During June and July most focus is on our vegetable garden that provides us with food for our selves and for our farm shop. It is also time for traditional hay harvesting. Our aim is to produce farm products with as little negative climate impact as possible. That means that it is a lot of heavy manual work. Bockgården is a well conserved farm with well preserved living houses and a complete traditional arrangement of the out-house buildings. There are normally a lot of restoration works on the houses and on our natural fodder land that provides us with food for our sheep. 2010 we started to establish our forest garden, a work that will continue. We are also running ecotourism activities and a Bed and Breakfast. Apart from the activities described above where we expect you to get involved we also need a helping hand from time to time with our ecotourism business.
Bockgården lies very close to Lake Siljan and the village’s fantastic bath-beach with smooth rocks and grand old forest in a harmonious setting. A nice place for relaxing and fun after a good working day. While many other farm units have rationalized in Sweden, Bockgården is today considered to be one of the small and well conserved farms. On the west and south from the homestead, with a slight inclination towards Lake Siljan, spreads the farm’s agricultural land where you will see some of the farm’s “gute”-sheep and “Hedemora”-hens (the Swedish ancestors’ sheep and hens). There is also a small forest just north of the homestead.
You will share the three main meals with Asya, Sven and their young daughter Svea (2009). In our own cooking, we only use smaller amount of meat from our own animals that are brought up and slaughtered at our farm. Otherwise we prefer vegetarian food that is as locally produced as possible. We are trying to do our best to follow the natural seasons. That means for instance, just before our vegetables are ready in July, we eat more meat than what we do rest of the year. You will get your own room with a nice view over Lake Siljan. The room has no electricity, but in June and July you will neither miss the light nor the warmth. You will have access to a shared traditional outdoor toilet and we encourage you to bath in the nearby lake Siljan.
We expect you to treat others with respect, work hard and that you are willing to learn more about sustainable lifestyles.
Your working days will in average be 6 hours per day. You should be flexible and some days work longer hours, other days shorter. You will have your days off on Fridays and Saturdays. If our bicycle and canoe are available we encourage you to borrow them and discover the beautiful surroundings. Otherwise the buses stop not far from the farm. Apart from the 6 hours of “farm work” we expect you to equally share with us the daily work related to cooking and cleaning of our common areas that is the dining room and the office. If the office is free, you are welcome to use our internet connection but remember to use your own computer.
Kindly, bring your own bed sheets, working clothes and rain clothes.
We allow no drugs. Smoking in the houses is forbidden.
Please send your application via e-mail with full contact details and your member name at WWOOF. Remember to share with us what kind of person you are, your skills, interest, your expectations, what specifically make you to want to work with just us and finally rank the preferable periods of stay indicated below. We will answer you as soon as possible. Note that applications received later than one month before preferable period of stay might not been responded. For 2012 you can choose one of the following two periods of stay:
