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!