DARYLN BREWER HOFFSTOT’S book, “A Farm Life: Observations of Fields and Forests” was published recently by Stackpole Books.
Carpenter Bees
We raised our babies in this old farmhouse, wrapped them in swaddling clothes like little cocoons, and protected them as best as we could. We renovated parts of the house, added a bathroom and knocked through a kitchen wall to create more space for a growing family. We fed our children, taught them what we …
Poison Ivy Flourishes on Carbon Dioxide
One of my husband’s first tasks when we moved to the farm 36 years ago was to remove poison ivy from the trees. He never used chemicals, just his two (gloved) hands. He came home time and time again with poison ivy pustules on his wrists that leaked liquid for three weeks. “A fool’s errand,” …
What Was that White Bird?
The first time I saw the white bird flying overhead, I thought I’d gone slightly mad because large white birds are not common in the Ligonier Valley. I was riding my bike on a rural road between two cow fields, a herd of black-angus eyeing me warily. I pedaled slowly, watching what I presumed was …
Chanterelles
We bought a small section of woods some years ago that came with treasures not spelled out in the purchase agreement: chanterelles. We had no idea the prized orange mushroom would fruit the following summer. I wasn’t even positive what type of mushroom it was — I’d never foraged for chanterelles before — but after …
Spring Blooming Plants Blooming in Fall
It’s the holiday season and my rural Pennsylvania town is bursting with the signs of Christmas: wreaths hung on doors, trees strung with colorful lights, a creche erected in the town square — and spring-flowering plants in bloom. My forsythia is blooming a bright yellow. White lilac flowers are just dying back. Pink magnolia buds …
What Would Rachel Carson Say?
On a Tuesday morning late last August, I turned out of my driveway onto Route 711 to drive into Ligonier. Route 711 is a two-lane state road, a main north-south corridor, designated as the Laurel Highlands Scenic Byway. I passed, heading in the other direction, two large white trucks, one of which had a long …
The Common Snapping Turtle
Each spring before my first real swim, I stand at the house and gaze downhill to the pond. (I have dipped every month of the year, but that doesn’t count as a real swim.) I scan the water’s surface, looking for snapping turtles. I see them when they come up for air — their little …
One Lone Bat
I never noticed so many ash trees in the forest until hundreds toppled over. The drumming of the ruffed grouse is dearer to me now because of its absence. But of all the things on the farm that have revealed themselves by passing away, none is more striking than the decline of bats. Thirty-five years …
Giving Thanks to Mosses
We hardly notice them. we trod all over them. Most mosses don’t even have universal common names. Moss experts are few. Yet mosses are among the most ancient of plants — the first to crawl out of the ocean and inhabit land 450 million years ago.I wonder if that’s why I feel as if I’m …
Less Lawn, More Native Plants
When my mother-in-law was ill 28 years ago, my husband began to build a stone wall on our front lawn. Each rock he handled three, maybe four times: plucked from the woods, thrown into the back of a pickup, dropped onto the grass to decide placement, or set directly atop a dry wall. One stone …
The Fledgling Wren that Wouldn’t Budge
What must it feel like for a baby bird to fledge? To take a leap (of faith?) and fly for the first time? I couldn’t help but wonder one warm day when I watched a clutch of birds fly off our front porch. I feared, however, that if I wrote about birds’ feelings, I’d be …
Fireflies: A Great Flourish of Evolution
“Male fireflies are like teenage boys,” said Lynn Frierson Faust, who wrote the book, Fireflies, Glow-worms, and Lightning Bugs: Identification and Natural History of the Fireflies of the Eastern and Central United States and Canada. “Males want to be seen, as flashy as possible, advertising their fitness. Look at me, they say!” One species, for …
Nettle: The Weed that Stings
What is a weed? A plant in the wrong place is a common definition, or as Ralph Waldo Emerson said: “a plant whose virtues we haven’t yet discovered.” But nettles — weeds to most of us — have virtues long discovered. Samuel Pepys wrote in his diary of eating very good nettle porridge. In Aesop’s …
A farm life
From photographs I sent to expert tracker Linda Spielman, she was able to tell me wonderful little stories about what animals on our farm were doing last winter. At the top of our hill, a mouse bounded across deep snow, its hind feet sinking into holes made by its front feet. “Lots of animals do …
A Trashy Ordeal
Last year, I rode my bike on back roads near our farm. I prefer swimming, but our YMCA was closed, so I dusted off my 30-year-old red Cannondale and set out in a beautiful valley between two ridges of the Allegheny Mountains. My favorite ride was a seven-mile loop with steep hills and as I …
Our Sleeping Porch
“There was nothing of the giant in the aspect of the man who was beginning to awaken on the sleeping porch of a Dutch Colonial house in that residential district of Zenith known as Floral Heights. His name was George F. Babbitt.” — “Babbitt” by Sinclair Lewis The joys of a sleeping porch are many, …
My Vegetable Garden, in Springtime
“The Glory of the Garden it abideth not in words.” —Rudyard Kipling My favorite time in the vegetable garden is in spring, after the soil is tilled and before the seeds are planted. Perennials are poking up—chervil, lovage, sorrel—but otherwise there’s little growth, just a blank canvas. The weather is cool, less humid and with …
Mysteries of the Porcupine
This is how a porcupine attacks. It turns its back, displays the black line running down the middle of its tail, edged with white quills visible in the dark. Its body shivers. The jaw clenches, incisors vibrate, and the teeth clatter. It emits an odor. Quills become erect. These are mere warnings. If not enough …
Counting Your Chickens During COVID
Buff Cochins: sold out. Barred Rocks: sold out. Light Brahmas: Sold out. Not a hen of my choice available this year from Murray McMurray, the hatchery in Iowa where I’ve ordered peeps for 30 years. This has never happened before, but due to coronavirus, suddenly everyone wants to be a chicken farmer. I had no …
The Invincible Elder
“Judas was hang’d on an elder…” —Biron in Shakespeare’s “Love’s Labour’s Lost” “What shall we do with it?” Ron Weasley asked Harry Potter and Hermione in “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows.” “It’s the elder wand. The most powerful wand in the world. With it we’d be invincible.” Who knew that the lowly-looking shrub perched …
Ramps
At Greene County’s 29th Annual Ramp Festival on a sunny Saturday last April, a party atmosphere was in full swing with crafters, wood carvers, metal workers and a band. But the main draw were about 15 vendors selling ramp chili, ramp sausage, ramp cookies, ramp mints, ramp butter, ramp wine, ramp hardtack, ramp pancakes, ramp …
Trying to Save a Horse
There have been phone calls in my life I wish I’d never received. I was cold and wet from swimming in an Irish lake when I returned to the house to see my husband standing in the driveway. Waiting for me. That wasn’t normal. My father had called. My mother was dead. She was unloading …