does it until forced to. Many of the others get burned, some badly.

Electric fence, including danger

If mainline power is available and dependable, 110 or 220 volt AC (plug it in the wall socket) energizers are usually most practical for permanent fences. Will they raise your electricity bill? Well, depending on the size of the unit, they typically draw 2 to 25 watts. The operational cost of an energizer drawing 17 watts would be about $1.50/month (assuming an electrical rate of $0.12/kilowatt hour).

How dangerous are they? Energizers (chargers) are usually rated in “joules.” (pronounced the way a West Virginian pronounces jewels.) This is a physics unit for measuring energy. It is directly related to the “kick” the fence gives the animal (and human) that shorts it to the ground. My daughter worked in the cardiac care unit of Ruby Memorial Hospital at one time, so I asked her how many joules were used to revive someone whose heart had stopped. She said 450 joules. So I don’t think there is much danger of heart stoppage with a properly grounded commercial charger. But 4 or 5 joules from the fence will “really get your attention,” as they say. I know, because I have been hit many times.

At this point I need to introduce a couple of terms. A capacitor (also called a condenser) is a device for storing electricity. That’s what a battery does, too, but the capacitor is able to let its contents go almost instantly, were a battery stores a lot of electricity and takes some time to let it go.

Volts is a measure of how hard the electrons are pushed through the wire. The more volts the more electrons are pushed through a particular resistance (the animal, or you, if you are not careful).

The way a fence charger works is to take 110 volts (or 220 volts if so wired) off the high line, step it up to several thousand volts to load the capacitor (sometimes more than one) in the charger. This takes about three-quarters of a second, then it switches that line off and hooks the capacitor to the fence. When this happens the fence shares the load with the capacitor. At this point the fence should read a few thousand volts on your meter.

That sounds pretty scary if you don’t know the details. The function of the capacitor is to limit the number of electrons at this high voltage. That much voltage off the high line would “fry” you. In fact, 110 can fry you too, if you are sufficiently grounded so the current of electrons can flow through you. The high line is effectively an unlimited supply of electrons.

The charger lets the charge on the fence drain off to ground within a few thousandths of a second after it starts. The intermittent nature of the charge on a proper electric fence is an important safety feature. Most of the time there is no charge on it, just very briefly for a few thousandths of a second about every three quarters of a second. The intermittent nature of the shock increases the element of surprise too, increasing its effectiveness

If there are weeds on the fence, they drain off the electrons, and so reduce the kick. Fortunately, their resistance is rather high, so some weeds can be tolerated. You need to keep the bottom wire about 17 inches or slightly more above ground, so cattle can eat under it, which helps keep the weeds down. It pays to have the area under the fence properly limed so you have palatable grass there, too.

The resistance in the “voltmeter-fence tester” is very high, so not many electrons drain through it. It does not “short out” the fence.

A good ground for the energizer (fence charger) is important. It will interfere with a telephone cable for several tens of yards. Be careful where you place it. The standard grounding rod, half inch in diameter and six feet long works well. It needs to be down to moist ground, no matter how dry the surface is. The dryer the surface is, the more kick you need in your fence. The rods are made so long to get down to moist earth. Use a steel fence post driver of the type that is a tube with handles on each side to get the rod down as far as you can, then use a sledge hammer. The preferred method is to take it below the surface, and use a clamp to attach a large diameter copper wire, which is also kept below the ground to where it can go straight up to the charger. Use several, preferably four hooked up with the same large diameter copper wire as the first one. Steel fence wire should not be used, particularly below ground – it rusts.

Insulators are made for steel posts, but steel posts should not be considered permanent. You find this type of insulator at feed stores. They soon age. Use treated wood for permanent posts, or locust. Locust serves well if you can find good trees, with no fungus infected wood. Both locust and treated posts have considerable conductivity, so insulators are needed. Get polyethylene or polypropylene plastic insulators. Also don’t use fine wire for permanent fence, deer will break it in no time.

Use “string fence” with polypropylene cords and fine stainless steel wires woven in for temporary fence. Just tie it for connections. Use lots of wrapping in your knots so the tiny stainless wires will come in contact with the steel wires. Get good spools to wind it on, ones designed to roll up extension cords. Take care of it, and it lasts for years. Don’t use the fancy plastic fence posts for permanent fence, they age very fast, and you can’t keep the wires tight. If you plan to reuse temporary posts, get fiberglass. I have used some for ten years. I like three-eights inch round posts which you can get from some fence supply houses and add two adjustable holders for the string fence. This is called “Spider Fence.”

An electric fence is not a physical barrier, like barbed wire and woven wire. It is psychological fence. Animals avoid it, but learn to eat inches from the wire. Animals unfamiliar with it can stumble through. Under extreme conditions predators can drive them through, and baby calves do not understand it the first time they come in contact. They seldom go through twice.

We keep a road wide enough to run a four wheeler along the fence through the woods and where ever we can. Like any fence, they need to be checked often. The four wheeler makes checking fast and makes access for the few needed repairs easy. We keep a few tools with us on the four wheeler any time we go into the pasture so that repairs can be made without a return to the house for tools.

Finally, the electrons repel each other, because they have negative charge. Most of the charge when it moves is carried in the outside layer of the wire. Rust is an insulator compared to the steel or its zinc galvanizing. Wire needs to be changed when it guts rusty. An electric fence will last far longer than barbed wire, though.

Some don'ts for electrical fence: 1. Don’t hook to the high line directly, without a charger. In other words, don’t provide the legal profession with another lucrative case to litigate at your expense. 2. Don’t use barbed wire. The animal needs to get away from the fence. 3. Take the time and go to the trouble to build a good ground. 4. Don’t get cheap plastic stuff. The insulators sold by fence supply houses have additives which make the insulators last and last. 5. Don’t use metal posts for permanent electric fence.