My View of Draft Animals and Land Use In The Future…

[blue80]

heard this on the radio today,

“Big Horn Basin, it’s cold out, and when it’s cold, tractors break. So call the Tractor Guys for your repairs….!

Gave me a good laugh. First we plug them in all night, then they break down anyways….

Have to go wash the diesel out of my carharts from the excavator fuel filters gelling, good night.

Kevin

[Robernson]

As usual Carl here has brought up some good points. I think that those questions are very good. I attend a public school system that is containing of such a high concentration of agriculturally ignorant idividuals. I might even venture so far to say that the “instructors” are equally as ignorant. Some may venture to argue with me but this is how I feel. I know a man who went to college,aquired numerous degrees,could answer any math problem you could trough at him and then some. But you know what? He didn’t know that a potatoe came from the ground! He also thought that “grain” was made in some factory! I was astounded! Being the blunt individual that I am, I procceded to inform him that he,a man that could argue and hold his own among mathematicians couldn’t fathom the birth of a potatoe.
Althought that story wasn’t completely relevent it did show how far we are drifting from our agrigrian lifestyle.
~~R

[near horse]

Carl

[This is because it is an ancient assumption. Even the Greeks considered that people who work with their hands, animals, and soil, are bestial, spiritless, and unfit for civic participation. Some philosophers even refer to this as “Social Predestination”. /QUOTE]

This was from an era when it was valuable to decrease the physical toll on one’s body – thus have servants/slaves do the work. Kind of like the ancient version of modern technologies to make life “easier”. Also a time when fat was a desirable look because it showed your wealth while lean and mean was a sign of labor. Now, we go to health clubs with personal trainers to get that look.

While there may be a stigma associated with logging/farming, it doesn’t seem to be associated with pay/income as long as you’re willing to play the game under the current rules. Commercial loggers here make pretty good money – more than teachers, store owners, etc. You just need to sign on with one of the big crews and cut,cut,cut. Farming is a little different but most farms here are big and make serious bucks as well. If anything, those with college degrees on average make less here, not more.

I think stupidity can be found in those that work with their hands, their minds or both. No one has that market cornered. As an old guy I used to work for once said “there’s a lot of competition amongst the failures.”

I think we are getting things crossed up when we draw the line between education and not being educated. Education is something that you own once you have it and you can do with it what you will. The same can be said of experience. Unfortunately, it takes much time and “recreating the wheel” if you’re only going to rely on experience. So we can learn from those who have gone before us (or those on this list!) and isn’t that a form of education? I do agree that there are issues with formal education but don’t throw the baby out with the bath water.

I am not surprised to know that a math instructor didn’t know much or anything about food production. But I wouldn’t be asking him/her for help with that type of thing anyway. Now if he couldn’t add, that would be another story!

In cuba and a many other places the ox is important, but I get the impression it’s seen as a sign of impoverishment rather than owning a machine is just not as economical for the small landholdings they farm.

Stable-man

Oxen are generally cheaper than horses in many parts of the world. The second half your comment about how animal powered farms are perceived demonstrates the need for a paradigm shift (I hate that phrase but it’s appropriate here) regarding animal power. Small land holdings and animal power can be viable (isn’t that what we’re about on this site?) and are only seen as a sign of impoverishment because big acre machine farming is seen as progressive – after all, that’s what John Deere, Cargill, …. tell us. The rest of the world is convinced that progress = Wal-marts, big TV’s and cars and debt, debt, debt. Ask China.

Just my opinions!!

[Carl Russell]

Geoff, I don’t think it is so much a condemnation of being educated, nor a statement against the ability of some individuals to make a living farming or logging.

It is more an acknowledgment that as a culture we have expectation about how “intelligence” is measured and expressed, and manual labor is across the board considered to require less intellect.

This is expressed in our schools in the methods of testing student’s intellectual aptitude using written tests. Those with high scores are automatically considered bright, and although many of us recognize that those who test low are not necessarily “un-bright”, they are never-the-less affected by their relative ranking.

There are certainly opportunities for students with more physically aptitude, but these are not given equal standings with academic achievement, and they are often offered as a consolation as a way to make up for their reduced aptitude.

Students who demonstrate academic aptitude can certainly use their achievements to their advantage even if they chose a manual career, but those who accept their relegation to the manual career, rarely get to take advantage of some method of validating and expanding the intellectual aptitude without just striking out on their own. This narrows the population of people who can or will become successful.

If our society was more accepting of manual dexterity, and physical aptitude, and spatial understanding as measures of intelligence, then we could have institutional assistance for these career choices, and we might even entice students who are mindlessly striving for academic accomplishment into more fulfilling, stimulating, and appropriate career choices.

The US culture values cheap food, and there are some people who end up making a lot of money providing this product, but in the scheme of things, it seems interesting that some professionals who merely provide services are easily accepted for the value of their service, while we seem to accept that food should be cheap, which in most cases is reflected in extremely low wages, and lifestyle compromises, that even teachers would never consider.

I just wonder how much of this is a result of cultural assumptions.
Carl

[near horse]

Carl –

I agree that testing is not a true measure of intelligence anymore than IQ scores tell us anything more than how well an individual is likely to perform in school (interpret as “how well they’ll take tests).

Believe me, I have some serious issues with public education after spending time teaching in a couple of different school districts. I’ve had administrators tell me I was wrong about some 9th grade students that couldn’t read because the district reading test scores were in the 70th percentile. My response was ” if flames are shooting out the windows of your house but the smoke alarm hasn’t sounded, is your house on fire or not?” MAybe that’s why I’m not in education anymore:D

If our society was more accepting of manual dexterity, and physical aptitude, and spatial understanding as measures of intelligence, then we could have institutional assistance for these career choices, and we might even entice students who are mindlessly striving for academic accomplishment into more fulfilling, stimulating, and appropriate career choices.

I also agree with some of what you say here. College, as it exists right now in the US, isn’t for everyone yet we say everyone should try and get a college education if they want a good paying job. Other countries seem to do a better “job” of providing alternative options (I saw something about how Germany provides meaningful and valuable alternate tracks for HS students).

The US culture values cheap food, and there are some people who end up making a lot of money providing this product, but in the scheme of things, it seems interesting that some professionals who merely provide services are easily accepted for the value of their service, while we seem to accept that food should be cheap, which in most cases is reflected in extremely low wages, and lifestyle compromises, that even teachers would never consider.

Cheap food is what drives most small farmers out of business so only the big guys are left – and they aren’t taking low wages or making lifestyle compromises – although their employees (who do all the actual work) are.

it seems interesting that some professionals who merely provide services are easily accepted for the value of their service

Providing a service can cover a lot of bases – from a psychologist to a diesel tech to a forestry management professional. Lack of understanding or education about what expertise a given service requires is where the problem lies. Work on your pick up, tractor or computer for awhile and then take it to someone who does it for a living – that will open your eyes!

I just don’t want some reading this to think education/knowledge = bad. Knowing stuff, however you come by it, is always better than not knowing because you can make better more informed decisions.

You may have heard this about higher education but I’ll throw it out there anyway.

As you get into graduate or professional school, you know more and more about less and less until, eventually you know a whole lot about nothing!:)

[TBigLug]

Well, I hadn’t popped my head in here for a while but I had a thought today while riding around out back with Dottie today. It’s something my grandfather told me years ago, “Big John, soemday you’ll learn, there’s nothing more ignorant than an educated person.” Kind of rings with what you guys were talking about. Everyone now is so obsessed with learning figures and prepackaged facts, no one takes the time to learn about what matters. When the wold goes to hell and technology finally pukes out on everyone, at least us “dumb horse farmers” will still be able to got hrough life with plates full of food and fields full of green.

[Marshall]

Something I have thought about is, how many generations are most people removed from a farm life? A lot of people talk about there granparent living on the farm but they and their parents do not.

[jac]

Looking at it from a British point of view, the rot seemed to set in during the 60s and early 70s. Before that a small farm could support all but the largest family. Our own situation was a small dairy farm that at the most only ever milked 47 cows !!! Grandfather never bought a beast apart from the odd bull, grew his own barley and a small amount of oats, turnips and potatos. They never had a holliday apart from a day at the county show. But, and this is the thing I think is missing from so many lives nowadays… His whole family was around him.. He was at the table at dinner time{or lunch as some call it:)} Family ate together. I am the last link with that life but because of where we live we are immersed in farm life and my daughter Caitlyn is really keen on all things farm especialy cattle. As much as I can, I try to recreate that far off lifestyle for her. It was so much more than just having freedom to roam but the values that farm chidren have seem diferent from a lot of town folks.. though we know a lot of townfolks that envy us for what we have, sadly they are in the minority, as most chase the big money and only judge you on the age of car you drive .. Its a very true saying “You dont know what you’ve got till its gone”..
John

[Marshall]

John, it sounds like things arn’t that much different from one side of the pond to the other. I do the same with my girls(7and4). When it is baling time they are on the wagon. At chore time they are in the barn. Emily, my oldest can tell you everything that needs to be done including how much feed each of the animals get. While I have been woking on the mulch layer(which is almost complete now) Emily has been out in the shed with me most of the time “building” her own projects. I can tell I have two girls that are going to make their Dad proud.

[Author]

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