Our Farm  | Our Story
We started our business in Spring of 2008 selling fresh herbs at the Mount Horeb Farmers' Market. Our customers were very interested in fresh vegetables so we began to offer produce from our own garden. The inspiration to grow into a CSA came from many sources. Our primary inspiration was our Italian heritage. We returned to Italy to a small Tuscan village to visit our family. There, life centered on the importance of family, friendship, and eating food produced locally and naturally. The flavors of locally produced dairy, meats and fresh produce differed dramatically from the commercial products that are commonly shipped hundreds of miles. Returning from Italy, we continued to sell at the farmers' market. The labor of growing additional vegetables was difficult yet rewarding and provided stress relief from our full time jobs. Our relationship with many return customers and the relaxing atmosphere of a warm summer's day at the market got us hooked on returning to a more simple and meaningful way of living. We purchased twenty-one acres outside of Mount Horeb at the end of 2008 and have been nurturing the land, slowly diversifying to create a sustainable and natural farm through community supported agriculture. Our crops feed our family, our CSA members and our animals. Our animals, in turn, provide fertilizer for our land which nourish our crops.
|  | Produce
Our CSA fields rest on a gentle slope bordered by woods on three sides and our vineyard to the South. The fields were tilled from a former horse pasture and are rich in organic matter. Each Spring we hand seed heirloom and organic seed and cultivate the soil, removing encroaching weeds with hand tools. Our vegetable varieties are more delicate than commercial types but are much more flavorful and well suited for local sustainable agriculture. We follow natural and organic practices and therefore do not use commercial pesticides, fertilizers or herbicides. We rely on the natural progression of the seasons and do not use black plastic or other synthetic means to control our natural environment. At the end of the season, the fields are cleared and fertilized by our Jersey cows who contribute natural fertilizer to the soil. Our fields are also blanketed by composted sheep manure and bedding enriching the soil for next seasons crops.
|  | Vineyard
In Spring 2010 we planted a vineyard of over 250 cold hardy grape vines consisting of Foch, Frontenac, St. Pepin and La Crescent grapes. The Foch and Frontenac varietals will produce a medium bodied, crisp, dry blended red wine while the St. Pepin and La Crescent will produce a dry yet fruity white. The grapes will be raised through natural methods without the use of synthetic fertilizers or pesticides. Our Southdown Babydoll sheep roam the vineyard in Spring through Fall munching on fresh green grass and suppressing the growth of weeds. The sheep fertilize the vineyard promoting growth of the vines. We expect our first harvest of grapes in 2014. We have been making wine for our family and friends since 2005 and hope to open a commercial winery to serve our CSA members by the time of our first grape harvest.
|  | Orchard
Our orchard was started in 2010 and includes pear, apple, plum, cherry and peach many which are heirloom varieties. Our apple varieties include Cox's Orange, Burgundy, Joyce, St. Lawrence, Britemac, Dudley, Calville Blanc, Honeycrisp and Frostbite. Pear varieties include Luscious, Southworth, Nova, Bosc and Hudar. Plum varieties include Mount Royal, Underwood and Hildreth. Our two cherry trees include Montmorency and Meteor. We hope our cold climate will support our Reliance variety peach. Our sheep help to nurture our orchard by trimming the grass and fertilizing the soil under the canopy. Bright Summer sunshine, Spring rain and time should allow our orchard to bear fruit by 2015.
|  | Lambs
In 2009 we purchased two Dorset ewes from our neighbor and named the sheep Molly and Poppy. Molly and Poppy quickly became accustomed to our green pastures and gave birth to Snowball, Sparky and Spoty the following year. The new ewes and their mothers became our breeding stock for the CSA. We offer lamb shares every year to our CSA members typically in late fall to early winter. The lambs are pasture raised and grass-fed with supplemental organic grain given as needed to maintain nutrition. The sheep and lambs are rotationally grazed through fresh grass to maintain healthy pastures. Since our lambs receive much less grain than commercially produced lamb they tend to be smaller and take longer to reach market weight. However, the leaner cuts are more flavorful than lamb not raised on pasture. The sheep allow us to rely less on fossil fuels in mowing the pastures and instead rely more on natural grazing and fertilization.
|  | Southdown Babydoll Sheep
The Old English Southdown Babydoll sheep are considered the guardians of the vineyard. Their role on our farm is to graze the vineyard throughout the year and add organic matter to the soil. They are an old breed, as the name implies, raised in England in the late 1700's. It is believed that the breed was brought to the US in 1803. They are a docile and friendly breed reaching only 24 inches in height with round smiling faces. Their limited stature and docile nature make them perfect as an organic solution to mowing, weed control and fertilization in vineyards and orchards. We started our flock with two ewe lambs in Spring 2010 from central Wisconsin and named them Chocolate and Panda. The following Spring, we drove to South Dakota to purchase a ram and another ewe lamb from one of the best breeders in the country - Jody Fuller. We named the ram Jacque and his partner Julia. Jacque is genetically RR and thus resistant to scrapie and will no doubt produce wonderful offspring. We will continue to breed the Babydolls to flourish in the vineyard and orchard and eventually raise some for sale.
|  | Black Mulefoot Hogs
Black Mulefoot hogs are one of the rarest breeds of pigs in the country. They are unique to the United States and have solid hooves unlike other swine varieties. We purchased our breeding stock from Shady Blue Acres just outside of Richland Center Wisconsin in Spring of 2011. Bruno our boar and Bella our sow were bought as piglets and grew to be wonderful docile, although constantly hungry, pigs during their first few months on the farm. They were kept in the barn with access to an outdoor pen during their first season. Through curiosity and rooting they transformed the old hay and straw bedding into rich dark compost by August. They will roam in over an acre of woods by Spring 2012 where they will be free to root and enjoy the goodies in the earth under a protective canopy of trees. In addition to eating what they find in the forest, they are fed organic grain and left over produce and fruit from the CSA. The rich compost they produce will be spread on the CSA fields each season to add organic matter to the soil. We will offer pork shares starting Fall 2012 if all goes well with breeding. The Black Mulefoot hog is know to produce some of the tastiest pork there is.
|  | Cows
We purchased our cow Biscuit from a local farm in Spring 2011. At that time, she was 4 years old and was joined by her feisty calf Arthur. Biscuit is 75% Jersey and 25% Guernsey. She produces some of the best tasting and creamy milk we have ever had. Jersey cows, originally bred on the Channel island of Jersey between France and England, are known for their docile nature and rich milk. They are a smaller breed that produce less milk than their commercial counterparts. The high quality of milk compensates for the smaller volume of production. Jersey bulls are notoriously aggressive, likely trying to make up for their much smaller stature. Biscuit and Arthur are grass fed and rotationally grazed from Spring through Fall. Biscuit is milked once a day and typically produces 2-3 gallons of creamy light yellow milk full of nutrients while on green pasture. We use our milk to feed our Black Mulefoot hogs and chickens as well as make cheese, butter, whipped cream and other goodies. The cattle contribute compost and fertilizer to our CSA fields and are one of the most important sustainable links on our farm transforming grass into nutrition for all.
|  | Chickens
Our egg layers are a combination of Heritage Rhode Island Reds and Barnevelders. The Barnevelders are beautiful brown birds with shades of iridescent green but they are truly chicken. Their skittish nature makes them run away at every noise and they refuse to climb up the gentle sloping ladder of their coop to the outdoor pen. They rarely venture far from the barn even in bright summer sunshine when green grass awaits them in the distance. The Rhode Island Reds, on the other hand, free range during the day venturing far to find tasty bugs and greener pastures and are willing to brave the incline of the ladder to catch an early morning sunrise. Both varieties produce beautiful brown eggs with orange yolks while on summer grass. They also contribute to the ecosystem of the farm by munching on bugs and fertilizing the pastures. We also raise a meat breed called Freedom Rangers every Spring. The birds are allowed to roam freely on pasture during the day and are fed organic grain. They produce plump, flavorful birds when they are harvested in mid Summer.
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