I’ve been feeling somewhat out of sorts, a little estranged from the sustainable living aspirations and ethics that underpin this whole life project. A little unproductive and certainly overwhelmed by the amount there is to be done, and perhaps a little immobilised by that. The Dairylad works as hard as any man i know, including my father, often 13 hours a day, taking on tasks which would have seemed unimaginable even 6 months ago. I struggle with and embrace the role which falls to me, or which i have constructed for myself, farmhousewife. I am put in mind of my mother, and understand the dynamic of partnership between her and my dad. Of course I have no children (mum had 5 under the age of 6) and have only hobby acreage as opposed to tens of thousands of acres (mum was responsible for the house gardens and provided for the whole family from those gardens. Amazing). I guess my mum must have suffered from a sense of social isolation that i cannot even imagine. 50 km along a rutted dirt road to the nearest town. Not large regional centre. Country town. Still, despite the differences in scale i find myself in a roleplay of farmer and farmer’s wife which is very traditional, very 1950’s, a construction, a performance, and yet not. A partnership which is necessary in order that the life we live is functional and possible.

So, I find myself, as I said, somewhat immobilised. There are systems which i am unhappy with, machinery which fails, the struggle i have with time, a concern around pasture and management of the pastures, fences to be fixed, weeds, weeds, weeds, a dog with a high prey drive, a failed winter season in the vegie patch and a need to make the spring/summer season productive, fences to be built around the house gardens to keep out the rabbits, the orchard to be reclaimed from weeds and neglect, domestic duty to be undertaken. There is social isolation and loneliness. And always always no money.

I’m kind of down too, because a duck was killed last night. We really need to install a dog containment system. The people who moved in next door and run horses own the business which created and installs the system we want to use! Perhaps we’d get a neighbour discount, but we’re still looking at $1,000 we do not have. Yes, I feel upset about the duck today, which is a contributing factor to this slump. Life and death on the farm I can manage, but that kind of death I am struggling with today.

In addition to this I also really need to maintain my own personal internal systems for strength of body and mind. Yoga keeps me on an even keel (over 20 years of practice, a few of teaching) and requires a dedication which is hard to find sometimes. A productive creative energy needs to be nurtured and fed also, through writing, or making films or image making, or web production. I cannot be fulfilled without this.

Despite all this, I look forward to the day when I get it right, because, as i have said before, this life is a blessing, and i love every blade of grass and the sweetness that is our small herd, and the challenges of making all this work to our advantage, and living a life of grace and beauty.

So today, some glitches aside, I managed to find some clarity through yoga and remembered beauty. I just showered outdoors, for one of the few times this season, and marveled at the greenness and at the glittering sun making gems of the droplets which sat on my skin and on the broad green leaves surrounding the shower.

About a kilometer or so down the road from home is one of the gorgeous natural wonders of our backyard. Whian Whian falls is a waterway, falls and string of swimming holes that cascades down a rocky creekbed and through bits of rainforest and eucalypt. It’s rarely dry, and sometimes is wild with the spray making mist and eddies and small whirlpools whirling in the fast rushing water. It’s a gorgeous spot to cool off in the summer, and clean up after sweaty gardening and anima wrangling. The other day we took the dogs down there, who are not exactly water babies, but are athletic and agile ad loved springing from rock to rock. I lay in the icy water, in miniature spa baths, and swam without kicking across quiet pools. It transforms at a cellular level. Resolve to do this more frequently. I took some photos on my phone. once again, excuse the quality!

Jimmy Jack, wearing geeky harness, looking worried

gorgeous little reedy marshy rockpool ecosystem

rushing water, over shiny rocks, into little spa baths

under the rainforest canopy

The cows are always a delight, and we clearly adore them, given the amount of screen space dedicated to them… We have a new calf, named Rabbit, and he’s gorgeous, with satellite ears and lots of high kicks. His arrival means that our milking situation has altered somewhat, since Rosie is now mum to Rabbit as well as Willy. The fostering business can be tricky, if the mum doesn’t take to the little calf. If this is the case the fostered calf will get nothing to eat, and little calves really need their milk. It sets them up for life, literally. Rosie is placid and happy as a rule, but certainly exercises her top cow status over the littler heifers when she needs to… she didn’t take to rabbit at first, there was a bit of butting and pile driving happening, but she really was ok as long as her biological calf, Willy, was getting his fair share of the milk… so we could sneak Rabbit in round the back (where he often copped a golden shower or a big cow pat harido) and he’d get a belly full. Now, though, I guess she figured Rabbit’s not going anywhere and she has totally adopted him and grooms him all over till he is just one big mess of cowlicks. It’s seriously gorgeous! Monitoring the milk intake of the calves and managing them is very different to when there’s just one calf. Too much milk and they’ll get scours (I think we covered scours extensively in earlier blogposts… it’s like calf diarrhoea) not enough and they’ll go hungry. We keep them apart from Rosie day and night, and they come together for feeding and grooming/bonding time in the morning and in the evening. Rosie needs to rest and make more milk overnight, and having 2 calves on her all day is very draining, though she does pine for them when they are apart. I take about 2-3 litres of milk on the morning and the calves still have plenty to drink after that. It is my way of regulating how much they drink. Willy has mild scours at the moment, but he’s such a guzzler that he takes the lion’s share of whatever is left. It is generally agreed that when a calf is scouring you should take them off milk and allow them access to elecrolytes in water. We prefer to keep minimum milk up to them, as well as the electrolytes. They need sustenance. So I don’t have the total excess of milk i used to have, for cheese and butter and yoghurt, but i have enough for our on needs and the needs of a few others. The few others covers some cow feed, which is great.

 Here’s a couple of pictures of rabbit:

satellite ears

gorgeous and shiny

I was chatting the other day with a neighbour about making yoghurt, comparing methods and so on, and we decided it might be a useful thing to run a Housecow and Dairy workshop, 101 style, teaching people how to milk, showing them about feed, teaching them about making butter and yoghurt, just really basic stuff. Even realy simple stuff about recognising common diseases, how to deal with things like scours and how to teach a calf to suckle, to bottle or bucket feed. I like the idea, especially since the Dairylad can throw in a few interesting bits and pieces learned in the industry. I’m really keen on the idea. I’ll let you know how it goes.

I’m done for today. Oh, but I wantd to mention that the end of the year will bring Camp Camp II - the Reprise. There are some earlier posts about last year’s floodfest and farm hijinks. We look forward to it immensely.

OK, friends and strangers, farmhousewife has duties which cannot be ignored. I’ll return, hopefully with my groove back, really soon.

Love, green grass and waterfalls to you all

Vxx