To the ground

With all the Earth Day celebrations and awareness going on this week, I wasn’t expecting to attend this particular gathering this evening.

My sister’s barn burned down today. They lost a number of animals including newborn piglets and calves and young chicks. The fire was so hot it burned fence posts within 100 feet and melted plastic buckets used for feed as well as rubber tires on two farm vehicles parked in the driveway. The remains of the building are expected to smolder for another week.

No person was injured for which we are truly thankful. And the house got only smoke in the upstairs rooms – which I understand can be a pretty major thing by itself, but not on the magnitude of having the house damaged.

Seeing the torched and scorched raspberry canes near the barn as well as chunks of charcoal lying in the yard from damaged tree branches was sobering.

My sister and her family have been very close to the land for many years, husbanding it well. And the farm has been in my brother-in-law’s family for a long time. This won’t stop them from continuing in their efforts to draw sustenance from the land – they are strong, practical and resilient people. I just hate to see them having to deal with this loss and all that will be required to rebuild.

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