sutton023

If you come to visit Badgersett Farm, it can be a little difficult to visualize the process of establishing productive nut plantings.  For one thing, our plantings, hazels, chestnuts, and pecans, all neohybrids, are now so extensive it takes several days to actually see them all.  For another, our plantings are insanely variable from a grower standpoint, because of the 40 years of necessary, and ongoing, research.  A field with 10% stocking can look like a failure; and be an enormous success- since it identified the plants for the next generation. But now, you can visit a planting where the process is crystal clear - and it's a bit easier to get to than SE Minnesota; north central Ohio; about 15 minutes off of Interstate 90. The planting of Badgersett neohybrid hazelnuts as part of the Oberlin College Adam Joseph Lewis Center for Environmental Studies is a stellar example of “how to do it right”.  The establishment success, growth rate, and early nut bearing in this...

What do you do when you discover your sheep worming practices - have stopped working?  You medicate the flock; again.  Immediately.  Which means rigging a catch-pen, then wrangling 40 sheep. This situation was discovered when a ewe went down, and the vet called. (This isn't the tornado part yet; wait for it.)  That ewe is fine now; but her lamb died; and we lost 2 more sheep; both of them not strong animals to begin with.  If you're losing animals- more can go down fast, if you don't act.  So; drop everything- and for several days we had a worming rodeo - Far above and beyond the call of duty, Sara and Tommy provided 98% of the muscle - and agility. The vet thinks a major factor in our worm treatment being inadequate is - the worms are becoming resistant to the 'usual' medications.  We'll be changing several management practices to lessen the pressure on the sheep.  The previous years we had no problems. They've responded quickly to the medication...