Hay bales ready to come in from the field
Hay bales ready to come in from the field
The harvest doesn't usually come in until the end of September, but this has been a dry year (2005). The corn has already fully dried in the field, and is being brought into the silos for use as feed for the dairy herd during the winter.
Throughout much of the Upper Midwest, a drought has been declared. This is tough for everyone, but Amish ways are a little heartier than those of larger farms. When there's only so much moisture in the soil to go around, it helps to have planted what a man behind a horse-drawn harvester can gather.
Still, this has been a tough year. Corn for dairy feed doesn't develop as well under these conditions, and won't make as good a feed all winter. There were only two or three cuttings of hay taken in this year instead of the usual four. The only good news is that corn prices are up, but most of the Amish use their corn for feed, not for selling.
But in good news and bad, one thing remains the same in an Amish family - there is always work to be done on the farm. There will be plenty of time to worry when October comes, but now it's time to get everything in out of the field. The dairy herd always needs milking even when there's other work to do, so this time of year it never seems to end. Even the smallest children have their jobs, usually picking out rocks and other foreign matter from the pile of corn that's come in. And even with a tough harvest, there's not an Amish father who isn't happy to see his crop stacked as big as next winter and the whole family working away to see that it lasts that long.
Though there are always difficulties in life, living close to the land has its own challenges. You can never be sure what the weather will be like. But one thing that the Amish count on is each other. That part always works out just fine.
Written and published by Harmony Cedar, all rights reserved.