Happy New Year!
As the New Year rolls in, We would again like to thank all of our friends, family, and customers for another successful year here on the farm. We cannot express our gratitude enough to all of you! YOU make this farm successful! YOU are the heart of our operation! YOU are the reason we do what we do! We honestly could not do it without all of your support, hard work, and your help here on the farm. From our hearts to yours: Thank you, and may the new year bring blessings to all of you!
This fall/winter, we are enjoying the slow pace of things. We have some downtime now that there are no cows, broilers, or pigs to care for. I am enjoying the fact that nothing has tried to attack me in the last few months, although it does provide much more exciting blog postings! Having more downtime does not mean that we are idle though!
We are using this time to prepare for the upcoming farming season. We plan to have two new cows, 10 pigs, our normal batches of broilers, turkeys, and to find a pasture buddy for Jasper. Lots of prep work and planning to be done! I am sure this will provide a host of exciting blog material to keep you entertained for the entire year! Especially the turkeys – they are absolutely going to try and eat me.
Jasper’s winter coat is coming in and he is enjoying his daily apple treats. He does miss the extra chicken feed treats he was able to nab when they were in his pasture! He is particular about which animals he shares his pasture with so we may try to add some sheep this year as pasture buddies. Hopefully he will accept them and enjoy their company.
The egg layers are doing great this winter! Earlier in the year we introduced two Brahma hens and one Brahma rooster to our flock. Brahma’s are a more winter hardy bird and prefer to lay eggs over the cooler months. We also hatched chicks from our flock this year, giving us some pure Brahma chicks and Brahma/Australorp mixed chicks. This has worked out well for us! Our Australorp hens started to slow down in the fall and were producing less and less eggs. The Brahma’s and Brahma mixes kicked in here recently and our egg tray is full again!
We would also like to introduce you to a new addition to the farm, as well as to new friends! There are now Ducks on the farm! These ducks do not belong to us however, but to two new friends we were blessed to meet this year, Darien and Trevor! Darien had reached out to the homesteading community on facebook, earlier this fall, looking for land to raise her young flock of 8 Cayuga ducks. As I read her post, I thought about how we have plenty of space here on the farm to accommodate them. I also thought about how many times I myself had reached out to that same community for help. If there is one thing I have learned about farming, it is that you are not alone. You do not work alone. You do not plan alone. You do not struggle alone and you certainly do not succeed alone. Farming is a community. That community is built on friends, family, customers, and complete strangers willing to go above and beyond to help others in their time of need. Farmers help others and our success depends on one another. We are so blessed to be a part of that community and were happy to reach out to Darien and Trevor and offer what help that we could!
Darien and Trevor worked hard to set up an enclosure in our woods for the ducks. They built duck houses, fencing, and set up lighting for them. Keeping everything mobile so that they can rotate them in the woods as they wear down an area, always providing them with a fresh paddock and allowing the land to heal once they move.
Their passion, goals for farming, and caring for their animals align perfectly with our values. They are just getting started in their journey and hope to raise their flock to breeding age. They hope to be able to hatch and sell ducklings in the future as well as providing meat birds and eggs as a business.
Darien and Trevor also raise Quail, although not here on the farm, and hope to get into the egg business as well as selling meat birds and providing quail for hunting lodges. They have provided us with plenty of Quail eggs and Tank especially loves them as a treat!
They are always happy to help out around the farm. They have helped me chase escaped chickens, giving Jasper yummy treats, and Trevor is helping CJ to clear fence lines, which we learned this summer is hard work! They bring their adorable furbaby Vandal over and Tank is ecstatic to have a buddy to run and play with! We are looking forward to learning from them and helping them get started! Please join us in welcoming them to the farm and supporting them on their farming journey!