Blog

A couple years ago, we bought hay from a farmer whose family has been farming the same land for a hundred and fifty years or so. He said jokingly “I have come to the realization that I’m not a farmer anymore, technically, I’m now a pet food manufacturer. You are the only one buying my hay for livestock - everyone else is either feeding pet goats or rescue ponies.” I knew he was making light of it, and I laughed, but even so it tapped into a sadness that just won’t quit. I can’t quite shake the

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A few months ago, I was heading out to the barn to collect eggs with my 5-year-old grandson and the pigs were actively engaged in “the process of conceiving piglets”. (Like seriously, they were very active and very engaged.) My grandson asked me what they were doing, and without hesitation I said, “they’re making piglets”.
“Really?” he asked, thinking I might be kidding.
“Yes, that’s how they do it.”
He watched for a couple minutes, asked his dad a couple questions - then we collected eggs and

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Most livestock farmers I know see things differently than me, and when it comes to politics, we’d probably never agree, but I feel completely at home with their hard-working pragmatism, and an affinity with their nature-based authenticity. I’ve also never known a group so quick to come to someone’s aid.
The first time I had a ewe with a prolapsed uterus, I had no idea what was going on other than there were organs outside her body that I knew should not have been hanging there. I called a woman

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When I was in my twenties a scuba diving accident landed me in the hospital for ten days. I was living in California, and though I didn’t have any family nearby I had a lot of friends. They all rallied around and visited me often and while most of them made a concerted effort to cheer me up, what I remember best was my friend Jules. She was taking an art class at a local community college and would stop by in between work and school. I’d wake up and see her sitting in the chair sketching. I’d

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Silvopasture is the deliberate combination of trees, pasture, and grazing animals. In our pastures we strive to have an abundance of trees to provide plenty of shade for our animals but enough sunshine to have grass under every tree. The USDA now recognizes the value of silvopasture in large part because its carbon sequestering abilities are greater than the sum of its parts. A pasture with trees can sequester more carbon than either the same pasture without trees or the same trees without a

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When it is so hot and so muggy that even the thought of thinking causes beads of perspiration to form and drip down your thoroughly disgusted brow – you know it’s the perfect time to go foraging for chanterelles!
Deep in the forest where the blazing sun can’t reach – and where it still smells like damp leaves and moss, emerges one of nature’s finest culinary gifts. Chanterelles thrive in this weather - weather that is so hot and humid that it makes the rest of us wilt.

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Merriam Webster dictionary defines a weed as “a plant that is not valued where it is growing.” Our sheep, pigs, and chickens would all unanimously agree that Bitter Dock is a weed that does not belong in their pasture. To them the only metric with which to measure something’s value is if that something is “edible” or “not edible.” To them if it’s not edible, it’s just taking up space. I understand their perspective – but personally, I don’t mind having Dock around. It thrives in soil that othe

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There’s a lot of death in livestock farming, there’s no getting around it. I tell myself it’s the price I pay for playing God. The more I bring to life, the more I have to watch die. Predation by bears and coyotes gets worse with every new housing development, as those animals get pushed ever closer to my animals. Fencing gets harder and harder to maintain because our storms are getting more destructive, our forests are in decline, and trees are dropping on power lines, and

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Despite a profound difference in opinion as to where she should farrow, our sow had 8 piglets and they are all doing great.
She flat out refused to farrow in the trailer I set up for her. Nor would she even consider the plein air makeshift pen I cobbled together when it was clear the trailer wasn’t going to make her happy. In each spot I placed a nice fluffy pile of hay for her to make a nest. I also supplied her with a generous food trough filled with everything a pig mi

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Now that the grass is growing and all our pastures have plenty of forage, we are setting up grazing paddocks for the summer. Once in place, it’s “just” a matter of keeping the fences electrified and predators away. Moving the sheep daily at Hill-Stead and weekly at Mountain Spring will help keep the grass in a constant vegetative state.

If we allowed the sheep to continuously graze an area, they’d eat all their favorite plants, like clover, down to the ground. As soon as the clover starts to

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