crowded acre

Perfect Imperfection

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By Jennifer Welch

My heifer has a penis. If you remember, it wasn’t too long ago that I was waiting for my dairy cow to calve. And I called heifer. So you can imagine my surprise when my heifer was born … with a penis. Damn. I guess it’s true that we can’t always get what we want. But I did get a bull calf, which I aptly christened Boy Named Sue. So it would appear that, if we try sometimes, we get what we need. This seems to be a recurring theme in my existence.

After last summer, I wasn’t sure where the food truck or the farm were heading – if anywhere. I had to ask myself some very hard questions. And what’s worse, I had to answer them. When we learned that we wouldn’t be offered another lease at the distillery, one of my employees mentioned that she might know of a good spot for the bus just up the street. A new couple, Rick and Katy, had purchased a building and lot on East Main and had moved to the valley from Chicago. I reluctantly reached out with an email and a hopeful heart. The rest, as they say, is history. The bus moved into a new location, we gained new friends, and the farm remained secure and stable. 

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The Crowded Acre: The Dude

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By Jennifer Welch

It’s no secret to most that I am part woman, part wild animal. I walk a paper thin line between human reasoning and animal instinct, between empathy for our man-made problems and disdain for the four walls surrounding me. I find it difficult to relate to most people, especially the ones that don’t have dog hair on their pants. Animal communication is simple, straightforward. Humans are much more complex and I constantly find myself fumbling through the intricacies of interaction. When I am in town I feel slightly out of place, the proverbial fish out of water, as it were. But when I come home there is a small tribe of humans and horses, poultry and swine, goats and cats, that make me feel at peace. There is also a giant dog that insists on climbing into the truck to greet me every time I pull into the driveway. These are the things that make those four walls feel like a home. It may not be the cleanest home on the block, but it’ll do. 

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The Bearded Lady

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By Jennifer Welch – The Crowded Acre

“The wheels on the bus go round and round …”

It was mid-summer when we purchased the 1984 65-passenger Bluebird school bus. At that time, it had been almost a full year since I had broken the news to my husband – I wanted to go back into the food service industry. I can’t be sure if he fully believed me then, but I am certain he believes me now. “If I can fit it down my winding driveway, I’ll take it,” I exclaimed to the previous owner of the school bus, despite being utterly unsure of where this adventure might take me. But it fit down the driveway like it was meant to be, and it hasn’t left our property since. After some explaining and very little coercing, my husband nodded for me to go ahead with my plans and insisted he be allowed to come along for the ride.

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The Crowded Acre – Annabelle

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by Jennifer Welch Jamie said the calf delivered just fine, making her oldest cow a mommy once again. Annabelle was a good mommy to her calves, and this time was no exception. She was a full-blooded Jersey that had been bred to a Scottish Highland bull. Her calf was a bullcalf, shaggy and wet, eager …

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A Cold and Broken Hallelujah

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 By Jennifer Welch

There is a certain amount of romance associated with farming; I can’t deny that this is true. Maybe it’s the idea of marrying a piece of land with a herd of livestock, or consummating that marriage with the careful placement of a seed deep inside a fold of the earth. There has to be some grand idea that makes the long hours and countless sacrifices mean something. The money makes you want to cry. The hours, and the losses, and the desolation make you want to cry. So why do farmers do it? No matter how certain farmers sound when they tell you the answer to this question, I can guarantee that they ask themselves the exact same thing every day: Why do I do this? For me, the answer is simple: it is love.

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The Crowded Acre

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by Jennifer Welch

“Thirteen Pair of Winter Cardinals”

Winter. It means something different to everyone. To me, it is the longest and slowest of all the seasons. It carries with it the least variability, gelatinous and dark, a time for reflections and musings. Sometimes it seems as though time stands still in winter; frozen within the ice, buried beneath the snow, waiting for the urgings of a new spring to push it forth from the dirt. When I was younger, it would tend to make me restless and fitful. Now I have learned to appreciate the tides of the seasons, the death that is so vital to the rebirth. And though most things use this time of year to remain dormant, my mind is anything but …

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The Crowded Acre – “Mama’s Boy”

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by Jennifer Welch

“OK, it’s time,” I say to my husband and my dad. The three of us walk outside to the pen where our three baby goats live. We pull out Mama’s Boy and I look into his sweet, unsuspecting eyes. I think about all the times I swore I would never do this to any animal. Things change, time goes on; all I can do is try to keep up. “Hold him down for me guys …”    

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