Depending on what type of farmer you are, you may get a bit more time off than others. If you don’t have any livestock, for example, you probably don’t need to worry about feeding them every single morning and night. Vacation days may be a bit more plentiful.
If you only feed livestock at a certain time of year you probably don’t leave very often during that time.
In our family, time off for “fun” things is something that is cherished. Now my husband has taken more time off in the last few years than ever before.
I don’t necessarily count it as time off because he is out there being a voice for agriculture. Whether it is talking about the Farm Bill, helping with the corn check off dollars of South Dakota corn farmers, and even some leadership training that has taken him to Washington to speak with the men and women that represent South Dakota. He has been quite the busy man. I love him for being such a hard worker, not only on our farm, but in representing agriculture.
We have cattle, all year round, which means we can’t just leave without anyone to feed. But, luckily we are in a family operation that allows for such luxuries of a vacation. But, that doesn’t mean summers off and winter holidays when the crops have all been harvested.
Spraying road ditches for weeds in the summer time. We cut and bale the grass in our field’s ditches as a feed source for our cattle in the winter time.
To most farmers, even those you may think of as traveling as soon as their crops are out of the fields, it means a whole 2 months to really work on all the odds and ends that get neglected during harvest and planting.
It means building wind breaks for cattle to help protect them from the dust and cold winter wind.
It means tiling fields. (Irrigation)
Visiting Daddy at the farm during calving season.
It means putting up fence.
It means cutting hay, raking hay, and baling hay.
Keeping our little girl occupied while hauling hay,
For farmers there is always, and I do mean always, something to do. Often times at midnight in the Fall we will still be combining and we just decide to stop, even though the field is almost finished. But, the reality? It will still be there tomorrow and there will be even more to be done come morning. Farmers don’t stop. And that is the truth, coming from a First Generation Farm Wife!
This is a great post in the whirlwind that I can only assume has been your spring. Congrats on your beautiful son, and I know how it feels to have a baby on a farm. Mine were both born during critical cattle times (March and Oct). I was (and am) searching for blog posts and stories about agriculture by and about women, when I came across your twitter profile. I was wondering if I could have your permission to repost this on http://www.ForFarmAndRanchWomen.com ? It is a brand new website conglomerating all women bloggers and advocates for agriculture in hopes of connecting with each other and reaching our non-ag friends to educate them and bring our industry to life for them.
If you are interested, please check it out. Or join us on facebook at For Farm and Ranch Women: Memoirs. Heck, I wouldn’t even mind a direct email back! JessieJohnson16750@gmail.com. I’m very excited to grow this content, and my own blogging just isn’t going to cut the mustard 🙂
If you’re interested, I will maintain formatting and syntax but will condense sidebars and original site widgets. Once formatted and put on the website, there will be a link to you and your blog. I will also feature it on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram with your choice of hashtags including #forfarmandranchwomen.
If you have other posts you would like publicized or other friends that write, please send them my way. Thanks for considering helping connect more women and reach broader audiences.
Jessie Johnson