We spotted an owl in our windbreak the other day.
We have seen this bird of prey for several days, along with an increasing amount of bald eagles. There are a couple of thoughts to this. One, our certified organic farm that is geared to increase biodiversity is achieving that goal and two, the presence of [...]

Filed under: Animals, Uncategorized on March 7th, 2013 | No Comments »

The National Organic Program (NOP) has released new rules for livestock that mandate access to pasture for ruminant animals. These rules require that a percentage of the necessary dry matter intake per day come from pasture.  The minimum is 30% dry matter per head per day for at least 120 days over the grazing season. [...]

Filed under: Animals, Grazing/Pasture, Healthy Food, Organic Dairy, Organic News, sheep on March 4th, 2011 | No Comments »

If you live in Iowa, you know it’s been raining a while. It seems like the faucet turned on in June, and basically hasn’t stopped very much since. I believe east of here (east of Kalona – like Des Moines) has been getting more, but we’ve been still pretty wet. For the conventional farmers it’s [...]

Filed under: Animals, Grazing/Pasture on August 23rd, 2010 | No Comments »

So far, so good. I’m coming up on my one year anniversary on this project. I got the sheep in August of 2009 as ewe lambs  from a cutting-edge breeder down in southern Missouri. One note of importance is the critical issue for any 100% grassfed program is to MAKE SURE your genetics are right. [...]

Filed under: Animals, Grazing/Pasture, Uncategorized, sheep on July 20th, 2010 | 8 Comments »

Well, we’re in full swing with grazing dairy replacement heifers from a local Mennonite dairyman. So far we’ve managed to graze approximately 13 acres with 30 cows. That might seem like a small amount for so many cows, but what I’m employing is a technique called “mob grazing”  – it’s essentially a replica of the [...]

Filed under: Animals, Grazing/Pasture, Organic Dairy on July 5th, 2010 | No Comments »

I switched out our Icelandic sheep herd last fall, in a radical attempt to reset my entire genetics with a low labor/low cost breed that would be parasite resistant in the summer and that would be hardy enough to dig through the snow in the winter and eat stockpiled grass. And, if that wasn’t enough, [...]

Filed under: Animals, Grazing/Pasture on February 22nd, 2010 | No Comments »