Let it rain

Written to This Guy's in Love by Steve Tyrell

If you yelled for 8 years, 7 months and 6 days you would have produced enough sound energy to heat one cup of coffee.
- AMAZING HUMAN FACTS

Beginning at approx. 14:00 on Wednesday, March 18th, it rained 124 mm in less than 24 hours! It rained so much that Lone was forced to empty her precision, German Regenmesser rainwater measuring apparatus in order to keep it from running over. To put this rainfall in perspective, London receives an average annual rainfall of 584 mm! We could not even take photos it was raining so hard...but perhaps this photo of the flattened vegetation along one of the river beds will give you all an idea of both the amount and force of the water.

Not sure if the rain has anything to do with it, but the number and variety of butterflies on display at Alfheim has gone up several notches in the last while. Take a look at this one...and this one. And what about this one...not a butterfly, but certainly a candidate for fauna of the week.

Light-brown and white-speckled mother hen's eggs hatched this week. First four, then four or five more. We think there are eight or nine in all. That brings our poultry total to....a lot.

The chickens have also discovered that hanging out with the hogs is the surest route to a tasty meal.

In other animal news, Muninn has been a little under the weather this week. Not sure why, but he is very, very lethargic.

The new fencers, Wilson and Vincente, made good progress despite the rain...113 fence posts in all. Unlike Chico and Martins, they dig down all of the fence posts before adding the barbed-wire. They are not quite as fast as Chico and Martins, and they cost 75% more, but they seem like nice fellows and the quality of their work appears to be the equal of their predecessors'. Unfortunately, fencing means moving fence posts. I have to remind myself that we will only have to do this once every 15 years!

We recently bought 600 130 cm high fence posts (as opposed to the normal 220 cm high fence posts for cattle pastures) for the enhanced pig pen. It is in this area that we plan to place the sows' maternity houses. Marcos built a prototype of my design this week. Still a few adjustments to be made, but soon the landscape behind the current pig pen will be populated with ten to 20 hog maternity houses. That is nearly as many houses as in all of Vargem Grande. We have already purchased all of the construction material. We assume that all of the gilts are pregnant because the older boar has been leaving them in peace, a break from his past practice. Not sure why, but we continue to be surprised by how well nature organizes everything. I cannot count the number of people who have told us to separate the boars from the pregnant females, and I could never understand why: surely the boars know, and the females can take care of themselves -not to mention their soon-to-be offspring. Our thinking was confirmed when we recently stumbled across the following text in one of our biodynamic handbooks, Bio-Dynamic Farming Practice, by Friedrich Sattler and Eckard Wistinghausen:

If pigs are to be kept in groups of several breeding sows with boar and piglets until weaned, adequate space is needed and the animals must be used to each other.

The prototype maternity house is open along the bottom, allowing the piglets to avoid being crushed should a momma sow inadvertantly lie on one or more of them...something they rarely do. We have also decided not to build a raised floor, putting the animals in direct contact with the ground; sow's stomachs are very sensitive when nursing, and plywood can cause irritation or worse. We will close them in completely for the first five-six days after birth, after which they will be allowed to roam freely. We are expecting the piglets to be born towards the end of May, beginning of June.

Another interesting tidbit from the same book:

The sun takes 25,920 years to move through the whole zodiac. A human being takes the same number of breaths (25,920) in a 24-hour day.

In other, non-animal news, Marcos spent the whole of the week inside, out of the rain, building shelves in the two suites in our house. The beta results are very rustic, but exactly what we were looking for.

Marcos' father, Adilio, meanwhile, spent most of the week closing the gap between the top of the walls and the roof in Clair and Rosana's house. Should make winter considerably more bearable.

Finally, under the headline of depressing but true, take a look at the U.S. NATIONAL DEBT CLOCK. Refresh the page three or four times and watch the debt grow!

Farmer Frankie* finds a waterfall

Written to Nevermind by Nirvana

If you only have a hammer, you tend to see every problem as a nail.
- Abraham Maslow

Over the past couple of months, the Polícia Florestal have been visiting regularly, looking for poachers. The police use our fazenda as their entry/exit point to inspect/protect the State park, Núcleo Santa Virginia. On one of their recent visits, they mentioned that they had stumbled across a waterfall not far from our house. On Wednesday, Rosana, Lone aka Frankie aka Frankie Four-Fingers (see below) and Dener decided to go on an expedition to find the waterfall. And find it they did. It was all Lone could talk about for the rest of the week. However, as they had wisely decided not to take the camera, I say wisely because Lone fell into at least one pool of water in between balancing on stones, Alfheim's newly discovered gem remained hidden to me.

That same day, Lone and Rosana went fishing for fresh-water shrimp, probably a form of crayfish. Not so appealing in the hand, but once cooked they transformed into a delight for both the eyes and the palate.

This week saw a drama of the female sort unfold when Rosana removed the unfertilized eggs from under a brooding Elle. Hormones raging, she quickly unseated the light-brown and white-speckled hen, who herself is brooding, from her nest. Needless to say, the light-brown and white-speckled hen did not take this affront to her maternal instincts lying down. Well, in a way she did, because she quickly pushed her way onto her nest alongside Elle until 24 hours later she had regained her throne by attrition.

On Saturday, Lone and I made a pilgrimage to the waterfall, camera in tow, carefully wrapped in a plastic bag and stowed away in a backpack. Barely 15 minutes from our house lies a breathtaking, six-seven meter high waterfall. We cleared a bit of the flotsam and jetsam in the pool and then went for a shower. As it was quite warm that day, the water was cool but not chilly. Wonderful! Be sure to bring your bathing suits when you visit.

Speaking of guests, I have compiled a list of essentials for those of you planning to visit Alfheim:

• Boots or better still Wellington boots
• A broad-rimmed hat
• Chocolate for the hosts (unlike the Auditors of Reality in Terry Pratchett's Discworld series of fantasy novels, the powerful experience of the flavor of chocolate is not fatal for Lone and me)
  

This week we passed a mini-milestone of sorts: we managed to produce a complete meal consisting solely of animals and plants produced at Alfheim. The meal comprised a succulent chicken, fried squash, fresh tomatoes and Lone's fresh baked havre boller, Danish for oat buns. Okay, so the oat buns were not made of locally-produced ingredients, but everything else was. More importantly, I can state without hesitation that until you have eaten organic, free-range chicken of the non-Dwarf variety, you have not tasted chicken. Exquisite!

It being goiabada or guava season, we should have topped off this meal with freshly harvested goiabada. Unfortunately, the local goiabada suffers from some sort of illness. Unfortunate for Lone and me, but fortunate for the pigs, who have been receiving daily bucketfuls of fresh produce, primarily goiabada but also squash and tomatoes to complement their more pedestrian rations of organic corn and wheat. The only risk is leaving the bucket unguarded for even a moment.

We will soon be able to harvest Caqui or Persimmon, which unlike goiabada seems to flourish here at Alfheim. Can't wait!

When she otherwise has a free minute, Lone has taken up weaving baskets from bamboo.

The growth of the girasol or sunflowers is nothing short of Chernobyl-like. In one week they have gone from this to this!

And speaking of growing fast, Huginn and Muninn are rapidly approaching Layla in overall body size. If possible, Huginn appears to be growing faster than Muninn, who despite his physical prowess continues to be as gentle as ever. That said watching Muninn dig himself a hole to rest in is like watching Caterpillar earth-moving equipment operate. Layla was lying behind his chosen resting spot on Saturday and was nearly buried alive.

The Mad Hatters (Nelore) seem to be settling down under the gentle influence of Bolinha and to a lesser extent Castanhã and Alazão, and from time to time they actually look a bit like cattle rather than pre-pubescent girls at their first sock-hop.

This week will see Marcos and his father will return for a second week of work, the arrival of a new crew of fencers, this time from Paraibuna, and a local stone cutter.

* Owing to her penchant for cutting herself while working in the kitchen, Johannes, Esben, Pelle and I lovingly refer to Lone as Frankie, i.e. Franky Four-Fingers, a reference to Benicio Del Toro's legendary character in Snatch.

The Witches of Eastwick

Written to The Ultimate Collection by B.B. King

Suburbia is where the developer bulldozes out the trees, then names the streets after them.
- Bill Vaughan

Clair spent most of the week constructing a brooding house for the egg-laying hens. The result is completely consistent with our previous hen house standards -simple and robust. As Borat would say, "Very Nice. Great Success." Rosana, who we have dubbed Dona do Galinheiro for her dominance of all things poultry, contributed to Clair's project by weaving six brooding nests out of bamboo. Polyface here we come.

While Clair was otherwise occupied, the witches of Alfheim finished stirring their cauldrons and began spraying their anti-ant pepper on the fields and orchard. We are all eagerly anticipating the results, though if it works I will have to remember to be extra nice to Lone...no telling what potion might be next. Kaoê participated in the voodoo. His comment, spot on for a seven-year-old boy: Tia, eu não sei se eu entendo muito bem como funciona (Auntie, his moniker for Lone, I am not entirely sure I understand well how this works). Comically, his lack of understanding did not stop him from absentmindedly tasting the pepper.

In parallel, the oxen crew completed plowing the first field. Beautiful work. Unfortunately, their boss and I simply could not agree on the grazing rotation, i.e. on which pasture the oxen would spend their nights, so they will not be coming back. It is truly a shame, but this was one of those cases where the gringo and the local did not manage to communicate. Sometimes you have to agree to disagree.

We will plant girasol or sunflower on the plowed field. As it turns out, girasol grows extremely well in our soil. We had little success with the soja perene, and the jury is still out on feijão-guandu, so it is nice to see that our thumbs may be green after all. At any rate the girasol has really taken off in the test field where we planted Lone's capim limão or lemon grass -and also mandioca or cassava, abacaxi or pineapple, peanuts and a cornucopia of squash. In fact, the girasol is doing so well that Lone is concerned it might block the sun from her capim limão. Most surprisingly, the abacaxi appears to be doing quite well. In fact, with the exception of the aforementioned soja perene and feijão-guandu, everything else is coming along nicely.

On Saturday, our good friend Beto from Paraibuna came for a work visit together with a mate. The purpose of his visit was to help us corral the Nelore so that we could examine them for parasites. Very impressive watching a verdadeiro cowboy work. Calm, systematic and skilled. Needless to say they were able to herd the Mad Hatters into the corral, though it still took some coaxing. I tried to imagine how this exercise might have gone without their help...not a pretty image. And best of all, they used our two new horses, Castanha or Chestnut and Alazão or Sorrel. After several hours of riding and herding, Beto concluded that 'o carvalho foi testado!'. In a chest-nutshell, he liked my horse. Sorrel will never be mistaken for either George Clooney or the Flash, but he is a solid workhouse. Hopefully Sorrel will approximate the fictional life of Bill the Pony, Samwise Gamgee's pony in The Lord of the Rings. I personally tested Sorrel late on Saturday afternoon, after he had spent the morning herding the Nelore, and he passed with flying colors, carrying me and a 50 kg sack of feed for several kilometers. Beto lent us a saddle, and our very good friend Márcio donated a first-class saddle to help start us on our life with horses. Where would we be without good friends!

On Sunday, after a long day of work, Lone and I went riding for a couple of hours...everything looks grander on horseback.

Carnaval 2009

Written to Bowie at Beeb: Best of BBC Radio 68-72 [BOX SET] [LIVE]

The man who smiles when things go wrong has thought of someone to blame it on.
- Robert Bloch

Carnaval was R * E * L * A * X * I * N * G, a well-deserved break from the day-to-day of farming. As mentioned in the previous blog post, we visited our new friends, Emannuel and Filipa, at their magnificent fazenda near Catuçaba on Saturday, where we enjoyed a wonderful day, which culminated with a three-hour tour of the fazenda on horseback. I broke every rule of cowboy by horseback riding in shorts and Crocks, and boy was it fun! Emmanuel plans to establish a hotel fazenda on the property, not hard to understand given both the awesome beauty of the place, the infrastructure and his background as a successful pousada owner.

We returned from Catuçaba on Saturday evening, enjoyed a light dinner of fresh farm eggs (these not found at your local Tesco) and then woke up on Sunday morning to a relaxing, two-day visit from our good friends Melissa, Layla's previous owner, Patrícia and Patrícia's son, Alexandre. Melissa and Patrícia brought us a beautiful needlework from Mexico, which has quickly become Alfheim's official dining table centerpiece. In sum, Carnaval offered a lot of rest and rehabilitation all around: Clair and Rosana were given Monday, Tuesday and Ash Wednesday off. Even the two day-workers who plow with oxen got into the spirit of Carnaval...Bahian style, i.e. they went AWOL for the entire week. I finally called their boss, Lei, who, after a bit of back and forth, assured me that they would be back bright and early on Monday, March 2nd. We'll see...initially he told us that they would return to work on Monday, February 23rd. While it is nice, and very Northern European, to be able to count on the precise whenabouts of people who work for you, it is far from the end of world in this case...they are paid per alqueire (2.42 hectares or 5.98 acres) plowed and sowed.

In other animal news, the Galinha-d'angola or Helmeted Guineafowl suffered two casualties last week: one was sick and had to be euthanized and Lone accidentally guillotined another when she shut the door of the hen house...ouch! Yet another has what appears to be a broken leg, but for the time being seems to be doing well enough by flying whenever walking is too troublesome. Also, Dan and Sandra, our newly-dubbed duck couple, named after friends of Lone's who live in New York, and who sent us a children's book entitled Make Way for Ducklings, by Robert McClosky, are doing well and have returned to swimming in the river. And on Sunday Lone bought two new roosters, three hens and 13 fertilized eggs for our two brooding hens from Rosana's father. In another 21 days or so we should have enough chicken power to establish hen houses on each of the pastures and in the pig pen -at which point we will be ready to farm Polyface style.

On Saturday we moved the 20 Nelore heifers and the eight plowing oxen from pasture 4 to pasture 3, not an altogether easy task as far as the Nelore were concerned; the heifers are extremely skittish. One got tangled up in the barbed wire fence when passing into pasture 4. After Clair and I freed her, she was so wound up that she attempted to charge us, coming close on a couple of occasions. It is quite self-assessing to stare an almost 200 kg animal in the eyes that, because of fear, is intent on harming you. Nelore are known to be bravo, but they will settle down as they mature and acclimatize. The company of the oxen has already helped in that regard, and pasture 3 offers far fewer places to hide, so the two groups of bovinae mingle more often than on pasture 4, where the Nelore basically remained in self-imposed exile, out of site in the top left-hand corner for the first week.

On Monday, March 2nd, Bolinha, our recently-purchased, pregnant dairy cow, a Hollandaise-Jersey cross, will arrive. We will begin milking her in May, shortly after she gives birth. Historically, this will be her third calving, Bolinha has produced approx. 15 liters of milk per day, more than enough to supplement the hogs' feed of organic wheat, which we recently purchased from Fazenda 2m, and which should arrive, all 3 tons of it, on Wednesday, March 4th. Each hog should consume approx. 1.8 kg per day (75% carbohydrates and 25% protein), though because they are free range this number is, in fact, much lower. When lactating, however, their daily ration will increase to approx. 6 kg.

This week Lone and Rosana will be testing peppering to combat ants. Peppering involves burning ants, pulverizing their ashes -followed by dynamization, and then applying the pepper for three consecutive nights to the affected plants when the sun or the moon is in Taurus. It all sounds pretty voodoo, but Maria Thun, a pre-eminent expert in biodynamic cultivation methods, and others have achieved good results using this method. Simply put, the concept involves treating like with like, similar to the way most vaccines work -or venom and anti-venom. I will let you know what the Alfheim witches discover.

Finally, we have reached two critical inflection points: the first involves the need to purchase some horses, mules and donkeys to help with herding and transporting of heavy materials. The second is the need for more farm help. To the latter end we have decided to begin constructing another worker's house. I believe I mentioned that Marcos has already produced a detailed budget on his last visit. Therefore, I expect us to break ground sometime this month. In parallel we will have to get serious about recruiting more help, a process that involves a delicate trifecta of identifying a solid, hard-working individual, convincing him to come and work for the Alemanzão and making certain that he meets with the approval of Rosana and Clair...should be an interesting local journey.

The color purple

Written to Led Zeppelin Remasters

At the worst, a house unkept cannot be so distressing as a life unlived.
-Dame Rose Macaulay (1881 - 1958)

It began raining on Wednesday...and it basically has not stopped since. Rainfall levels for the week:

• Sunday - 8 mm
• Monday - 4 mm
• Tuesday - 28 mm
• Wednesday - 4 mm
• Thursday - 27 mm
• Friday - 4 mm
• Saturday - 57 mm
• Total - 132 mm
  

In parallel, the temperature held steady at approx. 30 degrees Celsius until Thursday. The aggregate impact of all of this rain, unfortunately, is that the roads have become impassable for heavy vehicles. Therefore, neither the Nelore cattle nor the plowing oxen arrived as planned, nor will they until things dry out. The trucks are too heavy and the roads too poor. Fortunately, we have not yet been landlocked, and Lone was able to pick up and deliver Chico and Martins, who were able to get in three solid days of fencing (for the most part it rained in the afternoons). As you can see from the previous photo, Chico reaches only to the top of the fence post -with his hat on: 220 cm of fence post minus the 50 cm that is buried below ground minus his hat leaves less than 170 cm of Chico. Height notwithstanding, the sexagenarian together with his septuagenarian compañero de trabajo nearly completed pastures 1 and 2...and did finish fencing the paddock next to the corral. Slowly but surely we progress, but there are at least four more pastures to fence as well as the enlarged hog area, so this saga will continue for some months. This photo sums up pretty well the rain's impact on the activity level at Alfheim.

That said Lone did manage to cover her vegetable garden-to-be with hay -and likewise her potato plants- and seems very un-Danishly self-satisfied with herself.

Here she merely looks rather short. In fact, this photo illustrates the ridiculous growth of the banana plants that Johannes and Esben planted back in August, barely six months ago. When first planted, they barely reached our knees.

While Lone was in São Luiz do Paraitinga picking up Chico and Martins, she also picked up four meat bones for free at the butchers...excellent choice Layla, Negão, Huginn and Muninn seem to be saying.

The hogs could not be better...they continue to bulldoze the landscape unabated. Ditto for the Galinha-d'angola or Helmeted Guineafowl chicks and the kittens, i.e. they are all doing well -rather than bulldozing anything.

Clair also cut more grass for hay this week. At some point we will have to consider investing in a gas-powered grass trimmer...together with the leaf blower the scourge of the suburbs, but an essential tool on 319 hectares of fazenda.

The truly enduring impression of the week, however, is the blooming of the manacá-da-serra (Tibouchina mutabilis). The forest is ablaze with purple and white. From every corner of Alfheim ones eyes are delightfully assaulted by the tapestry of purple and white flowers pouring forth from the carpet of green hues. Nothing short of spectacular.

This week's flora and fauna winners: a frog in our kitchen and a series of gourds from the family Cucurbitaceae (1, 2 and 3).

Finally, next week (February 21st-24th) is Carnaval , the annual festival in Brazil held four days before Ash Wednesday. Therefore, I will be taking a week off from blogging. During our mini-holiday, Lone and I will visit our new friends Emmanuel Rengade and his wife, Filipa at their fazenda, and hopefully receive a visit from our good friends Melissa, Layla's previous owner, and Patrícia -and generally chill as much as possible. Please cross your fingers (7-9-13) for a period of dry weather or you will soon be forced to read a blog that consists solely of accounts of Lone and I playing backgammon...indoors...waiting for the sun.

I'm not sleeping

Written to Be Good Tanyas: Hello Love

You’ll never plow a field by turning it over in your mind.
- Anonymous

Lone and I spent three, as opposed to the usual two, days away from Alfheim last week, which resulted in, among other things, our returning to our fazenda on Friday morning at 02:00. Unfortunately, there was no time for laying about or catching up on missed rapid eye movement (REM) sleep on that particular morning; the Instituto Biodinâmico for Rural Development, IBD, inspector, Maria Carolina Wilmers Manço, was scheduled to arrive at 09:30 to initiate our process of organic certification. Much to my chagrin -Lone is the Morning Good of the two of us- and my anything but rapidly moving eyes, Maria Carolina arrived about one and one-half hours late. Nevertheless, upon arrival she was all business, and soon thereafter, Clair, Rosana, Lone and I accompanied Maria Carolina and her colleague, Rosangela, on an extensive tour of Fazenda Alfheim; all in all we walked from approx. 11:00 until 17:00, and not less than 10 km, only breaking for a quick lunch. Together we visited all of Alfheim's planned and/or productive pastures and fields, from which we took a composite soil sample that will subsequently be analyzed for pesticide residues, reviewed farming practices and spent the final couple of hours until they departed at just after 20:30 going over every detail of the process to ensue. It was without question an exhaustive but also productive and satisfying day, and it culminated with Lone and I feeling convinced that we had achieved what had hitherto been a seemingly unattainable clarity regarding precisely what is required for us to obtain organic certification. Maria Carolina will publish a report of her visit in the next 20 days, after which one of IBD's technical consultants will review the contents and make his/her recommendations, ultimately submitting our project for formal approval. We will have ample opportunity throughout the process to provide additional input and comments.

We had another breakthrough, no pun intended, of sorts this week, when four of the ten Galinha-d'angola or Helmeted Guineafowl (Numida meleagris) eggs hatched...with a little help from Rosana. Considering the fact that prior to arriving at Alfheim the eggs had traveled some distance to São Paulo, where they then spent a few days unincubated, 40% is an impressive result. No doubt there were a few awkward moments when mother hen met her chicks; nevertheless, all parties seem pleased in the aftermath. From these to these in just over 21 days...amazing!

On Sunday morning, Martins stopped by with another of his compadres who plows with oxen (arado de boi). Hopefully he will prove more reliable than Ronaldo, who was a no-show for reasons which have still not been explained adequately. With a little luck (7-9-13), plowing and sowing will begin on Sunday, February 14th, the very day in 1876 on which Alexander Graham Bell applied for a patent for the telephone, as did Elisha Gray, but also the day that commemorates the death of St. Valentine, the name of several martyred saints of ancient Rome, marking Valentines Day. In all, it will take approx. two weeks to plow and sow each of the three feed fields.

After Martin's visit, Lone and I drove to Paraibuna to visit our good friend Beto Camargo, who had arranged for us to visit a farm in the region to look at some Nelore cattle.

Nelore or Nellore beef cattle originated from Ongole (Bos indicus) cattle originally brought to Brazil from India. They are named for the district of Nelore in Andhra Pradesh. The Nelore has a distinct large hump over the top of the shoulder and neck. They have long legs which help them to walk in water and when grazing. The Nelore can adapt to all except very cold climates. They are very resistant to high temperatures and have natural resistance to various parasites and diseases. More than 100,000,000 cattle in Brazil have Nelore blood, making them the majority breed in Brazil. This popularity came from parasite resistance and growth rates.

We ended up buying 20 Nelore heifers (a young cow over one year old that has not produced a calf). Once again, Beto's cousin, Abilio, will deliver the animals to Alfheim...by Wednesday if all goes well. Very exciting!

In anticipation of the arrival of the heifers, Chico and Martins will return this week to complete the fencing of the first four pastures and the area around our recently refurbished corral. Thereafter we will ask them to fence a large area around the pig pen, allowing the hogs to continue to range free, but not so free as to allow them to eat our feed crops.

Finally, Lone's tomato plants continue their impressive growth, and this week's fauna sightings include a spectacular caterpillar and a turtle.

"Free at last! free at last! thank God Almighty, we are free at last!"

Written to Sheryl Crow: C'mon, C'mon

Early in the twentieth century American corn breeders figured out how to bring corn reproduction under firm control, and to protect the seed from copiers. The breeders discovered that when they crossed two corn plants that had come from inbred lines—from ancestors that had themselves been exclusively self-pollinated for several generations—the hybrid offspring displayed some highly unusual characteristics. First, all the seeds in that first generation (F-1, in the plant breeder’s vocabulary) produced genetically identical plants—a trait that, among other things, facilitates mechanization. Second, those plants exhibited heterosis, or hybrid vigor— better yields than either of their parents. But most important of all, they found that the seeds produced by these seeds did not come true—the plants in the second (F-2) generation bore little resemblance to the plants in the first. Specifically, their yields plummeted by as much as a third, making their seeds virtually worthless.
Hybrid corn now offered its breeders what no other plant at that time could: the biological equivalent of a patent. Farmers now had to buy seeds every spring; instead of depending upon their plants to reproduce themselves, they now depended on a corporation. The corporation, assured for the first time of a return on its investment in breeding, showered corn with attention—R & D, promotion, advertising—and the plant responded, multiplying its fruitfulness year after year. With the advent of the F-1 hybrid, a technology with the power to remake nature in the image of capitalism, Zea mays entered the industrial age and, in time, it brought the whole American food chain with it.
- Michael Pollan, The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals

On Thursday morning we liberated the gilts...I opened their newly constructed gate and introduced them to the joys of free range living. It took all of no time for all 21 gilts to mosey out of their pen. Cade os suínos? Here, there and everywhere. One of the reasons that I chose Thursday to free the gilts was that we were expecting the Duroc boars to arrive that day, and I figured it would be easier to guide the boars over to the gilts if the latter were out and about. As it turned out, the boars did not arrive until Friday, so at around 16:30 Clair and I used the sound of the bell and the lure of their single, afternoon feeding -which I had introduced earlier in the week- to herd the gilts back into their pen...Easy Peasy!

While waiting for the boars to arrive on Friday, we planted alternating rows of feijão (beans) and girasol (sunflowers) in the field where we had earlier planted soja perene. The soja perene has not done as well as we had hoped...hard to say why, but rather than clear it, we decided to plant the fejão and girasol in between the rows of soja perene. Worst case: the soja perene will provide excellent ground cover and, after harvest, organic fertilizer. After a few hours of planting, with Clair and I digging the holes and Rosana and Lone planting the seeds, we made quick work of the field.

After that, it was time to turn our attention to Lone's vegetable garden. Earlier in the week I had designed the raised planting beds using the cinder blocks from Esben's (on the right) summer memorial to the Sumerians; using the remaining cinder blocks, we constructed the first six beds. Another 300 or so cinder blocks and we will be able to finish; Lone was clearly more pleased with this week's gardening results than last week's.

The boars arrived that afternoon, but because of the muddy state of our entry road, Abilio had to park a couple of hundred meters from the pig pen. Clair and I then guided the boars from the truck to the river. After taking in the size of the older, larger boar, it quickly became clear that he only goes where he wants. I estimate his weight at somewhere between 150-200 kg. If he makes a stand, he stands and there is no moving him...period! Thankfully, he is quite even-tempered. In addition, the two boars appear to get along well. When the younger of the two boars first arrived at the river's edge, the water more than the sight of 21 extremely horny gilts was what pushed him across. Both boars were too tired from their two-day journey for any hanky panky; all they wanted was a cold bath and some peace and quiet, not that the latter proved possible. Our biggest challenge thus far has been keeping the hogs on their side of the river, so on Saturday I wrote the first draft of the blog from a seat under a tree on the bank of the river. Fortunately, Muninn has proved such a natural herder that, together with Layla, no slouch herself, I have barely had to get off my backside, as the British are fond of saying. Anyone who doubts that Rottweilers were originally valued as herding dogs has only to take a look at these photos to see history and genetics at work. Muninn is fearless...and will only get better (and bigger) with age. And he continues to have the sweetest disposition, though he has already made it clear that he is the Alpha dog of the four. Needless to say the hogs are quickly learning to stay on their side of the tracks, so to speak.

Fortunately, the dogs herding did not prevent the boars from fulfilling their destiny...3 months, 3 weeks and 3 days from now we should begin seeing their progeny. I only hope that Muninn has not been emotionally scarred by the experience (he is only three months old, after all).

On Saturday the sun broke through at last...30 degrees Celsius and 55% humidity, the latter representing a significant decline after having hovered around 90% for most of the past two weeks. Time to get all the laundry done. The change in weather could not have come at a more opportune time; the entry road has deteriorated rapidly over the past couple of weeks. Hopefully we will enjoy a drier period over the coming weeks.

Also this week, Marcos and his father returned to build and install pasture gates, repair our dilapidated corral, provide us with a comprehensive quote for the construction of another worker's house and help me brainstorm bridge designs, feeding troughs, salt lick stands etc. In brief, there is very little Marcos cannot figure out. We are extraordinarily lucky to have a contractor who can be left to his own devices for a couple of days and when we return everything is on track and as agreed. Marcos and his father will return again in two weeks.

Finally, this week's blog post marks an anniversary of sorts...six months of blogging and my 21st post. To date, the Fazenda Alfheim blog has racked up the following Visitor's Overview (Comparing: All sites of similar size):

• 1,857 Visits - Benchmark: 80 (+2,221.25%)
  
• 3,502 Pageviews - Benchmark: 150 (+2,234.67%)
  
• 1.89 Average Pageview- Benchmark: 1.87 (+0.98%)
  
• 00:03:38 Avg. Time on Site - Benchmark: 00:00:16 (+1,273.86%)
  

Muito obrigado to all of you for your support, comments and questions.