Our Philosophies

For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? ~ Mark 8:36

This is Hydeaway Farm.

That's our continual refrain. To the vet who is having an ongoing battle with my mother about culling old cows. To everyone who thinks that we are entirely off our heads, nursing the calf on the brink of death, milking the blind cows, retiring an ancient cow to live out her days amongst a group of heifers.

This is Hydeaway Farm.

The Jerseys spend all day in the veld. One day there will be pastures. Today there is veld, and they roam as cows are meant to roam, grazing, socialising, in their herd. The Holstein heifers we raise for Arcadia Farming live in a series of grassy paddocks, big enough for them to run and play in. Cows were not made to feed people; cows were made to be cows. I think God must cry when He sees them bunched up in little pens in houses, where they cannot see the sun. He told Adam that humans were to have dominion over animals. All too often, we're being tyrants, not kings. They have feelings too.

So this is how our cows spend their days.

    (This is Rita, a blind one)

During a heartbreaking outbreak of Asiatic redwater, which claimed the lives of two heifers, Dinki sighed to our vet, Dr. Louis: "There are five hundred animals on this farm, doc, and I have to keep them all alive."

Dr. Louis said, "Don't worry. There's someone up there, helping you."

I know he believed it because there have been times that some of our animals have survived by nothing short of a miracle.

We don't make a good living. We can't. Our hearts are too soft. But I'm willing to bet that we make a much better life than some millionaires. This is a place where the one-eyed heifer, the cow with only three teats, the two cows who can't see a thing get a second chance.

And guess what? That little blind cow, Ice Cream, regularly gives us 30 to 35 litres a day, being one of our best milkers.

We don't win every battle; they die sometimes. But we always fight. A lot of people might say that the fight isn't worth it, that that one small life isn't worth all the money and pain and love and effort being poured into it. Even if the fight is won, what has really been acheived? The saving of Beetle, a calf born at one-third of the normal weight, took weeks of careful nursing. The first few days of her life were entirely touch-and-go and not even the vet thought she would make it. But make it she did; now fat and healthy, Beetle still occasionally sneaks into the house.

But did it really make any difference? In the great scheme of things, what is the rescuing of a little Jersey calf? Does it really matter?

I think it matters to Beetle.

Of course, we strive to breed good cows so that we don't have to deal with the swinging udders and perpetually lame legs. We strive for quality, not quantity, but quality can also mean "quality of life". We make mistakes. We have our problems.

But the person who stumbles the most is the one who never, ever takes his eyes off the stars on the horizon. Oscar Wilde said that we're all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars. And maybe even if we never turn a tidy profit, if we never get round to fixing that gate or bricking up the parlour, if we never breed a show champion or a herd of wonderful milkers, if we always stay in the gutter, maybe it's good enough that we're looking at the stars.

Not many people have the guts to do that.

But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and His righteousness; and all these things will be added unto you. ~ Matthew 6:33