An Ounce Of Prevention

Good Morning and hello from your farmer,

An ounce of prevention is worth more than a pound of cure! Boy, how many times did I hear that growing up....

Perhaps the use of the phrase came from my parents interest in Prevention magazine - that was founded in 1950 by J. I. Rodale and was based on his interest in exploring the connection between human health and organic agriculture.

No matter the source, the principle is very true. Whatever amount you may spend to prevent an accident, illness, or even death - the cure (if there is one) would cost many times more.

This principle drives a lot of what we do here on the farm. Some examples:
1) Our Soil - buying diverse seeds and a no-till planter is expensive, but fails in comparison to the destruction tillage & chemicals have on soil life as well as unintended consequence of creating dead zones in the Gulf of Mexico. And, remember our customers who buy our products to feed their families

2) Our Cows - winter is the most expensive period to feed cows because of hay. Many farmers expect their cows to loose weight because they skimp on buying quality hay as well as providing quality minerals to meet the cows needs. That is NOT my approach. We source quality hay and take extra steps to keep the hay as nutritious as possible. We purposefully spread the bale across the pasture so each cow has a spot at the table to eat vs. a hay ring where they fight for a position.

While buying quality hay, minerals, etc. certainly is expensive it is critical to keeping our cows healthy and productive. The price to keep them healthy fails in comparison to expensive vet bills, aborted calves, and death.

3) Our Chickens - by now I'm sure you are getting the picture! I wanted to include the chickens because of our commitment to NON-GMO feed. There is no doubt our feed cost more than conventional feed. Back when we first started raising broilers a conventional grower told me what he paid Sanderson for his feed - about 1/3 the price of my NON-GMO feed. Very significant.

However, when you consider what happens when the animal eats conventionally grown feed using Glyphosate and that the chemical is absorbed into the meat which is then consumed by humans the price of our NON-GMO feed fails in comparison to the cost of human health issues caused by Glyphosate.

Joel Salatin once told a customer (who was commenting how expensive his product was compared to grocery store prices) "have you priced the cost of cancer lately"?

Preventing accidents on the farm is very important to me. We don't want any person or animal to get hurt - especially from negligence. With our new help on the farm I get to instruct them how we do things on our farm. The objective is to teach them the right way as well as how NOT to do things. Most of the time to prevent accidents may take a few extra minutes or more effort (like closing the gate each time vs. leaving open for cows to walk through), but is well worth the effort.

Ms. Martha and I were discussing this "prevention" topic at pickup last Saturday. In wisdom gained through much experience she said, "prevention also applies to people." Amen.

***Request from Beth*** we are trying to keep the cost down on lard, but the price and availability of pint jars keeps going up. If you have pint jars you don't use we would like to buy them back from you. Thanks!

Are you a "regular" customer of our farm?

If not, and you are looking for premium ALL NATURAL GOODNESS of beef, pork, chicken, and eggs raised on pasture as God intended - without growth hormones and antibiotics - and raised humanely then you have come to the right farm. Our delivery schedule and product availability is listed below along with several "Order" buttons that will take you to our website where you can browse over 90 product choices and place your order from the convenience of your home. It's that simple!

Beth & I really appreciate your business and thank you for rewarding our hard work with your trust and support. We look forward to seeing you soon.