For me, the word chore has a negative connotation. But on reflection I see no reason why chores shouldn’t be enjoyable. On our farm, as likely on all farms, chores are cyclical – daily, weekly, seasonal, annual. And of the annual chores, the two lengthiest and physically hardest are shearing our ewes, and carting in hay bales and stacking them in our hayshed. Both happen in December/January. This season our 39 breeding ewes were shorn on 21 December; and the hay carting was last Friday. We were a five-person hay team. On each load we had 28 bales on Sharon’s ute towing 24 on our trailer. And our four loads totalled 208 bales. With several kilometres between the paddock of the farmer we bought the hay from, and our hayshed, each round trip took about 80 minutes. We began at 2:20 p.m., and ended at 7:45 p.m., i.e. thankfully well before last light at 9:25 p.m.. We even had soft drink and biscuits half way through. The team worked beautifully together: harmoniously, cooperatively, good-humouredly. It couldn’t have gone better. Afterwards Sharon treated us to dinner. On Saturday morning I had a few aches, but nothing major. So now our hayshed is full, ahead of starting to feed the hay out in May. And it’s almost a year until we shear our ewes next December.
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