The Minnesota Farm Woman

I don’t know why I am so anxious for spring to get here. It hasn’t been a particularly bad winter, nor do I want to wish my life away, but I am more than ready. The first pair of swans flew over the creek yesterday, and the mere sight of them gave me spring fever. The days have been warm enough to keep the door to the chicken coop open most of the time. By that, I mean the door to the fenced-in run, because the wild animals and birds are especially hungry this time of year and would like nothing better than a nice plump chicken for dinner. The snow in the south-facing run is starting to melt, especially where the sun hits, and the girls are glad to have a little dirt and mud to scratch in. If you read “The Farm Woman’s Guide to Raising Chickens Even When Your Husband Doesn’t Want Them”,  it explains that “fresh clean water is essential to the good health of your flock.” I read it. I live it. I haul fresh water daily, even adding a few drops of organic apple cider vinegar to ward off disease. Today, with the melting snow in the run, they were drinking out of a mud puddle mixed with old straw and probably  doo-doo.  They hadn’t touched their water. The path to the coop is getting wet, too, and probably in a week or two, I will have to start wearing rubber boots. As spring continues springing, the snow will melt before the frost is out of the ground, causing standing water and mud everywhere. Along my route home, I often see people park at the end of their driveways and walk in, wearing their own rubber boots and carrying their shoes. The last thing they want is to be stuck in the mud in the middle of the driveway. Although it is not a pretty time of the year, I love it because it means the long winter is finally over. When I was a kid, back in the olden days, they would give us a few days off from school and call it “Mud Vacation”. Country roads were not as well maintained way back when, and nobody wanted the school busses to get stuck. My friends and I, who lived in town with paved roads and sidewalks,  wore green rubber boots all spring, and would spend our mud vacations playing marbles in the slush and the puddles, our fingers freezing in the cold water. We eagerly awaited and reported the first green shoots of spring and watched for pussy willows to burst into fuzzy little catkins.  I don’t think there was a mom in the entire town who didn’t have a bouquet of pussy willows on her table each spring. Even at my age, I still watch for them, checking out the bush that grows right next to the coop every single day with the same excitement as when I was ten.  I also look for the cowslips, also known as marsh marigolds, which grow in the wetlands, their cheery yellow flowers telling us that spring is finally here, even though they are sometimes surrounded by snow. And speaking of snow, we can always expect a snowstorm or two well into March or even April, but this time, we know it won’t last. What I’m looking forward to the most this year is Daylight Savings Time. For some reason, I have awakened each morning at four bells, ever since the last time change. HE says it is because I fall asleep at eight. I say it is because you can’t teach an old Farm Woman new tricks.