The Old Farmer’s 2011 Almanac: Delivering Facts And Fun

By Nancy K. Crevier

Where, within just 250 pages, can a person find the answers to questions as diverse as “Why should I eat green vegetables?” “Is it polite to talk about yourself to others?” “How do I make monkey bread?” or “What kind of winter can we expect in Connecticut?”

The Old Farmer’s 2011 Almanac addresses these questions and covers far broader topics between its two pale yellow covers, as it has since its first publication in 1792. Robert B. Thomas founded the Old Farmer’s Almanac, with the intention that it be “useful, with a pleasant degree of humor.”

Most revered for the countrywide weather forecasts predicted by the publishers using a bit of modern technology, some solar science, and a “secret formula,” The Old Farmer’s 2011 Almanac is now on the newsstands, in plenty of time to prepare for the upcoming year.

The Almanac remains faithful to Robert Thomas’s admonition to be “useful.” “Let’s Go Dutch (Oven, That is)” by Tammy Sapp introduces the reader to Dutch oven cooking, interspersed with Dutch oven lore and plenty of easy recipes. “Scythe Matters” by Janet Wallace is a “how to” essay on hand mowing with the sharp, curved blade that allows the mower to cut in wide, smooth swathes. An ancient tool for cutting grass and hay, renewed interest in the scythe by organic and back-to-the-land farmers today means learning the technique for laying fields flat without finding oneself laid flat with pain.

Gestation and mating tables for those interested in animal husbandry can be found in the pages of The Old Farmer’s 2011 Almanac, and gardeners can learn how to plant by the moon’s phase, a practice that is believed to affect plant growth.

Useful, too, are the many pages of weather forecasts, (warmer than usual in New England this coming winter, but don’t throw out the boots just yet), tide charts, and the calendar pages, “the heart of The Old Farmer’s Almanac.” The calendar pages present sky sightings and astrological data and lore to be read in a specified manner that will “reveal all of nature’s precision, rhythm, and glory….”

In keeping with Mr Thomas’s charge to include a “pleasant degree of humor,” readers will find “23 Curious Cures For A Headache” by Martha Deeringer to be lighthearted reading. Visions of headache sufferers lying prone with an application of collard greens or mashed earthworms adhered to the forehead, or with a salt herring strapped to the throat, are sure to raise a chuckle or two.

Be enlightened about manners of yesteryear vs etiquette of today in the special report “Good Manners: What’s Changed, What Hasn’t & What To Do Now.” Be happy to know that it is usually unnecessary to remind someone in modern times, unlike 500 years ago, that excrement at the side of the road should not be handled and held beneath the nose of a friend….

Readers seeking to get ahead at work will want to check out their employer’s Zodiac profile for useful tips: a Taurus boss? “Remember to turn off lights and computers when you leave, and to always reuse paper clips.”

As it has for the past 218 years, The Old Farmer’s 2011 Almanac delivers all that has come to be expected of the down-home tome — and more.

A digital edition of The Old Farmer’s 2011 Almanac can be ordered at almanac.com/store.