December 8 - 14, 2008

Written to Counting Crows, New Amsterdam Live at Heineken Music Hall February 6, 2003

"It is hard to have patience with people who say 'There is no death' or 'Death doesn't matter.'' There is death. And whatever is matters. And whatever happens has consequences, and it and they are irrevocable and irreversible. You might as well say that birth doesn't matter."
- C.S. Lewis

The life-death balance on a farm takes more than a little getting used to. On Thursday morning, Clair informed me that Negona had killed, but not eaten, four ducks the day before. Oddly, Clair had placed all four of the dead ducks inside the hen house...completely out character...he is always so tidy. When Lone inquired, Rosana informed her that they did not want us to think that they had killed the ducks and eaten them in our absence. Rosana added that some workers did this, so they decided to leave the dead animals in the hen house to remove any doubt. Wow!

Negona has always shown too much interest in the poultry; Lone, Clair, Chico and I have all caught her in various stages of poultry consumption. After conferring with a veterinarian, who confirmed my suspicion that this tendency was unlikely to abate, Lone and I made the decision to put her down, which I did on Sunday. Very sad, but the idea of chaining Negona up for the rest of her life, the veterinarian's best suggestion after she informed us that she would not assist us in putting her to sleep, just did not seem like any life for a dog -or any animal for that matter. A most difficult decision, but in this case the good of the many outweighed the good of the one.

On Wednesday, on our twice-weekly 16:00 call, Clair informed me that one of the gilts was infected with bicheira (not for the faint of heart), the common name, or miíase, the technical name, an infestation of parasitic larvae. I quickly contacted Dra. Leslie Almeida, a homeopathic veterinarian, and she informed me how to treat this parasite in an manner consistent with the organic certification process guidelines:

1. Apply Creolina, a coal tar derivative, to the wound;
2. This chokes off the larva's oxygen supply, forcing them to surface from inside the open wound;
3. Using tweezers, remove the larvae, which can number in the tens, hundreds or even thousands (approx. 70 in two wounds in our first case);
4. Clean the wound with cocoa soap;
5. Apply Calendula to help reduce inflammation, control bleeding and soothe irritated tissue.
   

There is only one, teansy-weensy detail missing from the above description: in order to administer the treatment, one first has to catch the hog. No small feat! Clair and I chased the infected animal until she tired and we were able to catch hold of a leg each, lay her down on her side and secure her. Lone then took over for Clair securing one of the gilt's back legs while Clair carried out the first treatment. Clair is the only one of the four of us who does not wear glasses, a distinct advantage when trying to find one of these in an open wound. I am happy to report that the results of the first treatment exceeded our expectations. Unfortunately, the next day a second gilt was infected. Being the Thinking Animals that we are, Clair and I concluded that for the second treatment it would be decidedly easier to catch the hog if we fed it first. While in fact this is true, we neglected to calculate how much more difficult it would be tiring out the animal without the warm-up foot chase. Incidentally, while a gilt is being treated, the other hogs circle her and one or two always check on her by nudging her with their snouts. After three treatments, the third administered by Lone and me on our own on Saturday, the infected gilts appear cured (7-9-13). We have since begun spraying the animals with neem, a tree in the mahogany family. The unique feature of neem products is that they do not directly kill pests, but alter the life-processing behavior in such a manner that the insect can no longer feed, breed or undergo metamorphosis.

Aside from the two cases of miíase, the hogs have otherwise made a complete recovery from their recent malaise. As such I owe a huge shout-out to my very good friend and the world's most curious orthopedic surgeon, and now wannabe veterinarian's apprentice, Tony Matan, who correctly diagnosed the hogs as suffering from sunburn. Impressive, particularly considering his only diagnostic input was my blog entry. Undoubtedly, there were many factors that affected the hogs condition, but exposure to the sun was the drop that caused their cup to run over...and not in the my cup runneth over sense. The gilts are again extremely active -even motoring around the pen at Usain Bolt-like speeds. They have also become more brazen in their search for contact. Yesterday one of the gilts not named Miss Massey actually let me rub her back and belly. In sum, while duck land suffered four tragic casualties this week, the mojo has returned to hog land.

On Thursday, December 18th, we hope to move the gilts to a permanent pen, where they will begin living caipira or free range -after a week or so of acclimatization. Their new pen is approx. 625 m2, almost twice as large as Lone's garden-to-be, and opens onto a beautiful pasture and a recently harvested field of mandioca...aka cassava, yuca, manioc or mogo. I cannot wait to set them loose. To this end Chico and Martins dug down 51 fence posts for the pig pen on Thursday! It should be added that Thursday's total of 51 fence posts for the pig pen came on top of approx. 160 pasture fence posts, each with four-strands of Belgo Motto® Farpa Vermelha barbed-wire, that they installed from Monday to Wednesday! When I said they were craftsman, I was not exagerating. Take a look at these examples (1, 2) of their fence lines! S * T * R * A * I G * H * T!

A few more details on the older of the dynamic duo. It turns out that Martins is 74, has a son who is nine years old, sadly his first wife died, and his father lived to be 116 years old! Yes, 116 years old! Legend...wait for it...

Lone finished painting the interior of our house...two coats...and it looks spectacular! If all goes well, we hope to receive our furniture from UK, which is actually in the Port of Santos, on Thursday, December 18th (7-9-13!).

On Saturday we decided to thin out the brood of dwarf chickens. We slaughtered five in all. The lucky survivors: the casal, our first farm animals -not counting the ill-fated, cachorro-do-mato chicks- and the loony rooster who has accompanied the two mother hens and their broods ever since they arrived. No reason to risk upsetting the latter life balance. Clair and I performed the neck snapping and feather plucking, while Lone and Rosana butchered the birds. Feather-plucking was surprisingly easy. On Saturday, Lone and I ate one dwarf chicken each for dinner...they are pretty lean creatures, but very, very tasty. Anyway, it was time to make room for the next batch...seven of Elle's chicks, three of whom appear to be cockrels based on their recent aggressiveness, and the 22 surviving chicks from the two mother hens.

On Sunday I had my hair cut by Janni in Vargem Grande. R$5.00 (€1.56 or $2.02) in all!

On Monday, we received a visit from Paulo Basetto Agro, a veterinarian who works with Fazenda Brazil, where we purchased the gilts. As always, each expert visit adds a layer to our nascent farming knowledge as well as a couple of additional contacts.

Finally, my apologies for the lateness of this post. Paulo's visit lasted most of Monday, and Picasa demanded a storage upgrade that took several hours to activate. No blog without photos.