Retirement

"When I watch ambitious people I can't help but feel sorry for them."
(From a book of folk sayings by the Finnish cartoonist, Erkki Tanttu.)

Retirement feels almost too good to be true.  Instead of heading out the door and driving to work, now I can watch the sun rise and enjoy the scenery.  I still have work at home, but there is no burning urgency to get started.

"En ole kovin rientoisa työn laitaan."

"As long as he has his wits and a sound body, a person can always get by."

The Finns are some of the hardest-working people on earth, but they try to not take themselves too seriously.  One of the great classics in Finnish Literature,  The Seven Brothers,  chronicles the adventures of seven brothers who flee civilization and its responsibilities to live out in the woods, but eventually reform and become hardworking, responsible members of society.  The Finnish psyche consists of a longing for freedom from all restraints, combined with a deep respect for good work and community.  The tension between these poles is often evident in Finnish art.

This is what I see looking out the window.

And this.

And this. 

One of my daughter-in-laws once told me,  " It seems like whenever I see you, you are sitting with your feet up, drinking a cup of coffee."  There is much truth to that, because I almost always put my feet on another chair when I sit down, and I always try to face a pleasant view when I drink coffee.  Those are two of the simplest things you can do to make your life more enjoyable and it has always amazed me that more people don't do them.

A Cold October

An October sunrise after a week of clouds and rain.

Nothing like an early snowfall to remind you about what is coming.

Time to get the firewood into the basement.  The plywood extension my my tractor bucket allows me to haul much more wood per load.

Back in the day, when I had healthy teenage sons at home, getting the wood into the basement kind of happened by itself.  I don't recall it being much work.  I'm not even sure I was involved.

Somebody found a warmer spot to sit on this cold morning.

Off we go.

Cats are curious.

He seemed fascinated to see the world go by from his perch.

When I was a grade school I recall that some kids from a less than well-to-do neighborhood carried  the distinctive odor of wood smoke.  It was the smell poverty.  I am often reminded of that when I step into our house and catch a whiff of smoke from our parlor stove.

Le Kilpela Daycare Centre

We look after two of our granddaughters a couple of days a week.  Marja had originally intended studying to become a preschool teacher in Finland, but wound up as a physical therapist.  I often tell her that she finally has her dream job.  

Many people do not realize that crayons are real people that you can talk to.  Small children are not handicapped with this lack of perception, and delight to carry on long conversations with these colorful little persons.

They also are quick to see plastic mugs are really building blocks in disguise. 

Wooden floors are great places to explore on your hands and knees.

The piano is just an instrument....

But music comes from the heart!

Momma stops in on her lunch hour to read a story.

Chickens: The Final Chapter

This summer we raised 16 meat chickens in the large fenced yard which the sheep occupy during winter.  Over the summer I periodically brought the sheep into the enclosure to graze down the lush grass, and was surprised to see how well both flocks got along.

These chickens are not the conventional meat bird that is raised in industrial operations, the Cornish Cross, which has a huge breast and grows so fast that it can barely stand, and is typically slaughtered (after a short miserable life inside) at six weeks old.  That's the chicken you buy at the grocery store.  My chickens are Red Rangers, developed to grow well but also to be able to run about and forage freely.  The bottom line is that these chickens led a good life with lots of room, sunshine, grass, bugs to eat.  What follows may seem heartless and cruel to some of you, but I think it is important that we recognize where our food comes from.  

After this picture was taken, I lured the chickens inside the shed with a pail of corn so that I could catch them easily.

The sheep were hoping that the corn was for them and complained loudly, as they always do when I am carrying something.

The chicken is squawking in alarm, but this only lasted a very short time.

Putting a noose of bailing twine around the chicken's feet.

  

Chop and release.  The decapitated chicken beats its wings wildly.  If you held onto the chicken you would be splattered with blood.  If you let it fall on the ground it would bounce around and bruise the meat.

My solution was to suspend it above ground.  I was planning to use my homemade sheet metal killing cone, which you see in the background, but it was not the proper size.

I slaughtered four chickens at a time.

It was a cold morning and I had to put on long johns and my insulated boots.  We set up the scalding pot in the doorway of the garage to stay out of the wind.

To loosen the feathers for plucking, the chicken is immersed in a big pot of hot water.  The temperature of the scald water optimally is around 160-170 F, and you need to slosh the chicken up and down for 10-15 seconds so that the water penetrates to the skin.    If you do this too long or the water is too hot, the skin will be damaged in the plucker,  If the water isn't hot enough the feathers will not come off easily.

Into the plucker.

The plucker is filled with rubber fingers that catch the feathers as the bottom disk spins.

Once you turn on the plucker, you need to spray the chicken with a hose so that the feathers will wash out and fall to the ground.  I borrowed this plucker from a friend.  It was built by another friend who has since passed away.  Thank you, George, for building it.  I have used it many times and it sure beats plucking by hand.

After about 10 seconds of tumbling around, the chicken is mostly clean., and the few remaining feathers can be plucked out by hand easily.

Onto the butchering table.  My tablesaw is a comfortable height, so I cover it with thick plastic and use it as a work table.

The trickiest part is loosening the esophagus and crop.  These are fused to the neck skin with connective tissue.

This is the crop, the storage pouch where the food first goes.  This allows gallinaceous birds, such as pheasants, turkeys, grouse and chickens to forage rapidly and then retreat to  cover, away from the eyes of predators.

After that is loosened you open up the other end of the bird, stick your hand in and pull out all the entrails.   In case you're wondering, there are some distinctive aromas released throughout this operation, and you really don't feel like eating chicken for a few days afterward. There are people who do this all day long in  chicken processing plants where the temperature is kept in the 40's.  I take my hat off to those folks.  When you've butchered a few of your own chickens you learn to respect what some people must do to earn a living.

There's nothing pretty about this, but it is quick.

I don't enjoy killing animals, but I take some solace in the fact that in nature animals die in much harder ways.  Think of a goshawk sinking its talons into a partridge, or a fox pouncing on a pheasant.  As humans we have the ability to mitigate stress and suffering in the animals we raise to eat.

Chickens that are raised on pasture live a good life and can express their natural behaviors, unlike those that are raised in crowded confinement.  They grow slower, live longer and and taste so much better than anything you can buy from the store.

September 30, The Last Day of Brook Trout Season

On our way to the beaver dam.

We take our Red and Sugar Maples for granted up here.  We shouldn't.  Tourists travel hundreds of miles to see them.

Looks like a portal to a Japanese Temple.  It isn't.

It's too bad that this only lasts several weeks.  It's not hard to get used to cool weather, gorgeous scenery and no biting insects.  The woods are very pleasant in autumn.

Ground pine.

Sometime when you're in no hurry and able to be unproductive without feeling guilty, get down and take a close look at a bed of moss and imagine that you are very small and the moss is a forest.  It is an amazing and beautiful world in miniature.

This summer I caught several frying panfulls of brook trout from this beaver dam, and was hoping for one more good meal.  Crisp-fried brook trout are one of the finest delicacies you can ever enjoy.  My father regarded anything other than brook trout and steelhead as trash fish.  I grew up on brook trout, for my father brought home a creel full of brookies at least once a week during the summer.  The concept of catch-and-release, had he ever considered it, would have been as absurd to him as eating soup with a fork.

Brook trout and beaver dams are synonymous.  A small creek can only support a few small fish, but when beavers dam it the trout population will explode.  These dams usually last only a few years.  Once their food supply diminishes, the beavers move on, the dam falls in disrepair,  the pond silts in, and the brook trout diminish or even worse, are replaced by chubs.  A big part of brook trout fishing is exploring creeks for new dams.   I think my father spent as much exploring as he did fishing.

Brook trout and beaver dams were the primary male conversation topics whenever the extended family would gather. The men would typically gather in the living room while the women remained in the kitchen,  and the discussion would begin with a  question like, "Did you find any new beaver dams last summer?"  My father's two brother-in-laws, John and Arvid, were also brook trout purists, so you never heard words like pike, walleye or  bass in these gatherings.  Anything with scales or spines rated about as low as carp or suckers.

For better or worse, I have inherited my father's prejudices toward other fish.  You will never find me in a bass tournament.

Unfortunately the fish were not biting and this little brookie was the only thing I caught.  I was not very surprised.  Brook trout bite best in the evening, and the biggest ones just as it is getting dark.  This day was too bright and sunny.

 

My father left me several boxes of wet flies, many tied by his brother Hugo.  I often think of them when I am fishing.  My father was a hard worker, but he always made time for fishing.

Time to try a new spot.

No luck from here either.  The dam was in disrepair, a sure sign that the beavers have left.

We walked downstream to another old beaver dam.  The beavers had not rebuilt this one either.  We headed downstream again.

Eureka!  When I saw this standing water among these trees I immediately knew what I would find, a newly-built beaver dam.

 Marja is standing on the beaver hut, a structure made of mud and sticks with an underwater entrance.  The beavers will live in it through the winter and go out to feed  on their cache of cut branches piled on the underwater near the hut.

The dam itself.

Stumps of small trees cut by the beavers.

The heavy brush made fly fishing impossible, but once the beavers harvest more of this it will open up.

The important thing is that the beavers are here now.  If they remain this dam will produce fish.   I have something to look forward to, which makes this last day of the season a marked success.

Red maples, also called soft maple, are some of the first trees to change color.

Tundra swans taking off from a wastewater treatment pond.  These ponds afford excellent resting places for migrating waterfowl.  Unfortunately these birds were just being shot at by a couple of young trigger happy boys wearing orange hunting vests.

Happily neither bird was hit.  I hollered at the boys and they took off running.  Hopefully they have given some thought about their actions.