Category: Farm Life

As the cold deepens, the cows grow thicker coats and the milk grows a little richer. It is the way of things. We want you to be prepared, because a cat who tastes winter milk for the first time may need a moment.

It is dense, creamy and faintly golden. It clings to the whiskers. It makes a different sound when it is lapped, a slower, deeper sound, like a cello. Some cats weep a little. Some fall asleep in the saucer. One of our regulars, a Persian named Duchess, refused to move for an hour.

All of this is normal. If it happens to you, please sit down, take your time, and let the milk do its work.

This morning the grass was white, every blade stitched with frost, and the cows breathed out clouds as they walked to the barn. The pump handle was too cold to touch. Wren sat on the fence, puffed up like a loaf, looking quite offended by winter.

First frost changes the milk, a little. It becomes richer and slightly sweeter, as if the cows are storing summer in it. We will pour our first frost milk on Friday, in blue rimmed saucers with a tiny snowflake painted on the bottom by Hollis.

Wear your warmest scarf if you visit. And bring a hot cup. Ottoline makes cocoa in a pot as big as a bathtub.

Wren wakes at dawn, stretches in the straw, and begins her rounds. First she checks the grain shed for mice. Then she checks the hay loft for the mice who got away. Finally she checks the cow barn, where the day shift is just beginning, and she gives each cow a long and thoughtful nod.

At noon she eats a sardine and sits on the fence post watching the lane. At two she supervises the churn. At four she naps in the warm spot above the milking stall, which she believes she invented.

Wren is eleven. She has never been wrong about the weather. She says it will rain on Thursday, and we are bringing in the washing.

Six goats came to the dairy this spring, and the cows have not entirely forgiven us. The goats are small, quick and constantly asking questions. They climb on the shed roof. They eat the laundry. One of them, a white doe named Cardamom, has learned to open the feed bin latch and gives lectures on it.

But their milk is lovely, light and a little tangy, and many of our cats, especially the older ones, like it better than the cow’s. We are pouring the first goat whey this week, in a limited number of saucers.

If you visit, say hello to Cardamom. She will say hello back. She will also check your pockets.

Gather round, because this is a good story. Two weeks ago our cart pony, Dumpling, took a turn at the crossroads where she should have gone left. She went right. She is a pony of strong feeling and few maps.

By the time we noticed, she had trotted three miles to the Hargrove place and was standing in the yard, calmly eating a rosebush, with forty pints of cream on her back. The Hargroves have no cats, only a bulldog named Gerald, who was very excited and not at all helpful.

We got everything home by moonlight. Not a drop was lost. Gerald now gets a free sample each month, and he has written us a thank you note with a paw print.

The clover is up this summer, thick as a green rug across the south field, and the cows are in a fine, drowsy temper. Clover in the grass puts a sweetness in the milk that no dairy trick can imitate. You can taste it, a little, like a memory of something warm.

This year’s clover census, taken by Wren the barn cat with some help from a bumblebee, counted roughly 40,000 blossoms in the lower pasture. She stopped counting somewhere around the third bumblebee.

We will bottle the first clover milk of the season next week. Only 60 saucers, and only for subscribers. Ottoline will deliver them herself, in the cart, ringing the bell.

Every batch that leaves our dairy has been inspected by Pudding, a large gray tabby with one torn ear and an expression of deep suspicion. He sniffs. He licks one drop. He stares into the middle distance as though recalling a lost love. Then he either nods or he knocks the saucer over.

Last Wednesday he knocked over four. We were deeply concerned, so we tested everything, and it turned out that the cream was perfect. Pudding simply wished to spill. It is a feeling every cat understands.

He has been given a raise of two extra sardines a week. He has declined to say whether this is enough. We will keep you posted.

4:45. The alarm is a rooster, and the rooster is wrong. I put on the old boots and walk out across wet grass, and the whole valley is the color of pearl.

5:10. Bernadette is already waiting, chewing and thinking. I wash my hands in water that smells of well stones. The pail is silver, the stool has three legs and one opinion. The first stream hits the tin with that bright little ringing sound.

5:55. Eleven cows milked, six goats nudged. Pudding the inspector arrives and sniffs the pail, nods once, and sits down. It is a good morning. They are all good mornings, if you let the mist do some of the work.

Some mornings, when the mist is still sitting in the low field, I like to tell you about the animals who make all this possible. Today it is Bernadette, a brown and white Jersey of nine summers and very firm convictions.

Bernadette believes the gate should open inward. Bernadette believes dandelions are a personal gift. Bernadette will not be milked while anyone whistles, and the day a farmhand whistled ‘Greensleeves’ she gave exactly zero pints out of spite. We have made our peace.

She gives about 3 gallons a day of the richest cream you will ever lap. Say hello when you visit. Just do not whistle.