Prince Farming Finds his Hidden Treasure

We’ve been married 21 years and I’ll admit I have not always been supportive of Keith’s need to hang on to junk, I mean inventory.

And over the years we’ve had a few discussions about inventory control. like the need (I believed) to keep a dumpster on the farm being as reliable daily garbage pickup in our area is non-existent. It took almost 15 years to win that battle. In Keiths defense he did do a great job of collecting cans and steel, as well as burning 99% of all our trash.

But still it was difficult for me to see items of non-use piled up around the farm. We found more compromises though, like the one where I said I’d be in charge of the yard around the farmhouse and he could be in charge of the land around the barns.

Then I came home full time and crossed the boundary, literally. Oppps. Fortunately I am married to a man who forgives easily and even more fortunately as I work at the farm fulltime now instead of just visiting on my days off from RN duty, I have come to see the reason for keeping so much inventory.

Sometimes you just might need it.

This week, Keith outdid himself in the recycling/inventory reinvention department, and if awards were given for this skill he would deserve it most.

When we bought The Poor Farm last August, there was a decades old, totally collapsed barn on the property. Many of us, myself included thought we should torch the building’s remains and put it out of our misery. But Keith and son Jason thought it best to go through all that rotting wood piece by piece. Why? Because who knew what treasure they might find underneath?

This spring and summer they did just that and sure enough at the bottom of that collapsed barn under tons of wood beams and walls they found this:

A hay conveyer. Circa 1970?

For you city folk, this is a device that will move bales of hay and straw from point A (usually the hay rack) to point B (usually the hay loft in the barn.)

Of course it was rusty and slightly bent at the top, probably from when the barn crashed down on it but Keith saw a real diamond in this hunk of flaking metal and he rescued her from her oppressive grave.

Loading her onto the back of our livestock trailer he covered her with grease to get her worn parts moving again. He added a motor, (from an old goat milker he’d been holding onto for over a decade) a new chain and in just a couple hours…

She was back doing what she was born to do.

Making the farmer and his helper’s job, a little easier.

So even though I am not always pleased about our collection of inventory, it is reassuring to know that when my parts get rusty, my original paint job goes flakey, and my top gets bent out of alignment, my husband will do all he can to save me from the rubble pile and keep me in good working order.

That’s a good thing, right?