Eastern Iowa Farmer Fall 2020
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ural reader<br />
Turns out the Crosscut Saw Manual is<br />
free for asking from the USDA’s Forest<br />
Service, 5785 Hwy 10 West, Missoula,<br />
Montana 59808-9361. You can email<br />
them at wo_mtdc_pubs@fs.fed.us<br />
There’s more. The Montana facility has<br />
produced an equally informative publication,<br />
An Axe to Grind: A Practical Ax<br />
Manual, available from the same address.<br />
Single copies only is the rule here. Dad<br />
and Grandpa Sagers both referred to<br />
crosscuts as “misery whips” and had vivid<br />
memories of cutting firewood during<br />
the Great Depression era. Both ended<br />
their crosscut stories with the observation<br />
a person got warmed by firewood twice,<br />
once when it was cut and again when it<br />
went into the stove.<br />
The chicken or the egg?<br />
Our Mennonite neighbors on either<br />
side of our farm operate state of the art<br />
automated egg barns with thousands and<br />
thousands of hens. And I thought my<br />
mother’s 300-hen operation was enough<br />
work. Their operations are just two of a<br />
number just like them their community<br />
has put into operation in Jackson County<br />
in recent years making us an important<br />
area for egg production.<br />
Bob Sheasley’s Home to Roost: Chasing<br />
Chickens Through the Ages (Thomas<br />
Dunne Books, 290 pages, paperback) is<br />
a happy, even whimsical, history of our<br />
complicated, and tasty, relationship with<br />
chickens.<br />
Fried chicken on Sunday was a fixture<br />
in homes where families kept a few<br />
chickens in the back lot, along with a milk<br />
cow. But chicken was not universal on<br />
the menu of America’s cafes and restaurants<br />
until men like Tyson and Perdue<br />
industrialized this bird. Cheap food, mass<br />
production and low wages for processing<br />
plant workers, it has fueled massive<br />
expansion of poultry production and consumption.<br />
Sheasley has managed to pack<br />
a lot of chicken history, lore, economics,<br />
and above all affection for this remarkable<br />
bird that is so important today.<br />
Suggestions?<br />
There are so many important tracts,<br />
books, articles, images that tell the story<br />
of agriculture. Suggestions? You bet.<br />
Contact me at 44lhcarlson@gmail.com if<br />
you have an idea for a review. Good<br />
reading and good farming. n<br />
Bellevue<br />
Lumber<br />
563-872-3750<br />
bellevuelumberia.com<br />
Maquoketa<br />
Lumber<br />
563-652-5155<br />
maquoketadoitbestlumber.com<br />
Quality...<br />
is like buying hay<br />
If you want nice, clean,<br />
fresh hay you must pay<br />
a fair price. However, if<br />
you can be satisfied with<br />
hay that has already been<br />
through the horse.....<br />
that comes a little cheaper.<br />
Serving Clinton, Dubuque, Jackson and Jones counties in <strong>Iowa</strong> since 1947<br />
eifarmer.com fall <strong>2020</strong> | <strong>Eastern</strong> <strong>Iowa</strong> <strong>Farmer</strong> 107
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