Our Values and Practices

One of Rob’s primary motivations for farming revolve around a love for the work, a love for the land, and a desire to produce healthy food that he can feel confident in providing for his family. There is something spiritual, a communion with God, a connection to the land and its plants and animals that Rob finds incredibly rewarding and meaningful. His values shape so much of how he farms and the decisions they make when farming. 

We value producing healthy, nutrient dense food for our family. Because of our own family’s health problems, we grow food in as healthy a way as possible. We do not want to feed sick animals that require sub-therapeutic doses of antibiotics to make them grow, or to keep them alive, to our family. We want healthy animals that eat healthy, natural foods to be our source of food. 

We value farming in a way the regenerates the soil, while making the farm more resilient. We rotate our animals on pasture, depending on the type of animals and the size of the paddocks. Our chickens move every day and often twice a day when the get bigger. Our pigs have much larger paddocks and often are moved every month to three months. We move our cows to fresh pasture as frequently as twice a day and sometimes every week. Moving the animals around gives the land a chance to rest, the pastures time to regrow, and distributes the manure of the animals so it does not become toxic. We include cover crops for pollinators in our pastures in addition to our forage crops to help nature and to improve soil.

We value the welfare of our animals, believing the healthy animals create healthy food. However, we also believe that if we are to eat animals, we should give them the ability to live as healthy, happy lives as they can. For this reason, we raise our pigs in the woods and on pasture in large paddocks. This allows them to eat grass, root in the soil for grubs and bugs, to scratch their backs on trees and limbs, and to express their innate desires. We form friendly relationships with many of our animals, and we even name some of them. 

We value local food systems. We believe that local food systems are capable of producing better food and instill trust in their consumers. We offer our customers the opportunity to visit the farm, see our farming practices, and see how happy our animals are.