Dear Friendly Farmer,
What do farmers do in the winter?
Yours Truly,
City Gal
Dear City,
Great question! During New England winters, your farmer isn’t just lying on the couch watching reality TV! Yes, shorter days and colder air naturally make the work days shorter for many farmers. For dairy and other livestock farmers, sometimes the workload increases.
Animals still need to be fed and dairy animals need to be milked. But in the winter, there can added complications of snow removal and making sure everything stays warm enough to work. Veggie and flower farmers also have their tasks in the winter—poring over seed catalogs and making or tweaking next year’s planting and harvest plans.
Many farmers, small business owners that they are, take time to catch up on bookkeeping or administrative tasks that went by the wayside during the growing season. For a lot of farmers, early winter is a good time for vacation. Chores are more routine and predictable in winter—you won’t miss an opportunity to make hay or fall behind on veggie harvests—and easier to delegate to a farm sitter. But for many, any vacation time ends by late January when calving/lambing season starts up, it’s time to get lines ready to harvest maple syrup, and seeds are getting started in the greenhouse.
Yours truly,
The Friendly Farmer