Deep Winter Greenhouse Kick Off!

Well our deep winter greenhouse (DWG) is up and growing! We had a fantastic turnout for our open house on October 29 and the first seeds were planted by DWG pioneer Carol Ford, Garden Goddess Greenhouse. Thank you so much to all our partners, supporters, contractors and members! This is thrilling and so important to our farm. We are full of gratitude.

Here is the open house and latest from the greenhouse in a photo update!

The greenhouse pre-landscaping around the exterior.

At the open house engineer Dan speaks about how the passive solar structure works. 

Here's a view of the air outtake at the front of the building, the circulation fan is in the middle, the intake (for hot air) is at the peak (black tiling).

We talk about how the DWG fits into our farm goals and what we plan to grow in it. Winter CSA here we come! Fresh greens during the winter - YuM!

Farmers John and Brooke.

Farmers John and Brooke, Greg from UMN RSDP.

Ribbon cutting time! Farmer John, bro-in-law Andy (construction helper, plus representing Carroll Distributing), Larry (construction helper supreme), farmer Brooke and CSA members Yvonne & Lee.

Thank you to the University of Minnesota Regional Sustainable Development Partnership for making this program possible and helping us move into the future of our farm!

Thank you to our CSA members who have supported us on our journey! We were thrilled to have members Yvonne & Lee sharing the excitement of the day and cutting the ribbon with us!

Brooke, Yvonne and Lee.

Time to talk about planting and sow the first seeds! DWG pioneer/veteran Carol Ford, Garden Goddess Greenhouse, talked about how she plants in her greenhouse, the soil mix she uses and a little bit about growing. Then she planted the first planter with arugula seed! Video on facebook.

Thanks to all who shopped our mini market, came to enjoy the festivities and learn and celebrate with us! The event was very energizing and exciting. Live music was enjoyed by all, courtesy of Dick Kimmel and Stacey Watje. Live entertainment provided by farm cat Loki.

The first planting of arugula is up and off the germination mats! Seeding will occur about every other day until the greenhouse is filled up. Right now there are baby greens and microgreens growing, as we finish setting up the growing space in the greenhouse.

Gutter planters and plastic trays on the germination mats. We are working on setting up the inside structures, farm dog Odin likes to help (in comfort, of course).

The back room will be for storage and soil mixing, etc.

Below you can see some of the gutter planters underneath the germination/planting table.

Thanks go out to event organizers:
UMN Regional Sustainable Development Partnership and the Sustainable Farming Association.

Shout out to our local contractors:
Cedar Hill Homes (Glenn Hauser, general construction); Darin Portner Trucking (excavation/grading work); Nosbush Glass Co. (plexiglass install); NU Current Electric; Pat Faerber Masonry (block work); Searles Well Drilling (water work, directional boring); Heiderscheidt Digging (tiling suppies for air circulation system); Carroll Distributing (construction supplies); Larry Knisley - what would we do without your construction help! Thank to Frandsen Bank for financing the project!

None of the big wigs came, but we got this nice letter from Senator Amy Klobuchar! :)

Cheers! We'll keep sending out updates on facebook and here, as we grow!

Where can you find us next?

Mankato Winter Farmers' Market
Saturday, November 11th 10:00-12:00am, at Drummers Garden Center

March for Science :: Let Science Fuel Your Passion

It was a blast being a part of the March for Science New Ulm on Earth Day! There were over 100 people that gathered at Herman Heights to celebrate, participate and honor our natural resources. I loved listening to the other speakers and very much enjoyed speaking myself. Here are a few pictures and my speech from the event. #everydayisearthday

March for Science - New Ulm

•  •  •

Hello! Thank you for welcoming me here today and thank you for all being here supporting and celebrating science. As an organic farmer science is very important to me, so your presence and support is encouraging.

When thinking about what to talk with you about today, how science is important to what we do at our farm, many things came to mind. Than amazing world of mycorrhizal fungi around root systems. Food as medicine. How bitter flavors aide digestion comes to mind in the spring. The art of grafting apple trees. Pest cycles. Beneficial insects. Soil organisms. Riveting, yes?! Science helps me understand all of these systems, processes and interactions, so we can do our job well - so we can produce food and nurture our farm ecosystem.

While musing on all the ways science influences our jobs at the farm my mind kept coming back to all the ways science inspires us to do what we do and to keep doing it better.

Science drives my passion to farm nutritious, healthful and organic food for people, in harmony with our amazing ecosystem. So this became my path - to bring the environment, and natural health, into people's homes through food, and to deeply care for and nurture the bit of ecosystem that is our farm.

My husband and I farm, because we have a great respect for our natural environment and we wanted to practice natural resources conservation actively, on the ground. We choose to farm organically, because this is what science tells us creates healthy soils, healthy plants, clean water and clean air. And if the soil is not healthy - vibrant and full of organic matter, teaming with beneficial bacteria, fungi, nematodes - if it is not alive and well balanced how can the food be healthy? How can we be healthy?

A single teaspoon of rich soil can hold a billion bacteria, several yards of fungal filaments, several thousand protozoa and many, many nematodes.

Recently we purchased new land, which we are transitioning from conventional agriculture to organic apple orchard and pasture for our pigs. As we were planting trees a couple weeks ago we were astonished at how dead the soil seemed. As we dug our trees out of the nursery bed the soil was beautiful - loose and crumbly, dark, full of worms and organic matter. We planted these trees into our new field, where the soil was compacted, more chunky and cloddy than crumbly, devoid of much organic matter, devoid of worms. We are excited to bring this land back to life.

Back to that fungi I mentioned, each tree was planted with mycorrhizal fungi to nurture the health of the trees and the underground soil ecosystem. The endomycorrhizal fungi live partially inside and partially outside a plants root system. This symbiotic relationship fosters a greater exchange of nutrients. The fungi helps the plant take up more water and nutrients than the plant can do on its own; then the plant pays the fungi back in carbon. Nurturing this relationship is a long-term investment, that thrives with lack of disturbance, which is why we use minimal tillage and are moving to no-till.

This fascinates me. Science helps me understand.

Parasitic wasps lay eggs in or on host insects - pests like aphids and cabbage worms - as the eggs hatch the prey is consumed.

This fascinates me.

These natural processes and interactions are amazing and science - hard core research and hands on citizen science - helps us to better understand what we can do to nurture them to better create ecosystem services into all parts of our farm and farming.

Over the last several years we have worked in partnership with the University of Minnesota on carious research projects at our farm. Early detection monitoring for new and emerging pests and diseases. A trial of native Minnesotan mycorrhizal fungi. Monitoring a bee nesting block for the Bee Lab. This year we are building a passive solar greenhouse for growing in the winter, designed by the UMN. All this research is so import and and needed!

My passion for farming is driven, in part, by the fact that there is always so much to learn - there is always something to observe and explore. Science fuels this inspiration daily. Sometimes we forget to slow down and appreciate it, but there are so many examples around us, all the time.

The topic of science keeps bringing be mack to my passion, my inspiration, and that is really what I want to get down to. Find that bit of science, that nerdy fact, or process, or system, or machine that inspires you and let that help fuel you. Let science make your life more driven - at your job, or life at home, outside your job. It can foster appreciation, build creativity and give you new energy for the things you do day to day. Life is meant for learning and the possibilities are endless.

I am a farmer, the soil is my lab, where is yours?

•  •  •

From the Pantry :: March

Fall storage items we are still eating from the pantry:

Winter squash (some are getting wrinkly)
Potatoes (beginning to look a little alien)
Garlic & shallots
Red & yellow onions
Sweet potatoes (bought from another farm)

Summer produce items we are still eating from the freezer:

Greens
Broccoli
Shredded zucchini
Peppers
Peas
Various fruit - rhubarb, strawberries
Other items below these, yet to be discovered...

Side Track!

Redefine what you think of as eating seasonally! YOU define the season, if you start preserving for year-round/extended consumption. Part of this may also include redefining what you think these items may look like - octopus sprouting potatoes, wrinkly spuds and squash. YuM.

It's Pantry and Freezer Clean Up Time

With spring and farming season just around the corner we have been putting priority to cleaning up our pantry and freezer. Focusing on prepping items for our busier times. This is the first time we have been so successful at this, during this time of year and it feels great. 

Potatoes: Our storage potatoes may indeed last us until the summer's new potatoes come in! With our potato stock we have been making twice baked potatoes with the larger, better looking tubers. Along with these we also continue to freeze portions of mashed potatoes.

 Twice bakers and mashers headed to the freezer. This is one way to redefine how we eat seasonally.

Winter Squash: We have butternut and acorn squash in the pantry and because of the wet WET fall they are not storing as well as normal. We have been roasting and freezing portions of puree and I still aim to can some (cubed) before we are done. P.S. Another reason I have really been enjoying this is because I have been adding squash to the dog's food and they love it (well Odin loves it, Hazel tolerates it).

Chicken: We put fifteen stew hens in the freezer in November and we have slowly been putting up shredded chicken and stock/bone broth. The chicken, veggies and herbs sit in the crock for a day, before shredding and canning. Then, the bones, skin, etc. goes back in for another day to make bone broth for cooking and using as a healthful drink (which I also put in the dog's food sometimes). I'll add apple cider vinegar to help extract beneficial minerals from the bones and sometimes I toss in a beef marrow bone to increase the benefits. After it's done I strain the broth and pressure can it (then sort out the 48-hr cooked veggies/skin, etc. to throw in the dog food). ;)

Organs: We always get back our pig organs when we harvest and since we aren't super good at eating them they have sort of piled up in the freezer. While one of us likes liver, the other doesn't, so we have resolved to dehydrating these items (if they don't get put into sausage) for dog treats. This is proving a great way to clean up the recesses of the freezer.

Still on the List

Lard: crank out a bunch of rendered lard. (Try making some soap?!?)

Garlic/shallots: freeze some olive oil/garlic balls; ferment some for holistic farm management.

Zucchini: I always freeze too much! I should crank out some breads to stick back in the freezer.

Freezer excavations: what is hiding at the bottom of the freezer? (Usually way too many frozen peppers.)

Lard, beautiful lard!

What's Missing?

It's a great time of year to check in and see what you are missing - what do you need to preserve more of next season? For us, celery. Darn it! Every year we run out. Okay, I'm going for an ice cream bucket full this year! Also, we need a new salsa to put away, one type is not enough. It would also be nice to have some canned beans.

What's on your list?

Resources & Other Interesting Things...

Why is organic food so *#@! expensive?? | Ali Partovi | TEDxManhattan

Bone Broth, Broths an Stock

8 Bits of Plastic You Can Quit Right Now

On Climate Change & Community

It is scary to me to see climate change being denied. It's scary to me what damage can be done to our ONE environment in a short period of time. What gives me hope is YOU as individuals, making progress with individual actions, and US as COMMUNITY working together for change.

We got into farming to put conservation on the ground and to build community through food. This is one way we are fighting to combat climate change, integrating community/environmental education - while eating well.

Remember that each food purchase you make is voting with your food dollars - you can vote with or against climate change. Support a healthy environment, a healthy future for our children. Support organic and sustainable.

Making a Blessing out of Fighting

Eternal mud season. That's what it feels like. Sometimes it seems like we are always fighting. Fighting the mud, the wind, the weather. Fighting time. Daylight. Sneaky chickens. Fighting for organic. Fighting the consumer mindset. Fighting for environmental and good food education. Time. Fighting bugs, disease, loss. Fighting to meet our sales goals. Fighting off exhaustion.

Right now the mud is a downer and it exacerbates this feeling, so pig chores became a meditation on fighting today. As I wrangled the kids hay rack out of one mud pit and into theirs I could feel the frustration (and triumph). (Fighting that fleeting thought that I just want to turn everyone into bacon!) The kiddos were delighted, grateful, exuberant over their alfalfa hay - my heart is full.

Hogs enjoying some good hay, despite the mud.

It's difficult to remind myself that it is a blessing to be able to fight these things, fight for these things. (I'll have to remember this in summer, when I'm trying to sleep with rain and 40 mph winds.) To have choice in these elements I'm fighting, and fighting for. Farming will never be easy, there will always be something to fight against, but we remain vibrant, grow strong.

We have the privilege not to have to be fighting for our livelihood. When there are others out there fighting for their homes, their lands, their water (our lands, our water), who have much less choice.

I think about the mud - the water in our ground. I am grateful that my family, my farm, my farm animals have access to good, clean water. The mud makes me crazy, but it's Minnesota...hopefully it will freeze soon. "This too shall pass." Meditating on gratitude that this is a temporary fight.

Mucking it up with my muddy buddies.

We stand with Standing Rock. We have to keep fighting for our environment, for our children for the next seven generations. We cannot give on this, but keep pressing forwards - each of us where we can.


The Seventh Generation Principle
"This principle states that we should make decisions about how we live today based on how our decisions will impact the future seven generations. We must be good caretakers of the earth, not simply for ourselves, but for those who will inherit the earth, and the results of our decisions. This value is found in the Iroquois (Haudenosaunee) Great Law of Peace (Gayanashagowa) and is common among a number of indigenous peoples in the Americas." - Woodbine Ecology Center

Don't Panic, We're Organic!

Grow Organic

Another year, a new organic certificate and inspection passed with flying colors and no changes needed. It feels good to be an organic producer.

At Alternative Roots Farm we believe that the right way to grow produce for our community is to grow organic. We never questioned this. There are arguments we hear, floating around the farming community, against this step, but they just aren't convincing to us to skip something so vital. The organic label is assurance to our customers that there are no synthetic chemicals on the food they are eating, we are caring for our land with organic management (crop rotation, organic matter, wildlife habitat) and no GMO crops are grown.

It is the only label that has solid, regulatory weight behind it that consumers can trust there are no chemicals and GMOs used. Many other claims, such as "natural" and "beyond organic," do not have any regulation for them. In a society where folks are hopping on the sustainability bandwagon, there is so much greenwashing of products it can be confusing when making purchasing decisions - organic eliminates this confusion.

ARF has been certified organic since August 2014.

Now, there are still ways organic could improve, but I feel it is a solid, trustworthy label for produce and produce products, while improvements for animal products are needed (in my opinion). When it comes to meat and eggs I would continue to use a skeptical eye and try to learn about your farmers and farms the products come from - buy local. "Access to pasture" is not the same as actually being out on pasture. With any good thing, such as a growing organic industry, there are going to be businesses that take advantage where there are profits to be made.

A Peek at the Certification Process

That brings me to the certification process behind organics. Each year, every organic operation - whether a grower, or processing facility - an organic business must work with their certification agency to apply annually for renewed certification. Then a third party, independent inspection agent makes a farm visit to verify paperwork, after which they report back to the certification agency, who reviews the report and makes a final determination of organic status. 

Certified organic by the Midwest Organic Services Association.

Paperwork and records are reviewed. Seed tags and bags and catalogs are saved for 5 years of accountability. Harvest data is checked to jive with what we are growing, to make sure folks aren't buying in and calling stuff organic that isn't. Seed to sale the inspector wants to be able to trace a product, for validity. What that looks like is our inspector, pulling out a sales receipt and having me trace that back to when and where it was harvested. There are various other paper trail details like this.

Arguments Against Organic

So, why do fellow farmer folks argue against organic? 

"The paperwork." Well, yes, there is paperwork, but in essence this is paperwork you want to do to be a good farmer, or business person, anyways. It's a little more work the first year of certification, then easy review and updating following that. 

"The Man." Yes, it is the government, and government regulations, which sometimes seem ass-backwards, but it's the way it is - deal with it. I file some paperwork, legally, federally filed paperwork that acts as a great insurance to our business and then I get to farm how I want. The government is not running my operation. I rotate crops on my schedule, plant the seeds that I want. Big Brother is never a presence on our farm.

There are other arguments, but these tend to be the main ones. I get frustrated by farms marketing as "Beyond Organic" which has no basis and confuses the organic name, confuses consumers we work so hard to educate and, frankly, is illegal. There are those that say we should not have to apply to not use chemicals, it's the conventional farmers that should apply to use chemicals (so much truth to that), but again...this is the way it is.

The hoops are worth jumping through for you, for our community, for education on real food. This isn't just about our farm, it's about our countries broken food system as well. It's as much a political statement as it is a small business decision.

Buy organic, support organic. For sustainable farms and food and future.

Sausage Making 101

Earlier this month we made our first sausage!! Our first on farm butcher experience gave us the opportunity to learn this new skill and make our own nitrate-free ground sausage and patties. (This "101" is not necessarily a tutorial on sausage making, but rather our 101 in making it!) In total we put close to 40 pounds of sausage in the freezer.

First, the meat needed to be ground with the right ratio of fat/lard.  Then we used a mixer to blend some of the ground pork with an Italian seasoning, some with a breakfast seasoning and we left some plain (seasonings are listed at the end). We were able to use herbs we dehydrated last summer, as well as some dehydrated onions. A huge thank you to Jason Moody for lending us the great equipment and showing us the ropes.

Ground pork, ready for seasoning.

Some pork was wrapped in full pound, and half pound, portions, the remainder was formed into patties. We used a regular canning ring to shape them. Another thank you goes out to Larry helping! It really was fun to share the experience with friends and family, plus it made relatively short work of the project. Thank you to the boys - John, Jason and Larry - for doing the work with the meat, I was happy to work on the packaging and labeling instead.  ;)

Sausage patties formed with a regular canning ring.

After forming the patties they were frozen on large baking sheets. They needed to be completely frozen before we packaged them in vacuum sealed bags. Patties were packaged in bags of 4 or 6.

Mmmm. So far we have enjoyed some delicious breakfast sausages, pasta with Italian sausage and zuppa tuscana (potato-sausage-kale) soup! It really is such a treat to put so much ground pork in the freezer, we always run out. I think a sausage quiche may be in order this weekend!

Italian Mix

per 2 lbs of meat
•2 tsp parsley
•2 tsp Italian seasoning
•1 T garlic
•1 tsp onion
•1/2 tsp fennel
•1-1/2 tsp black pepper
•1/2 tsp paprika
•1 tsp red pepper
•2 tsp salt

Breakfast Mix

per 5 lbs of meat
•2 T salt
•1-1/2 tsp sage
•1-1/2 tsp thyme
•1/2 tsp ginger
•3/4 tsp nutmeg
•1/2 tsp white pepper
•1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
•1/2 cup water

Love and Loss: Farming with Animals

This past weekend we said a teary goodbye to our matriarch sow, Vera. After complications during farrowing it was clear that she would not be able to be bred again, but we hoped for some recovery, so she could care for her last batch of piglets and live out her last days comfortably. Sadly, this was not the case and we did what we had to do. We gave her her few last treats, hugs and thanked her for her time with us. She was an amazing lady.

Vera at the orchard. 2015

She was one of our first breeding sows and had been with us for two years; we expected to have her for many more. While loss is part of having animals, this loss was felt a bit more deeply. John and Vera had a special bond, he could always read her so well and she really did like him best.

Vera and her brand new piglets. 2016

She raised her piglets to ten days old, giving everything she had to provide them with the best start they could have in this world. At about nine or ten days they can start digesting feed. Now they are drinking milk replacer and we are slowly introducing feed. Her memory lives on in these little nuggets.

Vera gave us memories, three litters of beautiful piglets and she added to our experience and taught us new skills. The best way we can honor her memory is by not letting her go to waste. So, we had our first on-farm butcher experience, as we processed her meat for our personal use. 

We move forward with this loss felt deeply, with more experience under our belts as farmers and humans and an ever-deepening respect for life.

9,100 lbs

In 2015 we produced over 9,100 pounds of food, for our members and community, from a half acre of cropland. 

We fed 50 families directly, through membership, plus those who made farmers' market part of their grocery shopping routine.

We are looking forward to a bountiful 2016!

2016 CSA Sign Up now open for returning members! Jan. 16 for wait list folks, Jan. 26 for all.
Questions? Emails us at alternativerootsfarm@yahoo.com

More Orchard, Less Lawn

As we have grown our orchard at the farm it feels like giving the lawn more purpose (and less mowing). This past week we added twenty-three heirloom apple trees to the farm orchard! Sixteen new varieties. (Getting a head-start on Arbor Day?!)

New apple trees, in the farm orchard with established
apple, crabapple and pear trees.

We started in 2011 with two apple trees on the farm - an existing Honeycrisp and a Honeygold. During 2012-2014 we planted some pears, plums, honeyberries and crabapples, as we continued to build the home orchard, while managing the Augustine orchard.

Last spring we planted out five of John's first apple grafts (Enigma, Mantet, MN 1628, Wealthy and Sweet 16) and three more plums (LaCrescent and Hanska).

Hazel and the new apple tree plantings.

This year we add the varieties Monarch, Baldwin, Carter's Blue, Golden Russet, Bottle Greening, Crimson Beauty, Calville Blanc d'Hiver, Wismer's Dessert, Red Seek-no-further, Green Pippen, Shiawassee, Spencer, Knobbed Russet, Ortley, Black Ben Davis and Hubbardston Nonesuch. Colors ranging from brown to dark purple-red, to green and yellow. Fresh eating and baking varieties. Ugly and beautiful orbs of splendid flavor.

This winter John grafted 100 more trees, which we will plant out shortly into their nursery beds, and then be planted out to their permanent locations in 2016. Grafts expand the stock of varieties we currently have, as well as add to our list with Stark, Porter, Smokehouse, Christmas Pearmain, and Hooples Antique Gold.

Plan to expand your apple palate folks, we have a lot of good fruit coming down the pipeline!

Thoughts on Eating in Season

Eating in season is more of a challenge here in the North, with such extreme temperatures, but it's not impossible. It may be a challenge to give certain items up, waiting until such time that they are gracing farmers' market tables and filling CSA boxes. Learning the many and varied skills of food preservation can help you build your pantry and fill your freezer, for better winter or year-round eating.

This past week we indulged in local and regional foods heartily. Fish from John's trip to Lake of the Woods. Vegetables, canned or frozen, from our farm, including broccoli, tomatoes, onions, garlic, winter squash, potatoes, carrots, parsnips. Apples from home and our friends at Hoch Orchards. Summery pesto graced our pasta and grape jam our toast. Of course home grown pork and eggs provided protein, as well as local beef. For beverage, both hard and sweet cider pleased our palates, along with homemade apple cider vinegar.

"Waiting for foods to come into season means tasting them when they're good, but waiting is also part of most value equations. Treating foods this way can help move "eating" in the consumer's mind from the Routine Maintenance Department over to the Division of Recreation. It's hard to reduce our modern complex of food choices to unifying principles, but this is one that generally works: eating home-cooked meals from whole, in-season ingredients obtained from the most local source available is eating well, in every sense. Good for the habitat, good for the body."

I love the thought of the "recreation" of local, in season foods. It brings to mind, for me, foraging wild mushrooms and asparagus, as well as the joy of opening a CSA box to see what the week's bounty brings, and customers at farmers' market waiting for the first tomatoes - the thrill is visible.

There are certain items in our household that we never buy out of season - strawberries and asparagus come to mind first. However, when winter peak citrus season rolls around we stock oranges and kiwi to keep our family in fruit, as our apples in the pantry and fridge continue to decline in quality and quantity.

I refuse to feel guilty about eating these items not raised local, as it's done with thought and intent - with a consciousness that is key in the move towards seasonal eating. Keeping our family healthy is of great importance, providing natural snacks at hand to promote healthy choices. Choices and habits only get better with each passing season, as conscious eating is a growth process with a learning curve. We are going against the grain, society does not teach seasonal eating, even if this knowledge was practiced with our ancestors. We must relearn old practices and create our own rules.

"It had felt arbitrary when we sat around the table with our shopping list, making our own rules. It felt almost silly to us, in fact, as it may now seem to you. Why impose restrictions on ourselves? Who Cares?

The fact is, though, millions of families have food pledges hanging over their kitchens - subtle rules about going to extra trouble, cutting the pasta by hand, rolling the sushi, making with care instead of buying on the cheap. Though they also may be busy with jobs and modern life, people the world over still take time to follow foodways that bring their families happiness and health. My family happens to live in a country where the min foodway has a yellow line painted down the middle. If we needed rules we'd have to make our own, going on faith that it might bring us something worthwhile.

On Saturday morning at the market as we ducked into the wind and started back towards our car, I clutched my bags with a heady sense of accomplishment. We'd found a lot more than we'd hoped for. We chatted a little more with our farmer friends who were closing up shop behind us, ready to head home too. Back to warm kitchens, keeping our fingers crossed in dogwood winter for the fruits of the coming year."  -from Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, Barbara Kingsolver

Strive to be conscious about your food choices, eating as much locally, organically and in season as you can. Do this especially when it is easy, when items are fresh for the offering from your local farmers and farmers' markets, co-ops and CSA program. Strive to try new items and recipes each season and build up your preservation tools. Feel great about your choices and avoid making yourself feel guilty about a bunch of kale going bad, that you still don't bake your own bread, or you forgot to go to market this week. Eating with intention and a consciousness about where your food comes from and how it was grown will naturally lead you towards more seasonal eating.

-Brooke

2015 Farm Shares available

On Raising Our Own Meat

The arrival of pigs on the farm again completes the full cycle of our first experience raising our own meat. As I see it, the cycle didn't end with the trip to the butcher shop, or the first pork chop dinner, but with the return of live pigs, full knowing what lies at the end of their long and joyful road. Last February we had welcomed our first herd to the farm, they were intertwined with our daily lives until harvest at the end of October. There is no question, John and I both agree that it was one of the most amazing and meaningful experiences in our lives.

Our 2013 herd, 7-mo. old feeder piglets. Daisy, Lauren, Jaymey,
Yoda and Oliver were raised with much love, open air and freedom (and many, many apples).

Before the end of the season we knew we wanted pigs again this year--the farm will no longer feel complete without animals, pigs in particular. There were difficult times, especially at the end. Tears were shed, more than once. No regrets were had, ever. And the meat? Amazing. The first pork chop dinner John made with our homegrown, pastured meat was delicious--we high-fived each other three times during that meal.

Pigs are affectionate, social, lovable creatures.

While raising our own meat was the main intention for this venture there were other benefits as well. We wanted to grow our own meat, because we would know exactly how it was raised--humanely, in the fresh air, no hormones and the freedom to live as the animals that they are. It is just wrong to raise animals in confinement barns, better called concentration camps, it's unnatural, unhealthy for the animals and people who consume them, and bad for the environment.

Pigs on green grass, the way it's supposed to be.

The pigs provided another benefit by closing the loop on the farm. By this I refer to a cycle of nutrients and a reduction in waste. Extra, bad and damaged produce, thinnings and trimmings went to the hogs, whom received them happily. Their bedding, which contains some manure, is applied to the field at the end of the season--adding organic matter and nutrients back to the soil. Last year they were put out on the barley field, after harvest, to clean up grain and spread their manure.

Those lucky hogs also had tickets to an unlimited apple buffet. The other main reason we decided to try pigs (aside from meat production) was for pest management at the apple orchard. Cleaning up the fallen apples at the orchard disrupts the pest cycle--extremely important in organic production. The pigs spent two weeks at the orchard in 2013 assisting in pest management. A couple trailer loads of apples were also brought back to the farm for them. Now, not only are we removing the downed apples, but we are able to make good use of them too. And the pigs were happy to help.

The piggies helped me with a Schell's photo contest.

The pigs brought therapeutic benefit--providing stress relief, affection and connection. Even in the middle of the hardest work, or the beating heat of summer a visit with the pigs would lift spirits and invite laughter. Every day we could watch them on pasture, which was a clear picture of the difference we are making in our little corner of the world. The pigs loved belly rubs and it was not uncommon to go in their pasture only to have two or three of them flop down around you for their turn. As soon as we went out to work in the morning we would wait to hear those first oinks of the day, and they always brought a smile.

The pigs grown and ready for harvest.

Having the pigs on the farm became the best way to get Emily, our teenager, involved. Although she wanted nothing to do with vegetables and weeds, bringing animals to the farm created a connection with her. This is a sure way that she will be outside each and every day, nurturing the pigs, and now chickens as well. That alone is worth so much. She now regularly takes her favored chicken, Bonita, for "walks" and has introduced her to the new piggies.

Vera and Lilly settling into their new digs.

Enter Vera and Lilly. We are already madly in love with these ladies. They have wonderful dispositions, they are playful and affectionate. The girls are sisters, two years old and a mix of 75% Ossabaw Island and 25% North American Guinea Hog, both smaller, heritage breeds. They were bred to Professor Beefcake in February and should farrow (give birth) this June. What exciting times we have ahead of us!

Lilly and Vera saying hello to the camera.

As we tend to and grow our herd we strive to give them the absolute best possible lives they could have, and we take pride in doing so. It is challenging work tending animals--they are live, active beings that are much different that kale and tomato plants (and tomatoes just aren't as playful). The experience of raising our own meat has been, and continues to be highly rewarding and invigorating. Being able to care for these precious animals is a gift. Putting nutritious and healthy meat in the freezer is a blessing for our family. Educating our community by sharing our story is invaluable. 

For videos of the pigs, and other farm happenings, head over to our new YouTube channel.

Don't forget to follow us on facebook, there are sure to be regular piggie pictures.