I was born and bred here in the metropolitan area. No cows or horses grazed in our back yard. However, we did have chickens we massacred regularly for food consumption. I spent lots of time on my grandmother’s small farm, but she only had one cow, one big hog, and a few laying chickens; nothing grazed in her yard either. My husband was and is the farmer. He was raised on a small farm. They did not have a herd of cows or horses, but they did grow big crops.
He never lost this yearning to be a rancher. He was somewhat knowledgeable about the growing of hay and feed for cows, but he has surely, through times of trial and error, become an expert. We have lots of Angus cows, so we have to provide fodder for their food through the winter months, about 2000 bales. Therefore, we grow lots of hay.
I am not involved in the spraying for weeds or the fertilizing that goes into growing this commodity. I have mentioned the “poulet fertilizer,” chicken droppings. We use these nearly every year and the yield from this is immense. I always enjoy the little yellow wild flowers that are so abundant until the herbicide kills them all. I am told cows do not eat bitterweeds!
The real work begins when the hay is ready to be cut, raked and baled. Now, this is the time my assistance comes into play. We baled hay out on the Natchez Trace a few weeks ago and the harvest was abundant; the windrows were many and the bales were plentiful. Each of this big round bundles weigh about 1500 pounds and I was in charge of moving the “loader” from one field to the next and pulling the trailer down through the grasslands to pick up the next load. It is nearly 20 miles from where we loaded the hay back to our ranch; we made the trek exactly nine times plus one more time to pick up the loading tractor. As I am sure you already know, no one can pull a trailer on the Trace, so we did have blue lights flashed at us until the trooper realized what we were doing and from where we were hauling. Now realizing that this chore has to be done two times a year during the haying season, I am resting up until the fall harvest.
Lunch is usually eaten as we travel to and from or sitting under a shade tree in the hay field. I frequently bake a ham to slice for sandwiches and make my herb mayonnaise to spread on the bread.
Two slices of your choice of bread. I use thick sliced sour dough. Spread with this topping – ½ cup of mayonnaise, a mixture of 2 ½ tablespoons of chives, oregano, thyme, and basil and layer on ham, tomato, and lettuce and mozzarella cheese slices. These can be made ahead of time and kept wrapped in the refrigerator.
