Busy time at the farm. Yesterday, I posted a piece on the need for a new way of looking at the ethics of animal rescue, The piece went viral, and has of the moment more than 10,000 shares on Facebook alone. I welcome the new and old readers to the blog and thank you for considering subscriptions for the blog, they help me pay for the photography and website maintenance fees, which are high and growing.

I am told the traffic through the blog is through the roof right now, for various reasons, and so it is an opportunity to mention that subscriptions are important, they make it possible for me to do my work, take my photos, wrote and research my posts. They are the new way for book writers like me, who can no longer make enough money off of hardcover books to only write books.

I saw this challenge coming in 2007 and started this blog, it now has more than four million visits a year. I began the subscription program two years ago, it is simply payment for my work, the blog is free whether you contribute to it or not. People stood by me when I started, I will stand by them.

Subscribing is  easy, you can pay $3 a month, $5 a month, or $60 a year. I wanted to offer as many options as possible. They are all inexpensive, from my point of view, the blog is hard work, and I do it just about every day.  But I know some people are struggling financially, and I understand that.

You can cancel at any time, and I do not have any control or knowledge of your money, you manage your own account. No financial information of any kind is stored on my blog or the website company that hosts it.  Two security companies monitor the blog, it is as safe as I can make it. You can use credit cards or Paypal.

A very small percentage of blog readers are subscribers, I think that is beginning to change. It is good to be paid for my work, something I resisted for six or seven years.

So if you choose to subscribe, thank you, you are making a huge difference and investing in the writing world of the future. The subscriptions matter.  If not, thanks for thinking about it.

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Secondly, I am hosting a Blogging Workshop on November 7-8 at the Pompanuck Farm Institute. The fee is $400 and I will be joined by a social media expert and a tech adviser. Blogs have become a revolutionary new means of expression for people, they are important and we will spend the better part of the weekend talking about how to start a blog and make it work,  and sharing ideas in a very beautiful setting. My teaching will focus on the creative aspects and significance of blogging, I am not a computer whiz, but we will have one or two around. The fee does not cover food or lodging. The class is limited to 10 people, if you are interested, please e-mall Deb Foster – [email protected].

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The Bedlam Farm October Open House is just a few weeks away. Lots of good and inexpensive art, singing, sheepherding with Red and Fate, big draft horses from Blue Star Equiculture, poetry readings and talks, donkey and pony visits. October ll, 11 to 4 p.m. No pets please. Check it out.