Planning for succession, Potential Popes, Proverbs, Woodchucks and Brush-hogging

One of the differences between somebody who raises animals (like sheep) and one who grows plants is that the animal breeder has to make "cull" decisions on a regular basis.

Suppose you have enough pasture for 12 ewes and their lambs. When do you replace a ewe? A young ewe will have a drop in production vs a fully mature ewe. Which lamb(s) do you keep?

The worst situation is when your kids raise bottle-lambs and insist that you keep them. Whether the mismothering is genetic or nurture, keeping lambs that you had to feed because their mother couldn't/wouldn't is not the path to profitability. Even worse is if you keep 20 ewes on pasture that can only support 12.

The problem is analogous to a coach, how many players on the bench and who he gives game-time too.

The gardener usually has a 100% turnover every year. It is less of an issue with him. Progress cucumber or Salt-and-Pepper? Serrano or Cayenne? Stupice tomato or Big Boy?

The orchardist often think in 30 year time cycles. Fruit trees are "edge species" in the cycle of progression. They mature quickly, make a lot of seeds and then cede the sunlight to taller, deep-forest species. Generally, fruit tree species don't live all that long.

A large pear tree in Austria.

Some fruit trees in favorable circumstances can survive much, much longer than 30 years. There are many pear trees that are more than 200 years old in Europe and a few in the eastern US. It can be hard to "date" a fruit tree that has a hollow trunk, so there might be many trees that are older than 200 year-old.

It is even more difficult to date a tree that forms thickets and is multi-stemmed. 

The "30 year" number is driven mostly by market forces. The market and the prices commanded by various kinds of apples keeps shifting; Fuji => Gala => Honeycrisp...what comes next? If you are producing for home-consumption you can stretch that out. That doesn't mean that any apple will do. Novaspy looked very promising until the birds discovered it and started pecking the skin. Some varieties are very robust and the wounds cork-over, but not Novaspy.

Anyway, the "tree nursery" that took up "just a little bit" of the home garden had become filled with trees that are too big to be moved and it consumed 1600 square-feet or about 30% of the garden. I bit the bullet and cut down everything but one Kanza pecan seedling, two Quercus texana and one Quercus X humidicola seedlings. Emotional attachment is not a vice I can afford.

Some of the contenders for the next (Roman Catholic) Pope

There is no way of predicting who will be the next Pope, but one of the leading contenders is an African Cardinal who is extremely conservative.

Uttering the words "conservative" and "African" causes many North American liberals' minds to vapor-lock, but Africa is a very conservative continent. People who are living without a safety-net tend to bet on the sure-thing.

There is a titanic struggle between the richest, Christian nations who are pushing LGBT and Marxist doctrines and the poorest countries...where the growth in Christian populations is greatest...which have little patience with fanciful theories. Is it about the money or is it about the souls?

Proverbs Chapter 15

Proverbs Chapter 15 has much to recommend it. Combine that with James 3:1-12 and you have a ready-made Ph.D. thesis.

Woodchuck #5

Woodchuck #5 slipped her mortal coil yesterday.

Buzzards are going to eat well tomorrow. 

Brush-hogging

I found somebody to brush-hog the floor of the Upper Orchard. He isn't available until after May 15, but that will give me time to move the big stuff out of his way.