Skating on the Pond

Cold Cold Cold

Like we are having now. 

It is time to check the pond and go ICE SKATING! 

Before we were allowed on the ice the old farmer would

sweep snow off the edge to see how thick it was.

If 3" or more he would edge out farther into the ice

and check again. 

And he would show us how to check. 4-5" was good to go.
It was amazing how clear the ice might

be so you could see how thick it was. 

Then let the fun begin! 

Someone would start with the snow shovel

and make paths until there was a large clear area. 

We were warned to stay away from the left side

along which there were muskrat holes and thinner places in the ice. 

At the far end a spring ran into the pond so that was thinner too. 

So when deemed safe we spent many a winter day
down on the pond. Just skating back and forth.
The neighbor boys would play hockey. 

Occassionally the top of the ice would get wet with snow on it

then the ice would refreeze all tiny bumpy and be unusuable,
pretty much for the rest of the winter :   ( 

Play safe everyone!~ 

The Land

Western New York was a wilderness by white man terms post revolutionary war.

After the war families started moving west. 

Which route west did they take?

Would they take the Great Western Turnpike,

which ran from Albany to Ithaca and Bath?

Or was it the Hudson-Mohawk

and Seneca Turnpikes to Canadaigua, then to Buffalo?

Whichever route the family had to take, it was  through a forested wilderness.

The Old Farmer's land had old wells and dumps
and old barbed wire grown into trees of the back woods.
I remember being told to be careful where there was
an old well with rotten wood beams covering it.
Remnants of a stone wall ran through the woods.

At the backside of the woods was a dump site.
I went rumaging around there one time and found this treasure! 

A cherry tree flask in good condition is quite valuable and a good find.
Unfortunately this one was half a cherry tree flask,
but a half that left the face design largely intact.
really pretty amazing to think of it laying out in the woods like that.

In the front corner of the north forty,
overgrown in the brush edging the field was a huge old log
roller that appeared designed to be dragged by horses?
It may have been two feet in diameter and well on its
way to rotting away. I wonder what its function was?   

In the spring there were beautiful waves of Great Trilliums.
Most were snowy white, every now and then there was a red one. 

We would gather armfuls to take home to The Old Farmer's Wife.

Spring Is Just Around The Corner

Well, maybe spring is here and after last weeks post

about planting by the signs it seems a good time to

segue into how The Old Farmer planted his garden.

The old garden had been plowed under in the fall.

So come the spring it is plowed again to loosen up the soil,

disced the break it up and dragged to get out grass.

You had to wait until it wasn't too wet for these processes

or the soil would just clump and get hard.
You would take a handful of soil and squeeze it, if too wet
it formed a tight clump. if just right it was damp but broke up.
Dragging to get out the grass would help minimize how much would grow

competing with your garden (and having to hoe hoe hoe)

 The garden was laid out in neat rows using a long line.
The Old Farmer would hoe a trench along the line,
We would follow setting the seeds or plants
and he would follow and fill it back in.

He starting the rows with the shortest plants and going

to the tallest, which would be at the north end of the garden.
This was the corn so it would not shade whatever was next to it
and so on.

I think this fellow played in the plantain too long. He is all tuckered out!