July 10

In Michigan

White clover is blooming in the roadsides, as are thistles. The white clover resembles tiny loosestrife, and the leaves smell vaguely like vanilla when crushed.

The second cut of hay was made yesterday at the farm and now sits in rows in the field drying in the summer sunshine until the baler can be put to service. Midsummer sees round bales nearly everywhere these days, but we worked the fields thirty years ago with square bales (which were rectangular really). In the sunshine we’d ride on the unsteady flatbed, pulled behind the Oliver tractor, two of us with hay picks in hand to catch and position the bales thrown up to us from below. When the tiers became too high, an elevator was hitched to the flatbed, lifting the bales up six to seven tiers and dropping them over for placement.

This second cut seems early, but perhaps the rainy June has hastened its growth. There is clover and vetch cut within, and the cows enjoy the additive all the more.

Notes:

Wild Bergamot and Bee balm in bloom