The Slowcook at Spydog Farm The Slowcook at Spydog Farm

I’m a Wreck

September 4th, 2013 · 3 Comments · Posted in farming

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I recently woke up with a badly aching right elbow. In fact, I could barely use my arm. Must be Lyme disease, I concluded. Pain in the joints is a primary symptom, and I knew I’d been bitten by at least one tick since I started work on the farm. That would also explain the flu-ish feelings I’d been experiencing.

I reported to the local health clinic where the doctor immediately diagnosed the pain in my arm as “tennis elbow.” Too much scything, he explained. But he had no problem prescribing a two-week course of antibiotic pills to assuage my Lyme paranoia. I was about 10 days into the treatment when suddenly I could barely swallow because of burning in my throat. Turns out lesions in the esophagus are one potential side effect of the traditional Lyme medication, Doxycycline. Nobody told me you need to drink copious amounts of water and remain upright for 30 minutes when taking the pill to get it to pass all the way to the stomach.

Meanwhile, I bruised a couple of ribs tackling a sheep that had gotten on the wrong side of the temporary fencing. I had to drag it into the paddock at the end of a rope leader, then pin it to the ground to remove the rope so it wouldn’t choke to death. I guess this is why God invented sheep dogs.

Then yesterday I sliced the thumb on my one good arm chasing a broiler chick after it escaped while I was moving the chicken tractor. Turns out the edge of the metal roof on the tractor is sharper than I thought. No stitches required, but blood was spilled and it slowed me down a bit.

Because of the bruised ribs and the pain swallowing I took to sleeping sitting upright on the living room couch. Needless to say, I’ve been feeling a bit sleep deprived lately. It all adds up to one weary , 60-year-old farmer. But there are still chores to do every morning. The sheep still need to be moved to fresh pasture every couple of days. The animals still need to be fed and watered. Coops need to be built.

It just makes me wish we’d started this 30 years ago. But hardly anyone was thinking about this kind of grass farming back then. And we wouldn’t have had the money to pull it off even if we had thought of it.

It sure is fun, though.

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  • The Wife

    Well, as you like to say, farming ain’t for sissies!

  • Lavinia

    You guys rock! My grandpa says that “you don’t know how hard we had to work” and I agree – and I find it amazing and awesome that there are some of us who go back to that. Thank you for doing it. I hope you feel better very soon!

  • Ed Bruske

    Thanks for that, Lavinia. I’m sure your grandpa is right. Imagine doing all this work by hand or with draft animals. But all that hard work is well rewarded.