Soule: It's The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year For This Farmer

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After 20 years raising cattle, you'd think I'd be unaffected by June, the cow who walks over looking for scratches, or Tazzy, the grumpy mini-pig grunting for dinner. But despite the years, the critters still pull on my heartstrings. I melt when Millie the calf looks at me with her blue Highland eyes, and Curious Bleu lets me sit on his back.

A farmer's life is not all fuzzy calves, grumpy pigs, and tolerant steers. This year two calves died, and I broke down sobbing with each death. (I know this sounds weird, coming from the proprietor of a meat farm, but I can't help how I feel.)

But then Millie was born. Now she is three months old and obsessed with her daily bottle of milk replacer. A fluffy, somewhat-weaned Scottish Highland calf, Millie thinks anyone with a bottle of milk replacer is her best friend. Each morning she lies at the gate of the holding pen, waiting for me to deliver her "milk," which she sucks down in seconds. Then she bounces and jumps, following me to the house. She'd come inside, but husband, Bruce, said, "No!" So Millie hangs around outside the farm store, waiting for a hug or a customer to feed her smashed-pumpkin bits. When it's time for her afternoon bottle, she latches on to the nipple like it's her first meal in a week.

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Bear the steer makes me laugh when he gallops to the fence for a bite of smashed pumpkin like a racehorse crossing the finish line. Then there is Topper, my 1,500-pound Highland ox, who walks up to me in the pasture, puts his head on my shoulder, and closes his eyes as I scratch his chin.

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Carole Soule is co-owner of Miles Smith Farm, in Loudon, N.H., where she sells beef and other local products. She can be reached at carolesoule60@gmail.com.

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