SHEPHERDING OUTDOORS

HARVEST

BY WALT MERRELL

Bay watched intently as Hannah worked the soil with her hands. Dark and rich, the soil looked more like river spoil than anything. River spoil, that is, is the term I give to the dark black soil I usually find in the Conecuh River flood plains. Moist and rich, this soil is the result of hundreds of years of flooding and decomposition… and “I believe you could plant popsicle sticks in this dirt and grow pine trees.” Or at least, that’s what I told Bay—my oldest daughter—as she studied Hannah’s every move.

A year earlier, we had moved from the well-established yard and gardens of our home to a house closer to Hannah’s mother. A widow now, Brenda deserved to have us look after her for a change. George, Hannah’s father, had passed away a year earlier. Hannah and I had done our best to manage our own family and tend to her mother’s needs, too… but the task was proving difficult. Not because we minded trimming an occasional limb or fixing rotten boards or leaky faucets at Brenda’s house, but because the art of managing two functioning households is tricky at best… especially when you have three growing girls.

And, as with any family, moving can cause things to go topsy turvy. We anticipated most of the problems… change of address forms and getting Lincoln, our black and tan hound, to stay at the new house and not journey over the river and through the woods, back to the old house… but one thing we didn’t really consider was the garden and the plants. Well, Hannah might have considered it in all of our contemplations, but, like any good husband… it never crossed my mind.

“I want you to get me one of those big tubs so I can make a raised bed for my garden,” Hannah declared.

It was already spring, and I was sure we had seen the last frost of the year. We’d been so busy with the move and the adjustment period that always follows… the leaving work and forgetting you moved and driving to the wrong house; the putting the wrong return address on all the bills; the telling people to stop by for a visit only to have them tell you “nobody was home” because they went to your old house… we were dealing with all of those adjustments and, honestly, I hadn’t even considered a garden. I was just happy to have the last of the boxes unpacked and actually know which drawer my underwear was in.

“You mean like some of those galvanized wash tubs?” My question was sincere. I didn’t know what she was talking about.

“Yes, but bigger,” she responded.

My mind searched the various options. My dad always used cast iron bathtubs for all of his water troughs. “You mean like a bathtub,” I suggested.

“No, not a bathtub. Bigger.” Her reply was as much a challenge to my ability as it was a criticism of my lack of understanding.

“Look, the only options bigger than a washtub are a bathtub—or a watering trough about the same size as a bathtub—and a swimming pool. We are not getting a swimming pool so you can fill it with dirt.” She could tell I was growing frustrated with the notion....

“People do make swimming pools out of them. But I think they are for watering cows and such. It’s not a pool,” she explained. One thing led to another, and eventually I bought a big, galvanized feed trough from a nice lady on Facebook Marketplace.

Nearly ten feet in diameter, it seemed brand spankin’ new, and I was proud as a pig in a poke that I bought it for half of what a new one would cost. I slid it off the rails of the trailer—it was wider than the trailer itself—and it plopped down onto the barren dirt patch right where Hannah wanted it. She grinned from ear to ear with excitement. I brimmed with pride at the idea that I had made my wife this happy with a “big ole bucket.”

“This is perfect,” she said with glee… just before she picked my ax up and wacked a big hole straight through the bottom of the tub! I was in shock. I was so busy unloading this pristine trough that I hadn’t noticed the ax laying nearby. “Whack!” She drove another hole through the bottom…. “Waaaaiiittt!” I hollered.

She rested the ax on her shoulder as if I was inconveniencing her and said, “Why?” I stuttered in disbelief… “Because it was in perfect condition!”

“Well, the water has to go somewhere…”

“Whack!”

And, so, it was… she destroyed this perfectly new feed trough….

We loaded rocks and logs and other debris—some that would decompose and some that would not—into the trough I nicknamed “Titanic,” and eventually, we went down to Cottle Creek and loaded up load after load of that good, black, river spoil. Soon enough, all of the debris in the bottom of the trough disappeared, and a flat, black sea of dirt washed over all of it. “This is going to grow some fine vegetables,” Hannah said with great cheer in her voice.

And it has. For several years now. Squash, tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, onions, potatoes, sage, thyme, rosemary… why, you could make a fine salad straight from that Titanic feed trough at the right time of the year. In the wintertime, she grows mustards and turnips and other wintery greens… and the harvest is always bountiful. But not because of the vegetables.

Bay stood just behind Hannah watching her work the soil. “You see? You wallow out a hole about as big as your two big fingers and about as deep as you can reach, and you drop it down in there. Then close it up with a pinch of your fingers.” Hannah demonstrated as she explained, dropping an onion sprig down in the hole as she went. Bay repeated what her Momma had just shown her. And one by one, they planted 25 or so onions....

“Now, let’s go cut up those seed potatoes we have.” Over the next hour, Hannah taught her about eyes and quartering potatoes and how deep the hole needed to be, and so on.

Over the years, Hannah has taught our girls much about gardens and harvests.

Our youngest daughter Banks has become quite the budding little entrepreneur with her Zinnia business. Thousands of Zinnias of every color of the rainbow blanket a half-acre or so not too far from Hannah’s ax murdered feed trough. Every Saturday and Wednesday Banks cuts about 20 dozen and sells them at the Andalusia Farmer’s Market.

And sometimes the harvest is not for us… Cape and I enjoy watching the deer eat the pears from underneath the trees in the orchard. We love eating those soft, sweet pears, too. Sometimes I get aggravated with the deer for knocking too many out of the tree… but I try to remind myself that the bounty of the harvest is plenty for all. We also love picking scuppernongs when the time is right. The juicy golden bulbs of sweet nectar just pop in your mouth like water balloons. We sift the seeds with our teeth and spit them right under the vines. We eat ‘till our bellies hurt and then we eat some more!

But the pears and scuppernongs, and the tomatoes, squash, peppers and potatoes are only part of the harvest. Truth is… we may not live to see the seeds planted in these years fully grown. Oh, I don’t plan on Hannah and I leaving this world anytime soon, but I don’t know how long it will be before Bay or Cape or Banks have families of their own, and they start planting gardens with their children. And that… is the real harvest. That’s when the seeds Hannah planted in our girls will have finally taken root and grown and produced fruit of its own. Not fruit on the vines of green… but fruit in the vines of life.

One day, Bay will dig her fingers down into some dark black soil in her own back yard and look at her daughter and say, “My momma taught me that this was good dirt.” And it is…

And what makes this harvest season so very special? Well, it might be that Titanic feed trough. Or it could be those sweet pears. But to me… it’s watching Brenda get to enjoy seeing the seeds she planted in Hannah so many years ago, finally produce fruit, too.

And that harvest is what makes a true horn-o-plenty.

Walt Merrell writes about life, family and faith.  An avid hunter and outdoorsman, he enjoys time “in the woods or on the water” with his wife Hannah, and their three girls, Bay, Cape and Banks. They also manage an outdoors-based ministry called Shepherding Outdoors.  Follow their adventures on Facebook, Instagram and YouTube at Shepherding Outdoors.  You can email him at shepherdingoutdoors@gmail.com.