Farm Life

Here in our family we live on a small 'farm', or what might more properly be termed a 'farmstead'. We do not own any large livestock or have the land to support large numbers of animals, but we do have a rather good-sized chicken flock that is kept for meat and eggs, a large herd of French Angora rabbits who provide meat and a small income from stock sales and wool, and a large, 1/2 acre vegetable/fruit/& herb garden. In addition to this we have a sizable orchard of apples, pears, plums, and peaches, and all in all we keep very busy cleaning, maintaining and breeding animals, weeding, harvesting, preserving, and planting. There may be pigs in our future someday around here too, but for now that is a ways away yet, and will only happen after we can build an enclosure to keep them safe from the bears:).



Farm animals (and gardens) are not only a great way to save money and control the quality of your family's food, but they are also of infinite value in teaching children the cycle of life and, most important of all, the principle of cause and effect.



Cause and effect means precisely what it sounds like, which is to say that the cause of something on one end invariably produces an effect (or consequence) on the other. From the very youngest age children have a perfect understanding of this principle. They know from infancy that when they cry, someone will feed them and attend to their needs. When they become older and decide to snatch their siblings' toys away, there are definitive consequences for that too:). The beauty of life on a farm is that the rule of cause and effect is an absolute, ever present force. It pervades every facet of the working family's existence, and without this symbiotic relationship that exists between animals and their owners, neither can produce or survive.



One of the reasons kids love farms so much is because they are so delightfully easy to understand. An animal is provided with food, water, and shelter, and it return it provides us with meat, eggs, milk, or fiber to spin. Seeds are planted in the ground, they are watered, weeded, and protected, and after a few suspenseful weeks there is food on the table to show for your efforts. Farming is a lifestyle that is so concrete and perfectly balanced, that children gravitate to it naturally as an extension of their own experience with the world.



We have seen many, many homeschoolers embrace the idea of growing food and raising livestock, but there is an alarmingly large number who also shun the idea of exposing their children to some of the 'darker' sides of farm life---which necessarily include sickness and death.



Of course, the ultimate 'cause and effect' principle is life and death. Whether you butcher your own animals or they sicken and die through one circumstance or another (as happens on every farm regardless of living conditions), it is important for children to see death as the natural outcome of life whether it occurs naturally or as a result of human effort. When the boys were small we carried on our work of raising and butchering chickens and rabbits. If they chose to be present during the culling they were certainly allowed, but if they didn't they were never forced. Over the years we also lost many housepets (dogs and cats, etc. who died of old age), but even though the kids were always sad at the loss of their pets, they never panicked or became overly distraught. I believe this was because they had an understanding of death as the natural effect of life, and there was no opportunity to develop irrational fears of the process.



The society we live in has an almost schizophrenic fear of death:(. Every day we hear of new products and research that promise to stop us from aging, keep us young and alert, and extend our lives no matter how ill, worn out, or compromised we have become. The refreshing thing about life on a farm is that events must be accepted regardless of how they come, and the emphasis on quality of life vastly overshadows the question of how it will end. This is a good way to look at the world, and a pretty nice way to grow up:).



Here is (an unfortunately dark!) photo of the chicks we ordered from the hatchery this spring to replenish our laying flock. Take a close look. Aren't they just the cutest darn things?:) Included in this batch are hens (and 1-2 roosters) of every possible description, a group we put together of the most endangered heritage breeds we could find. From a geographical standpoint it is interesting to point out to the kids that each of these breeds originated in different countries. This year we ordered breeds from Spain, Italy, Egypt, and a variety of other places. No doubt the yard is going to look seriously colorful come Fall.

Anonymom:)