January was always my favorite time on the farm.

During the 1940s and 1950s, almost every farm in our small rural community was a family farm. Let us describe that farm as a rather small holding, from 40 to 150 acres or so. Each farm had its inhabitants: first the human family, then a few cows (either a small beef or dairy herd), a few sows, some sheep and, of course, chickens.

Each month all year long was a working month – except January. January is named in honor of the Roman god, Janus, the two-headed god. One head looks backward, the other forward – into past and into the future. That’s the way it is with farming, too. It is a time to look at the past year’s production accomplishments and to look to the future and plan for the coming year’s production cycle.

And for me, and my dad before me, the best time to do that was during early morning chores in the barn. That was an ideal time to go a little more slowly and spend quality time with livestock.

We usually started feeding in the hog barn. There the ever-hungry hogs would greet us with grunts and squeals as we carried their special treats to them. Even though they had automatic feeders, when we walked in with a metal basket full of ear corn for them, they acted as though they had never had a bite to eat. As we walked amongst them, they relished the idea of a scratch behind their ears. In fact, most would rub against my legs just to get a little special attention. And it was good for me too. It gave me a chance to look over the animals to make sure all were healthy. These were the animals that brought in the most money throughout the year. Healthy, well-fed hogs gain weight more quickly, finish faster and go to market earlier.

Next we would go to the sheep shed where the old ewes were impatiently waiting to be fed. It seemed a few of them were always bleating as a way of welcoming me to their pen. The older ewes would line up at the trough waiting for their ration of grain. And we learned never, ever to climb in the haymow to throw down a bale of hay before sprinkling grain in their feed box. My goodness but they would all scold me to let me know they were unhappy. But once fed, they contentedly munched away while I put hay in their manger and spread a new layer of straw in the loafing area.

Finally, it was time to feed the cows. They always seemed more tolerant and patient than either the pigs or the sheep. And for Dad and me, it was the best time of the day. We finally had time to spend in the cow barn. I like cows. Compared to other farm animals, cows are kind of quiet creatures. Hogs grunt and snort and squeal at feeding time. Sheep make pleasant sounds as one walks into their midst, but cows just stand by quietly waiting to be fed.

Cows, I think, take more work, more feed and more time. First one had to climb up into the haymow to drop a few bales of hay down the chute for feed and a couple of bales of straw for bedding. They get up from their nesting area and stand by while one gets ready to feed them.

For me there is nothing to compare with the smell of a freshly broken bale of clover and timothy hay to feed the cows. When I break a bale, the aroma wafts upward and fills my nostrils with the pleasant scent of quality, cured hay. Then when one drops a wafer of hay in the manger, cows step up, grab a bite and start munching away. Did you ever notice while they munch, their lower jaw always seems to moves from side to side in a grinding motion? I used to think, “My, but that’s a really dry breakfast. It would be like eating a shredded wheat biscuit without milk.”

And cows don’t mind when you interrupt their feeding to put down a new layer of straw for bedding. As you walk among the animals, they move aside so you can shake out the straw for new bedding. The straw smells so good to them that they will often chew the straw, especially oat straw. And they, too, like to be petted and rubbed. I think they like to know that someone cares about them. Of course each animal species has its own odor. But I like the smell of cattle better than I like the smell of hogs or sheep. There is just something more pleasant to my nostrils about the body odor of a warm cow.

And after feeding and watering the livestock is complete, it is an opportune time to just sit and relax, watch and enjoy the stock. This is the time for contemplation and planning. Any cold January morning is a perfect time to spend time with your livestock, to look back over the past year to figure out what you could have done better, where you could have saved time or a little money, and to apply what you have learned when you work out your strategy for the new year. January is the time to enjoy the fruits of your labor by sharing time with the animals you raise. That’s why I always liked January when I was farming.

Sam Moore

“Blue moon, you saw me standing alone, without a dream in my heart, without a love of my own.”

— “Blue Moon,” Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart, 1934

I’m writing this on New Year’s Eve and, although it’s overcast outside and I can’t see it, there’s what is commonly called a “blue moon” overhead.

When I was a kid, folks often used the expression “once in a blue moon” or “never in a blue moon” to describe something that occurred very rarely, or that might never happen at all. I didn’t know what the term referred to since I’d never actually seen a blue moon; every moon looked yellow or white or maybe gray to me.

There have been several occasions when the moon actually did look as though it was blue, mainly due to dust, smoke or ashes from some cataclysmic event on earth permeating the atmosphere. One such event occurred in 1883, when the Indonesian volcano Krakatoa erupted, spewing so much ash into the atmosphere that moonbeams passing through the clouds of ash appeared blue or green for several years after.

A full moon occurs every 29 days, so it’s possible for there to be two in a single month, although it is relatively rare, happening on an average of once every 2.7 years. In 2009 there was a full moon on Dec. 2 and another on the 31st.

The common perception today is that a second full moon appearing in any single month is a blue moon. However, the Maine Farmers’ Almanac (first published in 1818) interprets a blue moon as being the third full moon of four in any one season – spring, summer, fall or winter – always occurring between the 20th and 23rd of the months of May, February, August or November, and almost exactly one month prior to the vernal equinox (about March 21), the autumnal equinox (about Sept. 22), the summer solstice (about June 21) and the winter solstice (Dec. 21). 

Accordingly, the last true blue moon was on May 19, 2008, being the third full moon of the four between the vernal equinox on March 20 and the summer solstice on June 20. Full moons that spring occurred on March 21, April 20, May 19 and June 18. As can be seen, none of those months had two full moons, although the spring season itself had four. The next blue moon will be on Nov. 21, 2010, that being the third full moon of the four occurring between the autumnal equinox on Sept. 23 (also the date of the first full moon), and the winter solstice on Dec. 21. Dec. 21, 2010, is the date of the fourth full moon of the season, which will go through a total eclipse on that night as well.

The original need to identify a blue moon arose centuries ago in Europe from the need to calculate the exact date of Easter on the Christian ecclesiastical calendar. The normal year had 12 full moons and each of these had a name. According to Biblical clues, Easter must fall on the fourteenth day of the Paschal Moon, which corresponds to the vernal equinox. A thirteenth full moon in any given year had no name and threw off these calculations, so the blue moon was dreamed up to keep things on track.

American Indians put great store in the phases of the moon, using moons instead of months to mark the passing of time. The most common names for the full moons among these people were as follows:

January: Wolf Moon, in reference to the hungry howling of wolves around the camps.

February: Snow Moon, because across northeastern America, the heaviest snows fell in that month. Some tribes used the name Hunger Moon, because food was scarce at that time.

March: Worm Moon. As the ground warmed, earthworms appeared. European settlers called this the Lenten Moon.

April: Pink Moon, after a spring wildflower. Sometimes known as Sprouting Grass Moon.

May: Flower Moon, because of the many wildflowers that bloomed in great profusion in May. Also called Corn Planting Moon, as that was the time to plant corn or maize.

June: Strawberry Moon. The sweet, red strawberries ripened during that month.

July: Buck Moon. Buck deer sprout new antlers at that time. Also known as the Hay Moon because grass was cut at that time.

August: Sturgeon Moon, from the huge spawning runs of these fish when they were very easy to catch. Sometimes called Green Corn Moon or Grain Moon as well.

September: Harvest Moon or Corn Moon, recognizing the time when American Indians harvested corn, pumpkins, squash, beans and other staples.

October: Hunter’s Moon. The month when summer-fattened game was taken and stored for the long winter ahead.

November: Beaver Moon or Frosty Moon. Time to set beaver traps before ponds froze.

December: Cold Moon or Long Nights Moon, for obvious reasons. European settlers called it the Moon before Yule.

Farmers used to plant and harvest crops, butcher animals and do many other chores according to the phases of the moon. For example, potatoes were always planted during the “dark of the moon,” and nothing was ever planted on the day of a full moon or a new moon. The rules for farming by the moon are too numerous and complex to squeeze into this article. Maybe someday.

Sam Moore

Let’s talk a little bit about some of the disasters, large and small, that befall tractor collectors.

Derby-style tractor pull
I witnessed one such sad event at a show several years ago. The exhibitors had organized an impromptu, derby-style tractor pull and several tractors were competing, including a very nicely restored 1925 McCormick-Deering 10-20 equipped with steel lug wheels. The track was loose dirt – not packed down much at all. The tractors all successfully pulled the sled the required 20 feet on the first round, more weight was added and the second round began. The old 10-20 hooked to the sled and pulled it a couple of feet when the left rear wheel began to spin in the soft dirt.

When a steel wheel equipped with spade lugs spins, the whole tractor jerks and jumps up and down, putting a lot of strain on both the tractor and the driver. With no individual rear wheel brakes, the driver can only leave it to spin or disengage the clutch. This driver let it spin. The left wheel caught, the right wheel began to spin and then caught suddenly, at which point there was a loud crack! The right wheel hub, made of cast iron to which the flat strap iron spokes were riveted, cracked wide open across its entire width while several spokes bent. It was enough to make a rusty iron lover weep.

Engine repair gone awry
I heard another story that could bring tears to the eyes of a tractor collector. A friend told me of a friend of his who bought a John Deere 730 tractor that was in beautiful shape with near-perfect sheet metal. The 730 had one problem: water in the oil.

The guy removed the hood and grille, pulled the head off the engine and found a bad head gasket. After suitable repairs, he reassembled the engine, started it up and it ran fine. It ran so well in fact, he decided to take the tractor for a spin, sans hood and grille. He backed the tractor out of his shop and right over the beautiful grille that he had carefully placed on the floor behind a rear wheel.

The last coat of paint
Many years ago, I put what I thought was the final coat of paint on a McCormick-Deering W-4 tractor. After the paint had dried, I draped a couple of old bed sheets over the tractor itself and threw towels over the separate gas tank, hood and grille to keep off the dust.

Since I was away all weekend, I didn’t look at my painting masterpiece, the best I’d ever done, I told myself. They say pride goeth before a fall. Sunday evening, I whipped the covering off the grille and found, to my horror, that the towel had left the imprint of its nap in the paint. Apparently, even though the paint felt dry to the touch, it was still soft enough that the heavy towel sank right into the finish.

Inexperienced steam engineers
An old gentleman once told me of a small disaster of another kind. When he was little (the second of five boys), he’d visit his grandfather, who owned a steam traction engine. One evening after chores, he and his older brother got to playing on the engine that had been used that day.

The boys threw a few lumps of coal on the still glowing embers in the firebox and started to play engine driver. The older brother moved a lever and the engine lurched forward! They had no idea how to stop the thing and stood helplessly on the platform as the big engine lumbered across the barnyard and into a split rail fence. Luckily, there was an open field beyond the fence where the engine ran out of steam and stopped, to the boys’ great relief. They left it sit, ran into the house and went to bed.

The next morning all five boys were eating breakfast when their father came in with that certain look in his eye. The two culprits confessed and had to repair several broken sections of fence, among other punishments.

Sometimes bad things happen to good people.