Who:
Joanne Dunlap
member
Where:
Rangeley, ME
One hundred years ago, my property in the Western mountains of Maine was a sheep farm. When I built my house, it was a forest! I found it a challenge to grow vegetables and flowers in the rather poor soil. It also was a constant battle to keep the unwanted tree seedlings, wild raspberries, strawberries, and thistles down.
I won't use poisons or artifical fertilizer and dislike spending hours with power equipment polluting my air. First came the chickens, and they provided great assistance in soil amendments (as well as some great eggs...mine come in green and blue as well as white and brown). Last fall I went into mower production! I got some of the funniest sheep I ever met: Icelandics love raspberry bushes! They provide me with magnificant wool and more soil amendments, are loving companions, and provide a wake-up service (hungry sheep are very vocal!) -- and baby lambs!
It is wonderful to return land to a use that improves the land while providing valuable products! Now if I could just find something to eat the grasshoppers!
