Manure

There was a lot of gravel in the dirt around the swimming pool that was here when we moved in. Our shovels and our muscles moved a whole lot of it on Saturday. But with clay soil, over the course of many years that gravel got smashed down into the dirt and embedded ... and we just ain't gonna be able to move it.

So Gary talked to one of the neighbors, a real-live farmer, one of the hold-outs who still has cows and pigs and hasn't subdivided his land into one-acre plots for mega-houses. We're going to pay him to come over with his bobcat and shove this dirt and gravel around for us so that we can get some topsoil and plant grass.

As we enjoyed a nice chat, he mentioned that they were looking to move further out from the city. He's had some of the new neighbors complain about farming. That just makes me mad. People move out into the country, and then complain about tractors on the road, or the smell of manure, or the sound of the machinery. He said he had some problems hauling manure once. And I'm thinkin', "What do people want?" If a farmer has to dispose of his manure, that will be costly to him. And where would it go anyway? To the town dump? And if he put his manure in the garbage can for the garbage man to pick up (LOL!) what would Mr Farmer use for fertilizer? A bunch of chemicals that are more toxic than cow manure. Do we want that in our nice little "country neighborhoods"?

Putting manure on the fields is a really good plan that works with nature. And yet, city folks get all upset about it. Those people should stay in the parts of the city where there is lots of concrete, and where they see cows only on long trips or when they go to the zoo. And if they get hungry someday because we've turned all the farms into corporations and run the farmers out of business, well, then what?

PS: This neighbor milks cows. I am glad. (Let the reader understand.)