Around the Kitchen Table: Spring planting

One topic that seems to be on everyone’s lips this time of year is spring planting. Whether you are a big-time farmer with hundreds of acres or a small local producer, planting time dominates conversations in the grocery store, hardware store or café. It’s on everyone’s minds. Even the hobby gardener gets caught up in the excitement.

I remember going with Dad to our small-town feed store and overhearing debates among the overalled and khaki-clad men. They would discuss the virtues of different varieties of corn and beans and what the Farmer’s Almanac predicted for rain. Many of the farmers we knew then still used horse- or mule-drawn equipment, so the timing of planting was dependent on the state of the fields – too wet and the animals and equipment would bog down; too dry and you’d end up with a lot of dust and too few germinating seeds.

Up until I was about 4 or 5, we had a Belgian Quarter horse cross that we used for field work. Unfortunately, Old Tom got too old to plow and died before spring planting, so that year Dad borrowed a neighbor’s mule and managed to get our garden in. We had to work it by hand the rest of the time. Fortunately, I was too little to be of much help, so I wasn’t required to hoe and chop weeds (thank goodness). I did, however, benefit from the onions, beans, potatoes, corn and tomatoes that grew – they were delicious.

Time went on and Dad tried other horses when it came time to plow, but they were basically a disaster. It was almost as if they were aware of the advent of modern machinery and were throwing off the archaic restraints put on equines for thousands of years. Dad just said, “They were too big for their britches and didn’t know their proper place.”

An observant neighbor concluded that Dad had probably chosen horses that were “too high falutin’” for such menial tasks as plowing. He may have been right. Dad was a good judge of horseflesh, but he favored the slick, lean, high-stepping saddle-type horses over the sturdy, slower-paced dependable farm horses. Can’t say I blame him; a pretty horse is hard to resist.

Eventually Dad came around to the modern way of doing things and bought a 1940s red Farmall tractor with implements. At least, it used to be red – now it was more of a faded, muddy, dark pink color. It did make short work of disking up the garden plot and making nice, even furrows for planting. Dad no longer had to chase down runaway reluctant “plow” horses, even though he did have to get used to different equipment.

There is a big difference in hooking up horse-drawn plows, planters and other things compared to the tractor variety. It took some getting used to for Dad; after all, he grew up walking behind a horse-drawn plow, and some habits are hard to break. But like everything in his life, he approached it with curiosity and an enthusiasm for learning something new. It didn’t take him long to figure out this new-fangled way of farming.

I think he sometimes missed the quiet sounds of the horse’s harness and traces jingling and creaking and the whisper of the soil as it rolled off the curve of the plow blade and heaped into rows. I guess that’s one of the reasons he couldn’t give up his manual corn planter. He’d used it for years with Old Tom, but now, he was faced with retiring it permanently.

My oldest sister overheard him talking to Mama about it and volunteered to pull it for him. Melanie was in high school at the time and stout for her age. She was Dad’s shadow growing up and had worked alongside him on the farm as hard as any son could, so Dad was willing to let her try.

I think she and Dad had fun that day because every round they made, their smiles got bigger. Pretty soon, we were all rowed up, cheering them on. That’s when Mama took this picture.

They got the field planted and we had a good crop of roasting ears that year thanks to their hard work. After that summer, Dad decided to retire the corn planter. He put it in our barn to protect it from the weather. It joined the harnesses, traces, horse collars, plow reins, plows and other outdated equipment. Today, it is part of Dad’s collection, a farm museum he put together with the help of my sisters, years ago.

When I look at the amazing display he is passing on to his grandchildren and great-grands, I am thankful I was able to see for myself the transition from the old ways to modernity … and I smile every time I see that old corn planter.

by Tamra M. Bolton