Sustainable Farming

Why are there so many buzz words related to farming these days.  When I was growing up the farmer was the slack jawed, overall wearing, grass chewing good ole boy that no one wanted to date.  Today, the farmer has stepped into the spot light.  We are no more reliant on the farmer for our food now than before, so it must be due to new customer savvy. 

Everyone wants to purchase organic this and organic that and only the USDA gets to decide what is organic.  What does the USDA have to do with whether a product is good for you, our economy and our world.  In order for a farmer to be competitive they have to be able to label their product ‘organic’.  I say “Po-ooh on that”.  I don’t want some bureaucrat snooping around my farm.   There are other options, however you won’t find the word ‘organic’ on the label.  Our Ranch is a member of Certified Naturally Grown - a farmer inspected organization.  We are acctually inspected by other farmers who know how to farm and what challenges we face.  In actuality, some of the requirements for Certified Naturally Grown are more stringent than to be Certified Organic.  Link here for more info on Certified Natually Grown.

We work hard to protect our land and ensure that we don’t destroy what we hope to pass on to our children.  We do this by allowing and creating natural wooded areas, undisturbed sage lands, keeping our stock out of the creek areas, and intensive rotational grazing.  This way the wild life with continue to utilize the land, our trees will continue providing shade and wind break, and our pastures remain lush and green.

Our life style reflects our commitment.  We live in a small cottage completely ‘off the grid’.  We are currently hauling all our water so we are quite frugal with the precious liquid.  All of our energy comes from a solar panel mounted on the roof.  We do supplement with a gas powered generator in pinch, but thankfully that is rare and far between.  Our major appliances are LP (liquid propane) and our heat is from a wood stove.  We have many more plans for utilizing as efficiently and effectively as possible those resources around us, such as more solar panels, wind generators and grey water usage.

We are starting small and attempting to plan things out step by step.  This may not be the most effective business model, but it is who we are and so it fits us.