10 days and counting…

Written to At Last! by Etta James

When you're finished changing, you're finished.
- Benjamin Franklin

After posting my previous blog entry, the yin and yang of life and death at Fazenda Alfheim once again swung forcefully against us, tautening us to what felt like our limit while bluntly reminding us of our own fragility, before mercifully undertaking a volte-face, washing over us with a cleansing, rejuvenating power that fuels dreams and strengthens souls. Our roller-coaster began with Sofia Sow losing all of her litter of what we think were 13 piglets to an unseen bicho, most likely a cachorro-do-mata or a suçuarana. Whatever did in Sofia's piglets certainly had to be a large predator as Sofia has a history of producing larger litters consisting of large, strong piglets. The deaths hit everyone hard…lending an extra chill to the sub-10 °C mornings at Alfheim.

Our unsentimental reaction to this sorrow was to build a maternity ward comprising three private hog pens in the old vegetable garden. Unfortunately, the first sow to give birth in this new unit had so severely injured her front legs that she was unable to stand, let alone walk, and Clair, João and I had to push/pull her under the roofing to protect her from the elements. Her first three-four piglets were stillborn, and Lone even suggested that we euthanize her to prevent her from suffering unnecessarily, something that I did not have the heart to do at the time. I also had an inkling…which thankfully turned into the hardiest of piglets…a lone live birth, and one which seems to give her great strength. I feed the sow and her little miracle three times per day, but will have to put her down in a week or so as she will not recover sufficient strength to go through another breeding cycle.

The little miracle signaled a turning point of sorts, and the next sow produced five healthy piglets, all of whom are thriving.

Next up in the birthing queue are the 3 Chiquinas.

A week later, Lone bequeathed me a pair of turkeys and geese. The Tom or gobbler is something to behold. Lone remarked that all of the new, domesticated fowl add their particular riff to the cacophony at the fazenda.

On Thursday that same week, Lone and I traveled to São Paulo, where she delivered product to our restaurant clients and then dropped off Mark at the airport (actually a taxi did the dropping off) and I took a couple of business meetings. While we were gone, Rosana called me twice, once in the morning to inform me that the eight new gilts I recently purchased from Topigs (actually I will only pay for six, the final two being the gratis compensation I negotiated for the poor logistics surrounding the delivery of the first 15 gilts from Topigs) had arrived in Vargem Grande, and later that same day to inform me that Alfheim's first calf had been born, a healthy nougat-colored Bambi, as Lone lovingly calls her. Four days later, on June 21st, our 24th wedding anniversary, our second calf was born, equally adorable and slightly larger than the first. With these two births, our modest herd of Jersey dairy cattle has suddenly grown to eight.

In other farm news, Mark spent a couple of days counting fence posts on all of the pastures, except 10, and hog pens. The tally:

• Pasture 1: 312 fence posts (3.7 hectares)
• Pasture 2: 284 (3.1)
• Pasture 3: 279 (3.0)
• Pasture 4: 275 (2.9)
• Pasture 5: 212, (1.7)
• Pasture 6: 585 (13.2)
• Pasture 7: 401 (6.2)
• Pastures 8/9: 510 (10.0)
• Pasture 10: TBD (?)
• Total: 2,858 (43.9)

• Hog Haven: 291 (3.3)
• Hog Hill A: 298 (3.4)
• Hog Hill B: 291 (3.3)
• Pasture 3: 279 (3.0)
• Pasture 10: TBD (?)
• Total: 1,159 (12.9)
  

Next I had to adjust these numbers to compensate for the inferior space efficiency of a square versus a circle (approx. -21.5%), after which we end up with approx. 34.5 hectares of pasture and 10.2 hectares of cropland. We can safely add another 10 hectares for pasture 10, five each for pasture and crops, bringing our totals to approx. 40 and 15 hectares of pasture and cropland, respectively.

We intend to plant corn on most of the cropland. In industrialized agriculture, typical yields should be between six and nine tons per hectare. Honestly, we have no idea what to expect, but we would be extremely pleased with three tons per hectare as it would be enough for us to achieve our goal of animal feed self-sufficiency by early 2011.

To this end, Clair, Dirlei and João finished liming pasture 3, using approx. three tons of lime, one for each hectare of land. With an assist from Lone, I calculated that the hogs produced and distributed between three and five tons of manure during their two months on pasture 3. The combination of manure and lime should do wonders for our crop yields…7-9-13!

The hogs are also being used to help us renovate our pastures, which we ultimately (three-four years hence) hope will support 80 head of dairy cattle, which in turn will produce somewhere north of 600 liters of milk (or > 100 kg of cheese) a day.

And to both of these ends, i.e. improved crop yields and pastures, we will no doubt benefit from our latest Lego toys, a disc plow and a till.

This week's fauna is not a moth…at least not yet.

Finally, only 10 more days until our new Farm Manager, Esben Christoffer Hesketh, arrives for duty, coming off a third straight ranking as the #1 student in his year at the Royal Agricultural College, the oldest agricultural college in the English speaking world! Not surprisingly, we can't wait.