Farm superstitions abound. If you’re superstitious, you might wish you could spend all of Friday the 13th in bed, covers pulled up to your ears, anxiously awaiting the onset of tomorrow.
Logically, we know that bad (and good) things will happen regardless of whether we cross our fingers. However, Judith Viorst gets at the core of most people’s superstitions with the following quote. “Superstition is foolish, childish, primitive and irrational – but how much does it cost you to knock on wood?”
Why not take the extra precaution?
13 Farming Superstitions
A quick online search will confirm that superstitions hold true across the board, but here are 13 superstitions that are well-known in the world of agriculture and farming. Do you swear by any of them?
1. Never start a new job/task on a Friday. (This must go doubly for Friday the 13th.)
2. Never raise 13 livestock of one species/breed.
3. Horseshoes are believed to be lucky and offer protection, but people have different beliefs about how they should be hung. Some say a horseshoe hung with the ends pointing up (U) will catch and store the luck. Others say a horseshoe hanging with the ends pointing down will let good luck flow out and surround your home or barn.
4. “Red sky at night, sailor’s delight. Red sky in morning, sailor’s warning.”
5. Finding a black snake in the garden or field is a harbinger of a bountiful harvest for that crop.
6. Tree leaves blown upside down by the wind foretell rain.
7. Crops sown from north to south will grow better than crops sown east to west.
8. Crops sown during a full moon will thrive, while crops sown during a waning moon will wither.
9. Never plant anything on the 31st of the month.
10. Rain on Easter Sunday will bring rain for the following seven Sundays.
11. Anything planted by a pregnant woman is guaranteed to thrive.
12. Never harvest or plant on the 13th of any month.
13. Once the forsythia blooms, there will be three more snows.
Regardless of whatever your beliefs on superstition are, Friday the 13th is an important day because it asks you to be present and aware of your surroundings more than other day throughout the year. Instead of just steering clear of the number 13 and being extra cautious around mirrors today, why not refocus that hyper-vigilance onto other aspects of your farm? Take this opportunity to analyze your soil with fresh eyes, or to reevaluate your chicken feeder/waterer setup. You’re already paying more attention to potentially bad things today; why not hone in on the good (and improvable) things, too?
In fact, maybe we should just put an end to Friday the 13th’s bad reputation and instead use it as a day to evaluate and improve the things around us on our farms and in our homes and gardens. But, just to be safe, I plan to avoid other things associated with bad luck today—as well as strangers in hockey masks carrying big knives. It can’t hurt, right?
This article about farm superstitions and Friday the 13th was written for Hobby Farms magazine. Click here to subscribe.
