The Farm in the Green Mountains

by Alice Herdan-Zuckmayer

  I let the chickens out as I always did, but they didn’t crowd to the door as usual. Some stayed back in the shed and cowered together in a corner as if they were freezing, even though it was a warm morning.

  About noon a farmer came by, bringing us a particular variety of seed potatoes from his farm. I took him to look at the chickens.

  “Do you perhaps know what is wrong with the chickens?” I asked him.

  He looked at the chickens and then went into the chicken houses and studied the blood spots on the perches.

  “That’s bad,” he said. “How many chickens do you have?”

  “Fifty young chickens,” I answered, “and seven hens.”

  “The hens won’t get it,” he said, “but you will probably lose twenty-five to thirty of the young ones, perhaps even more. You can count on that.”

  “What can we do then?” I asked, horrified.

  “Not much,” he answered and shrugged his shoulders, “but you can of course ask at the agricultural office.”

  At three o’clock in the afternoon, two chickens were dead. At four o’clock I was in the agricultural office in the next town. There they explained to me that, according to my description, it must be a case of coccidiosis, the red dysentery, a parasite disease which affects flocks and results in a high percentage of loss. There were known measures of prevention, but no sure way of treating it. I should however try the big feed store in the next town. They had medicine there. Then they put into my hand Farmers’ Bulletin No. 1652, which deals with poultry illnesses.

  I drove thirteen miles farther to the next town, where I arrived just as the store was closing. When I said “coccidiosis” and asked for a sack of “Flush” and one of “Pellets”—they had just taught me these expressions at the agricultural office—they handed me three kinds of medicine with an illustrated paper from the laboratory that told how to use them. In this paper I found pictures of chickens who had just the same cowering head-hanging pose that I had discovered that morning in our chicken house.

  They loaded the two bags in for me, and on the return trip I stopped once more at a sawmill to get some sacks of fresh sawdust.

  At seven o’clock I was back home again.

  I had gone about sixty miles to get medicines and materials for disinfection and had brought back as well a little hope of salvaging something from total loss.

  We set right to work. We tacked the paper with the illustrated description of coccidiosis on the wall and did exactly what was pictured there. We dissolved tablets in gallons of drinking water. We mixed two kinds of medicine into the feed meal and grain. When we were done, we brought the medicine-laced feed and drinking water over into the sheds, turned on the light, and woke the sleeping birds. Some of them were cowering on the ground because they were too weak to get up onto the perches. We fed them by hand to be sure that they also took some medicine. The others jumped down from their perches and went to the feed trough, for there is no hour, day or night, when chickens can’t eat.

  The night feeding was not at all prescribed, but we didn’t want to let another night pass without doing something about this sickness.

  Early the next morning we built a fence that on one hand would separate the sick chickens from the healthy ones and on the other enclose a new run for the sick ones, since the old run was infected by their manure. The manure contained the coccidiae in the form of egg cysts and could transmit it.

  When the fences were finished, we drove the chickens into the open, closed the chicken houses, and began to carry out a thorough cleaning of the buildings.

  Zuck carried buckets of boiling water over and took the infected sawdust away to a place where he burned it. We washed all feed containers with water containing disinfectants and wiped perches, manure drawers, walls, and floors with a creosote solution. By noon everything had been thoroughly cleaned, and we smelled from head to foot like hospital attendants in the cholera ward. The thought of eating turned our stomachs.

  Every day for five days we cleaned the chicken houses, changed the sawdust, fed the chickens with medicines, cleaned and rinsed them out with “Flush” and strengthened them with “Pellets.”

  Each morning we entered the chicken house with palpitations, expecting to find dead chickens, but not a single one more died.

  After this triumph I did not want to wait until an illness broke out to go after remedies. Instead I set up beforehand an apothecary that contained everything from medicines to disinfectants to udder salves and louse powders—whatever could be obtained.

  For this purpose I studied the farm bulletins, agricultural magazines, and advertisements from the laboratories. After reading these things I felt like a medical student who is coming into the clinic semester, or like a mother, expecting her first child, who has read all the popular literature about the birth process and now is quite certain that the birth will be abnormal and the child will be born crippled.

  So I was prepared for all illnesses, but to our surprise we were spared chicken cholera, plague, tuberculosis, diphtheria, leukemia, gout, smallpox, and rickets. There were still, however, a large choice of diseases left, and soon I set up a hospital with different divisions so that I could isolate the sick animals and take care of them without interruption.

  We seldom lost animals, but when one died of an unknown cause we packed it up according to instructions and sent the corpse to our nearest veterinary institute.

  After a short time an answer came that either reassured us or disturbed us and told us what measures we should immediately take.

  So, for example, one letter said: “The investigation of the red hen that you sent us showed a tumor of the inner organs, something that can have different causes and poses no serious threat to the other chickens. However, if there are further losses, I suggest that you send us two or three samples, and I hope that we can then give you a conclusive diagnosis of the condition of your poultry. Respectfully, _____, the veterinary pathologist.”

  For two years we had no sample cases to send.

  Michaela, the gray founding hen, got frozen toes in the winter because she sat in the snow too much, but I put her in a cage in the kitchen in spite of Zuck’s protests and quickly healed her there.

  Then Maria, also one of the gray founding hens, got swollen, scabby legs in the summer, and we determined with the help of Bulletin 1652 that she had mites. That meant disinfecting chicken houses again and painting the perches with a tobacco solution since the mites, also called chicken lice, like best to lodge there so that they can suck the blood of the chickens at night.

  Maria, who was generally so bright and understanding, showed the greatest displeasure when we dipped her scaly legs in crude oil. She stamped so that our hair, cheeks, and noses were drenched in oil and we smelled like gas station attendants. Maria, who had been hardly able to walk, recovered very quickly after this petroleum experience. We rubbed her legs with Peru balm and fed her the best greens and extra crumbs, and she soon forgave us for the crude oil treatment.

  But then we had something serious.

  One of Gussy’s daughters bent her webbed duck’s foot backwards one day, and then the second one, so that she lay helpless and after a short time perished miserably.

  We sent her as a sample to Montpelier to the veterinary institute and received the answer: “The organs of the duck sent show no abnormality. We would be interested to discover the cause; could you therefore send us as soon as possible one or two of your lame ducks?”

  No, we couldn’t and wouldn’t, for the next two lame ducks were Susie and the gigantic drake Emil. When we saw the two large, heavy creatures coming home for the first time, limping and dragging a foot, we were filled with foreboding, for we saw ahead of us the painful end that the nameless sample-duck had suffered.

  So I read all the parts of Bulletin 1652 that dealt with foot ailments and lameness. The symptoms were not clear, but closest to “bent-toe” was a disease that comes from vitamin deficiency.

  Susie’s and Emil�
��s feet had toes that were more than bent. Emil’s right and Susie’s left foot looked as if they were broken and all the ligaments torn. They walked on the top surface of the dragged foot and scratched and tore the skin.

  Winnetou, who was at this time playing with the idea of becoming a veterinarian, put the feet in splints to bring them into a normal position. Then we separated the ducks and put them on beds of straw to begin a diet rich in vitamins.

  We fed them a mixture of wheat bran, barley, meat, charcoal, and salt, to which we added a good dose of vitamin B complex and liver extract. Then we mixed the whole to mush with goat’s milk. Sometimes I even put yeast into the mixture and let it grow. Twice a day we fed them bowls full of clover, soybean leaves, pea leaves, and similar things. Every day we dipped the two ducks in the wash basin and dried them in the sun, and we forced them to take daily exercise limping on one leg.

  Susie accepted this treatment sullenly, but Emil, the albatross, could hardly be held and beat us with his wings like a vulture.

  The injuries that we got from taking care of the animals were too many to list here. It should just be noted that we kept in our animal dispensary large bottles of iodine and bandages for our injuries.

  Since everything always happened at the same time on the farm, it was just at the time when Winnetou and I were busiest taking care of Susie and Emil that Flicki gave birth to two little goats, and Flocki had serious difficulties so that Zuck had to draw three little kids out of her with his hands. Meanwhile Heidi had no young, but picked up an udder infection. Milking became a problem, and the hospital was full.

  Finally the day we anticipated and feared arrived, when we were to take the bandages off Susie’s and Emil’s feet.

  They had both become gentle as lambs from the special treatment and unusual diet. Emil no longer struck us with his powerful wings, but lay in our arms and gazed about dreamily.

  I cannot really describe that moment, neither the fear we had as we removed the bandages, nor the joy we felt when both ducks climbed out and waddled off to the pond on straight, unbent feet to begin a normal life again.

  For a long time they acted like convalescents, appearing daily at the kitchen door and demanding extra handouts, which they always received.

  Susie became mild and good natured toward us and quacked like a Walt Disney duck who wants to show that she is happy.

  Emil became peaceful and wise after his illness and could be seen evenings sitting together with Goesta, the Canadian drake, on a rock by the pond. He seemed to have forgotten that he had ever hated this rival, and an elegiac and gentle evening mood lay over them both.

  The sicknesses I have talked about were all regular, proper diseases that you could call by name. You could diagnose the symptoms, try to find the cause, and proceed to treatment and prevention.

  It seems to me that too little attention is paid to the personal treatment of animals, although some work is beginning to be done on animal psychology. I am convinced that the enormous losses that farmers suffer every year through animal illnesses could be significantly reduced if the sick animals were shown somewhat more personal interest in addition to sulfa and penicillin, and that it would strengthen their immunity and take away their gloomy desire to die.

  One day something new came up, something we were totally un-prepared for—insanity.

  Again we found flecks of blood in the chicken houses, but this time even walls, floors, and feeding troughs were spattered with blood, and we could see that the chickens were not just scrapping as usual, but had begun to peck at each other in earnest and to inflict dangerous wounds.

  They attacked toes, heads, tails—even on their sleeping perches there was no peace. Everything was red with their blood, and we noticed that they had a wild and confused look in their eyes.

  We found a description of this disease under the heading “Cannibalism,” but the treatment recommended for it, cutting off the beaks, seemed to us cruel and just as senselessly external as putting straitjackets on the insane.

  The causes listed for cannibalism were overpopulation of chicken houses, biting insects, and inactivity. None of these applied to our housing and care of chickens.

  The most noteworthy thing, however, was that this disease was listed among the deficiency diseases, like rickets, polyneuritis, and the “bent toes” described above, and could be ascribed to a lack of vitamins.

  Additional salt was recommended.

  Since we had had such good results with our vitamin cure of the ducks, we set up a combined treatment.

  To be quite certain that there was no chance that insects were involved, we bathed all the cannibals in warm water to which sulphur and soap had been added, a solution in which no mite can survive. Then we dried the birds, dusted them with louse powder, and disinfected all the poultry houses.

  Then, on the advice of a farmer, we gave them two heads of cabbage for vitamin A. At first they rolled these around in the chicken houses as if they were bowling with skulls. Later they pecked into the cabbages and ate some of them, but when they got tired of playing with them they went back to pecking at each other.

  We had mixed rice bran, wheat germ, and yeast in granular form into their laying mash and regular feed, and we set aside their corn ration as too “hot,” to use the medieval medicine book term. Meanwhile we prepared oat sprouts by letting oats germinate, and we set oats and oat sprouts out for them in big wash basins.

  After two days of this cure they were tame again, sociable, intelligent, and ready to live together in peace instead of mauling and pecking each other to death. Everything was in order again, except that I had been jolted and couldn’t get away from the strange conclusions that I had to draw from the fact that it had been possible to fight pugnacity, bloodthirstiness, and insanity with vitamins.

  And if you let yourself fantasize further, something that is easy to do in farm life, you can spin the thread out and come upon the strange connection between the practical use of yeast, oat sprouts, and wheat germ and the ideas they have stood for: fermenting, sprouting, and germinating, processes that can have a morbidly dangerous meaning, but also simply serve as symbols for growth.

  After this report of our successful treatment of animals, their correct and appropriate feeding and housing, it seems to me that it is time to give credit to the USDA so that we don’t give the impression that we worked into farm life so quickly by particular industry, ability, and intuition.

  We did nothing more than to realize from the beginning that you can’t do better than to live with the USDA from cradle to grave in barn, meadows, fields, woods, house, yard, kitchen, and workshop, and that it is only good sense to take this invisible mentor into your house and to get involved in his life.

  In a book about the USDA I found the following description of its functions:

  The Department of Agriculture affects the life and living of the American farmer and his family. There is scarcely a phase of farm life which is not dealt with in some way by at least one of the fifty-odd bureaus and agencies in the department. . . . The functions of these branches cover just about everything the farmer has done, is doing, plans to do, or wants to do.

  Agencies provide easy, low-interest loans on his farm or future crops. They make cash payments to him for terracing his own field to keep soil from washing away, for building a pond in his pasture, or for applying fertilizer and growing legumes to make the fields produce more.

  The bureaus tell the farmer how to grow spinach in his garden for home use or in the field as a commercial crop, and then they tell him what kind of price he may receive for his peanuts and who may buy them. They regulate the time and place of marketing his crops. They make cash subsidy payments to the dairy farmer from the public treasury when consumers complain that milk is too high, and they solve his labor problem by sending him a farmhand or by installing electricity to operate a milking machine.

  They keep thousands of specialists constantly at work seeking new crops, better cropping methods, and me
ans of combating insect pests and crop or livestock diseases. They try to circumvent the hazards of drought, flood, and frost so that production may be increased. If precautions fail and the harvest is lost, those farmers who have insured their crops with the government will receive so many bushels per acre (or its equivalent) from the government warehouses. . . .

  The bureaus of the Department of Agriculture help the farmers to grade and market his crops and livestock. If no buyers are available other bureaus are authorized to make crop loans to keep the produce off the market until buyers are at hand, or until the price goes up. They can even buy commodities outright and resell them later at huge financial losses. . . .

  Another bureau’s job is to study diets and nutrition, advising on these subjects as well as on how to make a chair more comfortable and attractive.

  At first we knew little about the functions and scope of the USDA, and our relationship to it could be described as entirely practical. It supplied us with bulletins, tested our soil samples and animals, and gave information in response to questions.

  It was evident that it must have many sources of information, that it had laboratories and employed a considerable staff of scientists and agricultural experts who wrote down the results of their research in simple language in bulletins and distributed them.

  The study of the development of agriculture in America, a development that continues daily and hourly right under our eyes, is doubtless one of the most interesting and important means to an understanding of the past, present, and future history of America. I can only tell a little of it now, for where I am writing in Europe the material about the history of the USDA is not at hand, and I am no longer in touch with the changes that may have taken place.

  However, since the USDA is one of the most significant and important institutions of America, I cannot avoid telling about this powerful support system, this unique institution with which we spent our daily life.

  LIFE WITH THE USDA

  It began this way: