Um maravilhoso Natal e um próspero Ano Novo!

Written to Smokes Like Lightning by Lightnin Hopkins

"Happiness makes up in height for what it lacks in length."
- Robert Frost

This will be one of my shortest-ever blog posts, a brief text wishing all of our family and friends um maravilhoso Natal e um próspero Ano Novo!

As regards our own family, Pelle and his girlfriend, Jemma, arrived yesterday at Ninho da Arara, the pousada of a good friend of mine from my Berkeley days, Davis Bales. Pelle and Jemma will unwind for a couple of days after a long, long journey from UK before returning by bus to Taubaté, where Esben and I will pick them up after picking up Johannes, weather gods willing, from São Paulo/Guarulhos – Governor André Franco Montoro International Airport. Weather gods not permitting…we will have to make do with two of Les Trois Mousquetaires. 7-9-13!

For those of you who have not yet registered the monumental event that was my joining Facebook, I have, in fact, recently succumbed to the seductive power of Time Magazine's Person of the Year 2010. I held out for as long as I could, I really did, but in the end the gravitational pull of the more than 500 million people connected to what Esben glibly describes as the world's most time-consuming image management tool was too overpowering for my fragile psyche. We shall see where it all ends, but for now I have ensconced myself in the warm glow of this world's digital hoi polo.

And finally, what would a year-end blog post be if it did not end with a quote from our generation's oracle:

“Cheers to a new year and another chance for us to get it right.”
- Oprah Winfrey

Son of Corcovado

Written to Lifeline by Ben Harper & the Innocent Criminals

"As Putin rears his head and comes into the air space of the United States of America, where– where do they go? It's Alaska. It's just right over the border."

-Sarah Palin, explaining why Alaska's proximity to Russia gives her foreign policy experience, interview with CBS's Katie Couric, Sept. 24, 2008 (You can read 9 more gems of equal depth here)

Originally, I was going to call this blog post Moon over Alfheim (I trust this photo explains my initial leaning), but opted instead to title it Son of Corcovado in homage to Esben who, together with Jeff, Suzanna and Emmanuel Cabale, completed the Trilha do Corcovado in the Parque Estadual da Serra do Mar - Núcleo Santa Virgínia on Saturday, November 20th.

Armed with his incomparable Nikon D90, Esben took a series of breathtaking photos, five of which I have highlighted here (1, 2, 3, 4, 5).

While Esben and his compadres were scaling the heavens, Lone and I remained at Alfheim and took care of the daily chores.

Unable to control myself, particularly given the stunningly beautiful day at hand, I opened the door to the chicken house and let the chicks explore their yard for the first time. Great fun!

And while his choice of extracurricular activities might not be a giveaway, Saturdays are now officially Esben's day off...Sundays Lone's. That said, Lone has as much trouble sitting still as does Esben, so she has taken to making candles out of the leftover bees wax from her honey production. Needless to say, I now know more about wick density than any man has a right to.

Not satisfied with candle making, Lone further added to her farming baggage by participating in a week-long cheese-making course in Paraibuna. While this particular Parmesan did not make the grade, both Esben and I are eagerly awaiting Lone's future efforts.

Finally, I could not let the following observation pass without sharing it:

"If you had spent a million dollars a day since Jesus Christ was born 2010 years ago, you would still not have spent a trillion dollars. And that will be our annual interest bill."

- David Cote, one of the civilian members of a presidential panel set up to help trim the US budget deficit

500

Written to Abbey Road by The Beatles

“When old people speak it is not because of the sweetness of words in our mouths; it is because we see something which you do not see.”

- Chinua Achebe

If you ever lay awake at night wondering what 500 day-old chicks look like, you can hereafter sleep easy.

After spending the better part of Sunday in Parque da Independência in São Paulo listening to a free Norah Jones concert, Esben departed from South America's leading megalopolis in the early morning on Proclamação da República (Republic Day), which commemorates the end of the Empire of Brazil and the proclamation of the Brazilian Republic in November 15, 1889, and headed toward Campinas to pick up the first half of our order of 1,000 day-old chicks from Fazenda Aves do Paraiso.

Approx. five hours later, Esben arrived with five neatly packed boxes, each containing 100 day-old chicks.

We showed the newest members of Fazenda Alfheim to their lodgings, our massive chicken house, and made sure they had plenty of food and water and a more insulated house within the chicken house to keep them warm during the critical, initial eight days in our care.

The chicks, which cost R$1.10 per head, appear strong, robust and should reach slaughter weight in 90-100 days.

In other developments, Lone and Esben harvested several buckets full of jaboticaba. The word jaboticaba is said to have been derived from the Tupi term, jabotim, for turtle, and means "like turtle fat", presumably referring to the fruit pulp. All I know is it makes a very yummy pancake syrup!

Also, our heirloom corn is growing at breakneck speed…from this to this in 3 weeks!

Finally, for anyone seeking a bit of inspiration, the following article from The Wall Street Journal should certainly lift your spirits.

Artemis of Alfheim

Written to Live my Life, Nu Mixx Klazzics and Greatest Hits by 2Pac

Around 800 AD during Tang dynasty, the Chinese were undoubtedly the most productive in the world with the national GDP accounting for half of the world. Would it be more reasonable to assume China reaches its peak when its GDP per capita is at least about the average of the developed world?

- China: Has the Last Opportunity Passed By?! (China in the 21st Century)

In a tradition dating back to 2400BC near Cairo, Lone, Alfheim's Artemis, harvested her first honey, 30 kg from four of her 10 boxes. A mere viewing of the fruits of her labor is sufficient to make one understand why the Greeks viewed honey as not only an important food, but also as a healing medicine, tasting it confirms why the Romans used honey as a gift to the gods. If you are interested in purchasing your very own gift to the gods, a 600 ml glass can be procured for the less-than-princely sum of R$20.00 (€8.57 or $11.66).

Aside from several bee stings, and Lone's resulting man hand, we were so emboldened by this initial success that we have decided to expand production to 40 bee boxes by year's end.

Based on the results from this first harvest, it is reasonable to assume that each bee box will produce approx. 15 kg of honey per year. Thus, already in 2011, Fazenda Alfheim should be producing approx. 600 kg of raw organic honey - the Nectar of the Gods.

In other fazenda developments:

• Our heirloom corn continues to grow spectacularly.
• Our young male calf appears to be recovering well from whatever virus has afflicted him for the past several weeks.
• Likewise, the younger of our Duroc boars seems to have gotten over the worst of his as-yet-unidentified illness.
• Same story for the cows…a change in our milking procedure has nearly put an end to the variola (aka as cowpox or pseudo-cowpox) affecting their utters.

Finally, not to be forgotten in this frenzy of farm activity, Dr. Márcio Magano's birthday bash was great, great fun!

On the map…quite literally

Written to Come Away With Me by Norah Jones

"Two of the greatest gifts we can give our children are roots and wings."

- Hodding Carter

I just received word that Lone arrived safely in Denmark, with my Amazon Kindle in tow, after more than 24 hours of travel. She will be visiting her faderland until October 28, when she returns to São Paulo, just in time for cowboy Magano's birthday celebration at Fazenda Caetê -and her first official Fazenda Alfheim honey harvest.

Prior to Lone's departure, we had the pleasure of a three-day visit from some new friends, Jeff and Suzanna Jones, who we met through Emmanuel Rengade. Great, great fun!

In actual fazenda news...

• I am at last comfortable in stating that we have a herd, defined by Merriam-Webster, Incorporated as a number of animals of one kind kept together under human control, of cattle, in all 10 Jerseys plus Mausolous and Bolina. We brought all 12 cattle together for the first time in a long time, the kickoff of our plan to keep the cattle off of the pastures for the next approx. six weeks, the beginning of the critical spring growth period.
• Esben, Clair and João planted various types of gourds between all of the rows of milho criolo, so now we just have to sit back and hope for the best. 7-9-13!
• The 30 sows and 3 boars that we purchased from Toshio Hisaeda arrived on Friday, October 8th, but thus far they are somewhat camera shy, so photos will have to wait. Most importantly, all 33 arrived in terrific shape, even after traveling the more than 1,000 km from Mato Grosso do Sul. In all, we now have 75 sows and five boars…a ratio of 1:15, which we have learned, thanks to a bit of research by Esben, is ideal for free-range hog farming.
• Fazenda Alfheim has officially been located and tagged (see attached *.kmz file in my e-mail) on Google Earth. Hopefully this will help those readers who have yet to visit our magic kingdom to get to know the property better…and also encourage them to stop by and see it for themselves in the non-virtual world.

Finally, in a somber note, and one which is far more likely to impact us in the medium term than Global Warming, the FDA is only now awakening to the threat posed by antibiotic resistance:

The drugs have been almost routinely used in recent years for common colds and ear infections in children, and have become fairly standard additions to feed in chickenhouses and for livestock, which are then eaten by consumers. The result has been the growth of bacteria and life-threatening diseases that respond poorly, if at all, to even some of the most modern antibiotic treatments.

Road trippin 3.0

Written to R.E.M. Live by R.E.M.

“No one realizes how beautiful it is to travel until he comes home and rests his head on his old, familiar pillow.”

- Lin Yutang

No quote could better sum up the past weekend, which began on Friday, when Lone and Esben picked me up in São Paulo and we headed out of town toward Porto Feliz (Happy Haven in English) to visit Carson and Ellen Geld. We arrived at Fazenda Pau d'Alho at around 16:30 on a cold, drizzling day. Not long after we arrived, Ellen, Lone and Esben went for a walk, together with the dogs, a trek which culminated with Ellen and Lone filling the bed of our Mitsubishi L200 Triton HPE 3.2 Diesel pickup with half a fazenda worth of saplings. After a lovely dinner, we retired relatively early.

The next day we enjoyed a huge family lunch with a large percentage of the Geld clan…delicious food and delightful company. Just after 16:00 we headed off, decorative clothing in tow to Catanduva for the wedding of Daniel Teruo Famano and Daniella de Grande Curi, which was slated to begin at 20:45. After a quick stop at a local luncheonette (note to any and all: do not mess with a hypoglycemic woman, especially when she doubles as your wife), we changed clothes on the fly and metaphorically-speaking transformed from road-weary ugly ducklings into swans (1, 2, 3) for an evening. While Lone was taking the first photo of a Bossed-out Esben and me, I leaned over to my middle son and quoted Kanye:

The Goyard so hard man I'm Hugo's boss

Why I gotta ask what that two door cost?

Esben's retort was breakneck: the reenactment of this scene from Men in Black.

At somewhere south of 01:00, we departed the festivities and climbed back into our trusty pickup and headed back to Taubaté, where we arrived in the parking lot of Carrefour at 07:00…and waited until the metal roller shutters were lifted at 08:00 to do a little grocery shopping. A couple of hours later, we arrived back at Fazenda Alfheim, more than slightly worse for the wear. Suffice it to say it was a quiet Sunday -despite the fact that it was election day in Brazil.

While I did all of the driving on our road trip, Esben and Lone bore the brunt of the farm work, which involved more sowing of heirloom corn and feijão, caring for our two beautiful new Jersey calves, one male and one female, and the all-important task of picking Jabuticaba! Vidunderligt!

While somewhat cold during the weekend and Monday, the weather cleared today, Tuesday, and with the sun brought hope that our milho criolo will continue to prosper...7-9-13!

Finally, in a blow to The Man, Monsanto appears to have fallen on hard times in the past year, its stock falling 42% since the beginning of the year, shortly after Forbes named it “company of the year” back in December. While normally not one to gloat over others' misery, I admit to having trouble hiding my glee over these developments. The New York Times article is well worth a read.

Road trippin 2.0

Written to FELA In Concert Starring Fela Anikulapo Kuti

“Like life, basketball is messy and unpredictable. It has its way with you, no matter how hard you try to control it. The trick is to experience each moment with a clear mind and open heart. When you do that, the game -- and life -- will take care of itself.”

- Phil Jackson

A week after breaking my collar bone and a rib, my abuser, aka Esben, and I set off at 21:30 in our Mitsubishi L200 Triton HPE 3.2 Diesel pickup from São Paulo for Campo Grande, Mato Grosso do Sul, a 1,011 km trip, to visit Toshio Hisaeda's hog farm. We drove through the night, taking turns behind the wheel, emerging from the darkness into an endless savannah, sprinkled with an out of place feed lot, a handful of sugar cane fields and a lot of roadworks, finally checking into our room at Vânia Hotel e Lanchonete in Campo Grande at around 11:00.

We chillaxed for the remainder of Monday, only leaving our humble abode to eat at a local diner for the princely sum of R$14.00 (€6.25 or $8.16).

On Tuesday, we visited Toshio at his office, Sementes Boi Gordo, an impressive seed business employing approx. 200 people. Toshio, the iconoclast that he is, has established a garden and a chicken yard on the premises, and we spent most of the afternoon meeting with Toshio and his employees.

That evening we met Toshio and a job candidate at Toshio's restaurant, where we dined on a sumptuous array of Japanese dishes. Truly yummy!

The following morning, Wednesday, we awoke at 05:00, packed, checked out of the hotel and headed off on the first of two farm visits. Stop 1: Toshio's 900 hectare hog farm, where he raises more than 1,000 hogs. The farm is run by only two employees, who are responsible for every aspect of raising the Sorocaba and Monteiro breeds that dominate Toshio's herd.

At any given time, Toshio's hogs and their offspring can be found in one of three main areas:

1. A maternity ward that features individual pens with drip-water systems and a retractable roof. The pregnant sows are typically brought into the maternity ward 15-30 before birthing and are released into...
2. the weaning area, mother sow together with her piglets, a couple of months after birthing. From the post-maternity weaning area, the animals are placed in...
3. a common pen, where all of the adult hogs and weaners live. The hog pens, which with the exception of one, monster 30-hectare pen, are approx. two hectares in size, have been seeded with Estilosantes Campo Grande, a protein-rich legume that comprises the majority of the hogs diet together with cassava and sugar cane. Once a week the hogs receive two kg of corn, though this is more of a behavioral modification tool that the workers use to train the hogs to gather at the entry gate, thus facilitating their move when required. There are no houses in these hog pens, i.e. the hogs sleep under open sky.

It is worth noting that while in the maternity ward, the pregnant sows receive a feed consisting of corn flour, soy and ash, approx. 15% of the latter to combat parasites.

After wrapping up our visit at Toshio's hog farm, we travelled a few km down the road to visit his 2,000 hectare cattle farm, where he raises 2,500 head of Wagyu beef cattle. After the tour, we enjoyed another fabulous lunch consisting of comida mineira, topped off with the most exquisitely delicious lemon mousse, the recipe for which I asked and was given.

After thanking our host profusely for his hospitality, we jumped into our bucket of bolts and headed back to São Paulo, where I had a full schedule of meetings on Thursday and Friday.

And while Esben and I were playing Thelma and Louise, Lone, Megan (Megan's parents please see the mini Megan photo gallery here: 1, 2, 3, 4) and Rosana were busy back at Fazenda Alfheim preparing Esben's apartment, among other tasks.

Painting aside, the week's biggest news in the Vale da Paraiba, was the announcement from beekeeper Lone that she will indeed harvest honey this year, more than 100 liters in November! Amazing! We got a little taste from a small sample, and as a lifelong honey connoisseur I can assure all of my readers that I have never tasted anything quite so delicious. Book your jar today because it will be sold out in less time than it takes to count Sara Palin's IQ. Parabéns, beekeeper Lone!

Finally,

• Jennifer Chatman, of the University of California, Berkeley, conducted experiments in which she tried to find a point at which flattery became ineffective. It turned out there wasn’t one.
• And next time you feel like your style is being cramped, think of this group of brothers and sisters!

Porcupines, pain and promising plants

Written to Macire by Boubacar Traore

“There is nothing like looking, if you want to find something. You certainly usually find something, if you look, but it is not always quite the something you were after.”
- J.R.R. Tolkien

It is not a stretch to say that it has been tough being a dog at Fazenda Alfheim of late: first there was Negão's eye piercing at the hands of a wayward twig, and shortly thereafter Muninn made the mistake of trying to play with a porcupine, with predictably painful results. Fortunately, both dogs are doing fine.

Less fortunately, I broke my left clavicle or collar bone during an amicable Sunday tussle with Esben on the lawn of the fazenda of our good friends Márcio and Heather. This is the second time our middle son has broken one of my bones while wrestling, a rib in Oslo and now a collar bone in São Paulo. Most ungrateful children suffice with writing tell-all biographies about their [choose your adjective] parents, but ours would seem to have a preference for more corporeal form of retribution: I have broken 5 bones in my lifetime, 40% of which can be traced directly to wrestling with Esben. On the plus side, the bursitis in my right shoulder will get a month of solid rest as I am required to wear a "figure-of-8" splint for 21-30 days.

Thankfully, another good friend, Paula Afrange, has been kind enough to put me up in her apartment in São Paulo during my first critical week of recovery, greatly easing day-to-day logistics as I have had numerous meetings in the Megalopolis.

In my absence, Lone lorded over Alfheim, both figuratively and literally, while thriving in her newly carved out, albeit diminished, corner of our former garden.

In parallel, phase I of planting season was executed without a hitch by Esben and the team: pasture 3 and our former garden, a total of 3 hectares, was planted with heirloom corn, a variety called Amarelão, in five-six days. Less than two weeks later, the early results are promising (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7). That said, given the precarious nature of any crop activity, and the momentousness of our getting this right and producing all of our own animal feed, all prayers and positive thoughts are most welcome. Phase II of planting season will begin with the next minguante or waning moon on September 24th, when we will plant other varieties of heirloom corn, including BRS Missões, Lombo Baio and BRS Planate.

Finally, on Monday, September 13th, Esben and I will head off on a massive 2,500 km road trip to Mato Grosso do Sul, more precisely to the fazenda of Toshio Hisaeda, a free-range hog farmer that I wrote about in my blog post of June 29, A video tour of Fazenda Alfheim.

Planting season arrives

Written to Sigh No More by Mumford & Sons

"I have heard there are troubles of more than one kind. Some come from ahead and some come from behind. But I've bought a big bat. I'm all ready you see. Now my troubles are going to have troubles with me!"
-- Dr. Seuss

As mentioned in last week's blog post, we have been waiting for:

• our heirloom seeds to arrive (√)
• for the cold to lift (√)
• for us to complete the re-clearing of pasture 3 (√)
• and finally minguante or the waning moon (√)

With all of the above boxes finally ticked, on Wednesday, August 25th, we began the slow process of planting, initially non-hybrid corn on pasture 3. Based on input from a number of reliable individuals who farm using comparable techniques, and despite Clair's misgivings, we are sowing 5 plants per linear meter, which requires 3-4 seeds per hole, each approx. 3 cm deep, and spacing of 80-90 cm between rows. This should yield approx. 50,000 plants per hectare if the Gods smile on us. We have 10 working days to plant before the moon begins to wax again, after which we will have to wait until September 24th, October 23rd and November 22nd to continue planting corn and feijão. The benefit of planting by the moon, aside from the obvious, is that it spreads our planting season over four months, hopefully ensuring that if the worst happens, bird ravaging or excessively heavy rains, we will lose only a portion of our crops…7-9-13!

It is worth mentioning that our single-digit mornings have necessitated some extreme measures -and clothing. The getup seen here is a combination of sports apparel I purchased in Norway for working out during winter in Oslo! For the better part of the past month I have needed every thread of it on my 6 km morning runs.

In other farm news:

• lots of new, healthy piglets have been born recently
  
• the calves are thriving -and too cute for words
• The prefeito of Natividade da Serra, João Carvalho, at last paid a visit to Fazenda Alfheim -no doubt prompted by my numerous exchanges with Dra. Renata Vita, Promotora de Justiça de Paraibuna- and promised to repair the road between Vargem Grande and our fazenda by mid September
  
• Esben continues to work at an impressive clip, but also appears to be enjoying himself
• our half-walled barn is progressing splendidly
• and Megan continues to contribute with equal portions of hard work and good humor
  

And in a tale worthy of a place on thatsweird.net, we removed a twig from Negão's right eye, which somehow managed to get lodged there while he was out running, penetrating his cornea, ciliary muscle and vitreous humor. I took this photo next to our home telephone to give people a sense of the twig's length…simply staggering, even more so because he appears to be recovering without a hitch. They don't make city dogs like that!

Finally, a well-deserved shout-out to Sara Geld, who recently returned from the XIII FINA World Masters (Swimming) Championship 2010 in Göteborg and Borås, Sweden, with two 8th place finishes!

Waiting for Godot…and discovering

Written to Live in Darwin, Australia by by Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu

"If you never did, you should. These things are fun, and fun is good."

- Dr. Seuss

We have been in a bit of a holding pattern recently, waiting for our heirloom milho (200 kg) and feijão (50 kg) to arrive. Frustratingly, our criolo seeds seem to have entered transport limbo; they left the União das Associações Comunitárias do Interior de Canguçu on July 28th and still have not arrived. If the transport company is on the up-and-up, I will pick them up this afternoon at Depósito Cursino in São Luiz do Paraitinga, where I am currently writing this blog post.

While waiting, Farm Manager Esben has been working on striking an appropriate balance between brain and brawn. The jury is still out, but everyone seems to be enjoying themselves - and that counts for a lot.

For her part, Megan continues to contribute in every way imaginable…one cannot say enough about her can-do attitude.

In the fascinating tradition of corn flakes, microwave ovens, Silly putty, Post-it notes, saccharin, Slinky, potato chips, fireworks and Play-Doh, we discovered that our bamboo chick feeding cages also make excellent pigeon traps…truly excellent. We have captured as many as 12 pigeons at a go. This discovery, coupled with the less surprising fact that hogs will consume pretty much 100% of a recently killed bird, has led us to consider trapping pigeons on a large scale. As a test, we recently fed 10 pigeons to our two groups of hogs...the hogs were unanimous in their approval. Using pigeons in this way would:

• provide our hogs with an excellent source of protein
• reduce their consumption of corn
• and help us manage the otherwise uncontrollable growth of Fazenda Alfheim's pigeon population

In another effort to feed our hogs, we picked up a bunch (as I am unsure of how many piglet equivalents, bunch seems like a suitable quantitive description for the time being) of freshly harvested organic feijão from Fazenda Santa Helena in Catuçaba. We will feed most of this feijão to our hogs and plant the rest.

Finally, last week's blog post was read 187 times, contributing to a record 519 visits to http://fazendaalfheim.blogspot.com/ during the month of August.

A video tour of Fazenda Alfheim

Written to Philosopher's Stone by Van Morrison

"You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself, any direction you choose."

- Dr. Seuss

Esben recently completed directing his second, much improved, video of life at Fazenda Alfheim, with me playing the role of Executive Producer, editing the video on my MacBook using iMovies, very intuitive and powerful software. The results of our artistic collaboration can be seen here.

Other noteworthy farm news:

• Our hen (female turkey) successfully brooded two duck eggs. It sounds complicated, and it was, but the results are delightful. The ridiculously cute pair are holed up in a plastic tub in our kitchen and doing splendidly.
• Our first Topigs' gilt gave birth, officially making her a sow, to seven healthy, pink piglets.
• Megan, our first WWOOF (World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms WOOF) volunteer, arrived at Fazenda Alfheim on Saturday, July 24th, and immediately rolled up her sleeves and lent a hand with all types of farm work: from counting fence posts to treating piglets to herding hogs to slaughtering...and we could not be more pleased with her work…she is a real asset.

Finally, a massive thanks to Ralph Wehrle, a regular reader of the blog and President of the Advisory Board of Axial, for sending us this inspiring video of a large-scale, free-range hog production in Brazil. A lot of similarities to what we are doing at Fazenda Alfheim…and clearly a lot we can learn, too.

Also worth watching: Chocolate: The Bitter Truth, by BBC Panorama reporter, Paul Kenyon, an investigation into the supply chain that delivers much of the chocolate sold in the UK.

Patronzinho

Written to Dusk by The The

“Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind.”

- Dr. Seuss

Esben has gripped his new role of Farm Manager with both hands...already managing day-to-day operations with only minor input from me. In less than three weeks he has become the fazenda's best, non-Brazilian milker (though he has yet to prove himself head-to-head against Sandra), learned how to chop Pennisetum purpureum (Napier Grass or Uganda Grass), managed the building of a chick house with capacity for 1,000 chicks and helped me repair the main source of water to the fazenda after six days of intensive rain last week. In best Matthew McConaughey style, he took advantage of every opportunity to take his shirt off. All of these exploits have earned him the title of Patronzinho from the employees -and he still found time to chilax.

Shortly after Esben arrived, Clair and Rosana went on vacation. We are, therefore, running shorthanded, but Esben's presence has accelerated the cadence of work considerably. He spends virtually all day in the trenches with the employees, which inevitably speeds things along. And there is certainly a need for speed; we are busy preparing the soil for planting, which we will begin in the first week of August, during minguindo or the waning moon. Thus far, we have prepped pasture 3 (2.4 hectares), half of Hog Hill (2.7 hectares) and our former garden (approx. 0.8 hectares). The Fazenda Brazil hogs are busy clearing half of Hog Haven, so we hope to add another 1.3 hectares of cropland within the next two-three weeks. All three areas have been plowed, either by tractor or by hand, limed and tilled. Next week we should receive our plantadeira and the heirloom corn and feijão seeds, after which the sky is the limit, and its byproducts, sun and rain, will seal our harvest's fate.

What is certain, however, is that we have begun harvesting Fazenda Alfheim's very own homegrown, organic mandioca, a milestone of great significance. We harvested the first four sacks a week or so ago, and this initial yield earned 3 Michelin stars from our hogs.

With the help of João Getulio, a local pedreiro or bricklayer, we have also started building an 80 m2 half-walled barn to house the tractor, plow, till, planter, hay and other non-perishables. João was recommended to us by Rosana's father, Antonio, and thus far he is proving a real asset. The only minor issue was having to wait a couple of months for him to finish all of his other projects so that he could dedicate himself (almost completely) to our needs; he will spend four days a week working at Alfheim, giving him a little leeway to assist his other customers. Also, since João the pedreiro does not have a motorcycle, our João gives him a carona to work each day, something that will cost me a two new tires for João's motorcycle, a R$184.00 investment (€80.99 or $104.50)…and well worth every centavo.

Something else worth every centavo is our new Mitsubishi L200 Triton HPE 3.2 Diesel, which we recently purchased at Virage Mitsubishi in Taubaté, where we got a very fair price for our Ford Ecosport 4WD 2.0 16v. So nice to be driving a truck again, though for legal reasons I am obliged to inform my readers that this is Lone's truck; I am but the payee and her humble chauffeur.

Finally, in another sign of the resurgence of São Luiz do Paraitinga, our old internet café has returned to the town square after a half-year's absence...bigger and better than ever. Very uplifting to see the old crew back on their feet again in such grand fashion.

Fazenda Alfheim turns two

Written to Live at the Fillmore by Derek & Dominos

A dreamer is one who can only find his way by moonlight, and his punishment is that he sees the dawn before the rest of the world.

- Oscar Wilde

Anella and Sandra departed Alfheim, and Brazil, on Monday, June 28th. Lone dropped them off in São Paulo, where she spent the week visiting with friends in anticipation of Esben's arrival on Friday, July 2nd. And arrive he did -despite a terminal mixup between mother and son which resulted in our jovial middle son spending the morning chatting up the Polícia Federal at Guarulhos International Airport in order to kill time while waiting to find Lone- bigger (6' 5" or 195.6 cm and now officially taller than his father) and badder than ever.

While Lone was away, we cracked on back at Alfheim with this season's priorities:

• preparing croplands
• improving pastures
• building the infrastructure to fatten up 1,000 chicks

Along the way, we added 18 beautiful piglets from the 3 Chiquinas, who interestingly all gave birth within the same 24-hour period, and to identically colored piglets, all of whom are doing extremely well. These 18 piglets are also the first from our own producers, i.e. they are the offspring of sows born at Alfheim. In other words, Biggy is now officially a grandfather. Fortunately, we managed to finish construction of our eight-pen hog maternity ward the morning of the day on which the 3 Chiquinas gave birth. We are excited about the positive impact that we expect this new birthing area at the base of Hog Haven to have on our hog production.

In addition to these 18 new piglets, we are fattening another 19 piglets for slaughter over the next couple of months, two sows are well advanced in the birthing queue and another seven are on deck.

On July 1st we moved the remaining Fazenda Brazil hogs from Hog Hill to pasture 6, where we added a house and a simple feed storage area so they could begin clearing and fertilizing the pasture. During what I anticipate to be their four-month stay, they will produce and distribute 5.6 tons of manure on the 13.2 hectares of pasture. When their work is complete, we will add 13 tons of lime and 317 liters of raw milk.

We have begun applying raw milk to our pastures after reading a fascinating article in the Stockman Grass Farmer, which recounted the experience of Spalding, Nebraska, dairyman, Bob Bernt, who applied three pounds of raw organic milk to a portion of his corn crop.

Raw, organic milk appears to be a great fertilizer for forages. In a University of Nebraska monitored trial on a private ranch near Page, Nebraska, an application of three gallons of raw, organic milk to irrigated pasture increased dry matter production by 1200 pounds per acre within 45 days.

University of Nebraska extension specialist, Terry Gompert, said University agronomists have no idea why plants respond so strongly to such a small amount of raw, organic milk. "It must stimulate the soil microbes somehow," he said. In contrast, Kenneth King in southeastern Kansas said he has been spraying skimmed milk and cheese whey on his pastures all summer and has seen absolutely no response. "I am pretty sure it only stimulates the microbes and that when they are working in high gear already no response will be observed. On the other hand, in a depleted or microbe deficient soil a response will be seen."

We began applying raw milk to pasture 5, which we limed last week, and we will monitor the results closely over the coming weeks and months.

I also managed to source milho criolo or heirloom corn, i.e. non-hybrid corn, placing an order for 200 kg of five different varieties, the largest portion of which is called Amarelão. We will be able to harvest this corn and save seeds for planting in 2011 and beyond. I would rather cut off my right hand than pay a royalty to Monsanto!

We could afford to take pasture 6 out of production for clearing and fertilizing (powered by hogs) because pasture 2 will be brought back into rotation on August 1st, approx. five months after placing our hogs on it to clear and fertilize the pasture.

By moving the group I hogs, Hog Hill is now also freed up to be prepared for planting, and we will begin doing so immediately. When complete, this will add another 2.7 hectares of cropland to pasture 3's 2.4 hectares, giving us 5.1 hectares on which we can plant our milho criolo.

After moving the group I hogs, we moved the 23 Topigs gilts + Betty from our vegetable garden, which we have recently decided instead to use for planting crops, to Hog Weald, our newest, four-hectare, state-of-the-art free range hog pen. In all, we now have five hog pens, Hog Haven, slightly reduced from its original size due to the newly inaugurated maternity ward, Hog Hill, half of which will be used for crops and half which has been fallow since February, Hogwood, which has been fallow since February, Hog Copse, which has been fallow since May, and Hog Weald, which we recently took into production. Esben will be measuring these areas over the next couple of days, but I am comfortable asserting that each hog pen is between three and five hectares -each consisting of two-four chambers equipped with housing, running water, feed storage shelters and treatment pens. Suddenly we have oodles of space for our herd of 60 sows, two boars and 700 plus piglets -the latter as temporary residents spread across the year- a far cry from where we found ourselves a year ago.

So we celebrate our two-year anniversary where we began, with Esben working at Fazenda Alfheim, though thankfully this time for a period of (at least) three years as opposed to two months. He is now taller than Mausolous, weighs more than a gilt of 150 days and brings with him three years of schooling from The Royal Agricultural College. We are indeed lucky to have him. Esben will transition with me over the coming month, after which I will turn the day-to-day management of Fazenda Alfheim over to him.

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.

Hitting our stride

Written to August & Everything After - Deluxe Edition by Counting Crows

Take care of your Thoughts because they become Words.

Take care of your Words because they become Actions.

Take care of your Actions because they become your Habits.

Take care of your Habits because they become your Character.

Take care of your Character because it will form your Destiny, and your Destiny will be your Life ... and ...

There is no religion higher than the Truth.

- the Dalai Lama

While things take time (TTT) is as true as ever when speaking of farming, it is also true that we are beginning to hit our stride and establish a daily routine that pushes us ever closer to our short- and medium-term goals.

Only last week I spent an entire Thursday morning walking the fazenda with Clair, Dirlei and João, planning the next critical three-four months in painstaking detail. The motivation for this hands-on planning session was the upcoming window for planting crops, which begins in the second half of July and ends in the first half of November. Before we can begin planting, of course, there are a number of critical tasks which must be completed:

• Manually clear the remaining post-hog shrubbery on pasture 3. Clair, Dirlei and João, with a couple of spirited contributions from Mark, have basically finished this job -in less than one week. √
• Treat the pastures and fields with calcium. We recently purchased 14 tons of calcium through the Casa da Agricultura in Natividade da Serra, the first seven tons of which were delivered this morning. √
• Secure the delivery of the plow, till and planter. Delivery has been confirmed by Agritech Lavrale Ltda. in Campinas for June 17th. √
• Ensure sufficient hog pens so as to avoid the need to fence during the critical weeks of planting. Hogwood is essentially ready and waiting for a new rotation, Hog Copse was emptied on June 1st and is in recovery mode (approx. six months) and Hog Weald, our latest construct, is still virgin territory…un-tread-upon and waiting. By my back-of-the-envelope calculation, our existing stock of hog pens will carry us through Q1 2011. √
• Pick and store mandioca (cassava) branches for planting in September. As the branches can be stored for approx. three months, we will begin this task next week.
• Secure untreated bean and corn seeds, mandioca branches and sugar cane and elephant grass stalks. We would like to plant sweat potatoes as well, but thus far have been unable to identify a supplier with sufficient volume. √

In sum, we are primed for a successful planting season, which in turn should allow us to achieve our goal of animal feed self-sufficiency beginning in Q1 2011. Given that feed is our second greatest expense, after wages, and unquestionably the biggest pain in the behind logistically-speaking, this would be a monstrous accomplishment. 7-9-13!

Over the past two plus weeks, when not planning the upcoming planting season, we partook in a couple of enjoyable outings:

1. Anella, Sandra, Mark, Emmanuel Cabale, another charming frog (worth reading the link) who is working with Emmanuel Rengade on his Fazenda Santa Helena project along with Jeff and Suzanna (an American couple who we hitherto had not had the pleasure of meeting) and I went for a gentle trek along the easiest of the three trails in the Parque Estadual da Serra do Mar, Núcleo Santa Virgínia, the six km, three waterfall, Trilha do Garcez.

Lone drew the short straw and stayed behind, taking advantage of a kind offer of assistance from our former neighbor, Januara, to check up on Lone's bees. In addition, Bia, Lone's former pottery teacher in São Paulo, paid us a visit, bringing with her a glorious clay salt pig as a present. After the hike, everyone returned to Alfheim for a BBQ and a chilaxing afternoon that effortlessly morphed into evening.

The following Monday Lone took the young folks to Picinguaba and Ubatuba, where Anella and Sandra, in particular, took full advantage of the opportunity to store up some Brazilian sand, surf and sun before heading back to their harsh Nordic fædreland. While Lone, Mark, Anella and Sandra were out frolicking, I stayed home to mind the fazenda.

In other farm-related news, the piglets are thriving, the first group of which will be ready for slaughter at eight weeks, essentially two months earlier than previous batches. We are definitely getting the hang of this.

And speaking of getting the hang of something, we are now officially experts at herding hogs…moving three different groups between gardens, pastures and pens in one day, in some cases more than a kilometer -and after lunch no-less (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14). Completely hassle-free. Amazing what a difference a year makes.

Lone is now officially a milk maid, though her dairy cattle herding skills leave a bit more than a bit to be desired, something she will have to work to improve as our herd of dairy cattle is set to expand by two, perhaps as early as this weekend. In preparation for the birth of the calves, the men built a stall in the corral, which they proudly displayed for the camera.

And speaking of menagerie expansion, Sofia Sow, so named by Anella, gave birth to an unquantified litter yesterday, after holding out for what seemed like forever, or at least for what looked like a physiological impossibility.

Finally, for all of you who own iPods/iPads, I would like to plug the iTunes U, Apple's collection of university content. I have started to download an eclectic collection of lectures whenever I visit the an urban center near or far, and the quality, in most cases, is nothing short of extraordinary -and free! Currently auditing: Justice with Michael Sandel.

Equally free, virtually any older work of classic literature on Amazon.com. I just finished downloading 16 works to my Kindle this morning, including The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, Uncle Tom's Cabin, Oliver Twist and Crime and Punishment.

What did we ever do before the internet?

The land of milk and honey...for real

Written to Look to the Rainbow by Al Jarreau

Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said it, no matter if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense.

- Buddha

As a result of a long-ago-agreed-to social commitment, Lone and I left the young people in charge of the farm for three days last week. We delivered piglets on Thursday, took care of sundry tasks in São Paulo on Friday and headed to Fazenda Pau d'Alho in Tietê to attend the pre-auction party at Carson and Ellen's that same evening. Post party we stayed at the uniquely orange Robusti Plazza Hotel, from which we returned to Fazenda Pau d'Alho on Saturday morning to participate in the Novilha do Futuro 2010 auction. The weather was glorious, and while I did not bid on any cattle, I did have the opportunity to finalize the purchase of four more Jersey cattle with Roberto V. Lopez, Carson's long-time veterinarian. We also got to spend a little time with São Paulo State's handsomest jurist and gentleman farmer, Márcio Magano.

Before leaving for São Paulo, we lost a sow…to what I have no idea. We heard her crying and found her basically immobile with a swollen, rock-hard stomach…and then she died. While sad, we have been quite fortunate, having only lost this one sow to illness (Flora was put down due to a damaged hip) since we began hog farming in early 2009. Depending on how one counts, that makes one-two sows in two years, equivalent to a mortality rate of 1.25-2.50%.

Thanks to Anella and Sandra's initiative, the horses are being ridden again. In fact, only Castanha is being ridden, as the others are so old they are merely passing time before they meet their maker. Our good friend Leonardo has kindly offered to replenish Fazenda Alfheim's equestrian stock in the next month or so. As important as the horses being ridden was the work the girls did cleaning up the saddles, bridles etc.

Phase II in Lone's war on the ants was implemented with typical military efficiency on Tuesday afternoon when we moved the hogs from pasture 3, where they have finished clearing all of the grass, to Lone's one hectare vegetable garden. With one exception, the hogs, after a morning without feed, charged enthusiastically into their new, verdant paradise. The slacker in question was quickly corralled, and we were about to call it a day when the truck transporting the four new Jerseys arrived. After a bit of work, we got all of the cattle into pasture 4, where Mausolus quickly assumed command for their well-being.

Two of the Jerseys are lactating, so on Wednesday morning, Lone and Rosana, with direction from Dirlei, milked them. 18 liters in the morning and another eight liters in the afternoon! Clearly we cannot consume that volume of milk daily, even if Lone begins making cheese, so in the short term the piglets will be the beneficiaries of the fattest, best-tasting milk in the world. The rule of thumb is that while it takes nine liters of milk to produce one kg of cheese, it only takes four and one-half liters of Jersey milk to produce the same. As for the taste, I can personally attest, having drunken it warm and raw, that it is ridiculously yummy. Sweet and consistent…a real treat!

In the afternoon, before the day's second milking, we gave the new Jerseys the once over: ear marked them, checked for parasites etc. With the exception of one swollen front leg, they all looked good. And like their two predecessors, Ressurrection Arabula and Rosa Iatolá, they possess a particularly sweet disposition.

Finally, Abilio has almost completed the new floor in what we hope will be Dirlei's house and the results are excellent (7-9-13 that this solves the humidity mystery), Lone finished reading her first Kindle book (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson), Mark has been taking a bit of a break this week from manual labor while he nurses a slightly sore back and this week's fauna is, you guessed it, another breathtaking moth.

Productivity boost

Written to Fabulous Flamenco/La Gitarra Flamenca by Paco Peña

The stupid neither forgive nor forget; the naive forgive and forget; the wise forgive but do not forget.
- Thomas Szasz

Last week’s blog post was read by 126 people, the third highest weekly total ever. On the one hand I am delighted by the high level of interest, but on the other I cannot help but wonder if there isn’t a correlation between this enhanced interest and my (almost) being eaten alive by a corybantic swine mother. Probably better not to ponder...

On May 1st Lone and I picked up the Danes, Anella and Sandra Jørgensen, at São Paulo/Guarulhos – Governor André Franco Montoro International Airport, a day after celebrating my birthday, actually both of our birthdays, with a lovely day in São Paulo (an oxymoron?), including dinner at Churrascaria Rodeio, one of our favorite restaurants. With the addition of Anella and Sandra, our workforce has suddenly ballooned to nine (including the proprietors, of course), and the results quickly followed. In what ended as a mere three and one-half day work week, we managed to:

• Prepare Lone’s local, ladies-only, birthday bash. A couple of weeks back, Lone had sent out invitations to all of her female friends and acquaintences from Greater Vargem Grande to coffee, tea and cakes to celebrate her aniversário. Before Lone and I departed for our São Paulo sojourn, Lone pre-prepped a colossal chocolate cake and a slew of lemon cupcakes and stored them in the freezer. When we arrived from the airport, Anella, Sandra, Mark and I helped Lone tie up all of the loose ends: dipping strawberries in chocolate (it was a brutal job, but someone (me) had to do it), making coffee, tea, setting the table etc. -even feeding the hogs.
• Give the girls a Sunday tour of Fazenda Alfheim, focusing primarily on Hog Hill, the vegetation of which has regrown to such an extent since we removed the hogs on March 1st that we will have to bring them back for a couple of weeks prior to planting corn there in July. If everything goes according to plan, I will purchase a disk plow (arado de disco), a harrow (grade) and maybe even a planter (plantadeira) to help us with soil preparation and planting.
• Paint the exteriors of both houses, this after numerous false starts by the aforementioned proprietors -and their full-time workers. (Almost) all credit for this accomplishment goes to Anella and Mark. They painted the exterior and the foundation of our house on Monday, and ditto for Clair and Rosana’s house on Tuesday, even squeezing in time on Tuesday morning to help Rosana paint her kitchen. The energy of youth is a beautiful thing!
• Paint (virtually) the entire exterior of the storage room/apartment complex (on Wednesday)
• Clean up the bamboo shed where the surplus building materials share space with the three numb-nuts (read: our dogs). Sandra was both the brains and the brawn behind this feat.
• Break up and remove the entire floor in the third house in order to try and (re)solve the mystery of the damp concrete floor. For this task we had the aid of Abilio, a local handyman, who finally completed his previous gig and was thus freed up to work at Alfheim. We had to wait almost four weeks to contract his services…some things never change, whether in the city or the countryside. Abilio suggested we add Vedacit to the new concrete to lock the moisture out. Interestingly, after they had broken up and removed the previous floor, spreading it judiciously on Alfheim's entry road, we could find no evidence of humidity or moisture anywhere. Go figure.
• Obtain 25-30 liters of whey per day from our cheese-producing neighbors, João Jipe (roughly translated: John the Jeep) and Isilda. We will soak our organic corn in the whey and feed it to both the hogs and the piglets. This represents a MASSIVE nutritional upgrade for the larger swine.
• Dig up four different ant nests inside of Lone’s one hectare vegetable garden. In other words, Lone's May Ant War has officially begun. The head Witch of Eastwick has taken off the gloves!
• Distribute the final 40-odd fence posts in what over the next three weeks will become our newest hog pen, henceforth to be known as Hog Weald.
• Treat all of the Topigs and the 3 Chiquinas, Betty and Beta Boar for parasites. Chiquina is definitely PREGNANT!
  

We completed all of these tasks, in addition to our normal fazenda workload, before 11:00 on Thursday morning, when the five of us piled into our Ford Ecosport 4WD 2.0 16v and headed to Campos do Jordão for some well-deserved R&R at our friend's (Paula Afrange) gorgeous mountain retreat. We arrived in the late afternoon after a quick stop in Taubaté to get the car lights fixed (a burned out relay), enjoy a pastel or three and shop at the Mercado Municipal. After settling in at Paula's, we ended the day gazing at this gudsbenået solnedgang!

Finally, the fuana of the week is once again a moth…I am running out of adjectives.

Saved by the quilt lined duck bib overall

Written to Sounds of Silence by Simon & Garfunkel

The ink of the scholar is more sacred than the blood of the martyr.

- Abu al-Qasim Muhammad Ibn Abd Allah Ibn Abd al-Muttalib Ibn Hashim

We have recently experienced a patch of nearly 14 days of piercing sunshine and crystalline air, many of these days bookended by spectacular sunrises and sunsets. Experiencing such beauty on a daily basis is obviously immensely pleasurable, but also humbling, a gift that keeps giving with equal force almost two years after I arrived to stake my formal claim to Fazenda Alfheim in July 2008.

While a more recent arrival, Mark continues to impress us with the manner in which he dives enthusiastically into nearly every task and grips his work with drive and purpose, never more so than when he was asked to catch a piglet that we bartered with Rosana's father in return for half a month's worth of milk. Lone decided to join Mark in this endeavor…I decided to enjoy the show. The hunters approach…position themselves…and fail. For the better part of 15 minutes, the piglet ran circles around them, so much so that even the cat lost interest. Mercifully (for Mark and Lone), they finally managed to corner and secure the exhausted animal, with Mark diving and holding on for dear life until Lone could provide a second pair of steadying hands. Mark then bore the piglet sack-of-potatoes style to the waiting sack. I can say unequivocally that I thoroughly enjoyed the show.

Mark also helps us with quieter, less stressful tasks, e.g. feeding the runt of a litter of 14 piglets and spring cleaning, the latter in anticipation of our soon-to-arrive guests from Denmark, Sandra and Anella Jørgensen.

On a less quiet note, on Monday, in conjunction with the weekly treatment of the animals, we moved two sows and their 12 piglets (eight and four, respectively) from their birthing/nesting areas into our recently inaugurated, designated maternal ward, formerly knows as Hog Haven. While we have performed this particular task before, on this particular occasion the mothers were more agitated than usual, which, unfortunately for me, resulted in a badly bitten right hamstring. Thankfully, I was wearing my Carhartt Men's Quilt Lined Duck Bib Overall. I am pretty certain the lining quite literally saved my backside. Most importantly, we succeeded in moving the mothers and their respective broods and all parties are chilaxing in their new digs.

Two days earlier, on Saturday, Lone and I went for a walk to the far mandioca field, since christened pasture 10. And what a pasture it has become, approx. 10 hectares of rich grasses. Also, because of its recent history, we will be able to harvest mandioca saplings in June and replant them in September. 18-20 months down the road this mandioca will go a long way to helping us achieve our #1 priority of animal feed self-sufficiency.

While on the subject of pasture, we completed fencing pasture 8/9, a huge area (my best guestimate: approx. 5-6 hectares) midway between the main house and pasture 10. The cattle were moved there for the first time this week. Safe to say our bovines have their work cut out for them.

And under the heading of all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, Lone, Mark and I travelled to Paraty on Sunday to visit friends, Simon and Fabiola, who are building a house near the Environmental Protection Area of Cairuçu.

As if the prospect of a day out in Paraty wasn't enjoyable enough, we were joined on our outing by Emmanuel and Filipa. While Mark took advantage of our outing to reconnect with family and friends in the cloud, the five of us travelled by boat to Simon and Fabiola's house, or rather to the house they are renting while theirs is being completed. We enjoyed a tasty lunch and chilaxed until we returned, again by boat, to Paraty in the early evening.

On the reading front, I finished Riotous Assembly by Tom Sharpe, The Book of Basketball: The NBA According to The Sports Guy by Bill Simmons, and Rework, by Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson -all highly recommended, albeit for very different reasons- and [BREAKING NEWS] managed to purchase Outliers: The Story of Success, by Malcolm Gladwell, the latter while lying on my sofa at Alfheim. Having previously read Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking by the same author, I am eager to get started on his latest work. Long live the Kindle!

Finally, under the heading of astonishing fauna, this picture shows a group of ants transporting a dead cockroach from our house. Believe it or not, I clocked their progress and determined that, cockroach in tow, the ants maintained a pace of approx. one cm per second, which corresponds to one km every 28 hours…impressive! As if that was not enough, I will leave you with these two factoids:

• With their combined weight greater than the combined weight of all humans, ants are the most numerous type of animal.
• An ant brain has about 250 000 brain cells. A human brain has 10,000 million so a colony of 40,000 ants has collectively the same size brain as a human. Ant brains are largest amongst insects. An ant's brain may have the same processing power as a Macintosh II computer. Thousands of years ago, King Solomon wrote: "Go to the ant, consider its ways and be wise".