There has been lots of talk this past week about shoveling snow off your roof. The heavy snowfall followed by warmer weather can wreak havoc on the roof over your head.
I can testify to that. A few years ago, during a similar winter weather event the Old Red Barn on the Phillips farm met its demise. The Old Red Barn was called that because when my father built it, he put red siding on it. It was down the road from the Slab Barn, built out of slabs of lumber salvaged from some old milling operation, and across the yard from the Shack, (still standing) a three-room shack my grandfather built in the 1920s and now used for a workshop/tractor garage.
The Old Red Barn was a magnificent structure. My dad built it in the 1950s. It was a two-storey barn complete with cement floor. The bottom floor was complete with stalls for cows to calve indoors (which they never did anyway), and cubbyholes for chickens to lay their eggs in (this was a fancy contraption whereby chickens could enter from one side and the egg gatherers could open a small door on the other and get the eggs).
The second storey was a hayloft. When I was a kid we used horses to hoist the hay into the loft. A rail was attached to the apex of the rafters and extended out past the end of the barn by about 15 feet. We would attach a sling around a bunch of bales and, with a pulley attached to the rail extending out about 25 feet above the ground, used the horses to pull the bales up and into the barn.
Ingenious. A tractor eventually replaced the horses. The only problem with this system was that there was usually a bit of a jerk when the sling of bales finished their vertical travel and started moving horizontally. If someone (usually me or my brother) hadn’t tied a good knot in the sling, the entire batch would come crashing back down to the ground, much to the chagrin of my father.
I swear that’s where I learned to swear.
The sling gave way to the bale elevator, which was a much more efficient way of getting bales into the hayloft. And that was the Phillips method of getting in shape. Tossing bales always gets one in shape, but the people who had the chore of working in the barn really got in good shape. Did I mention the hayloft was enclosed on three sides? And did I mention the roof of the red barn was tin?
Tossing bales in the 30-degree Celsius heat is bad enough, but do in it a tin box and you do get … well, a bit of workout. Kind of like lifting weights in a sauna. That which doesn’t render you unconscious makes you stronger.
The hayloft, however, had some other benefits. After all the hay was fed out, it made a great road hockey rink. We had some great road hockey games up there (we even tried tennis a few times). The only down side was when the road hockey or tennis ball went out the open side of the hayloft, it landed in the barnyard, which is only a problem if it’s been raining. We usually had to have a good supply of balls or pucks.
Over the years the Old Red Barn was used less and less. We bought a bale wagon, which meant we didn’t need to drop 40 or 50 pounds a day throwing bales. It developed a bit of lean to it, despite its concrete foundation, so we didn’t store too much in the loft. We used the bottom floor long after the loft was no longer functional – keeping sick livestock out of the bad weather, etc.
Then, one rather warm and wet January day about five years ago, almost 50 years after it was built, it came crashing down under the weight of wet, heavy snow. It was a shock to me because that barn had been there since before I was born. It was always in my visual landscape of the farm. Luckily there was nothing in the barn when it came down.
So the lesson is: Shovel the snow off your roof.